Classic Audiobook Collection - The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs ~ Full Audiobook [adventure]

Starting point is 00:00:00 The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. Part 1 Chapter 1 New of the Neocene New the Son of New, his mighty muscles rolling beneath his smooth, bronzed skin, moved silently through the jungle, primeval. His handsome head, with its shock of black hair,

Starting point is 00:00:24 roughly cropped between sharpened stones, was high-held. The delicate nostrils questioned. each vagrant breeze for word of O, hunter of men. Now his trained senses catch the familiar odor of Tah, the great woolly rhinoceros, directly in his path. But New, the son of Noo, does not hunt Tah this day. Does not the hide of Tah's brother already hang before the entrance of New's cave? No. Today, New hunts the gigantic cat, the fierce saber-toothed tiger, U, for Natul, wondrous daughter of old Tha, will mate with none but the mightiest of hunters.

Starting point is 00:01:07 Only so recently as the last darkness, as beneath the great equatorial moon the two had walked hand in hand beside the restless sea, she had made it quite plain to Nhu the son of Niu, that not even he, son of the chief of chiefs, could claim her, unless there hung at the thong of his loincloth the fangs of U. Natul, she had said to him, wishes her man to be greater than other men. She loves noon now better than her very life, but if love is to walk at her side during a long life, pride and respect must walk with it. Her slender hand reached up to stroke the young man's black hair.

Starting point is 00:01:48 I am very proud of my new even now, she continued. For among all the young men of the tribe, there is no great, hunter, or no mightier fighter than Noo the Son of New. Should you, single-handed, slay U before a grown man's beard has darkened your cheek, there will be none greater in all the world than Natu's mate, New, the son of New. The young man was still sensible to the sound of her soft voice and the caress of her gentle touch upon his brow. As these things had sent him speeding forth into the savage jungle in search of

Starting point is 00:02:25 while the day was still so young that the night-prouling beasts of prey were yet abroad, so they urged him forward deeper and deeper into the dark and trackless mazes of the tangled forest. As he forged on, the scent of Ta became stronger, until at last the huge, ungaining beast loomed large before New's eyes. He was standing in a little clearing, in deep rank jungle grasses, and had he not been head on toward New, He would not have seen him, since even his acute hearing was far too dull to apprehend the noiseless tread of the caveman, moving lightly upwind. As the tiny bloodshot eyes of the primordial beast discovered the man, the great head went down,

Starting point is 00:03:11 and ta, ill-natured and bellicose progenitor of the equally ill-natured and bellicose rhino of the twentieth century, charged the lithe giant who had disturbed his antediluvian meditation. The creature's great bulk and awkward, uncouth lines, belied his speed, for he tore down upon new with all the swiftness of a thoroughbred, and had not the brain and muscle of the troglodyte been fitted by heritage and training to the successful meeting of such emergencies, there would be no tale to tell to-day of New of the niacene. But the young man was prepared, and turning he ran with the swiftness of a hair toward the nearest tree, a huge, arboracious fern towering upon the verge of the little clearing.

Starting point is 00:03:56 Like a cat, the man ran up the perpendicular bowl, his hands and feet seeming barely to touch the projecting knobs marking the remains of former fronds, which converted the towering stem into an easy stairway for such as he. About Noosneck, his stone-tipped spear hung by its rawhide thong down his back, while stone hatchet and stone knife dangled from his g-string, giving him free use of his hands for climbing. You or I, having once gained the seeming safety of the lowest fronds of the great tree, fifty feet above the ground, might have heaved a great sigh of relief that we had thus easily escaped the hideous monster beneath, but not so knew, who was wise to the ways of the

Starting point is 00:04:41 creatures of his remote age. Not one wit did he abate his speed as he near the lowest branch, nor did he even waste a precious second in a downward glance at his enemy. What need indeed? Did he not know precisely what Ta would do? Instead, he swung monkey-like to the broad leaf, and though the chances he took would have paled the face of a brave man today, they did not cause New even to hesitate. As he ran lightly and swiftly along the bending, swaying frond, leaping just at the right instant toward the bowl of a nearby jungle giant. Nor was he an instant too soon. The frond from which he had sprung had scarce whipped up from beneath his weight when ta, with all the force and momentum of a runaway locomotive,

Starting point is 00:05:31 struck the base of the tree head on. The jar of that terrific collision shook the earth. There was the sound of the splintering of wood, and the mighty tree toppled to the ground with a deafening crash. Noe, from an adjoining tree, looked down and grinned. He was not hunting ta that day, and so he sprang from tree to tree until he had passed around the clearing, and then, coming to the surface once more, continued his way toward the distant lava cliffs, where O the manhunter, made his grim lair. From among the tangled creepers, the which the man wormed his sinuous way, ugly little eyes peered down upon him from beneath shaggy, beetling brows, and great fighting tusks were bared as the hairy ones growled and threatened from above.

Starting point is 00:06:23 But New paid not the slightest attention to the huge, ferocious creatures that menaced him upon every hand. From earliest childhood he had been accustomed to the jabberings and scoldings of the ape people, and so he knew that if he went his way in peace, harming them not, they would offer him no harm. One of lesser experience might have attempted to drive them away with menacing spear, or well-aimed hatchet, and thus have drawn down upon him a half-dozen or more ferocious bulls against which no single warrior, however doughty, might have lived long enough to count his

Starting point is 00:06:59 antagonists. Threatening and unfriendly as the apes seemed, the caveman really looked upon them as friends and allies, since between them and his own people, there existed a species of friendly alliance, due no doubt to the similarity of their form and structure. In that long-gone age, when the world was young and its broad bosom teamed with countless thousands of carnivorous beasts and reptiles, and other myriads blackened the bosoms of its inland seas, and filled its warm, moist air with the flutter of their mighty bat-like wings, man's battle for survival stretched from sun to sun. There was no rest of the rest of the world. There was no

Starting point is 00:07:39 respite. His semi-oboreal habits took him often into the domains of the great and lesser apes, and from this contact had arisen what might best be termed an armed truce, for they alone of all the other inhabitants of the earth had spoken languages, both meager it is true, yet sufficient to their primitive wants, and as both languages have been born of the same needs to deal with identical conditions, there were many words and phrases identical to both. Thus, the troglodyte and the primordial ape could converse when necessity demanded, and as new traversed their country, he understood their grumbling and chattering, merely as warnings to him against the performance of any overt act.

Starting point is 00:08:25 Had danger lurked in his path, the hairy ones would have warned him of that too, for of such was their service to man, who in return often hunted the more remorseless of their enemies, driving them from the land of the anthropoids. On and on went new, occasionally questioning the hairy ones he encountered for word of ooh. And always the replies confirmed him in his belief that he should come upon the man-eater before the sun crawled into its dark cave for the night. And so he did. He had passed out of the heavier vegetation, and was ascending a gentle rise that terminated in low volcanic cliffs, when there came adown upon the breeze to his alert nostrils, the strong

Starting point is 00:09:11 scent of oo. There was little or no cover now, other than the rank jungle grass that overgrew the slope, and an occasional lofty fern rearing its tufted pinnacle a hundred feet above the ground, but New was in no way desirous of cover. Cover that would protect him from the view of Wu would hide Wu from him. He was not afraid that the saber-toothed tiger would run away from him. That was not U's way. But he did not wish to come unexpectedly upon the animal in the thick grass. He had approached to within a hundred yards of the cliffs now, and the scent of U had become as a stench in the sensitive nostrils of the caveman. Just ahead he could see the openings

Starting point is 00:09:57 to several caves in the face of the rocky barrier, and in one of these he knew must lie the lair of his quarry. Fifty yards from the cliff the grasses ceased, except for scattered tufts that had found foothold among the broken rocks that strewed the ground. And as New emerged into this clear space, he breathed a sigh of relief, for during the past fifty yards a considerable portion of the way had been through a matted jungle that rose above his head. To have met ooh there would, would have spelled almost certain death for the caveman. Now, as he bent his eyes toward the nearby cave cave mouths, he discovered one before which was strewn such an array of gigantic bones that he needed no other evidence as to the identity of its occupant. Here, indeed, laird no lesser creature than the

Starting point is 00:10:49 awesome oo, the gigantic saber-toothed tiger of antiquity. Even as new looked, there came a low and ominous growl from the dark mouth of the foul cavern, and then, in the blackness beyond the entrance, New saw two flaming blotches of yellow glaring out upon him. A moment later, the mighty beast itself sauntered majestically into the sunlight. There it stood, lashing its long tail from side to side, glaring with unblinking eyes straight at the rash man-thing, who dared venture thus near its abode of death. The huge body, fully as large as that of a full-grown bull, was beautifully marked with black stripes upon a vivid yellow ground, while the belly and breast were of the purest white. As new advanced, the great upper lip curled back, revealing in all their terrible ferocity,

Starting point is 00:11:44 the eighteen-inch curved fangs that armed either side of the upper jaw. And from the cavernous throat came a fearsome scream of rage that brought frightened silence upon the jungle for miles around. The hunter loosened the stone knife at his G-string and transferred it to his mouth where he held it firmly, ready for instant use, between his strong white teeth. In his left hand, he carried his stone-tipped spear, and in his right the heavy stone hatchet that was so effective both at a distance and at close range. Ooo is creeping upon him now. The grinning jaws drip saliva. The yellow-green eyes gleam bloodthirstyly. Can it be possible that this fragile pygmy dreams of meeting in hand-to-hand combat, the terror of a world,

Starting point is 00:12:37 the scourge of the jungle, the hunter of men and of mammoths? For Nat Oll, murmured new, for U was about to spring. As the mighty hurtling mass of bone and muscle, claws and fangs, shot through the air toward him, the man swung his tiny stone hatchet with all the power behind his giant muscles, timing its release so nicely

Starting point is 00:13:02 that it caught U in mid-leap squarely between the eyes with the terrific force of a powder-sped projectile. Then Ngued, cat-like as U himself, leaped agilely to one side, as the huge bulk of the beast dashed, sprawling to the ground at the spot where the man had stood. Scarce had the beast struck the earth, then the caveman, knowing that his puny weapon could at best but momentarily stun the monster, drove his heavy spear deep into the glossy side just behind the giant shoulder. Already, Ooo has regained his feet, roaring and screaming and pain and rage.

Starting point is 00:13:41 The air vibrates, and the earth trembles to his hideous shape. shrieks. For miles around, the savage denizens of the savage jungle bristle in terror, slinking further into the depths of their dank and gloomy haunts, casting the wild affrighted glances rearward in the direction of that awesome sound. With gaping jaws and widespread talons, the tiger lunges towards its rash tormentor who still stands gripping the haft of his primitive weapon. As the beast turns, the spear turns also, and new is will bea, and new is will about as a leaf at the extremity of a gale-tossed branch. Striking and cavorting futilely, the colossal feline leaps hither and thither in prodigious bounds

Starting point is 00:14:25 as he strives to reach the taunting figure that remains ever just beyond the zone of those destroying talons. But presently, oo goes more slowly, and now he stops and crouches flat upon his belly. Slowly and cautiously, he reaches outward and backward with one huge paw until the torturing spear is within his grasp. Meanwhile, the man screams taunts and insults into the face of his enemy, at the same time forcing the spear further and further into the vitals of the tiger, for he knows that once the paw encircles the spears halved, his chances for survival will be of the slenderest. He has seen that Ooo is weakening from the loss of blood, but there are many fighting minutes left in the big carcass unless a happy twist of the spear sends its point

Starting point is 00:15:16 through the wall of the great heart. But at length the beast succeeds. The paw closes upon the spear. The tough wood bends beneath the weight of those steel fuse, then snaps short a foot from the tiger's body, and at the same instant, O' rears and throws himself upon the top of the same thing. Hew rears and throws himself upon the youth, who has snatched his stone-hunting-knife from between his teeth and crouches ready for the impact. Down they go, the man entirely buried beneath the great body of his antagonist. Again and again, the crude knife is buried in the snowy breast of the tiger, even while new is falling beneath the screaming, tearing incarnation of bestial rage.

Starting point is 00:15:59 At the instant, it strikes the man as strange that not once have the sun, snapping jaws or frightful talents touched him, and then he is crushed to earth beneath the dead weight of O. The beast gives one last titanic struggle, and is still. With difficulty, new wriggles from beneath the carcass of his kill. At the last moment, the tiger itself had forced the spear's point into its own heart, as it bent and broke the haft. The man leaps to his feet and cuts the great throat. Then, as the blood flows, he dances about the dead body of his vanquished foe, brandishing his knife and recovered hatchet, and emitting now shrill shrieks in mimicry of oo, and now deep-toned roars, the call of the victorious caveman.

Starting point is 00:16:52 From the surrounding cliffs and jungle came answering challenges from a hundred savage throats, the rumbling thunder of the cave bears growl, the roar of Zor, the lion, the wail of the hyena, the trumpeting of the mammoth, the deep-toned bellowing of the bulbose, and from distant swamp and sea came the hissing and whistling of Sarians and amphibians. His victory dance completed, Newbisied himself in the removal of the broken spear from the carcass of his kill. At the same time, he removed several strong tendons from ooze, forearm, with which he roughly spliced the broken haft, for there was never an instant in the danger-fraud existence of his kind when it was well to be without the service of a stone-tipped spear.

Starting point is 00:17:41 This precaution taken, the man busied himself with the task of cutting off Ooo's head, that he might bear it in triumph to the cave of his love. With stone hatchet and knife he hacked and hewed for the better part of half an hour, until at last he, he had. he raised the dripping trophy above his head. As leaping high in air, he screamed once more the gloating challenge of the victor, that all the world might know that there was no greater hunter than knew the son of New. Even as the last note of his fierce cry rolled through the heavy, humid, superheated air of the niacine, there came a sudden hush upon the face of the world. A strange darkness obscured the swollen sun. The ground trembled and,

Starting point is 00:18:27 shook. Deep rumblings muttered upward from the bowels of the young earth, and answering grumblings thundered down from the firmament above. The startled troglodyte looked quickly in every direction, searching for the great beast who could thus cause the whole land to tremble and cry out in fear, and the heavens above to moan, and the sun to hide itself in terror. In every direction he saw frightened beasts and birds and flying reptiles scurring in panic-stricken terror in search of hiding places, and moved by the same primitive instinct, the young giant grabbed up his weapons and his trophy, and ran like an antelope for the sheltering darkness of the cave of Ooo. Scarcely had he reached the fancied safety of the interior

Starting point is 00:19:15 when the earth's crust crumpled and rocked. There was a sickening sensation of sudden sinking, and amidst the awful roar and thunder of rending rock, the cavemouth closed, and in the impenetrable darkness of his living tomb, knew the son of new, new of the niacene, lost consciousness. That was a hundred thousand years ago. End of Section 1. Section 2 of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 00:19:56 Chapter 2. The Earthquake To have looked at her merely, you would never have thought Victoria Custer of Beatrice Nebraska at all the sort of girl she really was. Her large, dreamy eyes and the graceful lines of her slender figure, gave one an impression of that physical cowardice, which we have grown to take for granted as an inherent characteristic of the truly womanly woman. And yet, I dare say, there were only two. two things on God's green earth that Victoria Custer feared, or beneath it or above it, for that matter, mice and earthquakes. She readily admitted the deadly terror which the former aroused within her,

Starting point is 00:20:41 but of earthquakes she seldom, if ever, would speak. To her brother Barney, her chum and confidant, she had on one or two occasions unburdened her soul. The two were guests now of Lord and Lady Greystoke, upon the Englishman's vast estate in equatorial Africa, in the country of the Waziri, to which Barney Custer had come to haunt big game, and forget. But all that has nothing to do with this story. Nor has John Clayton, Lord Greystoke, who was, once upon a time, Tarzan of the Apes, except that my having chance to be a guest of his at the same time as the Custer's, makes it possible for me to give you a story that otherwise might never have been a... told. South of Uziuri, the country of the Waziri, lies a chain of rugged mountains at the foot of which

Starting point is 00:21:34 stretches a broad plain, where antelope, zebra, giraffe, rhinos, and elephant abound. And here are lion and leopard and hyena praying, each after his own fashion upon the sleek, fat herds of antelope, zebra, and giraffe. Here, too, are buffalo, irritable savage beasts, more formidable than the lion himself, Clayton says. It is indeed a hunter's paradise, and scarce a day passed that did not find a party absent from the low rambling bungalow of the Greystokes in search of game and adventure, nor seldom was it that Victoria Custer failed to be of the party. Already she had bagged two leopards, in addition to numerous antelope and zebra,

Starting point is 00:22:20 and on foot had faced a bull buffalo's charge, bringing him down with a perfect shot within ten paces of where she stood. At first she had kept her brother in a state bordering a nervous collapse, for the risks she took were such as few men would care to undertake. But after he had discovered that she possessed perfect coolness in the face of danger, and that the accuracy of her aim was so almost uncanny as to ring unstinted praise from the oldest hunters among them, he commenced to lean a trifle too far in the other direction,

Starting point is 00:22:57 so that Victoria was often in positions where she found herself entirely separated from the other members of the party, a compliment to her prowess which she greatly prized, since women and beginners were usually surrounded by precautions and guards, the which it was difficult to get within firing distance of any sort of game. As they were riding homeward one evening after a hunt in the foothills, Barney noticed that his sister was unusually quiet and apparently depressed. "'What's the matter, Vic?' he asked.

Starting point is 00:23:31 "'Dead tired, eh?' The girl looked up with a bright smile, which was immediately followed by an expression of puzzled bewilderment. "'Barnie,' she said after a moment of silence, "'there is something about those hills back there that fills me with the strangest sensation of terror imaginable. Today I passed an outcropping of volcanic rock that gave evidence of a frightful convulsion of nature in some bygone age. At sight of it I commenced to tremble from head to foot, a cold perspiration breaking out all over me.

Starting point is 00:24:07 But that part is not so strange. You know I have always been subject to these same silly attacks of unreasoning terror at any sight of any evidence of the mighty forces that have wrought changes in the earth's crust, or of the slightest tremor of an earthquake. But today, the feeling of unhonorable personable loss which overwhelmed me was almost unbearable. It was as though one whom I loved above all others had been taken from me. And yet, she continued, through all my inexplicable sorrow, there shone a ray of brilliant hope,

Starting point is 00:24:42 as remarkable and unfathomable as the deeper and depressing emotion which still stirred me. For some time neither spoke, but rode silently stirrup to stirrup as their ponies picked their ways daintily through the knee-high grass. The girl was thinking, trying to puzzle out an explanation of the rather weird sensations which had so recently claimed her. Barney Custer was one of those unusual and delightful people who do not scoff at whatever they cannot understand. the reason, doubtless, that his sister, as well as others, chose him as the recipient of their confidences. Not understanding her emotion, he had nothing to offer, and so remained silent. He was, however, not a little puzzled, as he had always been at each new manifestation,

Starting point is 00:25:34 a Victoria's uncanny reaction to every indication of the great upheavals, which marked the physical changes in the conformation of the earth's crust. He recalled former occasions upon which his sister had confided in him something of similar terrors. Once in the Garden of the Gods, and again during a trip through the Grand Canyon in Arizona. And very vivid indeed was the recollection of victorious nervous collapse following the reading of the press dispatches describing the San Francisco earthquake. In all other respects, his sister was an exceptionally normal, well-balanced young American woman, which fact doubtless rendered her one weakness the more apparent.

Starting point is 00:26:20 But Victoria Custer's terror of earthquakes was not her only peculiarity. The other was her strange contempt for the men who had sued for her hand, and these had been many. Her brother had thought several of them the salt of the earth, and Victoria had liked them too, but as for loving them, perished the thought. Oddly enough, recollection of this other phase of her character obtruded itself upon Barney's memory, as the two rode on toward the Clayton bungalow, and with it he recalled a persistent dream which Victoria had said recurred after each reminder of a great convulsion of nature.

Starting point is 00:27:03 At the thought, he broke the silence. "'Has your—' "'Avatar made his customary appearance?' he asked, smiling. The girl extended her hand toward her brother and laid it on his where it rested upon his thigh as he rode, looking up at him with half-frightened, half-longing eyes. "'Oh, Barney!' she cried. "'You were such a dear, never to have laughed at my silly dreams. "'I'm sure I should go quite mad did I not have you in whom to confide.

Starting point is 00:27:37 "'But lately I have hesitated to speak of it even to you. "'He has been coming so often. Every night since we first hunted in the vicinity of the hills, I have walked hand in hand with him beneath a great equatorial moon beside a restless sea, and more clearly than ever in the past have I seen his form and features. He is very handsome, Barney, and very tall and strong and clean-limbed. I wish that I might meet such a man in real life. I know it is a ridiculous thing to say, but I can never love any of the pusillanimous weaklings who are forever falling in love with me, not after having walked hand in hand with such as he, and read the love in his clear eyes.

Starting point is 00:28:23 And yet, Barney, I am afraid of him. Is it not odd? At this juncture they were joined by other members of the party, so that no further reference to the subject was made by either. At the Clayton's they found that an addition had been made to the number of guests, by the unheralded advent of two khaki-clad young men, one of whom rose and came forward to meet the returning hunters while they were yet a hundred yards away. He was a tall, athletic-appearing man.

Starting point is 00:28:55 As Victoria Custer recognized his features, she did not know whether to be pleased or angry. Here was the one man she had ever met who came nearest to the realization of her dream man, and this one of all the others had never spoken a word of love, to her. His companion, who had now risen from the cool shade of the low veranda, was also coming forward, but more slowly the set of his shoulders and the swing of his stride betokening his military vocation. "'Mr. Curtis!' exclaimed Victoria, and looking past him,

Starting point is 00:29:29 "'and Lieutenant Butzow, where in the world did you come from?' "'The world left us,' replied the officer, smiling, "'and we have followed her to the wilds of equatorial African.' We found Nebraska a very tame place after you and Barney left, explained to Mr. Curtis, and when I discovered that Butsa out would accompany me, we lost no time in following you, and here we are throwing ourselves upon the mercy and hospitality of Lady Greystoke. I have been trying to convince them, said that lady, who had now joined the party at the foot of the veranda steps, that the obligation is all upon our side. It taxed.

Starting point is 00:30:11 is our ingenuity and the generosity of our friends to keep the house even half full of congenial companions. It was not until after dinner that night that Mr. William Curtis had an opportunity to draw Miss Victoria Custer away from the others upon some more or less hazy pretext, that he might explain for her ears alone just why he had suddenly found Beatrice Nebraska such a desolate place, and had realized that it was imperative to the salvation of his life and happiness, that he travel halfway around the world in search of a certain slender bit of femininity. This usually self-possessed young man stammered and hesitated like a bashful schoolboy, speaking his Friday afternoon peace. But finally, he managed to expel from his system,

Starting point is 00:31:02 more or less coherently, the fact that he was very much in love with Victoria Custer, that he should never again eat or sleep until she had promised to be his wife. There was a strong appeal to the girl in the masterful thing the man had done in searching her out in the wilds of Africa to tell her of his love, for it seemed that he and Butzal had forced their way with but a handful of carriers through a very savage section of the savage jungle, because it was the shortest route from the coast to the Greystoke Ranch. Then there was that about him which appealed to the same attribute of her nature, to which the young giant of her dreams appealed. A primitive strength and masterfulness that left her both

Starting point is 00:31:48 frightened and happily helpless in the presence of both these strong loves. For the love of her dream man was to Victoria Custer, a real and living love. Curtis saw a scent in the silence which followed his outbreak, and taking advantage of this tacit encouragement, he seized her hands in his and drew her toward him. "'Oh, Victoria!' he whispered. "'I whispered. Tell me that thing I wish to hear from your dear lips. Tell me that even a tenth part of my love is returned, and I shall be happy.' She looked up into his eyes, shining down upon her in the moonlight, and her lips trembled and avowal of the love she honestly believed she could at last

Starting point is 00:32:31 bestow upon the man of her choice. In the past few moments she had thrashed out the question of that other, unreal and intangible love that held her chain to a dream for years, And in the cold light of twentieth-century American rationality, she found it possible to put her hallucinations from her, and find happiness in the love of this very real and very earnest young man. "'Billy?' she said. "'Aye.'

Starting point is 00:33:02 But she got no further. Even as the words that would have bound her to him were forming upon her tongue, there came a low, sullen rumbling from the bowels of the earth. The ground rose and fell beneath them, as the sweat. well of the sea rises and falls. Then there came a violent trembling and shaking, and a final deafening crash in the distance that might have accompanied the birth of mountain ranges. With a little moan of terror, the girl drew away from Curtis, and then, before he could restrain her, she had turned and fled toward the bungalow. At the veranda steps, she was met by the other

Starting point is 00:33:40 members of the house party, and by the Grey Stokes and numerous servants who had rushed out at the first premonition of the coming shock. Barney Custer saw his sister running toward the house, and knowing her terror of such phenomena ran to meet her. Close behind her came Curtis, just in time to see the girl swoon in her brother's arms. Barney carried her to her room, where Lady Greystoke, abandoning the youthful Jack to his black mammy Esmeralda, ministered to her. End of Section 2.

Starting point is 00:34:20 Section 3. of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 3. New the Sleeper Awakes The shock that had been felt so plainly in the valley had been much more severe in the mountains to the south. In one place, an overhanging cliff had split and fallen away from the face of the mountain,

Starting point is 00:34:48 bumbling with a mighty roar into the valley below. As it hurtled down the mountainside, the moonlight shining upon the fresh scar that it had left behind it upon the hill's face, reveal the mouth of a gloomy cave, from which there tumble the inert figure of an animal, which rolled down the steep declivity in the wake of the mass of rock that had preceded it, the tearing away of which had opened up the cavern in which it had lain. For a hundred feet, perhaps, the body rolled, coming to a stop upon a broad ledge. For some time it lay perfectly motionless, but at last a feeble movement of the limbs was discernible. Then for another long period it was quiet. Minutes dragged into hours, and still the lonely thing lay upon the mountainside.

Starting point is 00:35:37 While upon the plain below it, hungry lions moaned and roared, and all the teeming life of the savage wilds took up their search for food, their sleeping and their love-making where they had dropped them in the fright of the earthquake. At last, the stars paled and the eastern horizon glowed to a new day, and then the thing upon the ledge sat up. It was a man. Still, partially dazed, he drew his hand across his eyes and looked about him in bewilderment. Then, staggering a little, he rose to his feet, and as he came erect, the new sun shining on his bronze limbs and his shock of black hair, roughly cropped between sharpened stones, his youth and beauty became startlingly apparent.

Starting point is 00:36:23 He looked about him upon the ground, and not finding that which he sought, turned his eyes upward toward the mountain, until they fell upon the cave-mouth he had just quitted so precipitately. Quickly he clambered back to the cavern, his stone hatchet and knife beating against his bare hips as he climbed. For a moment he was lost to view within the cave, but presently he emerged, in one hand a stone-tipped spear, which seemed recently to have been broken and roughly spliced with raw tendons.

Starting point is 00:36:57 And in the other, the severed head of an enormous beast, which more nearly resembled the Royal Tiger of Asia than it did any other beast, though that resemblance was little closer than is the resemblance of the Royal Bengal to a house kitten. The young man was new, the son of New. For a hundred thousand years he had lain hermetically sealed in his rocky tomb, as toads remain in suspended animation for similar periods of time. The earthquake had unsealed his sepulchre, and the rough tumble down the mountainside had induced respiration. His heart had responded to the pumping of his lungs, and simultaneously the other organs of his body had taken up their various functions as though they had never

Starting point is 00:37:42 ceased functioning. As he stood upon the threshold of the cave of U, the man-hunter, the look of bewilderment grew upon his features as his eyes roved over the panorama of the unfamiliar world which lay spread below him. There was scarce an object to remind him of the world that had been but a brief instant before, for New could not know that ages had rolled by since he took hasty refuge in the lair of the great beast he had slain.

Starting point is 00:38:11 He thought that he might be dreaming, and so he rubbed his eyes and looked again. But still he saw the unfamiliar trees and bushes about him, and further down in the valley the odd-appearing vegetation of the jungle. Noo could not fathom the mystery of it. Slowly he stepped from the cave and began the descent toward the valley, for he was very thirsty and very hungry. Below him he saw animals grazing upon him. the broad plain, but even at that distance, he realized that they were such as no mortal eye

Starting point is 00:38:47 had ever before rested upon. Wharily, he advanced, every sense alert against whatever new form of danger might lurk in this strange new world. Had he had any conception of a life after death, he would doubtless have felt assured that the earthquake had killed him, and that he was now wandering through the heavenly veil. But the man of newsage had not yet conceived. any sort of religion, other than a vague fear of certain natural phenomena, such as storms and earthquakes, the movements of the sun and moon, and those familiar happenings which first awake the questionings of the primitive. He saw the sun, but to him it was a different sun from the great, swollen orb that had shone through the thick, humid atmosphere of the

Starting point is 00:39:34 niacene. From Uzlear only the day before, he had been able to see in the distance the shimmering surface of the restless sea. But now, as far as I could reach, there stretched an interminable jungle of gently waving treetops, except for the rolling plain at his feet where yesterday the black jungle of the ape people had reared its lofty fronds. New shook his head. It was all quite beyond him. But there were certain things which he could comprehend. And so, after the manner of the self-reliant, he set about to rest his livelihood from nature under the new conditions which had been imposed upon him while he slept. First of all, his spear must be attended to. It would never do to trust to that crude patch longer than it would take him to find and fit a new haft. His meat must wait until that thing was

Starting point is 00:40:31 accomplished. In the meantime, he might pick up what fruit was available in the forest toward which he was bending his steps, in search of a long straight shoot of the hardwood which alone would meet his requirements. In the days that had been news, there had grown in isolated patches a few lone clumps of very straight hardwood trees. The smaller of these, the men of the tribe would cut down and split lengthways with stone wedges, until from a single tree they might have produced material for a score or more spear-shafts. But now, New must see the very smallest of saplings, for he had no time to waste in splitting a larger tree,

Starting point is 00:41:13 even had he had the necessary wedges and hammers. Forest the youth crept, for though a hundred thousand years had elapsed since his birth, he was still to all intent and purpose a youth. Upon all sides he saw strange and wonderful trees, the likes of which had never been in the forests of yesterday. The growths were not so luxuriant or prodigious, but for the most part the trees offered suggestions of alluring possibilities

Starting point is 00:41:42 to the semi-arborial new, for the branches were much heavier and more solid than those of the great tree-furns of his own epoch, and commenced much nearer the ground. Cat-like, he leaped into the lower branches of them, revelling in the ease with which he could travel from tree to tree. Gay-colored birds of strange appearance screamed and scolded at him. Little monkeys hurried, chattering from his path. New laughed. What a quaint, diminutive world it was indeed. Nowhere had he yet seen a tree or creature that might compare in size to the monsters

Starting point is 00:42:19 among which he had traveled the preceding day. The fruits, too, were small and strange. He scarcely dared venture to eat of them, lest they be poisonous. If the lesser ape-folk would only let him come close enough to speak with them, he might ascertain from them which were safe. But, for some unaccountable reason, they seemed to fear and mistrust him. This, above all other considerations, argued to knew that he had come in some mysterious way into another world.

Starting point is 00:42:50 Presently, the troglodyte discovered a slender, straight young sapling. He came to the ground and tested its strength by bending it back and forth. Apparently, it met the requirements of a new shaft. With his stone hatchet, he hewed it off close to the ground, stripped it of branches, and climbing to the safety of the trees again, where he need fear no interruption from the huge monsters of the world he knew, set to work with his stone knife to remove the bark and shape the end to receive his spearhead. First, he split it down the center for four or five inches,

Starting point is 00:43:25 and then he cut notches in the surface upon the surface upon the rock. either side of the split portion. Now he carefully unwraps the rawhide that binds the spur head into his old shaft, and for one of water to moisten it crams the whole unfragrant mass into his mouth, that it may be softened by warmth and saliva. For several minutes he busies himself in shaping the point of the new shaft, that it may exactly fit the inequalities of the shank of the spearhead. By the time this is done, the rawhite has been sufficiently moistened to permit. him to wind it tightly about the new haft, into which he has set the spearhead. As he works, he hears the noises of the jungle about him.

Starting point is 00:44:09 There are many familiar voices, but more strange ones. Not once has the cave bear spoken, nor Zor the mighty lion of the niacene, nor oo the saber-tooth tiger. He misses the bellowing of the bulbose and the hissing and whistling of monster Sarian and amphibian. To new it seems a silent world. Propped against the bolt of the tree before him, grins the hideous head of the man-hunter, the only familiar object in all this strange, curiously changed world about him.

Starting point is 00:44:44 Presently, he becomes aware that the lesser apes are creeping warily closer to have a better look at him. He waits silently, until from the tail of his eye, he glimpses one quite near, and then, in a low voice, he speaks in the language that his allies of yesterday understood, and though ages have elapsed since that long-gone day, the little monkey above him understood, for the language of the apes can never change. Why do you fear new, the son of new? asked the man.

Starting point is 00:45:17 When has he ever harmed the ape people? The hairless ones kill us with sharp sticks that fly through the air, replied the monkey, or with little sticks that make a great noise and kill us from afar. But you seem not to be of these. We have never seen one like you until now. Do you not wish to kill us? Why should I? replied New. It is better that we be friends.

Starting point is 00:45:44 All that I wish of you is that you tell me which of the fruits that grow here be safe for me to eat, and then direct me to the sea beside which dwell the tribe of Nuh my father. The monkeys had gathered in force by this time, seeing that the strange white ape offered no harm to their fellows, and when they learned his wants, they scampered about in all directions to gather nuts and fruits and berries for him. It is true that some of them forgot what they had intended doing before the task was half completed, and ended by pulling one another's tails and frolicking among the higher branches, or else ate the fruit they had gone to gather for their new friend.

Starting point is 00:46:25 But a few there were with greater powers of concentration than their fellows, who returned with fruit and berries and caterpillars, all of which New devoured with the avidity of the half famished. Of the whereabouts of the tribe of his father, they could tell him nothing, for they had never heard of such a people, or of the great sea beside which he told them that his people dwelt. His breakfast finished and his spear repaired, New set out toward the plain to bring down one of the bees

Starting point is 00:46:55 he had seen grazing there, for his stomach called aloud for flesh. Fruit and bugs might be all right for children and ape people, but a full-grown man must have meat, warm and red and dripping. Closest to him as he emerged from the jungle, browsed a small herd of zebra. They were directly upwind, and between him and them were patches of tall grass and clumps of trees scattered about the surface of the plain.

Starting point is 00:47:23 New wondered at the strange beasts, admiring their gaudy markings as he came closer to them. Upon the edge of the herd nearest him, a plump stallion stood switching his tail against the annoying flies, occasionally raising his head from his feeding to search the horizon for signs of danger, sniffing the air for the tell-tale scent of an enemy. It was he that knew selected for his prey.

Starting point is 00:47:50 Stealthily, the caveman crept through the tall grass, scarce a blade moving to the sinuous advance of his sleek body. Within fifty feet of the zebra, news stopped, for the stallion was giving evidence of restlessness, as though sensing intuitively the near approach of a foe he could neither see nor hear nor smell. The man, still prone upon his belly, drew his spear into the throwing grasp.

Starting point is 00:48:17 With utmost caution he warmed his legs beneath him, and then, like lightning, and all with a single, movement, he leaped to his feet and cast the stone-tipped weapon at his quarry. With a snort of terror, the stelling reared to plunge away, but the spear had found the point behind his shoulder, even as he saw the figure of the man arise from the tall grasses, and as the balance of the herd galloped madly off, their leader pitched headlong to the earth. New ran forward with a ready knife, but the animal was dead before he reached its side. The great spear had passed through its heart, and with the little bit of the earth. And we had,

Starting point is 00:48:53 protruding upon the opposite side of the body. The man removed the weapon, and with his knife cut several long strips of meat from the plump haunches. Ever in anon he raised his head to scan the plain and jungle for evidences of danger, sniffing the breeze just as had the stallion he had killed. His work was but partially completed when he caught the scent of a man yet a long way off. He knew that he could not be mistaken, yet never had he had he. scent so strange an odor. There were men coming, he knew, but of the other odors that accompanied them he could make nothing, for khaki and guns and sweaty saddle blankets and the stench of

Starting point is 00:49:36 tanned leather were to noose nostrils as Greek would have been to his ears. It would be best, thought new, to retreat to the safety of the forest, until he could ascertain the number and kind of beings that were approaching. And so, taking but careless advantage of the handier shelter, the caveman sauntered toward the forest. For now he was not stalking game, and never yet had he shown fear in the presence of an enemy. If their numbers were too great for him to cope with single-handed, he would not show himself, but none might ever say that he had seen New the son of New run away from danger. In his hand still swung the head of O, and as the man leaped to the low branches of a tree at the jungle's edge to spy upon the men, and he was a man,

Starting point is 00:50:23 then he knew to be advancing from the far side of the plain, he fell to wondering how he was to find his way back to Nadu, that he might place the trophy at her feet and claim her as his mate. Only the previous evening they had walked together hand and hand along the beach, and now he had not the remotest conception of where that beach lay. Straight across the plain should be the direction of it, for from that direction he had come to find the lair of U, but now all was changed.

Starting point is 00:50:57 There was no single familiar landmark to guide him. Not even the ape people knew of any sea nearby, and he himself had no conception as to whether he was in the same world that he had traversed when last the sun shone upon him. End of Section 3. Section 4. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Starting point is 00:51:27 This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 4 The Mysterious Hunter The morning following the earthquake found Victoria Custer still confined to her bed. She told Lady Greystoke that she felt weak from the effects of the nervous shock, but the truth of the matter was

Starting point is 00:51:48 that she dreaded to meet Curtis and undergo the ordeal which she knew confronted her. How was she to explain to him the effect that the subterranean rumblings and the shaking of the outer crust had had upon her and her sentiments toward him. When her brother came in to see her, she drew his head down upon the pillow beside hers

Starting point is 00:52:08 and whispered something of the terrible hallucinations that had haunted her since the previous evening. "'Oh, Barney!' she cried. "'What can it be? What can it be?' The first deep grumblings that preceded the shock seemed to awake me as from a lethargy. And as plainly as I see you beside me now, I saw the half-naked creature of my dreams, and when I saw him, I knew that I could never wed Mr. Curtis or any other.

Starting point is 00:52:39 It is awful to have to admit it even to you, Barney, but I—I knew when I saw him that I loved him, that I was his. Not his wife, Barney, but his woman, his mate. And I had to fight with myself to keep from rushing out into the terrible blackness of the night to throw myself into his arms. It was then that I managed to control myself long enough to run to you where I fainted. And last night, in my dreams, I saw him again, alone and lonely, searching through a strange and hostile world to find and claim me. You cannot know, Barney, how real he is to me. It is not as other dreams, but instead I really see him. The satin texture of his smooth, bronzed skin, the lordly poise of his perfect

Starting point is 00:53:29 head, the tousled shock of cold black hair that I have learned to love and through which I know I have run my fingers as he stooped to kiss me. He carries a great spear, stone-tipped, I should know it the moment that I saw it, and a knife and hatchet of the same flinty material, and in his left hand he bears the severed head of a mighty beast. He is a noble figure, but of another world or of another aid. and somewhere he wanders so lonely and alone that my heart weeps at the thought of him. Oh, Barney, either he is true and I shall find him, or I am gone mad. Tell me, Barney, for the love of heaven, you believe that I am sane.'

Starting point is 00:54:18 Barney Custer drew his sister's face close to his and kissed her tenderly. "'Of course you're saying, Vic,' he reassured her. You've just allowed that old dream of yours to become a sort of obsession with you, and now it's gotten on your nerves until you're commencing to believe it, even against your better judgment. Take a good grip on yourself. Get up and join Curtis in a long ride. Have it out with him.

