It was the mysterious, evil forest, a charnel house of
silence, wherein naught moved save strange tiny birds--the strangeness of
them making the mystery more profound, for they flitted on noiseless
wings, emitting neither song nor chirp, and they were mottled with morbid
colours, having all the seeming of orchids, flying blossoms of sickness
and decay.
He was caught by surprise, fifteen feet in the air above the path, in the
forks of a many-branched tree. All saw him as he dropped like a shadow,
naked as on his natal morn, landing springily on his bent knees, and like
a shadow leaping along the run-way. It was hard for them to realize that
it was a man, for he seemed a weird jungle spirit, a goblin of the
forest. Only Binu Charley was not perturbed. He flung his poisoned
spear over the head of the captive at the flitting form. It was a mighty
cast, well intended, but the shadow, leaping, received the spear
harmlessly between the legs, and, tripping upon it, was flung sprawling.
Before he could get away, Binu Charley was upon him, clutching him by his
snow-white hair. He was only a young man, and a dandy at that, his face
blackened with charcoal, his hair whitened with wood-ashes, with the
freshly severed tail of a wild pig thrust through his perforated nose,
and two more thrust through his ears.
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