IX. — THE NIGHTMARE
The blacks of
the village of Mbonga, the chief, were feasting, while above them in a large
tree sat Tarzan of the Apes— grim, terrible, empty, and envious. Hunting had
proved poor that day, for there are lean days as well as fat ones for even the
greatest of the jungle hunters. Oftentimes Tarzan went empty for more than a
full sun, and he had passed through entire moons during which he had been but
barely able to stave off starvation; but such times were infrequent.
There
once had been a period of sickness among the grass-eaters which had left the
plains almost bare of game for several years, and again the great cats had
increased so rapidly and so overrun the country that their prey, which was also
Tarzan's, had been frightened off for a considerable time.
But
for the most part Tarzan had fed well always. Today, though, he had gone empty,
one misfortune following another as rapidly as he raised new quarry, so that
now, as he sat perched in the tree above the feasting blacks, he experienced
all the pangs of famine and his hatred for his lifelong enemies waxed strong in
his breast. It was tantalizing, indeed, to sit there hungry while these
Gomangani filled themselves so full of food that their stomachs seemed almost upon
the point of bursting, and with elephant steaks at that!
It
was true that Tarzan and Tantor were the best of friends, and that Tarzan never
yet had tasted of the flesh of the elephant; but the Gomangani evidently had
slain one, and as they were eating of the flesh of their kill, Tarzan was
assailed by no doubts as to the ethics of his doing likewise, should he have
the opportunity. Had he known that the elephant had died of sickness several
days before the blacks discovered the carcass, he might not have been so keen
to partake of the feast, for Tarzan of the Apes was no carrion-eater. Hunger,
however, may blunt the most epicurean taste, and Tarzan was not exactly an
epicure.
What
he was at this moment was a very hungry wild beast whom caution was holding in
leash, for the great cooking pot in the center of the village was surrounded by
black warriors, through whom not even Tarzan of the Apes might hope to pass
unharmed. It would be necessary, therefore, for the watcher to remain there
hungry until the blacks had gorged themselves to stupor, and then, if they had
left any scraps, to make the best meal he could from such; but to the impatient
Tarzan it seemed that the greedy Gomangani would rather burst than leave the
feast before the last morsel had been devoured. For a time they broke the
monotony of eating by executing portions of a hunting dance, a maneuver which
sufficiently stimulated digestion to permit them to fall to once more with
renewed vigor; but with the consumption of appalling quantities of elephant
meat and native beer they presently became too logy for physical exertion of
any sort, some reaching a stage where they no longer could rise from the
ground, but lay conveniently close to the great cooking pot, stuffing
themselves into unconsciousness.
It
was well past midnight before Tarzan even could begin to see the end of the
orgy. The blacks were now falling asleep rapidly; but a few still persisted.
From before their condition Tarzan had no doubt but that he easily could enter
the village and snatch a handful of meat from before their noses; but a handful
was not what he wanted. Nothing less than a stomachful would allay the gnawing
craving of that great emptiness. He must therefore have ample time to forage in
peace.
At
last but a single warrior remained true to his ideals—an old fellow whose once
wrinkled belly was now as smooth and as tight as the head of a drum. With
evidences of great discomfort, and even pain, he would crawl toward the pot and
drag himself slowly to his knees, from which position he could reach into the
receptacle and seize a piece of meat. Then he would roll over on his back with
a loud groan and lie there while he slowly forced the food between his teeth
and down into his gorged stomach.
It
was evident to Tarzan that the old fellow would eat until he died, or until
there was no more meat. The ape-man shook his head in disgust. What foul
creatures were these Gomangani? Yet of all the jungle folk they alone resembled
Tarzan closely in form. Tarzan was a man, and they, too, must be some manner of
men, just as the little monkeys, and the great apes, and Bolgani, the gorilla,
were quite evidently of one great family, though differing in size and
appearance and customs. Tarzan was ashamed, for of all the beasts of the jungle,
then, man was the most disgusting—man and Dango, the hyena. Only man and Dango
ate until they swelled up like a dead rat. Tarzan had seen Dango eat his way
into the carcass of a dead elephant and then continue to eat so much that he
had been unable to get out of the hole through which he had entered. Now he
could readily believe that man, given the opportunity, would do the same. Man,
too, was the most unlovely of creatures—with his skinny legs and his big
stomach, his filed teeth, and his thick, red lips. Man was disgusting. Tarzan's
gaze was riveted upon the hideous old warrior wallowing in filth beneath him.