Starting point is 00:54:46 Tell him just what you have told me, and then tell him you'll marry him, and I'll warrant that you'll be dreaming about him instead of that young giant that you have stolen out of some fairy tale. I'll get up and take a ride, Barney, replied the girl. But as for marrying Mr. Curtis, well, I'll have to think it over. But after all, she did not join the party that was riding toward the hills that morning, for the thought of seeing the torn and twisted strata of a bygone age that lifted its scarred head above the surface of the plain at the base of the mountains was more than she felt equal to.

Starting point is 00:55:26 They did not urge her, and as she insisted, that Mr. Curtis accompanied the other men, she was left alone at the bungalow with Lady Greystoke, the baby, and the servants. As the party trotted across the rolling land that stretched before them to the foothills, they sighted a herd of zebras coming toward them in mad stampede. "'Something is hunting ahead of us,' remarked one of the men.

Starting point is 00:55:51 "'We may get a shot at a lion from the looks of it,' replied another. A short distance further on, they came upon the carcass of a zebra stallion. Barney and Buttsow dismounted to examine it in an effort to determine the nature of the enemy that had dispatched it. At first glance, Barney called to one of the other members of the party, an experienced big game hunter.

Starting point is 00:56:15 "'What do you make of this, Brown?' he asked, pointing to the exposed haunch. "'It is a man's kill,' replied the other. "'Look at that gaping hole over the heart. that would tell the story, were it not for the evidence of the knife that cut away these strips from the rump. The carcass is still warm. The kill must have been made within the past few minutes. Then it wouldn't have been a man, spoke up another, or we should have heard the shot.

Starting point is 00:56:44 Wait, here's Greystoke. Let's see what he thinks of it. The ape-man, who had been riding a couple hundred yards in the rear of the others with one of the older men, now reigned in close to the dead zebra. "'What have we here?' he asked, swinging from his saddle. "'Brown says this looks like the kill of a man,' said Barney. "'But none of us heard any shot.' Tarzan grasped the zebra by a front and hind-pasturn

Starting point is 00:57:12 and rolled him over upon his other side. "'It went way through, whatever it was,' said Butzow, as the hole behind this shoulder was exposed to view. Must have been a bullet, even if we didn't hear the report of the gun. I'm not so sure of that, said Tarzan, and then he glanced casually at the ground about the carcass, and bending lower brought his sensitive nostrils close to the mutilated haunch, and then to the tramped grasses at the zebra's side. When he straightened up, the others looked at him questioningly.

Starting point is 00:57:49 A man, he said, a white man has been a man. been here since the zebra died. He cut these stakes from the haunches. There is not the slightest odor of gunpowder about the wound. It was not made by a powder-sped projectile. It is too large and too deep for an arrow wound. The only other weapon that could have inflicted it is a spear. But to cast a spear entirely through the carcass of a zebra at the distance to which a man could approach one in the open presupposes a mightiness of muscle and an accuracy of aim little short of superhuman. "'And you think?' commenced Brown.

Starting point is 00:58:30 "'I think nothing,' interrupted Tarzan, "'except that my judgment tells me that my senses are in error. There is no naked white giant hunting through the country of the Waziri. Come, let us ride on to the hills and see if we can't locate the old villain who has been stealing my sheep. From his spoor, I'll venture to say that when we bring up to the world, bring him down, we shall see the largest lion that any of us has ever seen. End of Section 4. Section 5. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Starting point is 00:59:14 This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 5. The Watcher As the party remounted and rode away toward the foothills, two wondering black eyes watched them from the safety of the jungle. New was utterly nonplussed. What sort of men were these who rode upon beasts, the like of which New had never dreamed? At first he thought their pith helmets and khaki clothing a part of them.

Starting point is 00:59:43 But when one of them removed his helmet and another unbuttoned his jacket, New saw that they were merely coverings for the head and body, though why men should wish to hamper themselves with such foolish and cumbersome contraptions, the troglodyte could not imagine. As the party rode toward the foothills, New paralleled them, keeping always downwind from them. He followed them all day during their fruitless search for the lion that had been entering Greystoke's compound and stealing his sheep,

Starting point is 01:00:13 and as they retraced their way toward the bungalow late in the afternoon, New followed after them. Never in his life had he been so deeply interested in anything as he was in these strange creatures, and when, halfway across the plain, The party came unexpectedly upon a band of antelope grazing in a little hollow, and New heard the voice of one of the little black sticks the men carried, and saw a buck leap into the air and then come heavily to the ground quite dead. Deep respect was added to his interest, and possibly a trace

Starting point is 01:00:47 of awe as well, fear he knew not. In a clump of bushes a quarter of a mile from the bungalow knew came to a halt. The strange odors that assailed his nostrils as he approached the ranch warned him to caution. The black servants and the Waziri warriors, some of whom were always visiting their former chief, presented to Noose nostrils an unfamiliar scent, one which made the black shock upon his head stiffen, as you have seen the hair upon the neck of a white man's hound, stiffen, when for the first time his nose detects the odor of an Indian. And half-smothered in the riot of more powerful odors, there came to news nostrils now and then a tantalizing suggestion of a faint aroma that set his heart to pounding and the red blood coursing through

Starting point is 01:01:36 his veins. Never did it abide for a sufficient time to make New quite sure that it was more than a wanton trick of his senses, the result of the great longing that was in his lonely heart for her whom this ephemeral and elusive effluvium proclaimed. As to her, as to her, as to her, darkness came, he approached closer to the bungalow, always careful, however, to keep downwind from it. Through the windows he could see people moving about within the lighted interior, but he was not close enough to distinguish features. He saw men and women sitting about a long table, eating with strange weapons upon which they impaled tiny morsels of food which lay upon round, flat stones before them.

Starting point is 01:02:22 There was much laughter and talking, which floated through the open windows to the caveman's eager ears. But throughout it all, there came to him no single word which he could interpret. After these men and women had eaten, they came out and sat in the shadows

Starting point is 01:02:38 before the entrance to their strange cave, and here again they laughed and chattered, for all the world thought new, like the ape people. And yet, though it was different from the ways of his own people, the troglodyte could not help but note within his own breast, a strange yearning to take part in it, a longing for the company of these strange new people. He had crept quite close to the veranda now, and presently there floated down to him upon the almost

Starting point is 01:03:08 stagnant air, a subtle exhalation that is not precisely sent, and for which the languages of modern men have no expression, since men themselves have no powers of perception which may grasp it. But to New of the Niescene, it carried as clear and unmistakable a message as could word of mouth, and it told him that Natul, the daughter of Tha, sat among these strange people before the entrance to their wonderful cave. And yet, New could not believe the evidence of his own senses. What could not Ull be doing among such as these? How, between two sons, could she have learned the language and the ways of these strangers. It was impossible. And then a man upon the veranda, who sat close beside Victoria Custer, struck a match to light a cigarette, and the

Starting point is 01:04:01 flare of the blaze lit up the girl's features. At the sight of them, the caveman involuntarily sprang to his feet. A half-smothered exclamation broke from his lips, "'Not all!' "'What was that?' exclaimed Barney Custer. I thought I heard someone speak out there near the rose bushes. He rose as though to investigate, but his sister laid her hand upon his arm. "'Don't go, Barney,' she whispered. He turned toward her with a questioning look.

Starting point is 01:04:33 "'Why?' he asked. "'There is no danger. Did you not hear it, too?' "'Yes,' she answered in a low voice. "'I heard it, Barney. Please, don't leave me.' He felt the trembling of her hand where it rested upon his sleeve. One of the other men heard the conversation,

Starting point is 01:04:53 but of course he could not guess that it carried any peculiar significance. It was merely an expression of the natural timidity of the civilized white woman in the midst of the savage African knight. "'It's nothing, Miss Custer,' he said. "'I'll just walk down there to reassure you. A prowling hyena, perhaps, but nothing more.' Or would have been glad to deter him, but she felt that he was, she had already evinced more perturbation than the occasion warranted, and so she but forced a laugh, remarking that it was not at all worthwhile. Yet in her ears rang the familiar name that had so often

Starting point is 01:05:30 fallen from the lips of her dream man. When one of the others suggested that the investigator had better take an express rifle with him on the chance that the intruder might be old raffles, the sheep thief, the girl started up as though to object, but realizing how ridiculous such an attitude would be, and how impossible to explain, she turned instead and entered the house. Several of the men walked down into the garden, but though they searched for the better part of half an hour, they came upon no indication that any savage beast was nearby. Always in front of them, a silent figure moved just outside the range of their vision, and when they returned again to the veranda, it took up its position once more behind the rose-bushes, nor until, and, until they were,

Starting point is 01:06:18 till all had entered the bungalow and sought their beds, did the figure stir. New was hungry again, and knowing no law of property rights, he found the odor of the Greystoke's sheep as appetizing as that of any of the other numerous creatures that were penned within their compounds for the night. Like a supple panther, the man scaled the high fence that guarded the imported, pedigreed stock, in which Lord Greystoke took such just pride. A moment later there was the frightened rush of animals to the far side of the enclosure, where they halted to turn fear-filled eyes back toward the silent beast of prey that crouched

Starting point is 01:06:57 over the carcass of a plump U. Within the pen, New ate his fill, and then, cat-like as he had come, he glided back stealthily toward the garden before the darkened bungalow. Out across the plain, down wind from New, another silent figure moved to the night. stealthily toward the ranch. It was a huge mained lion. Every now and then he would halt and lift his sniffing nose to the gentle breeze, and his lips would lift, bearing the mighty fangs beneath, but no sound came from his deep throat, for he was old, and his wisdom was as the wisdom of the fox. Once upon a time he would have coughed and moaned and roared after the manner of his hungry brethren,

Starting point is 01:07:43 but much experience with men people and their deafening thundersticks had taught him that he hunted longest who hunted in silence. End of Section 5. Section 6 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Librevox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 6. New and the Lion Victoria Custer had gone to her room much early. earlier in the evening than was her custom, but not to sleep. She did not even disrobe, but sat instead in the darkness beside her window, looking out toward the black and mysterious jungle in the distance, and the shadowy outlines of the southern hills. She was trying to fight down

Starting point is 01:08:39 forever the foolish obsession that had been growing upon her slowly and insidiously for years. Since the first awakening of developing womanhood within her, she had been subject to the strange dream that was now becoming an almost nightly occurrence. At first, she had thought nothing of it, other than it was odd that she should continue to dream the same thing so many times. But of late these nightly visions had seemed to hold more of reality than formerly, and to presage some eventful happening in her career, some crisis that was to alter the course of her life. Even by day she could not rid herself of the vision of her life. Even by day she could not rid herself of the vision of the black-haired young giant, and tonight the culmination had come when she had heard his

Starting point is 01:09:26 voice calling her from the rose-thicket. She knew that he was but a creature of her dreams, and it was this knowledge which frightened her so, for it meant but one thing. Her mind was tottering beneath the burden of the nervous strain these hallucinations had imposed upon it. She must gather all the resources of her nervous energy and throw off this terrible obsession for forever. She must. She must. Rising, the girl paced back and forth the length of her room. She felt stifled and confined within its narrow limits. Outside, beneath the open sky, with no boundary save the distant horizon, was the place best fitted for such a battle as was raging within her. Snatching up a silken scarf, she threw it about her shoulders, a concession to habit for the

Starting point is 01:10:18 night was hot, and stepping through her window to the porch that encircled the bungalow, she passed on into the garden. Just around the nearest angle of the house, her brother and Billy Curtis sat smoking before the window of their bedroom, clad in pajamas and slippers. Curtis was cleaning the rifle that he had used that day, the same that he had carried into the Rose Garden earlier in the evening. Neither heard the girl's light footsteps upon the sward, and the corner of the building hid her from their view. In the open moonlight beside the rose-thagot, Victoria Custer paced back and forth.

Starting point is 01:10:56 A dozen times she reached a determination to seek the first opportunity upon the morrow to give Billy Curtis an affirmative action to the question he had asked her the night before, the night of the earthquake. But each time that she thought she had disposed of the matter definitely, she found herself involuntarily comparing him with the heroic figure of her dream man, and again she must need rewage her battle. As she walked in the moonlight, two pair of eyes watched her every movement, one pair, clear, black eyes from the rose-thicket,

Starting point is 01:11:30 the other flaming yellow-green orbs hidden in the little clump of bushes at a point where she turned in her passing to retrace her steps, at the point farthest from the watcher among the roses. Twenty times, Newt was on the point of leaping from his concealment and taking the girl in his arms. For to him she was Natul, daughter of Tha,

Starting point is 01:11:54 and it had not been a hundred thousand years, but only since the day before yesterday that he had last seen her. Yet each time something deterred him, a strange, vague, indefinable fear of this wondrous creature who was Nadu, and yet who was not Nadu, but another maiden Nadu's image. The strange stings'est, things that covered her fair form seemed to have raised a barrier between them. The last time

Starting point is 01:12:22 that he had walked hand in hand with her upon the beach, not but a soft strip of the skin of a red-dose calf had circled her gracefully undulating hips. Her familiar association, too, with these strange people, coupled with the fact that she spoke and understood their language, only tended to remove her further from him. New was very sad, and very lonely. And the sight of of Natul seemed to accentuate rather than relieve his depression. Slowly, there was born within him the conviction that Natul was no longer for New the son of New. Why, he could not guess, but the bitter fact seemed irrevocable. The girl had turned quite close to him now, and was retracing her steps toward the bushes

Starting point is 01:13:10 twenty yards away. Behind their screening verger, old raffles twitched his tufted tail, and drew his steel-thewed legs beneath him for the spring. And as he waited, just the faintest of purrs escaped his slavering jowls. Too faint the sound to pierce the dulled senses of the twentieth-century maiden, but to the man hiding in the rose-thicket twenty paces further from the lion than she, it fell deep and sinister upon his unspoiled ear. Like a bolt of lightning, so quickly his muscles responded to his will, the caveman hurled the intervening rose-bole. with a single bound, and raised spear in hand bounded after the unconscious girl. The great lion saw him coming, and lest he be cheated of his prey, leaped into the moonlight

Starting point is 01:13:59 before his intended victim was quite within the radius of his spring. The beast emitted a horrid roar that froze the girl with terror, and then, in the face of his terrific charge, the figure of a naked giant leaped past her. She saw a great arm, wheeling a mighty spear hurled a weapon at the infuriated beast, and then she swooned. As the savage note of the lion's roar broke the stillness of the quiet night, Curtis and Barney Custer sprang to their feet, running toward the side of the bungalow from which the sound had come. Curtis grasped the rifle he had but just reloaded, and as he turned the corner of the building, he caught one fleeting glimpse of something moving near the bushes

Starting point is 01:14:43 fifty yards away. Raising his weapon, he fired. The whole household had been aroused by the lion's deep voice and the answering boom of the big rifle, so that scarcely admitted after Barney and Curtis reached the side of the prostrate girl, a score of white men and black were gathered about them. The dead body of a huge lion lay scarce twenty feet from Victoria Custer, but a hurried examination of the girl brought unutterable relief to them all. for she was uninjured. Barney lifted her in his arms and carried her to her room, while the others examined the dead beast.

Starting point is 01:15:22 From the center of the beast, a wooden shaft protruded, and when they had drawn this out, and it required the united efforts of four strong men to do it, they found that a stone-tipped spear had passed straight through the savage heart almost the full length of the brute's body. The zebra killer, said Brown to Greystoke. The latter nodded his head. "'We must find him,' he said.

Starting point is 01:15:48 "'He has rendered us a great service. But for him, Miss Custer would not be alive now.' But though twenty men scouted the grounds in the plain beyond for several hours, no trace of the killer of old raffles could be found. And the reason that they did not find him abroad was because he lay directly beneath their noses in a little clump of low flowering shrubs with a bullet wound in his head. End of Section 6.

Starting point is 01:16:24 Section 7 of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 7. Victoria obeys the call. The next morning, the men were examining the stone-headed spear upon the veranda just outside the breakfast room. It's the audit.

Starting point is 01:16:49 thing of its kind I ever saw, said Greystoke. I can almost swear that it was never made by any of the tribesmen of present-day Africa. I once saw several similar heads, though in the British Museum. They had been taken from the debris of a prehistoric cave-dwelling. From the window of the breakfast-room just behind them, a wide-eyed girl was staring in breathless wonderment at the rude weapon, which to her presented concrete, evidence of the reality of the thing she had thought but another hallucination. The leaping figure of the naked man that had sprung past her into the face of the

Starting point is 01:17:29 charging lion an instant before she had swooned. One of the men turned and saw her standing there. "'Ah, Miss Custer,' he exclaimed, "'no worse off this morning I see for your little adventure of last night?' "'Here's a memento that your rescuer left behind him in the heart of old raffles. Would you like it?' The girl stepped forward, hiding her true emotions behind the mask of a gay smile. She took the spear of New, the son of New, in her hands,

Starting point is 01:18:00 and her heart leaped in half-savage pride as she felt the weight of the great missile. "'What a man he must be who wields such a mighty weapon!' she exclaimed. Barney Custer was watching his sister closely, for with the discovery of the spear in the lion's body had come the sudden recollection a victorious description of her dream man. He carried a great spear, stone-tipped, I should know it the moment that I saw it.

Starting point is 01:18:29 The young man stepped to his sister's side, putting an arm about her shoulders. She looked up into his face, and then, in a low voice that was not audible to the others, she whispered, "'It is his, Barney. I knew that I should know it.' For some time the young man had been heard,

Starting point is 01:18:48 harassed by fears as to his sister's sanity. Now he was forced to entertain fears of an even more sinister nature, or else admit that he too had gone mad. If he were sane, then it was God's truth that somewhere in this savage land, a savage white man roamed in search of Victoria. Now that he had found her, would he not claim her? He shuddered at the thought. He must do something to avert a tragedy. He must act at once. He drew Lord Greystoke to one side. "'Victory and I must leave at once,' he said. The nervous strain of the earthquake and this last adventure have told upon her to such an extent that I fear we may have a very sick girl upon our hands if I do not get her back to civilization and home as quickly as possible.'

Starting point is 01:19:40 Graystoke did not attempt to offer any remonstrances. He, too, felt that it would be best for Miss Custer to go home. He had noted her growing nervousness with increasing apprehension. It was decided that they should leave on the morrow. There were fifty black carriers anxious to return to the coast, and Butzau and Curtis readily signified their willingness to accompany the Nebraska and his sister. As he was explaining his decision to Victoria, a black servant came excitedly to Lord Greystoke.

Starting point is 01:20:15 He told of the finding of a dead you in the compound. The animal's neck had been broken, the man said, and several strips of meat cut from its haunches with a knife. Beside it in the soft mud of the enclosure, the prince of an unshawed human foot were plainly in evidence. Greystoke smiled. The zebra killer again, he said. Well, he is welcome to all he can.

Starting point is 01:20:41 and eat. Before he had finished speaking, Brown, who had been nosing around in the garden, called to him from a little clump of bushes beside the spot where the lion's body had lain. "'Look here, Clayton,' he called. "'Here something we overlooked in the darkness last night!' The men upon the veranda followed Greystoke to the garden. Behind them came Victoria Custer, drawn as though by a magnet to the spot where they had gathered. In the bushes was a little pool of dried blood, and where the earth near the roots was free from sod, there were several impressions of a bare foot. "'He must have been wounded,' exclaimed Brown, by Curtis's shot.

Starting point is 01:21:26 "'I doubt if the lion touched him. The beast must have died instantly the spear entered his heart. But where can he have disappeared to?' Victoria Custer was examining the grass a little distance beyond the bushes. She saw what the others failed to see, a drop of blood now and then leading away in the direction of the mountains to the south. At the sight of it, a great compassion welled in her heart for the lonely, wounded man who had saved her life and then staggered, bleeding toward the savage wilderness from which she had come. It seemed to her that somewhere out there he was calling to her now and that she must go. She did not call the attention of the

Starting point is 01:22:11 others to her discovery, and presently they all returned to the veranda, where Barney again took up the discussion of their plans for tomorrow's departure. The girl interposed no objections. Barney was delighted to see that she was apparently as anxious to return home as he was to have her. He had feared a flat refusal. Barney had wanted to get a buffalo bull before he left, and when one of the Waziri warriors brought word that morning that there was a spruce, splendid herd a few miles north of the ranch, Victoria urged him to accompany the other men upon the hunt. "'I'll attend to the balance of the packing,' she said.

Starting point is 01:22:52 "'There's not the slightest reason in the world why you shouldn't go.' And so he went, and Victoria busied herself in the gathering together of the odds and ends of their personal belongings. All morning the household was alive with its numerous duties, but after luncheon, while the of the day was greatest, the bungalow might have been entirely deserted for any sign of life that there was about it. Lady Greystoke was taking her siesta, as were practically all of the servants. Victoria Custer had paused in her work to gaze out of her window toward the distant hills far to the south. At her side, nosing his nuzzle into her palm, stood one of Lord

Starting point is 01:23:35 Gratstoke's great wolfhounds, Turcaws. He had taken a great fancy to Victor's. He had taken a great fancy to Victoria Custer from the first, and whenever permitted to do so, remained close beside her. The girl's heart filled with a great longing as she looked wistfully out toward the hills that she had so feared before. She feared them still, yet something they're called her. She tried to fight against the mad desire with every ounce of her reason, but she was fighting against an unreasoning instinct that was far stronger than any argument she could bring to bear against it. Presently, the hound's cold muzzle brought forth an idea in her mind, and with it she cast aside

Starting point is 01:24:18 the last semblance of attempted restraint upon her mad desire. Seizing a rifle and ammunition belt, she moved noiselessly into the veranda. There she found a number of leashes hanging from a peg. One of these she snapped to the hound's collar. Unseen, she crossed the garden to the little patch of bushes where the dried blood was. Here she gathered up some of the brown stained earth and held it close to Turcos's nose. Then she put her finger to the ground where the trail of blood led away toward the south. "'Here, Turcos!' she whispered. The beast gave a low growl as the scent of the new blood filled his nostrils, and with nose close to the ground started off, tugging upon the leash in the direction of the mountains upon the opposite side of the plain.

Starting point is 01:25:10 Beside him walked the girl, across her shoulder was slung a modern big game rifle, and in her left hand swung the stone-tipped spear of the savage mate she sought. What motive prompted her act she did not even pause to consider? The results she gave not the slightest thought. It seemed the most natural thing in the world that she should be seeking this lonely, wounded man. Her place was at his side. He needed her. That was enough for her to know. She was no longer the pampered, petted child of an effete civilization.

Starting point is 01:25:47 That any metamorphosis had taken place within her, she did not dream, nor is it certain that any change had occurred, for whom may say that it is such a far step from one incarnation to another, however many countless years of man-measured time may have intervened. Darkness had fallen upon the plain and the jungle and the mountain, and still Turcos forged ahead, nose to the ground, and beside him moved the slender figure of the graceful girl. Now the roar of a distant lion came faintly to her ears, answered quite close by the moaning of another, a sound that is infinitely more weird and terrifying than the deeper-throated challenge.

Starting point is 01:26:30 The cough of the leopard and the uncanny laughter of hyenas added their evidence, that the night-prouling carnivora were abroad. The hair along the wolfhound spine stiffened in a little ridge of bristling rage. The girl unslung her rifle, shifting the leash to the hand that carried the heavy spear of the troglodyte, but she was unafraid. Suddenly, just before her, a little band of antelope sprang from the grass in startled terror. There was a hideous roar, and a great body hurtled through the air to alight upon the rump of the hindmost of the herd. A single scream of pain and terror from the stricken animal, a succession of low growls and

Starting point is 01:27:11 the sound of huge jaws crunching through flesh and bone, and then silence. The girl made a slight detour to avoid the beast and its kill, passing a hundred yards above them. In the moonlight the lion saw her and the hound. Standing across his fallen prey, his flaming eyes glaring at the intruders, he rumbled his deep warning to the But Victoria, dragging the growling Turcos after her, passed on, and the King of Beast turned to his feast. It was fifteen minutes before Turcos could relocate the trail, and then the two took up their lonely way once more. Into the foothills past the tortured strata of an ancient age it wound.

Starting point is 01:27:58 At sight of the naked rock the girl shuddered, yet on and up she went, until Turcoss halted, bristling and growling before the inky entrance to a gloomy cave. Holding the beast back, Victoria peered within. Her eyes could not penetrate the stidgy in darkness. Here, evidently, the trail ended, but of a sudden it occurred to her that she had only surmised that the bloody spoor they had been following was that of the man she sought. It was almost equally as probable that Curtis's shot had struck old Raffles' mate, and that after all she had followed the blood of a wounded lioness to the creature's rocky lair. Bending low she listened, and at last there came to her ears a sound as of a body moving,

Starting point is 01:28:46 and then heavy breathing and a sigh. "'No,' she whispered, "'is it you? I have come.' Nor did it seem strange to her that she spoke in a strange tongue, no word of which she had ever heard in all her life before. For a moment that was silence, and then, weakly from the depths of the cave, a voice replied. Not ooh!

Starting point is 01:29:14 It was barely a whisper. Quickly the girl groped her way into the cavern, feeling before her with her hands, until she came to the prostrate form of a man lying upon the cold, hard rock. With difficulty she kept the growling wolf, found from his throat. Tarkos had found the prey that he had tracked, and he could not understand why he should not now be allowed to make the kill. But he was a well-trained beast, and at last at the girl's command he took up a position at the cave's mouth on guard.

Starting point is 01:29:48 Victoria kneeled beside the prostrate form of Nuh, the son of Ngu. But she was no longer Victoria Custer. It was Nautul, the daughter of Tha, who kneeled there beside the man she loved. Gently she passed her slim fingers across his forehead. It was burning with a raging fever. She felt the wound along the side of his head and shuddered. Then she raised him in her arms

Starting point is 01:30:14 so that his head was pillowed in her lap and stooping kissed his cheek. Halfway down the mountainside, she recalled, there was a little spring of fresh cold water. Removing her hunting jacket, she rolled it into a pillow for the unconscious man. and then, with Turcas at her side, clambered down the rocky way. Filling her hat with water, she returned to the cave.

Starting point is 01:30:39 All night she bathed the fevered head and washed the ugly wound, at times squeezing a few refreshing drops between the hot lips. At last, the restless tossing of the wounded man ceased, and the girls saw that he had fallen into a natural sleep, and that the fever had abated. When the first rays of the rising sun relieved the gloom within the cavern, Turcaz, rising to stretch himself, looked backward into the interior. He saw a black-haired giant sleeping quietly, his head pillowed upon a khaki hunting coat,

Starting point is 01:31:15 and beside him sat the girl. Her loosened hair tumbled about her shoulders and over the breast of the sleeping man upon which her own tired head had dropped in the sleep of utter exhaustion. Tercas yawned and lay down again. End of Section 7. Section 8. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 01:31:51 Chapter 8. Captured by Arabs After a time, the girl awoke. For a few minutes she could not assure herself of the reality of her surroundings. She thought this was but a number. other of her dreams. Gently, she put out her hand and touched the face of the sleeper. It was very real.

Starting point is 01:32:13 Also, she noted that the fever had left. She sat in silence for a few minutes, attempting to adjust herself to the new and strange conditions which surrounded her. She seemed to be two people, the American girl, Victoria Custer, and Natul. But who or from where was Natul she could not fathom, other than that she was was beloved by Ngu and that she returned his love. She wondered that she did not regret the life of ease she had abandoned, in which she knew that she could never again return to.

Starting point is 01:32:47 She was still sufficiently of the twentieth century to realize that the step she had taken must cut her off forever from her past life, yet she was very happy. Bending low over the man she kissed his lips, and then rising went outside, and calling Turcos with her descended to the spring, for she was thirsty. Neither the girl nor the hound

Starting point is 01:33:11 saw the white-robed figure that withdrew suddenly behind a huge boulder as the two emerged from the cave's mouth. Nor did they see him signal to others behind him, who had not yet rounded the shoulder of the cliff at the base of which they had been marching. Victoria stooped to fill her hat at the spring. First she leaned far down to quench her own. thirst. A sudden warning growl from Turcos brought her head up, and there, not ten paces from her,

Starting point is 01:33:41 she saw a dozen white-robed Arabs, and behind them half a hundred blacks. All were armed, evil-looking fellows they were, and one of the Arabs had covered her with his long gun. Now he spoke to her, but in a tongue she did not understand, though she knew that his message was unfriendly, and imagined that it warned her not to attempt to, to use her own rifle which lay beside her. Next he spoke to those behind him, and two of them approached the girl, one from either side,

Starting point is 01:34:13 while the leader continued to keep his peace leveled at her. As the two came toward her, she heard a menacing growl from the wolfhound, and then saw him leave for the nearest Arab. The fellow clubbed his gun and swung it full upon Turcas's skull, so that the faithful hound collapsed in a silent heap at their feet. Then the two rushed in and seized Victoria's rifle, and a moment later she was roughly dragged toward the leader of the ill-favored gang.

Starting point is 01:34:43 Through one of the blacks, a west-coast negro who had picked up a smattering of pigeon English, the leader questioned the girl, and when he found that she was a guest of Lord Greystoke, an ugly grin crossed his evil face. For the fellow recalled what had befallen another Arab slave and ivory caravan at the hands of the Englishmen and his waziri warriors. Here was an opportunity for partial revenge. He motioned for his followers to bring her along. There was no time to tarry in this country of their enemies, into which they had accidentally stumbled after being lost in the jungle for the better part of a month. Victoria asked what their intentions toward her were, but all that she could learn was that

Starting point is 01:35:26 they would take her north with them. She offered to arrange the payment of a suitable ransom if they would return her to her friends unharmed, but the Arab only laughed at her. "'Iho will bring a good price,' he said, "'at the court of the Sultan of Fulad, north of Taguara, "'and for the rest I shall have partly settled the score "'which I have against the Englishman.'

Starting point is 01:35:49 "'And so Victoria Custer disappeared from the sight of men "'at the border of the savage land of the Waziri, "'nor was there any other than her capital, to know the devious route that they had followed to gain the country north of Uziri. When at last New, the son of New, opened his eyes from the deep slumber that had refreshed and invigorated him, he looked up expectantly for the sweet face that had been hovering above his, and as he realized that the cave was tenantless except for himself, a side that was half a sob broke from the depth of his lonely heart, for he knew that Nadu had been with him

Starting point is 01:36:26 only in his dreams. Yet it had been so real. Even now he could feel the touch of her cool hand upon his forehead, and her slim fingers running through his hair. His cheek glowed to her hot kisses, and in his nostrils was the sweet aroma of her dear presence. The disillusionment of his waking brought with it bitter disappointment, and a return of the fever.

Starting point is 01:36:53 Again, New lapsed into semi-consciousness and delirious, and delirium, so that he was not aware of the figure of the khaki-clad white man that crept warily into the half-darkness of his lair shortly after noon. It was Barney Custer. In behind him, came Curtis, Budzow, and a half-dozen others of the searching party. They had stumbled upon the half-dead Turcos beside the spring, and there also they had found Victoria Custer's hat, and plainly in the soft earth between the shoulders of the hillside, they had seen the the new-made path to the cave higher up. When Barney saw that the prostrate figure within the cavern did not stir at his entrance,

Starting point is 01:37:34 a stifling fear rose in his throat, for he was sure that he had found the dead body of his sister. But as his eyes became more accustomed to the dim light of the interior, he realized his mistake. At first, with a sense of infinite relief, and later with misgivings that amounted almost to a wished that it had been Victoria, safe in death. For among the savage men of savage Africa, there are fates worse than death for women. The others had crowded in beside him, and one had lighted a torch of dry twigs which illuminated the interior of the cave brightly for a few seconds. In that time they saw that the man was the only occupant, and that he was helpless from fever.

Starting point is 01:38:19 beside him lay the stone's spear that had slain old raffles. Each of them recognized it. How could it have been brought to him? The zebra killer, said Brown. What's that beneath his head? Looks like a khaki coat. Barney drew it out and held it up. God, muttered Curtis, it's hers.

Starting point is 01:38:43 He must have come down here after we left and got his spear and stole your sister, said Brown. Curtis drew his revolver and pushed closer toward the unconscious new. The beast, he growled, shooting's too damn good for him. Get out of the way, Barney. I'm going to give him all six chambers. No, said Barney quietly. Why? demanded Curtis, trying to push past Custer. Because, I don't believe that he harmed Victoria, replied Barney. That's sufficient reason for way. waiting until we know the truth. Then I won't stand for the killing of an unconscious man anyway.

Starting point is 01:39:25 He's nothing but a beast, a mad dog, insisted Curtis. He should be killed for what he is. I'd never have thought to see defending the man who killed your sister. God alone knows what worst crime he committed before he killed her. Don't be a fool, Curtis, snapped Barney. We don't even know that Victoria is dead. the chances are that this man has been helpless from fever for a long time. There's a wound in his head that was probably made by your shot last night.

Starting point is 01:39:57 If he recovers from that, he may be able to throw some light on victorious disappearance. If it develops that he has harmed her, I'm the one to demand an accounting, not you. But as I said before, I do not believe that this man would have harmed a hair of my sister's head. What do you know about him? demanded Curtis. "'I never saw him before,' replied Barney. "'I don't know who he is or where he came from. But I know—well, never mind what I know, except there isn't anybody going to kill him,

Starting point is 01:40:31 other than Barney Custer.' "'Custer's right,' Broken Brown. "'It will be murdered to kill this fellow in cold blood. You have jumped to the conclusion, Curtis, that Miss Custer is dead. "'If we let you kill this man, we might be determined. destroying our best chance to locate and rescue her. As they talked, the gaunt figure of the wolfhound, Turcos, crept into the cave. He had not been killed by the Arabs' blow, and a liberal dose of cold water poured over his

Starting point is 01:41:01 head had helped him to hasten returning consciousness. He nosed whining about the cavern as though in search of Victoria. The men watched him in silence after Brown had said, If this man harmed Miss Custer and laid out Turcos, the beast will be keen for revenge. Watch him. And if Curtis is right, there won't any of us have to avenge your sister? Turcos'll take care of that. I know him. We'll leave it to Turcos, said Barney confidently. After the animal had made the complete rounds of the cave, sniffing at every crack and crevice,

Starting point is 01:41:40 he came to each of the watching men, nosing them carefully. Then he walked directly to the side of the unconscious new, licked his cheek, and lying down beside him, rested his head upon the man's breast, so that his fierce, wolfish eyes were pointed straight and watchful at the group of men opposite him. There, said Barney, leaning down and stroking the beast's head. The hound wind up into his face, but when Curtis approached he rose bristling, and standing across the body of New growled ominously at him. You'd better keep away from him, Curtis, warned Brown.

Starting point is 01:42:19 He always has had a strange way with him in his likes and dislikes, and he's a mighty ugly customer to deal with when he's crossed. He has killed one man already, a big Wamboli spearman, who was stalking Greystoke up in the North Country last fall. Let's see if he's got it in for the rest of us. But one by one, Turcos suffered the others to approach New. Only Curtis seemed to rouse his savage, protective instinct. As they discussed their plans for the immediate future,

Starting point is 01:42:51 New opened his eyes with a return of consciousness. At sight of the strange figures about him, he sat up and reached for his spear. But Barney had had the foresight to remove this weapon, as well as the man's knife and hatchet from his reach. As the caveman came to his sitting posture, Barney laid a hand upon his shoulder. "'We shall not harm you,' he said, "'if you will tell us what has become of my sister.' And then, placing his lips close to the other's ear, he whispered,

Starting point is 01:43:23 "'Where is, Natul?' New understood but the single word, Natul. But the friendly tone and the hand upon his shoulder convinced him that this man was no enemy. He shook his head negatively. "'Nu does not understand the stranger's tongue,' he said, and then he asked the same question as had Barney. "'Where is Natul?'

Starting point is 01:43:48 But the American could translate only the name, yet it told him that here indeed was the dream man of his sister. When it became quite evident that the man could not understand anything that they said to him and that he was in no condition to march, it was decided to send him back to the ranch by some of the native carriers that accompanied the searching party, while the others continued the search for the missing girl. Turcars suffered them to lift new in their arms and carry him outside,

Starting point is 01:44:21 where he was transferred to a rude litter constructed with a saddle-blanket and two spears, belonging to the waziri hunters who had accompanied them. Barney felt that this man might prove the key to the solution of Victoria's whereabouts, and so for fear that he might attempt to escape, he decided to accompany him personally, knowing that the search for his sister would proceed as thoroughly without him as with. In the meantime, he might be working out some plan whereby he could communicate with the stranger. And so they set out for the ranch.

Starting point is 01:44:56 Four half-naked blacks bore the rude stretcher. Upon one side walked Turcass the wolfhound and upon the other Barney Custer. Four Waziri warriors accompanied them. End of Section 8. Section 9. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 9

Starting point is 01:45:29 New goes to find Natul New, weak and sick, was indifferent to his fate. If he had been captured by enemies, well and good. He knew what to expect, either slavery or death, for that was the way of men as New knew them. If slavery, there was always the chance to escape. If death, he would at least no longer suffer from loneliness in a strange world far from his own people and his matchless Natul, whom he only saw now in his dreams. He wondered what this strangely garbed stranger knew of Natul. The man had most certainly spoken her name.

Starting point is 01:46:13 Could it be possible that she too was a prisoner among these people? He had most certainly seen her in the garden before the strange cave where he had slain the diminutive zor that had been about to devour her. That was no dream he was positive, and so she must indeed be a prisoner. As he recalled the lion, he half smiled. What a runt of a beast it had been indeed! Why, old Zor who hunted in the forest of the eight people and dwelt in the caves upon the hither slopes of the barren hills,

Starting point is 01:46:49 would have snapped that fellow up in two bits. And, ooh, a sneeze from U would have sent him scurring into the dark swamp where U could not venture because of his great weight. It was an odd world in which New found himself, The country seemed almost barren to him, and yet he was in the heart of tropical Africa. The creature seemed small and insignificant, yet the lion he had killed was one of the largest that Brown or Greystoke had ever seen, and he shivered even in the heat of the equatorial sun. How he longed for the world of his birth, with its mighty beasts, its gigantic vegetation,

Starting point is 01:47:30 and its hot, humid atmosphere, the which its great blurred sun appeared grotesquely large and close at hand. For a week they doctored new at the bungalow of the Greystokes. There were times when they despaired of his life, for the bullet wound that creased his temple clear to the skull had become infected. But at last he commenced to mend, and after that his recovery was rapid, for his constitution was that of untainted physical perfection. The several searching parties returned one by one

Starting point is 01:48:06 without a clue to the whereabouts of Victoria Custer. Barney knew that all was being done that could be done by his friends. But he clung tenaciously to the belief that the solution to the baffling mystery lay locked in the breast of the strange giant who was convalescing upon the cot that had been set up for him in Barney's own room, for such had been the young Americans' wish.

