Jan of the Jungle (5 page)

Strangling and choking, he inhaled great lungfuls of air. Clinging to a bar beside him, Chicma seemed to be in like case. And swimming beside the floating cage, gripping its door with one huge black hand, Jan saw Borno.

The cage was floating bars up, its opened door swung outward over the edge and causing one side to sag. Jan tried to climb out through the door, but before he had half of his body out of the water the entire cage went under, ducking Chicma. He subsided into the water once more, and the bars of the cage emerged. Chicma chattered angrily, and Borno told him to "Keep down."

Thereafter Jan held his head only above the surface of the water that sloshed about in the cage. Borno continued swimming with one hand while he held to the door with the other.

Presently Jan heard a roaring sound that seemed familiar. Then he remembered the sound he had heard shortly before his first sight of salt water-the roaring of breakers on a beach. He wanted to raise himself once more to look out, but the memory of his last experience restrained him.

The roaring grew louder, and great foamy waves began sweeping over the cage, rocking it violently. Suddenly the bottom struck something solid, and with its two startled and half drowned occupants still clinging to the bars, turned over and over. It stopped with the bars down, half full of water, waves spanking against one side. Jan and Chicma sat there in the water, barely able to see the interior of their prison by the dim light that filtered through the cracks between the planks.

Above the roaring and slapping of the waves Jan heard a thudding sound. Presently more light came in, and the blade of Borno's machete flashed downward again and again, cutting a great V in one of the planks. To Jan, sitting there in his soggy prison, the time seemed interminable before the board was cut in two.

Borno sheathed his weapon and, seizing a half of the plank, pulled it toward him, bending the spikes that held it at the corner. Jan and Chicma quickly squirmed through the opening, and the three, hurled forward again and again by the breakers that raced in from behind them, quickly reached a white, sandy beach.

Apparently exhausted by his efforts, Borno threw himself on the sand. Chicma, also, squatted on the beach to rest. She was quite old for a chimpanzee, and her recent experience had tired her. But Jan, save for a slight soreness in his lungs and nasal cavities from the salt water: he had inhaled, was feeling not only fit but ravenously hungry.

Just above the matted jungle growth that fringed the beach, three coconut palms reared their crowns, dangling their fruit invitingly. With a wordless cry of delight, Jan plunged through the undergrowth toward them. He was about to spring up the nearest tree, when two powerful brown hands, reaching from behind him, suddenly gripped his throat.

Unable to cry out because of the strangling pressure on his windpipe, Jan was dragged, kicking and struggling, back into the dark depths of the South American jungle.

JAN'S STRUGGLES presently grew less as the pressure of the powerful fingers on his throat continued. Then his arms were seized and tightly bound behind his back. For some time he lay on the ground, panting for breath with rattling palate, and staring defiantly up at the strange creature whose prisoner he had become.

The man was short and powerful, and naked save for an abbreviated loin-cloth. His straight black hair was cut in a soup-bowl bob, and his coppery skin glistened with perspiration from his recent exertions, for, despite his youth Jan was stronger than the average man and had given him a good tussle.

Jan watched the native suspiciously as he took up a bundle of long sticks-as long as he was tall-from the ground. One of these sticks was curved, with a string stretched across the curve from tip to tip. The others were sharply pointed at one end. To Jan, a stick had always meant a potential beating, and a low growl rumbled from his throat as his captor made a step toward him.

Puzzled by this unusual sound, coming from a human being, the tall savage paused for a moment, looking quizzically down at his prisoner. He took a second step, and a louder growl resulted. Then he uttered a few words. The youth's only answer was a snarl and a quick leap to his feet. Then he darted into the jungle, his hands still bound behind him.

As he dashed away through the forest, Jan heard a quick grunt of surprise. Then there was a_ twang, and one of the long sticks whizzed past his ear, burying its point in a tree trunk, where it quivered for a moment as if alive.

