第56章

In truth she did not know whether to be angry, or frightened, or glad of the truth that she read there;or mortified that it had awakened in her a realization that possibly an analysis of her own interest in this young stranger might reveal more than she had imagined.

The constraint that suddenly fell upon them was relieved when Bulan motioned her to follow him back down the trail into the gorge in search of food.

There they sat together upon a fallen tree beside a tiny rivulet, eating the fruit that the man gathered.

Often their eyes met as they talked, but always the girl's fell before the open worship of the man's.

Many were the men who had looked in admiration at Virginia Maxon in the past, but never, she felt, with eyes so clean and brave and honest.There was no guile or evil in them, and because of it she wondered all the more that she could not face them.

"What a wonderful soul those eyes portray," she thought, "and how perfectly they assure the safety of my life and honor while their owner is near me."And the man thought: "Would that I owned a soul that I might aspire to live always near her--always to protect her."When they had eaten the two set out once more in search of the river, and the confidence that is born of ignorance was theirs, so that beyond each succeeding tangled barrier of vines and creepers they looked to see the swirling stream that would lead them to the girl's father.

On and on they trudged, the man often carrying the girl across the rougher obstacles and through the little streams that crossed their path, until at last came noon, and yet no sign of the river they sought.

The combined jungle craft of the two had been insufficient either to trace the way that they had come, or point the general direction of the river.

As the afternoon drew to a close Virginia Maxon commenced to lose heart--she was confident that they were lost.Bulan made no pretence of knowing the way, the most that he would say being that eventually they must come to the river.As a matter-of-fact had it not been for the girl's evident concern he would have been glad to know that they were irretrievably lost;but for her sake his efforts to find the river were conscientious.

When at last night closed down upon them the girl was, at heart, terror stricken, but she hid her true state from the man, because she knew that their plight was no fault of his.The strange and uncanny noises of the jungle night filled her with the most dreadful forebodings, and when a cold, drizzling rain set in upon them her cup of misery was full.

Bulan rigged a rude shelter for her, making her lie down beneath it, and then he removed his Dyak war-coat and threw it over her, but it was hours before her exhausted body overpowered her nervous fright and won a fitful and restless slumber.Several times Virginia became obsessed with the idea that Bulan had left her alone there in the jungle, but when she called his name he answered from close beside her shelter.

She thought that he had reared another for himself nearby, but even the thought that he might sleep filled her with dread, yet she would not call to him again, since she knew that he needed his rest even more than she.And all the night Bulan stood close beside the woman he had learned to love--stood almost naked in the chill night air and the cold rain, lest some savage man or beast creep out of the darkness after her while he slept.

The next day with its night, and the next, and the next were but repetitions of the first.It had become an agony of suffering for the man to fight off sleep longer.

The girl read part of the truth in his heavy eyes and worn face, and tried to force him to take needed rest, but she did not guess that he had not slept for four days and nights.

At last abused Nature succumbed to the terrific strain that had been put upon her, and the giant constitution of the man went down before the cold and the wet, weakened and impoverished by loss of sleep and insufficient food; for through the last two days he had been able to find but little, and that little he had given to the girl, telling her that he had eaten his fill while he gathered hers.

It was on the fifth morning, when Virginia awoke, that she found Bulan rolling and tossing upon the wet ground before her shelter, delirious with fever.At the sight of the mighty figure reduced to pitiable inefficiency and weakness, despite the knowledge that her protector could no longer protect, the fear of the jungle faded from the heart of the young girl--she was no more a weak and trembling daughter of an effete civilization.

Instead she was a lioness, watching over and protecting her sick mate.The analogy did not occur to her, but something else did as she saw the flushed face and fever wracked body of the man whose appeal to her she would have thought purely physical had she given the subject any analytic consideration; and as a realization of his utter helplessness came to her she bent over him and kissed first his forehead and then his lips.

"What a noble and unselfish love yours has been,"she murmured."You have even tried to hide it that my position might be the easier to bear, and now that it may be too late I learn that I love you--that Ihave always loved you.Oh, Bulan, my Bulan, what a cruel fate that permitted us to find one another only to die together!"