Starting point is 01:48:32 Curtis had been relegated to other apartments, and Barney stuck close to the bedside of his patient day and night. His principal reasons for doing so were his wish to prevent the man's escape, and his desire to open some method of communication with the stranger as rapidly as possible. Already the wounded man had learned to make known his simpler once in English, and the ease with which he mastered what he mastered,

Starting point is 01:48:58 whatever Barney attempted to teach him, assured the American of the early success of his venture in this direction. Curtis continued to view the stranger with suspicion and ill-discised hostility. He was positive the man had murdered Victoria Custer, and failing to persuade the others that they should take justice into their own hands and execute the prisoner forthwith. He now insisted that he be taken to the nearest point at which civilization had established the machinery of law and turned over to the authorities. Barney, on the other hand, was just as firm in his determination, to wait until the man had gained a sufficient command of English

Starting point is 01:49:41 to enable them to give him a fair hearing, and then be governed accordingly. He could not forget that there had existed some strange and inexplicable bond between this handsome giant and his sister, nor that unquestionably the man had saved her life when old raffles had sprung upon her. Barney had loved and lost, because he had loved a girl beyond his reach, and so his sympathies went out to this man, who he was confident, loved his sister. Uncanny as her dreams had been, Barney was forced to admit that there had been more to them than either Victoria or he had imagined, and now he felt that for a Victoria's sake he should champion her dreamman

Starting point is 01:50:25 in her absence. One of the first things that Barney tried to be able to be able to be able to be. One of the first things that Barney tried to impress upon the man was that he was a prisoner. At lest he should escape by night, when Barney slept, Greystoke set Turcos to watch over him. But New did not seem inclined to wish to escape. His one desire, apparently,

Starting point is 01:50:45 was to master the strange tongue of his captors. For two weeks after he was able to quit his bed, he devoted his time to learning English. He had the freedom of the ranch, coming and going as he pleased, But his weapons were kept from him, hidden in Lord Greystoke's study, and Barney, sometimes with others of the household, always accompanied him. New was waiting for Natul.

Starting point is 01:51:12 He was sure that she would come back again to this cave that his new acquaintances called a bungalow. Barney was waiting for the man to mention his sister. One day Curtis came upon New sitting upon the veranda. Turcass lay at his feet. New was clothed in khaki, an old suit of Greystokes being the largest that could be found upon the place, and that was none too large. As Curtis approached, the wolfhound turned his wicked little eyes upon him, without moving his head from where it lay stretched upon his forepaws and growled. New extended a booted foot across the beast's neck to hold him in check.

Starting point is 01:51:53 The hound's show of hostility angered Curtis. He hated the brute, and he hated new as cordially. Just why he did not know. For it seemed that his hatred of the stranger was a thing apart from his righteous anger in his belief that the man had guilty knowledge of the fate of Victoria Custer. He halted in front of the caveman.

Starting point is 01:52:19 "'I want to ask you a question,' he said coldly. "'I have been waiting to do so for a long time.' "'But there has always been someone else around.' "'New nodded. "'What can New tell you?' he asked. "'You can tell me where Miss Custer is,' replied Curtis. "'Miss Custer? I do not know what you mean. "'I never heard of Miss Custer.'

Starting point is 01:52:47 "'You lie!' cried Curtis, losing control of himself. "'Her jacket was found beneath your head in that foul den of yours. "'New came slowly to his feet. "'What does lie mean?' he asked. "'I do not understand all that people say to me yet. "'But I can translate much from the manner and tone of the saying, "'and I do not like your tone, Curtis. "'Answer my question.

Starting point is 01:53:15 "'Where is Victoria Custer? "'And when you speak to me, remember that I'm Mr. Curtis, "'you damned white nigger?' "'What does lie me, mean, persisted new. And what is a nigger? And why should I call you mister? I do not like the sound of your voice, Curtis. It was at this moment that Barney appeared. A single glance at the attitude of the two men warned him that he was barely in time to avert a tragedy. The black-haired giant stood with the bristling wolfhound at his side. The attitude of the man resembled nothing more closely than that of a big

Starting point is 01:53:54 Black Panther, tense for a spring. Curtis's hand was reaching for the butt of the gun at his hip. Barney stepped between them. What is the meaning of this Curtis? He asked sharply. Curtis had been a warm friend for years, a friend of civilization and luxury and ease. He had known Curtis under conditions which gave Curtis everything that Curtis wished,

Starting point is 01:54:19 and Curtis had seemed a fine fellow, but lately, since Curtis had been crossed and disappointed, he had found sights to the man's character that had never before presented themselves. His narrow and unreasoning hatred for the half-savage white man had caused the first doubts in Barney's mind as to the breadth of his friend's character. And then, most unpardonable of sins,

Starting point is 01:54:44 Curtis had grumbled at the hardships of the field while the searching parties had been out. But Sal had told Barney of it, and of how Curtis had shirked much of the work which the other white men had assumed when there had been a doth of competent servants in the camp. Curtis made no reply to Barney's question. Instead, he turned on his heel and walked away. Noon laid a hand upon the American shoulder.

Starting point is 01:55:11 What does lie mean Custer? He asked. Barney tried to explain. I see, said New. And what is a nigger and a mister? Again Barney did his best to explain. Who is Miss Custer? New asked.

Starting point is 01:55:32 Barney looked at the man in surprise. Do you not know? He asked. Why should I? She is my sister, said Barney, looking closely at the man. Your sister? Question knew. I did not know you had a sister,

Starting point is 01:55:50 Custer. "'You did not know my sister, Natul?' cried Barney. "'Not all!' exclaimed the man. "'Not Ool? Your sister?' "'Yes. I suppose that you knew it.' "'But you are not Oot, son of Tha,' said New. "'And Natul had no other brother.' "'I am brother of the girl you say from the lion in the garden yonder,' said Barney. "'Is it she you know as not?'

Starting point is 01:56:20 Natul? She was Natul. Where is she? cried Barney. I do not know, replied New. I thought that she was a prisoner among you, and I have been waiting here quietly for her to be brought back. You saw her last, said Barney. The time had come to have it out with this man. You saw her last. She was in your cave in the mountain. We found her jacket there, and beside the spring this dog lay senseless. What became of her?

Starting point is 01:56:55 New stood with an expression of dull incomprehension upon his fine features. It was as though he had received a stunning blow. "'She was there?' he said at last in a low voice. "'She was there, in my cave, and I thought it was but a dream. "'She has gone away, and for many days I have remained here doing nothing while she roams amidst the dangers of the forest alone and unprotected. Unless, his tone became more hopeful, she has found her way back to our own people among the caves beside the restless sea.

Starting point is 01:57:35 But how could she? Not even I, a man and a great hunter, can even guess in what direction lies the country of my father knew. Perhaps you can tell me. Barney shook his head. His disappointment was great. He had been sure that New would cast some light upon the whereabouts of Victoria. He wondered if the man was telling him the truth. Doubts began to assail him. It seemed scarce credible that Victoria could have been in the fellow's lair without his knowing of her presence.

Starting point is 01:58:10 That she had been there, there seemed little or no doubt. The only other explanation was that New had, as Curtis had suggested, stolen her from the vicinity of the bungalow, killed her, and taken his spear and her coat back to his cave with him. But that did not account for the presence of the hound or the beast's evident loyalty to the man. New had turned from the veranda and entered the bungalow.

Starting point is 01:58:36 Barney followed him. The caveman was hunting about the house for something. "'What are you looking for?' asked the American. "'My spear,' replied. knew. What do you want of it? I'm going to find Natul. Barney laid a hand upon the other's arm. No, he said, you are not going away from here until we find my sister. You are a prisoner. Do you understand? The caveman drew himself to his full height. There was a sneer upon his

Starting point is 01:59:09 lip. Who can prevent me? Barney drew his revolver. This. He said. For a moment, the man seemed plunged in thought. He looked at the menacing gun, and then off through the open windows toward the distant hills. I can wait, for her sake, he said. Don't make any attempt to escape, warned Barney. You will be watched carefully. Turcos will give the alarm even if he should be unable to stop you,

Starting point is 01:59:44 though as a matter of fact he could stop you. He could stop you easily enough. Were I you, I should hate to be stopped by Turcos. He is as savage as a lion when aroused, and almost as formidable. Barney did not see this smile that touched the caveman's lips at this, for he had turned away to resume his chair upon the veranda. Later, Barney told the others that New seemed to realize the futility of attempting to get away. But that night he locked their door securely,

Starting point is 02:00:15 placed the key under his pillow and drew his cot beneath the double windows of their room. It would take a mighty, stealthy, cat, thought he, to leave the apartment without arousing him, even were Turcos not stretched beside the prisoner's cot. About midnight the caveman opened his eyes. The regular breathing of the American attested the soundness of his slumber. New extended a hand toward the sleeping Turcos, at the same time, making a low, purring sound with his lips. The beast raised his head.

Starting point is 02:00:52 Sh, whispered New. Then he rose to a sitting posture and very carefully put his feet to the floor. Stooping, he lifted the heavy wolfhound in his arms. The only sign the animal made was

Starting point is 02:01:07 to raise his muscle to the man's face and lick his cheek. News smiled. He recalled Custer's words. Turcas will give the alarm arm, even if he should be unable to stop you. The troglodyte approached the cot on which Barney lay in peaceful slumber. He rested one hand upon the sill of the open window, leaning across the sleeper.

Starting point is 02:01:31 Without a sound he vaulted over the cot, through the window, and alighted noiselessly upon the veranda without. In the garden he deposited Turcos, telling him to wait there. Then he returned to the living-room of the bungalow to fetch his stay. spear, his hatchet, and his knife. A moment later, the figures of a naked man and a gaunt wolfhound swung away beneath the tropic moon across the rolling plain toward the mountains to the south. End of Section 9.

Starting point is 02:02:10 Section 10 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 10. On the Trail It was daylight when Barney Custer awoke. His first thought was for his prisoner, and when his eyes fell upon the empty cot across the room, the American came to the center of the floor with a single bound.

Starting point is 02:02:37 Clad in his pajamas he ran out into the living room and gave the alarm. In another moment the search was on, but no sign of the caveman was to be found nor of the guardian turquoise. He must have killed the dog, insisted Greystoke. But they failed to find the beast's body, for the excellent reason that at that very moment, Turcos, wrestling with anger,

Starting point is 02:03:01 was nosing about the spot where, nearly a month before, he had been struck down by the Arab as he had sought to protect the girl to whom he had attached himself. As he searched the spot, his equally savage companion hastened to the cave further up the mountainside, and with his knife unearthed the head of U,

Starting point is 02:03:21 which he had buried there in the source, soft earth of a crevice within the lair. The trophy was now in a rather sad state of putrefaction, and New felt that he must forego the pleasure of laying it intact at the feet of his future mate. But the great saber-teeth were there, and the skull. He removed a former, fastening them to his G-string, and laid the balance of the head outside the cave, where vultures might strip it clean of flesh against New's return, for he did not wish to be burdened with it during his search for Natu. A deep bay from Turcos presently announced the finding of the trail, and at the signal,

Starting point is 02:04:01 New leaped down the mountainside where the impatient beast awaited him. A moment later, the two savage trailers were speeding away upon the spore of the Arab slave and ivory raiders. Though the trail was old, it still was sufficiently plain for these two. The hound's scent was but a trifle more acute than his human companions, but the man independent almost solely upon the tell-tale evidences which his eyes could apprehend, leaving the scent sport to the beast, for thus it had been his custom to hunt with the savage wolfish progenitors of Turcos a hundred thousand years before.

Starting point is 02:04:38 They moved silently and swiftly through the jungle, across valleys, overwinding hill trails, wherever the broad path of the caravan led. In a day they covered as much ground as the caravan had covered in a week. By night they slept at the foot of some great tree. The man and beast curled up together, or crawled within dark caves where the way led through the mountains. Or when Zor, the lion, was abroad, the man would build a rude platform high among the branches of a tree, that he and the hound might sleep in peace throughout the night. New saw strange sights that filled him with wonder and sealed his belief that he had

Starting point is 02:05:19 been miraculously transferred to another world. There were villages of black men, some of which gave evidence of recent conflict. Burned huts and mutilated corpses were all that remained of many, and in others only a few old men and women were to be seen. He also passed herds of giraffe, a beast that had been unknown in his own world, and many elephant which reminded him of glue, the mammoth. But all these beasts were smaller than those he had known in his other life, nor nearly so ferocious. Why, he could scarce recall a beast of any description that did not

Starting point is 02:05:58 rush into a death-struggle with the first member of another species which it came upon, provided, of course, that it stood the slightest show of dispatching its antagonist. Of course, there had been the smaller and more timid animals, whose entire existence had consisted in snatching what food they could as they fled through the savage days and awful nights of that fierce age in the perpetual effort to escape or elude the countless myriads of huge carnivora and bellicose ruminants whose trails formed a mighty network from pole to pole. So to New, the jungles of Africa, seem silent and deserted places. The beasts, even the more savage of them, seldom attacked except in hunger or the protection of their young. Why, he had

Starting point is 02:06:45 passed within a dozen paces of a great herd of these diminutive, hairless mammoths, and they had but raised their little pig eyes and glanced at him, as they flapped their great ears back and forth against the annoying flies and browsed upon the branches of young trees. The eight people seemed frightened out of their wits at his approach, and he had not even seen the tawny bodies of lions pass within a stone's throw of him without charging. It was amazing. Life in such a world would scarce be worth the living. It made him lonier than ever to feel that he could travel for miles without encountering a single danger. Far behind him, along the trails of the Arabs,

Starting point is 02:07:27 came a dozen white men and a half-a-hundred savage Waziri warriors. Not an hour after Barney Custer discovered New's absence, a native runner had come hurrying in from the north to beg Lord Greystoke's help in pursuing and punishing a band of Arab slave and ivory raiders, who were laying waste the villages, murdering the old men and the children and carrying the young men and women into slavery.

Starting point is 02:07:52 While Greystoke was questioning the fellow, he let drop the fact that among the other prisoners of the Arabs was a young white woman. Instantly, commotion reigned upon the Greystoke Ranch. White men were jumping into field khaki, looking to firearms and ammunition, lest their black body servants should have neglected some essential. Stable boys were saddling the horses,

Starting point is 02:08:15 and the sleek ebbin warriors of Uziri were greasing their black hides, adjusting barbaric war bonnets, streaking faces, breasts, limbs and bellies with ochre, vermilion, or ghastly bluish-white, and looking to slim shield, poisoned arrow, and formidable war-spear. For a time the fugitive was forgotten, but as the march proceeded, they came upon certain reminders that recalled him to their thoughts, and indicated that he was far in advance of them upon the trail of the arrow. The first sign of him was the carcass of a bull buffalo. Straight through the heart was the great hole that they now knew was made by the passage of the ancient stone-tipped spear.

Starting point is 02:08:58 Strips have a knife cut from the sides, and the belly was torn as though by a wild beast. Brown stooped to examine the ground about the bull. When he straightened up, he looked at Greystoke and laughed. "'Didn't I understand you to say that he must have killed the dog?' He asked, Look here! They ate side by side from the body of their kill. End of Section 10.

Starting point is 02:09:31 Section 11. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 11. The Abduction For three weeks now, Victoria Custer had been a prisoner of Sheikh Ibn Azwad, but other than the ordinary hardships

Starting point is 02:09:53 of African travel, she had experienced nothing of which she might complain. She had even been permitted to ride upon one of the few donkeys that still survived, and her food was as good as that of Ibn Azwad himself, for the canny old sheik knew that the better the condition of his prisoner, the better the price she would bring at the court of the Sultan of Fulad. Abul Mukarum, Ibn Oswad's right-hand man, a swaggering young Arab from the rim of the Sahara, had cast covetous eyes upon the beautiful prisoner, but the old sheik delivered himself of a peremptory no

Starting point is 02:10:28 when his lieutenant broached a proposal to him. Then Abul Makarum, balked in his passing desire, found the thing growing upon him until the idea of possessing the girl became a veritable obsession with him. Victoria, forced to it by necessity, had picked up enough of the language of the sons of the desert to be able to converse with them,

Starting point is 02:10:49 And Abu Makarum often rode at her side, feasting his eyes upon her face and figure, the while he attempted to ingratiate himself into her esteem by accounts of his prowess. But when at last he spoke of love, the girl turned her flushed an angry face away from him, and reigning in her donkey, refused to ride further beside him. Ibn Azwad, from afar, witnessed the altercation, and when he rode to Victoria's side and learned the truth of the matter, he berated to him. Abu Makaram roundly, ordered him to the rear of the column, and placed another Arab over the prisoner. Thereafter, the venomous looks which the discredited Abu Ghast upon Victoria

Starting point is 02:11:32 oftentimes caused her to shudder inwardly, for she knew that she had made a cruel and implacable enemy of the man. Ibn Azwad had given her but a hint of the fate which awaited her, yet it had been sufficient to warn her that death were better than the thing she was being dragged through the jungles to suffer. Every walking minute her mind was occupied with plans for escape, yet not one presented itself which did not offer insuperable obstacles. Even had she been able to leave the camp undetected, how long could she hope to survive in the savage jungle? And should, by some miracle, her life be spared even for months, of what avail would that be? For she could no longer have

Starting point is 02:12:16 retraced her way to Lord Greystoke's ranch, then she could have laid a true course upon the trackless ocean. The horrors of the march that passed daily in hideous review before her left her sick and disgusted. The cruelly beaten slaves who carried the great burdens of ivory, tans, and provisions brought tears to her eyes. The brutal massacres that followed the forcible entrance into each succeeding village wrung her heart and aroused her shame for those beats in human form, who urged on their savage and cowardly Manuema cannibals to commit nameless excesses against the cowering prisoners that fell into their hands. But at last, they came to a village where victory failed to rush forward and fall into their arms. Instead, they were met with sullen

Starting point is 02:13:06 resistance. Ferocious, painted devils fought them stubbornly every inch of the way, until Ibn Azwa decided to make a detour and pass around the village rather than sacrifice more of his followers. In the confusion of the fight and the near retreat which followed it, Abul Makarum found the opportunity he had been awaiting. The prisoners, including the white girl, were being pushed ahead of the retreating raiders, while the Arabs and Manuima brought up the rear, fighting off the pursuing savages. Now, Abu Mekarum knew a way to the Northland that two might traverse with ease, and over which one could fairly fly, but which was impossible for a slave caravan, because it passed through the territory of the English. If the girl would accompany him willingly, well and good,

Starting point is 02:13:58 if not, then he would go alone, but not before he had committed upon her the revenge he had planned. He left the firing-line, therefore, and pushed his way through the terror-stricken slave, to the side of the Arab who guarded Victoria Custer. "'Go back to Eben Azwad,' he said to the Arab. "'He desires your presence.' The other looked at him closely for a moment. "'You lie, Abul Makarum,' he said at last. "'Ibn Azad commanded me particularly against permitting you

Starting point is 02:14:28 "'to be alone with the girl. Go too!' "'Fool!' muttered Abul Macarum, and with the word he pulled the trigger of the long gun that rested across the pommel of his saddle with its muzzle scarce a foot from the stomach of the other Arab. With a single shriek, the man lunged from his donkey. "'Come!' cried Abuamakarum, seizing the bridle of victorious beast and turning into the jungle to the west.

Starting point is 02:14:55 The girl tried to slip from her saddle, but a strong arm went about her waist and held her firm as the two donkeys forged shoulder to shoulder through the tangled mass of creepers which all but blocked their way. Once Victoria screamed for help, but the savage war-cries of the natives drowned her voice. Fifteen minutes later, the two came out upon the trail again that they had followed when they approached the village, and soon the sounds of the conflict behind them grew fainter and fainter until they were lost entirely in the distance. Victoria Custer's mind was working rapidly, casting about for some means of escape from the

Starting point is 02:15:35 silent figure at her side. A revolver, or even a knife, would have solved her difficulty, but she had neither. Gee, the life of Abu Makaram, would have been worth but little, for the girl was beside herself with hopeless horror of the fate that now loomed so close at hand. The thought that she had not even the means to take her own life left her numb and cold. There was but one way, to battle with tooth and nail, until, in anger, the man himself should kill her. Yet, until the last moment, she might hope against hope for the sucker which he knew in her heart of hearts was impossible to receive. For the better part of two hours,

Starting point is 02:16:18 Abu Mukaram kept on away from the master he had robbed. He spoke but little, and when he did, it was in the tone of the master to his slave. Near noon they left the jungle and came out into a higher country, where the space between the trees was greater, and there was little or no underbrush. Traveling was much easier here, and they made better time. They were still retracing the trail along which the caravan had traveled. It would be some time during the next morning that they would turn north again upon a new trail. Beside a stream, Abu Makarum halted. He tethered the donkeys, and then turned toward the girl. "'Come,' he said, and lay. "'I'm sorry. "'You're laid his hand upon her. End of Section 11. Section 12. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice

Starting point is 02:17:17 Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 12. The caveman finds his mate. Each day, New realized that he was gaining rapidly upon those with whom Natul traveled. The experiences of his other life assured him that she must be a prisoner, yet, at the same time he realized that such might not be the case at all, for had he not thought her a prisoner among the others who had held him prisoner, only to learn that one of them claimed her as a sister. It all seemed very strange to New. It was quite beyond him. Natul could not be the sister of Custer, and yet he had seen her apparently happy and contented in the society of these strangers, and Custer unquestionably appeared to feel for her the solicitude of a brother.

Starting point is 02:18:09 Curtis, it was evident, loved Natul. That much he had gleaned from conversations he had overheard between him and Custer. How the man could have become so well acquainted with Natul, between the two days that had elapsed since New had set forth from the caves beside the restless sea to hunt down O'u, and the morning that he had awakened following the mighty shaking of the world was quite as much a mystery as was the remarkable changes that had taken place in the aspect of the world during the same brief period. New had given much thought to those miraculous happenings,

Starting point is 02:18:47 with the result that he had about convinced himself that he must have slept much longer than he had believed, but that a hundred thousand years had rolled their slow and weary progress above his unconscious head could not, of course, have occurred to him even as the remotest of possibilities. He had also weighed the sneering words of Curtis, and with them the attitude of the strangers with whom he had been thrown. He had quickly appreciated the fact that their manners and customs

Starting point is 02:19:16 were as far removed from his as they were from those of the beasts of the jungle. He had seen that his own ways were more in accordance with the ways of the black and half-naked natives, whom the whites looked upon as so much their inferiors, that they would not even eat at the same table with them. He had noted the fact that the blacks treated the other whites, with a marked respect which they did not extend to New, and being no fool,

Starting point is 02:19:43 New had come to the conclusion that the whites themselves looked upon him as an inferior, even before Curtis's words convinced him of the truth of his suspicions. Evidently, though his skin was white, he was in some subtle way different from the other whites. Possibly it was in the matter of raiment. He had tried to wear the strange body coverings they had given him

Starting point is 02:20:08 but they were cumbersome and uncomfortable, and though he was seldom warm enough now, he had nevertheless been glad when the opportunity came to discard the hampering and unaccustomed clothing. These thoughts suggested the possibility that if Natul had found recognition among the strangers upon an equal footing with them, that she too might have those attributes of superiority

Starting point is 02:20:32 which the strangers claimed. And if such was the fact, it became evident that she would consider New from the viewpoint of her new friends, as an inferior. Such reveries made New very sad, for he loved Nadu just as you or I would love, just as normal white men have always loved, with a devotion that placed the object of his affection upon a pedestal before which he was happy to bow down and worship. His passion was not of the brute type of the inferior races, which oftentimes sometimes sometimes solemnizes the marriage ceremony with a cudgel, and ever places the woman in the position of an inferior and a chattel. Even as New pondered the puzzling questions which confronted him,

Starting point is 02:21:19 his eyes and ears were alert as he sped along the now-fresh trail of the caravan. Every indication pointed the recent passing of many men, and the troglodyte was positive that he could be but a few hours behind his quarry. A few miles east of him, the rescue party from the Greystoke Ranch, were pushing rapidly ahead upon a different trail with a view to heading off the Arabs. Ibn Azwat had taken a circuitous route in order that he might pass around the country of the Waziri, and with his slow-moving slave caravan, he had now reached a point but a few days' journey in a direct line from the ranch. The lightly equipped pursuers, having to be a little-moving knowledge of the route taken by the Arabs, from the messenger who had come to seek their assistance,

Starting point is 02:22:07 had not been compelled to follow the spoor of their quarry, but instead had marched straight across country in a direct line for a point which they believed would bring them ahead of the caravan. Thus it was that Nou and Turcaz, and the party of whites and Wiziri from the ranch were closing in upon Ibn Oswald from opposite direction simultaneously. But New was not destined to follow the trail of the raiders to where they were still engaged in repelling the savage attacks of the fierce Wamboli, for as he trotted along with the dog at his side, his quick eyes detected that which the hound, with all his wondrous instinctive powers, would have passed by, unnoticing, the well-marked prince of the hoofs of two donkeys that had come back along the trail since

Starting point is 02:22:53 the caravan had passed. That they were donkeys belonging to the Arabs was evident to new, through his familiarity with the distinctive hoof-prints of each, which, during the past three days, had become as well known to him as his mother's face had been. But what were they doing retracing the way they had but just covered? New halted and raised his head to sniff the air, and listen intently for the faintest sound from the direction in which the beast had gone when they left the old trail at the point where he had discovered their spoor. But the wind was blowing from the opposite direction, so there was no chance that Nook could sent them. He was in doubt as to whether he should leave the trail of the main body and follow these two,

Starting point is 02:23:40 or continue on his way. From the manner of their passing, side by side, he was convinced that each carried a rider, since otherwise they would have gone in single file after the manner of beasts moving along a none too wide trail. But there was nothing to indicate that either rider was Nadu. For an instant he hesitated, and then his judgment told him to keep on after the main body, for if Nadu was a prisoner, she would be with the larger force, not riding in the opposite direction with a single guard. Even as he turned to take up the pursuit again, there came faintly to his ears from the jungle

Starting point is 02:24:21 to his left, the sound of a human voice. It was a woman's, raised in frightened protest. Like a deer, Newt turned and leaped in the direction of that familiar voice. The fleet wolfhound was put to it to keep pace with the agile caveman, for New had left the earth and taken to the branches of the trees, where no underbrush retarded his swift flight. From tree to tree he leaped or swung, sometimes hurling his body twenty feet through the air from one jungle giant to another. Below him raced the panting turquoise, red tongue lolling from his foam-flecked mouth. But with all their speed, the two moved with the noiselessness of shadowy ghosts. At the edge of the jungle, New came upon a park-like forest, and well into this he saw a

Starting point is 02:25:12 white-robed Arab forcing a woman slowly backward across his knee. One sinewy brown hand clutched her throat. The other was raised to strike her in the face. New saw that he could not reach the man in time to prevent the blow, but he might do not. distract his attention for the moment that would be required for him to reach his side. From his throat there rose the savage war cry of his long-dead people, a cry that brought a hundred jungle creatures to their feet trembling in fear or in rage according to their kind. And it brought Abu Mukaram upstanding too, for in all his life he had never heard the like of that blood-freezing challenge.

Starting point is 02:25:53 At the sight which met his eyes, he dropped the girl and darted toward his donkey were hung his long-barreled rifle in its boot. Victoria Custer looked, too, and what she saw brought unutterable relief and happiness to her. Then the Arab had turned with leveled gun just as the caveman leaped upon him. There was a report of the firearm ere it was wrenched from Abu al-Makarum's grasp and hurled to one side, but the bullet went wide of its mark. In the next instant the girl saw the two men locked in what she knew was a death-struggle. The Arab struck mighty blows at the head and face of his antagonist, while the caveman,

Starting point is 02:26:33 the great muscles rolling beneath his smooth hide, sought for a hold upon the other's throat. About the two, the vicious wolf-hounds slunk growling with bristling hair, waiting for an opportunity to rush in upon the white-robed antagonist of his master. Victoria Custer, her glenched fists tight pressed against her bosom, watched the two men who battled for her. She saw the handsome black head of her savage man bend lower and lower toward the throat of his foeman, and when the strong white teeth buried themselves in the jugular of the other, it was with no sickening qualm of nausea that the girl witnessed the bestial act. She heard the half-wolfish growl of New as he tasted the hot red blood of his enemy.

Starting point is 02:27:19 She saw the strong jaws tear and rend the soft flesh of the Arab's throat. She saw the powerful hands bent back the head of the doomed Abu Makaram. She saw her ferocious mate shake the man as a terrier shakes a rat, and her heart swelled in fierce, primitive pride at the prowess of her man. No longer did Victoria Custer exist. It was Nadul, the savage maiden of the niacene, who, as knew through the lifeless corpse of his kill to one side and opened his arms, flung herself into his embrace. It was not a woman. Nathul, daughter of Tha, Nadul of the tribe of Nguel that dwelt beyond the barren cliffs beside the restless sea, who threw her arms about her lord and master's neck and drew

Starting point is 02:28:06 his mouth down to her hot lips. It was Nautul of the firstborn, who watched New and the fierce wolfhound circle about the corpse of the dead Arab. The caveman, moving in the graceful savage steps of the death-dance of his tribe, now bent half over, now leaping high over, now leaping high in air, throwing his stone-tips spear aloft, chanting the weird victory song of a dead and buried age, and beside him, his equally savage mate squatted upon her haunches beating time with their slim white hands. When the dance was done, New halted before Natul. The girl rose, facing him, and for a long minute, the two stood in silence looking at one another. It was the first opportunity that either had had to study the features of the other since the strange

Starting point is 02:28:57 miracle that had separated them. Nu found that some subtle change had taken place in his Nadu. It was she. Of that there could be no doubt. But yet there was that about her which cast a spell of awe over him. She was infinitely finer and more wonderful than he ever had realized. With the passing of the excitement of the battle and the dance, the strange ecstasy which had held the girl enthrall passed slowly away. The rhythm of the dancing of the savage black-haired giant had touched some chord within her which awoke the long-dormant instinct of the primordial. For the time, she had been carried back a hundred thousand years to the childhood of the human race.

Starting point is 02:29:44 She had not known for those brief instance, Victoria Custer, or the twentieth century or its civilization, for they were yet a thousand centuries in the future. But now she commenced once more to look through the eyes of generations of culture and refinement. Before her she saw a savage, primitive man. In his eyes was the fire of a great love that would not for long be denied. About her she saw the wild, fierce forest and the cruel jungle, and behind all this and beyond, Her vision wandered to the world she had always known, the world of cities and homes and gentlefolk. She saw her father and her mother and her friends. What would they say?

Starting point is 02:30:31 Again she let her eyes rest upon the man. It was with difficulty that she restrained a mad desire to throw herself upon his broad breast and weep out her doubts and fears close to the beating of his great heart and in the safety of those mighty protecting arms. But with the wish there arose again the question, What would they say? Held her trembling and frightened from him. The man saw something of the girl's trouble in her eyes,

Starting point is 02:31:03 but he partially misinterpreted it, for he read fear of himself where there was principally self-fear, and because of what he had heard Curtis say, he thought that he saw contempt too, for primitive people are infinitely more sensitive than their more sophisticated brothers. "'You do not love me, Natul?' he asked. "'Have the strangers turned you against me?' "'What one of them could have fetched you the head of U, the man-hunter?

Starting point is 02:31:32 "'See?' He tapped the two great tusks that hung from his loincloth. "'Nu slew the mightiest of beast for his Natul. "'The head is buried in the cave of U. "'Yet, now that I come to take you as my mate, "'I seek fear in your eyes and something else which never was there before. What is it, Natu? Have the stranger stolen your love from New?

Starting point is 02:31:57 The man spoke in a tongue so ancient that in all the world there live no man who spoke or knew a word of it. Yet to Victoria Custer it was as intelligible as her own English, nor did it seem strange to her that she answered New in his own language. My heart tells me that I am yours, new, she said, but my judgment and my training wore me against the step that my heart prompts. I love you, but I could not be happy to wander

Starting point is 02:32:27 half-naked through the jungle for the balance of my life, and if I go with you now, even for a day, I may never return to my people. Nor would you be happy in the life that I lead. It would stifle and kill you. I think I see now something of the miracle that has overwhelmed us. To you it has been but a few days since you left your Natu to hunt down the ferocious O, but in reality countless ages have rolled by.

Starting point is 02:32:58 By some strange freak of fate you have remained unchanged during all these ages, until now you step forth from your long sleep, an unspoiled caveman of the stone age into the midst of the twentieth century. While I, doubtless, have been born and reborn a thousand times, merging from one incarnation to another, until in this we are again united. Had you two died and been born again during all these weary years, no gap of ages would intervene between us now, and we should meet again upon a common footing, as to other souls, and mate and die to be born again to a new mating and a new life with its inevitable death.

Starting point is 02:33:42 But you have defied the laws of life and death. You have refied the laws of life and death. You have refuse to die, and now that we meet again at last, a hundred thousand years lie between us. An unbridgeable gulf across which I may not return, and over which you may not come, other than by the same route which I have followed, through death and a new life thereafter. Much that the girl said was beyond news comprehension, and the most of it, without the scope of his primitive language, so that she had been forced to draw liberally upon her twentieth-century English to fill in the gaps, yet New had caught the idea in a vague sort of way. At least that his Nadu was far removed from him because of a great lapse of time that had occurred while he

Starting point is 02:34:30 slept in the cave of U, and that through his own death alone could he span the gulf between them and claim her as his mate. He placed the butt of his spear upon the ground, resting the stone tip against his heart. "'I go, Natul,' he said simple. simply, that I may return again as you would have me, no longer the white nigger that Curtis says I am. The girl and the man were so occupied and engrossed with their own tragedy that they did not note the restless pacing of Turquhaw's the wolfhound, or hear the ominous growls that rumble from his savage throat as he looked toward the jungle behind them. End of Section 13 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

Starting point is 02:35:27 This Libravox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 13. Into the Jungle The searching party from the Greystoke Ranch had come upon Ibn Azwat so unexpectedly that not a shot had been exchanged between the two parties. The Arabs, pressed from behind by the savage Wamboli warriors, had literally run into the arms of the whites and the waziri. When Greystoke demanded that the white girl he turned over to him at once, Ibn Aswad smote his breast and swore that there had been no white girl with them. But one of the slaves told a different story to a waziri. And when the whites found that Victoria had been stolen from Ibn Aswad by one of the sheikhs'

Starting point is 02:36:12 lieutenants only a few hours before, they hastened to scour the jungle in search of her. To facilitate their movements and ensure covering as wide a territory as possible, each of the whites took a few waziri, and spreading out in a far-flung skirmish line, beat the jungle in the direction toward which the slave had told them Abul Makarum had ridden. To comb the jungle finally, each whites spread his waziri upon either side of him, and thus they advanced, seldom inside of one another, but always within hailing distance. And so it happened that chance brought William Curtis, unseen, to the edge of the jungle beside the park-like forest, beneath the giant trees of which he saw a tableau that brought him to a sudden

Starting point is 02:36:58 halt. There was the girl he loved and sought, apparently unharmed, and two donkeys, and the dead body of an Arab, and the great wolfhound, looking toward his hiding place and growling menacingly. And before the girl, the savage white man stood. Curtis was about to spring forward when he saw the man place the butt of his spear upon the ground and the point against his heart. The act and the expression upon the man's face proclaimed his intention. And so Curtis drew back again, waiting for the perpetration of the deed that he knew was coming. A smile of anticipation played about the American's lips. Victoria Custer, too, guessed the thing that knew contemplated.

Starting point is 02:37:45 It was, in accordance with her own reasoning, the only logical thing for the man to to do. But love is not logical. And when love saw and realized the imminence of its bereavement, it cast logic to the winds. And with a little scream of terror, the girl threw herself upon New of the niacene, striking the spear from its goal. "'No, no!' she cried. "'You must not do it. I cannot let you go. I love you, New. Oh, how I love you!' And as the strong arms enfolded her once more, she gave a happy sigh of content, and let her head drop again upon the breast of him who had come back out of the ages to claim her. The man put an arm about her waist, and together the two turned toward the west in the direction that Abu Makarum had been fleeing. Nor did either see the

Starting point is 02:38:37 white-faced, scowling man who leaped from the jungle behind them, and with leveled rifle took deliberate aim at the back of the black-haired giant. Nor did they see the swift-faced, spring of the wolfhound, nor the thing that followed there beneath the brooding silence of the savage jungle. Ten minutes later, Barney Custer broke through the tangled wall of verdure upon a sight that took his breath away. There stood the two patient donkeys, switching their tails and flapping their long ears. Beside them lay the corpse of Abu Macarum, and upon the edge of the jungle, at his feet,

Starting point is 02:39:13 was stretched the dead body of William Curtis, his breast and throat torn by savage fangs. Across the clearing, a great gaunt wolfhound halted in its retreat at the sound of Barney's approach. It bared its bloody fangs in an ominous growl of warning, and then turned and disappeared into the jungle. Barney advanced and examined the soft ground about the donkeys and the body of the Arab. He saw the imprints of a man's naked feet, and the smaller impress of a woman's riding boot. He looked toward the jungle where Turcote, and he looked toward the jungle where Turcos had disappeared. What had his sister gone to within the somber savage depths beyond?

Starting point is 02:39:55 What would he bring her back to, were he to follow after? He doubted that she would come without her dream man. Where would she be happier with him, in the pitiless jungle which was the only world he knew, or in the still more pitiless haunts of civilized men? End of Section 13. Section 14 of The Eternal Savage. by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libravox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 02:40:32 The Eternal Savage, Part 2. Chapter 1 Again, a world upheaval. Victoria Custer was aware that Barney Custer, her brother, was forcing his way through the jungle behind them, that he was coming to take her away from New. Many lifetimes of culture and refinement pled with her to relinquish her mad, idyllic purpose, to give up her savage man and return to the

Starting point is 02:41:00 protection and comforts that her brother and civilization represented. But there was still another force at work, older by far than the brief span of cultivation that had marked the advancement of her more recent forebears, the countless ages of prehistoric savagery in which the mind and heart and soul of man were born, the countless awful ages that have left upon the soul and heart and mind of man, an impress that will endure so long as man endures. From out of that black abyss before man had either mind or soul, there still emanates the same mighty power that was his soul master then, instinct. And it was instinct that drove Victoria Custer deeper into the jungle with her savage lover,

Starting point is 02:41:46 as she sensed the nearer approach of her brother. One of the two master instincts that have dominated and preserved life upon the face of the earth. Yet it was not without a struggle. She hesitated, half turning backward. Nook has to questioning look upon her. They are coming, Natul, he said. Nook cannot fight these strange men who hurl lead with the thunders they have stolen from the skies. Come, we must hurry back to the cave of O, and on the morrow we shall go forth and search for the tribe of New my father, that dwells beyond the barren cliffs beside the restless sea. There, in our own world, we shall be happy.

Starting point is 02:42:31 And yet the girl held back afraid. Then the man gathered her in his mighty arms and ran on in the direction of the cave of O the Sabretooth Tiger. The girl did not even struggle to escape. Instead, she lay quietly, as over her fell a sensation of peace and happiness, as though after a long absence she was being born home. And at their heels Trudda Turcos the wolfhound. Sometimes New took to the lower branches of the trees,

Starting point is 02:43:02 for in her own age his race had been semi-orboreo. Here he traveled with the ease and agility of a squirrel, though oftentimes the modern woman that still lived in the breast of Victoria Custer quailed at the dizzy leaps and the swaying perilous trail. Yet as they fled, her fears were greatest now that they might be overtaken, and herself snatched back into the world of civilization where her Ngu could never follow. It was dusk of the third evening when they came again to the cave of U. Up the steep cliffside they clambered hand in hand.

Starting point is 02:43:40 Together they entered the dark and forbidding hole. Tomorrow, said Nguer, We will search for the caves of our people, and we shall find them. Darkness settled upon the jungle, the plain and the mountains. New and Natul slept, for both were exhausted from the long days of flight. And then there came, out of the boughs of the earth, a deep and ominous rumbling. The earth shook. The cliff rocked, great masses of shattered rocks shaken from its summit roared and tumbled

Starting point is 02:44:13 down its face. New sprang to his feet, only to be hurled immediately to the floor of the cave, stunned and senseless. Within all was darkness. No light filtered through the opening. For minutes the frightful din endured, and with it the sickening tossing of the earth. But at last the rumbling ceased. The world sank back to rest, exhausted. And Newly unconscious where he had fallen.