There!
the thing was struggling to its knees to reach for another morsel of flesh. It
groaned aloud in pain and yet it persisted in eating, eating, ever eating.
Tarzan could endure it no longer—neither his hunger nor his disgust. Silently
he slipped to the ground with the bole of the great tree between himself and
the feaster.
The
man was still kneeling, bent almost double in agony, before the cooking pot.
His back was toward the ape-man. Swiftly and noiselessly Tarzan approached him.
There was no sound as steel fingers closed about the black throat. The struggle
was short, for the man was old and already half stupefied from the effects of
the gorging and the beer.
Tarzan
dropped the inert mass and scooped several large pieces of meat from the
cooking pot—enough to satisfy even his great hunger— then he raised the body of
the feaster and shoved it into the vessel. When the other blacks awoke they would
have something to think about! Tarzan grinned. As he turned toward the tree
with his meat, he picked up a vessel containing beer and raised it to his lips,
but at the first taste he spat the stuff from his mouth and tossed the
primitive tankard aside. He was quite sure that even Dango would draw the line
at such filthy tasting drink as that, and his contempt for man increased with
the conviction.
Tarzan
swung off into the jungle some half mile or so before he paused to partake of
his stolen food. He noticed that it gave forth a strange and unpleasant odor,
but assumed that this was due to the fact that it had stood in a vessel of
water above a fire. Tarzan was, of course, unaccustomed to cooked food. He did
not like it; but he was very hungry and had eaten a considerable portion of his
haul before it was really borne in upon him that the stuff was nauseating. It
required far less than he had imagined it would to satisfy his appetite.
Throwing
the balance to the ground he curled up in a convenient crotch and sought
slumber; but slumber seemed difficult to woo. Ordinarily Tarzan of the Apes was
asleep as quickly as a dog after it curls itself upon a hearthrug before a
roaring blaze; but tonight he squirmed and twisted, for at the pit of his
stomach was a peculiar feeling that resembled nothing more closely than an
attempt upon the part of the fragments of elephant meat reposing there to come
out into the night and search for their elephant; but Tarzan was adamant. He
gritted his teeth and held them back. He was not to be robbed of his meal after
waiting so long to obtain it.
He
had succeeded in dozing when the roaring of a lion awoke him. He sat up to
discover that it was broad daylight. Tarzan rubbed his eyes. Could it be that
he had really slept? He did not feel particularly refreshed as he should have
after a good sleep. A noise attracted his attention, and he looked down to see
a lion standing at the foot of the tree gazing hungrily at him. Tarzan made a
face at the king of beasts, whereat Numa, greatly to the ape-man's surprise,
started to climb up into the branches toward him. Now, never before had Tarzan
seen a lion climb a tree, yet, for some unaccountable reason, he was not
greatly surprised that this particular lion should do so.
As
the lion climbed slowly toward him, Tarzan sought higher branches; but to his
chagrin, he discovered that it was with the utmost difficulty that he could
climb at all. Again and again he slipped back, losing all that he had gained,
while the lion kept steadily at his climbing, coming ever closer and closer to
the ape-man. Tarzan could see the hungry light in the yellow-green eyes. He
could see the slaver on the drooping jowls, and the great fangs agape to seize
and destroy him. Clawing desperately, the ape-man at last succeeded in gaining
a little upon his pursuer. He reached the more slender branches far aloft where
he well knew no lion could follow; yet on and on came devil-faced Numa. It was
incredible; but it was true. Yet what most amazed Tarzan was that though he realized
the incredibility of it all, he at the same time accepted it as a matter of
course, first that a lion should climb at all and second that he should enter
the upper terraces where even Sheeta, the panther, dared not venture.