Sprinting, leaping, stumbling, dodging first one way, then another, and constantly goaded to his utmost speed by the unmistakable sounds of pursuit behind him, the youth ran on and on until his breath came in great sobbing gasps and there was a terrific pain in his side: But still the sound of those menacing, footsteps followed him relentlessly, doggedly.

Suddenly there came to his nostrils an odor that was hatefully familiar to him. It was the smell of burning wood, and he instantly associated it with Dr. Bracken and his years of captivity. The cook always burned wood in her kitchen stove, and at some time during the day there was always a puff of wind to carry it into the menagerie.

Jan halted for a moment, suspicious of the acrid odor, but a shout from his pursuer sent him running forward again. The shout was instantly answered by a voice directly ahead of him. Soon there were more yells on his right and left, and more answers from the man who, pursued him. Accompanying the yells were the patter of footsteps and the rustling of underbrush, warning him that he had been surrounded.

Looking about for a place to hide, Jan selected a clump of huge begonias, which spread their immense leaves nearby. Plunging into this clump, he squatted down, and peering through a space between two gigantic leaves, watched for the approach of the numerous enemies his ears told him were closing in on him.

As he sat there with perspiration streaming from him, endeavoring to keep his labored breathing as quiet as possible, two bronze-skinned savages suddenly came into Jan's line of vision. They passed on, but were succeeded by three more, the last of whom stopped as something caught his attention. It was one of Jan's footprints, and it told this trained hunter as plainly as words that the youth was hidden behind the broad leaves of the begonia. With a loud whoop of exultation, he sprang upon the crouching Jan and dragged him forth.

In an instant, Jan was the center of a ring of curious savages, who plucked at his shock of red hair, pulled at his jaguar-skin garment, and poked at his sunburned body as if he were a strange being from another planet, chattering excitedly to each other the while with many grunts and exclamations of amazement.

His spirit unbroken and his anger aroused by this manhandling, Jan voiced his disapproval in the only manner he knew-by alternately snarling and growling at his captors. This demonstration seemed to amuse them hugely, and several of them took to baiting him for the purpose of entertainment.

One huge fellow took it upon himself to poke Jan's tender, sunburned nose with his forefinger. He instantly withdrew the hand with a howl of pain, for Jan, with a quick snap, had bitten it nearly through at the second joint. Enraged, the wounded savage whipped out a machete and would have cut off Jan's head, but two companions seized and dragged him away, while the entire party laughed at his discomfiture.

Then Jan's original captor took him by one arm and one of his fellows seized the other, after which they hustled him along between them into a cleared space where a fire was burning and many hammocks were swung. Here Jan's feet were bound, and he was thrown to the ground with one man watching him. Several others gathered around the fire, which they replenished, and over which, when it was going well, they suspended the carcasses of six monkeys, a capybara and two peccaries to roast.

Despite the ache of his bound hands and feet and the stinging bites of numerous tiny black flies, Jan kept every sense alert, listening to the strange chatter of the bronze-skinned men and watching their every movement. All were naked except for their abbreviated loin-cloths, and all were well armed. Some, he observed, had the bent sticks with strings stretched across, and the bundles of sharp-pointed sticks which could fly from them. All had either machetes or knives, familiar to Jan because of the assortment of cutlery which Dr. Bracken had used in cutting up meat. Some also carried short, heavy sticks with sharp stones lashed to their thick ends, and some had very long sticks with sharp points.

As soon as they finished eating, the savages, one by one, wandered to their hammocks, which were slung in the smoke of the fire to keep off insect pests and went to sleep.

Jan's original captor brought him some gnawed monkey bones with a little meat left on them, and unbound his hands so he could eat. His fingers were first numb, then filled with a sensation that resembled the pricking of a thousand needles as the blood began to circulate freely in them. He ate a few bites of monkey flesh, took a long drink from a gourd which his captor proffered, and submitted to having his hands bound once more, for he saw that resistance would be useless.

The black flies, which Jan was powerless to brush away, disappeared at nightfall, but their place was taken by hordes of mosquitoes. For hours Jan lay awake squirming and tossing in fruitless endeavor to rid himself of his tiny tormentors But at last he slept.

