_The Men of the Woods_
When Ru awoke, the mysterious light had disappeared; and in its place
the first pale glimmer of day was newly revealing the world. The
night's adventures now seemed so extraordinary that Ru wondered vaguely
whether he had not merely dreamed them; and when the heartening morning
light had filled all things, he could hardly understand why he had been
so frightened.
As by degrees his courage returned, he felt the proddings of that
slyest of temptresses, curiosity. What had been the meaning of that
which he had seen and heard? Would it not be possible to find out, and
find out safely? Might he not even make some marvelous discovery? learn
of the existence of some people akin to his own? perhaps even find
friends among that unknown people?
Realizing his danger, and yet resolved to tread so cautiously that
he might seek refuge in the trees at the first suspicious sign, Ru
descended from his leafy perch, regained his club, and warily set out
in the direction of the night's terrifying sights and sounds.
At first, as he made his way through those shadow-dim woods, treading
noiselessly on the thick matting of dead leaves and scrupulously
avoiding the dense clumps of underbrush, Ru observed nothing out of
the ordinary. Here and there some little bird, rustling unseen among
the shrubs and vines, made him stop short in quickly conquered alarm;
here and there some squirrel would flash into view and out again, with
bright beady eyes alertly glittering. But, except for such harmless
creatures, there was no sign of life, and the great wilderness
stretched before him, silent and undisturbed.
He was almost convinced that he should discover nothing--that he had
taken the wrong direction, or that there was nothing to be found--when
his keen eyes caught a telltale mark in the soft soil. Faintly traced
in the midst of a narrow open space was the imprint of a foot--a human
foot of gigantic proportions!
For a moment Ru stared in surprise and dread. Fearfully he glanced
toward the trees, lest one of a race of giants be watching him unseen;
then he began to inspect the ground on all sides, and speedily
discovered scores of similar footprints! That they had not all been
made by one individual was apparent from their difference in size; and
that they had not been left by his tribesmen was evident from the fact
that several of the unknowns were lacking in one or more toes.
Tracing the footprints toward what appeared to be their source, he
forgot for the moment his own possible peril. Curiosity still led
him on blindly--with every step he was finding fresh evidence of
unaccountable things. He was appalled at sight of a great blur of
clotted blood at the edge of a fallen tree, and at sight of numerous
sinister-looking reddish spots and patches. In a secluded little pocket
of the glade, he observed that the herbs and grass had been beaten
down as though in some terrific struggle, and here too were the same
ghastly blots of red; and finally, when an uncanny creeping sensation
was running down his spine and his better judgment was counseling him
to flee, he beheld that which stabbed his mind with such sudden and
overwhelming horror that the memory was not to leave him until his
dying day.
Huddled in a cluster of shrubbery at one end of the glade, was a
gruesome apparition that seemed half man and half beast--more beast
than man, for surely this great motionless hairy bulk could not be
human. It lay slumped among the bushes as though it had crept there to
breathe its last; an intermittent trail of blood led from it to the
open spaces; its huge apelike head drooped almost to the ground, with
enormous jaws agape, thick lips slimy with coagulated foam, and glazed
little black eyes sightlessly staring. On its broad shaggy chest the
crimson gore was matted, while its battered right temple was little
more than a clot of red.
With a low cry of alarm, Ru drew back. He did not take time for a
second glimpse; in a panic, he raced away, raced straight across the
open and toward the farther woods--scarcely knowing where he was
going, filled only with a mad desire to escape that bloody terror in
the bushes.
But, in his impetuosity, he was to dash directly upon a still more
alarming scene.
