? ? ? ? As I stooped to drop to the floor beside him he motioned me to wait, and coming close below me whispered: "Catch my hand; I can almost leap to the top of that wall myself. I have tried it many times, and each day I come a little closer. Some day I should have been able to make it."
? ? ? ? I lay upon my belly across the wall and reached my hand far down toward him. With a little run from the centre of the cell he sprang up until I grasped his outstretched hand, and thus I pulled him to the wall's top beside me.
? ? ? ? "You are the first jumper I ever saw among the red men of Barsoom," I said.
? ? ? ? He smiled. "It is not strange. I will tell you why when we have more time."
? ? ? ? Together we returned to the cell in which Xodar sat; descending to talk with him until the hour had passed.
? ? ? ? There we made our plans for the immediate future, binding ourselves by a solemn oath to fight to the death for one another against whatsoever enemies should confront us, for we knew that even should we succeed in escaping the First Born we might still have a whole world against us--the power of religious superstition is mighty.
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