Tarzan of the Apes Reswung

by Edna Rice Burroughs

  Chapter 9

  Woman and Woman

  Tarzyn of the Apes lived on in her wild, jungle existence with little change for several years, only that she grew stronger and wiser, and learned from her books more and more of the strange worlds which lay somewhere outside her primeval forest.

  To her life was never monotonous or stale. There was always Pisah, the fish, to be caught in the many streams and the little lakes, and Sabora, with his ferocious cousins to keep one ever on the alert and give zest to every instant that one spent upon the ground.

  Often they hunted her, and more often she hunted them, but though they never quite reached her with those cruel, sharp claws of theirs, yet there were times when one could scarce have passed a thick leaf between their talons and her smooth hide.

  Quick was Sabora, the lioness, and quick were Numa and Sheeta, but Tarzyn of the Apes was lightning.

  With Tantor, the elephant, she made friends. How? Ask not. But this is known to the denizens of the jungle, that on many moonlight nights Tarzyn of the Apes and Tantor, the elephant, walked together, and where the way was clear Tarzyn rode, perched high upon Tantor's mighty back.

  Many days during these years she spent in the cabin of her mother, where still lay, untouched, the bones of her parents and the skeleton of Kale's baby. At eighteen she read fluently and understood nearly all she read in the many and varied volumes on the shelves.

  Also could she write, with printed letters, rapidly and plainly, but script she had not mastered, for though there were several copy books among her treasure, there was so little written English in the cabin that she saw no use for bothering with this other form of writing, though she could read it, laboriously.

  Thus, at eighteen, we find her, an English lordling, who could speak no English, and yet who could read and write her native language. Never had she seen a human being other than herself, for the little area traversed by her tribe was watered by no greater river to bring down the savage natives of the interior.

  High hills shut it off on three sides, the ocean on the fourth. It was alive with lions and leopards and poisonous snakes. Its untouched mazes of matted jungle had as yet invited no hardy pioneer from the human beasts beyond its frontier.

  But as Tarzyn of the Apes sat one day in the cabin of her mother delving into the mysteries of a new book, the ancient security of her jungle was broken forever.

  At the far eastern confine a strange cavalcade strung, in single file, over the brow of a low hill.

  In advance were fifty black warriors armed with slender wooden spears with ends hard baked over slow fires, and long bows and poisoned arrows. On their backs were oval shields, in their noses huge rings, while from the kinky wool of their heads protruded tufts of gay feathers.

  Across their foreheads were tattooed three parallel lines of color, and on each breast three concentric circles. Their yellow teeth were filed to sharp points, and their great protruding lips added still further to the low and bestial brutishness of their appearance.

  Following them were several hundred men and children, the former bearing upon their heads great burdens of cooking pots, household utensils and ivory. In the rear were a hundred warriors, similar in all respects to the advance guard.

  That they more greatly feared an attack from the rear than whatever unknown enemies lurked in their advance was evidenced by the formation of the column; and such was the fact, for they were fleeing from the white woman's soldiers who had so harassed them for rubber and ivory that they had turned upon their conquerors one day and massacred a white officer and a small detachment of her black troops.

  For many days they had gorged themselves on meat, but eventually a stronger body of troops had come and fallen upon their village by night to revenge the death of their comrades.

  That night the black soldiers of the white woman had had meat a-plenty, and this little remnant of a once powerful tribe had slunk off into the gloomy jungle toward the unknown, and freedom.

  But that which meant freedom and the pursuit of happiness to these savage blacks meant consternation and death to many of the wild denizens of their new home.

  For three days the little cavalcade marched slowly through the heart of this unknown and untracked forest, until finally, early in the fourth day, they came upon a little spot near the banks of a small river, which seemed less thickly overgrown than any ground they had yet encountered.

  Here they set to work to build a new village, and in a month a great clearing had been made, huts and palisades erected, plantains, yams and maize planted, and they had taken up their old life in their new home. Here there were no white women, no soldiers, nor any rubber or ivory to be gathered for cruel and thankless taskmasters.

  Several moons passed by ere the blacks ventured far into the territory surrounding their new village. Several had already fallen prey to old Sabora, and because the jungle was so infested with these fierce and bloodthirsty cats, and with lions and leopards, the ebony warriors hesitated to trust themselves far from the safety of their palisades.