From the place of the strange footprints and blood-marks, he fled
into an adjoining and larger glade. Almost in the center of this
grass-covered opening, he stopped short in fresh terror; and his
startled eyes surveyed the ground at first without full realization,
but with gradually growing comprehension--comprehension of the most
fearful deed that even those savage days could boast. The appalling
fact was not that the ashes of a camp-fire lay before him, a few of the
embers still dully smoldering--this he had half expected to find; it
was not that the relics of a feast lay scattered among the weeds and
grass, which reeked of the entrails of animals, discarded bits of hide
and fat, and crushed and shattered bones. That which made Ru shudder
and quail was that the feast had evidently not been confined to animal
fare. From a recess between two rocks, a gaunt blood-stained skull
leered at him, bits of flesh still clinging to the brow, the brain-cast
battered as by a heavy blow.
With a gasp of revulsion, Ru recognized that it was the skull of a man!
And on the ground beside it he detected scraps of reddened human skin
and hair, split and charred human thigh-bones emptied of marrow, and
severed human fingers and toes!
Slowly, like one half stunned by a blow, Ru started to retreat. His
horror-stricken eyes searched the borders of the glade for sight of the
dread feasters; his limbs began to tremble uncontrollably beneath him.
Fortunately, there was no sign of anything menacing; neither beast nor
human challenged him before he had gained the bushes and vanished.
But as he stole away into the underbrush, he heard that which seemed to
confirm his worst fears. From across the open space a renewed tumult
startled him--a tumult as of voices calling. They were heavy and
raucous, like the voices of his tribesmen, yet the accentuation was not
that of his people--and they had in them a bestial note like that of
prowling wild creatures.
But who they might be Ru did not seek to discover. At as rapid a pace
as he could maintain without making a telltale noise, he picked his way
among the thickets in the direction of the lake. Thorns pricked his
hands, sharp stones cut his feet, bloodsucking insects alighted upon
his unprotected skin--but he did not notice; in his mind was a ravening
dread that drove him on like a goad of fire. Had the terrible unknowns
discovered his presence? Hearing him, had they returned? and, observing
his footprints, were they even now following on his trail? Were
they--though built in his own form--hunting him as man hunts beast? And
was there danger that they would overtake him, strike him down, and--
But here Ru's imagination reached a barrier that it would not cross.
He recalled the scraps of human skin and flesh scattered about the
burnt-out camp-fire--and at this abhorrent memory he shuddered, thought
of old tales of men that ate men, and strained to quicken his gait.
From time to time, as he glided beneath the trees and through the
tangle of bushes and shrubs, he paused to listen for the sound of
possible pursuit. At first he heard no more than the heavy pounding of
his own heart; a moment afterwards, he could make out only the fussing
and chattering of some gossipy bird; but not much later he detected a
suspicious crackling and rustling in the brush.
Was it only the noise of some browsing beast? Ru did not take time to
find out. Forgetting all caution in his panic, he darted down the long
meandering twilight aisles at the speed of the hounded wild thing,
while the squirrels leaped from his path with startled eyes, and
frightened flocks of wood-doves made way for him with a heavy flapping
of wings.
Somewhat to his surprise, he came out suddenly at the shores of the
lake. For a moment he halted in confusion; then recognized the long
sandy beach that he had passed only yesterday afternoon.
Straining every muscle, he began to dash along the shore toward the
mouth of the Harr-Sizz River. Several minutes passed; he had covered
hundreds of yards; all was silent again, and there was no sign of
approaching peril. He was just beginning to believe that he would elude
his pursuers, when a sudden shrill shouting broke the stillness of the
woods....
At that crisis his heart gave a terrific thump. His brain worked
with lightning rapidity. If he took once more to the forest, his
tracks would be found, the pursuit would be renewed, and, driven to
exhaustion, he would probably be overtaken. His only refuge therefore
lay in the waters. Not in swimming, for he could not swim far enough or
fast enough; the one hope was in his new-found means of propulsion.
And good fortune favored him, for a little distance down the beach lay
a fair-sized drifted tree trunk, resting more than half in the water.
With an effort, he set the huge mass afloat; then waded in after it and
pushed it as far as possible from shore; and finally, equipped with his
club as paddle, he climbed to a precarious seat astride the log, and
shoved and shoved until he was well out in the lake.