To
the very top of a tall tree the ape-man clawed his awkward way and after him
came Numa, the lion, moaning dismally. At last Tarzan stood balanced upon the
very utmost pinnacle of a swaying branch, high above the forest. He could go no
farther. Below him the lion came steadily upward, and Tarzan of the Apes
realized that at last the end had come. He could not do battle upon a tiny
branch with Numa, the lion, especially with such a Numa, to which swaying
branches two hundred feet above the ground provided as substantial footing as
the ground itself.
Nearer
and nearer came the lion. Another moment and he could reach up with one great
paw and drag the ape-man downward to those awful jaws. A whirring noise above
his head caused Tarzan to glance apprehensively upward. A great bird was
circling close above him. He never had seen so large a bird in all his life,
yet he recognized it immediately, for had he not seen it hundreds of times in
one of the books in the little cabin by the land-locked bay —the moss-grown
cabin that with its contents was the sole heritage left by his dead and unknown
father to the young Lord Greystoke?
In
the picture-book the great bird was shown flying far above the ground with a
small child in its talons while, beneath, a distracted mother stood with
uplifted hands. The lion was already reaching forth a taloned paw to seize him
when the bird swooped and buried no less formidable talons in Tarzan's back.
The pain was numbing; but it was with a sense of relief that the ape-man felt
himself snatched from the clutches of Numa.
With
a great whirring of wings the bird rose rapidly until the forest lay far below.
It made Tarzan sick and dizzy to look down upon it from so great a height, so
he closed his eyes tight and held his breath. Higher and higher climbed the
huge bird. Tarzan opened his eyes. The jungle was so far away that he could see
only a dim, green blur below him, but just above and quite close was the sun.
Tarzan reached out his hands and warmed them, for they were very cold. Then a
sudden madness seized him. Where was the bird taking him? Was he to submit thus
passively to a feathered creature however enormous? Was he, Tarzan of the Apes,
mighty fighter, to die without striking a blow in his own defense? Never!
He
snatched the hunting blade from his gee-string and thrusting upward drove it
once, twice, thrice into the breast above him. The mighty wings fluttered a few
more times, spasmodically, the talons relaxed their hold, and Tarzan of the
Apes fell hurtling downward toward the distant jungle.
It
seemed to the ape-man that he fell for many minutes before he crashed through
the leafy verdure of the tree tops. The smaller branches broke his fall, so
that he came to rest for an instant upon the very branch upon which he had
sought slumber the previous night. For an instant he toppled there in a frantic
attempt to regain his equilibrium; but at last he rolled off, yet, clutching
wildly, he succeeded in grasping the branch and hanging on.
Once
more he opened his eyes, which he had closed during the fall. Again it was
night. With all his old agility he clambered back to the crotch from which he
had toppled. Below him a lion roared, and, looking downward, Tarzan could see
the yellow-green eyes shining in the moonlight as they bored hungrily upward
through the darkness of the jungle night toward him.
The
ape-man gasped for breath. Cold sweat stood out from every pore, there was a
great sickness at the pit of Tarzan's stomach. Tarzan of the Apes had dreamed
his first dream.
For
a long time he sat watching for Numa to climb into the tree after him, and
listening for the sound of the great wings from above, for to Tarzan of the
Apes his dream was a reality.
He
could not believe what he had seen and yet, having seen even these incredible
things, he could not disbelieve the evidence of his own perceptions. Never in
all his life had Tarzan's senses deceived him badly, and so, naturally, he had
great faith in them. Each perception which ever had been transmitted to
Tarzan's brain had been, with varying accuracy, a true perception. He could not
conceive of the possibility of apparently having passed through such a weird
adventure in which there was no grain of truth. That a stomach, disordered by
decayed elephant flesh, a lion roaring in the jungle, a picture-book, and sleep
could have so truly portrayed all the clear-cut details of what he had
seemingly experienced was quite beyond his knowledge; yet he knew that Numa
could not climb a tree, he knew that there existed in the jungle no such bird as
he had seen, and he knew, too, that he could not have fallen a tiny fraction of
the distance he had hurtled downward, and lived.
To
say the least, he was a very puzzled Tarzan as he tried to compose himself once
more for slumber—a very puzzled and a very nauseated Tarzan.
