CHAPTER XVIII.
WHAT IT DID.
The moments that followed were filled with a tenser excitement than any of the lads had ever known before. After the first frightened flurry of the alarmed creatures of the forest, a deep silence prevailed. It lasted for possibly fifteen minutes, and then the professor decided not to test their nerves to the breaking point.
“Turn on the searchlight!” came the breathed command.
A sharp click followed, as the light, which was supplied by current from the storage battery, was switched on.
A dazzling white pencil of light swept all about the Discoverer. Its brilliancy pierced the night like a saber, and illumined the solemn trees and the open savannah all about.
At almost precisely the same instant, a chorus of ferocious yells and cries broke out, and from all sides there rushed on the aerial adventurers a horde of short-statured Indians. The searchlight showed them to be wild-looking men, clothed in a single garment, their heads covered with straight black hair. Through their lower lips most of them had thrust a triangular bit of white stone with a sharp point. This added to their fantastic appearance.
Nat noted that one of them, larger in stature than the rest, seemed to be the leader. He also saw, with an unpleasant thrill, that they carried long blow pipes. It was through these pipes, the professor had said, that the poisoned arrows were discharged.
Rope in hand, ready to slip at the word of command, Nat stood his ground. On the opposite side of the framework Joe was likewise waiting. Neither boy budged an inch, and Ding-dong stood steady as a rock at his engines.
So suddenly had it all happened, in fact, that neither boy could regard it for an instant as more than a dream.