crouched down in it, heads under, for nearly a minute; while Loob,
spear in hand, stood over them, his wild little eyes scanning the
water depths in front and the jungle depths behind for the approach of
any foe.

When they could hold their breath no longer, they stood up. Their red
assailants were floating off on the current; but the fiery poison
remained, and they bathed each other's scarlet and scorched shoulders
assiduously, forgetful for the moment of everything besides. At this
moment a gigantic water python reared its head from the leafage close
by, fixed its flat, lidless, glittering eyes upon them, and drew back
to strike. But in the next second Loob's ready spear was thrust clean
through its throat, and his yell of warning tore the air. Grom and
A-ya whipped up onto the bank like a pair of otters: and the python,
mortally stricken, shot out into the water over their heads, carrying
Loob's spear with it, gripped tight in the constriction of its throat
muscles.

As the lashing body struck the surface the water boiled about it,
suddenly alive with crocodiles. Balked of their human prey, they fell
upon the python. One of the monsters shot straight up, half-way out of
the water, with two convulsive coils of the python's tail wrapped
crushingly about its jaws; but the python, with Loob's spear through
its throat, could only struggle blindly. A moment more and it was
bitten in two, and the crocodiles were fighting monstrously among
themselves for the writhing fragments.

"You got us out of that just in time," said Grom, grinning upon the
little scout with approval.

A-ya wrung the water out of her heavy hair with both hands, and threw
the masses back with an upward toss of her head.

"I hate ants," she said, shuddering. "Let's get away from here."

II

Some two hours after sunrise of the following day they came to a place
where a belt of woods, perhaps a hundred to two hundred yards in
depth, ran bordering the river, while behind it a broad stretch of
grassy plain thrust back the jungle. Along the edge of the plain,
skirting the belt of woods, the grass was short and the traveling was
easy; but off to the left the growth was ranker, and interspersed with
thickets such as Grom always regarded with suspicion. He had learned
by experience that these dense thickets in the grass-land were a
favorite lurking-place of the unexpected--and that the unexpected was
almost always perilous.

Suddenly from the deeper