As
he thought deeply upon the strange occurrences of the night, he witnessed
another remarkable happening. It was indeed quite preposterous, yet he saw it
all with his own eyes—it was nothing less than Histah, the snake, writhing his
sinuous and slimy way up the bole of the tree below him—Histah, with the head
of the old man Tarzan had shoved into the cooking pot—the head and the round,
tight, black, distended stomach. As the old man's frightful face, with upturned
eyes, set and glassy, came close to Tarzan, the jaws opened to seize him. The
ape-man struck furiously at the hideous face, and as he struck the apparition
disappeared.
Tarzan
sat straight up upon his branch trembling in every limb, wide-eyed and panting.
He looked all around him with his keen, jungle-trained eyes, but he saw naught
of the old man with the body of Histah, the snake, but on his naked thigh the
ape-man saw a caterpillar, dropped from a branch above him. With a grimace he
flicked it off into the darkness beneath.
And
so the night wore on, dream following dream, nightmare following nightmare,
until the distracted ape-man started like a frightened deer at the rustling of
the wind in the trees about him, or leaped to his feet as the uncanny laugh of
a hyena burst suddenly upon a momentary jungle silence. But at last the tardy
morning broke and a sick and feverish Tarzan wound sluggishly through the dank
and gloomy mazes of the forest in search of water. His whole body seemed on
fire, a great sickness surged upward to his throat. He saw a tangle of almost
impenetrable thicket, and, like the wild beast he was, he crawled into it to
die alone and unseen, safe from the attacks of predatory carnivora.
But
he did not die. For a long time he wanted to; but presently nature and an
outraged stomach relieved themselves in their own therapeutic manner, the
ape-man broke into a violent perspiration and then fell into a normal and
untroubled sleep which persisted well into the afternoon. When he awoke he
found himself weak but no longer sick.
Once
more he sought water, and after drinking deeply, took his way slowly toward the
cabin by the sea. In times of loneliness and trouble it had long been his
custom to seek there the quiet and restfulness which he could find nowhere
else.
As
he approached the cabin and raised the crude latch which his father had
fashioned so many years before, two small, blood-shot eyes watched him from the
concealing foliage of the jungle close by. From beneath shaggy, beetling brows
they glared maliciously upon him, maliciously and with a keen curiosity; then
Tarzan entered the cabin and closed the door after him. Here, with all the
world shut out from him, he could dream without fear of interruption. He could
curl up and look at the pictures in the strange things which were books, he
could puzzle out the printed word he had learned to read without knowledge of
the spoken language it represented, he could live in a wonderful world of which
he had no knowledge beyond the covers of his beloved books. Numa and Sabor
might prowl about close to him, the elements might rage in all their fury; but
here at least, Tarzan might be entirely off his guard in a delightful
relaxation which gave him all his faculties for the uninterrupted pursuit of
this greatest of all his pleasures.
Today
he turned to the picture of the huge bird which bore off the little Tarmangani
in its talons. Tarzan puckered his brows as he examined the colored print. Yes,
this was the very bird that had carried him off the day before, for to Tarzan
the dream had been so great a reality that he still thought another day and a
night had passed since he had lain down in the tree to sleep.
But
the more he thought upon the matter the less positive he was as to the verity
of the seeming adventure through which he had passed, yet where the real had
ceased and the unreal commenced he was quite unable to determine. Had he really
then been to the village of the blacks at all, had he killed the old Gomangani,
had he eaten of the elephant meat, had he been sick? Tarzan scratched his
tousled black head and wondered. It was all very strange, yet he knew that he
never had seen Numa climb a tree, or Histah with the head and belly of an old
black man whom Tarzan already had slain.
Finally,
with a sigh he gave up trying to fathom the unfathomable, yet in his heart of
hearts he knew that something had come into his life that he never before had
experienced, another life which existed when he slept and the consciousness of
which was carried over into his waking hours.
Then
he commenced to wonder if some of these strange creatures which he met in his
sleep might not slay him, for at such times Tarzan of the Apes seemed to be a
different Tarzan, sluggish, helpless and timid—wishing to flee his enemies as
fled Bara, the deer, most fearful of creatures.
