Page 93 - tarzan-of-the-apes
P. 93

charge.
            Tarzan looked with wonder upon the strange creature
         beneath him—so like him in form and yet so different in
         face and color. His books had portrayed the NEGRO, but
         how  different  had  been  the  dull,  dead  print  to  this  sleek
         thing of ebony, pulsing with life.
            As the man stood there with taut drawn bow Tarzan rec-
         ognized him not so much the NEGRO as the ARCHER of
         his picture book—

            A stands for Archer

            How wonderful! Tarzan almost betrayed his presence in
         the deep excitement of his discovery.
            But things were commencing to happen below him. The
         sinewy black arm had drawn the shaft far back; Horta, the
         boar, was charging, and then the black released the little
         poisoned arrow, and Tarzan saw it fly with the quickness of
         thought and lodge in the bristling neck of the boar.
            Scarcely had the shaft left his bow ere Kulonga had fitted
         another to it, but Horta, the boar, was upon him so quickly
         that he had no time to discharge it. With a bound the black
         leaped entirely over the rushing beast and turning with in-
         credible swiftness planted a second arrow in Horta’s back.
            Then Kulonga sprang into a near-by tree.
            Horta wheeled to charge his enemy once more; a dozen
         steps he took, then he staggered and fell upon his side. For
         a moment his muscles stiffened and relaxed convulsively,
         then he lay still.

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