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Title: The Tower of the Elephant Author: Robert E. Howard * A ProjectGutenberg of Australia eBook * eBook No.: Language: English Date firstposted: September 2006 Date most recently updated: September 2006 This eBookwas produced by: Richard Scott Project Gutenberg of Australia eBooks arecreated from printed editions which are in the public domain in Australia,unless a copyright notice is included. We do NOT keep any eBooks in compliancewith a particular paper edition. Copyright laws are changing all over theworld. Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before downloadingor redistributing this file. This eBook is made available at no cost and withalmost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use itunder the terms of the Project Gutenberg of Australia License which may beviewed online at http://gutenberg.net.au/licence.html To contact ProjectGutenberg of Australia go to http://gutenberg.net.au

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The Tower of the Elephant

by

Robert E. Howard

Torches flared murkily on the revels in the Maul, where the thieves of the east held carnival by night. Inthe Maul they could carouse and roar as they liked, for honest people shunned the quarter, andwatchmen, well paid with stained coins, did not interfere with their sport. Along the crooked, unpavedstreets with their heaps of refuse and sloppy puddles, drunken roisterers staggered, roaring. Steel glintedin the shadows where wolf preyed on wolf, and from the darkness rose the shrill laughter of women, andthe sounds of scufflings and stragglings. Torchlight licked luridly from broken windows and wide-throwndoors, and out of these doors, stale smells of wine and rank sweaty bodies, clamor of drinking-jacks andfists hammered on rough tables, snatches of obscene songs, rushed like a blow in the face.

In one of these dens merriment thundered to the low smoke-stained roof, where rascals gathered inevery stage of rags and tatters--furtive cut-purses, leering kidnappers, quick-fingered thieves, swaggeringbravoes with their wenches, strident-voiced women clad in tawdry finery. Native rogues were thedominant element--dark-skinned, dark-eyed Zamorians, with daggers at their girdles and guile in theirhearts. But there were wolves of half a dozen outland nations there as well. There was a giantHyperborean renegade, taciturn, dangerous, with a broadsword strapped to his great gaunt frame--formen wore steel openly in the Maul. There was a Shemitish counterfeiter, with his hook nose and curledblue-black beard. There was a bold-eyed Brythunian wench, sitting on the knee of a tawny-hairedGunderman--a wandering mercenary soldier, a deserter from some defeated army. And the fat grossrogue whose bawdy jests were causing all the shouts of mirth was a professional kidnapper come upfrom distant Koth to teach woman-stealing to Zamorians who were born with more knowledge of the anthan he could ever attain.

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This man halted in his description of an intended victim's charms, and thrust his muzzle into a hugetankard of frothing ale. Then blowing the foam from his fat lips, he said, 'By Bel, god of all thieves, I'llshow them how to steal wenches: I'll have her over the Zamorian border before dawn, and there'll be acaravan waiting to receive her. Three hundred pieces of silver, a count of Ophir promised me for a sleekyoung Brythunian of the better class. It took me weeks, wandering among the border cities as a beggar,to find one I knew would suit. And is she a pretty baggage!'

He blew a slobbery kiss in the air.

'I know lords in Shem who would trade the secret of the Elephant Tower for her,' he said, returning tohis ale.

A touch on his tunic sleeve made him turn his head, scowling at the interruption. He saw a tall, stronglymade youth standing beside him. This person was as much out of place in that den as a gray wolf amongmangy rats of the gutters. His cheap tunic could not conceal the hard, rangy lines of his powerful frame,the broad heavy shoulders, the massive chest, lean waist and heavy arms. His skin was brown fromoutland suns, his eyes blue and smoldering; a shock of tousled black hair crowned his broad forehead.From his girdle hung a sword in a worn leather scabbard.

The Kothian involuntarily drew back; for the man was not one of any civilized race he knew.

'You spoke of the Elephant Tower,' said the stranger, speaking Zamorian with an alien accent. 'I'veheard much of this tower; what is its secret?'

The fellow's attitude did not seem threatening, and the Kothian's courage was bolstered up by the ale,and the evident approval of his audience. He swelled with self-importance.

'The secret of the Elephant Tower?' he exclaimed. 'Why, any fool knows that Yara the priest dwellsthere with the great jewel men call the Elephant's Heart, that is the secret of his magic.'

The barbarian digested this for a space.

'I have seen this tower,' he said. 'It is set in a great garden above the level of the city, surrounded by highwalls. I have seen no guards. The walls would be easy to climb. Why has not somebody stolen this secretgem?'

The Kothian stared wide-mouthed at the other's simplicity, then burst into a roar of derisive mirth, inwhich the others joined.

'Harken to this heathen!' he bellowed. 'He would steal the jewel of Yara!--Harken, fellow,' he said,turning portentously to the other, 'I suppose you are some sort of a northern barbarian--'

'I am a Cimmerian,' the outlander answered, in no friendly tone. The reply and the manner of it meantlittle to the Kothian; of a kingdom that lay far to the south, on the borders of Shem, he knew only vaguelyof the northern races.

'Then give ear and leam wisdom, fellow,' said he, pointing his drinking-jack at the discomfited youth.'Know that in Zamora, and more especially in this city, there are more bold thieves than anywhere else inthe world, even Koth. If mortal man could have stolen the gem, be sure it would have been filched longago. You speak of climbing the walls, but once having climbed, you would quickly wish yourself backagain. There are no guards in the gardens at night for a very good reason--that is, no human guards. But

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in the watch-chamber, in the lower part of the tower, are armed men, and even if you passed those whoroam the gardens by night, you must still pass through the soldiers, for the gem is kept somewhere in thetower above.'

'But if a man could pass through the gardens,' argued the Cimmerian, 'why could he not come at the gemthrough the upper part of the tower and thus avoid the soldiers?'

Again the Kothian gaped at him.

'Listen to him!' he shouted jeeringly. 'The barbarian is an eagle who would fly to the jeweled rim of thetower, which is only a hundred and fifty feet above the earth, with rounded sides slicker than polishedglass!'