Thus,
with a dream, came the first faint tinge of a knowledge of fear, a knowledge
which Tarzan, awake, had never experienced, and perhaps he was experiencing
what his early forbears passed through and transmitted to posterity in the form
of superstition first and religion later; for they, as Tarzan, had seen things
at night which they could not explain by the daylight standards of sense
perception or of reason, and so had built for themselves a weird explanation
which included grotesque shapes, possessed of strange and uncanny powers, to
whom they finally came to attribute all those inexplicable phenomena of nature
which with each recurrence filled them with awe, with wonder, or with terror.
And
as Tarzan concentrated his mind on the little bugs upon the printed page before
him, the active recollection of the strange adventures presently merged into
the text of that which he was reading—a story of Bolgani, the gorilla, in
captivity. There was a more or less lifelike illustration of Bolgani in colors
and in a cage, with many remarkable looking Tarmangani standing against a rail
and peering curiously at the snarling brute. Tarzan wondered not a little, as
he always did, at the odd and seemingly useless array of colored plumage which
covered the bodies of the Tarmangani. It always caused him to grin a trifle
when he looked at these strange creatures. He wondered if they so covered their
bodies from shame of their hairlessness or because they thought the odd things
they wore added any to the beauty of their appearance. Particularly was Tarzan
amused by the grotesque headdresses of the pictured people. He wondered how
some of the shes succeeded in balancing theirs in an upright position, and he
came as near to laughing aloud as he ever had, as he contemplated the funny
little round things upon the heads of the hes.
Slowly
the ape-man picked out the meaning of the various combinations of letters on
the printed page, and as he read, the little bugs, for as such he always
thought of the letters, commenced to run about in a most confusing manner,
blurring his vision and befuddling his thoughts. Twice he brushed the back of a
hand smartly across his eyes; but only for a moment could he bring the bugs
back to coherent and intelligible form. He had slept ill the night before and
now he was exhausted from loss of sleep, from sickness, and from the slight
fever he had had, so that it became more and more difficult to fix his
attention, or to keep his eyes open.
Tarzan
realized that he was falling asleep, and just as the realization was borne in
upon him and he had decided to relinquish himself to an inclination which had
assumed almost the proportions of a physical pain, he was aroused by the
opening of the cabin door. Turning quickly toward the interruption Tarzan was
amazed, for a moment, to see bulking large in the doorway the huge and hairy
form of Bolgani, the gorilla.
Now
there was scarcely a denizen of the great jungle with whom Tarzan would rather
not have been cooped up inside the small cabin than Bolgani, the gorilla, yet
he felt no fear, even though his quick eye noted that Bolgani was in the throes
of that jungle madness which seizes upon so many of the fiercer males.
Ordinarily the huge gorillas avoid conflict, hide themselves from the other
jungle folk, and are generally the best of neighbors; but when they are
attacked, or the madness seizes them, there is no jungle denizen so bold and
fierce as to deliberately seek a quarrel with them.
But
for Tarzan there was no escape. Bolgani was glowering at him from red-rimmed,
wicked eyes. In a moment he would rush in and seize the ape-man. Tarzan reached
for the hunting knife where he had lain it on the table beside him; but as his
fingers did not immediately locate the weapon, he turned a quick glance in
search of it. As he did so his eyes fell upon the book he had been looking at
which still lay open at the picture of Bolgani. Tarzan found his knife, but he
merely fingered it idly and grinned in the direction of the advancing gorilla.
Not
again would he be fooled by empty things which came while he slept! In a
moment, no doubt, Bolgani would turn into Pamba, the rat, with the head of
Tantor, the elephant. Tarzan had seen enough of such strange happenings
recently to have some idea as to what he might expect; but this time Bolgani
did not alter his form as he came slowly toward the young ape-man.
Tarzan
was a bit puzzled, too, that he felt no desire to rush frantically to some
place of safety, as had been the sensation most conspicuous in the other of his
new and remarkable adventures. He was just himself now, ready to fight, if
necessary; but still sure that no flesh and blood gorilla stood before him.