  But one day, Kulonga, a daughter of the old queen, Mbonga, wandered far into the dense mazes to the west. Warily she stepped, her slender lance ever ready, her long oval shield firmly grasped in her left hand close to her sleek ebony body.

  At her back her bow, and in the quiver upon her shield many slim, straight arrows, well smeared with the thick, dark, tarry substance that rendered deadly their tiniest needle prick.

  Night found Kulonga far from the palisades of her mother's village, but still headed westward, and climbing into the fork of a great tree she fashioned a rude platform and curled herself for sleep.

  Three miles to the west slept the tribe of Kercha.

  Early the next morning the apes were astir, moving through the jungle in search of food. Tarzyn, as was her custom, prosecuted her search in the direction of the cabin so that by leisurely hunting on the way her stomach was filled by the time she reached the beach.

  The apes scattered by ones, and twos, and threes in all directions, but ever within sound of a signal of alarm.

  Kale had moved slowly along an elephant track toward the east, and was busily engaged in turning over rotted limbs and logs in search of succulent bugs and fungi, when the faintest shadow of a strange noise brought his to startled attention.

  For fifty yards before his the trail was straight, and down this leafy tunnel he saw the stealthy advancing figure of a strange and fearful creature.

  It was Kulonga.

  Kale did not wait to see more, but, turning, moved rapidly back along the trail. He did not run; but, after the manner of his kind when not aroused, sought rather to avoid than to escape.

  Close after his came Kulonga. Here was meat. She could make a killing and feast well this day. On she hurried, her spear poised for the throw.

  At a turning of the trail she came in sight of his again upon another straight stretch. Her spear hand went far back the muscles rolled, lightning-like, beneath the sleek hide. Out shot the arm, and the spear sped toward Kale.

  A poor cast. It but grazed his side.

  With a cry of rage and pain the she-ape turned upon his tormentor. In an instant the trees were crashing beneath the weight of his hurrying fellows, swinging rapidly toward the scene of trouble in answer to Kale's scream.

  As he charged, Kulonga unslung her bow and fitted an arrow with almost unthinkable quickness. Drawing the shaft far back she drove the poisoned missile straight into the heart of the great anthropoid.

  With a horrid scream Kale plunged forward upon his face before the astonished members of his tribe.

  Roaring and shrieking the apes dashed toward Kulonga, but that wary savage was fleeing down the trail like a frightened antelope.

  She knew something of the ferocity of these wild, hairy women, and her one desire was to put as many miles between herself and them as she possibly could.

  They followed her, racing through the trees, for a long distance, but finally one by one they abandoned
the chase and returned to the scene of the tragedy.

  None of them had ever seen a woman before, other than Tarzyn, and so they wondered vaguely what strange manner of creature it might be that had invaded their jungle.

  On the far beach by the little cabin Tarzyn heard the faint echoes of the conflict and knowing that something was seriously amiss among the tribe she hastened rapidly toward the direction of the sound.

  When she arrived she found the entire tribe gathered jabbering about the dead body of her slain mother.

  Tarzyn's grief and anger were unbounded. She roared out her hideous challenge time and again. She beat upon her great breast with her clenched fists, and then she fell upon the body of Kale and sobbed out the pitiful sorrowing of her lonely heart.

  To lose the only creature in all her world who ever had manifested love and affection for hers was the greatest tragedy she had ever known.

  What though Kale was a fierce and hideous ape! To Tarzyn he had been kind, he had been beautiful.

  Upon his she had lavished, unknown to herself, all the reverence and respect and love that a normal English girl feels for her own mother. She had never known another, and so to Kale was given, though mutely, all that would have belonged to the fair and lovely Sir Alister had he lived.

  After the first outburst of grief Tarzyn controlled herself, and questioning the members of the tribe who had witnessed the killing of Kale she learned all that their meager vocabulary could convey.

  It was enough, however, for her needs. It told her of a strange, hairless, black ape with feathers growing upon its head, who launched death from a slender branch, and then ran, with the fleetness of Bara, the deer, toward the rising sun.

  Tarzyn waited no longer, but leaping into the branches of the trees sped rapidly through the forest. She knew the windings of the elephant trail along which Kale's murderer had flown, and so she cut straight through the jungle to intercept the black warrior who was evidently following the tortuous detours of the trail.