The Cimmerian glared about, embarrassed at the roar of mocking laughter that greeted this remark. Hesaw no particular humor in it, and was too new to civilization to understand its discourtesies. Civilizedmen are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having theirskulls split, as a general thing. He was bewildered and chagrined, and doubtless would have slunk away,abashed, but the Kothian chose to goad him further.

'Come, come!' he shouted. 'Tell these poor fellows, who have only been thieves since before you werespawned, tell them how you would steal the gem!'

'There is always a way, if the desire be coupled with courage,' answered the Cimmerian shortly, nettled.

The Kothian chose to take this as a personal slur. His face grew purple with anger.

'What!' he roared. 'You dare tell us our business, and intimate that we are cowards? Get along; get outof my sight!' And he pushed the Cimmerian violently.

'Will you mock me and then lay hands on me?' grated the barbarian, his quick rage leaping up; and hereturned the push with an open-handed blow that knocked his tormentor back against the rude-hewntable. Ale splashed over the jack's lip, and the Kothian roared in fury, dragging at his sword.

'Heathen dog!' he bellowed. 'I'll have your heart for that!' Steel flashed and the throng surged wildlyback out of the way. In their flight they knocked over the single candle and the den was plunged indarkness, broken by the crash of upset benches, drum of flying feet, shouts, oaths of people tumblingover one another, and a single strident yell of agony that cut the din like a knife. When a candle wasrelighted, most of the guests had gone out by doors and broken windows, and the rest huddled behindstacks of wine-kegs and under tables. The barbarian was gone; the center of the room was desertedexcept for the gashed body of the Kothian. The Cimmerian, with the unerring instinct of the barbarian,had killed his man in the darkness and confusion.

The lurid lights and drunken revelry fell away behind the Cimmerian. He had discarded his torn tunic,and walked through the night naked except for a loin-cloth and his high-strapped sandals. He moved withthe supple ease of a great tiger, his steely muscles rippling under his brown skin.

He had entered the part of the city reserved for the temples. On all sides of him they glittered white in thestarlight--snowy marble pillars and golden domes and silver arches, shrines of Zamora's myriad strangegods. He did not trouble his head about them; he knew that Zamora's religion, like all things of a civilized,long-settled people, was intricate and complex, and had lost most of the pristine essence in a maze offormulas and rituals. He had squatted for hours in the courtyard of the philosophers, listening to the

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arguments of theologians and teachers, and come away in a haze of bewilderment, sure of only one thing,and that, that they were all touched in the head.

His gods were simple and understandable; Crom was their chief, and he lived on a great mountain,whence he sent forth dooms and death. It was useless to call on Crom, because he was a gloomy,savage god, and he hated weaklings. But he gave a man courage at birth, and the will and might to kill hisenemies, which, in the Cimmerian's mind, was all any god should be expected to do.

His sandalled feet made no sound on the gleaming pave. No watchmen passed, for even the thieves ofthe Maul shunned the temples, where strange dooms had been known to fall on violators. Ahead of himhe saw, looming against the sky, the Tower of the Elephant. He mused, wondering why it was so named.No one seemed to know. He had never seen an elephant, but he vaguely understood that it was amonstrous animal, with a tail in front as well as behind. This a wandering Shemite had told him, swearingthat he had seen such beasts by the thousands in the country of the Hyrkanians; but all men knew whatliars were the men of Shem. At any rate, there were no elephants in Zamora.

The shimmering shaft of the tower rose frostily in the stars. In the sunlight it shone so dazzlingly that fewcould bear its glare, and men said it was built of silver. It was round, a slim perfect cylinder, a hundredand fifty feet in height, and its rim glittered in the starlight with the great jewels which crusted it. The towerstood among the waving exotic trees of a garden raised high above the general level of the city. A highwall enclosed this garden, and outside the wall was a lower level, likewise enclosed by a wall. No lightsshone forth; there seemed to be no windows in the tower--at least not above the level of the inner wall.Only the gems high above sparkled frostily in the starlight.

Shrubbery grew thick outside the lower, or outer wall. The Cimmerian crept close and stood beside thebarrier, measuring it with his eyes. It was high, but he could leap and catch the coping with his fingers.Then it would be child's play to swing himself up and over, and he did not doubt that he could pass theinner wall in the same manner. But he hesitated at the thought of the strange perils which were said toawait within. These people were strange and mysterious to him; they were not of his kind--not even ofthe same blood as the more westerly Brythunians, Nemedians, Kothians and Aquilonians, whose civilizedmysteries had awed him in times past. The people of Zamora were very ancient, and, from what he hadseen of them, very evil.

He thought of Yara, the high priest, who worked strange dooms from this jeweled tower, and theCimmerian's hair prickled as he remembered a tale told by a drunken page of the court--how Yara hadlaughed in the face of a hostile prince, and held up a glowing, evil gem before him, and how rays shotblindingly from that unholy jewel, to envelop the prince, who screamed and fell down, and shrank to awithered blackened lump that changed to a black spider which scampered wildly about the chamber untilYara set his heel upon it.

Yara came not often from his tower of magic, and always to work evil on some man or some nation.The king of Zamora feared him more than he feared death, and kept himself drunk all the time becausethat fear was more than he could endure sober. Yara was very old--centuries old, men said, and addedthat he would live for ever because of the magic of his gem, which men called the Heart of the Elephant,for no better reason than they named his hold the Elephant's Tower.

The Cimmerian, engrossed in these thoughts, shrank quickly against the wall. Within the garden someonewas passing, who walked with a measured stride. The listener heard the clink of steel. So after all a guarddid pace those gardens. The Cimmerian waited, expected to hear him pass again, on the next round, butsilence rested over the mysterious gardens.

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At last curiosity overcame him. Leaping lightly he grasped the wall and swung himself up to the top withone arm. Lying flat on the broad coping, he looked down into the wide space between the walls. Noshrubbery grew near him, though he saw some carefully trimmed bushes near the inner wall. The starlightfell on the even sward and somewhere a fountain tinkled.