Starting point is 02:44:45 of Section 14, Section 15 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recordings in the public domain. Chapter 2. Back to the Stone Age. It was morning when Nat Ull awoke. The sun was streaming in across a wide sea to illumine the interior of the cave where she lay huddled in a great pile of soft, furry pelts.

Starting point is 02:45:20 Near her lay a woman. Older than herself, but still beautiful. In front of them, nearer the mouth of a cave, two men slept. One was Tha, her father, and the other her brother, aunt. The woman was Natul's mother, Lu Tann. Now she too opened her eyes. She stretched, raising her bare brown arms above her head, and half turning on her side toward Natul.

Starting point is 02:45:46 It was the luxurious movement of the she-tiger, the embodiment of perfect health and her head. grace. Lu Tans smiled at her daughter, exposing a row of strong, white, even teeth. Natul returned the smile. "'I am glad that it is light again,' said the girl. "'The shaking of the ground yesterday frightened me, so that I had the most terrible dreams all during the darkness.

Starting point is 02:46:12 Ugg!' And Natul shuddered. Tha opened his eyes and looked at the two women. I too dreamed. He said, I dreamed that the earth shook again. The cliffs sank, and the restless sea rolled in upon them,

Starting point is 02:46:28 drowning us all. This is no longer a good place to live. After we have eaten, I shall go speak to New, telling him that we should seek other caves in a new country. Natul rose, and stepping between the two men, came to the ledge before the entrance to the cave. Before her stretched a scene that was perfectly

Starting point is 02:46:51 familiar, and yet strangely new. Below her was an open patch at the foot of the cliff, all barren and boulder-strewn except for a rude rectangle that had been cleared of rock and debris. Beyond lay a narrow strip of tangled tropical jungle. Enormous fern-like trees lifted their huge fronds a hundred feet into the air. The sun was topping the horizon, coming out of a great sea that lay just beyond the jungle. And such a sun! It was dull red and swollen to an enormous size. The atmosphere was thick and hot, almost sticky. And the life!

Starting point is 02:47:31 Such countless myriads of creatures teeming through the jungle, winging their way through the air and blackening the surface of the sea. Nuttul knit her brows. She was trying to think, trying to recall something. Was it her dream that she attempted to visualize, or was this the dream? She shook herself. Then she glanced quickly down at her apparel.

Starting point is 02:47:56 For an instant, she seemed not to comprehend the meaning of her garmature, the single red-dose skin, or the sandals of the thick hide of Ta, the woolly rhinoceros, held to her shapely feet by thin lacings of the rawhide of the great bose. And yet she quickly realized she had always been clothed just thus. But had she? The question puzzled her. Mechanically, her hands slipped to the back of her head above the nape of her neck. A look of puzzlement entered her eyes as her fingers fell upon the loose strands of her long hair

Starting point is 02:48:32 that tumbled to her waist in the riotous and lovely confusion of early morning. What was it that her light touch missed? A barrette? What could Nautau, child of the Stone Age, know of barrettes? Slowly her fingers felt about her head. When they came in contact with the broad fillet that bound her hair back from her forehead, she smiled. This was the fillet that knew the son of New had fashioned for her, from a single gorgeous

Starting point is 02:49:01 snake-skin of black and red and yellow, split lengthwise and dried. It awoke her to a more vivid realization of the present. She turned and re-entered the cave. From a wooden peg driven into a hole in the wall, she took a handful of brilliant feathers. These she stuck in the front of the fillet, where they nodded in a gay plume above her sweet face. By this time, Lutan, Tha, and Ot had risen. The older woman was busing herself with some dry tinder and a firestick, just inside the entrance to the cave. Tha and Ot had stepped out upon the ledge, filling their lungs with the morning air.

Starting point is 02:49:43 Natul joined them. In her hand was a bladder. The three clambered down the face of the cliff. Other men and women were emerging from other caves that pitted the rocky escarpment. They greeted the three with smiles and pleasant words, and upon every tongue was some comment upon the earthquake of the preceding night. Tha and Ott went into the jungle toward the sea. Nadu stopped beside a little spring that bubbled, clear, and cold at the foot of the cliff.

Starting point is 02:50:14 Here were other girls with bladders which they were her. filling with water. There was Ra'el, daughter of Kor, who made the keenest spear-tips and the best balanced. And there was Una, daughter of Noe, the chief, and sister of New, the son of New. And beside these were half a dozen others, all clean-limbed, fine-featured girls, straight as arrows, supple as Panthers. They laughed and talked as they filled their bladders at the spring. "'Were you not frightened when the earth shook Nadul?' asked Unah. I was frightened, replied Natu. Yes, but I was more frightened by the dream I had after the shaking had stopped.

Starting point is 02:50:56 What did you dream? cried Ra'el, daughter of Kor, core who made the truest spearheads, with which a strong man could strike a flying reptile in mid-air. I dreamed that I was not Nadu, replied the girl. I dreamed of a strange world and strange people. I was one of them. I was clothed in many garments that were not skin at all. I lived in a cave that was not a cave.

Starting point is 02:51:24 It was built upon the ground of the stuff of which trees are made, only cut into thin slabs and fastened together. There were many caves in the one cave. There were men and women, and some of the men were black. Black, echoed the other girls. Yes, black, insisted Natul. And they alone were gargarde. something as are our men. The white men wore strange garments and things upon their heads,

Starting point is 02:51:52 and had no beards. They carried short spears that spit smoke and great noise out upon their enemies and the wild beasts, and slew them at a great distance. And was New the son of New there? asked Rael, tittering behind her hand. He came and took me away, replied Nadu gravely. And at night the earth shook as we slept in the cave of U. And when I awoke, I was here in the cave of Thah, my father.

Starting point is 02:52:23 Noo has not returned, said Una. Natul looked at her inquiringly. Where did Noo the son of Noo go? She asked. Who should know better than Natul, daughter of Tha, that knew the son of New, went forth to slay U

Starting point is 02:52:40 the killer of men and mammoths, that he might lay U's head before the cave of Nodul, she asked in reply. "'He has not returned,' asked Naduil. "'He said that he would go, but I thought that he joked, "'for one man alone may not slay U, the killer of men and of mammoths.' But she did not use the word mammoth, nor the word man. Instead, she spoke in a language that survives only among the apes of our day, if it survives at all, and among them only in crude and disjointed monosyllables.

Starting point is 02:53:16 When she spoke of the mammoth, she called him glue, and man was pa. The tongue was low and liquid, and entirely beautiful and enchanting, and she spoke too much with her eyes and with her graceful hands, as did her companions. For the tribe of Nugh was not far removed from those earlier peoples, descended from the Alalus who were speechless, and who preceded those who spoke. spoke by signs. The girls, having filled the bladders with water, now returned to their respective caves. Nadul had scarce entered and hung up the bladder, ere Tha and Ott returned, one with the carcass of an antelope, the other with an armful of fruits. In the floor of the cave beside

Starting point is 02:53:59 the fire a little hollow had been shipped from the living rock. Into this, Nadu poured some water, while Lutan cut pieces of the antelope's flesh into small bits, dropping them into the water. Then she scooped a large pebble from the fire, where it had been raised to a high temperature. This she dropped into the water with the meat. There was a great bubbling and sputtering, which was repeated, as Luton dropped one superheated pebble after another into the water, until the hole became a boiling cauldron. When the water continued to boil for a few moments after a pebble was thrown in,

Starting point is 02:54:35 Lutan ceased her operation, sitting quietly with her family about the primitive stew for several minutes. Occasionally, she would stick a finger into the water to test its temperature, and when at last she seemed satisfied she signaled thaw to eat. The man plunged his stone knife into a piece of the half-cooked meat, withdrew it from the cauldron, and tossed it upon the floor beside Lutan. A second piece was given to Nadeul, a third to aught, and the fourth Tha kept to himself. The four ate with a certain dignity.

Starting point is 02:55:10 There was nothing bestial nor repulsive in their manners, and as they ate they talked and laughed among themselves. There seemed great good fellowship in the cavehold of Tha. Ot joked with Natul about Noo the son of New, telling her that doubtless a hyena had devoured the mighty hunter before ever he had had a chance to slay U. But Lou Tan came to her daughter's rescue, saying that it was more likely that Noo the son of New had discovered Wu and all his family and had remained to kill them all.

Starting point is 02:55:45 I do not fear for New because of O, said Tha presently. For New the son of New is as great a hunter as his father. But I shall be glad to see him safe again from all that might have befallen him when the earth rocked and the thunder came from below instead of from above. I shall be glad to have him return and take my daughter as his mate, whether he brings back the head of Ooo or not. Nathul was silent, but she was worried, for all feared the power of the elements against which no man might survive in battle, no matter how brave he might be.

Starting point is 02:56:23 After breakfast, Tha went, as he had said that he should, to the cave of Nhu, the chief. There he found many of the older warriors and the young men. There were so many of them that there was not room within the cave and upon the narrow ledge without, so, at a word from New, they all descended to the little roughly cleared rectangle at the base of the cliff. This place was where their councils were held, and where the tribe congregated for feasts or other purposes that called many together. New sat at one end of the clearing upon a flat rock.

Starting point is 02:56:59 About his shoulders fell the shaggy-haired skin of a huge cave-bearer. In the string that supported his loincloth reposed a wooden-handled stone axe and a stone knife. Upright in his hand, its butt between his feet rose a tall, slim spear, stone-tipped. His black hair was rudely cut into a shock. A fillet of tiger hide encircled his head, supporting a single long, straight feather. About his neck depended a string of long, sharp fangs and talons, and from cheek to heel his smooth The smooth bronze tide was marked with many scars inflicted by these same mementos when they had armed the mighty paws and jaws of the fierce denizens of that primeval world.

Starting point is 02:57:44 He let the skin that covered him slip from his shoulders, for the morning was warm. In that hot and human atmosphere there was seldom need for covering, but even then men were slaves to fashion. They wore the trophies of their prowess and bedecked their women similarly. Thaw, being second only to New, was the first among the warriors to speak. As speech was young, and words comparatively few, they must needs be supplemented with many signs and gestures. Oratory was, therefore, a strenuous business, and one which required a keen imagination, more than ordinary intelligence and considerable histrionic ability.

Starting point is 02:58:26 Because it was so difficult to convey one's ideas to one's felon, the art of speech in its infancy was of infinitely more value to the human race than it is today. Now we converse mechanically. The more one listens to ordinary conversations, the more apparent it becomes that the reasoning faculties of the brain take a little part in the direction of the vocal organs. When Thaw spoke to New and the warriors of his tribe, he was constantly required to invent signs and words to carry varying shades of meaning to his listeners. It was great mental exercise for Tha and for his audience as well. Men were good listeners in those days. They had to be, and they advanced more rapidly in proportion to our advancement, because what

Starting point is 02:59:10 little speech they heard meant something. It was too precious to waste. Nor could men afford to attend to foolish matters when it required all their eyes as well as their ears and the concentration of the best of their mental faculties to follow the thread of an argument. Tha stepped to the center of the group of warriors. There was a little open space left there for the speaker. About it squatted the older men. Behind them knelt others, and behind these stood the young men of the tribe of New. Thaw uttered a deep rumbling from his chest cavity. He shook his giant frame. The ground roars and trembles where we live, he said, the cliffs will fall. He pointed toward their dwellings and making a gesture with his open paw.

Starting point is 02:59:58 towards the ground. "'We shall all be killed. Let us go. Let us seek a new place where the ground does not tremble. The beasts are everywhere. Fruit is everywhere. Grain grows in the valley of every river. We may hunt elsewhere as well as here. We shall find plenty to eat. Let us take our women and our children and go out of this place.' As he spoke he mimicked the hunting of game, the gathering of fruit and grain, the marching and the search for a new home. His motions were both dignified and graceful. His listener sat in rapt attention. When he had done, he squatted down among the older warriors. Then another rose, a very old man.

Starting point is 03:00:45 He came to the center of the open space and told, by word and pantomime, the dangers of migration. He recalled in numerous instances when strangers, in small parties, and in great numbers, had come too close to the country of New, and how they, Nuz warriors, had rushed upon them slaying all who could not escape. "'Others will do the same to us,' he said, "'if we approach their dwellings.' When he had sat down, Hudd pushed through to the center of the ring of younger warriors. HUD desired Nadu the daughter of Tha.

Starting point is 03:01:22 Therefore he had two good reasons for espousing the cause of her father. One was that he might ingratiate himself with the older man, and the other was the hope that the tribe might migrate at once, while New the son of New was absent, thus giving HUD uninterrupted opportunity to push his suit for the girl. "'Thaw has spoken wisely,' he said. "'This land is no longer safe for man or beast. Scarce a moon passes that does not see the ground tremble and crack, and in places have faces of the mountains tumbled away. Any time it may be the turn of our cliff to fall. Let us go to a land

Starting point is 03:02:03 where the ground does not tremble. We need not fear the strangers. That is the talk of old men and women who are big with child. The tribe of Nhu is mighty. It can go where it pleases, and slay those who would block its way. Let us do as Tha says, and go away from here at once. Another great trembling may come at any moment. Let us leave now, for we have eaten. Others spoke, and so great was the fear of the earthquakes among them, that there was scarce a dissenting voice, nearly all wished to go. New listened with grave dignity.

Starting point is 03:02:42 When all had spoken who wished to speak, he arose. "'It is best,' he said. "'We will go away.' HUD could scarce repress a smile of elation. So soon as New my son returns. HUD scowled. I go seek him, concluded New. The council was over.

Starting point is 03:03:05 The men dispersed to their various duties. Thaw accompanied New in search of the latter's son. A party of hunters went north toward the barren cliffs, at the foot of which, not far from the sea, one of the tribe had seen a bull mammoth the previous day. HUD went to his cave and watched his opportunity to see Natul alone. At last his patience was rewarded by sight of her going down toward the spring, which was now deserted.

Starting point is 03:03:33 HUD ran after her. He overtook her as she stooped to fill the bladder. "'I want you,' said HUD, coming directly to the point in most primitive fashion, to be my mate.' Natul looked at him for a moment and then laughed full in his face. "'Go fetch the head of Ooo and lay it before my father's cave,' she answered, and then, maybe, Natul will think about becoming the mate of HUD. "'But I forgot,' she suddenly cried.

Starting point is 03:04:05 "'Hud does not hunt. He prefers to remain at home with the old men and the women and the children, while the men go forth in search of glue.' She emphasized the word men. The man colored. He was far from being a physical coward. coward. Cowers were not bred until a later age. He seized her roughly by the arm. "'Hud will show you that he is no coward,' he cried,

Starting point is 03:04:30 "'for he will take you away to be his mate, defying Noo and Tha and New the son of New. If they come to take you from him, HUD will slay them all.' As he spoke, he dragged her toward the jungle beyond the spring, the jungle that lay between the cliff and the sea. Nattole struggled, fighting to be free, but HUD, a great hand across her mouth and an arm about her body, forged silently ahead with his captive. Beyond the jungle the man turned north along the beach. Now he relaxed his hold upon the girl's mouth. "'Will you come with me?' he asked. "'Or must I drag you thus all day?'

Starting point is 03:05:11 "'I shall not come willingly,' she replied, for otherwise knew the son of New, nor my father, nor my brother might have the right to kill you for what you have done. But now they may, for you are taking me by force, as did the hairy people who live long time ago take their mates. You are a beast, HUD, and when my men come upon you, they will slay you for the beast you are. You will suffer most, retorted HUD, for if you do not come willingly with me, the tribe will kill the child. There will be no child, replied Natul, and beneath her red-dose skin she hugged the stag handle of a stone knife. HUD kept to the beach to escape detection by the mammoth hunters upon their return from the chase,

Starting point is 03:06:01 for they too had gone northward. But along the base of the cliffs upon the opposite side of the strip of jungle that extended parallel with the beach to the very foot of the barren cliffs, where they jutted boldly out into the restless sea, half a day's journey northward. The sun was directly above the two when HUD dragged his unwilling companion up the steep face of the barren cliffs, which he had determined to cross

Starting point is 03:06:26 and search of a secure hiding place, for he knew that he might not return to the tribe for a full moon after the thing he had done. Even then it might not be safe, for the men of the tribe of New had not taken their mates by force for many generations. There was a strong belief among them, that the children of women who made it through their own choice were more beautiful, better

Starting point is 03:06:49 natured and braver than those whose mothers were little better than prisoners and slaves. HUD hoped, however, to persuade Natul to say that she had run away with him voluntarily, to which there could be no objection. But that might require many days. From the top of the barren cliffs there stretched away toward the north an entirely different landscape than that upon the southern side. Here was a great level plain, dotted with occasional clumps of trees. At a little distance a broad river ran down to the sea, its banks clothed in jungle. Upon the plain, herds of antelope, bison, and boss, browsed in tall grasses and wild grains.

Starting point is 03:07:33 Sheep too were there, and rooting just within the jungle were great droves of wild hog. Now and then there would be a sudden stampede among the feeding herbivora, as some beast of prey dashed among them. Bleeding, bellowing, squealing, or grunting, they would race off madly for a short distance, only to resume their feeding and love-making when assured that they were not pursued, though the great carnivore might be standing in full sight of them

Starting point is 03:07:59 above the carcass of its kill. But why run further? All about them, in every direction, were other savage, bloodthirsty beasts. It was but a part of their terror-stricken lives, fleeing hither and thither as they snatch sustenance, and only surviving because they bred more surely than the beast that preyed upon them, and could live further from water. HUD led Naduil down the northern face of the barren cliffs, searching for a cavern

Starting point is 03:08:28 in which they might make their temporary home. Halfway between the summit and the base, he came upon a cave. Before it were strewn gnawed bones of antelope, buffalo, and even mammoth. Hudd grasped his spear more firmly as he peered into the dark interior. Here was the cave of Er, the cave bear. Hud picked up a bone and threw it within. There was no remonstrative growl. Err was not at home. Hud pushed Natu within. Then he rolled a few large boulders before the cave's mouth,

Starting point is 03:09:04 enough to bar the entrance of the gigantic bear upon his return. After, he crawled through the small opening that he had. had left. In the dim light of the interior, he saw Nadu flattened against the further side of the cave. He crossed toward her to take her in his arms. End of Section 15. Section 16 of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Liberbox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 3. The Great Cave Bear When Noo the son of New regained consciousness, daylight was filtering through several tiny crevices in the debris that blocked the entrance to the cave in which the earthquake had found and imprisoned him.

Starting point is 03:09:58 As he sat up, half bewildered, he cast his eyes about the dim interior in search of Nat Ull. Not seeing her, he sprang to his feet and searched each corner of the cavern minutely. She was not there. New stood for a moment with one hand pressed to his forehead, deep in thought. He was trying to marshal from the recesses of his memory the occurrences of his immediate past. Finally, he recalled that he had set forth from the village of his people in search of U, as he had been wont to do often in the past, that he might bring the head of the fierce monster and lay it before the cave of Nat U, daughter of Tha. But what had led him to believe

Starting point is 03:10:40 that Natul should be there now in the cave beside him? He passed his hand across his hand across his eyes, yet the same memory vision persisted. A confused and chaotic muddle of strange beasts and stranger men, among which he and Natu fled through an unknown world. Nus shook his head and stamped his foot. It was all a ridiculous dream. The shaking of the earth the previous night, however, had been no dream. This and the fact that he was buried alive were all too self-evident. He remembered that he had not found U. at home. He remembered that he had not found U. and when the quake had come, he had run into the cave of the great beast to hide from the wrath of the elements. Now he turned his attention to the broken rock piled before the mouth of the cave.

Starting point is 03:11:28 To his immense relief, he discovered that it was composed largely of small fragments. These he loosened and removed one by one, and though others continued to roll down from above and take their places for a while, until the cave behind him was half filled with the debris, He eventually succeeded in making an opening of sufficient size to pass his body through into the outer air. Looking about him, he discovered that the quake seemed to have done but little damage, other than to the top of the cliff which had overhung before and now had fallen from above, scattering its fragments upon the ledges and at the foot of the escarpment. For years Uu had laird here.

Starting point is 03:12:09 It was here that Ngu had sought him since he had determined to win his mate with the greatest of all trophies. But now that his cave was choked with the debris of the cliff-top, Ooo would have to seek elsewhere for a den, and that might carry him far from the haunts of Nuh. That would never do at all. U must be kept within striking distance until his head had served the purpose for which the Troglodite intended it. So, for several hours, New labored industriously to remove the rocks from the cave and from the ledge immediately before it, as well as from the rough

Starting point is 03:12:44 trail that led up from the foot of the cliff. All the time he kept his spear close to his hand, and his stone axe and knife ready in his g-string, for at any moment Ooo might return. As the great cat had a way of appearing with most uncanny silence and unexpectedness, it behoved one to be ever on the alert. But at last the work was completed, and news set forth to search for a breakfast. He had determined to await the return of the return of the the saber-toothed tiger, and have the encounter over for good and all. Had not the young men and women of the tribe begun to smile of late each time that he returned empty-handed from the hunt for O? None had doubted the sincerity of his desire to meet the formidable beast

Starting point is 03:13:30 from which it was no disgrace to fly, for none doubted the courage of New. But nevertheless, it was humiliating to return always with excuses instead of the head of his quarry. settled himself comfortably upon the branch of a tree where he could command the various approaches to the tiger's lair, when his keen ear caught the sound of movement in the jungle at his back. The noise was upwind from him, and presently the scent of man came down the breeze to the sensitive nostrils of the watcher. Now he was alert in this new direction. Every faculty bent to discovering the identity of the newcomers before they sensed his presence. Soon they came in view, two men, Noo and Tha, searching for the former son.

Starting point is 03:14:21 At sight of them, Noo the son of Noo called out a greeting. "'Where go, Nuh and Tha?' he asked, as the two came to a halt beneath his perch. "'They sought Noo the son of New,' replied the young man's father, and having found him they returned to the dwellings of New's people, and New the son of New returns with them. The young man shrugged his broad shoulders. "'New, the son of New, would remain and slay U,' he replied. "'Come down and accompany your father,' returned the older man,

Starting point is 03:14:55 "'for the people of New start to-day in search of other dwelling where the earth does not shake, or the cliffs crumble and fall.' New slid nimbly to the ground. "'Tell me which way the tribe travels,' said New the son of New, that I may find them after I have slainly. if he returns today. If he does not return today, then I will set out tomorrow after the tribe. The young man's father thought in silence for a moment. He was very proud of the prowess of his son. He should be as elated as the young man himself when he returned with the head of the hunter of

Starting point is 03:15:32 men and of mammoths. Then too he realized the humiliation which his son might feel on being forced to return again without the trophy. He laid to say to him. He laid to hand upon the young man's shoulder. "'Remain, my son,' he said, "'until the next light. The tribe will travel north beside the restless sea beyond the barren cliffs. Because of the old and the babes we shall move slowly.

Starting point is 03:15:58 It will be easy for you to overtake us. If you do not come, we shall know that Ooo was mightier than the son of Ngu. Without other words, the two older men turned and retraced their steps toward the village, while New the son of New, climbed again to his perch within the tree. All day he watched for the return of Ooo. The great apes and the lesser apes passed below and above and around him.

Starting point is 03:16:26 Sometimes threw him upward in passing. Below the woolly rhinoceros browsed and lay down to sleep. A pack of hyenas slung down from the plateau above the cliffs. They circled the sleeping parasadactal. The great beast opened its little eyes. Lumberingly it came to his feet, wheeling about until it faced up wind, and then, like a mountain run amok, it charged straight for the line of now growling hyenas. The cowardly brutes leaped aside, and the whole pack closed upon the rear of the rhinoceros.

Starting point is 03:17:00 The big beast turned, quick as a cat. Down went its arm's snout, and one of his tormentors was hurled far aloft, torn by the mighty horn that had pierced him through. Again the rhinoceros wheeled and ran, and again the pack closed in upon him. The jungle swallowed them, but for a long time New could hear the savage growls of the pursuing beasts, and the yells of pain as from time to time the rhinoceros turned upon his tormentors. Then came a cave bear, lumbering down the face of the cliff. At the mouth of the cave of O, he halted, sniffing about warily, and uttering deep-throated growls

Starting point is 03:17:42 of rage and hate. New listened for the answering challenge of the ancient enemy of Err, but no sound came. New shrugged his shoulders. It was evident that U was far away, otherwise he would never have let Err's challenge go unanswered. Now the bear had continued his way to the foot of the cliff. He was advancing toward the tree in which Ngu sat. At the edge of the jungle, the beast halted and commenced a nose in the soft earth for roots.

Starting point is 03:18:14 Noo watched him. If not the head of U, why not the head of Er? Ooo would not return that day, of that Ngu was positive, for it was already late in the afternoon, and if the great tiger had been near, he would have heard and answered the challenge of the cave bear. New dropped lightly to the ground upon the opposite side of the tree from Err. In his right hand he grasped his long, heavy spear. In his left was his stone axe. He approached the huge beast from the rear,

Starting point is 03:18:47 coming within a few paces of it before the animal was aware of his presence, for none of the jungle folk moved more noiselessly than primeval man. But at last Err looked up, and at the same instant Niu's mighty muscle, launched the stone-tipped spear. Straight as a bullet it sped toward the breast of the hairy monster, bearing itself deep in his body as he lunged forward to seize the rash creature that dared attack him. New held his ground, standing with feet apart and swinging his heavy stone axe to and fro in both hands. The cave bear rose upon his hind feet as he neared the man, towering high above his enemy's head.

Starting point is 03:19:29 With gaping jaws an outstretched pause, the terrible beast advanced, now and then tearing at the stout haft of the spear protruding from its breast, and giving tongue to roars of rage and pain that shook the earth. As the mighty forearms reached for him, New dodged beneath them, swinging his axe to the side of the bear's head as he passed. With a how, the beast wheeled and charged in the new direction, but again New followed his previous tactics, and again a crushing blow fell upon the side of the cave-bear's jaw. Blood spurred it from the creature's mouth and nostrils, for not only had the stone axe

Starting point is 03:20:10 brought blood, but the stone spear had penetrated the savage lungs. And now Erd did what do had been waiting for him to do. He dropped upon all fours and raced madly toward his tormentor. The changed position brought the top of his skull within reach of the man's weapon. open, and this time, as he sidestepped the charge, he brought the axe down full upon the bear's forehead between his eyes. Stunned, the beast staggered and stumbled, his nose buried in the trampled mud and grass of the battlefield. Only for an instant would he be thus, and in that instant must new leap in and finish him. Nor did he hesitate. Dropping his axe, he sprang upon er with his stone knife, and again and again sent the blade into the wild heart.

Starting point is 03:21:01 Before the cave bear regained full consciousness, he rolled over upon his side, dead. For half an hour, New was busy removing the head, and then he set himself to the task of skinning the beast. His methods were crude, but he worked much faster with his primitive implements than modern man with keen knives. Before another hour had passed, he had the skin off and rolled into a bundle, and had cut a great steak from Err's loin. Now he gathered some dry leaves and tender, and with a sharpened bit of hardwood, produced fire by twirling the point vigorously in a tiny hollow, scooped from another piece of hardwood. When the blaze had been nourished to a fire of respectable dimensions, New impaled the steak

Starting point is 03:21:47 upon a small branch, and squatting before the blaze grilled his supper. It was half burned and half raw and partially smoked, but that he enjoyed it was evidenced by the fact that he devoured it all. Afterward he placed a pelt upon his shoulder and set forth upon his return to his people. He returned directly to the cliffs by the restless sea, for he did not know whether the tribe had yet left in search of the new camping ground or not. It was night by the time he emerged from the jungle at the foot of the cliff. A cursory exploration showed him that the tribe had gone, and so he crawled into his own cave for the night. In the morning, he easily could overtake them.

Starting point is 03:22:33 When Hud crossed the cave toward Natul, he had expected to encounter physical resistance, and so he came half-crouched and with hands outstretched to seize and subdue her. "'Hud,' said the girl, "'if I come to you willingly, will you treat me kindly always?' The man came to a stop a few feet from his victim. Evidently it was going to be more easy than he had anticipated. He did not relish the idea of taking a she-tiger for mate, and so he was glad to make whatever promises the girl required.

Starting point is 03:23:09 Afterward, he could keep such as were easiest to keep. HUD will be a kind mate, he answered. The girl stepped toward him, and HUD met her with encircling arms. But as hers went around him, he failed to see the sharp stone knife and not Toole's right hand. The first he knew of it was when it was plunged remorselessly into his back beneath his left shoulder blade. Then HUD tried to disengage himself from the girl's embrace,

Starting point is 03:23:40 but struggle as he would, she clung to him tenaciously, plunging the weapon time and time again into his back. He tried to reach her throat with his fingers, but her sharp teeth fastened upon his hand, and then, with his free hand, he beat upon her face, but only for an instant, as the knife found his heart, and with a groan he sank to the rocky floor of the cave. Without waiting to know that he was dead, Nadu rushed from the dark interior. Swiftly she scaled the barren cliffs, and dropped once more into her own valley upon the other side.

Starting point is 03:24:16 Along the beach she raced back toward the dwellings of her people, not knowing that at that very moment they were setting out in search of a new home. At mid-afternoon, she passed them scarce half a mile away, for they had taken the way that led upon the far side of the jungle that they might meet the returning mammoth hunters, and so Natul came to the deserted caves of her tribe at nightfall, only to find that her people had departed. Supperless, she crawled into one of the smaller and higher caves, for it would be futile to attempt to discover the trail of the departed tribe, while night with its darkness and its innumerable horrors enveloped the earth. She had dozed once when she was awakened by the sound of movement upon the face of the

Starting point is 03:25:03 cliff. Scarce breathing she lay listening. Was it man or beast that roamed through the deserted haunts of her tribe? Higher and higher up the face of the cliff came the sound of the midnight prowler. That the creature, whatever it was, was making a systematic search of the caves seemed all too apparent. It would be but a question of minutes before it would reach her hiding-place. Natu grasped her knife more firmly. The sound ceased upon the ledge directly beneath her. Then, after a few moments, they were resumed. But to the girl's relief, they now retreated

Starting point is 03:25:42 down the steep bluff. Presently, they ceased entirely, and though it was a little bit of the hours before she could quiet her fears, she at last fell into a deep slumber. At dawn New the son of New awoke. He rose and stretched himself, standing in the glare of the new sun upon the ledge before his cave. Fifty feet above him slept the girl he loved. New gathered up his weapons and his bearskin and moved silently down to the spring where he quenched his thirst. Then he passed through the jungle to the sea. Here he removed his loincloth and the skin that covered his shoulders and waded into the surf. In his right hand he held his knife, for great reptiles inhabited the restless sea.

Starting point is 03:26:32 Carefully, he bathed, keeping a wary watch for enemies in the water or upon the land behind. In him was no fear, for he knew no other existence than that which might present at any moment the necessity of battling for his life with some slimy creature of the deep, or equally ferocious denizen of the jungle or the hills. To New, it was but a part of the day's work. You or I might survive a single day where we suddenly cast back into the primeval savagery of New's long-dead age, and New, if, as suddenly transplanted to the corner of Fifth Avenue and 23rd Street, might escape destruction for a few hours, but sooner or later a trolley car or a taxi would pounce upon him. His ablutions completed. The troglodyte replaced his loincloth and his shaggy fur, took up his

Starting point is 03:27:26 weapons and his burden, and set forth upon the trail of his father's people. And above him, as he passed again along the foot of the cliff, the woman that he loved slept in ignorance of his presence. When at last Matula woke, the son was hot. in the heavens. The girl came cautiously down the cliff face, looking first in one direction and then another, often pausing for several minutes at a time to listen. All about her were the noises of the jungle and the sea and the air. For great birds and horrid-winged reptiles threaten primeval men as sorely from above as did the carnivor of the land from his own plane. She came to the spring in safety and passed on into the jungle in search

Starting point is 03:28:13 of food, for she was half famished. Fruits and vegetables, with grasshoppers, caterpillars, and small rodents, and the eggs of birds and reptiles were what she sought, nor was she long in satisfying the cravings of her appetite. Nature was infinitely more bountiful in those days than at the present, for she had infinitely more numerous and often far greater stomachs to satisfy then than now. Natul passed through the jungle to the beach. She had wanted to bathe, but alone she dared not. Now she stood wondering in which direction the tribe had gone. She knew that ordinarily, if they had been traveling either north or south,

Starting point is 03:28:56 they would follow the hard-packed sand of the beach, for there the traveling was easiest, but the tide would have washed away their spoor long before this. She had seen signs of their passage north beside the jungle, but the trail was an old, well-worn one, traversed daily by many feet, so she had not been able to guess from it that it contained the guide to the direction her people had taken. As she stood upon the beach trying to reason out her future plans, it became apparent that if the tribe had gone north she would have met them

Starting point is 03:29:31 on her return from the barren cliffs yesterday, and so, as she had not met them, they must have gone south. And so she turned her own footsteps south, away from her people, and from New. End of Section 16. Section 17. Of the Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burrows. This Liberbox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 03:30:06 Chapter 4. The Boat Builders Natul kept to the beach as she tramped southward. Upon her right was the jungle. Upon her left, the great sea, stretching away she knew not with her. To her it represented the boundary of the world. All beyond was an appalling waste of water. To the southeast she could see the outlines of islands. They were familiar objects, yet shrouded in mystery.

Starting point is 03:30:35 Often they formed the topic of conversation among her people. What was there upon them? Were they inhabited? And if so, were the creatures men and women like themselves? To Naduil, they were as full of romantic mysteries as are the stars and planets to us, but she knew less of them than we do of the countless brilliant islands that dot the silent sea of space. They were further from Nadu and her people than is Mars from us. A boat was as utterly unknown to Nadu as was a telescope. Just beyond a rise of ground ahead of Natul, 50 or 60 men, women and children, were busy,

Starting point is 03:31:17 beside a little stream that flowed into the sea. When Nadu topped the rise and her eyes fell upon these strangers, she dropped suddenly flat upon her belly behind a bush. There she watched the peculiar actions of these people. It was evident that they had but just arrived after a long march. They differed in many ways from any people she had ever seen. Their skins were of the less dangerous animals, those which fed upon grasses.

Starting point is 03:31:46 Their headdresses bore the horns of bulls and antelope, giving them altogether a most fearsome aspect. But it was their habitations and the work upon which they were engaged, which caused Natul the greatest wonderment. Their caves were not caves at all. They were constructed of a number of long saplings leaned inward against one another in a circle, and covered with skins and brush, or the great fronds of giant palms, as well as those of the plant which is known today as it was in Natul's time as elephant's ear, because of its resemblance to that portion of the great peccaderm. The weapons of these peoples were unlike those with which Natul was familiar. The stone axe was of a different shape, and the spear was much shorter and stouter,

Starting point is 03:32:34 its point being barbed, and having one end of a long-plated sinew rope tied to it, while the balance of the rope was fastened in a coil at the warrior's side. Natul knew nothing of fisher-folk. Her own people often caught fish. Sometimes they speared them with their light spears, but they did not make a business of fishing. So she did not know that the spears of these strangers answer the double purpose of weapons of warfare and harpoons. What interested her most, however, was the strange work upon which many of the people were engaged. They had cut down a number of large trees, which they had chopped, and burned into different lengths, from 15 to 20 feet. With their stone axes, they had hewn

Starting point is 03:33:21 away the bark and heavier growth among the upper surfaces of the logs. The softer, pithy centers have been scooped out and fires built within. Natu could not but wonder at the purpose of all this labor. She saw the men and women tending the fires carefully, extinguishing with water any blaze that seemed threatening to pierce too far from the center of a tree. Deeper and deeper, the flames ate until there remained but a thin outer husk of fire-hardened wood. So intent was the girl upon the strange sights before her that she did not know the approach of a tall young warrior from the jungle at her right and a little behind her. The man was tall and straight. A shaggy bison hide fell from his shoulders,

Starting point is 03:34:07 the tail dragging upon the ground behind him. Upon his head the skull of the bull fitted firmly. a primitive helmet, clothed in its dried skin, and with the short stout horns protruding at right angles from his temples. In his right hand was the stout harpoon, and at his waist the coil of sinew rope. The robe, falling away in front, disclosed a well-knit, muscular figure, naked but for a loincloth of nose-skin in which was stuck his stone knife and axe. For several minutes he stood watching the girl, his eyes glowing at the beauties of her

Starting point is 03:34:46 profile and life-graceful figure. Then, very cautiously, he crept toward her. It was Tur of the boat-builders. Never in his life had Tur looked upon a more beautiful woman. To see her was to want her. Tur must own her. He was almost upon her when a dried twig snapped beneath his tread. Like a startled antelope, Nadu was upon her feet. At the same instant, Tur leaped forward to Caesar. She was between him and the camp she had been watching. To run toward them would have meant certain capture. Like a shot, she wheeled right into TUR's outstretched arms, but as they closed to grasp her, they encircled but empty air. Nadu had ducked beneath the young warrior's eager embrace and was fleeing north along the beach, like a frightened deer. After her sprang

Starting point is 03:35:41 T' Tur, calling upon her to stop. But with terror-goated speech, and she was, the fleet-footed Nadu raced on. A hundred paces behind her came to her. For a short distance she might outstrip him, he knew, but in the end his mightier muscles would prevail. Already she was lagging. No longer was the distance between them growing. Soon it would lessen.

Starting point is 03:36:07 He would close upon her, and then. To the north of the barren cliffs, New overtook the tribe of New his father. He came upon them during a period of rest, and as he approached he noted the constraint of their manners as they greeted him. The young women looked at him with sorrowing eyes. His young warrior friends did not smile as he called their names in passing. Straight to knew his father he went, as became a returning warrior.

Starting point is 03:36:38 He found the chief sitting with thaw before a small fire where a tarmigan, clay-wrapped, was roasting. His father rose and greeted him. There was pleasure in the older man's eyes at the sight of his son, but no smile upon his lips. He glanced at the head and pelt of Err. O did not return, he asked. O did not return, replied the son.

Starting point is 03:37:03 New the son of New looked about among the women and children and the uneasy warriors. She he sought was not there. His mother came and kissed him, as did Una his sister. "'Where is Nadu?' asked New. His mother and sister looked at one another and then at his father. New the chief looked at Tha. Tha rose and came before the young man. He laid his hand upon the other shoulder.

Starting point is 03:37:32 "'Since your mother bore you,' he said, "'Always have I loved you, loved you second only to Ott, my own son. Someday I hope that you would become my son, for I saw that you loved Nadul, my daughter. But now Nadu has gone away with HUD. We know not how it happened, but Rael, the daughter of Khor, says that she went willingly. He got no further.

Starting point is 03:37:59 It's a lie, cried New the son of New. Nadu never went willingly with HUD or any other. When did they go? Whither went they? Tell me, and I will follow and bring back Nadu, and with her own living. she will give Ra'el the lie. I will bring her back if she still lives, but unless she escaped HUD, she is dead, for she would have died rather than mate with another than knew the son of

Starting point is 03:38:26 New. I have spoken. Which way went they?' No one could tell him. All that they knew was that when the tribe set out from their old dwellings, HUD and Natul could not be found, and then Rael had come forward and said that the two had fled together. When he questioned Rael, he could glean nothing more from her, but he stuck obstinately to her assertion that Nadu had gone willingly. And will New the Son of New be such a fool as to follow after a woman who has chosen another mate when there are those as beautiful whom knew the Son of New could have for the asking?

Starting point is 03:39:07 She said. At her words, the young man saw the motive be her statement that Nadul had run away voluntarily with HUD, and now he was more positive than ever that the girl did not speak the truth. Her words recalled many little occurrences in the past that had slipped by unnoticed at a time when all his thoughts were of the splendid Nadu. It was evident that Ra'el would have liked new for herself. The young man returned to his father's side. "'I go,' he said, "'nor shall I return until I know. know the truth. The older man laid his hand upon the shoulder of the younger.

