His efforts but served to accelerate the speed of the crocodile, and
just as the ape-man realized that he had reached the limit of his
endurance he felt his body dragged to a muddy bed and his nostrils
rise above the water's surface. All about him was the blackness
of the pit--the silence of the grave.
For a moment Tarzan of the Apes lay gasping for breath upon the
slimy, evil-smelling bed to which the animal had borne him. Close
at his side he could feel the cold, hard plates of the creatures
coat rising and falling as though with spasmodic efforts to breathe.
For several minutes the two lay thus, and then a sudden convulsion
of the giant carcass at the man's side, a tremor, and a stiffening
brought Tarzan to his knees beside the crocodile. To his utter
amazement he found that the beast was dead. The slim knife had
found a vulnerable spot in the scaly armour.
Staggering to his feet, the ape-man groped about the reeking, oozy
den. He found that he was imprisoned in a subterranean chamber
amply large enough to have accommodated a dozen or more of the huge
animals such as the one that had dragged him thither.
He realized that he was in the creature's hidden nest far under the
bank of the stream, and that doubtless the only means of ingress
or egress lay through the submerged opening through which the
crocodile had brought him.
Pages:
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205