The Cimmerian cautiously lowered himself down on the inside and drew his sword, staring about him.He was shaken by the nervousness of the wild at standing thus unprotected in the naked starlight, and hemoved lightly around the curve of the wall, hugging its shadow, until he was even with the shrubbery hehad noticed. Then he ran quickly toward it, crouching low, and almost tripped over a form that laycrumpled near the edges of the bushes.

A quick look to right and left showed him no enemy in sight at least, and he bent close to investigate. Hiskeen eyes, even in the dim starlight, showed him a strongly built man in the silvered armor and crestedhelmet of the Zamorian royal guard. A shield and a spear lay near him, and it took but an instant'sexamination to show that he had been strangled. The barbarian glanced about uneasily. He knew that thisman must be the guard he had heard pass his hiding-place by the wall. Only a short time had passed, yetin that interval nameless hands had reached out of the dark and choked out the soldier's life.

Straining his eyes in the gloom, he saw a hint of motion through the shrubs near the wall. Thither heglided, gripping his sword. He made no more noise than a panther stealing through the night, yet the manhe was stalking heard. The Cimmerian had a dim glimpse of a huge bulk close to the wall felt relief that itwas at least human; then the fellow wheeled quickly with a gasp that sounded like panic, made the firstmotion of a forward plunge, hands clutching, then recoiled as the Cimmerian's blade caught the starlight.For a tense instant neither spoke, standing ready for anything.

'You are no soldier,' hissed the stranger at last. 'You are a thief like myself.'

'And who are you?' asked the Cimmerian in a suspicious whisper.

'Taurus of Nemedia.' The Cimmerian lowered his sword. 'I've heard of you. Men call you a prince ofthieves.' A low laugh answered him. Taurus was tall as the Cimmerian, and heavier; he was big-belliedand fat, but his every movement betokened a subtle dynamic magnetism, which was reflected in the keeneyes that glinted vitally, even in the starlight. He was barefooted and carried a coil of what looked like athin, strong rope, knotted at regular intervals. 'Who are you?' he whispered.

'Conan, a Cimmerian,' answered the other. 'I came seeking a way to steal Yara's jewel, that men call theElephant's Heart.'

Conan sensed the man's great belly shaking in laughter, but it was not derisive.

'By Bel, god of thieves!' hissed Taurus. 'I had thought only myself had courage to attempt that poaching.These Zamorians call themselves thieves--bah! Conan, I like your grit. I never shared an adventure withanyone, but by Bel, we'll attempt this together if you're willing.'

'Then you are after the gem, too?'

'What else? I've had my plans laid for months, but you, I think, have acted on a sudden impulse, myfriend.' 'You killed the soldier?'

'Of course. I slid over the wall when he was on the other side of the garden. I hid in the bushes; he heardme, or thought he heard something. When he came blundering over, it was no trick at all to get behind

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him and suddenly grip his neck and choke out his fool's life. He was like most men, half blind in the dark.A good thief should have eyes like a cat.'

'You made one mistake,' said Conan.

Taurus's eyes flashed angrily.

'I? I, a mistake? Impossible!'

'You should have dragged the body into the bushes.'

'Said the novice to the master of the art. They will not change the guard until past midnight. Should anycome searching for him now, and find his body, they would flee at once to Yara, bellowing the news, andgive us time to escape. Were they not to find it, they'd go on beating up the bushes and catch us like ratsin a trap.'

'You are right,' agreed Conan.

'So. Now attend. We waste time in this cursed discussion. There are no guards in the innergarden--human guards, I mean, though there are sentinels even more deadly. It was their presence whichbaffled me for so long, but I finally discovered a way to circumvent them.'

'What of the soldiers in the lower part of the tower?'

'Old Yara dwells in the chambers above. By that route we will come--and go, I hope. Never mindasking me how. I have arranged a way. We'll steal down through the top of the tower and strangle oldYara before he can cast any of his accursed spells on us. At least we'll try; it's the chance of being turnedinto a spider or a toad, against the wealth and power of the world. All good thieves must know how totake risks.'

'I'll go as far as any man,' said Conan, slipping off his sandals.

'Then follow me.' And turning, Taurus leaped up, caught the wall and drew himself up. The man'ssuppleness was amazing, considering his bulk; he seemed almost to glide up over the edge of the coping.Conan followed him, and lying flat on the broad top, they spoke in wary whispers.

'I see no light,' Conan muttered. The lower part of the tower seemed much like that portion visible fromoutside the garden--a perfect, gleaming cylinder, with no apparent openings.

'There are cleverly constructed doors and windows,' answered Taurus, 'but they are closed. Thesoldiers breathe air that comes from above.'

The garden was a vague pool of shadows, where feadiery bushes and low spreading trees waved darklyin the starlight. Conan's wary soul felt the aura of waiting menace that brooded over it. He felt the burningglare of unseen eyes, and he caught a subde scent that made the short hairs on his neck instinctivelybrisde as a hunting dog brisdes at the scent of an ancient enemy. 'Follow me,' whispered Taurus, 'keepbehind me, as you value your life.'

Taking what looked like a copper tube from his girdle, the Nemedian dropped lighdy to the sward insidethe wall. Conan was close behind him, sword ready, but Taurus pushed him back, close to the wall, andshowed no indication to advance, himself. His whole attitude was of tense expectancy, and his gaze, like

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Conan's, was fixed on the shadowy mass of shrubbery a few yards away. This shrubbery was shaken,although the breeze had thed down. Then two great eyes blazed from the waving shadows, and behindthem other sparks of fire glinted in the darkness.

'Lions!' muttered Conan.

'Aye. By day they are kept in subterranean caverns below the tower. That's why there are no guards inthis garden.' Conan counted the eyes rapidly.