The
thing should be fading away into thin air by now, thought Tarzan, or changing
into something else; yet it did not. Instead it loomed clear-cut and real as
Bolgani himself, the magnificent dark coat glistening with life and health in a
bar of sunlight which shot across the cabin through the high window behind the
young Lord Greystoke. This was quite the most realistic of his sleep
adventures, thought Tarzan, as he passively awaited the next amusing incident.
And
then the gorilla charged. Two mighty, calloused hands seized upon the ape-man,
great fangs were bared close to his face, a hideous growl burst from the
cavernous throat and hot breath fanned Tarzan's cheek, and still he sat
grinning at the apparition. Tarzan might be fooled once or twice, but not for
so many times in succession! He knew that this Bolgani was no real Bolgani, for
had he been he never could have gained entrance to the cabin, since only Tarzan
knew how to operate the latch.
The
gorilla seemed puzzled by the strange passivity of the hairless ape. He paused
an instant with his jaws snarling close to the other's throat, then he seemed
suddenly to come to some decision. Whirling the ape-man across a hairy
shoulder, as easily as you or I might lift a babe in arms, Bolgani turned and
dashed out into the open, racing toward the great trees.
Now,
indeed, was Tarzan sure that this was a sleep adventure, and so grinned largely
as the giant gorilla bore him, unresisting, away. Presently, reasoned Tarzan,
he would awaken and find himself back in the cabin where he had fallen asleep.
He glanced back at the thought and saw the cabin door standing wide open. This
would never do! Always had he been careful to close and latch it against wild
intruders. Manu, the monkey, would make sad havoc there among Tarzan's
treasures should he have access to the interior for even a few minutes. The
question which arose in Tarzan's mind was a baffling one. Where did sleep
adventures end and reality commence? How was he to be sure that the cabin door
was not really open? Everything about him appeared quite normal—there were none
of the grotesque exaggerations of his former sleep adventures. It would be
better then to be upon the safe side and make sure that the cabin door was
closed—it would do no harm even if all that seemed to be happening were not
happening at all.
Tarzan
essayed to slip from Bolgani's shoulder; but the great beast only growled
ominously and gripped him tighter. With a mighty effort the ape-man wrenched
himself loose, and as he slid to the ground, the dream gorilla turned
ferociously upon him, seized him once more and buried great fangs in a sleek,
brown shoulder.
The
grin of derision faded from Tarzan's lips as the pain and the hot blood aroused
his fighting instincts. Asleep or awake, this thing was no longer a joke!
Biting, tearing, and snarling, the two rolled over upon the ground. The gorilla
now was frantic with insane rage. Again and again he loosed his hold upon the
ape-man's shoulder in an attempt to seize the jugular; but Tarzan of the Apes
had fought before with creatures who struck first for the vital vein, and each
time he wriggled out of harm's way as he strove to get his fingers upon his
adversary's throat. At last he succeeded—his great muscles tensed and knotted
beneath his smooth hide as he forced with every ounce of his mighty strength to
push the hairy torso from him. And as he choked Bolgani and strained him away,
his other hand crept slowly upward between them until the point of the hunting
knife rested over the savage heart—there was a quick movement of the
steel-thewed wrist and the blade plunged to its goal.
Bolgani,
the gorilla, voiced a single frightful shriek, tore himself loose from the
grasp of the ape-man, rose to his feet, staggered a few steps and then plunged
to earth. There were a few spasmodic movements of the limbs and the brute was
still.
Tarzan
of the Apes stood looking down upon his kill, and as he stood there he ran his
fingers through his thick, black shock of hair. Presently he stooped and
touched the dead body. Some of the red life-blood of the gorilla crimsoned his
fingers. He raised them to his nose and sniffed. Then he shook his head and
turned toward the cabin. The door was still open. He closed it and fastened the
latch. Returning toward the body of his kill he again paused and scratched his
head.
If
this was a sleep adventure, what then was reality? How was he to know the one
from the other? How much of all that had happened in his life had been real and
how much unreal?
He
placed a foot upon the prostrate form and raising his face to the heavens gave
voice to the kill cry of the bull ape. Far in the distance a lion answered. It
was very real and, yet, he did not know. Puzzled, he turned away into the
jungle.
No,
he did not know what was real and what was not; but there was one thing that he
did know—never again would he eat of the flesh of Tantor, the elephant.