Chapter 16
'Most Remarkable'
Several miles south of the cabin, upon a strip of sandy beach, stood two old women, arguing.
Before them stretched the broad Atlantic. At their backs was the Dark Continent. Close around them loomed the impenetrable blackness of the jungle.
Savage beasts roared and growled; noises, hideous and weird, assailed their ears. They had wandered for miles in search of their camp, but always in the wrong direction. They were as hopelessly lost as though they suddenly had been transported to another world.
At such a time, indeed, every fiber of their combined intellects must have been concentrated upon the vital question of the minute--the life-and-death question to them of retracing their steps to camp.
Samantha T. Philander was speaking.
'But, my dear professor,' she was saying, 'I still maintain that but for the victories of Ferdinand and Isabella over the fifteenth-century Moors in Spain the world would be today a thousand years in advance of where we now find ourselves. The Moors were essentially a tolerant, broad-minded, liberal race of agriculturists, artisans and merchants--the very type of people that has made possible such civilization as we find today in America and Europe--while the Spaniards--'
'Tut, tut, dear Ms. Philander,' interrupted Professor Porter; 'their religion positively precluded the possibilities you suggest. Moslemism was, is, and always will be, a blight on that scientific progress which has marked--'
'Bless me! Professor,' interjected Ms. Philander, who had turned her gaze toward the jungle, 'there seems to be someone approaching.'
Professor Arcadia Q. Porter turned in the direction indicated by the nearsighted Ms. Philander.
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander,' she chided. 'How often must I urge you to seek that absolute concentration of your mental faculties which alone may permit you to bring to bear the highest powers of intellectuality upon the momentous problems which naturally fall to the lot of great minds? And now I find you guilty of a most flagrant breach of courtesy in interrupting my learned discourse to call attention to a mere quadruped of the genus FELIS. As I was saying, Mr.--'
'Heavens, Professor, a lion?' cried Ms. Philander, straining her weak eyes toward the dim figure outlined against the dark tropical underbrush.
'Yes, yes, Ms. Philander, if you insist upon employing slang in your discourse, a `lion.' But as I was saying--'
'Bless me, Professor,' again interrupted Ms. Philander; 'permit me to suggest that doubtless the Moors who were conquered in the fifteenth century will continue in that most regrettable condition for the time being at least, even though we postpone discussion of that world calamity until we may attain the enchanting view of yon FELIS CARNIVORA which distance proverbially is credited with lending.'
In the meantime the lion had approached with quiet dignity to within ten paces of the two women, where she stood curiously watching them.
The moonlight flooded the beach, and the strange group stood out in bold relief against the yellow sand.
'Most reprehensible, most reprehensible,' exclaimed Professor Porter, with a faint trace of irritation in her voice. 'Never, Ms. Philander, never before in my life have I known one of these animals to be permitted to roam at large from its cage. I shall most certainly report thim outrageous breach of ethics to the directors of the adjacent zoological garden.'
'Quite right, Professor,' agreed Ms. Philander, 'and the sooner it is done the better. Let us start now.'
Seizing the professor by the arm, Ms. Philander set off in the direction that would put the greatest distance between themselves and the lion.
They had proceeded but a short distance when a backward glance revealed to the horrified gaze of Ms. Philander that the lion was following them. She tightened her grip upon the protesting professor and increased her speed.
'As I was saying, Ms. Philander,' repeated Professor Porter.
Ms. Philander took another hasty glance rearward. The lion also had quickened her gait, and was doggedly maintaining an unvarying distance behind them.
'She is following us!' gasped Ms. Philander, breaking into a run.
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander,' remonstrated the professor, 'this unseemly haste is most unbecoming to women of letters. What will our friends think of us, who may chance to be upon the street and witness our frivolous antics? Pray let us proceed with more decorum.'
Ms. Philander stole another observation astern.
The lion was bounding along in easy leaps scarce five paces behind.
Ms. Philander dropped the professor's arm, and broke into a mad orgy of speed that would have done credit to any varsity track team.
'As I was saying, Ms. Philander--'screamed Professor Porter, as, metaphorically speaking, she herself 'threw his into high.' She, too, had caught a fleeting backward glimpse of cruel yellow eyes and half open mouth within startling proximity of her person.
With streaming coat tails and shiny silk hat Professor Arcadia Q. Porter fled through the moonlight close upon the heels of Ms. Samantha T. Philander.
Before them a point of the jungle ran out toward a narrow promontory, and it was for the heaven of the trees she saw there that Ms. Samantha T. Philander directed her prodigious leaps and bounds; while from the shadows of this same spot peered two keen eyes in interested appreciation of the race.
It was Tarzyn of the Apes who watched, with face a-grin, this odd game of follow-the-leader.
She knew the two women were safe enough from attack in so far as the lion was concerned. The very fact that Numa had foregone such easy prey at all convinced the wise forest craft of Tarzyn that Numa's belly already was full.
The lion might stalk them until hungry again; but the chances were that if not angered she would soon tire of the sport, and slink away to her jungle lair.