'Five in sight; maybe more back in the bushes. They'll charge in a moment--'

'Be silent!' hissed Taurus, and he moved out from the wall, cautiously as if treading on razors, lifting theslender tube. Low rumblings rose from the shadows and the blazing eyes moved forward. Conan couldsense the great slavering jaws, the tufted tails lashing tawny sides. The air grew tense--the Cimmeriangripped his sword, expecting the charge and the irresistible hurtling of giant bodies. Then Taurus broughtthe mouth of the tube to his lips and blew powerfully. A long jet of yellowish powder shot from the otherend of the tube and billowed out instandy in a thick green-yellow cloud that settled over the shrubbery,blotting out the glaring eyes.

Taurus ran back hastily to the wall. Conan glared without understanding. The thick cloud hid theshrubbery, and from it no sound came.

'What is that mist?' the Cimmerian asked uneasily.

'Death!' hissed the Nemedian. 'If a wind springs up and blows it back upon us, we must flee over thewall. But no, the wind is still, and now it is dissipating. Wait until it vanishes entirely. To breathe it isdeath.'

Presently only yellowish shreds hung ghostily in the air; then they were gone, and Taurus motioned hiscompanion forward. They stole toward the bushes, and Conan gasped. Stretched out in the shadows layfive great tawny shapes, the fire of their grim eyes dimmed for ever. A sweetish cloying scent lingered inthe atmosphere.

'They died widiout a sound!' muttered the Cimmerian. 'Taurus, what was that powder?'

'It was made from the black lotus, whose blossoms wave in the lost jungles of Khitai, where only theyellow-skulled priests of Yun dwell. Those blossoms strike dead any who smell of them.'

Conan knelt beside the great forms, assuring himself that they were indeed beyond power of harm. Heshook his head; the magic of the exotic lands was mysterious and terrible to the barbarians of the north.

'Why can you not slay the soldiers in the tower in the same way?' he asked.

'Because that was all the powder I possessed. The obtaining of it was a feat which in itself was enoughto make me famous among the thieves of the world. I stole it out of a caravan bound for Stygia, and Ilifted it, in its cloth-of-gold bag, out of the coils of the great serpent which guarded it, without awakinghim. But come, in Bel's name! Are we to waste the night in discussion?'

They glided through the shrubbery to the gleaming foot of the tower, and there, with a motion enjoiningsilence, Taurus unwound his knotted cord, on one end of which was a strong steel hook. Conan saw hisplan, and asked no questions as the Nemedian gripped the line a short distance below the hook, and

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began to swing it about his head. Conan laid his ear to the smooth wall and listened, but could hearnothing. Evidendy the soldiers within did not suspect the presence of intruders, who had made no moresound than the night wind blowing through the trees. But a strange nervousness was on the barbarian;perhaps it was the lion-smell which was over everything.

Taurus threw the line with a smooth, ripping motion of his mighty arm. The hook curved upward andinward in a peculiar manner, hard to describe, and vanished over the jeweled rim. It apparently caughtfirmly, for cautious jerking and then hard pulling did not result in any slipping or giving.

'Luck the first cast,' murmured Taurus. 'I--'

It was Conan's savage instinct which made him wheel suddenly; for the death that was upon them madeno sound. A fleeting glimpse showed the Cimmerian the giant tawny shape, rearing upright against thestars, towering over him for the death-stroke. No civilized man could have moved half so quickly as thebarbarian moved. His sword flashed frostily in the starlight with every ounce of desperate nerve and thewbehind it, and man and beast went down together.

Cursing incoherently beneath his breath, Taurus bent above the mass, and saw his companion's limbsmove as he strove to drag himself from under the great weight that lay limply upon him. A glance showedthe startled Nemedian that the lion was dead, its slanting skull split in half. He laid hold of the carcass,and by his aid, Conan thrust it aside and clambered up, still gripping his dripping sword.

'Are you hurt, man?' gasped Taurus, still bewildered by the stunning swiftness of that touch-and-goepisode.

'No, by Crom!' answered the barbarian. 'But that was as close a call as I've had in a life noways tame.Why did not the cursed beast roar as he charged?'

'All things are strange in this garden,' said Taurus. 'The lions strike silently--and so do other deaths. Butcome--little sound was made in that slaying, but the soldiers might have heard, if they are not asleep ordrunk. That beast was in some other part of the garden and escaped the death of the flowers, but surelythere are no more. We must climb this cord--little need to ask a Cimmerian if he can.'

'If it will bear my weight,' grunted Conan, cleansing his sword on the grass.

'It will bear thrice my own,' answered Taurus. 'It was woven from the tresses of dead women, which Itook from their tombs at midnight, and steeped in the deadly wine of the upas tree, to give it strength. Iwill go first--then follow me closely.'

The Nemedian gripped the rope and, crooking a knee about it, began the ascent; he went up like a cat,belying the apparent clumsiness of his bulk. The Cimmerian followed. The cord swayed and turned onitself, but the climbers were not hindered; both had made more difficult climbs before. The jeweled rimglittered high above them, jutting out from the perpendicular--a fact which added greatly to the ease ofthe ascent.

Up and up they went, silently, the lights of the city spreading out further and further to their sight as theyclimbed, the stars above them more and more dimmed by the glitter of the jewels along the rim. NowTaurus reached up a hand and gripped the rim itself, pulling himself up and over. Conan paused amoment on the very edge, fascinated by the great frosty jewels whose gleams dazzled hiseyes--diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, turquoises, moonstones, set thick as stars in the shimmeringsilver. At a distance their different gleams had seemed to merge into a pulsing white glare; but now, at

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close range, they shimmered with a million rainbow tints and lights, hypnotizing him with their scintillations.

'There is a fabulous fortune here, Taurus,' he whispered; but the Nemedian answered impatiently. 'Comeon! If we secure the Heart, these and all other things shall be ours.'