Starting point is 03:39:47 "'Go, my son,' he said, "'your father's heart goes with you.' In silence, New the son of New retraced his steps southward toward the barren cliffs. It was his intention to return directly to the former dwellings of his people, and there search out the spore of HUD and Natul. A great rage burned in his heart as he thought of the foul deed that HUD had done. The tribe of Nugh had progressed far beyond the status of the beasts. They acknowledged certain property rights, among them the inalienable right of the man to his mate, and going a step further, the right of the woman to mate as she chose.

Starting point is 03:40:28 That Nadu had chosen to mate with HUD, New could not for a moment admit. He knew the courageous nature of the girl, and knowing it knew that had she preferred HUD to him, she would have mated with the man of her choice openly after the manner of the tribe. No, Natu would never have run off with any man, not even himself. Halfway up the face of the barren cliffs, New was arrested by a faint moan, coming apparently from a cave at his right. He had no time to devote to the pleasures of the chase, but there was a human note in the sound that he had heard that brought him up all suddenly alert and listening. After a moment, it was repeated.

Starting point is 03:41:13 No, there could be no doubt of it. That sound came only from a human throat. Cautiously, New crept toward the mouth of a cave from which the moaning seemed to issue. At the entrance he came to a sudden halt at the sight that met his eyes. There, in the half-light of the entrance, lay hud in a pool of blood. The man was breathing feebly. New called him by name. HUD opened his eyes. When he saw who stood over him,

Starting point is 03:41:42 he shrugged his shoulders and lay still, as though to say, the worst has already been done to me, you can do no more. Where is Nadu? asked New. Hud shook his head. Noon held beside him, raising his head in his arms. Where is Nadu, man?

Starting point is 03:42:01 He cried shaking the dying warrior. Tell me before you die! I do not ask if she went with you willingly, for I know that she did not. All I ask is what you have done with her. Does she live? And if she lives, where is she?' HUD tried to speak. The effort cost him dear.

Starting point is 03:42:21 But at last he managed to whisper a few words. "'She did this,' he panted. Then she went away. I don't know,' he gasped and died. died. New dropped him back upon the stone floor of the cave and ran out upon the ledge. He searched about the face of the cliff, even going down upon all fours and creeping from ledge to ledge, oftentimes with his nose close to the trail sniffing. After half an hour of going back and forth over the same ground and following a rocky ascent upward toward the summit of the cliff a dozen times,

Starting point is 03:43:01 as though proving and reproving the correctness of his deductions, Newy, at last set forth across the barren cliffs and down onto the beach beside the restless sea. Here he found the spore more plainly marked in many places above high tide where Natu's little sandals had left their legible record in the soft loam, or upon the higher sand that the water had not reached. The way led southward, and southward hurried New the the sun of New. Straight to the old dwellings led the trail. There New found evidence that Natul had spent the night in a cave above the one in which he had slept. There was the bed of grasses, and a trace of a delicate aroma that our blunted sense of

Starting point is 03:43:46 smell could never have detected, but which was plain to new and deliciously familiar. A pang of regret seized him as he realized that his natul had been so close to him, and that he had unwittingly permitted her to remain alone and unprotected amidst the countless dangers of their savage world, and to go forth none knew where into other myriad dangers. Returning to the foot of the cliff, he once more came upon the girl's spoor. Once again, it led south along the beach. Swiftly, he followed it until it stopped behind a little clump of bushes at the top of a rise in the ground. Before New realized that this was the southern limit of the trail, he had seen the village beyond, and the people engaged in what to him seemed

Starting point is 03:44:36 a strange occupation. He knew that the same sight had brought Nadu to a halt a few hours before, and now he saw where she had lain upon her belly watching, just as he was watching. For a few minutes he lay watching the workers, and seeking through the little cluster of skin and that Thad's shelters for some sign that Nadu was a prisoner there. New had never seen a boat or guessed that such a thing might be. His people had been hunters from time immemorial. They had come down from the great plateaus far inland, but a few generations since. Then, for the first time, had his forefather seen the ocean.

Starting point is 03:45:18 As yet, they had not met with any need that required them to navigate its waters, nor had they come in contact with the boat builders, who dwelt far south at the mouth of a gregor. great river that emptied into the restless sea. Now for the first time, New saw both the boats and the boat builders. For the first time, he saw artificial shelters, and who knew they seemed frail and uncomfortable things by comparison with his eternal caves. The boat builders had been several days in this new camp. What had driven them so far north of their ancestral home, who may guess? A tribal feud, perhaps, or the birth of a new force that was to drive them and the progeny across

Starting point is 03:46:03 the face of the world in restless wanderings to the end of time, the primitive wanderlust from which so many of us suffer, and yet would not forego. New saw that of all the workers one tall young giant labored most rapidly. His haste seemed almost verging upon frenzy. New wondered what he could be about upon the fell tree trunk that required so much exertion. Noon did not like work of that nature. It is true that he had never done any manual labor outside the needs of the chase,

Starting point is 03:46:38 but intuitively he knew that he disliked it. He was a hunter, a warrior, and even then, in his primitive and untutored mind, those arose a species of contempt for the drudge. At last, tiring of watching, he turned his attention again to the spoor he had been following. Where had Natu gone after lying here behind these bushes? New crawled about until he saw evidences of the girl's quick leap to her feet and a rapid

Starting point is 03:47:08 flight. Then it was, he came upon the footprints of Tur. Now New's blood ran hot. It surged through his heart and pounded against his temples. Natul, his Natul, was in danger. He saw where the girl had dodged past the man. He saw distinctly in the sand the marks of Tours quickly turning footsteps as he wheeled in pursuit. He saw that the two had been running rapidly along the beach toward the north. The man following the girl, and then, to his surprise, he saw that the man had come to a sudden stop, had taken a few steps forward, and stood for some time looking seaward, and then turned and raced back toward the strange camp at break now.

Starting point is 03:47:52 speed. And the girl's trail had continued toward the north for perhaps a hundred paces beyond the point at which the man had halted. New followed it easily. They were fresh signs since the last high tide, alone and uncrossed upon a wide stretch of smooth white sand. Who followed the dainty imprints of Nautau's swiftly flying little feet for a hundred paces beyond the end of the man's pursuit, and came to a dead, bewildered halt. The footprints ended abruptly upon the beach midway between the ocean and the jungle. About them was only an expanse of unbroken sand. They simply ceased.

Starting point is 03:48:33 That was all. They did not double back upon themselves. They did not enter the ocean. They did not approach the jungle. They stopped as though Nadu had suddenly been swallowed by a great hole in the beach. But there was no hole. New halted and looked about in every direction. There was no trace of any living thing about.

Starting point is 03:48:56 Where had Natul gone? What had become of her? Had the footprints of the man who pursued her reached the point upon the sand where hers ended, New would have concluded that he had picked her up and carried her back to his village. But the man had been a hundred paces behind Natul when her trail ceased, nor had he approached closer to the spot at any time.

Starting point is 03:49:19 And when he had returned to his village, he had done so at a rapid run, and the lightness of his spore indicated that he had not been burdened with a heavy load. For some time New stood in bewildered thought, but at last he turned back toward the village of the boat-builders. New knew little of the supernatural, and so he turned first to the nearest material and natural cause of Natul's disappearance that he could conceive, the man who had pursued her, and that man had returned to the village of the strange, who were diligently burning and scooping the hearts out of felled trees. New returned to the vantage of the bush before the village.

Starting point is 03:50:02 Here he lay down again to watch. He was positive that in some way these people were responsible for the disappearance of Natul. They knew where she was, and judging by his own estimate of the girl, he knew that the man who had seen her and pursued her would not lightly relinquish his attempts to obtain her. New had seen the women of the strangers. Beside his Nadul, they look like the shees of the ape-folk. No, the man would seek to follow and capture the radiant stranger.

Starting point is 03:50:34 New wished that he could guess which of the men it was who had chased Nadu. Something told him that it was the young giant who worked with such feverish haste, so New watched him most closely. At last Tours' boat was completed. The centers of the trees the boat-builder selected for their craft is soft and easily burned and scooped. The fires kindled in the hollowed trunk served a double purpose. They ate away their harder portions near the outside, and at the same time tended to harden what remained. The result was a fairly light and staunch dugout.

Starting point is 03:51:12 When Ture's boat was finished, he called to several of the other workers. These came, and, lending a hand with T'er, dragged the hollow, log down to the water. One of the women came with a long stick, larger at one end than the other, and with the large end flattened upon both sides. It was a paddle. Turr tossed this into the boat, and then running through the surf, he launched his primitive craft upon the crest of a receding roller, leaped in, and seizing the paddle, struck out vigorously against the next incoming wave. New watched him with wide eyes. His estimate, of the man rose in leaps and bounds. Here was sport. And New did not have to attempt the feat he had

Starting point is 03:51:57 witnessed to know that it required skill and courage. Only a brave man would venture the perils of the awful waters. Where was he going? New saw that he paddled straight out into the sea. In the distance were the islands. Could he be going to these? New, from childhood, had always long to explore those distant lands of mystery. These people had found a way. New had learned something, an aeroplane could not have presented greater wonders to him than did this crude dugout.

Starting point is 03:52:33 For a while he watched the man in the little boat. They grew smaller and smaller, as wind, tide, and the sturdy strokes of the paddler carried the hollowed log farther out to sea. Then New turned his attention once more to the other workers. He saw that they too were, rapidly completing their boats. They were talking back and forth among themselves, raising their voices as they were scattered over a considerable distance about the village. New caught

Starting point is 03:53:01 a word now and then. The language was similar to his own. He discovered that they were talking about the man who had just departed and about his venture. New wanted to hear more. He crept cautiously through the dense vegetation to the little clearing the strangers had made about their shelters. As he peered through the curtain of tangled creepers that hid him from their view, he saw the camp more closely. He saw the ring of ashes that surrounded it, the remains of the nocturnal fires that kept off the beasts of prey by night. He saw the cooking fire before each rude shelter. He saw pots of clay, something new to him. He saw the women and the children and the men. They did not differ greatly from his own people, though their garments and weapons were.

Starting point is 03:53:50 dissimilar. And now he could hear all their conversation. "'She must be beautiful,' a man was saying. "'Or Tur would not venture across this strange water to those unknown lands in search of her.' And he grinned broadly, casting a knowing glance at a young woman who suckled a babe, and as she sat scraping, scraping, scraping, with a bit of sharpened flint upon the hide of an aurox, pegged out upon the ground before her. The young woman looked up with an ugly scowl. "'Let him bring her back,' she cried,

Starting point is 03:54:24 "'and she will no longer be beautiful. "'This will I do to her face,' and she fell to scraping viciously upon the skin. "'Tur was very angry when she escaped him,' continued the man. "'He almost had his hands upon her, "'but he will find her, "'though whether there will be enough of her to bring back is hard to say. "'I myself rather doubt it.

Starting point is 03:54:47 and think that it is a foolish thing for T'r to waste his time thus. New was nonplussed. Could it be possible that the man they called T'ur was pursuing Natul to those distant islands? How could Natu be there? It was impossible. And yet there seemed little doubt from the conversation he had overheard that the man was following some woman across the water to the mysterious lands. A woman he had just surprised and chased that very day.

Starting point is 03:55:17 and who had alluded him. Who else could it be, but not all? End of Section 17. Section 18 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 5. News First Voyage Presently all the boats were completed,

Starting point is 03:55:52 and the men dragged them one by one down close to the water. In them they place their paddles, their axes, and their harpoons, just as Tur had before he departed. New watched them with feverish interest. At last all had been launched, and are being paddled vigorously beyond the surf. In the comparatively smoother water, the boats turned toward the north and south, scattering. Evidently, they are not bound for the distant islands. New Caesar warrior rise suddenly in the bow of one of the boats and hurl his speed. quickly into the water. Immediately there is a great commotion in the boat and in the water beside it. There are three men in each boat. Two in the boat new is watching, paddle frantically

Starting point is 03:56:38 away from the thing that lashes the sea beside them. New guessed what had occurred. The spearman had buried his weapon in some huge creature of the deep, and the battle was on. They were too far out for new to see the details of the conflict, but he saw the boat towed swiftly by the wounded creature as it raced toward the open sea. He saw the boat pulled closer alongside and another spear hurled into the fleeing thing. He understood now why these men tied their spearheads to long ropes. He saw the sudden commotion in the dugout as the hunted turned upon the hunters. He saw the swift stroke of a mighty flipper as it rose from the water and fell with awful fury across the boat. He saw the other boats hurry toward the scene of battle.

Starting point is 03:57:25 but before they reached the spot all was quiet save for two pieces of bobbing tree trunk and the head and shoulders of a single man who clung to one of them. A few minutes later he was dragged into another boat and the fleet dispersed again to search out other prey. Soon all were out of sight beyond a promontory except a single craft which fished before the village. These men evidently sought less formidable game and knew could see that from the team sea they were dragging in great fish almost as rapidly as they could hurl their weapons. Soon the boat was completely filled, and with their great load the men paddled slowly

Starting point is 03:58:06 in shore. As they came, a sudden resolution formed in New's mind. The sight of the dangerous sport upon the waters had filled him with a strong desire to emulate these strangers, but greater than that was the power of another suggestion which the idea held forth. As the men dragged the boat upon the beach, the women came down to meet them, carrying great bags of bull-hide sewn with bullock's sinew. Into these they gathered the fish and dragged their loads over the ground toward their camp. The men, their day's work evidently finished, stretched out beneath the shade of trees to sleep.

Starting point is 03:58:47 This was the time. Newm moved stealthily to his hands and knees. He grasped his long spear and his stone axe tightly in his hand. The boat lay upon the open beach. There was no near point where he might reach it undetected by the women. The alternative rather appealed to news-warlike nature. It was nothing less than rushing directly through the village. He came to his feet and advanced lightly among the shelters.

Starting point is 03:59:15 No need to give the alarm before he was detected. He was directly behind the young woman who scraped the aurochs skin. She did not hear his light for. footfall. The baby, now sitting by her side, playing with the arach's tail, looked up to see the stranger close upon him. He lunged toward his mother with a lusty shriek. Instantly the camp was in commotion. No need now for stealth. With a war-whoop that might have sprung from a score of lusty lungs, new leap from the village among the frightened women and the startled men, awakened rudely from their sleep. Straight toward the boat ran new.

Starting point is 03:59:55 and upon his heels raced the three warriors. One was coming toward him from the side. He was quite close, so close, that he came upon New at the same instant that the latter reached the boat. The two fell upon one another with their great axes, but New the son of New was a mighty warrior. He dodged the blow of the other's axe, and before his adversary could recover himself to deliver a second, New's weapon fell upon his skull, crushing it as if it had been an eggshell. Now New seized the boat and dragged it toward the water as he had seen the strangers do, but he had taken but a half-dozen steps when he was forced to turn and defend himself against the remaining warriors. With savage howls they were upon him,

Starting point is 04:00:42 their women huddled upon the beach behind them, shouting wild cries of encouragement to their men and defiance to the enemy. New abandoned the boat and rushed to meet his antagonists. His long spear, thrown with the power of the foremost boat-builder, who was upon the point of hurling his stout harpoon at New. Down went the harpooner. Up rose a chorus of howls and lamentations from the women. Now the third warrior closed upon the troglodyte.

Starting point is 04:01:12 It was too close for spearwork, and so the fellow dropped his heavy weapon and leaped to close quarters with his night. knife. Down the two men went into the knee-deep water, striking at one another with their knives as they sought death-holes with their free hands. A great roller rumbled in upon them, turning them over and over as it carried them up the beach. Still they fought, sputtering and choking in the salty brine, but when the wave receded it left a corpse behind it upon the beach, stabbed through and through the great hairy chest by the long keen knife of New, the son of New.

Starting point is 04:01:49 The caveman rose, dripping to his feet, and turned his back toward the sea. The roller had carried the boat out with it. The women, furious now at the death of their three men, rushed forward to drag down the victor. Savage creatures they were, but little less sinister than their males. Their long hair streamed in the wind. Their faces were distorted by rage and hatred. They screamed aloud their taunts and insults and challenges. But Noo did not wait to battle with them. Instead, he dove into the surf and struck out for the drifting boat. His spear was lost, but he clung to his axe.

Starting point is 04:02:29 His knife he had returned to his G-string. They ran into the water to their waists, but New was beyond their reach. In a moment more he had come to the side of the boat. Tossing in his axe, he clambered over the side, scarce escaping overturning the hollowed log. Once safely within, he took up the paddle, an unaccustomed implement, and, fashioning his strokes after those of the men he had watched, he made headway from the shore. The tide and the wind helped him, but he found, too, that he quickly mastered the art of paddling. First, he discovered that when he paddled exclusively upon the side of his spear-hand,

Starting point is 04:03:10 the boat turned in the opposite direction, and so he understood why the boatman had paddled alternately upon one side and the other. When he did this, the craft kept a straighter course in the direction he wished to go, the distant land of mystery. Halfway across the water that spread between the mainland and the nearest island, a monstrous shape loomed suddenly close to the boat's side.

Starting point is 04:03:36 A long neck surmounted by a huge reptilian head shot above the surface, and wide gaping jaws open to seize the paddler. protruding eyes glared down upon him, and then the thing struck. Noodged to one side and struck back with his knife. With a hiss and screamed the creature dove beneath the surface, only to reappear a moment later upon the opposite side of the boat. Blood flowed from the knife wound in its neck.

Starting point is 04:04:04 Again it snapped at the man. Again the knife found its neck as New crouched to one side to elude the gaping jaws. Once more the thing dove, and almost simultaneously a mighty tail rose high out of the water above the man's head. New seized the paddle and drove the boat forward just as that terrific engine of destruction fell with a mighty whack upon the very spot the boat had quit. The blow, had it touched the craft, would have splintered it into firewood. For a few minutes the sea was churned to white, crimson stained by the creature's blood

Starting point is 04:04:41 as it thrashed about in impotent fury. Then, as New paddled away, the raging ceased and the great carcass floated upon its side. On went new, paddling with redoubled energy toward the distant goal. What he expected to find at his journey's end

Starting point is 04:05:00 he could not believe, yet what else was drawing him through countless dangers across the face of the terrible waters. The man, Tur, had come hither. He it was who had pursued, not Ull. Was he still pursuing her? That he was following some woman knew was positive from the fragments of conversation he had overheard. And yet, though try as he would to believe it,

Starting point is 04:05:24 he could not make his judgment except as a possibility the chance that it was really not Ull whom the man expected to find upon this distant land. The wind had risen considerably since New set out upon his perilous journey. Already the waves were running high, tipped with white. That the island lay straight before the wind was all that saved the rude craft from instant annihilation. All about him, the sea was alive with praying monsters. Titanic duels were in progress upon every hand, as the ferocious reptilia battled over their kills, or turning from the chase, fell upon one another in frenzied joy of battle while their unfortunate quarry swam rapidly away. Through innumerable dangers swept the little tree-trunk skiff

Starting point is 04:06:12 to be deposited at last upon the surf-beaten beach of the nearest island. Scarce had new landed and dragged his boat above the rollers when he descried another boat a short distance from his own. That this belonged to the man, Tur, he had no doubt, and seizing his axe, he hastened to it to pick up and follow the other spoor wherever it might lead. Clean cut and distinct in the sand knew found the impress of Tur's sandals, nor did it require a second glance at them to convince the Tragorite that they had been made by the same feet that had pursued Natul upon the mainland beach. The trail led around a rocky promontory into a deep and somber gorge.

Starting point is 04:06:56 Up the center of this it followed the course of a rapid brook, leaping downward toward the sea. From time to time the man had evidently a safe. to scale the cliffs, first upon one side and then upon the other. But each time he had abandoned the attempt before the difficulties and dangers of the precipitous crags. To New, the ascent would have proved a simple matter, and so he wondered why the man had turned back each time after clamoring but a short distance from the base of the cliffs. But Tor was not a cliff-dweller. His peoples had come from a great level river valley beside the sea, from a country where cliffs and natural caves

Starting point is 04:07:37 were the exception rather than the rule, so he had had but little practice in climbing of that sort. Finally, at the head of the ravine, he had been forced to climb or retrace his steps, and here, at last, he had managed to clamber out upon the table-land that stretched beyond the summit. Across this the trail led, turning suddenly toward the west at the east of the east of the east of the edge of another ravine. The abruptness with which the spore wheeled to the right indicated to New that something had suddenly attracted the man's attention toward the new direction, and that he had proceeded at a rapid run to investigate.

Starting point is 04:08:16 Could he here have discovered the woman he sought? Was he already in pursuit of Naatul, if it was indeed she? Was he even now in possession of her? New two wheeled to the west and raced rapidly along the well-marked trail. Since he had come upon the signs of Ture, new speed had been infinitely greater than that of the boat-builder. This his woodcraft told him, so he knew that he was constantly gaining upon the man

Starting point is 04:08:45 who was still unconscious of the fact that he was being pursued. Down the steep side of the ravine, T'ur must have slid and rolled in a most reckless fashion. At the bottom was a dense forest through which the trail led back toward the sea, after the man had made a series of frantic but futile attempts to scale the opposite heights. What had he seen or heard or followed that had led him to make such desperate attempts to gain the opposite summit? Should New follow him down the ravine, or clamber to the vantage point the other had been unable to reach? For an instant the troglodyte hesitated.

Starting point is 04:09:25 Then he wheeled toward the cliff, and with the agility of long practice, backed by ages of cliff-dwelling forebears, he clambered rapidly upward. At times he was forced to leave for a projecting rock above his head, dangling out over space as he drew himself by mighty biceps and forearm to the tiny foothold it afforded. Again a gnarled root or a small crevice aided him in his assent, until presently he crawled over the brow and stood erect once more on level ground. New looked about warily. There was no sign of the man or the woman. Then he examined the ground in ever-enlarging circles, but no spore such as he saw it rewarded his eager eyes. He had about decided to return to the bottom of the ravine and followed Tours' spore, when, clear and shrill from the west,

Starting point is 04:10:21 there came to his ears the scream of a woman in distress. And scarce had its first note risen upon the air, then knew the son of new was dashing madly in the direction of the sound. End of Section 18. Section 19 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 6. The Anthropoid Apes As Nadu, surprised by Tur in her spying upon the village of the boat-builders,

Starting point is 04:11:05 fled north along the beach, she had little hope of permanently distancing her pursuer. But she could do no less than flee, hoping against hope that some chance accident might save her from capture. It was in her mind to dodge into the jungle where it came down close to the water a quarter of a mile ahead of her. Here she might elude the man and reach the cliffs that lay a short distance in Once there there was an excellent chance of hiding from him, or holding him off with pieces of rock until nightfall. Then she would retrace her steps northward, for it was evident that her people had not traveled in this direction.

Starting point is 04:11:43 The jungle was already quite close, but on the other hand the man was gaining upon her. Could she reach the tangled screen in time to elude him before he should be upon her? At least she could do no less than try. Suddenly, from directly above her head, came a loud flapping of great wings. A black shadow fell upon the sand about her. She glanced upward, and the sight that met her eyes froze her brave heart in terror. There, poised just above her ready to strike with its mighty talents, hovered one of those huge flying reptiles, that even in Natul's Day were practically extinct,

Starting point is 04:12:23 a gigantic teradactyl. The man behind her screamed a shout of one. morning. He launched his barbed spear for the great creature, catching it in the fatty portion of the long tail near the body. With a whistling scream of pain and rage, the hideous thing swooped down upon the girl beneath. Natuil felt the huge talents close upon her body. The heavy hide that covered her kept them from piercing through to her flesh as the pterodactyl rose swiftly, bearing her victim with her. For a moment Natul had battled and struggled for freedom, but almost at once she had realized the futility of her pitiful efforts.

Starting point is 04:13:03 In that awful clutch, even the cave-bearer of the bull-boss would have been helpless. Now she hung inert and limp, waiting for the end. She could not even draw her stone knife, for one of the great talons was closed tightly over it where it rested in the cord that supported her loin-cloth. Below her, she could see the tossing waters. The thing was bearing her far out from shore. The great wings flapped noisily above her. The long neck and the hideous head were stretched far forward as the creature flew in a straight line, high in air. Presently, the girl saw land ahead. Terror filled her heart as she realized that the thing was bearing her to the mysterious country that lay far out upon the bosom of the restless sea. She had dreamed

Starting point is 04:13:50 of this strange, unattainable country. There were stories among her people of the awful creatures that dwelt within it. She had sometimes long to visit it, but always with the brave warriors of her tribe to protect her. To come thus alone to the terrifying shore in the clutches of the most fearsome beast that terrified primeval man was beyond conception. Her mind was partially stupefied by the enormity of the fate that had overwhelmed her. Now the great reptile was above the nearest island. A jagged rocky hill raised its bare summit, in a huge index finger that pointed straight into the air far above the surrounding hilltops and the dense vegetation of the encircling jungle. Toward this the creature bore its prey.

Starting point is 04:14:37 As it hovered above the rocky pinnacle, Nadu glanced fearfully downward. Directly below her, her horrified sight fell upon the goal toward which her captor had been winging its rapid way, upon the cruel and hideous fate that awaited her there. Craning their long necks upward from a cup-like nest of mud-matted grasses, three young pterodactyl shrilled and hissed in anticipatory joy at their returning mother and the food she brought them. Several times the adult circled above the young, dropping lower and lower toward the nest in a diminishing spiral. For a second, she hovered almost at rest, a few feet above them. Then she loosed her hold upon Nat-Ull, dropping her squarely amongst her wide-jawed progeny, and with a final wheel above them, soared away in search of

Starting point is 04:15:26 her own dinner. As Naduil touched the nest, three sets of sharp-toothed jaws snapped at her simultaneously. The creatures were quite young, but for all of that they were formidable antagonists, with their many teeth, their sharp talons, and their strong tails. The girl dodged the first assault and drew her knife. Here was no time or place for hysteria or nerves. Death, unthinkably horrible, was upon her. Her chances of escape were practically non-existent, and yet so strong is the instinct of self-preservation, Natuil battled as heroically as though safety depended upon a single lucky knife-thrust. And though she knew it not, so it did. The three heads were close together, as the three monsters sought greedily to devour

Starting point is 04:16:16 the tender morsel brought to them by their parent. Natul, for a moment, eluded. It was a little the snapping jaws of the awkward young. And then, as the three heads came together in a mad attempt to seize her, she plunged her blade into two of the long, scragy necks. Instantly, the wounded creature set up a chorus of whistling shrieks. Their minute brains told them only that they had been hurt, and with bestial fury they set upon one another, each attributing its pain to one of its fellows. Instantly the nest became a mad whirling of wings, tails and hideous jaws. The two that had been wounded set upon each other, and the third, ignoring Naduil, fell upon the two contestants with impartial fury. Taking advantage of their distraction,

Starting point is 04:17:04 the girl clambered quickly over the side of the nest. Below her, the sheer side of the lofty pinnacle dropped fearfully downward a hundred feet. Vertical crevices and slight protuberances of harder rocks that had withstood the ravages of time and the elements, afforded the only means of descent. But death, certain and terrible, lay in the nest. Below, there was some hope, however slight. Klinged to the outside of the nest,

Starting point is 04:17:34 Nadu lowered her body until her feet found a precarious foothold upon a slightly jutting surface of the spire-like needle. Slowly, she lowered herself, clinging desperately to each crevice and outcropping. Time and again it seemed that she must give up and cling where she was until exhausted she toppled to the depth below.

Starting point is 04:17:55 Twice she circled the rocky finger in search of a new foothold further down, and each time, when hope seemed hopeless, she had found some meager thing, once only a little rounded roughness to which her hand or foot could cling a few inches further away from the awful nest above her. And so at last she came to the base of the gigantic needle, but even here she could not rest. At any moment the mighty mother might return and snatch her back once more to the horrors of her slimy nest.

Starting point is 04:18:28 The descent of the lower summit was in places, but little less hazardous than that of the surmounting spire. But finally it was accomplished, at Natuil found herself in a broad ravine, densely wooded. Here she lay down upon the grass to rest, for her labors had exhausted her. She knew not what other dangers minister, her, but for the moment she was numb to further terror. Pilling her head upon her arm,

Starting point is 04:18:54 she fell asleep. About her were the million sounds of the jungle, the lesser animals, the birds, the insects, the swaying branches. They but lulled her to deeper slumber. The winds blowing up the ravine from the sea fanned her cheek. It moved the soft, luxuriant hair that fell about her shoulders. It soothed and comforted her, but it did not. It did not. It was a little bit of the ravine from the sea, but it did not whisper to her of the close-set, wicked eyes that peered out of the trees upon her. It did not warn her of the drooling jaws, the pendulous lower lip, the hairy breast beneath which a savage heart beat faster as the little eyes feasted upon her form. It did not tell her that a huge body had slipped from a nearby tree and was slinking toward her.

Starting point is 04:19:40 It did not tell her, but a broken twig, snapping beneath the wary foot of the stalker, did. Among the primordial there was no easy transition from sleep to wakefulness. There could not be for those who would survive. As the twig snapped, Natu was upon her feet facing the new danger that minister. She saw a great, manlike form slinking toward her. She saw the reddish hair that covered the giant body. She saw the pig eyes and the wolf fangs, the hulking slouch of the heavy torso upon the short crooked legs.

Starting point is 04:20:15 and seeing all in one swift glance she turned and fled up the face of the cliff down which she had so recently descended. As she clambered swiftly aloft, the creature behind her rushed forward in pursuit, and behind him came a half-dozen others like him. Not who knew them as the hairy tree people. They differ from the greater ape-folk, and that they went always upon two legs when on the ground, and when they were killed and cut up for food, they yielded one less rib than their apish prototype. She knew how terrible it was to fall into their hands, worse than the fate that had almost claimed her in the lofty nest far above. A hundred feet up the cliffside, Nadu paused to look back. A dozen yards below her was the hairy one. The girl loosened

Starting point is 04:21:04 a bit of rock and hurled it down upon him. He dodged it, and with a shrill scream, continued the pursuit. Upward she fled for another hundred feet. Again, she paused to look downward. The tree-man was gaining on her. She loosened a bit of quartz and dropped it upon him. Just below him were six others. The missile struck her foremost pursuer. He toppled for an instant and then tumbled backward upon those behind him. He knocked one from a scant handhold upon the precipitous cliff, and the two dashed violently downward toward the jagged rocks at the bottom. With an exultant taunt upon her lips, Nadu resumed her upward flight.

Starting point is 04:21:45 Now she came to a point near the summit. The hillside was less steep. Here she could go with only occasional use of her hands. Halfway up her foot slipped upon a loose round rock. She fell heavily to the ground, clutching for support as she did so. The few rocks that met her hands gave way beneath her weight. With sickening velocity she hurtled down toward the brink of the perpendicular cliff face, toward mangled, tortured death beside the bodies of the two who had preceded her to the same destruction. Above the brink of the chasm, the first of the remaining pursuers was emerging. He was directly in the path of Nautau's swiftly rolling body.

Starting point is 04:22:26 It struck him in his hairy chest, hurling him backward into the precipice to his death. But his body had served a purpose. It had broken the velocity of the girl's fall, so that now she but rolled gently over the edge of the cliff, clutching at the top as she went, and thus further diminishing her speed. Directly below the summit lay a narrow ledge. Upon this, Nadu came almost to a full stop, but there was nothing there upon which she could gain a handhold, and so she toppled slowly over the edge into the arms of another of the man-apes.

Starting point is 04:23:01 Close beside him was one of his fellows, and a little way below the third who remained of the original six. The near clutched at Nadu to drag her from the arms of her captor, who drew back with bared fangs and menacing grouse. But the other was insistent. Evidently, he desired the prey fully as much as he who had obtained it. He came closer. The ledge upon which they stood was very narrow. A battle there would have met death for all three. With a cat-like leap, the creature that held Naduil in his arms sprang to one side, turned, and with the strength and agility of a shamaw leapt down the steep cliff face.

Starting point is 04:23:42 In his path was the remaining tree-man. To have met that charge would have met being catapulted to the bottom of the ravine. Wisely, the man-ape sidestepped, but immediately the two had passed, he fell into pursuit of them. Behind him came the other that Nadu's captor had eluded. There ensued a mad chase that often blanched the cheek of the almost fearless cave-girl. From the base of the cliffs, the man-ape leapt across the intervening jungle toward the trees. To the lower branches of these he took

Starting point is 04:24:16 without lessening his speed in the least. He almost flew, so swiftly he passed through the tangled mazes of the primeval forest. Close behind him, screaming and roaring, came his two fellows, intent upon robbing him of his prey. He carried Natul across one shoulder, gripping her firmly with a gigantic hand. She could plainly see the pursuers behind them.

Starting point is 04:24:39 They were gaining on their burdened fellow. Already, the foremost was reaching out to clutch the girl. Her captor, shooting a quick glance rearward, discovered the imminence of his despoilment. Wheeling suddenly upon the precarious trail, he snapped viciously at the nearer pursuer, who, with bared fangs and growling horribly, retreated out of reach.

Starting point is 04:25:02 Then the creature recommends his flight, only to be at once pursued again by his two kinsmen. Up and down the jungle, the savage trio raced. Twice they crossed the height separating one ravine from another. More and more insistent became the pursuers. Oftener, the captor was forced to halt

Starting point is 04:25:21 with his prize and fight off first one of them and then the other. At last, at the edge of the jungle close to the mouth of a narrow rocky gorge, the beast went mad with rage. He wheeled suddenly upon his pursuers, hurled Natul heavily to the ground, and charged roaring and foaming upon them.

Starting point is 04:25:41 They were roughly, running side by side, and so quick was the offensive movement of their fellow that they had no time to dodge him. His great hands seized them, and then all three went to the earth, tearing at one another, bearing their formidable tusks in throat and breast, and all the while keeping up a terrific growling and roaring. Warily, Nadu raised herself upon all fours. Her eyes were fastened intently upon the three savage beasts. They paid no attention to her. It was evident that their every faculty was wholly engaged in the life and death struggle upon which they had entered. Natul came to her feet, and without another backward glance, fled into the narrow gorge behind her.

Starting point is 04:26:25 She ran as swiftly as she could that she might put as great a distance as possible between herself and the horrid beasts that battled for her. Where the gorge led, she had no conception. What other horrors lay at its end, she could not guess. She only knew that hope had almost left her, for that she ever could regain the mainland she had not the faintest belief. Nor could her people succor her even should they discover her whereabouts, which in itself was equally beyond the pale of probability.

Starting point is 04:26:56 That she could long survive the dangers of the mysterious country, she doubted. Even a mighty warrior, fully armed, would fare ill in this place of terror. What indeed was to become of a girl armed only? with a knife. That New already was searching for her, she did not doubt. But long ere this, the tide had washed the imprints of her sandals from the sandy beach. Where would he search? And even had he followed her spoor before the tide had erased it, how could he guess what had befallen her, or interpret the sudden ending of her trail in the center of the beach? The stranger had seen the winged reptile pounce upon her and bear her away. But even if New

Starting point is 04:27:40 should come upon him, how could he learn of the truth? Since the moment that the two met, they would fall upon one another in mortal combat, as was the way of strangers then. Or if, by any chance, New discovered that she had been carried to the mysterious country, how could he follow, even though he believed against all reason that she still lived? No, there seemed no hope anywhere upon Natuil's horizon or below it. There was nothing left for her but to battle for survival. pitting her wits and her agility against the brute force and cunning of the brutes that would menace her to the end of her days, the end that could not be far distant. The windings of the gorge as she traversed it downward had shut off the louder sounds of the combat raging behind her,

Starting point is 04:28:29 though still she could hear an occasional roar or shriller scream of pain. She hoped that they would fight until all were dead. otherwise the survivor would continue the pursuit. As she stopped once to listen that she might know the three were still engaged in battle, she turned her eyes backward up the gorge, so that for the moment she failed to see that she had reached the end of the narrow canyon and that the beach and the sea lay before her. Nor did she see the figure of the man who came to a sudden stop at the gorge's mouth as his eyes fell upon her, nor the quick movement that took him behind a projecting bowl.

Starting point is 04:29:06 Boulder. Satisfied that she was not as yet being pursued, Nadu resumed her way down the rocky trail. As she turned, she saw the sea, and far away the mainland across the water. She hurried onward toward the beach, that she might reach a point as close as possible to her beloved country. As she passed the boulder behind which the man hid, the scraping of a pebble beneath his sandal attracted her attention. She wheeled toward him and then turned to fly. lie, but he was too close. Already he had leapt for her. One brawny hand closed in her flowing hair, the other grasped the wrist of the upraised hand in which the long knife of the girl had flashed above him with incredible swiftness. He laughed in her face. It was the stranger

Starting point is 04:29:55 who had pursued her upon the mainland beach, and then he drew her toward him. Nadu fought like a tigris, and once she screamed. Section 20 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 7. The Beast Fires Tur carried the girl, still struggling and fighting toward his boat. For the first time, he saw the boat that had brought new and wondered at the presence of another craft. Who could it be?

Starting point is 04:30:43 A closer inspection revealed that the boat was one that had just been fashioned by others of his own tribe. Some of the men must have followed him. Still clasping Nadu firmly, as he stood ankle-deep in the water beside his boat, he raised his voice in a loud halloo. Presently, a clattering of falling stones from the cliff facing the beach attracted the attention of Tur and the girl. Already halfway down, the figure of an agile giant was leaping toward them, in descent. From his shoulders fluttered the skin of a cave lion. From his shock of black hair, a single long feather rose straight and defiantly aloft. A single glance revealed to Turd the fact that this was no member of his tribe. It was a stranger, and so an enemy. Nadu recognized New at once.

Starting point is 04:31:36 She gave a little cry of delight at sight of him, a cry that was answered by a shout of encouragement from Noe. Tear threw the girl roughly into the bottom of the boat, holding her there with one hand, though she fought bitterly to escape. While with his freehand, he dragged first his boat and then Neus out into deeper water. Handicapped though he was, Tur worked rapidly, for he was at home in the surf and wonderfully proficient in the handling of the cumbersome craft of his tribe even under the most adverse conditions. At last he succeeded in shoving Noos' boat into the grip of a receding roller

Starting point is 04:32:14 that carried it swiftly away from shore, and at the same time he shoved his own through, leaping into it with his captive. Nadu fought her way to her niece, calling aloud to New, and striving desperately to throw herself overboard. But Tur held her fast, paddling with one hand,

Starting point is 04:32:32 and when New reached the water's edge, they were well beyond his reach. So, too, was his own tree trunk. Between him and Natul, the sea swarmed with carnivorous reptiles. Every instant was carrying her away from him. The troglodyte scarce hesitated. With a swift movement, he threw off his lion's skin and discarded his stone axe. Then, naked but for a loincloth, and armed only with his knife,

Starting point is 04:33:00 he dove through the pounding surf into the frightful sea. As Nett will witness this act, she redoubled her efforts to retard Ture. Crawling to her knees, she threw both arms about her captor's neck, dragging him down until he could no longer wield his paddle. Turr fought to disengage himself. He did not wish to kill or maim his captive. She was far too beautiful to destroy or disfigure. He wanted her in all her physical perfection just as she was.

