Edgar Rice Burroughs

The Mad King Edgar Rice Burroughs

Book Excerpt: ...used a young man, the following day in the little hamlet of Tafelberg, to whistle as he carefully read it over."I am glad that I am not the mad king of Lutha," he said as he paid the storekeeper for the gasoline he had just pur- chased and stepped into the gray roadster for whose greedy maw it was destined."Why, mein Herr?" asked the man."This notice practically gives immunity to whoever shoots down the king," replied the traveler. "Worse still, it gives such an account of the maniacal ferocity of the fugitive as to warrant anyone in shooting him on sight."As the young man spoke the storekeeper had examined his face closely for the first time. A shrewd look came into the man's ordinarily stolid countenance. He leaned forward quite close to the other's ear."We of Lutha," he whispered, "love our 'mad king'--no reward could be offered that would tempt us to betray him. Even in self-protection we would not kill him, we of the mountains who remember him as a boy and loved his father and hi..