Conan climbed over the sparkling rim. The level of the tower's top was some feet below the gemmedledge. It was flat, composed of some dark blue substance, set with gold that caught the starlight, so thatthe whole looked like a wide sapphire flecked with shining gold-dust. Across from the point where theyhad entered there seemed to be a sort of chamber, built upon the roof. It was of the same silvery materialas the walls of the tower, adorned with designs worked in smaller gems; its single door was of gold, itssurface cut in scales, and crusted with jewels that gleamed like ice.

Conan cast a glance at the pulsing ocean of lights which spread far below them, then glanced at Taurus.The Nemedian was drawing up his cord and coiling it. He showed Conan where the hook had caught--afraction of an inch of the point had sunk under a great blazing jewel on the inner side of the rim.

'Luck was with us again,' he muttered. 'One would think that our combined weight would have torn thatstone out. Follow me; the real risks of the venture begin now. We are in the serpent's lair, and we knownot where he lies hidden.'

Like stalking tigers they crept across the darkly gleaming floor and halted outside the sparkling door.With a deft and cautious hand Taurus tried it. It gave without resistance, and the companions looked in,tensed for anything. Over the Nemedian's shoulder Conan had a glimpse of a glittering chamber, thewalls, ceiling and floor of which were crusted with great white jewels which lighted it brightly, and whichseemed its only illumination. It seemed empty of life.

'Before we cut off our last retreat,' hissed Taurus, 'go you to the rim and look over on all sides; if yousee any soldiers moving in the gardens, or anything suspicious, return and tell me. I will await you withinthis chamber.'

Conan saw scant reason in this, and a faint suspicion of his companion touched his wary soul, but he didas Taurus requested. As he turned away, the Nemedian slipt inside the door and drew it shut behind him.Conan crept about the rim of the tower, returning to his starting-point without having seen any suspiciousmovement in the vaguely waving sea of leaves below. He turned toward the door--suddenly from withinthe chamber there sounded a strangled cry.

The Cimmerian leaped forward, electrified--the gleaming door swung open and Taurus stood framed inthe cold blaze behind him. He swayed and his lips parted, but only a dry rattle burst from his throat.Catching at the golden door for support, he lurched out upon the roof, then fell headlong, clutching at histhroat. The door swung to behind him.

Conan, crouching like a panther at bay, saw nothing in the room behind the stricken Nemedian, in thebrief instant the door was partly open--unless it was not a trick of the light which made it seem as if ashadow darted across the gleaming door. Nothing followed Taurus out on the roof, and Conan bentabove the man.

The Nemedian stared up with dilated, glazing eyes, that somehow held a terrible bewilderment. Hishands clawed at his throat, his lips slobbered and gurgled; then suddenly he stiffened, and the astoundedCimmerian knew that he was dead. And he felt that Taurus had died without knowing what manner ofdeath had stricken him. Conan glared bewilderedly at the cryptic golden door. In that empty room, withits glittering jeweled walls, death had come to the prince of thieves as swiftly and mysteriously as he had

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dealt doom to the lions in the gardens below.

Gingerly the barbarian ran his hands over the man's half-naked body, seeking a wound. But the onlymarks of violence were between his shoulders, high up near the base of his bull-neck--three smallwounds, which looked as if three nails had been driven deep in the flesh and withdrawn. The edges ofthese wounds were black, and a faint smell as of putrefaction was evident. Poisoned darts? thoughtConan--but in that case the missiles should be still in the wounds.

Cautiously he stole toward the golden door, pushed it open, and looked inside. The chamber lay empty,bathed in the cold, pulsing glow of the myriad jewels. In the very center of the ceiling he idly noted acurious design--a black eight-sided pattern, in the center of which four gems glittered with a red flameunlike the white blaze of the other jewels. Across the room there was another door, like the one in whichhe stood, except that it was not carved in the scale pattern. Was it from that door that death hadcome?--and having struck down its victim, had it retreated by the same way?

Closing the door behind him, the Cimmerian advanced into the chamber. His bare feet made no soundon the crystal floor. There were no chairs or tables in the chamber, only three or four silken couches,embroidered with gold and worked in strange serpentine designs, and several silver-bound mahoganychests. Some were sealed with heavy golden locks; others lay open, their carven lids thrown back,revealing heaps of jewels in a careless riot of splendor to the Cimmerian's astounded eyes. Conan sworebeneath his breath; already he had looked upon more wealth that night than he had ever dreamed existedin allthe world, and he grew dizzy thinking of what must be the value of the jewel he sought.

He was in the center of the room now, going stooped forward, head thrust out warily, sword advanced,when again death struck at him soundlessly. A flying shadow that swept across the gleaming floor was hisonly warning, and his instinctive sidelong leap all that saved his life. He had a flashing glimpse of a hairyblack horror that swung past him with a clashing of frothing fangs, and something splashed on his bareshoulder that burned like drops of liquid hellfire. Springing back, sword high, he saw the horror strike thefloor, wheel and scuttle toward him with appalling speed--a gigantic black spider, such as men see only innightmare dreams.

It was as large as a pig, and its eight thick hairy legs drove its ogreish body over the floor at headlongpace; its four evilly gleaming eyes shone with a horrible intelligence, and its fangs dripped venom thatConan knew, from the burning of his shoulder where only a few drops had splashed as the thing struckand missed, was laden with swift death. This was the killer that had dropped from its perch in the middleof the ceiling on a strand of its web, on the neck of the Nemedian. Fools that they were not to havesuspected that the upper chambers would be guarded as well as the lower!

These thoughts flashed briefly through Conan's mind as the monster rushed. He leaped high, and itpassed beneath him, wheeled and charged back. This time he evaded its rush with a sidewise leap, andstruck back like a cat. His sword severed one of the hairy legs, and again he barely saved himself as themonstrosity swerved at him, fangs clicking fiendishly. But the creature did not press the pursuit; turning, itscuttled across the crystal floor and ran up the wall to the ceiling, where it crouched for an instant, glaringdown at him with its fiendish red eyes. Then without warning it launched itself through space, trailing astrand of slimy grayish stuff.

