With a roar the great tree man charged, and Og leaped forward at the same instant. They met in mid air and crashed to the ground locked in a combat that was terrible to witness. What a clash that was. With all the fury of their primitive natures they fought, for to Og it was life or death. He felt certain that the scar-faced one meant to kill him, and Og’s determination was to prevent it if he had in him the strength and courage to withstand the giant tree dweller.
Over and over they rolled on the ground, kicking, biting, clawing and thrashing with all their strength. Og had buried his powerful teeth into the corded neck of his antagonist, in an effort to reach his windpipe, while his strong hands tore at the tree man’s stomach, trying to rip open the flesh and tear at his vitals. It was the primitive man’s method of combat. He knew no other way to fight, and he pressed his attack with all the strength there was in his powerful body. The tree man, however, did not display the same viciousness. Rather he seemed to use his greater strength in protecting himself than in injuring the hairy boy. Og realized this and wondered. At first he attributed it to the tree man’s lack of courage, but presently he knew that this was not so for in the mêlée the great ape man suddenly shifted his long arms in such a manner that with a single quick movement he could have broken Og’s back and left him helpless, yet for some strange reason the tree man restrained himself. Og was more puzzled than ever.
Seeing their leader thus locked in combat with the captive seemed to instill more courage in the hearts of the other warriors of the tree clan, and suddenly they all closed in on the fighting pair, and Og again felt many hands gripping him, locking his legs and arms in helpless grips, and forcing his head and neck backward until he must needs let go his chewing at the throat of Scar Face, to protect his own neck from being broken.
Gradually they pinioned his arms and legs and head and trussed him about the body with their long strong arms, until he was utterly helpless. Then, as before, he felt himself being lifted off the ground and carried he knew not whither. For a long time they carried him and Og realized that they were taking him up to the upper end of the valley between the tall mountains. Soon the ground became rocky under foot, and seemed to slope slightly upward. Og wondered whether they meant to take him to the top of one of the mountains, and perhaps fling him from a precipice.
But they did not travel far up the slope before, one by one, they let loose their grip upon him until only Scar Face and another one of the ape men gripped him. Then, swinging him slowly back and forth between them several times, they hurled him from them. Og felt himself travel for a brief instant through space, then he landed with a dull and painful thud among a mass of jagged rocks, in the entrance to a dark cave. Half dazed he lay for a brief space where he had fallen and as he lay there he was conscious of two other forms hurtling through the air and falling beside him. They, too, lay still, where they were, and by their whimpering Og knew that he had the wolf cubs for his companions.
CHAPTER IX
SACRIFICED TO SABRE TOOTH
Why had they not killed him?
This question puzzled Og more than any other. Certainly they had had ample opportunity. That night, there in the sequoia forest, they could have strangled him and left his body for the wolves. Or at any time during their long tree top journey they needed but to drop him from the branches of one of the high palms and the crash to the ground would have broken every bone in his body. And again, when they attacked him, Scar Face could have broken his back, but refrained, or the group of warriors together could have literally torn him limb from limb, yet they had not done so. Surely it could not have been cowardice that had stayed them, nor yet mercy, for mercy was a quality that Og knew but little about and the tree men nothing at all. Why then had he been spared?