Not until their lights were no longer discernible did I venture to
flash my little lamp upon my compass, and then I found to my
consternation that a fragment of the projectile had utterly destroyed
my only guide, as well as my speedometer. It was true I could follow
the stars in the general direction of Helium, but without knowing the
exact location of the city or the speed at which I was traveling my
chances for finding it were slim.
Helium lies a thousand miles southwest of Zodanga, and with my compass
intact I should have made the trip, barring accidents, in between four
and five hours. As it turned out, however, morning found me speeding
over a vast expanse of dead sea bottom after nearly six hours of
continuous flight at high speed. Presently a great city showed below
me, but it was not Helium, as that alone of all Barsoomian metropolises
consists in two immense circular walled cities about seventy-five miles
apart and would have been easily distinguishable from the altitude at
which I was flying.
Believing that I had come too far to the north and west, I turned back
in a southeasterly direction, passing during the forenoon several other
large cities, but none resembling the description which Kantos Kan had
given me of Helium. In addition to the twin-city formation of Helium,
another distinguishing feature is the two immense towers, one of vivid
scarlet rising nearly a mile into the air from the center of one of the
cities, while the other, of bright yellow and of the same height, marks
her sister.