Conan stepped back to avoid the hurtling body--then ducked frantically, just in time to escape beingsnared by the flying web-rope. He saw the monster's intent and sprang toward the door, but it wasquicker, and a sticky strand cast across the door made him a prisoner. He dared not try to cut it with hissword; he knew the stuff would cling to the blade, and before he could shake it loose, the fiend would besinking its fangs into his back.

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Then began a desperate game, the wits and quickness of the man matched against the fiendish craft andspeed of the giant spider. It no longer scuttled across the floor in a direct charge, or swung its bodythrough the air at him. It raced about the ceiling and the walls, seeking to snare him in the long loops ofsticky gray web-strands, which it flung with a devilish accuracy. These strands were thick as ropes, andConan knew that once they were coiled about him, his desperate strength would not be enough to tearhim free before the monster struck.

All over the chamber went on that devil's game, in utter silence except for the quick breathing of theman, the low scuff of his bare feet on the shining floor, the castanet rattle of the monstrosity's fangs. Thegray strands lay in coils on the floor; they were looped along the walls; they overlaid the jewel-chests andsilken couches, and hung in dusky festoons from the jeweled ceiling. Conan's steel-trap quickness of eyeand muscle had kept him untouched, though the sticky loops had passed him so close they rasped hisnaked hide. He knew he could not always avoid them; he not only had to watch the strands swingingfrom the ceiling, but to keep his eye on the floor, lest he trip in the coils that lay there. Sooner or later agummy loop would writhe about him, python-like, and then, wrapped like a cocoon, he would lie at themonster's mercy.

The spider raced across the chamber floor, the gray rope waving out behind it. Conan leaped high,clearing a couch--with a quick wheel the fiend ran up the wall, and the strand, leaping off the floor like alive thing, whipped about the Cimmerian's ankle. He caught himself on his hands as he fell, jerkingfrantically at the web which held him like a pliant vise, or the coil of a python. The hairy devil was racingdown the wall to complete its capture. Stung to frenzy, Conan caught up a jewel chest and hurled it withall his strength. It was a move toe monster was not expecting. Full in the midst of the branching black legsthe massive missile struck, smashing against the wall with a muffled sickening crunch. Blood and greenishslime spattered, and the shattered mass fell with the burst gem-chest to the floor. The crushed black bodylay among the flaming riot of jewels that spilled over it; the hairy legs moved aimlessly, the dying eyesglittered redly among the twinkling gems.

Conan glared about, but no other horror appeared, and he set himself to working free of the web. Thesubstance clung tenaciously to his ankle and his hands, but at last he was free, and taking up his sword,he picked his way among the gray coils and loops to the inner door. What horrors lay within he did notknow. The Cimmerian's blood was up, and since he had come so far, and overcome so much peril, hewas determined to go through to the grim finish of the adventure, whatever that might be. And he felt thatthe jewel he sought was not among the many so carelessly strewn about the gleaming chamber.

Stripping off the loops that fouled the inner door, he found that it, like the other, was not locked. Hewondered if the soldiers below were still unaware of his presence. Well, he was high above their heads,and if tales were to be believed, they were used to strange noises in the tower above them--sinistersounds, and screams of agony and horror.

Yara was on his mind, and he was not altogether comfortable as he opened the golden door. But he sawonly a flight of silver steps leading down, dimly lighted by what means he could not ascertain. Down thesehe went silently, gripping his sword. He heard no sound, and came presently to an ivory door, set withblood-stones. He listened, but no sound came from within; only thin wisps of smoke drifted lazily frombeneath the door, bearing a curious exotic odor unfamiliar to the Cimmerian. Below him the silver stairwound down to vanish in the dimness, and up that shadowy well no sound floated; he had an eery feelingthat he was alone in a tower occupied only by ghosts and phantoms.

Cautiously he pressed against the ivory door and it swung silently inward. On the shimmering thresholdConan stared like a wolf in strange surroundings, ready to fight or flee on the instant. He was looking into

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a large chamber with a domed golden ceiling; the walls were of green jade, the floor of ivory, partlycovered by thick rugs. Smoke and exotic scent of incense floated up from a brazier on a golden tripod,and behind it sat an idol on a sort of marble couch. Conan stared aghast; the image had the body of aman, naked, and green in color; but the head was one of nightmare and madness. Too large for thehuman body, it had no attributes of humanity. Conan stared at the wide flaring ears, the curling proboscis,on either side of which stood white tusks tipped with round golden balls. The eyes were closed, as if insleep.

This then, was the reason for the name, the Tower of the Elephant, for the head of the thing was muchlike that of the beasts described by the Shemitish wanderer. This was Yara's god; where then should thegem be, but concealed in the idol, since the stone was called the Elephant's Heart?

As Conan came forward, his eyes fixed on the motionless idol, the eyes of the thing opened suddenly!The Cimmerian froze in his tracks. It was no image--it was a living thing, and he was trapped in itschamber!

That he did not instantly explode in a burst of murderous frenzy is a fact that measures his horror, whichparalyzed him where he stood. A civilized man in his position would have sought doubtful refuge in theconclusion that he was insane; it did not occur to the Cimmerian to doubt his senses. He knew he wasface to face with a demon of the Elder World, and the realization robbed him of all his faculties exceptsight.

The trunk of the horror was lifted and quested about, the topaz eyes stared unseeingly, and Conan knewthe monster was blind. With the thought came a thawing of his frozen nerves, and he began to backsilently toward the door. But the creature heard. The sensitive trunk stretched toward him, and Conan'shorror froze him again when the being spoke, in a strange, stammering voice that never changed its keyor timbre. The Cimmerian knew that those jaws were never built or intended for human speech.

'Who is here? Have you come to torture me again, Yara? Will you never be done? Oh, Yag-kosha, isthere no end to agony?'

