ere were still eighteen warriors to be accounted for, so that
unless he could frighten them off, it was evident that his fate
was sealed.

That they must pay the price of one life for every attempt to take
his had its effect upon them and they were longer now in initiating
a new rush and when they did so it was more skillfully ordered than
those that had preceded it, for they scattered into three bands
which, partially surrounding him, came simultaneously toward him
from different directions, and though he emptied his pistol with
good effect, they reached him at last. They seemed to know that
his ammunition was exhausted, for they circled close about him now
with the evident intention of taking him alive, since they might
easily have riddled him with their sharp spears with perfect safety
to themselves.

For two or three minutes they circled about him until, at a word
from Numabo, they closed in simultaneously, and though the slender
young lieutenant struck out to right and left, he was soon overwhelmed
by superior numbers and beaten down by the hafts of spears in brawny
hands.

He was all but unconscious when they finally dragged him to his
feet, and after securing his hands behind his back, pushed him
roughly along ahead of them toward the jungle.

As the guard prodded him along the narrow trail, Lieutenant
Smith-Oldwick could not but wonder why they had wished to take him
alive. He knew that he was too far inland for his uniform to have
any significance to this native tribe to whom no inkling of the
World War probably ever had come, and he could only assume that he
had fallen into the hands of the warriors of some savage potentate
upon whose royal caprice his fate would hinge.

They had marched for perhaps half an hour when the Englishman saw
ahead of them, in a little clearing upon the bank of the river,
the thatched roofs of native huts showing above a crude but strong
palisade; and presently he was ushered into a village street where
he was immediately surrounded by a throng of women and children
and warriors. Here he was soon the center of an excited mob whose
intent seemed to be to dispatch him as quickly as possible. The
women were more venomous than the men, striking and scratching him
whenever they could reach him, until at last Numabo, the chief, was
obliged to interfere to save his prisoner for whatever purpose he
was destined.

As the warriors pushed the crowd back, opening a space through
which