Starting point is 04:33:31 Gradually, New was overhauling them. Twice he was attacked by slimy monsters. Once he fought his way to victory, and again the two who menaced him fell to fighting between themselves and forgot their prey. At last he was within reach of Turs' boat. Nadu, battling with desperation and every ounce of her strength to hampered Turs' movements, was tugging at the man's arms. He could do nothing, and already New had seized the side of the craft and was raising one

Starting point is 04:34:01 leg over it. With a sudden wrench, Turre freed his right hand. Naduil strove to regain it, but the great fist rose above her face. With terrific impact it fell upon her forehead. All went black before her as she released her hold upon Turr and sank to the bottom of the boat unconscious. Instantly, Ter snatched up his paddle and leaping to his feet beat furiously at New's head and hands.

Starting point is 04:34:29 Bravely the man strove to force his way into the boat in the face of this terrific punishment, but it was too severe, and at last, half-stunned, he slipped back into the water, as Tur drove his paddle once again and the rude craft forged away toward the mainland. When Natu regained consciousness, she found herself lying upon a shaggy arach skin beneath a rude shelter of thatch and hide. Her hands and feet were securely bound with tough bullock sinew. When she struggled to free herself, they cut into her soft flesh, hurting cruelly. So she lay still, looking straight up at the funnel-like peak of the shelter's interior. She knew where she was. This was one of the strange caves of the people she had seen working

Starting point is 04:35:17 upon the tree trunks, for what purpose she now knew. She turned her head toward the entrance. Beyond, she saw men and women squatting about small fires eating. It was already dark. Beyond them were other fires, larger fires, that kept the savage carnivora at bay. And beyond this outer circle of fires, from out of the outer darkness, came the roaring and the coughing, the grunting and the growling of scores of terrible beasts of prey that slunk back and forth about the encampment, thirsting for the blood of the men and women and children,

Starting point is 04:35:52 who huddled within the safety of the protecting fires. Occasionally a little boy would snatch up a burning brand and hurled among the night-proullers. There would be a chorus of angry screams and low-toned, rumbling growls, as the menacers retreated for an instant. Then the ring of shadowy forms, and the glowing spots of burning flame that were their eyes, would reform out of the stigium blackness of the night. Once, a cave lion, emboldened by familiarity with the campfires of primitive people, leapt through the encircling ring of flame. Into the midst of a family party he sprang, seizing upon an old man.

Starting point is 04:36:32 Instantly a half-hundred warriors snatched up their spears, and as the lion turned with his prey and leapt back into the night, fifty harpoons caught him in mid-air. Down he came directly on top of a flaming pile of brush, and with him came the old man. The warriors leapt forward with whirling axes. What mattered if the old man was pierced by a d'clock? dozen of the spears that had been intended for the marauder. They leapt and shouted in savage glee, for the lion was dead even before a single axe had smitten him. The old man was dead, too. Him they hurled out to the beast beyond the flames, the lion they first skinned.

Starting point is 04:37:15 It was an awful spectacle, that evening seen in the far antiquity of man, when the boat-builders come north in search of new fisheries, camped upon the shore of the restless sea in the edge of the jungle primeval. But to Natul it presented nothing remarkable. To such scenes she had been accustomed since earliest childhood. Of course, with her people, the danger of attack by wild beasts at night was minimized by the fact that her tribe dwelt in caves, the mouths of which could be easily blocked against four-footed enemies. But she was familiar with the evening fire. which burned at the cliff's base, while the tribe was gathered to feast or council, and she was used, too, to the sudden charge of some bolder individual amongst the many

Starting point is 04:38:01 that always foregathered about the haunts of man at night. At last the people withdrew to their shelters. Only two girls were left, whose business it was to keep the fires burning brightly. Natul was familiar with this custom, and she knew the utilitarian origin of it. women were the least valuable assets of a tribe. They could best be spared in case of a sudden onslaught by some fierce beast at night. It was the young men who soon were to become warriors that must be preserved. The death of a single girl would count for little. Her purpose would have been served if the screams of herself and her companion aroused the warriors. But why not old

Starting point is 04:38:45 and useless women instead of young girls? Merely because the instinct of self-prepared preservation is stronger in the young than in the very old. An old woman would have been much less careless of her life than would a young woman, and so might sleep and permit the fires to die out. She would have but a few years or months to live anyway, and little or nothing to live for in those primitive days. The young woman, on the contrary, would watch the fire zealously for her own protection, and so ensured the greater safety of the tribe. Thus, perhaps, was born the custom from which sprung the order of holy virgins, who tended the eternal fires in the temples that were yet unbuilt in the still undreamed of Rome.

Starting point is 04:39:31 Presently, the entrance to the shelter in which Natul was secured was darkened by the figure of a man. It was Tur. Natul recognized him at once. He came to her side and knelt. "'I have kept the women from you,' he said. "'Gron would have torn you to pieces. and the others would have helped her. But you need not fear them.

Starting point is 04:39:53 Promise me that you will not resist or attempt to escape, and you shall be freed from your bonds permanently. Otherwise I shall have to tie you up whenever I am away, and then there is no telling what Gron may do, since you will be defenseless and I not here to keep her from you. What do you say? I say that the moment my hands are freed I shall fight until, I kill or am killed," replied the girl.

Starting point is 04:40:22 "'And when my feet are loosed, I shall run away as fast as I can.' "'Tur shrugged his shoulders. "'Very well,' he said. "'It will profit you nothing, unless you enjoy being always tied in this uncomfortable position.' He stooped and commenced to work upon the knots that held her feet and ankles. Outside the shelter, something slunk stealthily in the shadows. TIR did not hear the faint scraping sound of the creature's wary advance. His back was toward the entrance of the shelter as he knelt low over the hard knots in the

Starting point is 04:40:57 bullock's sinews. Already he had released the courts that encircled Natu's ankles, and now he was turning his attention to those at her knees. The girl lay quietly, her face toward the lesser darkness which showed through the entrance. She should wait patiently until he had freed her, and then she would fight until the man was forced to kill her. Suddenly she became aware of the darker shadow of a form blotting a portion of the dark entrance way. The creature was not large enough to be of the more formidable carnivora,

Starting point is 04:41:31 though it might have been a hyena or a wild dog. Natul was on the point of warning the man, when it occurred to her that, here might be not only the quick death she now craved, but at the same time a means of a reason of a man. revenging herself upon her captor. She lay very quiet while T'r labored over the last knot. Close behind the man crept the silent prowler of the night. Natu could imagine the bared fangs and the slavering jowls. In another instant there would be a savage growl as the thing closed

Starting point is 04:42:05 with a swift spring upon its prey. Or would it leap past the man upon her unprotected throat? The girl's eyes were white in fascinated horror. She shuddered once as in the close presence of death. The last knot loosened beneath her's fingers. He jerked the cord from about the girl's knees with a low exclamation of satisfaction. And then Nadu saw the thing behind the man rear upon its hind legs and spring full upon his back. There was no savage growl, no sound. The silence of the attack rendered it infinitely more horrible than would bestial roars and growls

Starting point is 04:42:44 that might have proclaimed the nature of the animal. Tert rolled over upon his side to grapple with his antagonist. In an instant they were locked in furious combat. Natuil staggered to her feet. Her arms were still pinioned, but her legs were free. Here was her opportunity. Leaping over the two blood-mad beasts, she darted from the shelter and plunged into the nearby jungle.

Starting point is 04:43:12 End of Section 20. Section 21 of the E. Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 8. Bound to the Steak New, New, the son of New, half stunned by the paddle of Tur, still managed to keep afloat until he partially regained his senses. Then, seeing the futility a further attempt to overtake the boat in which Nadu was being born toward the mainland, he struck out for the

Starting point is 04:43:51 shore of the island. For a while he lay upon the hot sand resting. Then he arose looking out across the water. Far in the distance he could see a tiny speck approaching the opposite shore. It must be the boat in which Nadu had been carried off. New marked the spot. In the distance a lofty mountain peak reared its head far inland. New bethought himself of the boat that had brought him to the island. He looked out to the sea. He looked out to the sea, and he was a little bit of the for it, but it was not in sight there. He walked along the beach. Beyond a heap of wave-washed boulders, he came upon the thing he sought. He could have shouted aloud so elated was he. There before him laid the boat, and in it was the paddle. He ran forward and pulled it up upon

Starting point is 04:44:41 the beach. Then he hurried back to the spot at which he had discarded his robe and axe, and after regaining them, returned to the dugout. A moment more saw him floundering out through the surf. He leapt into the craft, seized the paddle, and struck out for the far-off shoreline. With paddle and axe and stone knife, he fought off the marauders of the sea. The journey was marked by a series of duels and battles that greatly impeded the man's progress. But he was not discouraged. He was accustomed to nothing else.

Starting point is 04:45:16 It was his life, as it was the life of every creature that roamed. the land or haunted the deeps in those stupendously savage days. It was quite dark when the heavy booming of the surf before him warned New that he was close in shore. For some time he had seen the fires of the boat builders ahead of him, and toward these he had directed his way. Now his boat ran its blunt nose out upon the sand a hundred yards north of the camp. New leapt out, leaving the boat where it lay.

Starting point is 04:45:50 He doubted that he should ever have further use for it, but should he live to return to his people, he will lose no time in building a similar craft with which he should fill his father's people with awe and admiration. About the camp of the boat-builders, as New approached, he discovered the usual cordon of night prowlers that he had naturally expected. Circling until he was downwind from the shelters, he was enabled to reach the jungle without being discovered by any of the more ferocious beasts. Once he had just eluded a ponderous cave bear

Starting point is 04:46:24 that was lumbering toward the encampment in search of prey, and again he almost stumbled against a huge rhinoceros as it lay in the long grasses upon the jungle's outer fringe. But once within the jungle he took to the trees, since among their branches there were few that he had reason to fear. The panther sometimes climbed to the lower branches, but though he was a mighty beast by comparison with the panther of the twentieth century, New looked upon him with contempt,

Starting point is 04:46:54 since he seldom deliberately hunted man and could be put to flight, if not killed by a well-hurled axe. Reptiles constituted the greatest menace to the jungle traveler who chose the branches of the trees, for here often lurked enormous snakes in whose giant coils the mightiest hunters were helpless as babes. To the rear of the village, New traveled through the trees, leaping in the dark from one huge fron to another. When the distance was too great to span in a single leap, he came to the ground, springing across the

Starting point is 04:47:28 intervening space with the speed and agility of a deer. At last he came to the edge of the jungle opposite the camp. The fires came close beneath the tree in which he hid. He could see the girls tending them, and further in the balance of the tribe squatting about their smaller cooking fires, gnawing upon bones or splitting them to extract the marrow. He saw the rush of the lion upon the opposite side of the camp. He saw him seize the old man. He saw the warriors leap to their feet and run toward the beast. He saw the eyes and attention of every member of the tribe directed toward the spot which

Starting point is 04:48:08 was farthest from new. the girls who were tending the fires below him, ran quickly across the village to witness the killing of the marauder. Taking advantage of this fortuitous good fortune, New dropped quickly to the ground, and ran for the shadows of the shelters which were placed in a rude circle facing outward toward the outer circle of fires, with the result that the circular space they enclosed was in partial shadow. Here New threw himself upon his belly in the darkest spot he could find. For some time he lay motionless, listening and sniffing the air. As nothing rewarded his observations at this point, he rose cautiously upon all fours and crept a few feet further on

Starting point is 04:48:52 in the shadows of the shelters. Again he lay down to listen and sniff. For half an hour he pursued his slow way about the inner circle behind the dwellings. The inhabitants had retired, all except the girls who tended the fires. At last, New heard low voices coming from the interior of a shelter behind which he had but just crawled. He lay very quiet with his nose a few inches from the bottom of the skin and thatch hut. Presently, there came to his sensitive nostrils the evidence he had been seeking. Within was Nadu. But there was someone with her. Cautiously, New crept around to the front of the shelter. Even there it was very dark, for the girls had permitted the fires to die down to a few

Starting point is 04:49:43 fitful flames. Opposite the entrance, knew her Natuil's voice distinctly. He saw the form of a man leaning over her. He went hot with hate and rage. Like a beast of prey, he slunk noiselessly upon all fours into the shelter directly behind the unsuspecting terror. Then, without a sound, he rose to his feet and threw himself full upon the back of the stranger. His knife was out, and his fighting fangs were bared, as the two rolled about the floor of the shelter, striking, clawing, and biting at one another. At last, the man raised his voice in a call for help, for New was getting the better of him. The long knife had not found a vital spot as yet, for Tur was an experienced fighter, and so far had been able to ward off the more dangerous

Starting point is 04:50:34 blows. But nevertheless, he was bleeding from several wounds, and his throat and breast were lacerated by the other's teeth. In reply to his shouts, the village awoke with answering cries. Warriors, bearing their short spears, ran from every shelter. Women and children scampered at their heels. Gron, Turs' mate, was among the first to come. She had recognized the voice of her man and had guessed where he might be in trouble. Like an angry, Tigris, she sprang for the shelter in which the beautiful stranger had been confined. Behind her came the warriors. One carried a burning bran from a nearby fire. He flung it into the interior, careless of where it might land. Fortunately for the inmates it fell beyond them, rolling against

Starting point is 04:51:24 the further side of the hut. Instantly, the dry fronds of the thatch that had been leaned against the bottom of the skins to fill in the gaps caught fire, and the inside of the shelter was illumined by the sudden glare of flames. When the rescuer saw that but a single man opposed their fellow, they threw themselves upon the two, and though New battled bravely he was presently overcome. The entire hut was now aflame, so that his captors were forced to drag him outside.

Starting point is 04:51:54 Here they bound his arms and legs, and then turned their attention to saving the balance of the village from destruction. This they accomplished by pulling down the blaze, shelter with their spears and beating out the flames with fresh hides. Even in the excitement of the fight, New had not for a moment forgotten Naduil, and when the brand lighted up the interior, he sought for her with his eyes unsuccessfully.

Starting point is 04:52:21 Naduil had disappeared. He wondered what could have become of her. From her position upon the floor of the hut, he had been sure that she was securely bound, otherwise she would have been fighting tooth and nail against her captor. He looked about him from where he lay before the ruins of the burned shelter. He could see nothing of her. But he saw another woman, a young woman with good features,

Starting point is 04:52:47 but with the expression of a wild beast. Hate, jealousy, and rage were mirrored in every line of the passion-distorted countenance. It was groan. She came toward him. "'Who are you?' she cried. cried. "'I am New, the son of New,' replied the man. "'Are you of the same people as the woman in whose shelter you found my man?' she continued. Noon nodded affirmatively. "'She was to have been my mate,' he said.

Starting point is 04:53:18 "'Where is she?' For the first time the woman seemed to realize the absence of the fair prisoner. She turned toward her. "'Where is the woman?' she shrieked. "'Where have you hidden the woman?' No longer shall you keep me from her. This time I shall tear out her heart and drink her blood.' T'r looked about in consternation.

Starting point is 04:53:43 "'Where is the woman?' he called to the warriors, but none seemed to know. Immediately a search of the village commenced. The warriors ran hither and thither through the huts and into the enclosure behind them. New lay awaiting the outcome of the search. As it became evident that Nadu had escaped, his heart leapt with joy. At last there was no other place to look and all the searchers had returned. Nadu was not in the village. Gron turned toward New.

Starting point is 04:54:16 "'Your woman has escaped me!' she shouted. "'But you shall suffer for her!' And she leapt upon him as he lay there bound and defenseless. In her mad rage she would have torn his head. eyes out, had not a tall warrior interfered. He seized the woman by her hair, jerking her roughly from her victim. Then he swung her, still by the hair, brutally to the ground. "'Take your woman away,' he called to Tur. "'Does a woman rule my people? Take her away, and beat her, that she may learn that it is not a woman's place to interfere with the doings of men.

Starting point is 04:54:54 Then take you another, mate, that this woman may be taught her place.' T'er ceased upon the unfortunate Gron and dragged her toward his own shelter, for which, later, could be heard the sound of a spear-haft falling upon flesh, and the shrieks and moans of a woman. New was disgusted. Among his people, women were not treated thus. He looked up at the burly form of the chief who was standing over him. Well, why didn't they kill him? That was the proper thing to do with male prisoners. Among his own terms, he looked up at the burly form of the chief who was standing over him. Well, why didn't they kill him? Among his own tribe, a spear thrust through the heart would long since have settled the fate of one in news position. He wondered where Nadu was. Could she find her way back to the tribe safely?

Starting point is 04:55:41 He wished that he might live but long enough to find her and see her safe in her father's cave. The chief was gazing intently upon him, but he had as yet made no move to finish him. "'Who are you?' he at length asked. "'I am New, the son of New,' replied the prisoner. "'From where do you come?' Noon nodded toward the north. "'From near the barren cliffs,' he replied. "'And should you go thither, beater of women,

Starting point is 04:56:13 "'my father's tribe would fall upon you and kill you all.' "'You talk big,' said the chief. "'I talk truth,' retorted New. "'My father's people would laugh at such as you, that men clothed in the skins of cows. It shows what manner of people you be. Now my father's warriors wear the skins of Er and Zor and U,

Starting point is 04:56:37 and upon their feet are sandals of the hides of ta and glue. They are men. They would laugh as they sent their women and children out with sticks to drive you away. This was a terrible insult. The chief of the boat-builders trembled with rage. You shall say, "'See,' he cried,

Starting point is 04:56:57 "'that we are men, and the manner of your death will prove if you be such a brave man as you say. "'Tomorrow you shall die. "'After the day is done and the fires are lighted, you shall begin to die. "'But it will be long before you are dead, "'and all the time you will be crying out against the woman who bore you "'and begging us to put you out of your misery.' New laughed at him. He had heard of distant peoples who tortured their prisoners, and so he guessed what the chief

Starting point is 04:57:30 meant to suggest. Well, he would show them how the son of Ngu could die. Presently, at the chief's command, a couple of warriors dragged New into a nearby shelter. A guard was placed before the door, for the escape of Nautul had warned them to greater watchfulness. The long night dragged itself to a slow end. The sun rose out of the restless sea. sea. The villagers bestirred themselves. Nook could smell the cooking food. He was very hungry, but they offered him not a single morsel. He was thirsty, but none brought him water,

Starting point is 04:58:07 and he was too proud to ask favors of his captors. If the night had been long, the day seemed an eternity, and though he knew that darkness was to be the signal for the commencement of the torches that were to mark his passing, he welcomed the first shadows of the declining sun. Whatever cruelties they might perpetrate upon him could not last forever. Sooner or later he would die, and with this slim comfort, knew the son of New, waited for the end. The fissures had all returned. The outer ring of fires had been kindled, as well as the smaller cooking fires within.

Starting point is 04:58:46 The people squatted about on their haunches, gnawing upon their food like beasts. At last they had completed their evening meal. A couple of men brought a small post, and after scooping a hole in the ground with their spears, set it up halfway between the shelters and the outer fires. Then two warriors came to the hut where New lay. They seized him by the feet and dragged him upon his back and shoulders through the village. The women and children poked him with sharp sticks, threw stones at him, and spat upon him. New the son of New made no remonstrances.

Starting point is 04:59:23 Not by so much as a line did the expression of utter indifference that sat his features like a mask alter in response to painful blows or foul indignities. At last his guard stopped before the post, which was now set firmly upright in the ground. They jerked new to his feet and bound him securely to the stake. In a circle about him was a ring of brushwood. He knew that he was to be slowly roasted, for the brush was nowhere. quite close enough for the flames to reach him. It would be a slow death, very pleasant to the eyes of the audience,

Starting point is 05:00:00 especially if the victim gave evidence of his agonies. But it was far from the intention of New the son of New to afford the boat-builders dissatisfaction. He looked around upon the ring of eager, savage faces with bored contempt. New despised them, not because they would kill him, for that he might expect for many strangers, but because they wore the skins of cows, and the men labored instead of devoting all their time and energies

Starting point is 05:00:29 to the chase and to warfare. Their boats were fine to have. Lou had even thought of fashioning one upon his return to his people, but to make a business of such labor, ugh, it was disgusting. Had he escaped, he should have returned to the boat-builders with his father's warriors and taken what boats he wished. His meditations were cut short by the ceremonies which were going on about him.

Starting point is 05:00:57 There had been dancing, and a certain primitive chanting, and now one of the warriors lighted the brush that surrounded the victim at the stake. End of Section 21. Section 22 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 9. The fight. After Noo, the son of New, had left his father and his father's people to go in search of Natul and Hud, the warrior chief had sat in silence for many minutes.

Starting point is 05:01:41 Beside him sat Tha, father of Naduil, and roundabout squatted the other members of the tribe. All were silent in the face of the sorrow that had overtaken their chief and his principal lieutenant. Neu and Natul were great favorites among their savage fellows. Not so, however, HUD, and anger against him was bitter. Presently knew the chief spoke. We cannot go in search of a new home, he said, leaving two of our children behind.

Starting point is 05:02:13 His listeners knew that he ignored HUD, that HUD, in bringing this sorrow upon the tribe, had forfeited his rights among them. They were satisfied that it should be so. A young warrior stood up. With his spear, he drew a line, upon the ground from east to west, lying just north of him. "'New, the son of New, passed through the ordeals with me.

Starting point is 05:02:36 We became men and warriors upon the same day. Together we hunted our first lion.' He paused, and then, pointing to the line he had drawn upon the ground, continued. "'Never shall I cross this line until I have found New the son of New.' As he ceased speaking, he drew himself to his full height, and with arms folded across his broad chest, turned to face his chief. From the tribe came grunts of approval. All eyes turned toward New.

Starting point is 05:03:08 What would he do? The young warrior's act was nothing short of rebellion. Suddenly, Ot, brother of Natu, sprang to his feet and stood beside the defiant warrior. He said nothing. His act proclaimed his intention. New the chief looked at the two young men from beneath his chief. shaggy brows. The watchers were almost certain that a half-smile played grimly about his grim countenance. He too arose. He walked to where the two stood and ranged himself beside them.

Starting point is 05:03:42 Thaw was the first to guess the significance of the act, and the instant that he did so, he leapt to new side. Then the others understood, and a moment later the whole tribe was ranged with their backs to Dag's line, facing toward the south. They were dancing and shouting now. The men waved their stone axes or through their long spears high in air. The women beat their palms together, and the little children ran skipping about, getting in everyone's way. After a few minutes of this,

Starting point is 05:04:14 New started off toward the south, telling off a score of men to remain with the women and children who were to follow slowly back toward their former dwellings, while the chief, with the balance of the fighting men searched rapidly ahead for signs of New and Not all. First they came upon the dead body of HUD within the cave in the face of the barren cliffs. From there they discovered New spore and faint traces of the older spore of the girl, showing that New had not overtaken her at this point.

Starting point is 05:04:44 On they went along the beach toward their old caves, where everywhere the signs of one or the other of those they followed were distinguishable. It was dark when they reached the caves, and the following morning they had difficulty in again pips. kicking up the spore because of the fact that the tide had obliterated it where it had touched the sandy beach at low tide. Now Newse separated his warriors into three parties. One with which he remained was to keep south along the beach. The second was to work into the jungle for a mile and then turn south, while the third was to search straight inland toward the west. In this way one of them

Starting point is 05:05:24 must come upon those they sought or some sign of them. Tha was in command of the central party, and Ot was with him. Dag was with New the chief. They beat rapidly along the beach, and spread out across it from the water to the jungle, that nothing might escape their observation. Several times they followed false leads into the jungle, so that they lost much time, with the result that darkness came upon them without their having discovered the two they sought.

Starting point is 05:05:54 They camped upon the sand just outside the jungle, building a ring of fires about them to keep off the wild beasts. Then they lay down to sleep, all but two who kept watch and tended the fires. Dag was one of the watchers. As the night grew darker, he became aware of a glow in the south. He called his companion's attention to it. "'There are men there,' he said. "'That is the light from beast fires.' Listen!

Starting point is 05:06:26 Savage yells rose faintly from the distance, and in the direction of the lights. Dag was on the point of arousing new, when his keen eyes detected something moving rarely between the jungle and the camp. Evidently, it had but just crept out of the dense vegetation. Ordinarily, Dag might have thought it a beast of prey, but with the discovery of the nearness of a camp of men, he was not so sure. True, men seldom crept through the jungle after darkness had fallen, but there was something about the movements of this creature

Starting point is 05:06:59 that suggested the crawling of a man on all fours. Dag circled the camp, apparently oblivious of the presence of the intruder. He threw a stick upon a blaze here, and there he stamped out some smoking faggots that had fallen inside the ring. But all the while he watched the movements of the thing that crept through the outer darkness toward the camp. He could see it more distinctly now, and was aware that from time to time

Starting point is 05:07:27 it cast a backward glance over its shoulder. Had it a companion, or companions, was something following it? Deggs scrutinized the black face of the jungle beyond the creeping thing. Ah, so that was it? A dark shadow had stepped from the somber wood upon the trail of the creature

Starting point is 05:07:49 that was now halfway across the open space, between the jungle and the camp. Degg needed no second glance to attest the identity of the newcomer. The lithe body, the black mass that marked the bristling mane, the crouching pose, the two angry splotches of yellow-green fire. No doubt here. It was Zor, the lion, stalking his prey. Deg whispered a word to his companion, who came to his side.

Starting point is 05:08:17 The two stood looking straight toward the nearer creature, with no attempt to disguise the fact that they had discovered it. "'It is a man,' whispered Dag's companion. And then, with a frightful roar, Zor charged, and the creature before it rose upon two feet full in the light of the nearer blaze. With a cry that aroused the whole camp, Dag leapt beyond the flaming circle, his spear-hand back thrown, the stone head laboriously chipped to a sharp point directed at the charging Zor.

Starting point is 05:08:50 the weapon passed a scarce handsbread from the shoulder of Zor's prey, and buried itself in the breast of the beast. At the same instant, Dag leapt past the fugitive, placing himself directly in the path of the lion with only an axe and knife of stone to combat the fury of the raging, wounded demon of destruction. Over his shoulder, he threw a word to the one he had leapt forth to succor. "'Run within the beast fires, Natul,' he cried. "'Zor's mate is coming to his aid.' And sure enough, springing lightly across the sands came a fierce lioness, maimed like her lord. Now Dag's fellow warrior had sprung to his side, and from the camp were running the balance of the savage spearmen. Zor, rearing upon his hind feet, was striking at Dag

Starting point is 05:09:37 who leapt nimbly from side to side, dodging the terrific blows of the mighty talon paws, and striking the beast's head repeatedly with his heavy axe. The other warrior met the charge of the infuriated lioness with his spear. Straight into the broad breast ran the sharp point, while the man clung tenaciously to the haft, whipped hither and thither as the beast reared and wheeled and struck at him with her claws. Now knew the chief and his fellows arrived upon the scene. A score of spears bristled from the bodies of Zor and his mate.

Starting point is 05:10:12 Axes fell upon their heads, and knew, the mighty, leapt upon Zor's back, with only his stone knife. There he clung to the thick mane, driving the puny weapon time and again into back and side, until at last the roaring, screaming beast rolled over upon its side to rise no more. The lioness proved more tenacious of life than her lord, and though bristling with spears and cut to ribbons with the knives of her antagonists, she charged into close quarters with a sudden rush that found one of the cavemen a fraction of a second too slow. The strong claws raked him from neck to groin, and as he fell, the mighty jaws closed with a sickening crunch upon his skull.

Starting point is 05:10:57 At bay over her victim, the lioness stood growling and threatening, while the wild warriors danced in a circle about her, awaiting the chance to rush in and avenge their comrade. Within the circle of fires, Natu replenish the blaze, keeping the whole scene brilliantly lighted for the warriors. That she had stumbled upon men of her own tribe, unexpectedly, seemed a little short of miraculous. She could scarce wait for the battle with the lions to be concluded, so urgent was the business that filled her thoughts. But at last Zora's savage mate lay dead, and as New the chief returned to the camp, Natu leapt forward to meet

Starting point is 05:11:37 him. "'Quick!' she cried. "'They are killing, Niu, thy son!' and she pointed toward the south in the direction of the glare that was now plainly visible through the darkness. Ngu did not wait to ask questions then. He called his warriors about him. Natul says that they slay Nuh the son of Ngu there, he said, pointing toward the distant fire glow. Come!

Starting point is 05:12:03 As Nadu led them along the beach and through the jungle, she told Nguel the chief all that had transpired since HUD had stolen her away. She told of her wanderings and of the boat builders, of how one had chased her, and of the terrible creature that had seen her. seized and carried her to its nest. She told of the strange creature that crawled into the shelter where she was confined, leaping upon the back of Turr, and of how she slipped out of the shelter as the two battled, and escaped into the jungle, wriggling her hands from their bonds as she ran. She shuddered as she told knew of the gauntlet of savage beasts, she had been

Starting point is 05:12:41 forced to run between the beast fires of the boat-builders and the safety of the jungle trees. I rested for the balance of the night in a great tree close beside the village of the strangers, she said. Early the next morning I set out in search of food, intending to travel northward until I came to our old dwellings where I could live in comparative safety. But all the time I kept wondering what it might have been that leapt upon Turs back in the shelter the night before, and the more I thought about it, the more apparent it became that it might have been a man, that it must have been a man, for what animal could pass through the beast-fires unseen. And so, after filling my stomach, I crept back through the trees to the edge of the village, and there I watched. The sun then was straight above me. Half the day was gone.

Starting point is 05:13:33 I could not reach the caves before darkness, if anything occurred to delay me, and as I might at any moment stumble upon some of the strangers, or betrayed by Err or Zor or U, I decided to wait until early tomorrow morning before setting out for the caves. There was something within me that urged me to remain. What it was, I do not know. But it was as though there were two Natul's, one wishing to hurry away from the land of the strangers as rapidly as possible, and the other insisting that it was her duty to remain.

Starting point is 05:14:07 At last I could deny my other self no longer. I must stay. And so I found a comfortable, position in a great tree that grows close beside the clearing where the stranger's village stands, and there I remained until long after darkness came. It was then that I saw the thing within the village that sent me here. Before I had seen your fires, and wondered who it might be that came from the north. I knew that all the strangers had returned in the afternoon, so it could be none of them,

Starting point is 05:14:40 and the first tribe to the north I knew was my own, so I hope that. without believing, that it might indeed be some of thy warriors, knew. And then I saw that something was going to occur in the village below me. Warriors approached a hut from which they dragged a captive. By the legs they dragged him, through the village and about it, and as they did so, the women and children tortured and spat upon the prisoner. At first I could not see the victim plainly, but at last, as they raised him to his feet and bound him to a stake,

Starting point is 05:15:14 where they were going to roast him alive among slow fires. I saw his face. Oh, New, can you not guess who it was that had followed me so far, had overcome such dangers and fought his way through the awful waters to rescue me? New, the son of New, said the old warrior, and his chest swelled with pride as he strode through the jungle in the rear of the village. Angry beasts of prey menaced the rescuing party upon every hand. Twice they were attacked and compelled to battle with some fierce primordial brute, but at last they won to the edge of the jungle behind the village they sought.

Starting point is 05:15:54 There the sight that met their eyes and ears was one of wild confusion. Men and women were running hither and thither, uttering shouts of rage. Beyond them was a circle of flaming brush. In the center of this, Nadu told the rescuers, New the son of New was fast bound to a stake. Slowly he was roasting to death, possibly he was already dead. New gathered his warriors about him. Two he commanded to remain always beside Natu. Then, with the others at his heels, his long white feather nodding bravely above his noble head,

Starting point is 05:16:29 and the shaggy pelt of Err the cave bear falling from his shoulders, New the chief slunk silently out of the jungle toward the village of the excited boat builders. There were forty of them, mighty men, mightily muscled. In their strong hands they grasped their formidable spears and heavy axes. In their loin claws rested their stone knives, for the moment when they closed in hand-to-hand combat with foes. In their savage brains was but a single idea. To kill. To kill. To kill. To the outer rim of fires they came,

Starting point is 05:17:07 and yet the excited populace within had not discovered them. Then a girl, remembering tardily her duties at the fires, turned to throw more brush upon the blaze and saw them, saw a score of handsome, savage faces just beyond the flames. With a scream of terror and warning, she turned and scurried amongst the villagers. For an instant, the hubbub was stilled, only to break out anew at the girl's frightened cry of, Warriors! Warriors!

Starting point is 05:17:37 Then New and his men were among them. The warriors of the boat-builders ran forward to meet the attackers. The women and children fled to the opposite side of the enclosure. Horse shouts and battle-cries rang out as the cliffwaters hurled themselves upon the boat-builders. A shower of long, slim spears volleyed from one side, to be answered by the short, stout harpoons of the villagers. Then the warriors rushed to closer conflict with their axes. Never after the first assault was the outcome of the battle in question.

Starting point is 05:18:09 The fiercer tribe of Nhu, the hunters of beasts of prey, the warrior people, were the masters at every turn. Back, back they forced the wearers of cowskins, until the defenders have been driven across the enclosure upon their women and children. And now the inner circle of fires was surrendered to the invaders. And as Nadu sprang between the warriors of her people to be first to the side of knew and cut away his bonds, the last of the boat-builders turned and fled into the outer darkness, along the beach to where their boats were drawn up beyond the tide.

Starting point is 05:18:45 New, the chief, leapt through the flames upon the heels of Nauru. In the terrible heat within, the two came side by side before the stake. The girl gave a single glance at the bare and smoking pole and at the ground around it before she turned and threw herself into Ngu's arms. New the Son of New was not there, nor was his body within the enclosure. End of Section 22. Section 23 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 10. Gron's revenge Gron, suffering and exhausted from the effects of the cruel beating TUR had administered,

Starting point is 05:19:39 lay all the following day in her shelter. TIR did not molest her further. Apparently, he had forgotten her, a suggestion which aroused all her primitive savagery and jealousy as no amount of brutal punishment might have done. All day she lay suffering and hating T'ur. All day she planned new and diabolical schemes for revenge. Close to her breast she hugged her stone knife.

Starting point is 05:20:06 It was well for T'er that he did not chance to viz. venture near her then. While he had beaten her, the knife had remained in her loincloth, nor had the thought to use it against her mate entered the head of Gron. But now, now that he had deserted her, now that he was doubtless thinking upon a new mate, her thoughts constantly reverted to the weapon. It was not until after nightfall that Gron crawled from beneath the hides and thatch of her shelter.

Starting point is 05:20:35 She had not eaten for twenty-four hours, yet she felt no hunger. hunger. Every other sense and emotion was paralyzed by the poison of jealousy and hate. Gron slunk about the outskirts of the crowd that pressed around the figure at the stake. Ah, they were about to torture the prisoner. What pleasure they would derive from that. Gron raised herself on tiptoe to look over the shoulder of a woman. The latter turned, and recognizing her, grinned. "'Tur will enjoy the death-aghanes of the mate of the woman he is going to take in your stead, Gron,' taunted her friend. "'Gron made no reply. It was not the way of her period to betray the emotions of the heart.

Starting point is 05:21:20 She would rather have died than let this woman know that she suffered.' "'That is why he was so angry,' continued the tormentor, "'when you try to rob him of this pleasure.' With the woman's words, a sudden inspiration flashed into the mind of Gron. Yes, T'ur would be made mad if the prisoner escaped. So would Scarp, the chief who had commanded T'ur to beat her and to take another mate. Gron raised herself again upon her toes and looked long and earnestly at the face of the man bound to the stake.

Starting point is 05:21:56 Already, the flames of the encircling fires illuminated his figure and his ever. every feature. They stood out as distinctly as by sunlight. The man was very handsome. There was no man among the tribe of Scarb who could compare with the stranger in physical perfection and beauty. A gleam of pleasure shot Gron's dark eyes. If she could only find such another man and run off with him, then, indeed, would she be revenged upon Tur? If it could be this very man! Ah, then indeed would Scarb and Turb both be punished. But that, of course, was impossible. The man would be dead in a few hours.

Starting point is 05:22:41 Gron wandered about the village, too filled with her hate to remain long in one place. Like an angry Tigris she paced to and fro. Now and again some other woman of the tribe hurled a taunt or a reproach at her. It would be ever thus. How she hated them. Every one of them! As she passed her shelter in her restless rounds, she heard the plaintive wailing of her child. She had almost forgotten him. She hurried within, snatching up the infant from where it lay upon a pile of otter and fox skins.

Starting point is 05:23:17 This was T'er's child, his man-child. Already it commends to resemble the father. How proud T'er was of it. Gron grasped but the hideous thought that followed remorselessly upon the heels of this recollection. She held the child at arm's length and tried to scrutinize its features in the dim interior of the hut. How Tur would suffer if harm befell his first man-child, his only offspring? Grasn almost threw the wee bundle of humanity back upon its pile of skins, and leaping to her feet, ran from the shelter. For half an hour, she roamed. restlessly among the camp. Her brain was a whirling chaos of conflicting emotions. A dozen times

Starting point is 05:24:03 she approached the death-fires that were slowly roasting alive the man bound to the stake they encircled. As yet, they had not injured him, but given him a taste of the suffering to come. That was all. Suddenly she came face to face with terror. Involuntarily, her hands went out in a gesture of appeal and supplication. She was directly to face with terror. She was directly to face with terror. She was directly inters path. The man stopped and looked at her for an instant. Then, with a sneer that was half snarl, he raised his hand and struck her in the face. Get out of my way, woman, he growled and passed on. A group of women, standing near had seen. They laughed boisterously at the discomforter of their sister. But let us not judge them too harshly. It was to require countless ages of humanizing culture,

Starting point is 05:24:56 before their sisters yet unborn were to be able to hide the same emotions. Gron went cold and hot and cold again. She burned with rage and humiliation. She froze with resolve, a horrid resolve. And suddenly she went mad. Wheeling from where she stood, she ran to the shelter that housed her babe. In the darkness she found the wee thing. It was Turs. T'er loved it. For a moment she pressed the soft cheek to her own. She strained the warm body close to her breasts. Then, may God forgive her, for she was only a wild thing goaded to desperation. Dropping the pitiful bundle to the floor of the shelter, Gron ran back into the open.

Starting point is 05:25:44 She was wild-eyed and disheveled. Her long black hair streamed about her face and across her shoulders. She ran to the outskirts of the crowd that was watching the victim, who obstinately refused to gratify their appetite for human suffering. New would not wince. Already the heat of the flames must have caused him excruciating agony, yet not by the movement of a muscle did he admit knowledge of either the surrounding fires or the savage, eager spectators. Grand watched him for a moment. His fate was to be hers when Tur and Scarb discovered the deed she had committed, for a man-child was a sacred thing. And now, there sprang to Gras' mind a recurrence of the thought that the taunting female's words had implanted

Starting point is 05:26:30 there earlier in the evening. How could she compass this last stroke of revenge? It seemed practically impossible. The stake was hemmed in upon all sides by the clustering horde of eager tribesmen. Gron turned and ran to the opposite side of the village, beyond the shelters. There was no one there. Even the girls tending the fires had deserted their post to witness the last agonies of the prisoner. Gron seized a leafy branch that lay among the firewood that was to replenish the blaze. With it, she beat out two of the fires,

Starting point is 05:27:05 leaving an open avenue into the enclosure through which savage beasts might reasonably be expected to venture. Then she ran back to the crowding ring of watchers. As she approached them, she cried out an apparently incoherent terror. Those nearest her turned, startled by her shrieks. "'Zorrs!' she cried. "'The fires have died, and four of them have entered the shelters where they are devouring the babes.