  At her side was the hunting knife of her unknown sire, and across her shoulders the coils of her own long rope. In an hour she struck the trail again, and coming to earth examined the soil minutely.

  In the soft mud on the bank of a tiny rivulet she found footprints such as she alone in all the jungle had ever made, but much larger than hers. Her heart beat fast. Could it be that she was trailing a MAN--one of her own race?

  There were two sets of imprints pointing in opposite directions. So her quarry had already passed on her return along the trail. As she examined the newer spoor a tiny particle of earth toppled from the outer edge of one of the footprints to the bottom of its shallow depression--ah, the trail was very fresh, her prey must have but scarcely passed.

  Tarzyn swung herself to the trees once more, and with swift noiselessness sped along high above the trail.

  She had covered barely a mile when she came upon the black warrior standing in a little open space. In her hand was her slender bow to which she had fitted one of her death dealing arrows.

  Opposite her across the little clearing stood Horta, the boar, with lowered head and foam flecked tucks, ready to charge.

  Tarzyn looked with wonder upon the strange creature beneath her--so like her in form and yet so different in face and color. Her books had portrayed the NEGRO, but how different had been the dull, dead print to this sleek thing of ebony, pulsing with life.

  As the woman stood there with taut drawn bow Tarzyn recognized her not so much the NEGRO as the ARCHER of her picture book--

  A stands for Archer

  How wonderful! Tarzyn almost betrayed her presence in the deep excitement of her discovery.

  But things were commencing to happen below her. The sinewy black arm had drawn the shaft far back; Horta, the boar, was charging, and then the black released the little poisoned arrow, and Tarzyn saw it fly with the quickness of thought and lodge in the bristling neck of the boar.

  Scarcely had the shaft left her bow ere Kulonga had fitted another to it, but Horta, the boar, was upon her so quickly that she had no time to discharge it. With a bound the black leaped entirely over the rushing beast and turning with incredible swiftness planted a second arrow in Horta's back.

  Then Kulonga sprang into a near-by tree.

  Horta wheeled to charge her enemy once more; a dozen steps she took, then she staggered and fell upon her side. For a moment her muscles stiffened and relaxed convulsively, then she lay still.

  Kulonga came down from her tree.

  With a knife that hung at her side she cut several large pieces from the boar's body, and in the center of the trail she built a fire, cooking and eating as much as she wanted. The rest she left where it had fallen.

  Tarzyn was an interested spectator. Her desire to kill burned fiercely in her wild breast, but her desire to learn was even greater. She would follow this savage creature for a while and know from whence she came. She could kill her at her leisure later, when the bow and deadly arrows were laid aside.

  When Kulonga had finished her repast and disappeared beyond a near turning of the path, Tarzyn dropped quietly to the ground. With her knife she severed many strips of meat from Horta's carcass, but she did not cook them.

  She had seen fire, but only when Ara, the lightning, had destroyed some great tree. That any creature of the jungle could produce the red-and-yellow fangs which devoured wood and left nothing but fine dust surprised Tarzyn greatly, and why the black warrior had ruined her delicious repast by plunging it into the blighting heat was quite beyond her. Possibly Ara was a friend with whom the Archers was sharing her food.

  But, be that as it may, Tarzyn would not ruin good meat in any such foolish manner, so she gobbled down a great quantity of the raw flesh, burying the balance of the carcass beside the trail where she could find it upon her return.

  And then Lady Greystoke wiped her greasy fingers upon her naked thighs and took up the trail of Kulonga, the daughter of Mbonga, the king; while in far-off London another Lady Greystoke, the younger sister of the real Lady Greystoke's mother, sent back her chops to the club's CHEF because they were underdone, and when she had finished her repast she dipped her finger-ends into a silver bowl of scented water and dried them upon a piece of snowy damask.

  All day Tarzyn followed Kulonga, hovering above her in the trees like some malign spirit. Twice more she saw her hurl her arrows of destruction--once at Dango, the hyena, and again at Manu, the monkey. In each instance the animal died almost instantly, for Kulonga's poison was very fresh and very deadly.

