The Best of Argosy #4 - The Sapphire Death by Loring Brent & Radio Archives

Author:Loring Brent & Radio Archives [Brent, Loring]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Pulp Adventure
Publisher: RadioArchives.com
Published: 2014-09-23T00:00:00+00:00

TO BE matched with a cobra was, at this time, cruelly unfair. All the contestants had spent a strenuous morning. No matter how perfect their physical condition, it was inevitable that their muscles would lack freshness, that their powers of coordination would be below par. Dekka had never permitted Peter to enter the cobra pit unless he was absolutely untired, fresh.

Facing the pit, Peter could see, above the head of the priest across from him, that architectural monstrosity, the Temple of the Coiled Serpent — coil upon coil of pale blue stone rising to the gigantic stone head, with its jaws agape, its gemmed eyes glistening in the tropical afternoon sun.

Such a contest as this one — man against reptile — was, of course, in keeping with the cherished spirit of the temple. Presumably it was regarded as fitting that the next high priest of such a temple should show his skill against a deadly serpent.

A hush had fallen over the spectators. Far away in the jungle, Peter could hear the measured, maddening bell-like strokes of the bird-that-beats-on-gold.

In the silence, the hairy giant near him shouted, “Pig of an Annamese! May your opponent sink its fangs into the veins of your arm!”

“And yours, flea-bitten rat,” Peter retorted, “into the vein of your neck!”

The crowd roared its appreciation.

“Attention!” snapped the priest across from Peter.

Peter’s wrathful eyes returned to the two-foot-square teakwood box. The priest was holding it at a slanting angle on one knee. The side toward Peter had a hinged lid. The hinges were at the bottom. At the top was a metal hasp through which a wooden plug was thrust. The priest had his fingers on this plug. At the signal from the high priest, he would pluck out the plug and the cobra would slide down, tumbling into the pit. Behind the priest, on the sand, was a thick, five-foot club with which he would, presumably, kill the cobra if the cobra first killed Peter.

The high priest was lifting his hand containing a fragment of red silk. A hush like death had fallen on the eighty thousand spectators.

The red fragment left the high priest’s hand. In the deathly silence, the scraping sounds as the priests freed the wooden plugs from the hasps were loud and sharp. Next the thuds of squirming black and brown and tan coils sliding down out of the boxes, tumbling into the pits, hissing. Instantly the crowd began to chant, counting off the seconds in a score of languages and dialects, to the fateful fifteen.

Peter, with steady eyes, grim mouth, was watching the box in the hands of the priest across from him. The priest’s face was flushed, either with exertion or embarrassment. The plug was stuck! He could not pull it out of the hasp!

The chanting voices had reached the count of ten. Still the sweating, flushed priest struggled with the obstinate plug. It would not yield.

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