CHAPTER XVII

SAURIANS AS FOES

As if the culmination of the electric discharge in that particular quarter had come with the bolt which struck so near myself, there was almost a complete cessation of pyrotechnics which would have been visible from the rain-pelted lake. Distant thunder grumbled incessantly, but the gloom which descended over water and jungle was only rendered more intense by the fitful glow of light which trembled upward so far away.

Inasmuch as my log was steady, I sat down as comfortably as possible. Soaked through as I was, I paid no attention to the drenching shower which continued. It was warm enough, and while it could hardly be pleasant, when thus continued such a time, I felt as if it were less than trifling, after all I had recently undergone. Naturally enough the shore had no immediate attractions which would tend to make me wish to paddle in. From the sound of my stream, tumbling noisily into the lake, I concluded the log could not be drifting to any considerable extent. I would wait for the light to come before I moved.

One usually feels entitled to suppose that a thunder-shower is fleeting, here one minute and gone the next, but I was in for a disappointment. Though the wind had ceased to blow, the lowering clouds continued rank with rain and apparently as dense as lead. The darkness of the storm continued till the margin between day and night was passed. I realised at last that there would be no light till dawn.

“What shall I do?” I muttered aloud, but I knew as I spoke that I would sit all night on that floating log, wet, somewhat chilled and ravenously hungry, to say no word of being alone and lost.

The prospect was not exactly bright, but I felt so grateful for my miraculous escape, and so much more content to be on the water than alone again for a night in the jungle, that I entertained no fears for present or future. I tried to think of any duties I owed to myself, which I ought in reason to perform, and then the obvious impossibility of doing anything at all made me smile.

It was still early evening when the rain ceased to fall. I laid out full length on the log, to see if I thought it safe as a position in which to sleep. It served to ease my joints directly, though I found it as a bed rather hard and lumpy. Sleep being about the last thing possible, I remained on my side, gazing absently at nothing, engaged in reviewing my own mental panorama of events. From time to time I dabbled my hand in the water, as I always had done when in a boat as a child. I was not so peaceful as this apparent mood of dalliance might imply, for my brain was painfully alert, both on the things already done since my memorable ballooning trip with Ford, and concerning what would happen on the morrow and the days, weeks and months to come.

In the midst of this business something gently “nosed” my fingers in the water. I jerked them away quickly enough to have startled anything alive out of all its wits, but nothing dived or swam away in alarm, so that after a minute I put my hand downward again and felt it come in contact with something which was touching against the log. Exultantly then I grasped this something and pulled it aboard.

It was simply my bow, which had floated down the stream, when I lost it by striking in the water, and which had drifted in the only current there was. In this current, of course, the log was also drifting, hence the coming together.

A feeling as if an old comrade had rejoined me made me joyous, as I held the weapon up to let it drip. Its return to my hand made me think of and feel for the arrows. Five were still in my quiver, and having been protected as they hung on my back, they were as good as ever, except for the wetness of the feathers. The string of the bow was flabby and useless. I held this friend in my hand for more than an hour, rubbing the wood with my palm till it felt as dry as an idol in a temple.

The night advanced. I sat down, lay down and then got up on my feet a dozen times. Once I fancied the log was drifting in toward the shore. With my hands I paddled it slowly away. The stars shone brilliantly at last, for the final cloud had disappeared from the sky. From the jungle issued sounds in plenty, repetitions of what I had heard before, but I thought myself secure and tried to catch a bit of sleep.

A night more long than that one on the lake I have never passed. It was made more interminable by the five-minute slumbers which came to my senses after midnight. I grew uncomfortably chilly. Two things happened before the morning finally dawned. The first was that weary nature asserted herself and I became lost in dreams of that horrible pair of ourang-outangs; the second was that a breeze sprang up and drifted my log where it listed.

I awoke with a start, for something struck the log such a blow that it lurched heavily and all but pitched me end-ways in the water. I sprang up, on my tossing craft, beholding myself less than quarter of a mile from the nearest shore and surrounded by the rings of a great ripple which something had evidently caused on the lake’s surface.

It was morning and already warm. My bow string was not only dry, but it had shrunk to nearly its old condition. The stream of water down which I had tumbled was neither in sight nor hearing. I began slowly to realise the truth; I had drifted almost entirely across the lake. I scanned the scenery on every side. There were jungle-covered hills in front, the same, but more distant, behind me, and again the same toward the North, where the shore was two miles away. To the South I saw familiar slopes and features of the mountains. This meant that I was looking on the lake as I had when at work on the boat. Plainly my boat and “home” then, were northward a goodly distance.