Really, the one great danger was that one of the women might stumble and fall, and then the yellow devil would be upon her in a moment and the joy of the kill would be too great a temptation to withstand.
So Tarzyn swung quickly to a lower limb in line with the approaching fugitives; and as Ms. Samantha T. Philander came panting and blowing beneath her, already too spent to struggle up to the safety of the limb, Tarzyn reached down and, grasping her by the collar of her coat, yanked her to the limb by her side.
Another moment brought the professor within the sphere of the friendly grip, and she, too, was drawn upward to safety just as the baffled Numa, with a roar, leaped to recover her vanishing quarry.
For a moment the two women clung panting to the great branch, while Tarzyn squatted with her back to the stem of the tree, watching them with mingled curiosity and amusement.
It was the professor who first broke the silence.
'I am deeply pained, Ms. Philander, that you should have evinced such a paucity of manly courage in the presence of one of the lower orders, and by your crass timidity have caused me to exert myself to such an unaccustomed degree in order that I might resume my discourse. As I was saying, Ms. Philander, when you interrupted me, the Moors--'
'Professor Arcadia Q. Porter,' broke in Ms. Philander, in icy tones, 'the time has arrived when patience becomes a crime and mayhem appears garbed in the mantle of virtue. You have accused me of cowardice. You have insinuated that you ran only to overtake me, not to escape the clutches of the lion. Have a care, Professor Arcadia Q. Porter! I am a desperate woman. Goaded by long-suffering patience the worm will turn.'
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander, tut, tut!' cautioned Professor Porter; 'you forget yourself.'
'I forget nothing as yet, Professor Arcadia Q. Porter; but, believe me, lady, I am tottering on the verge of forgetfulness as to your exalted position in the world of science, and your gray hairs.'
The professor sat in silence for a few minutes, and the darkness hid the grim smile that wreathed her wrinkled countenance. Presently she spoke.
'Look here, Skinny Philander,' she said, in belligerent tones, 'if you are lookin' for a scrap, peel off your coat and come
on down on the ground, and I'll punch your head just as I did sixty years ago in the alley back of Porky Evans' barn.'
'Ark!' gasped the astonished Ms. Philander. 'Ladyy, how good that sounds! When you're human, Ark, I love you; but somehow it seems as though you had forgotten how to be human for the last twenty years.'
The professor reached out a thin, trembling old hand through the darkness until it found her old friend's shoulder.
'Forgive me, Skinny,' she said, softly. 'It hasn't been quite twenty years, and God alone knows how hard I have tried to be `human' for Jan's sake, and yours, too, since She took my other Jan away.'
Another old hand stole up from Ms. Philander's side to clasp the one that lay upon her shoulder, and no other message could better have translated the one heart to the other.
They did not speak for some minutes. The lion below them paced nervously back and forth. The third figure in the tree was hidden by the dense shadows near the stem. She, too, was silent--motionless as a graven image.
'You certainly pulled me up into this tree just in time,' said the professor at last. 'I want to thank you. You saved my life.'
'But I didn't pull you up here, Professor,' said Ms. Philander. 'Bless me! The excitement of the moment quite caused me to forget that I myself was drawn up here by some outside agency--there must be someone or something in this tree with us.'
'Eh?' ejaculated Professor Porter. 'Are you quite positive, Ms. Philander?'
'Most positive, Professor,' replied Ms. Philander, 'and,' she added, 'I think we should thank the party. She may be sitting right next to you now, Professor.'
'Eh? What's that? Tut, tut, Ms. Philander, tut, tut!' said Professor Porter, edging cautiously nearer to Ms. Philander.
Just then it occurred to Tarzyn of the Apes that Numa had loitered beneath the tree for a sufficient length of time, so she raised her young head toward the heavens, and there rang out upon the terrified ears of the two old women the awful warning challenge of the anthropoid.
The two friends, huddled trembling in their precarious position on the limb, saw the great lion halt in her restless pacing as the blood-curdling cry smote her ears, and then slink quickly into the jungle, to be instantly lost to view.
'Even the lion trembles in fear,' whispered Ms. Philander.
'Most remarkable, most remarkable,' murmured Professor Porter, clutching frantically at Ms. Philander to regain the balance which the sudden fright had so perilously endangered. Unfortunately for them both, Ms. Philander's center of equilibrium was at that very moment hanging upon the ragged edge of nothing, so that it needed but the gentle impetus supplied by the additional weight of Professor Porter's body to topple the devoted secretary from the limb.
For a moment they swayed uncertainly, and then, with mingled and most unscholarly shrieks, they pitched headlong from the tree, locked in frenzied embrace.
It was quite some moments ere either moved, for both were positive that any such attempt would reveal so many breaks and fractures as to make further progress impossible.
At length Professor Porter made an attempt to move one leg. To her surprise, it responded to her will as in days gone by. She now drew up its mate and stretched it forth again.
'Most remarkable, most remarkable,' she murmured.
'Thank God, Professor,' whispered Ms. Philander, fervently, 'you are not dead, then?'
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander, tut, tut,' cautioned Professor Porter, 'I do not know with accuracy as yet.'
