The women did not wait for more. They ran away from him in terror.
But Zeppa had heard enough. Turning his face towards the village he sped over the ground at a pace that soon brought him in sight of the combatants, who seemed to be swaying to and fro—now here, now there—as the tide of battle flowed and victory leaned sometimes to one side sometimes to the other.
Zeppa was unarmed. As he drew near he was observed by both parties to stop abruptly in his career, and wrench out of the ground a stake that had been meant for the corner-post of a newly-begun hut. It resembled the great club of Hercules rather than a weapon of modern man.
Whirling it like a feather round his head, the maniac rushed on. He was thoroughly roused. A feeling of desperate anxiety coupled with a sense of horrible injustice had set his spirit in a blaze. His great size, which became more apparent as he advanced, his flashing eyes, compressed lips, and the wild flowing of his uncut hair and beard, gave him altogether an aspect so terrible that his foes trembled, while his friends rejoiced, and when at last he uttered a roar like a mad bull, and launched himself into the thickest of the fight the Raturans could not stand it, but turned and fled in a body under the impression that he was more than human. He was too fleet for them, however. Overtaking a flying knot, he brought the the corner-post down on the mass, and three warriors were levelled with the ground. Then, hurling the mighty club away as if it were a mere hindrance to him, he ran straight at the leader of the Raturans, who, being head and shoulders above his fellows, seemed a suitable foe to single out.
Before reaching him, however, his attention was arrested by a cry from some one in the midst of the enemy in front. It was the voice of Wapoota, who was trying to break his way through the flying foe to his own people.
Fortunately Zeppa recognised the voice, and darted towards his friend, who was hard pressed at the time by a crowd of opponents.
One roar from the maniac sent these flying like chaff before the wind. It must be added, however, for the credit of the men of Ratura, that Ongoloo and his warriors had backed up their new leader gallantly.
When Wapoota saw his deliverer, he ran to him, panting, and said—
“Come with me—this way—Lippy is here!”
That was sufficient. Zeppa became submissive like a child, while the jester, taking him by the hand, ran with him at racing speed in the direction of the Raturan villages, towards which the child and her mother were being led by the party which had captured them.