Tears rolled from the sightless eyes, and Conan's gaze strayed to the limbs stretched on the marblecouch. And he knew the monster would not rise to attack him. He knew the marks of the rack, and thesearing brand of the flame, and tough-souled as he was, he stood aghast at the ruined deformities whichhis reason told him had once been limbs as comely as his own. And suddenly all fear and repulsion wentfrom him, to be replaced by a great pity. What this monster was, Conan could not know, but theevidences of its sufferings were so terrible and pathetic that a strange aching sadness came over theCimmerian, he knew not why. He only felt that he was looking upon a cosmic tragedy, and he shrankwith shame, as if the guilt of a whole race were laid upon him.

'I am not Yara,' he said. 'I am only a thief. I will not harm you.'

'Come near that I may touch you,' the creature faltered, and Conan came near unfearingly, his swordhanging forgotten in his hand. The sensitive trunk came out and groped over his face and shoulders, as ablind man gropes, and its touch was light as a girl's hand.

'You are not of Yara's race of devils,' sighed the creature. 'The clean, lean fierceness of the wastelandsmarks you. I know your people from of old, whom I knew by another name in the long, long ago whenanother world lifted its jeweled spires to the stars. There is blood on your fingers.'

'A spider in the chamber above and a lion in the garden,' muttered Conan.

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'You have slain a man too, this night,' answered the other. 'And there is death in the tower above. I feel;I know.'

'Aye,' muttered Conan. 'The prince of all thieves lies there dead from the bite of a vermin.'

'So--and so!' The strange inhuman voice rose in a sort of low chant. 'A slaying in the tavern and a slayingon the road--I know; I feel. And the third will make the magic of which not even Yara dreams--oh,magic of deliverance, green gods of Yag!'

Again tears fell as the tortured body was rocked to and fro in the grip of varied emotions. Conan lookedon, bewildered.

Then the convulsions ceased; the soft, sightless eyes were turned toward the Cimmerian, the trunkbeckoned.

'Oh man, listen,' said the strange being. 'I am foul and monstrous to you, am I not? Nay, do not answer;I know. But you would seem as strange to me, could I see you. There are many worlds besides thisearth, and life takes many shapes. I am neither god nor demon, but flesh and blood like yourself, thoughthe substance differ in part, and the form be cast in a different mold.

'I am very old, oh man of the waste countries; long and long ago I came to this planet with others of myworld, from the green planet Yag, which circles for ever in the outer fringe of this universe. We sweptthrough space on mighty wings that drove us through the cosmos quicker than light, because we hadwarred with the kings of Yag and were defeated and outcast. But we could never return, for on earth ourwings withered from our shoulders. Here we abode apart from earthly life. We fought the strange andterrible forms of life which then walked the earth, so that we became feared, and were not molested inthe dim jungles of the east, where we had our abode.

'We saw men grow from the ape and build the shining cities of Valusia, Kamelia, Commoria and theirsisters. We saw them reel before the thrusts of the heathen Atlanteans and Picts and Lemurians. We sawthe oceans rise and engulf Atlantis and Lemuria, and the isles of the Picts, and shining cities of civilization.We saw the survivors of Pictdom and Atlantis build their stone-age empires, and go down to ruin, lockedin bloody wars. We saw the Picts sink into abysmal savagery, the Atlanteans into apedom again. We sawnew savages drift southward in conquering waves from the Arctic circle to build a new civilization, withnew kingdoms called Nemedia, and Koth, and Aquilonia and their sisters. We saw your people riseunder a new name from the jungles of the apes that had been Atlanteans. We saw the descendants of theLemurians who had survived the cataclysm, rise again through savagery and ride westward asHyrkanians. And we saw this race of devils, survivors of the ancient civilization that was before Atlantissank, come once more into culture and power--this accursed kingdom of Zamora.

'All this we saw, neither aiding nor hindering the immutable cosmic law, and one by one we died; for weof Yag are not immortal, though our lives are as the lives of planets and constellations. At last I alone wasleft, dreaming of old times among the ruined temples of jungle-lost Khitai, worshipped as a god by anancient yellow-skinned race. Then came Yara, versed in dark knowledge handed down through the daysof barbarism, since before Atlantis sank.

'First he sat at my feet and learned wisdom. But he was not satisfied with what I taught him, for it waswhite magic, and he wished evil lore, to enslave kings and glut a fiendish ambition. I would teach himnone of the black secrets I had gained, through no wish of mine, through the eons.

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'But his wisdom was deeper than I had guessed; with guile gotten among the dusky tombs of darkStygia, he trapped me into divulging a secret I had not intended to bare; and turning my own power uponme, he enslaved me. Ah, gods of Yag, my cup has been bitter since that hour!

'He brought me up from the lost jungles of Khitai where the gray apes danced to the pipes of the yellowpriests, and offerings of fruit and wine heaped my broken altars. No more was I a god to kindlyjungle-folk--I was slave to a devil in human form.'

Again tears stole from the unseeing eyes.

'He pent me in this tower which at his command I built for him in a single night. By fire and rack hemastered me, and by strange unearthly tortures you would not understand. In agony I would long agohave taken my own life, if I could. But he kept me alive--mangled, blinded, and broken--to do his foulbidding. And for three hundred years I have done his bidding, from this marble couch, blackening mysoul with cosmic sins, and staining my wisdom with crimes, because I had no other choice. Yet not all myancient secrets has he wrested from me, and my last gift shall be the sorcery of the Blood and the Jewel.

'For I feel the end of time draw near. You are the hand of Fate. I beg of you, take the gem you will findon yonder altar.'

Conan turned to the gold and ivory altar indicated, and took up a great round jewel, clear as crimsoncrystal; and he knew that this was the Heart of the Elephant.

'Now for the great magic, the mighty magic, such as earth has not seen before, and shall not see again,through a million million of millenniums. By my life-blood I conjure it, by blood born on the green breastof Yag, dreaming far-poised in the great blue vastness of Space.

