any of the inhabitants of the wilderness in
such unequal combat?

Warruk looked steadfastly at the light flickering on the riverbank, far,
far away. He turned his gaze in the other direction where lay the untold
miles of untrodden wastes that were his kingdom, to have and to hold so
long as he chose. He faced the river; the turtle battalions were
emerging from the water as before, causing scarcely a ripple. Again he
looked at the fire, took a few steps toward it, halted, sniffed the air,
and checked a roar that welled up in his throat. He had reached a
decision.

If there were new worlds to conquer he would invade them, fearless,
determined and confident. He reckoned not on man, the unknown, and had
he known it is not improbable but that he should have acted exactly as
he did. For, what is all life but a game of chance? And what is chance
but a disguise for opportunity?

The first steps toward the fire had been taken. The die had been cast.
Fate had stepped into Warruk's life and while luring him onward, baited
with the promise of adventure the hard path that lay ahead.

Daylight was just breaking when the black Jaguar reached the vicinity of
the blaze. The fire, replenished throughout the hours of darkness, had
guided him unerringly on his way; but with the coming of dawn it had
been allowed to dwindle down until nothing remained but a bed of embers
and even these died when the sun shot over the horizon.

The place reeked of an uncommon though not unknown odor and the sand was
trodden into paths by long, broad feet. Once before he had come upon the
same tracks and scent; and it came to him in a flash that it had been
along the border of the marsh and near the stream flowing out of it
where the dead egrets lay in heaps and rows, their feathers ruffled by
the wind. And the recollection also came of the illness he had suffered
as the result of eating of the birds. The creatures that could work such
havoc among the shy egrets and the after-effects of whose presence was
violent sickness, were not to be taken too lightly and Warruk felt a
distrust of the insidious power they must possess.

He circled the place, once, twice, in search of further clues to the
strange inhabitants. They were not lacking in the form of heaps of
turtle shells, bones, feathers, fish scales and numerous other objects.
But, of the creatures themselves he saw nothing. His keen ears, however
caught the sound of deep breathing that came from a gr