There was a single violent upheaval of limbs which Tharn smothered instantly beneath his own weight, a sobbing cry which died unborn as a mighty hand pressed against the parted lips ... and Roban lay senseless.
Swinging the unconscious youth to his shoulders, Tharn turned to make his way back to the cave entrance. Three cautious steps he took ... and then a muscular hand closed about his ankle!
CHAPTER III
SADU ATTACKS
Sadu, the lion, pacing slowly and majestically through the velvet blackness of a jungle night, came to a sudden halt as Siha, the wind, brought to his sensitive nostrils the acrid scent of burning wood.
For several long minutes the great cat stood as though turned to stone, his broad nostrils twitching nervously under the biting fumes. Sadu was unpleasantly familiar with the red teeth that ate everything in their path, for it had been scarcely a moon ago that he barely escaped the fangs of a forest fire.
Had it been smoke alone which Sadu smelled, he would have turned away and sought his night's food elsewhere. But commingled with the scent of fire was another smell, and it was the latter that finally sent him slinking ahead.
After the lion progressed another several hundred yards in this manner, the winding game trail debouched abruptly into a large natural clearing bordering the reed-covered banks of a wide shallow river.
Standing amid the impenetrable shadows cast by a great tree at the clearing's edge, Sadu surveyed with slitted eyes the bustle of activity about the open ground. There were at least fifty men there, some of them tending a blazing windrow of branches arranged in a large circle to encompass a considerable section of open ground where were heaped several mounds of supplies. Others were preparing the evening meal, bringing water from the river and performing the other duties which go with establishing camp for the night.