For a moment the two stood looking at the strange apparition before them.
“Don’t you know me?” asked Kraski. “I am Carl—Carl Kraski. You know me, Flora.”
“Carl!” exclaimed the girl, and started to leap forward, but Esteban grasped her by the wrist and held her back.
“What are you doing here, Kraski?” asked the Spaniard in a surly tone.
“I am trying to make my way to the coast,” replied the Russian. “I am nearly dead from starvation and exposure.”
“The way to the coast is there,” said the Spaniard, and pointed down the trail toward the west. “Keep moving, Kraski, it is not healthy for you here.”
“You mean to say that you will send me on without food or water?” demanded the Russian.
“There is water,” said Esteban, pointing at the river, “and the jungle is full of food for one with sufficient courage and intelligence to gather it.”
“You cannot send him away,” cried the girl. “I did not think it possible that even you could be so cruel,” and then, turning to the Russian, “O Carl,” she cried, “do not go. Save me! Save me from this beast!”
“Then stand aside,” cried Kraski, and as the girl wrenched herself free from the grasp of Miranda the Russian leveled his automatic and fired point-blank at the Spaniard. The bullet missed its target; the empty shell jammed in the breach and as Kraski pulled the trigger again with no result he glanced at his weapon and, discovering its uselessness, hurled it from him with an oath. As he strove frantically to bring his rifle into action Esteban threw back his spear hand with the short, heavy spear that he had learned by now so well to use, and before the other could press the trigger of his rifle the barbed shaft tore through his chest and heart. Without a sound Carl Kraski sank dead at the foot of his enemy and his rival, while the woman both had loved, each in his own selfish or brutal way, sank sobbing to the ground in the last and deepest depths of despair.