Then the hunt was continued. Several splendid birds were knocked over, and they were now high up in the river valley, where the great monitor lizards haunted the sun-baked volcanic stones.
“Knock one of those down, Jackum,” said Carey, who was anxious to see how the blacks would deal with the tail-lashing creatures.
“Plenty, plenty,” said the black, grinning; but he obeyed directly after, sending his boomerang whizzing at one, which suddenly bounded on to a rock and turned defiantly with open jaws upon those who had interrupted his noon-tide sleep.
Carey had ocular proof that the nude blacks were cautious enough to keep their skins clear of the fearful lash formed by the steel-wire-like tails. For the boomerang struck the distended jaws with a sharp crack, and the next moment the reptile was down, with its silvery-grey scales flashing in the sun like oxidised silver, as it lashed its tail about like a coil-whip. It was not round Jackum’s legs, however, when he ran up to recover his boomerang, but round and round the spear-shaft which he held ready for the purpose.
A few minutes later the great lizard was dead. “Plenty cookie now,” said Jackum, and they began to return, picking up their trophies as they went back exactly over their trail.
“They’ll only cut a piece out of the carpet snake,” thought Carey. “It’s too big to take back.”
But he was mistaken. That serpent was too fat and juicy, and promised too many pleasant cookings, to be left behind, and it was soon lowered down, to be dragged after the party by two of the blacks, who harnessed themselves to the canes about the reptile’s neck, the smooth hard scales making the elongated body glide easily enough over the grass and sandy earth.
“But I’m not going to ride in the canoe with that horrid beast,” muttered Carey. “It’s alive and moving still.”
But he did, for, when all their game had been successively picked up and they reached the edge of the lagoon, the great serpent was dragged in and fitted itself in the bottom of the canoe, and the rest was thrown fore and aft. Carey set his teeth, for he dared not let the blacks see him shrink, and stepped calmly in, to sit down with his knees to his chin and the thickest part of the serpent passing round behind his heels, the head and tail lying forward, with the paddlers sitting inside the loop it formed.
They had cargo enough to make the slight vessel seem heavily-laden, but it was sent rapidly across the lagoon, the blacks eager and triumphant to display their successful efforts to their companions, who were all perched up on the bulwarks on either side of the gangway, face outward, waiting to see the portion that would come to their share.