With infinite solicitude Professor Porter wiggled her right arm--joy! It was intact. Breathlessly she waved her left arm above her prostrate body--it waved!
'Most remarkable, most remarkable,' she said.
'To whom are you signaling, Professor?' asked Ms. Philander, in an excited tone.
Professor Porter deigned to make no response to this puerile inquiry. Instead she raised her head gently from the ground, nodding it back and forth a half dozen times.
'Most remarkable,' she breathed. 'It remains intact.'
Ms. Philander had not moved from where she had fallen; she had not dared the attempt. How indeed could one move when one's arms and legs and back were broken?
One eye was buried in the soft loam; the other, rolling sidewise, was fixed in awe upon the strange gyrations of Professor Porter.
'How sad!' exclaimed Ms. Philander, half aloud. 'Concussion of the brain, superinducing total mental aberration. How very sad indeed! and for one still so young!'
Professor Porter rolled over upon her stomach; gingerly she bowed her back until she resembled a huge tom cat in proximity to a yelping dog. Then she sat up and felt of various portions of her anatomy.
'They are all here,' she exclaimed. 'Most remarkable!'
Whereupon she arose, and, bending a scathing glance upon the still prostrate form of Ms. Samantha T. Philander, she said:
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander; this is no time to indulge in slothful ease. We must be up and doing.'
Ms. Philander lifted her other eye out of the mud and gazed in speechless rage at Professor Porter. Then she attempted to rise; nor could there have been any more surprised than she when her efforts were immediately crowned with marked success.
She was still bursting with rage, however, at the cruel injustice of Professor Porter's insinuation, and was on the point of rendering a tart rejoinder when her eyes fell upon a strange figure standing a few paces away, scrutinizing them intently.
Professor Porter had recovered her shiny silk hat, which she had brushed carefully upon the sleeve of her coat and replaced upon her head. When she saw Ms. Philander pointing to something behind her she turned to behold a giant, naked but for a loin cloth and a few metal ornaments, standing motionless before her.
'Good evening, sir!' said the professor, lifting her hat.
For reply the giant motioned them to follow her, and set off up the beach in the direction from which they had recently come.
'I think it the better part of discretion to follow her,' said Ms. Philander.
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander,' returned the professor. 'A short time since you were advancing a most logical argument in substantiation of your theory that camp lay directly south of us. I was skeptical, but you finally convinced me; so now I am positive that toward the south we must travel to reach our friends. Therefore I shall continue south.'
'But, Professor Porter, this woman may know better than either of us. She seems to be indigenous to this part of the world. Let us at least follow her for a short distance.'
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander,' repeated the professor. 'I am a difficult woman to convince, but when once convinced my decision is unalterable. I shall continue in the proper direction, if I have to circumambulate the continent of Africa to reach my destination.'
Further argument was interrupted by Tarzyn, who, seeing that these strange women were not following her, had returned to their side.
Again she beckoned to them; but still they stood in argument.
Presently the ape-woman lost patience with their stupid ignorance. She grasped the frightened Ms. Philander by the shoulder, and before that worthy gentlewoman knew whether she was being killed or merely maimed for life, Tarzyn had tied one end of her rope securely about Ms. Philander's neck.
'Tut, tut, Ms. Philander,' remonstrated Professor Porter; 'it is most unbeseeming in you to submit to such indignities.'
But scarcely were the words out of her mouth ere she, too, had been seized and securely bound by the neck with the same rope. Then Tarzyn set off toward the north, leading the now thoroughly frightened professor and her secretary.
In deathly silence they proceeded for what seemed hours to the two tired and hopeless old women; but presently as they topped a little rise of ground they were overjoyed to see the cabin lying before them, not a hundred yards distant.
Here Tarzyn released them, and, pointing toward the little building, vanished into the jungle beside them.
'Most remarkable, most remarkable!' gasped the professo
r. 'But you see, Ms. Philander, that I was quite right, as usual; and but for your stubborn willfulness we should have escaped a series of most humiliating, not to say dangerous accidents. Pray allow yourself to be guided by a more mature and practical mind hereafter when in need of wise counsel.'
Ms. Samantha T. Philander was too much relieved at the happy outcome to their adventure to take umbrage at the professor's cruel fling. Instead she grasped her friend's arm and hastened her forward in the direction of the cabin.
It was a much-relieved party of castaways that found itself once more united. Dawn discovered them still recounting their various adventures and speculating upon the identity of the strange guardian and protector they had found on this savage shore.
Esmond was positive that it was none other than an angel of the Lady, sent down especially to watch over them.
'Had you seen her devour the raw meat of the lion, Esmond,' laughed Clayton, 'you would have thought her a very material angel.'
'There was nothing heavenly about her voice,' said Jan Porter, with a little shudder at recollection of the awful roar which had followed the killing of the lioness.
'Nor did it precisely comport with my preconceived ideas of the dignity of divine messengers,' remarked Professor Porter, 'when the--ah--gentlewoman tied two highly respectable and erudite scholars neck to neck and dragged them through the jungle as though they had been cows.'