  Tarzyn thought much on this wondrous method of slaying as she swung slowly along at a safe distance behind her quarry. She knew that alone the tiny prick of the arrow could not so quickly dispatch these wild things of the jungle, who were often torn and scratched and gored in a frightful manner as they fought with their jungle neighbors, yet as often recovered as not.

  No, there was something mysterious connected with these tiny slivers of wood which could bring death by a mere scratch. She must look into the matter.

  That night Kulonga slept in the crotch of a mighty tree and far above her crouched Tarzyn of the Apes.

  When Kulonga awoke she found that her bow and arrows had disappeared. The black warrior was furious and frightened, but more frightened than furious. She searched the ground below the tree, and she searched the tree above the ground; but there was no sign of either bow or arrows or of the nocturnal marauder.

  Kulonga was panic-stricken. Her spear she had hurled at Kale and had not recovered; and, now that her bow and arrows were gone, she was defenseless except for a single knife. Her only hope lay in reaching the village of Mbonga as quickly as her legs would carry her.

  That she was not far from home she was certain, so she took the trail at a rapid trot.

  From a great mass of impenetrable foliage a few yards away emerged Tarzyn of the Apes to swing quietly in her wake.

  Kulonga's bow and arrows were securely tied high in the top of a giant tree from which a
patch of bark had been removed by a sharp knife near to the ground, and a branch half cut through and left hanging about fifty feet higher up. Thus Tarzyn blazed the forest trails and marked her caches.

  As Kulonga continued her journey Tarzyn closed on her until she traveled almost over the black's head. Her rope she now held coiled in her right hand; she was almost ready for the kill.

  The moment was delayed only because Tarzyn was anxious to ascertain the black warrior's destination, and presently she was rewarded, for they came suddenly in view of a great clearing, at one end of which lay many strange lairs.

  Tarzyn was directly over Kulonga, as she made the discovery. The forest ended abruptly and beyond lay two hundred yards of planted fields between the jungle and the village.

  Tarzyn must act quickly or her prey would be gone; but Tarzyn's life training left so little space between decision and action when an emergency confronted her that there was not even room for the shadow of a thought between.

  So it was that as Kulonga emerged from the shadow of the jungle a slender coil of rope sped sinuously above her from the lowest branch of a mighty tree directly upon the edge of the fields of Mbonga, and ere the queen's daughter had taken a half dozen steps into the clearing a quick noose tightened about her neck.

  So quickly did Tarzyn of the Apes drag back her prey that Kulonga's cry of alarm was throttled in her windpipe. Hand over hand Tarzyn drew the struggling black until she had her hanging by her neck in mid-air; then Tarzyn climbed to a larger branch drawing the still threshing victim well up into the sheltering verdure of the tree.

  Here she fastened the rope securely to a stout branch, and then, descending, plunged her hunting knife into Kulonga's heart. Kale was avenged.

  Tarzyn examined the black minutely, for she had never seen any other human being. The knife with its sheath and belt caught her eye; she appropriated them. A copper anklet also took her fancy, and this she transferred to her own leg.

  She examined and admired the tattooing on the forehead and breast. She marveled at the sharp filed teeth. She investigated and appropriated the feathered headdress, and then she prepared to get down to business, for Tarzyn of the Apes was hungry, and here was meat; meat of the kill, which jungle ethics permitted her to eat.

  How may we judge her, by what standards, this ape-woman with the heart and head and body of an English gentlewoman, and the training of a wild beast?

  Tublati, whom she had hated and who had hated her, she had killed in a fair fight, and yet never had the thought of eating Tublati's flesh entered her head. It could have been as revolting to her as is cannibalism to us.

  But who was Kulonga that she might not be eaten as fairly as Horta, the boar, or Bara, the deer? Was she not simply another of the countless wild things of the jungle who preyed upon one another to satisfy the cravings of hunger?

  Suddenly, a strange doubt stayed her hand. Had not her books taught her that she was a woman? And was not The Archer a woman, also?

  Did women eat women? Alas, she did not know. Why, then, this hesitancy! Once more she essayed the effort, but a qualm of nausea overwhelmed her. She did not understand.

  All she knew was that she could not eat the flesh of this black woman, and thus hereditary instinct, ages old, usurped the functions of her untaught mind and saved her from transgressing a worldwide law of whose very existence she was ignorant.

  Quickly she lowered Kulonga's body to the ground, removed the noose, and took to the trees again.