The People the Time forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs (best free ereader .TXT) 📖

upon me, and as I looked up, I realized that there
were flying reptiles even in this part of Caspak. The creature
dived for my right wing so quickly that nothing but a sheer drop
could have saved me. I was already close to the ground, so that
my maneuver was extremely dangerous; but I was in a fair way of
making it successfully when I saw that I was too closely approaching
a large tree. My effort to dodge the tree and the pterodactyl at
the same time resulted disastrously. One wing touched an upper
branch; the plane tipped and swung around, and then, out of control,
dashed into the branches of the tree, where it came to rest, battered
and torn, forty feet above the ground.

Hissing loudly, the huge reptile swept close above the tree in
which my plane had lodged, circled twice over me and then flapped
away toward the south. As I guessed then and was to learn later,
forests are the surest sanctuary from these hideous creatures,
which, with their enormous spread of wing and their great weight,
are as much out of place among trees as is a seaplane.

For a minute or so I clung there to my battered flyer, now useless
beyond redemption, my brain numbed by the frightful catastrophe
that had befallen me. All my plans for the succor of Bowen and
Miss La Rue had depended upon this craft, and in a few brief minutes
my own selfish love of adventure had wrecked their hopes and mine.
And what effect it might have upon the future of the balance of
the rescuing expedition I could not even guess. Their lives, too,
might be sacrificed to my suicidal foolishness. That I was doomed
seemed inevitable; but I can honestly say that the fate of my
friends concerned me more greatly than did my own.

Beyond the barrier cliffs my party was even now nervously awaiting
my return. Presently apprehension and fear would claim them--and
they would never know! They would attempt to scale the cliffs--of
that I was sure; but I was not so positive that they would succeed; and
after a while they would turn back, what there were left of them,
and go sadly and mournfully upon their return journey to home.
Home! I set my jaws and tried to forget the word, for I knew that
I should never again see home.

And what of Bowen and his girl? I had doomed them too. They would
never even know that an attempt had been made to rescue them. If
they still lived, they might some day come upon the ruined remnants
of this great plane hanging in its lofty sepulcher and hazard vain
guesses and be filled with wonder; but they would never know; and
I could not but be glad that they would not know that Tom Billings
had sealed their death-warrants by his criminal selfishness.

All these useless regrets were getting me in a bad way; but at last
I shook myself and tried to put such things out of my mind and take
hold of conditions as they existed and do my level best to wrest
victory from defeat. I was badly shaken up and bruised, but
considered myself mighty lucky to escape with my life. The plane
hung at a precarious angle, so that it was with difficulty and
considerable danger that I climbed from it into the tree and then
to the ground.

My predicament was grave. Between me and my friends lay an
inland sea fully sixty miles wide at this point and an estimated
land-distance of some three hundred miles around the northern end
of the sea, through such hideous dangers as I am perfectly free
to admit had me pretty well buffaloed. I had seen quite enough of
Caspak this day to assure me that Bowen had in no way exaggerated
its perils. As a matter of fact, I am inclined to believe that
he had become so accustomed to them before he started upon his
manuscript that he rather slighted them. As I stood there beneath
that tree--a tree which should have been part of a coal-bed countless
ages since--and looked out across a sea teeming with frightful
life--life which should have been fossil before God conceived of
Adam--I would not have given a minim of stale beer for my chances
of ever seeing my friends or the outside world again; yet then
and there I swore to fight my way as far through this hideous land
as circumstances would permit. I had plenty of ammunition, an
automatic pistol and a heavy rifle--the latter one of twenty added
to our equipment on the strength of Bowen's description of the
huge beasts of prey which ravaged Caspak. My greatest danger lay
in the hideous reptilia whose low nervous organizations permitted
their carnivorous instincts to function for several minutes after
they had ceased to live.

But to these things I gave less thought than to the sudden frustration of
all our plans. With the bitterest of thoughts I condemned myself
for the foolish weakness that had permitted me to be drawn from the
main object of my flight into premature and useless exploration.
It seemed to me then that I must be totally eliminated from further
search for Bowen, since, as I estimated it, the three hundred miles
of Caspakian territory I must traverse to reach the base of the
cliffs beyond which my party awaited me were practically impassable
for a single individual unaccustomed to Caspakian life and ignorant
of all that lay before him. Yet I could not give up hope entirely.
My duty lay clear before me; I must follow it while life remained
to me, and so I set forth toward the north.

