Most of those present had witnessed the machine’s marvelous performances, and in nearly every face now lurked an expression of awe or apprehension. Nalig-Nad saw the look, and it aroused him to fury.
“Come!” he cried, “I will prove that the white men have no magic.”
Seizing a heavy, bronze-tipped spear from an attendant he ran from the enclosure and made directly for the automobile, followed by a crowd of his most devoted adherents. The others, with us, remained to watch curiously what he would do.
I saw Moit’s face pale and his lips tremble; but he stood firm and steadfast while the king rushed upon his beloved machine and with a powerful stroke drove the spear clean through the plates of sheathing which protected the body.
I own I was amazed at such a display of strength, but a more athletic savage than Nalig-Nad I have never beheld. When the jagged rent was torn in the side of the automobile the crowd that surrounded it danced gleefully and jeered at the helpless child of our poor inventor’s brain as if it were alive and could feel their scorn.
Again Nalig-Nad seized a spear and hurled it at the side of the machine, piercing once more the light but stout metal. A third went crashing into the automobile, and then—
And then it seemed as though the world had suddenly come to an end.
I was dashed so forcibly against the huge body of my guard that where he fell upon the hard earth his head was crushed in like an eggshell. But I did not know this until I came to my senses and heard the sounds of moaning all around me and saw the ground covered with the forms of the stricken natives.
A knife severed my bonds and set me free, and I staggered to my feet to find Ilalah and Duncan Moit supporting me until I could recover sufficiently to stand alone.
Nux and Bryonia, all unhurt, were busy restoring the bruised and bewildered Techlas to consciousness, while Uncle Naboth sat upon the king’s bench, his clothing torn to tatters, and wiped away with his red handkerchief the blood that trickled from a cut in his head.