He was perhaps a hundred paces from land, when an enormous shambling
shape shouldered out of the woods and halted on the beach. At this
distance Ru could hardly be sure that it was not one of his own people;
like them, it was thick-set and stocky, with monstrously developed
shaggy black limbs. But it was even more hairy than his tribesmen;
it wore no clothes at all; and its great form was unusually bent and
stooped, while its long arms slid down in front of it almost to its
knees.
For an instant the creature paused on the beach, peering about it
in all directions as if bewildered. Then, sighting Ru where he was
struggling with his unwieldy craft, it let out a long-drawn ferocious
bellow of rage; in response to which half a dozen of its fellows, all
likewise stooping and unclad, came plunging and snorting out of the
woods.
There followed a moment's silence, during which they all stared at Ru
in obvious amazement, meanwhile pointing to him significantly with
their hairy arms. Then all at once there rang forth a chorus of shrieks
and howls such as Ru had rarely heard before. In it was a peculiar
blood-curdling note not to be described, except that it had something
of the growling menace of the cave-bear, and something of the yelping
fierceness of the sabertooth--and Ru knew that it was this cry that had
so terrified him last night among the tree tops.
But now the only effect of those screams was to make Ru push even more
desperately away from shore. Such was his haste that once or twice he
lost his balance and slipped into the water, and several times struck
his own legs painfully with the paddle.
Recognizing that all their clamoring was gaining them nothing, the
howling ones dropped suddenly into silence; and, picking up small
stones and pebbles, began to hurl them furiously at Ru. Their aim was
good, and the missiles went hurtling through the air at tremendous
speed; but the fugitive was already out of range; and the pebbles
splashed harmlessly in a little shower to his rear.
Angry mutterings now sounded from the throats of the stone-throwers.
With deep-voiced growls and grumblings, three or four of them strode
out into the water after their fleeing prey. Ru's alarm grew by leaps
and bounds as the wavelets broke first over their knees, then over
their thighs, then almost up to their sloping shoulders and bull-like
necks--and his dread turned to actual terror when he observed them
swimming, swimming toward him with rapid and powerful strokes! Through
the fast-diminishing distance, he could watch their hideous round heads
bobbing up and down, could see the gleam of the fiendish little eyes
and the brutish lines of the heavy eye-ridges.
On and on they came; their great arms clove the water with the easy,
regular strokes of accomplished swimmers; their hairy, baboonish faces
were twisted into diabolical grins. And Ru, though he tugged and pushed
at his pole with all his force, could not match the speed of his
pursuers; the space between them steadily grew less and less until it
measured but a stone's throw.
Like a pack of wolves upon a cornered deer, they pressed nearer, still
nearer, until he could see the white glittering of their enormous teeth
and make out the clotted blood-streaks on their outthrust arms. Then a
sudden idea come to Ru. Abruptly he ceased his paddling; carefully he
balanced himself on the broadest and flattest part of the log. And into
his anxious face and pale gray eyes a grim smile flitted as he stood
there and waited.
But his pursuers seemed not to suspect that anything was amiss. An evil
leer lighted the eyes of the swiftest of the band as he drew near; he
muttered in savage triumph as he stretched out a massive black arm
toward the log where Ru stood.
But his arm was never to reach the log. In a flash Ru had swung his
paddle from its hiding-place behind him; and with a dull thud the heavy
stick came down upon the head of his assailant.
The swimmer sank back with a low piteous moan. His form collapsed
helplessly into the waters; there was a sudden floundering of arms, a
gurgling, a few bubbles--and one man less was afloat upon the lake.
Still with a grim smile, Ru looked out across the waters. Not fifty
feet away, two or three dark bobbing faces were peering at him
hesitatingly. Ru held his place firmly on the log, shouted a challenge,
and swung his club angrily. And the swimmers, after a moment's
indecision, made unexpected response to the threat--of one accord, they
turned and energetically splashed their way shoreward.