Awakened at daybreak by a stir in the camp around him, Jan was fed, given a drink of water, and left to watch the preparations for departure. All camp equipment was loaded into a half dozen large baskets, which were carried on men's backs, suspended by broad straps that went around their foreheads. When all was in readiness, Jan's feet were unbound and he was forced to march away with the others.

For five days Jan was taken deeper and deeper into the jungle by the band of hunters. Near the end of the fifth day they suddenly emerged into a circular clearing, in the center of which was a large round communal but or malocca, flanked by two crudely constructed lean-tos.

A dozen yapping mongrel dogs rushed out to greet them, instantly followed by more than a score of pot-bellied naked children whose clamor equaled that of the canines, and then by women wearing nothing but small square or triangular aprons.

Jan was dragged to a strong stump about five feet tall near the entrance to the communal hut, and bound to it by strips of fiber passed around his body. Then his hands and feet were unbound and he was given a drink of water. Dogs, children, and women crowded around him, all apparently more curious than the men had been. A dog nipped him on the shin, and Jan promptly kicked it over the heads of the children standing in front. Then a youth of about Jan's age, apparently its master, attempted reprisal by pulling his shock of red hair. Jan cuffed him off his feet with one well-placed blow, much to the young native's chagrin and the amusement of the spectators.

Then a middle-aged matron, evidently the squaw of Jan's original captor, came to his side, knocking children and kicking dogs right and left. After she had cleared a space around him she handed him a piece of something flat and hard, evidently food. He bit into it, finding it rather tasteless and difficult to chew, but it satisfied his hunger which had been developed by the long march. It was a farinha cake, made from mandioca root.

Jan was left on exhibition at the stump for some time, but his popularity as an exhibit suddenly waned as another party of hunters returned with a new prisoner whose hands were bound behind him and 'who was urged forward by spear thrusts from behind. Although, like his captors, he was naked except for a loincloth and copper-skinned, he was much taller than the men who had captured him, none of whom were much taller than Jan, and his aspect was made ferocious by daubs of red ocher on his face, ornamented sections of bamboo thrust through the distended lobes of his ears, and a necklace of jaguar's teeth.

The new prisoner was quickly hustled to the stump and bound like Jan to the opposite side. Women and children crowded around him hurling insults, while dogs barked and snapped at his legs. But despite the abuse heaped upon him, he maintained a stoical silence.

As the sun sank lower and lower toward the horizon, and the shadows of the trees that rimmed the clearing grew longer, many children brought firewood, which they heaped around the two who were bound to the post. Jan had no idea what it was for; and although the silent Indian behind him knew, he gave no sign.

A number of cooking fires were built, and much meat was consumed, as both hunting parties had been quite successful. But this time the savages did not retire to their hammocks immediately after their meal. Instead, they formed a large circle around the prisoners.

As soon as darkness fell, Jan's hands were bound like those of the other prisoner, and the circle of spectators began a slow dance around them in time to the throbbing cadence of a kettle-drum beaten by an old man. Many of the dancers carried flaming faggots, snatched from their cook fires, which they thrust into the prisoner's faces or held against their arms or bodies, inflicting painful burns.

Jan struggled to break his bonds, snarling and growling at his tormentors, but to no avail. Presently, imitating his fellow prisoner, who had neither moved nor cried out under torture, he relapsed into silence and ceased his struggles, resolved to show these people that he could stand pain as stoically as the big Indian.

The dance grew faster and faster, the searing thrusts of the lighted faggots more frequent. Then suddenly, as if at a prearranged signal, all of the dancers threw their faggots at the base of the pyre which had been stacked around the two torture victims. Jan heard a crackling sound that swiftly increased in volume. Then there was a sudden upthrust of licking flames and a burst of terrific heat which brought scorching, excruciating agony.

BORNO AND CHICMA did not rest very long on the beach. By the time they were dry from their ocean bath, the rays of the sun had grown intolerable.

The ape got up first, and began sniffing the air as if some far-off scent had attracted her attention. Then she shuffled away in the direction of the jungle.