Starting point is 05:27:30 "'On that side!' And she pointed to the opposite side of the enclosure. Instantly the whole tribe rushed toward the ring of huts. First the warriors, then the women and children. The victim at the stake was deserted. Scarce was every back turned toward the prisoner that Gron leapt through the fiery girdle to his side. New saw the woman and recognized her. He saw the knife in her hand. She had tried to kill him

Starting point is 05:27:58 the previous night, and now she was going to have her way. Well, it was better than the slow death by fire. But Gron's knife did not touch New. Instead, it cut quickly through the bullock sinews that bound him to the stake. As the last strand parted, the woman seized him by the hand. "'Come!' she cried. "'Quick!' "'Before they return! There are no Zores in the village!' Noo did not pause to question her, or her motives. For a few steps he staggered drunkenly, for the bonds had stopped the circulation in his arms and legs. But Gron, half-supporting, half-dragging him, pulled him across the fires about the stake, on past the outer circle

Starting point is 05:28:42 of the beast-fires toward the stidgy in blackness that enveloped the beach toward the sea. As new advanced, the blood commenced to circulate once more through the veins from which it had been choked, so that by the time they came to the water he was almost in perfect command of his muscles. Here Gron led them to a dugout. Quick, she urged, as the two seized it to run it through the surf. They will soon be upon us, and then we shall both die. Already angry shouts were plainly distinguishable from the village,

Starting point is 05:29:15 and the firelight disclosed the tribe running hither and thither about the fires that encircled the stake to which New had been secured. The boat was through the surf and riding the waves beyond. Gron had clambered in and New was taking his place in the opposite end of the craft, when a noon note arose from the village. The savage shouting carried a different tone. Now there were battle cries, where before there had been but howls of rage. Even at the distance at which they were, Gron and New could see that a battle was raging among the shelters of the boat-builders. What could it mean? They have fallen upon one another, said Gron.

Starting point is 05:29:56 And while they fight, let us hasten to put as great a distance between them and ourselves as we can before day returns. But New was not so anxious to leave. He wanted to know more of the cause of the battle. It was not within the bounds of reason that the villagers could have set upon one another with such apparent unanimity, and without any seeming provocation. And, too, it appeared to know that there were more people in the village now than there had been before he left it.

Starting point is 05:30:28 What did all this mean? Why, it meant to the troglodyte that the village had been attacked by enemies, and he wished to wait until he might discover the identity of the invaders. But Gron did not wish to wait. She seized her paddle and commenced to ply it. "'Wait,' urged New, "'but the woman insisted that they must hasten or be lost. "'Even as they argued, Grasn suddenly leaned forward pointing toward the beach.

Starting point is 05:30:56 "'See?' she whispered. "'They have discovered us. "'We are being pursued.' "'New looked in the direction that she pointed, "'and sure enough, dimly through the night, "'he described two forms racing toward the beach. "'As he looked, he saw them seize upon a boat "'and start launching it,

Starting point is 05:31:13 And then he knew that only in immediate flight lay safety. He seized his paddle, and in concert with Grand, struck out for the open sea. "'We can turn to one side presently and elude them,' whispered the woman. "'Noo nodded. "'We will turn north toward my country,' he said. "'Gron did not demur. "'She might as well go north as south. "'Her life was spent.

Starting point is 05:31:40 "'There was to be no more happiness for her. Her thoughts haunted the dim interior of a hide shelter where lay a pathetic bundle upon a pile of fox and otter skins. For a while both were silent, paddling out away from shore. Behind them they now and then discerned the darker blotch of the pursuing canoe upon the dark waters of the sea. Why did you save me? asked New at length. Because I hated Turr, replied the woman.

Starting point is 05:32:10 New fell silent thinking. But he was not thinking of Gron. His mind was filled with speculations as to the fate of Nauduil. Whither had she fled when she had escaped from the clutches of the boat-builders? Could she have reached the tribe in safety? Had she known that it was New who had entered the shelter where she lay and rescued her from Tur? He thought not, for had she known it, he was sure that she would have remained and fought with him. Presently, Gron interrupted his reveries.

Starting point is 05:32:44 She was pointing over the stern of the boat. There, not fifty yards away, New saw the outlines of another craft with two paddlers within. "'Hasin,' whispered Gron, "'they are overtaking us, and but for my knife we are unarmed.' New bent to his paddle. On the boat wallowed toward the open sea. There was no chance to elude the pursuers and turn north. First, they must put sufficient distance between them that the others might not see which way

Starting point is 05:33:13 they turned. But there seemed little likelihood of their being able to accomplish this, for strive as they would they could not shake off the silent twain. The darkest hours of the night were upon them, those that precede dawn. They struggled to outdistance their pursuers. That they were lengthening the distance between the two boats seemed certain. In another few minutes they might risk. the stratagem.

Starting point is 05:33:40 But they had scarcely more than turned when the surge of surf upon a beach rose directly before them. Both were nonplussed. What had happened? Where were they? They had been moving straight out to sea for some time, and yet there could be no mistaking that familiar sound. Land was directly ahead of them.

Starting point is 05:34:01 To turn back now would mean to run straight into the arms of their pursuers, which neither had the slightest desire to do. Had new been armed, he would not have hesitated to grapple with the two occupants of the boat that had clung so tenaciously to their wake, but with only the woman's knife and a couple of wooden paddles, it would have been a fruitless thing to do. Exerting all their strength, the two drove the dugout through the surf until its nose ran upon the sand. Then they leapt out and dragged the boat still further up beyond the reach of the mightiest ruler. Where were they? New guessed a part of the truth.

Starting point is 05:34:38 He reasoned that they had fallen upon the same island from which he had seen Nadu snatched by the boat-builder, and from which he himself had escaped so recently. But he was not quite right. Their strenuous paddling during the hours of darkness had carried them to the north of the nearer island and beyond it. As a matter of fact, they had been deposited upon the southern coast of the largest island of the group which lay several miles northeast of the one with which New had had acquaintance. But what mattered it? One was as bad as another. Both belonged to the mysterious country.

Starting point is 05:35:16 They were inhabited by hideous flying reptiles, and legend held that frightful men dwelt upon them, and knew was without weapons of defense. Who of us has not dreamed of going abroad upon the public streets in scant attire, or in no attire whatever? What painful emotions we have suffered! Yet how insignificant our plight by comparison with that of the primeval troglodyte thrown into a strange country without his weapons, without even a knife. New was lost, but far from hopeless. He did not turn to the woman with the question, what shall we do now? If primeval man was anything, he was self-reliant. Heredity, environment, and all of nature's mightiest laws combined to make him so. Otherwise,

Starting point is 05:36:06 he would have perished off the face of the face of his own. of the earth, long before he had had an opportunity to transmit his image to posterity. There would have been no posterity for him. Some other form than ours would have exhumed his bones from the drift of the ages, and wondered upon the structure and habits of the extinct monstrosity, whose hinder limbs were so much longer than his forelims that locomotion must have been a tiresome and painful process, interrupted by many disastrous tumbles upon the prehistoric countenance. But New the Son of New was not of a race doomed to extinction. He knew when to fight and when to flee.

Starting point is 05:36:46 At present there was nothing to flee from, but a place of safe hiding must be their first concern. He grasped, groaned by the wrist. "'Come,' he said, "'we must find a cave or tree to preserve us "'until the day comes again.' The woman cast a backward glance over her shoulder, away with women.

Starting point is 05:37:06 "'Look,' she whispered and pointed toward the surf. New looked, and there, upon the crest of a great wave, outlined against the dark horizon, loomed a boat in which sat two figures plying paddles. One glance was enough. The pursuers were close upon them. New, still holding Grand's wrist, started toward the black shadows above the beach. The woman ran swiftly by his side. New wondered not a little that the woman should thus flee her own people to save him, a stranger, and an enemy. Again he raised the question that Gron had so illy answered. "'Why do you seek to save me?' he asked, from your own people.

Starting point is 05:37:50 "'I do not seek to save you,' replied the woman. "'I wish to make T'ur mad, that is all. He will think I have run off to mate with you.' When he thinks that, you may die. for all that I care. I hate you, but not quite so much as I hate ter. End of Section 23. Section 24 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libravox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 05:38:31 Chapter 11. The Oryx As New led Gron through the dark night amidst the blackness of the tropical forest, the clothed a gentle ascent leading inland from the beach. He grinned at the thought of TUR's discomfiture, as well as the candor of his rescuer. But now, New was the protector. He might have left the woman to shift for herself.

Starting point is 05:38:54 She had made it quite plain that she had no love for him, as plain as words could convey the idea, I hate you, but not quite so much as I hate T'er. But the idea of deserting Gron never occurred to him. She was a woman. She had saved New's life. Her motive was of negligible import. In the darkness, New found a large tree. He entered the lower branches to reconnoiter. There were no dangerous foes lurking there, so he reached down and assisted Gron to his side. There they must make the best of it until daylight returned. It would never do to roam

Starting point is 05:39:32 through the woods unarmed at night longer than was absolutely necessary. New was accustomed to sleeping in trees. His people often did so when on the march, or when the quarry of the chase led them over far from their caves by day, necessitating the spending of the night abroad. But Gron was not so familiar with life arboreal. She clung fearful to the bowl of the tree in a position that precluded sleep. New showed her how to compose herself upon a limb with her back to the tree-stem,

Starting point is 05:40:05 But even then, she was afraid of falling should she chance to doze. At last, New placed an arm about her to support her, and thus she slept. Her head pillowed upon the shoulder of her enemy. The sun was high when the sleepers awoke. Gron was the first to open her eyes. For a moment she was bewildered by the strangeness of her surroundings. Where was she? Upon what was her head pillowed?

Starting point is 05:40:33 She raised her eyes. They fell up. upon the sun-tanned regular features of the godlike new. Slowly, recollection forced its way through the misty pall of somnolence. She felt the arm of the man about her, still firmly flexed in protective support. This was her enemy, the enemy of her people. She looked at New through new eyes. It was as though the awakening day had brought an awakening of her soul. The man was undeniably beautiful, of a masculine beauty that was all strength. Gron closed her eyes again dreamily

Starting point is 05:41:10 and let her head sink closer to the strong, brown shoulder. But presently came entire wakefulness, and with it a full return of actively functioning recollection. She saw the pitiful bundle lying among the fox and otterskins upon the floor of the distant shelter. With a sudden intaking of her breath that was almost a scream,

Starting point is 05:41:32 Gron sat erect. The movement of her. awakened New. He opened his eyes, looked at the woman, and removing his arm from about her, stood upright upon the tree branch. "'First, we must seek food and weapons,' he said, and then return to the land that holds my country. Come.' His quick eyes had scanned the ground below. There were no beasts of prey in sight. New lowered the woman to the base of the tree, leaping lightly to her side. Fruits, growing in plenitude, assuaged the keenest pangs of hunger. This accomplished, New led the way inland toward higher ground, where he might find growing the harder wood necessary

Starting point is 05:42:14 for a spear-shaft. A fire-hardened point was the best that he might hope for temporarily, unless chance should direct him upon a fragment of leek-green nephrite or a piece of flint. Onward and upward toiled the searchers, but though they scaled the low and rugged mountains that paralleled the coast, they came upon neither the straight hardwood that knew sought, nor any sign of the prized minerals from which he might fashion a spearhead, an axe, or a knife. Down the further slopes of the mountain they made their way, glimpsing at times through the break of a gorge, a forest in a valley far below. Toward this new bent his steps. There, might grow the wood he sought. At last they reached the last steep declivity. A sheer drop of

Starting point is 05:43:01 two hundred feet to the leveller slopes, whereon the forest grew almost to the base of the cliff. For a moment the two stood gazing out over the unfamiliar scene, a rather open woodland that seemed to fringe the shoulder of a plateau, dropping from sight a mile or so beyond them into an invisible valley, above which hung a soft, warm haze. Far beyond all this dimly rose the outlines of far-off mountains, their serrated crests seemingly floating above the haze that obscured their bases. "'Let us descend,' said New, and started to lower his legs over the edge of the precipice.

Starting point is 05:43:41 Grand drew back with a little exclamation of terror. "'You will fall,' she cried. "'Let us search out an easier way.' New looked up and laughed. "'What could be easier than this?' He asked. Gron peered over the edge. She saw the face of a rocky wall,

Starting point is 05:44:00 broken here and there by protruding boulders, and again by narrow ledges where a harder stratum had better withstood the ravages of the elements. In occasional spots where lodgment had been afforded lay accumulations of loose rock, ready to trip the unwary foot, and below all a tumbled mass of jagged pieces,

Starting point is 05:44:21 waiting to receive the bruised and mangled body of whomever might be so foolhardy as to choose this way to the forest. New saw that Gron was but little reassured by her inspection. "'Come,' he said, "'there is no danger, with me.' Gron looked at him, conscious of an admiration for his courage and prowess, an admiration for an enemy that she would rather not have felt. Yet she did feel the truth of his words, there is no danger with me.

Starting point is 05:44:52 She sat down upon the edge of the cliff, letting her legs dangle over the abyss. New reached up and grasped her arm, drawing her down to his side. How he clung there she could not guess, but somehow, as he supported her in the descent, he found handholds and stepping-stones that made the path seem a miracle of ease.

Starting point is 05:45:13 Long before they reached the bottom, Grant ceased to be afraid, and even found herself, discovering ledges and outcroppings that made the journey easier for them both. And when they stood safely amid the clutter of debris at the base, she threw a glance of ill-concealed admiration upon her enemy. Mentally, she compared him with Tur and Scarb and the other males of the boat-builders. Nor would the comparison have swelled the manly chests of the latter,

Starting point is 05:45:41 could they have had knowledge of it. "'Those who follow us will stop here,' she said. "'Nor do I see any break in the clemen. as far as my eye can travel. And she looked to the right and left along the rocky escarpment. I had forgotten that we might be followed, said New, but when we have found wherewith to fashion a spear and an axe, let them come. New the son of New will welcome them. From the base of the cliff they crossed the rubble and stepped out into the grassy clearing

Starting point is 05:46:12 that reached to the forest's edge. They had crossed but halfway to the wood when they heard the crashing of great bodies ahead of them. And as they paused, the head of a bull-orix appeared among the trees before them. Another and another came into sight, and as the animals saw the couple, they halted, the bulls bellowing, the cows peering wide-eyed across the shaggy backs of their lords. Here was meat, and only the knife of the woman to bring it down. New reach for Gron's weapon. "'Go back to the cliff,' he said, lest they charge. I will bring down a young she." Grasn was about to turn back as New had bitter, and the man was on the point of circling

Starting point is 05:46:56 toward the right when there appeared on either side of the aurochs several men. They were clothed in the skins of the species they accompanied, and were armed with spears and axes. At sight of New and Grom, they raised a great shout and dashed forward toward the two. New, unarmed, perceived the futility of accepting battle. Instead, he grasped Gron's hand and with her fled back toward the cliffs. Close upon their heels came the herders, shouting savage cries of carnage and victory. They had their quarry cornered.

Starting point is 05:47:31 The cliff would stop them, and then, with their backs against the wall, the man would be quickly killed and the woman captured. But these were not cliff-dwellers. They knew nothing of the agility of new. Otherwise, they would not have slowed up as they did, nor spread out to right and left for the purpose of preventing a flank escape by the fugitives. Across the rubble ran new and groan, and at the foot of the cliff where they should have stopped, according to the reasoning of the herders, they did not even hesitate.

Starting point is 05:48:04 Straight up the sheer wall sprang new, dragging the woman after him. Now the oryx herders raised a mighty shout of anger and dismay. Who had ever seen such a thing? It was impossible, and yet, There before their very eyes they beheld a man, encumbered by a woman scaling the unscalable heights. With renewed speed, the herders dashed straight toward the foot of the cliff, but Neue and Gras were beyond the reach of their hands before ever they arrived. Turning for an instant, New saw that they were not yet out of the reach of the weapons.

Starting point is 05:48:40 He reached down with his right hand and picked up a loose bit of rock, hurling it toward the nearest spearmen. The missile struck its target full upon the forehead, crumpling him to an inert mass. Then New scrambled upward again, and before the herders could recover from their surprise, he had dragged Gron out of range of the spears. Squatting upon a narrow ledge, the woman at his side knew hurled insulting epithets at their pursuers. These he punctuated with well-timed and equally well-aimed rocks, until the yelling herders were glad to retreat. to a safer distance. The enemy did not even venture the attempt to follow the fugitives.

Starting point is 05:49:22 It was evident that they were no better climbers than Gron. New held them in supreme contempt. Had he but a good axe, he would descend and annihilate the whole crew. Gron, sitting close beside New, was filled with wonder and something more than wonder, that this enemy should have risked so much to save her, for at the bottom of the cliff, cliff, New had evidently forgotten for the instant that the woman was not of his own breed, able to climb equally as well as he, and had ascended a short distance before he had discovered that Gron was scrambling futilely for a foothold at the bottom. Then, in the face of the advancing

Starting point is 05:50:02 foeman, he had descended to her side, risking capture and death in the act, and had hoisted her to a point of safety far up the cliff face. Turr would never have done so much. The woman, stealing stealthy glances at the profile of the young giant beside her, felt her sentiments undergoing a strange metamorphosis. New was no longer her enemy. He protected her, and now she looked to him for protection with greater assurance of receiving it than ever she had looked to turf or the same thing. She knew that New would forage for her.

Starting point is 05:50:39 Upon him she depended for food as well as protection. She had never looked for more from her mate. Her mate. She stole another half-shy glance at New. Ah, what a mate he would have been. And why not? They were alone in the world, separated from their people, doubtless forever. Grand suddenly realized that she hoped that it was forever.

Starting point is 05:51:05 She wondered what was passing in New's mind. Apparently, the man was wholly occupied with the joys of insulting the threatening savages beneath him, but yet his thoughts were busy with plans for escape. And why? Solely because he yearned for his own land and his father's people? Far from it. Noom might have been happy upon this island forever, had there been another there in the place of Gron.

Starting point is 05:51:31 He thought of Nadu. No other woman occupied his mind, and his plans for escape were solely a means for returning to the mainland and again taking up his search for the daughter of Tha. For an hour the herders remained in the clearing near the foot of the cliff. Then, evidently tiring of the fruitless sport, they collected their scattered herd and disappeared in the wood toward the direction from which they had come. A half hour later, New ventured down.

Starting point is 05:52:01 He had discovered a cave in the face of the cliff, and there he left Gron, telling her that he would fetch food to her, since in case of pursuit he could escape more easily alone than when burdened with her. After short absence he returned with both food and drink, the latter carried in the bladder that always hung from his g-string. He had seen nothing of the herders, and not of the hardwood or the materials for spear and axe-heads that he had desired. There is an easier way, however, he confided to the woman as they squatted at the mouth of

Starting point is 05:52:38 the cave and ate. The drivers of oryx bore spears and axes and knives. It will be easier to follow them and take them. theirs than to make weapons of my own. Stay here, Gron, in safety, and New will follow the strangers, returning shortly with weapons and the flesh of the fattest of the she-orix. Then we will return to the coast, fearless of enemies, find the boat, and go back to New's country.

Starting point is 05:53:06 There, you will be well received, for New my father is chief, and when he learns that you have saved my life, he will treat you well." So New dropped quickly down to the foot of the cliff, crossed the clearing, and a moment later disappeared from the eyes of Gron into the shadows of the wood. For a while he could make neither head nor tail to the tangled spore of the herd, but at last he found the point where the herders evidently had collected their charges and driven them in a more or less compact formation toward the opposite side of the forest. New went warily, keeping every sense alert against surprise by savage beast or man.

Starting point is 05:53:49 Every living thing that he might encounter could be nothing other than an enemy. He stopped often, listening, and sniffing the air. Twice he was compelled to take to the trees upon the approach of wandering beasts of prey. But when they had passed on, New descended and resumed his trailing. The trampled path of the herd led to the further edge of the forest, and there Newsaw unfolded below him as beautiful as seen as had ever broken upon his vision. The western sun hung low over a broad valley that stretched below him, for the wood ended upon the brow of a gentle slope that dropped downward to a blue lake,

Starting point is 05:54:28 sparkling in the midst of green meadows a couple of miles away. Upon the surface of the lake, apparently floating, were a score or more of strange structures. That they were man-built, knew a certain structure. certain, though he never had seen or dreamed of their like. To himself he thought of them as caves, just as he had mentally described the shelters of the boat-builders, for to knew any human habitation was a cave, and that they were the dwellings of men he had no doubt, since he could see human figures passing back and forth along the narrow causeways that connected the thatched structures with the shore of the lake. Across these long bridges they were

Starting point is 05:55:10 driving oryx too, evidently to pen them safely for the night against the night-proulers of the forest and the plain. Until darkness settled, New watched with unflagging interest the activities of the floating village. Then, in the comparative safety of the darkness, he crept down close to the water's edge. He took advantage of every tree and bush, of every rock and hollow that intervened between himself and the enemy to shelter and height his advance. At last he lay concealed in a heavy growth of reeds upon the bank of the lake. By separating them before his eyes, he could obtain an excellent view of the village without himself being discovered.

Starting point is 05:55:53 The moon had risen, brilliantly flooding the unusual scene. Now, New saw that the dwellings did not really float upon the surface. He discovered the ends of piles that disappeared beneath the surface of the water. The habitation stood upon these. He saw men and women and little children gathered upon the open platforms that encircled many of the structures, and upon the narrow bridges that span the water between the dwellings and the shore. Fires burned before many of the huts, blazing upon little hearths of clay that protected the planking beneath them from combustion.

Starting point is 05:56:31 Nook could smell the savory aroma of cooking fish, and his mouth watered as he saw the teeth of the lake-dwellers close upon juicy oric steaks, while others could smell the same, open shellfish and devoured their contents raw, throwing the shells into the water below them. But hungry though he was for meat, the objects of his particular desire were the long spear, the heavy axe, and the sharp knife of the hairy giant standing guard upon the nearest causeway.

Starting point is 05:56:59 Upon him, Noose eyes rested the oftenest. He saw the villagers, the evening meal consumed and the scraps tossed into the water beneath their dwellings, engaged in noisy gossip about, their fires. Children romped and tumbled perilously close to the edges of the platforms. Youths and maidens strolled to the darker corners of the village, and leaning over the low rails above the water conversed in whispers. Loud-voiced warriors recounted for the thousandth time the details of past valorous deeds. The younger mothers in little circles

Starting point is 05:57:33 gossiped with much nodding of heads the while they suckled their babes. The old women, toothless and white-haired, but still erect and agile in token of the rigid primitive laws which govern the survival of the fit alone, busy themselves with the care of the older children, and various phases of the simple household economy which devolved upon them. The evening drew on into darkness. The children have been posted off to their skin-covered grass pallets. For another half-hour the elders remained about the fires. Then, by twos and threes, they also sought the interiors of the huts and sleep. Quiet settled upon the village,

Starting point is 05:58:15 and still knew, hidden in the reeds beside the lake, watched the nearest guardsman. Now and then, the fellow would leave his post to replenish a watch-fire that blazed close to the shore end of the causeway. Past this, no ordinary beast of prey would dare venture, nor could any do so without detection, for its light illumined brightly the end of the narrow bridge. New found himself wondering how he was to reach the sentry unseen.

Starting point is 05:58:46 To rush past the watch-fire would have been madness, for the guard then would have ample time to raise an alarm that would call forth the entire population of the village before ever knew could reach the fellow's side. There was the water, of course, but even there there was an excellent chance of detection, since upon the mirror-like surface of the moonlit lake the swimmer would be all too apparent from the village. A shadow fell directly along the side of the causeway.

Starting point is 05:59:15 Could he reach that, he might make his way to a point near the sentry, and then clambered to close quarters before the man realized that a foe was upon him? However, the chance was slight at best, and so New waited hoping for some fortuitous circumstance to offer him a happier solution of his problem. As a matter of fact, he rather shrank from the unknown dangers of the strange waters in which might lurk countless creatures of destruction. But there was that brewing close at hand

Starting point is 05:59:45 that was to force a decision quickly upon the troglodyte, leaving but an immediate choice between two horns of a dilemma, one carrying a known death, and the other a precarious, problematical fate. It was news quick ears that first detected the stealthy movement in the reeds behind him, downwind, where his scent must have been carrying tidings of his presence to whatever roamed abroad in that locality.

Starting point is 06:00:12 Now the passing of a great beast of prey upon its way through the grasses or the jungle is almost noiseless, and more so are his stealthy footfalls when he stalks his quarry. You or I could not detect them with our dull ears amid the myriad sounds of a primeval night, the coughing and the moaning of the great cats punctuated by deafening roars, the lowing and bellowing and grunting of the herds, the shrill scream of people, pain and terror as a hunter lands upon the neck or rump of his prey, the hum of insects, the hissing of reptiles, the rustling and sowing of the night wind among the grasses and the trees. But news-ears were not as ours. Not only had he been aware of the passing and repassing

Starting point is 06:00:57 of great beasts through the reeds behind him, but so quick his perceptive faculties, he immediately caught the change from mere careless passage to that of stealthy stalking on the part of his creature in his rear. The beast had caught his scent, and now, cautiously, he was moving straight toward the watcher upon the shore. New did not need the evidence of his eyes to picture the great pads carefully raised and cautiously placed so that not a bent grass might give out its faint alarm, the lowered and flattened head, the forward-tilted ears, the gentle undulations of the swaying tail, lashing a little at the tufted tip. He saw it all, realizing, too, all that it meant to him.

Starting point is 06:01:42 There was no escape to right or left, and before him lay the waters of the unknown lake. He was all unarmed, and the mighty cat was now almost within its leap. New looked toward the sentry. The fellow had just returned from replenishing his watchfire. He stood leaning over the railing, gazing into the water. What was that? New's eyes strained through the darkness toward the platform where the warrior stood. Just behind him was another figure. Ah, the figure of a woman. Stealthily,

Starting point is 06:02:16 with many a backward glance, she approached the sentinel. There was a low word. The man turned, and at sight of the figure so close beside him now he opened his arms and crushed the woman to him. Her face was buried on his shoulder, his head turned from new and doubtless, his eyes hidden in the red-brown hair that fell unconfined almost to the woman's waist. And then, the great carnivore at Newsback sprang. End of Section 24. Section 25 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 06:03:07 Chapter 12. TUR's Deception At the instant that the beast left for him, knew dove forward into the lake. The water was shallow, not over two or three feet deep, but the caveman hugged the bottom, worming his way to the left toward the shadows of the causeway. He knew that the cat would not follow him into the lake. His greatest danger now lay in the unknown denizens of the water. But though every instant he expected to feel a slimy body or sharp teeth, he met with no attack. At last his breath spent, he turned upon his back, floating until his nose and mouth rose above the surface.

Starting point is 06:03:47 Filling his lungs with air, he sank again and continued his way in the direction of the piling. After what seemed an eternity to him, his hand came at last in contact with the rough surface of a pile. Immediately he rose to the surface, and to his delight found that he was beneath the causeway, safe from the eyes of the guardsman and his companion. Upon the bank behind him, he could hear the anxious, complaining of the baffled cat. He wondered if the noise of his escape had alarmed the sentry to greater watchfulness. For long he listened for some sign from above, and at last he caught the low tones of whispered conversation. Good. They were still at their love-making,

Starting point is 06:04:32 with never a thought for the dangers lying close at hand. New wished that they would be done. He dared not venture aloft while the woman was there. For an hour, he waited way steep in water, until finally he heard her retreating footsteps above him. He gave her time to regain her dwelling, and then, with the agility of a cat, he clambered up the slippery pile until his fingers closed upon the edge of the flooring of the causeway. Cautiously, he drew himself up so that his eyes topped the upper surface of the platform. A dozen paces from him was the sentry moving slowly shoreward toward the watchfire. The man's back was toward New, and he was already between New and the shore.

Starting point is 06:05:17 Nothing could have been better. The caveman crawled quickly to the platform, and with silent feet ran lightly in the wake of the guard. The man was beside the pile of wood with which he kept up the fire, and was bending over to gather up an armful, when New overtook him. With the speed and directness of a killing lion, New leapt full upon his quarry's back. Both hands sought the man's throat to shut off his cries for help, and the teeth of the attacker buried themselves in the muscles behind the collarbone that he might not easily be shaken from his advantageous hold. The sentry, taken entirely by surprise by this attack from

Starting point is 06:05:54 the rear, struggled to turn upon his foe. He tore at the fingers at his throat that he might release them for a little instant that would be sufficient for him to call for help, but the vice-like grip would not loosen. Then the victim would the victim would be. him groped with his right hand for his knife. New had been expecting this and waiting for it. Instantly, his own right hand released its grip upon the other's throat, and lightning-like followed the dagger-hand in quest of the coveted blade, so that New's fingers closed about those of the sentry

Starting point is 06:06:25 the instant that the latter gripped the handle of the knife. Now the blade flew from its sheath drawn by the power of two hands, and then commenced a test of strength that was to decide the outcome of the battle. The lake dweller sought to drive the knife backward into the body of the man upon his back. New sought to force the knife hand upward and outward. The blade was turned backward. New did not attempt to alter this. It was as he would have it. Slowly his mighty muscles prevailed over those of his antagonist,

Starting point is 06:06:57 and still his left hand choked off the other's voice. Upward, slowly but surely, New carried the knife hand of his foe. Now it was breast-high, now. It was breast-high. to the other shoulder, and all the time the hairy giant is attempting to drive it back to the body of the caveman. At the instant that it rose level with the sentry's shoulder, New pushed the hand gradually toward the left until the blade hovered directly over the heart of its owner. And then, quite suddenly, New reversed the direction of his exertions, and, like lightning,

Starting point is 06:07:31 the blade, driven by the combined strength of both men and guided by New, plunged into the heart of the lake dweller. Silently the man crumpled beneath the weight upon him. There was a final struggle, and then he lay still. Nood did not wait longer than to transfer all the coveted weapons from the corpse of his antagonist to his own body, and then, silent and swift as a wraith, he vanished into the darkness toward the forest and the heights above the lake.

Starting point is 06:08:00 Grasn, alone in the cave, sat buried in thought. Sometimes she was goaded to despair by recollection of her lost babe, and again she rose to heights of righteous anger at thoughts of the brutality and injustice of terror. Her fingers twitched to be at the brute's throat. She compared him time and time again with new, and at each comparison she realized more and more fully the intensity of her newfound passion for the stranger. She loved this alien warrior with a fierceness that almost hurt.

Starting point is 06:08:33 She relived again and again the countless little episodes in which he had. had shown her a kindness and consideration to which she was not accustomed. Among her own people, these things would have seemed a sign of weakness upon the part of a man, but Gron knew that no taint of weakness lay behind that noble exterior. For long into the night she sat straining her eyes and ears through the darkness for the first intimation of his return. At last, when he had not come, she commenced to feel apprehension. He had gone out unarmed through the savage land to rest weapons from the enemy. Already he might be dead, yet Gron could not believe that Aud could overcome that mighty

Starting point is 06:09:15 physique. Toward morning she became hopeless, and crawling within the cave, curled up upon the grasses that knew had gathered for her and slept. It was several hours after dawn when she was awakened by a sound from without. It was the scraping of a spear-butt against the rocky face of the cliff, as it trailed along in the wake of a climbing man. As Gras saw who it was that came, she gave a little cry of joy, braving the dangers of the perilous declivity to meet him.

Starting point is 06:09:45 New looked up with a smile, exhibiting his captured weapons as he came. He noted the changed expression upon the woman's face, a smile of welcome that rendered her countenance quite radiant. He had never before taken the time to appraise Gras Gron's personal appearance, and now it was with a sense of surprise that was almost a shock, that he realized that the woman was both young and good-looking. But this surprise was as nothing by comparison with that which followed, for no sooner had Gron reached him than she threw both arms about his neck, and before he realized her intent had dragged his lips to hers.

Starting point is 06:10:24 New disengaged himself with a laugh. He did not love, Gron. His heart was wholly Nautul's. and his whole mine now was occupied with plans for returning to his own country, where he might continue a search for her who was to have been his mate. Still laughing, and with an arm about Grand to support her up the steep cliff, he turned his steps toward the cave. "'I have brought a little food,' he said, and after I have slept we were returned to the sea. On the way I can hunt, for now I have weapons. But in the meantime I must sleep, for I am exhausted. While I sleep, you must watch. But once within the cave, Gron, carried away by her newfound love, renewed her protestations of affection.

Starting point is 06:11:12 But even with her arms about him, New saw only the lovely vision of another face, his Natul. Where was she? When Natul and New the chief, discovered that the son of New no longer was bound to the flame-girt stake in the village of the boat-builders, they turned toward one another in, questioning surprise. The man examined the stake more closely. "'It is not burned,' he said. So therefore, New could not have been burned. And here,' he pointed at the ground about the stake, "'Look, here are the cores that bound him.' He picked up one of them, examining it.

Starting point is 06:11:52 "'They have been cut. Someone came before us and liberated New the son of New. "'Who could it have been? And whither have they gone? Question Natul. Nguu shook his head. I do not know, and now I may not stop to learn, for my warriors are pursuing the strangers, and I must be with them. And Ngu, the chief, leapt across the dying fires after the yelling spearmen who chased the enemy toward the sea.

Starting point is 06:12:20 But Nathul was determined to let nothing stay her search for Ngu the son of Ngu. Scarcely had the young man's father left her, then she turned back toward the shelters. First, she would search the village, and if she did not find him there, she would go out into the jungle and along the beach. He could not be far. As Nadu searched the shelters of the boat-builders, a figure hid beneath a pile of aryx skins in one of them, stirred, uncovered an ear, and listened.

Starting point is 06:12:49 The sounds of conflict had retreated. The village seemed deserted. An arm threw aside the coverings, and a man sprang quickly to his feet. It was Tur. Hard pressed by the savage spearmen of the caves and surrounded, the man had crawled within a hut and hid himself beneath the skins. Now he thought he saw a chance to escape while the enemy were pursuing his people. He approached the entrance to the shelter and peered out.

Starting point is 06:13:16 Quickly he drew back. He had seen a figure emerging from the next hut. It was a woman, and she was coming toward the shelter in which he had concealed himself. The light of the beast fires played upon her. TUR drew in his breath in pleased surprise. It was the woman he had once captured and who had escaped him. Natul advanced rapidly to the shelter. She thought them all deserted. As she entered this one, she saw the figure of a man dimly visible in the darkness of the interior. She thought it one of the warriors of her own tribe looting. Oftentimes they could not wait the total

Starting point is 06:13:54 destruction of an enemy before searching greedily for booty. "'Who are you?' she asked, and then, not waiting for an answer. "'I am searching for New, the Son of New.' "'Tur saw his opportunity and was quick to grasp it. "'I know where he is,' he said. "'I am one of Scarbs' people, but I will lead you to New the Son of New, "'if you will promise that you will protect me from your warriors when we return. "'My people have fled, and I may never hope to reach them again

Starting point is 06:14:24 "'unless you promise to aid me.' Natul thought this unnatural and fair proposition, and was quick to accept it. "'Then come,' cried Tur, "'there is no time to be lost. The man is hidden in a cove south of here along the shore. He is fast bound, and so was left without a guard. If we hurry we may reach him before my people regain him. If we can elude your warriors and the delay that would follow their discovery of me, we may yet be in time.' Tur hurried from the shelter followed by Natul.

Starting point is 06:14:56 The man was careful to keep his face averted from the girl while they traversed the area lit by the camp and beastfires, so he forged ahead trusting to her desire to find her man to urge her after him. Nor did he overestimate the girl's anxiety to find New, the son of New. Natu followed swiftly upon TUR's heels through the deserted village and across the beach, from whence the sounds of conflict rose beside the sea. Turke kept to the north of the fighters, going to a spot upon the beach, where he had left his own boat. He found the craft without difficulty, pushed it into the water,

Starting point is 06:15:32 lifted Natuil into it, and shoved it through the surf. To Tur, the work required but a moment. He was as much at home in the boiling surf as upon dry land. Seated in the stern with Natul facing him in the bow, he forced the dugout beyond the grip of the rollers. Natul took up a second paddle that lay at her feet, plying it awkwardly perhaps, but not without good effect. She could scarce wait until the boat reached the cove, and every effort of her own added so much to the speed of the craft. Turk kept the boat's head toward the open sea. It was his purpose to turn toward the south after they were well out, and moving slowly during the night, await the breaking dawn to disclose the whereabouts of his fellows. That they too would

Starting point is 06:16:20 paddle slowly southward, he was sure. Presently he caught sight of the outline of a boat just ahead. Probably beyond that were others. He had been fortunate to stumble upon the last boatload of his fleeing tribe. He did not hail them for two reasons. One was that he did not wish the girl to know that he was not bearing herself toward the cove, the imaginary location of her man, and the other was due to the danger of attracting the attention of the boats and be carrying the pursuit out upon the sea. Presently a third possibility kept him quiet. The boat ahead might contain warriors of the enemy searching for fugitives. Tur did not know that the tribe of New was entirely unfamiliar with navigation,

Starting point is 06:17:06 that never before had they dreamed of such a thing as a boat. So Tur followed the boat ahead in silence straight out to sea. To Nadul it seemed that the cove must be a long distance away. In the darkness, she did not perceive that they were traveling directly away from shore. After a long time she heard the pounding of surf to the left of the boat. She was startled and confused. Traveling south, as she supposed they had been doing, the surf should have been off the right side of the boat. "'Where are we?' she asked.

Starting point is 06:17:42 "'There is land upon the left, whereas it should be upon the right.' Tur laughed. "'We must be lost,' he said. But Nadu knew now that she had been deceived. At the same instant there came over her a sudden sense of familiarity in the voice of her companion. Where had she heard it before? She strove to pierce the darkness that shrouded the features of the man at the opposite end of the boat. "'Who are you?' she asked.

Starting point is 06:18:11 "'Where are you taking me?' "'You will soon be with your man,' replied Tur, but there was an ill-concealed note of gloating that did not escape Nadu. The girl now remained silent. She no longer paddled, but sat listening to the booming of the surf which she realized that they were approaching. What shore was it? Her mind was working rapidly.

Starting point is 06:18:35 She was accustomed to depending largely on a well-developed instinct for locality and direction upon land, and while it did not aid her much upon water, it at least preserved her from the hopeless bewilderment that besets the average modern when once he loses his bearings, preventing any semblance of rational thought in the establishment of his whereabouts. Natul knew that they had not turned toward the north once after they had left the shore, and so she knew that the mainland could not be upon their left. Therefore, the surf upon that hand must be breaking upon the shore of one of the islands that she only too well knew lay off the mainland.

Starting point is 06:19:14 Which of the islands they were approaching she could not guess, but any one of them was sufficiently horrible in her estimation. Not to a plant quickly against the emergency which confronted her. She knew or thought that the man had brought her here where she would be utterly helpless in his power. Her people could not follow them. There would be none to succor or avenge. TUR was wielding his paddle rapidly and vigorously now.

Starting point is 06:19:43 He shot the boat just ahead of an enormous roller that presently caught and lifted it upon its crest, carrying it swiftly up the beach. As the keel touched the sand, TUR leapt out and dragged the craft as far up as he could while the wave receded to the ocean. Natuil stepped out upon the beach. In her hand she still held the paddle. Turr came toward her. He was quite close, so close that even in the darkness of the night she saw his features and recognized them. He reached toward her arm to Caesar. "'Come,' he said. "'Come to your mate.' Like a flash, the crude heavy paddle flew back over Natuel's shoulder, cleaving the air

Starting point is 06:20:26 downward toward the man's head. Tur, realizing his danger, leapt back, but the point of the blade struck his forehead a glancing blow. The man reeled drunkenly for a second, stumbled forward, and fell full upon his face on the wet sand. The instant that the blade touched her tormentor Natul dropped the paddle, dodged past the man, and scurried like a frightened deer toward the black shadows of the jungle above the beach. The next great roller washed in across the prostrate form of Turr. It rolled him over, and as it raced back toward the sea, it dragged him with it. But the water revived him, and he came coughing and struggling to his hands and knees, clinging desperately to life until the waters receded, leaving him in momentary safety.