'Take your sword, man, and cut out my heart; then squeeze it so that the blood will flow over the redstone. Then go you down these stairs and enter the ebony chamber where Yara sits wrapped inlotus-dreams of evil. Speak his name and he will awaken. Then lay this gem before him, and say,"Yag-kosha gives you a last gift and a last enchantment." Then get you from the tower quickly; fear not,your way shall be made clear. The life of man is not the life of Yag, nor is human death the death of Yag.Let me be free of this cage of broken blind flesh, and I will once more be Yogah of Yag,morning-crowned and shining, with wings to fly, and feet to dance, and eyes to see, and hands to break.'

Uncertainly Conan approached, and Yag-kosha, or Yogah, as if sensing his uncertainty, indicated wherehe should strike. Conan set his teeth and drove the sword deep. Blood streamed over the blade and hishand, and the monster started convulsively, then lay back quite still. Sure that life had fled, at least life ashe understood it, Conan set to work on his grisly task and quickly brought forth something that he feltmust be the strange being's heart, though it differed curiously from any he had ever seen. Holding thepulsing organ over the blazing jewel, he pressed it with bodi hands, and a rain of blood fell on the stone.To his surprise, it did not run off, but soaked into the gem, as water is absorbed by a sponge.

Holding the jewel gingerly, he went out of the fantastic and came upon the silver steps. He did not lookback; he instinctively felt that some transmutation was taking place in the body on the marble couch, andhe further felt that it was of a sort not to be witnessed by human eyes.

He closed the ivory door behind him and without hesitation descended the silver steps. It did not occurto him to ignore the instructions given him. He halted at an ebony door, in the center of which was agrinning silver skull, and pushed it open. He looked into a chamber of ebony and jet, and saw, on a blacksilken couch, a tall, spare form reclining. Yara the priest and sorcerer lay before him, his eyes open and

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dilated with the fumes of the yellow lotus, far-staring, as if fixed on gulfs and nighted abysses beyondhuman ken.

'Yara!' said Conan, like a judge pronouncing doom. 'Awaken!'

The eyes cleared instantly and became cold and cruel as a vulture's. The tall silken-clad form lifted erect,and towered gauntly above the Cimmerian.

'Dog!' His hiss was like the voice of a cobra. 'What do you here?'

Conan laid the jewel on the ebony table.

'He who sent this gem bade me say, "Yag-kosha gives you a last gift and a last enchantment."'

Yara recoiled, his dark face ashy. The jewel was no longer crystal-clear; its murky depths pulsed andthrobbed, and curious smoky waves of changing color passed over its smooth surface. As if drawnhypnotically, Yara bent over the table and gripped the gem in his hands, staring into its shadowed depths,as if it were a magnet to draw the shuddering soul from his body. And as Conan looked, he thought thathis eyes must be playing him tricks. For when Yara had risen up from his couch, the priest had seemedgigantically tall; yet now he saw that Yara's head would scarcely come to his shoulder. He blinked,puzzled, and for the first time that night, doubted his own senses. Then with a shock he realized that thepriest was shrinking in stature--was growing smaller before his very gaze.

With a detached feeling he watched, as a man might watch a play; immersed in a feeling of overpoweringunreality, the Cimmerian was no longer sure of his own identity; he only knew that he was looking uponthe external evidence of the unseen play of vast Outer forces, beyond his understanding.

Now Yara was no bigger than a child; now like an infant he sprawled on the table, still grasping thejewel. And now the sorcerer suddenly realized his fate, and he sprang up, releasing the gem. But still hedwindled, and Conan saw a tiny, pygmy figure rushing wildly about the ebony table-top, waving tiny armsand shrieking in a voice that was like the squeak of an insect.

Now he had shrunk until the great jewel towered above him like a hill, and Conan saw him cover hiseyes with his hands, as if to shield them from the glare, as he staggered about like a madman. Conansensed that some unseen magnetic force was pulling Yara to the gem. Thrice he raced wildly about it in anarrowing circle, thrice he strove to turn and run out across the table; then with a scream that echoedfaintly in the ears of the watcher, the priest threw up his arms and ran straight toward the blazing globe.

Bending close, Conan saw Yara clamber up the smooth, curving surface, impossibly, like a man climbinga glass mountain. Now the priest stood on the top, still with tossing arms, invoking what grisly names onlythe gods know. And suddenly he sank into the very heart of the jewel, as a man sinks into a sea, andConan saw the smoky waves close over his head. Now he saw him in the crimson heart of the jewel,once more crystal-clear, as a man sees a scene far away, tiny with great distance. And into the heartcame a green, shining winged figure with the body of a man and the head of an elephant--no longer blindor crippled. Yara threw up his arms and fled as a madman flees, and on his heels came the avenger.Then, like the bursting of a bubble, the great jewel vanished in a rainbow burst of iridescent gleams, andthe ebony table-top lay bare and deserted--as bare, Conan somehow knew, as the marble couch in thechamber above, where the body of that strange transcosmic being called Yag-kosha and Yogah had lain.

The Cimmerian turned and fled from the chamber, down the silver stairs. So mazed was he that it did notoccur to him to escape from the tower by the way he had entered it. Down that winding, shadowy silver

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well he ran, and came into a large chamber at the foot of the gleaming stairs. There he halted for aninstant; he had come into the room of soldiers. He saw the glitter of their silver corselets, the sheen oftheir jeweled sword-hilts. They sat slumped at the banquet board, their dusky plumes waving somberlyabove their drooping helmeted heads; they lay among their dice and fallen goblets on the wine-stainedlapis-lazuli floor. And he knew that they were dead. The promise had been made, the word kept;whether sorcery or magic or the falling shadow of great green wings had stilled the revelry, Conan couldnot know, but his way had been made clear. And a silver door stood open, framed in the whiteness ofdawn.

Into the waving green gardens came the Cimmerian, and as the dawn wind blew upon him with the coolfragrance of luxuriant growths, he started like a man waking from a dream. He turned back uncertainly,to stare at the cryptic tower he had just left. Was he bewitched and enchanted? Had he dreamed all thathad seemed to have passed? As he looked he saw the gleaming tower sway against the crimson dawn,its jewel-crusted rim sparkling in the growing light, and crash into shining shards.

THE END

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