Bomba covered the distance between him and his prey in a few leaps.
Good luck, thought Bomba. He would have something good to take back to the hut. It would be good to have meat again, after living so long on the eggs of the jaboty.
He cut choice steaks from the carcass with his machete. These he wrapped in leaves, bound with bush cord and slung with the hammocks over his shoulder.
Bomba was jubilant. The day was ending in accordance with his fondest hopes. He had gained the friendship of the Araos and put an obstacle in the way of Nascanora. He had with him hammocks, the comfort of which he and Casson had sadly missed. He had replenished his stock of arrows. And there was the tapir meat, which would make a fine meal for them both, roasted on a stout stick held over a blazing fire. Yes, it had been a good day!
The thought of food moved Bomba to still greater speed. He had eaten nothing since morning except a handful of roasted Brazil nuts that Pirah had thrust into his hand at parting, and he was ravenous.
For another hour he pressed rapidly through the jungle, his eyes sharply scanning every tree and covert, for dusk was coming on and the beasts of prey would soon be starting on their nightly mission of death.
Suddenly his steps slackened, for that instinct of his that he had learned to trust warned him of danger. It was in the air. He did not know just what form it was taking, but he knew that, whatever it was, it was near at hand.
As silently now as a panther he glided on, not a twig snapping beneath his sandaled feet.
Soon a smell of a campfire warned him of human proximity. He crept cautiously nearer and, peering through the undergrowth, saw dark forms squatting about a fire. He edged a little nearer until he could hear fragments of their guttural speech.
Bomba dropped on his stomach and wormed his way through the brush until he reached the outermost edge of the zone of light cast by the fire. Then from his screen he slowly raised his head and looked.