The country through which I took my way was as lovely as it was
unusual--I had almost said unearthly, for the plants, the trees,
the blooms were not of the earth that I knew. They were larger,
the colors more brilliant and the shapes startling, some almost to
grotesqueness, though even such added to the charm and romance of
the landscape as the giant cacti render weirdly beautiful the waste
spots of the sad Mohave. And over all the sun shone huge and round
and red, a monster sun above a monstrous world, its light dispersed
by the humid air of Caspak--the warm, moist air which lies sluggish
upon the breast of this great mother of life, Nature's mightiest
incubator.

All about me, in every direction, was life. It moved through the
tree-tops and among the boles; it displayed itself in widening and
intermingling circles upon the bosom of the sea; it leaped from
the depths; I could hear it in a dense wood at my right, the murmur
of it rising and falling in ceaseless volumes of sound, riven at
intervals by a horrid scream or a thunderous roar which shook the
earth; and always I was haunted by that inexplicable sensation that
unseen eyes were watching me, that soundless feet dogged my trail.
I am neither nervous nor highstrung; but the burden of responsibility
upon me weighed heavily, so that I was more cautious than is my
wont. I turned often to right and left and rear lest I be surprised,
and I carried my rifle at the ready in my hand. Once I could have
sworn that among the many creatures dimly perceived amidst the
shadows of the wood I saw a human figure dart from one cover to
another, but I could not be sure.

For the most part I skirted the wood, making occasional detours
rather than enter those forbidding depths of gloom, though many
times I was forced to pass through arms of the forest which extended
to the very shore of the inland sea. There was so sinister a
suggestion in the uncouth sounds and the vague glimpses of moving
things within the forest, of the menace of strange beasts and possibly
still stranger men, that I always breathed more freely when I had
passed once more into open country.

I had traveled northward for perhaps an hour, still haunted by the
conviction that I was being stalked by some creature which kept
always hidden among the trees and shrubbery to my right and a
little to my rear, when for the hundredth time I was attracted by
a sound from that direction, and turning, saw some animal running
rapidly through the forest toward me. There was no longer any
effort on its part at concealment; it came on through the underbrush
swiftly, and I was confident that whatever it was, it had finally
gathered the courage to charge me boldly. Before it finally broke
into plain view, I became aware that it was not alone, for a few
yards in its rear a second thing thrashed through the leafy jungle.
Evidently I was to be attacked in force by a pair of hunting beasts
or men.

And then through the last clump of waving ferns broke the figure of
the foremost creature, which came leaping toward me on light feet
as I stood with my rifle to my shoulder covering the point at which
I had expected it would emerge. I must have looked foolish indeed
if my surprise and consternation were in any way reflected upon
my countenance as I lowered my rifle and gazed incredulous at the
lithe figure of the girl speeding swiftly in my direction. But
I did not have long to stand thus with lowered weapon, for as she
came, I saw her cast an affrighted glance over her shoulder, and
at the same moment there broke from the jungle at the same spot at
which I had seen her, the hugest cat I had ever looked upon.

At first I took the beast for a saber-tooth tiger, as it was quite
the most fearsome-appearing beast one could imagine; but it was not
that dread monster of the past, though quite formidable enough to
satisfy the most fastidious thrill-hunter. On it came, grim and
terrible, its baleful eyes glaring above its distended jaws, its
lips curled in a frightful snarl which exposed a whole mouthful of
formidable teeth. At sight of me it had abandoned its impetuous
rush and was now sneaking slowly toward us; while the girl, a long
knife in her hand, took her stand bravely at my left and a little
to my rear. She had called something to me in a strange tongue as
she raced toward me, and now she spoke again; but what she said I
could not then, of course, know--only that her tones were sweet,
well modulated and free from any suggestion of panic.

Facing the huge cat, which I now saw was an enormous panther,
I waited until I could place a shot where I felt it would do the
most good, for at best a frontal shot at any of the large carnivora
is a ticklish matter. I had some advantage in that the beast was
not charging; its head was held low and its back exposed; and so
at forty yards I took careful aim at its spine at the junction of
neck and shoulders. But at the same instant, as though sensing my
intention, the great creature lifted its head and leaped forward
in full charge. To fire at that sloping forehead I knew would be
worse than useless, and so I quickly shifted my aim and pulled the
trigger, hoping against hope that the soft-nosed bullet and the
heavy charge of powder would have sufficient stopping effect to
give me time to place