Starting point is 06:21:13 Slowly he staggered to his feet and made his way up the beach beyond the reach of the greedy seas. His head hurt him terribly. Blood trickled down his cheek and clotted upon his hairy breast, and he was mad with rage and the lust for vengeance. Could he have laid his hands upon Natul then, she would have died beneath his choking fingers. But he did not lay hands upon her, for Natul was already safely ensconced in a tree just within the shadows of the jungle. Until daylight, she was as safe there from Turr as though a thousand miles separated them.

Starting point is 06:21:50 A half hour later, New and Gron, a mile further inland, were clambering into another tree. Ah, if Natul could but have known it, what doubt, despair, and suffering she might have been spared. Tur ran down the beach in the direction in which he thought that he heard the sound of the fleeing Natul. Yes, there she was. TUR redoubled his speed. His quarry was just beneath a tree at the edge of the jungle. The man leapt forward with an exclamation of savage satisfaction that died upon his lips, frozen by the horrid roar of a lion. Tur turned and fled. The thing he had thought was Nadul proved to be a huge cave lion standing over the corpse of its kill.

Starting point is 06:22:35 Fortunate for Tur was it that the beast already had its supper before it. It did not pursue the frightened man, and so Tur reached the safety of a nearby tree, where he crouched, shaking, and trembling throughout the balance of the night. TUR was a boat-builder and a fisherman. He was not of the stock of New and Natul, the hunters of savage beasts, the precursors of warrior nations, yet unborn. End of Section 25. Section 26 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libravox recording is in the public domain.

Starting point is 06:23:23 Chapter 13. Natul is heartbroken. It was late in the morning when Natul awoke. She peered through the foliage in every direction, but could see no sign of tur. Cautiously, she descended to the ground. Upon the beach, not far separated, she saw two boats. To whom could the other belong? naturally to some of the boat builders. Then there were other enemies upon the island beside Tur.

Starting point is 06:23:54 She looked up and down the beach. There was no sign of man or beast. If she could but reach the boat, she could push them both through the surf, and some way, dragging one, paddle the other away from the island. This would leave no means of pursuit to her enemies. That she could reach the mainland, she had not the slightest doubt, so self-reliant had her reddishly. and environment made her.

Starting point is 06:24:19 Again she glanced up and down the beach. Then she raced swiftly toward the nearest boat. She tugged and pushed upon the heavy thing until, at last, after what seemed to her anxious mind many minutes, she felt it slipping loose from its moorings of sand. Slowly, inch by inch, she was forcing it toward the point where the rollers would at last reach and float it. She had almost gained success with this first boat,

Starting point is 06:24:46 when something impelled her to glance up. Instantly, her dream of escape faded, for from up the beach she saw Tur running swiftly toward her. Even could she have managed to launch this one boat and enter it, T'er easily could overtake her in the other. The water was his element, hers was the land, the caves, and the jungles. Abandoning her efforts with the boat,

Starting point is 06:25:13 she turned and fled back toward the jungle. A couple of hundred yards behind her raced Turr, but the girl knew that once she reached the tangled vegetation of the forest it would take a better man than Turr to catch her. Straight into the maces of the wood she plunged, sometimes keeping to the ground and again running through the lower branches of the trees. All day she fled, scarce halting for food or drink, for several times from the elevation of the foothills and the mountains that she traversed after leaving the jungle. she saw the man sticking to her trail.

Starting point is 06:25:49 It was dark when she came at last to a precipitous gulf, dropping how far she could not guess. Below and as far as her eyes could reach, all was impenetrable darkness. About her, beasts wandered restlessly in search of prey. She caught their scent and heard their dismal moaning, or the thunder of their titanic roaring. That the cliff upon the verge of which she had halted,

Starting point is 06:26:16 just in time to avert a plunge into its unknown depths was a high one, she was sure from the volume of night noises that came up to her from below, mellowed by distance. What should she do? The summit of the escarpment was nude of trees insofar as she could judge in the darkness. At least she had not recently passed through any sort of forest. To sleep in the open would be dangerous in the extreme, probably fatal. To risk the descent of the descent of of an unknown precipice at night might prove equally as calamitous. Natu crouched upon the brink of the abyss at a loss as to her future steps. She was alone, a woman, practically unarmed, in a strange and savage land. Hope that she might ever return to her own people seemed futile.

Starting point is 06:27:06 How, indeed, could she accomplish it, followed by enemies and surrounded by unknown dangers? She was very hungry and thirsty and sleepy. She would have given almost her last chance for sucker to have lain down and slept. She would risk it. Drawing her shaggy robe about her, Natul stretched herself upon the hard earth at the top of the precipice. She closed her eyes, and sleep would have instantly claimed her, had not a stealthy noise not a dozen yards behind her caused her to come to startled wakefulness. Something was creeping upon her, In some form she was positive. Even now she heard the heavy breathing of a large animal,

Starting point is 06:27:49 and although the wind was blowing between them, she caught the pungent odor of a great cat. There was but a single alternative to remaining and surrendering herself to the claws and fangs of the carnivore, nor did not Ull hesitate in accepting it. With the speed of a swift, she lowered herself over the edge of the cliff, her feet dangling in space.

Starting point is 06:28:11 rapidly, and yet without panic, she groped with her feet for a hold upon the rocky surface below her. There seemed nothing, not the slightest protuberance, that would give her a chance to lower herself from the clutches of the beast that she knew must be sneaking cautiously toward her from above. A sudden chill of horror swept over her as she felt hot breath and the drip of saliva upon her hands where they clung to the edge of the cliff above. A low growl came from above. Evidently the beast was puzzled by the strange position of its quarry,

Starting point is 06:28:48 but in another moment it would seize her wrists, or reaching down, bury its talons in her head or back. And just then her fingers slipped from their hold, and Nadu dropped into darkness. That she fell but a couple of feet did not detract an iota from the fright she endured in the instant that her handhold gave way, But the relief of feeling a narrow ledge beneath her feet quickly overcame her terror. That the beast might follow her, she had little fear.

Starting point is 06:29:18 There might be a ledge running down to this point, and then again there might not. All she could do was to stay where she was, and hope for the best. And so she settled herself as securely as she might to await what the immediate future might hold for her. She heard the beast growling angrily as it paced along the brow of, of the cliff above her, now stopping occasionally to lower its nose over the edge and sniff at her, and again reaching down a mighty paw whose great talons clawed desperately to Caesar, sweeping but a few inches above her head. For an hour or more this lasted until the hungry cat, baffled and disgruntled, wandered away into the jungle in search of other prey, voicing his anger

Starting point is 06:30:04 as he went in deep-throated roars. Natul felt along the edge to the road, right and left with her fingers. The surface of the rock was weather-worn, but not polished, as would have been true were the ledge the accustomed pathway of padded feet. The girl felt a sense of relief in this discovery. At least she was not upon the well-beaten trail leading to the lair of some wild beast, or connecting the cliff-top with the valley below. Slowly and cautiously, she wormed her way along the ledge, searching for a wider and more comfortable projection, but the ledge only narrowed as she proceeded. Having ventured thus far, the girl decided to prosecute her search

Starting point is 06:30:49 until she discovered a spot where she might sleep in comparative safety and comfort. As no such place seemed to exist at the level at which she was, she determined to descend away. She lowered her feet over the ledge, groping with her sandaled toes along the rough surface below her. Finally, she found a safe projection. to which she descended. For half an hour, Natuil searched through the pitch-black night

Starting point is 06:31:15 upon the steep cliff face, until accident led her groping feet to the mouth of a cave, a darker blot upon the darkness of the cliff. For a moment, she listened attentively at the somber opening. No sound of breathing within came to her keen ears.

Starting point is 06:31:33 Satisfied that the cave was untenanted, Nadu crawled boldly in and lay down to sleep, exhausted by her long day of flight. A scraping sound upon the cliff face awakened Nadu. She raised herself upon an elbow and listened attentively. What was it that could make that particular noise? It did not require but an instant for her to recognize it,

Starting point is 06:31:57 a sound familiar since infancy to the cliff-dweller. It was the trailing of the butt of a spear as it dangled from its raw high thong down the back of a climbing warrior. Now it scraped along a comparatively smooth surface, now it bumped and pounded over a series of projections. What new menace did it spell? Natul crawled cautiously to the opening of the cave. Here she could obtain a view of the cliff to the right, but the climber she could not see. He was below the projecting ledge that ran before the threshold of her cavern. As she looked, Natul was startled to see a woman

Starting point is 06:32:38 emerged from a cave, a trifle above her, and fifty feet perhaps, to her right. The watcher drew back, lest she be discovered. She heard the stranger's cry of delight as she sighted the climber below. She saw her clamber down to meet the newcomer. She saw the man an instant later as he clambered to the level of her ledge. Her heart gave a throb of happiness. Her lips formed a beloved name, but her happiness was short-lived. The name died ere ever it was uttered. The man was New the son of New, and the woman who met him threw her arms about his neck and covered his lips with kisses. It was Gron. Natu recognized her now. Then she shrank back from the sight, covering her eyes with her hands, while hot tears trickled between her slim brown fingers.

Starting point is 06:33:30 She did not see News easy and different laugh as he slipped Gron's arms from about his neck. Fate was unkind, hiding this and unseeming Natuel's eyes again only in time to show the distracted girl a momentary glance of her lover, disappearing into Gras' cave with an arm about the woman's waist. Natuil sprang to her feet. Tears of rage, jealousy, and mortification blinded her eyes. She seized the knife that lay in her girdle. Murder flamed hot in her wild young heart as she stepped boldly out upon the ledge. She took a few hurried steps in the direction of the cave which held new and grown. To the very threshold she went, and then, of a sudden, she paused.

Starting point is 06:34:15 Some new emotion seized her. A flood of hot tears welled once more to her eyes, tears of anguish and hurt love this time. She tried to force herself within the cave, but pride held her back. Then sorrowfully she turned away and descended the cliff face. she went, her speed increased until by the time she reached the level before the forest she was flying like a deer from the scene of her greatest sorrow. On through the wood she ran, heedless of every menace that might lurk within its wild shadows. Beyond the wood, she came

Starting point is 06:34:52 upon a little plain that seemed to end at the edge of a declivity some distance ahead of her. Beyond, in the far distance, she could see the tops of mountains rising through a mist that floated over an intervening valley. She would keep on. She cared not what lay ahead, only that at each step she was putting a greater distance between herself and the faithless new

Starting point is 06:35:16 the hateful groan. That was all that counted, to get away where none might ever find her, to court death, to welcome the end that one need never seek for long in that savage, primeval world. She had crossed half the clearing, perhaps,

Starting point is 06:35:33 when the head of a bull oryx appeared topping the crest of the Gulf ahead. The brute paused to look at the woman. He lowered his head and bellowed. Directly behind him appeared another and another. Ordinarily, the oryx was a harmless beast, fighting only when forced to it in self-defense. But an occasional bull there was that developed bellicose tendencies that made discretion upon the side of an unarmed human the better part of valor. Nathul paused, measuring the distance between herself and the bull and herself and the nearest tree. While Nadul, torn by anguish, fled the cliff that sheltered Ngu the man, within the cave with Gron, again disengaged the fingers of the woman from about his neck.

Starting point is 06:36:21 "'Sease thy love-making, Gron,' he said. "'There may be no love between us. In the tribe of Niu, my father, a man takes but one mate. I would take Nadu the daughter of Tha. You are already mated to Tur. You have told me this, and I have seen his child suckling your breast. I love only Nadul. You should love only Tur.

Starting point is 06:36:46 The woman interrupted him with an angry stamp of her sandaled foot. I hate him, she cried. I hate him! I love only new the son of New. The man shook his head, and when he spoke, it was still in a kindly voice, for he felt only sorrow for the unhappy woman. "'It is useless, Gron,' he said, "'for us to speak further upon this matter.

Starting point is 06:37:13 Together we must remain until we have come back to our own countries, but there must be no love, nor more words of love between us. Do you understand?' The woman looked at him for a moment. What the emotion was that stirred her heart, her face did not betray. It might have been the anger of a woman scorned, or the sorrow of a breaking heart. She took a step toward him, paused, and then, throwing her arms before her face, turned and sank to the floor of the cave, sobbing.

Starting point is 06:37:46 New turned away and stepped out upon the ledge before the cave. His quick eyes scanned the panorama spread out before him in a single glance. They stopped instantly upon a tiny figure showing across the forest in the little plain that ran to the edge of the plateau before it dove into the valley beside the inland sea. It was the figure of a woman. She was running swiftly toward the declivity. New puckered his brows. There was something familiar about the graceful swing of the tiny figure, the twinkling of the little feet as they raced across the grassy plain. Who could it be? What member of his tribe could have come to this distant island?

Starting point is 06:38:30 It was but an accidental similarity, of course. But yet, how wildly his heart beat at the sight of the distant figure? Could it be? By any remote possibility could not who'll have reached this strange country. Coming over the edge of the plateau from the valley beyond, New saw the leaders of a herd of oryx. Behind these must be the herders. Will the girl be able to escape them?

Starting point is 06:38:58 Ah, she has seen the beasts. She has stopped and is looking about for a tree new reasoned, for women are oft-times afraid of these shaggy bulls. He remembered with pride that his Nadu feared little or nothing upon the face of the earth. She was cautious, of course, else she would not have survived a fortnight. Feared nothing? New smiled. There were two things that filled Nadu with terror, mice and earthquake. Now Newsease the first of the herders upon the flanks of the herd. They are hurrying forward, spears ready to ascertain what it is that has brought the leaders to a halt, what is causing the old King-Bull to bellow and paw the earth.

Starting point is 06:39:45 Will the girls see them? Can she escape them? They see her now, and at the same instant, it is evident that she sees them. Is she of their people? If so, she will hasten toward them. No, she has turned and is running swiftly back toward the forest. The herder spring into swift pursuit. New trembled in excitement. If he only knew! If he only knew! At his shoulder stood groan.

Starting point is 06:40:17 He had not been aware of her presence. The woman's eyes strained across the distance to the little figure racing over the clearing toward the forest. Her hands were tightly clenched against her breast. She, too, had been struck with the same fear that haunted New. Perhaps she had received the idea telepathically from the man. The watcher saw the herders overtake the fugitive, Caesar, and drag her back toward the edge of the plateau. The herd was turned back, and a moment later all disappeared over the brink.

Starting point is 06:40:50 New wavered in indecision. He knew that the captive could not be Nodoole, and yet something urged him on to her sucker. They were taking her back to the lake dwellings. Should he follow? It would be foolish, and yet suppose that it should be Nathu. Without a backward glance the man started down the cliff face. The woman behind him, reading his intention plainly, took a step after him, her arms outstretched toward him.

Starting point is 06:41:19 "'No!' she cried. Her voice was low and pleading. The man did not turn. He had no ears, no thoughts beyond the fear and hope that followed the life figure of the captive girl into the hidden valley toward the distant lake. Gron threw out her arms toward him in a gesture of supplication. For a moment she stood thus, motionless. New continued his descent of the cliff.

Starting point is 06:41:46 He reached the bottom and started off at a rapid trot toward the forest. Grasn clapped her open palm across her eyes and turning, staggered back to the ledge before the cave, where, with a stifled moan, she sank to her knees and slipped prone upon the narrow platform. End of Section 26. Section 27 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 14. I have come to save you. New reached the edge of the plateau in time to see the herders and their captive arrive at the dwellings on the lake. He saw the crowds of excited natives that ran out to meet them.

Starting point is 06:42:39 He saw the captive pulled and hauled hither and thither. The herders pointed often toward the plateau behind them. It was evident that News assault upon the century of the previous night, taken with the capture of this stranger and the appearance of new and groan upon the cliff the day before, had filled the villagers with fear of an invasion from the south. This only could account for the early return of the herders with their aryx. Taking advantage of what cover the descent to the valley afforded, and the bushes and trees that dotted the valley itself, New crept cautiously onward toward the lake. He was determined to discover the identity of the prisoner, though even yet he could not believe

Starting point is 06:43:20 that she was not Ull. A mile from the shore he was compelled to hide until dark, for there was less shelter thereafter, and, too, there were many of the natives moving to and fro, having the herds browsing in the bottomlands close to their dwellings. When it was sufficiently dark, New crept closer. Again he hid in the reeds, but this time much closer to one of the causeways. He wished that he knew in precisely which of the dwellings the captive was confined. He knew that it would be madness to attempt to search the entire village, and yet he saw no other way. At last the villagers had to be a lot of retired, with the exception of the sentries that guarded the narrow bridges connecting the

Starting point is 06:44:05 dwellings with the shore. New crept silently beneath the nearest causeway. Waiting through the shallow water, he made his way to a point beyond the sentinel's post. Then he crossed beneath the dwelling until he had come to the opposite side. Here the water was almost to his neck. He climbed slowly up one of the piles. Stopping often to listen, he came at last to a height which in enable him to grasp the edge of the flooring above with the fingers of one hand. Then he drew himself up until his eyes topped the platform. Utter silence reigned about him. Utter silence and complete darkness.

Starting point is 06:44:46 He raised himself, grasping the railing, until one knee rested upon the flooring. Then he drew himself up, threw a leg over the railing, and was crouching close in the shadows against the wall. Here he listened intently for several minutes. from within came the sound of the heavy breathing of many sleepers. Above his head was an opening, a window. New raised himself until he could peer within.

Starting point is 06:45:13 All was darkness. He sniffed in the vain hope of detecting the familiar scent of Natul, but if she were there, all sign of her must have been submerged in the sweaty exhalations from the close-packed men, women, and children, and the strong stench of the ely cured oryxhy. upon which they slept. There was but one way to assure himself definitely. He must enter the dwelling. With the stealth of a cat, he crawled through the small aperture. The floor was almost covered with sleepers. Among them and over them knew picked his careful way. He bent low toward

Starting point is 06:45:51 each one, using its sensitive nostrils in the blind search where his eyes were of no avail. He had crossed the room and assured himself that Nadu was not a little. He had crossed the room and assured himself that Nadu was not there, when a man appeared in the doorway. It was the sentry. New flattened himself against the wall not two yards from the door. What had called the fellow within? Had he been alarmed by the movement within the hut? New waited with ready knife. The man stepped just within the doorway. Throck, he called. One of the sleepers stirred and sat up. Huh? grunted he. "'Come and watch. It's your turn,' replied the sentry.

Starting point is 06:46:33 "'Ugh,' replied the sleepy one, and the sentry turned and left the hut. New could hear him, who had been called Throck, rising and collecting his weapons, donning his sandals, straightening and tightening his loincloth. He was making ready for his turn at sentry duty. As he listened, a bold scheme flashed into New's mind. He grasped his knife more tightly, and of a sudden, stepped up a sudden, stepped up to boldly across the room toward Throck. "'Sh!' he whispered.

Starting point is 06:47:03 "'I will stand watch in your place to-night, Throck.' "'H'all?' questioned the sleepy man. "'I will stand watch for you,' repeated New. "'I would meet.' Andy mumbled a name that might have been anything. She said that she would come to me tonight during the second watch. New could hear the man chuckle. "'Give me your robe,' said New,

Starting point is 06:47:26 that all may think that it is you, and he reached his hand for the horn-crowned Oric's skin. Throck passed it over, only too glad to drop back again into the slumber that his fellow had disturbed. New drew the bull's head over his own, the muzzle projecting like a visor, and the hole sitting low upon his head

Starting point is 06:47:46 threw his features into shadow. New stepped out upon the platform. The other sentry was standing impatiently waiting his coming, at the sight of him, the fellow turned and walked toward one of the dwellings that stretched further into the lake. There were seven and all that were joined to the shore by this single causeway. New had entered the one nearest the land. In which was the prisoner, and was she even in any of this particular collection of

Starting point is 06:48:13 dwellings? It was equally possible that she might be in one of the others, of which New had counted not less than ten, stretching along the shore of the lake for at least a mile or more. But he was sure that they had first brought her to one of the dwellings of this unit. He had seen them cross the causeway with her. Whether they had removed her to some other village later, he could not know. If there was only some way to learn definitely. He thought of the accommodating and sleepy throck. Would he dare venture another assault upon the lunkhead's credulity?

Starting point is 06:48:49 New shrugged. The chances were more than even that he would not find the girl before dawn without help. and that whether he did or know he never would escape from the village with his life. What was life anyway, but a series of chances, great and small? He had taken chances before. Well, he would take this one. He re-entered the dwelling and walked noisely to Throck's side. Stooping, he shook the man by the shoulder. Throck opened his eyes.

Starting point is 06:49:20 "'In which place is the prisoner?' asked new. He had come near to saying cave, but he had heard Grond speak of the hide-and-thatch things which protected them from the reins by another name than cave, so he was bright enough to guess that he might betray himself if he used the word here. For the most part, his language and the language of the lake-twellers was identical, and so he used a word which meant roughly in exactly what spot was the captive secured. In the last one, of course, grumbled a sleepy throbbed. Noe did not dare question him further. The last one might mean the last of this unit of dwellings, or it might mean that he was

Starting point is 06:50:03 in the last village, and New did not know which the last village might be, whether north or south of the village where he was. Already he could feel the eyes of the man searching through the darkness toward him. New rose and turned toward the doorway. Had the fellow suspicions been aroused? knew gone too far? Throck sat upright upon his hides watching the retreating figure. In his dense mind questions were revolving. Who was this man? Of course he must know him, but somehow he could not place his voice. Why had he asked where the captive was imprisoned? Everyone in all the villages

Starting point is 06:50:43 knew that well enough. Throck became uneasy. He did not like the looks of things. He started to rise. Ugh, how sleepy he was. What was the use, anyway? It was all right, of course. He lay back again upon his aric skins. Outside, New walked to the shore and replenished the beast fire. Then he turned back up the causeway. Quickly, he continued along the platforms past the several dwellings

Starting point is 06:51:15 until he had come to the last of the seven. At the doorway he paused and listened, at the same time, sniffing quietly. A sudden tremor ran through his giant frame. His heart, throbbing wildly, leapt to his throat. Natul was within. He crossed the threshold. The building was a small one.

Starting point is 06:51:37 No other scent of human being had mingled with that of Nadul. She must be alone. New groped through the darkness, feeling with his hands in the air before him and his sandaled feet upon the floor. His delicate nostrils guided him too, and at last he came upon her, lying tightly bound to an upright at the far end of the room. He bent low over her. She was asleep. He laid a hand upon her shoulder, and as he felt her stir, he placed his other palm across her lips, and bending his mouth close to her ear, whispered that she must make no outcry.

Starting point is 06:52:14 Nautau opened her eyes and stirred. "'Shh!' caution knew. I, New the son of New. He removed his hand from her lips and raised her to a sitting posture, kneeling at her side. He put his arms about her, a word of endearment on his lips, but she pushed him away. "'What do you hear?' she asked coldly. New was stunned with the surprise of it. "'I have come to save you,' he whispered, to take you back to the cliffs beside the restless sea where our people dwell. "'Go away,' replied Natul.

Starting point is 06:52:50 "'Go back to your woman.' "'Notul!' exclaimed New. "'What has happened? What has changed you? Has the sickness come upon you because of what you have endured? The sickness that changes the mind of his victim into the mind of one of the ape-folk? There is no woman for new, but Nadu, the daughter of Da.' "'There is the stranger woman. "'Gron!' cried Natul bitterly.

Starting point is 06:53:16 I saw her in your arms. I saw your lips meet, and then I ran away. Go back to her. I wish to die. New saw her hand, holding it tight. You saw what you saw, Natul, he said, but you did not hear when I told Gron that I loved only you. You did not see me disengage her arms. Then I saw you far away, and the herders come and take you, and I did not even cast into the look upon the stranger woman, but hurried after your captors, hiding close by until darkness came. That I came here, Natul, should prove my love, if ever you could have doubted it. Oh, Natul, Natul, how could you doubt the love of new?' The girl read as much in his manner as his words that he spoke the truth,

Starting point is 06:54:08 and even had he lied she would surely have believed him, so grue. rate was her wish to hear the very words he spoke. She dropped her cheek to his hand with a little sigh of relief and happiness, and then he took her in his arms. But only a moment could they spare to sentiment. Stern necessity called upon them for action, immediate and swift. How urgent was the call new wood of guessed could he have looked into the hut where Throck lay upon his aric skins, wide-eyed. The man's muddy brain revolved many times the details of the the coming of the fellow who had just asked the whereabouts of the prisoner. It was all quite strange, and the more that Throck thought upon it, the more fully awake he

Starting point is 06:54:51 became, and the better able to realize that there had been something altogether too unusual and mysterious in the odd request and actions of the stranger. Throck sat up. He had suddenly realized what would befall him should anything happen to the community because of his neglect of duty. The primitive communal laws were harsh, the results of their infringement, sudden, and relentless. He jumped to his feet, all excitement now. Not waiting to find a skin to throw over his shoulders, he grasped his weapons and ran out upon the platform. A quick glance revealed the fact that no sentry was in sight where a sentry should have been. He recalled the stranger's query about the location of the captive, and turned his face in the

Starting point is 06:55:35 direction of the further dwellings. Running swiftly and silently, he hastened toward the hut in which Natul had been confined, and so it was that as New emerged, he found a naked warrior almost upon him. At sight of Ngu and the girl behind him, Throck raised his voice in a loud cry of alarm. His spear-hand flew back, but back too flew the spear-hand of Niu, the son of Ngu. Two weapons flew simultaneously, and at the same instant, Natu, Nathu, Ngu and Throck dropped to the planking to avoid the missiles. Both whizzed harmlessly above them, and then the two warriors rushed upon one another with upraised axes.

Starting point is 06:56:16 From every doorway men were pouring in response to Throx's cry. New could not wait to close with his antagonist. He must risk the loss of the encounter and his axe as well in one swift move. Behind his shoulder his axe hand paused for an instant, then shot forward and released the heavy weapon. With the force of a cannonball, the crude stone implement flew through the air, striking throck full in the face, crushing his countenance to a mangled blur of bloody flesh. As the lake dweller stumbled forward dead, New grasped Natuel's hand, and dragged her round

Starting point is 06:56:53 the corner of the dwelling out of sight of the advancing warriors, who are dashing toward them with savage shouts and menacing weapons. At the rail of the platform, New seized Natul and lifted her over, dropping her into the water beneath as he vaulted over at her side. A few strong strokes carried them well under the village, and as they forged toward the shore, they could hear the searchers running hither and thither above them. The whole community was awake by now, and the din was deafening.

Starting point is 06:57:23 As the two crawled from the water to the shore, they were instantly discovered by those nearest them, and at once the causeway rattled and groaned beneath the feet of a hundred warriors that sped along it to intercept the fire. flight of the fugitives. Ahead of them were the dangers of the primeval night. Behind them were no less grave dangers at the

Starting point is 06:57:43 hands of their savage foes. Unarmed, but for a knife, it was futile to stand and fight. The only hope lay in flight, and the chance that they might reach the forest and a sheltering tree before either the human beasts behind them or the beasts a prey before had seized them.

Starting point is 06:58:02 Both New and Matul were fleet of foot. beside them the lake-dwellers were sluggards, and consequently five minutes put them far ahead of their pursuers, who, seeing the futility of further pursuit and the danger of being led too far from their dwellings and possibly into a strong camp of enemies, abandoned the chase and returned to the lake. Fortune favored New and Natul, as it is ever credited with favoring the brave. They reached the forest at the edge of the plateau without encountering any of the more formidable carnivora. Here they found sanctuary in a tree where they remained until dawn. Then they resumed their way toward the cliffs which they must scale to reach the sea. The matter of Gron had been settled

Starting point is 06:58:48 between them. They would offer to take her with them back to their own people where she might live in safety so long as she chose. It was daylight when New and Natul reached the base of the cliffs. Gras. Gron was not in sight. At the summit of the cliff, however, two crafty eyes looked from behind a grassy screen upon them. The watcher saw the man and the maid, and recognized them both. They were ascending. He would wait a bit. Noon and Natu climbed easily upward. When they had gained about half the distance toward the summit, the man, shunning further concealment, started downward to meet them. His awkwardness started a loose stone and appraised them of his presence.

Starting point is 06:59:32 Noo looked up, as did Natul. "'Tur!' exclaimed the latter. "'Tur,' echoed New, and redoubled his efforts to ascend. "'You are unarmed, Koshaned Natul, and he is above. The advantage is all his.' But the caveman was hot to lay hands upon this fellow who had brought upon Natul all the hardships she had suffered. He loosed his knife and carried it between his teeth.

Starting point is 06:59:59 ready for instant use. Like a cat, he scrambled up the steep ascent. Directly at his heels came his sweet and savage nadool. Between her strong white teeth was her own knife. Tur was in for a warm reception. He had reached a ledge now just below a cave mouth. Lying loosely upon the cliffside, scarcely balanced there was a huge rock,

Starting point is 07:00:23 a ton or two of potential destruction. Turr espied it. Just below it, directly in its path, climbed Nou and Natul. Turg grasped in an instant the possibilities that lay in the mighty weight of that huge boulder. He leapt behind it, and bracing his feet against it and his back against the cliff, pushed. The boulder leaned and rocked. New, realizing the danger, looked to the right and left for an avenue of escape, but chance had played well into the hands of the enemy.

Starting point is 07:00:55 Just at this point, there was no footwork. other than directly where they stood. They redoubled their efforts to reach the man before he could dislodge the boulder. Turr redoubled his efforts to start it spitting down upon them. He changed his position, placing a shoulder against the rock and one hand and foot against the cliff. Thus he pushed frantically. The hideous menace to those below it swayed and rocked. Another moment, and it would topple downward. Presently, from the cave behind the TUR, a woman emerged, awakened by the noises from without. It was grown. She took in the whole scene in a single glance. She saw New and with him, Natul. The man she loved with the woman who stood between

Starting point is 07:01:43 them, who must always stand between them, for she realized that New would never love her, whether Natul were alive or dead. She smiled as she saw success about to crown the efforts of T'er. In another instant, the man who scorned her love and the woman she hated with all the power of her savage jealousy would be hurled, crushed and mangled to the bottom of the cliff. Tur. She watched her mate with suddenly narrowing eyes. Tur! He struck her. He repudiated her.

Starting point is 07:02:16 A flush of shame scorched her cheek. Tur! Her mate. The father of her child! The rock toppled. New and Natul from below were clambering upward. The man had seen Gron, but he had read her emotions clearly. No use to call upon her for help. Out of the past the old love for her true mate had sprung to claim her. She would cleave to Tur in the moment of his victory, hoping thus to win him

Starting point is 07:02:44 back. Nor was new insensible to the power of hatred which he might have engendered in the woman's breast by repulsing her demonstrations of love. Another push like the last, and the boulder would lunge down upon them. Gron stood with her hands clutching her naked breasts, the nails buried in the soft flesh until blood trickled down the bronze skin. The father of her child! Her child! The pitiful thing that she deserted within the shelter by the beach! Her baby! Her dead baby!

Starting point is 07:03:19 Dead because of ter and his cruelty toward her. T'er braced himself for the final push. A smile curled his lip. His back was toward Gron, otherwise he would not have smiled. Even Nude did not smile at the thing he saw above him, the face of a woman made hideous by hate and bloodlust. With bared knife, Gron leapt toward T'ur. The upraised knife buried itself in his back and chest.

Starting point is 07:03:49 With a scream he turned toward the Avenger. As his eyes rested upon the face of the mother of his child, he shrieked aloud, and with the shriek still upon his lips he sank to the ledge dead. Then Gras turned to face the two who were rapidly ascending toward her. Words of thanks were already upon New's lips, but Gras stood silent, ready to meet them, with bared knife. What would she do, knew and Natua wondered, but there was no retreat and only a knife-armed woman barred their way to liberty and home.

Starting point is 07:04:24 New was almost level with her. Gron raised her knife above her head. New sprang upward to strike the weapon to one side before it was buried in his breast, but Gron was too quick for him. The blade fell, but not upon New. Deep into her own broken heart, Gron plunged the sharp point, and at the same instant she leapt far beyond New and Natul to crash, mangled and broken at the foot of the lofty cliff.

Starting point is 07:04:51 Death, sudden, and horrible was no stranger to these primeval lovers. They saw that Gron was dead, and Turr likewise. New appropriated the latter's weapons, and side by side the two set out to find the beach. They found it with only such delays and dangers as were daily incidents in their savage lives. They found the boat, too, and reached the mainland, and later the cliffs and their tribe in safety. Here they found a wild welcome awaiting them, for both have been given up as dead. That night they walked hand in hand beneath the great equatorial moon beside the restless sea. Soon, said New, Natul shall become the mate of New the son of New.

Starting point is 07:05:38 New my father hath said it, and so too has spoken Tha, the father of Natul. At the birth of the next moon, we are to mate. Natul Nessal closer to him. "'My new is a great warrior,' she said, and a great hunter. But he has not brought back the head of U, the killer of men and mammoths, that he promised to lay before the cave of Tha my father. Noo sets out at the breaking of the next light to hunt U, he answered quietly. Nor will he return to claim his mate until he has taken the head of the killer of men and mammoths.

Starting point is 07:06:17 Natul laughed up into Ngu's face. "'Natoo but joked,' she said. "'My man has proved himself greater than a hunter of O. "'I do not want the great-toothed head, New. "'I only want you. "'You must not go forth to hunt the beast. "'It is enough that you could slay him were he to attack us, "'and none there is who dare say it be beyond you.'

Starting point is 07:06:40 "'Nevertheless, I hunt O' on the morrow,' insisted New. "'I have never forgotten my promise. Nadu tried to dissuade him, but he was obdurate, and the next morning, Noo the son of New set forth from the cliffs beside the restless sea to haunt the lair of Ou. All day Nadu sat waiting his return, though she knew that it might be days before he came back, or that he might not come at all. Grave premonitions of impending danger haunted her. She wandered in and out of her cave, looking for the thousandth time along the

Starting point is 07:07:17 that new might come. Suddenly, a rumbling rose from far inland. The earth shook and trembled. Nadu, wide-eyed with terror, saw her people fleeing upward toward their caves. The heavens became overcast. The loud rumbling rose to a hideous and deafening roar. The violence of the earth's motion increased, until the very cliffs in which the people hid, rocked and shook like a leaf before a hurricane. Natuil ran to the innermost recess of her father's cave. There she huddled upon the floor bearing her face in a pile of bear and lion skins. About her clustered other members of her father's family.

Starting point is 07:07:59 All were terror-stricken. It was five minutes before the end came. It came in one awful, hideous convulsion that lifted the mighty cliff a hundred feet aloft, cracking and shattering it to fragments as its face toppled forward into the forest at its foot. Then there was silence, silence awful and ominous. For five minutes, the quiet of death reigned upon the face of the earth, until presently, from far out at sea came a rushing, swirling sound, a sound that only a few wild beasts were left to hear, and the ocean, mountain high, rushed in upon what had been the village of New the chief.

Starting point is 07:08:39 End of Section 27. Section 28 of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs. This Libervox recordings in the public domain. Chapter 15. What the Cave Revealed When Victoria Custer opened her eyes, the first face that she saw was that of her brother Barney bent above her. She looked at him in puzzled bewilderment for a moment. presently she reached her hands toward him.

Starting point is 07:09:20 Where am I? she asked. What has happened? You're all right, Vic, replied the young man. You're safe and sound in Lord Greystoke's bungalow. For another moment the girl knit her brows in perplexity. But the earthquake, she asked. Wasn't there an earthquake? A little one, Vic, but it didn't amount to anything.

Starting point is 07:09:42 There wasn't any damage done. How long have I been? "'This way,' she continued. "'You swooned about three minutes ago,' replied her brother. "'I just put you down here and sent Esmeralda for some brandy when you opened your eyes.' "'Three minutes,' murmured the girl. "'Three minutes.' That night, after the others had retired, Barney Custer sat beside his sister's bed,

Starting point is 07:10:09 and long into the early morning she told him in simple words and without sign of hysteria the story that I have told here of Nautul and New the Son of New. I think, she said when she had finished the strange tale, that I shall be happier for this vision, or whatever one may call it. I have met my dream-man and lived again the life that he and I lived countless ages ago. Even if he comes to me in my dreams again, it will not disturb me. I am glad that it was but a dream, and that Mr. Curtis was not killed by Turcote. and that all those terrible things were not real.

Starting point is 07:10:49 Now, said Barney, with a smile, you may be able to listen to what Curtis has been trying to tell you. It was a half-question. Victoria Custer shook her head. No, she said, I could never love him now. I cannot tell you why, but it may be that what I've lived through in those three minutes revealed more than the dim and distant past. "'Turkhas has never liked him, you know.'

Starting point is 07:11:15 Barney did not pursue the subject. He kissed the girl good night, and as the East commenced to lighten to the coming dawn, he sought his own room and a few hours sleep. The next day it was decided that Victoria and Barney should start for the coast as soon as porters could be procured, which would require but a few days at most. Lieutenant Butzow, Curtis, and I decided to accompany them. It was the last day of their stay at the Greystoke Ranch. The others were hunting.

Starting point is 07:11:47 Barney and Victoria had remained to put the finishing touches upon their packing, but that was done now, and the girl begged for a last ride over the broad, game-dotted valley of Uziere. Before they had covered a mile, Barney saw that his sister had some particular object in mind, for she wrote straight as an arrow and rapidly, with scarce a word straight south toward the foot of the rugged mountains, the bound the Waziri's country upon that side, in the very direction that she had previously shunned.

Starting point is 07:12:18 After a couple of hours of stiff riding, they came to the foot of the lofty cliff that had formerly so filled Victoria with terror and misgivings. "'What's the idea, Vic?' asked the man. "'I thought you were through with all this.' "'I am, Barney,' she replied, "'or will be after to-day. "'But I just couldn't go away without satisfying my curiosity.'

Starting point is 07:12:40 I want to know that there is no cave here in which a man might be buried. She dismounted and started to climb the rugged escarpment. Barney was amazed at the agility and strength of the slender girl. It kept him puffing to remain near her in her rapid ascent. At last she stopped suddenly upon a narrow ledge. When Barney reached her side, he saw that she was very white, and he paled himself when he saw what her eyes rested upon. The earthquake had dislodged a great boulder that for ages evidently had formed a part of the face of the cliff.

Starting point is 07:13:17 Now it had tilted outward a half-dozen feet, revealing behind it the mouth of a gloomy cavern. Barney took Victoria's hand. It was very cold and trembled a little. Come, he said, this has gone far enough, Vic. You'll be sick again if you keep it up. Come back to the horses. We've seen all we want to see. She shook her head.

Starting point is 07:13:42 "'Not until I have searched that cave,' she said, almost defiantly, and Barney knew that she would have her way. Together they entered the forbidding grotto, Barney in advance, striking matches with one hand, while he clung to his cocked rifle with the other. But there was nothing there that longer had the power to injure. In a far corner the feeble rays of the match lighted something that brought Barney to a sudden halt. He tried to turn the girl back as though there was nothing more to be seen, but she had seen too and pressed forward.

Starting point is 07:14:16 She made her brother light another match, and there before them lay the crumbling skeleton of a large man. By its side rested a broken, stone-tipped spear, and there was a stone knife and a stone axe as well. "'Look,' whispered the girl, pointing to something that lay just beyond the skeleton. Barney raised the match he held until its feeble flame carried to that other object. The grinning skull of a great cat, its upper jaw armed with two mighty 18-inch curved fangs. "'Oo! The killer of men and of mammals!' whispered Victoria Custer in an awed voice.

Starting point is 07:14:57 "'And knew, the son of New, who killed him for his Natul. "'For me!' End of Section 28. The End of The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Spurrows.

Classic Audiobook Collection - The Eternal Savage by Edgar Rice Burroughs ~ Full Audiobook [adventure]

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.