IN THE FOLDS OF A BOA CONSTRICTOR
A thrill of terror ran through Bomba.
He knew in an instant what had happened. A great boa, lying in wait
for whatever living thing might pass beneath the tree, had darted
down upon him. The coils of the great snake were tightening upon him
inexorably.
For a moment he gave himself up for lost. And lost he inevitably
would have been, had the snake retained the grip of its tail upon the
bough. This it was that gave it the purchase required for squeezing
its prey to death.
But the bough was slippery from the recent rain, and the fury of the
reptile’s sudden dart tore the tail loose from the point of support.
The great body fell with a thud. The coils did not relax. But on the
other hand they could not tighten until the snake, lashing wildly
about, could find some stump or tree to encircle with its tail and
use it as a lever.
Bomba felt as though his lungs were bursting, his ribs cracking. He
expected every second to be crushed into a shapeless mass.
The snake had wound about his body, but the boy’s arms remained free.
Desperately he felt for his machete. He drew it forth from its sheath
with his right hand and slashed furiously at the enfolding coils.
For a moment the iron bands seemed to press all the closer. The
infuriated reptile raised its horrid head and struck at the boy’s
neck. Bomba dodged, and the fangs buried themselves in his shoulder.
Again and again Bomba lashed out frantically with his knife. Each
time the weapon found its mark. Bomba could feel that the coils were
relaxing slightly.
Once more the terrible head was raised high in the air for another
blow. And at that instant a lucky slash went deep and severed the
spinal cord.
The threatened blow never descended. The head wavered and fell. Bomba
grasped it with his left hand and, summoning all his strength, struck
the reptile in the throat, completely severing the head from the
body. The coils unwound and fell in a heap at the boy’s feet.
Bomba threw the head from him with a sharp exclamation of disgust,
mingled with relief, and stepped quickly to one side to escape
the flailing of the writhing, twisting body of the headless boa
constrictor.
He had been close to death. Only the slipping of the snake’s tail
from the slippery bough had saved him. His brave heart alone would
not have availed.
With a shudder of repulsion he examined his foe, after the thrashing
had subsided and the great snake lay quiet.
Bomba had seen much larger snakes, but this was quite large enough,
the boy reflected, as he rubbed his chest, bruised and sore from the
pressure of the folds. The reptile was about twelve feet long and as
thick as Bomba’s leg.
The horrible head, lying a little distance from the body, still gaped
at him, though the malignant glitter of the eyes had been glazed by
death. Bomba shuddered as he thought how nearly those awful fangs had
been imbedded in his throat. But they had sunk into his shoulder.
Now, as well as he could, he examined the wound. It was causing him
severe pain, but no apprehension. He knew that the boa constrictor
carried no poison in its jaws. Its terrible crushing power was its
main reliance. His shoulder would be sore for a few days, and that
was all. He cleansed the wound with water from a pool, and then wiped
his bloody hunting knife on a wad of leaves.
“You did well,” he said aloud, addressing his trusty weapon as he
thrust it back into his girdle of cloth. “You have served Bomba many
times, but never better than this.”
Once more he went on his way, but, warned by his adventure, his eyes
scanned the trees above him as carefully as they did the ground
before him.
Before long he had passed through the dreary ygapo and heard in the
distance the musical tinkle of a waterfall. It was a sound that made
his heart leap with pleasure. Again and again he had viewed the fall,
entranced, as the spray-crested torrent dashed over the lip of the
cliff into the whirling vortex of water beneath that formed the first
of the series of great rapids rushing onward to the river.
Bomba loved the waterfall. It spoke to him in a vague and mystic way
of forces unchained. As he came now in full sight of it, there was
something in the power and wild beauty of the rushing waters that
struck an answering chord in his soul, causing his blood to run more
swiftly and making his eyes kindle with delight.
What made him feel that way? Bomba brooded over this, as he brooded
over many of the strange thoughts and emotions that puzzled him.
He wondered if the caboclos felt as he did about this magnificent
cascade. He remembered that he had seen one of them come out from
the jungle and stand for a moment above the rushing waters, looking
down upon them.
There had been no change in the expression of the caboclo. He had not
seemed to be drinking in the beauty of it all. If the man had loved
the waterfall as Bomba did, his face would have lighted up and his
eyes would have laughed, as Bomba had seen his own laugh one day when
he had suddenly seen his face reflected in the pellucid waters of a
lovely pool.
Bomba had not known himself then. He had started back from the image
in the pool as though from some mysterious thing hiding beneath the
surface of the water. But when, gaining courage, he had again peered
over the rim, his face looked back at him, and he knew it was his own.
But the face now was puzzled and solemn. It had lost the first
laughing look, the look of some one on whom a radiant vision has
burst. He tried again to laugh, but it was not the same. The laughter
was forced. What a strange changing mixture of emotions he possessed!
He was something, then, besides form and features. There was more in
him than he could touch and see. Could it be perhaps because he had
something that the white men had called a soul? What was this soul?
Many, many lonely hours Bomba had spent wondering about this.
Why did he never see that look upon the face of Casson? Why did the
faces of the natives always wear to Bomba the same dull and stupid
look, as dull and stupid, Bomba thought, and often more so, than the
faces of his jungle friends? Why were the faces of the Indians always
the same, except when they darkened and grew fierce and stern? Why
did beauty not appeal to them as it did to him?
Bomba felt sure that the native tribes who lived within sight and
sound of the great cascade, who could feast their eyes on it whenever
they would, did not love it as he did. They thought of it only as the
abode of spirits, some good, most of them bad, and believed that the
evil spirits walked at night. During the dark hours they remained
close within the circle of the maloca, where the night fires burned
bright.
Bomba did not believe that evil spirits dwelt in the waterfall. It
was beautiful, and to Bomba beautiful things were good.
Why did they feel so differently from him? Was it because they did
not have souls? He dismissed this thought as improbable. But perhaps
their souls were asleep. Ah, that must be it! They were asleep!
But his was awake. At least it was waking. Perhaps that was because
he was white. The thought gave him a thrill. Now he was sure that he
had found the truth. The natives’ souls were asleep. The white men’s
souls were awake. And he was white!
He had been so absorbed in his broodings that he had become almost
oblivious of the passage of time. A glance at the sun startled him.
He must hurry.
With a last lingering look at the beautiful cascade and a mental
resolve to return to it soon, he struck off at a tangent into the
jungle, gliding along silently and swiftly, eager to make up for the
time he had spent in dreaming.
He reproached himself for having lingered. Why had he forgotten for
the moment Casson, poor old helpless Casson, left alone in the hut,
an easy prey to the stealthy head-hunters if they should succeed in
ferreting out his location.
He was hurrying along when he suddenly stopped short.
In his path were the freshly made tracks of a jaguar!