Suddenly, while I was looking about, the maker of all the recent disturbance appeared—an alligator. He was not very large, but black, hideous and actively concerned about the log. He must have overlooked me entirely to have struck such a blow, and then doubtless he had dived for safety. Now as he jutted up darkly, dividing the waters which rolled off his revolting head, his two little eyes gleamed with a look which made me think of my weapons in a hurry.

He came toward me cautiously, circling slowly about. There was nothing to do but to get an arrow in readiness, and then to wait, but I shuddered to think of a fight with such a powerful monster. The creature, I am convinced, thought me a larger one of the monkeys on which his kind were fond of dining. He presently headed straight for the log. Knowing he would dive in a moment I shot at him quickly. The arrow struck him just beneath the eye. It broke and glanced from the tough wet skin, but a splinter actually struck in his eye-ball and ruined his sight on that side of his head. He sank like a thing of iron. A second later the end of the log went heaving up and I was thrown violently off into the lake.

The log came down with a force that beat up a fountain of spray. I was struck on the foot by the half-blinded reptile as I struggled to get back to my place and out of his way. He began furiously to lash the water as he rammed about in a circle. Rising to the surface like a small living island, he turned upon me again and came ahead with all his speed, making me think of a deadly torpedo.

There was no time for arrow or bow, and the latter was gone again in the bargain, but it took me only half a second to rip out that ever-needed knife. Over we went, more abruptly than before, the water churning and boiling up in foam about my ears. He had calculated poorly and now he closed his awful jaws upon the jagged end of the log, not a foot from my shoulder. I jabbed at him frantically—stabbing at his other eye which suddenly popped fairly out of its socket as I pried and gouged with the end of the blade.

The beast raised a snorting noise at this, which made me ill with fear. With the power of a whale and the ferocity of a shark he whipped the water into froth and snapped his jaws in every direction. He was head on, side on and tail on, alternately, feeling for me and grinding pieces out of the log whenever he found it. He clawed me once and knocked me clean over the log with his tail a moment later. I stabbed at him wildly, but with no effect, a dozen times. I was nearly drowned and the creature seemed to be everywhere at once.

Had he been able to see me, my life could not have been saved by any chance, in such a whirlpool of wrathful attacking. I was nearly blinded by the spray which flew from the waves. The log, which was pitching madly, with a force only second to the creature’s own, arose abruptly from a plunge and, like a lever, pried the alligator fairly over on his back and threw me almost upon him.

I stabbed him twice in the belly, the last blow tearing a deep, wide hole, as he rolled to right himself, and then to my great astonishment he dived like a porpoise. I lost not a second in getting on top of the log. But the water grew calm and a deep red dye came floating up, to weave a strange device in the ripples.

Breathlessly I waited, for a time that seemed endless. Cautiously I drew in my bow, which was floating near. At last there came a small commotion fifteen feet away. The alligator rose, fought a second with the foe which is Death, and sank again from sight. I believed then that my knife had reached his heart.

Up to this moment I had taken not so much as a glance toward the shore. I did so now and discovered myself to be something like fifty yards off. The breeze had drifted me rapidly while the fight was being waged. Looking hurriedly about, I saw a rude sort of path, leading into the jungle from the shore, made through the growth, which all along was so thick that I could see no beach in either direction. At the same moment I beheld another huge alligator some distance away, up toward a jutting point of land.

It took me about an instant to decide that I had experienced all the alligator tactics I needed. Quietly pushing my bow downward, to sound the water’s depth, I was surprised and glad to have it strike bottom at three feet only. Using it then to pole myself and the log forward, I headed for the trail on shore.

The alligator saw me before I had gone ten feet. He started, full steam ahead, to overhaul my craft. I worked like a maniac; the monster was closing up the gap between us with alarming rapidity. My raft was heavy and deep in the water. Nearer, nearer I drew to the shore, and terribly nearer came the fierce and hungry saurian.

I had twenty yards, fifteen, ten to make; the creature was hardly more than five away. In a second he would strike the log. Leaping madly into the water I dashed to the bank and bounded up a slippery way, less than six good feet from the creature’s snout.

Knowing I could beat him on the land, I dashed along full speed. Forty feet up—Lord save me!—it seemed as if the woods were full of the monsters, several of which moved sluggishly as they heard me coming. These got no chance to be dangerous, for I ran the gauntlet between them almost before they were awake. In five minutes more I was clear of the marshy border of the lake and up on higher ground. Here a large tree, twined in a thousand folds of the creepers, offered an easy retreat. I climbed up among its branches and finding a natural seat, where my back was supported by the extra growth, sat down, weak and winded.