The Call of the Jungle by Clyde B Read online

  Adventure, 1st October, 1918

  ISS MADELINE GODARD, Though a Filipino was picked up in the hills comfortably quartered at Manila, and recognized by members of the girl’s M decided to visit her brother who was escort as her former guide.

  Lieutenant Godard, Commanding Officer at

  At first the Filipino refused to answer

  Subong. Subong being a one-company post,

  questions. But later, under pressure of

  stuck down in a small clearing at the western

  strenuous persuasion, he admitted that he had

  end of Monaga Pass. Monaga Pass, in turn,

  managed the abduction and jeeringly told the

  being a gash across Mt. Iriga and a few miles

  lieutenant that his sister was dead. She had

  east of Pasacao, a small coast town in southern

  gotten possession of a kris, he said, and that

  Luzon.

  had been the end. And since he stuck to this

  Had Miss Godard gone to Pasacao by

  story to the last, even in the face of the firing boat, the moderate distance from there inland,

  squad, it was assumed that Miss Godard had

  to the post, would have been easy and safe

  liberated herself in the only way possible.

  with her brother and his company for escort.

  Under the circumstances such an act was

  But, because she was studying the natives and

  highly probable. So the search was abandoned

  their language, she chose to make the long,

  and the troops returned to their respective

  hard trip overland with a small escort and a

  posts.

  guide who turned out to be treacherous. She

  After that Godard virtually ignored his

  was captured just one-day’s march from the

  command and kept to his quarters, sullen with

  end of her journey—spirited away in the night

  grief. The men, left to themselves, ate heavily,

  and not missed until morning.

  took no exercise, smoked much, and sweated

  For weeks the surrounding country out the days and nights on their cots. These, of was scoured and combed. Troops were sent

  course, were precisely the things they should

  from Lipas and Batangas and the search was

  not have done. It was the dry season and they

  minute, but Miss Godard was not found. were hemmed in by the jungle.

  Adventure

  2

  In the morning the sun came up out of

  the semi-darkness of the storeroom and they

  the jungle and in the evening it went down

  were intensely interested in what he was

  into the jungle. At night, out of the jungle

  doing, what he would do next and what he

  came strange, weird cries and up from its

  would finally do. But not in the results. Their

  darkest recesses huge vampire-bats flapped minds did not reach that far. To them it was a into space, flitted their grotesque moon-play and they were the audience and they

  shadows athwart the camp and left depression

  waited breathlessly for the climax. It did not

  in their wake.

  occur to them to stop Kirk. What audience

  In short, to the men at Subong, the

  would stop the play and cheat itself of the

  jungle was become a converging menace.

  climactical thrills?

  That is to all save Kirk. From the first

  In a few minutes Kirk came out. At his

  the jungle had affected him differently from

  side hung a haversack filled with cartridges,

  the others. At the same time it, began to creep

  around his waist was a belt and every cell was

  in on them, it began to lure him. And the spell

  full. Still carrying the ax he stopped at the

  grew and the mystery of Beyond beckoned

  arms rack, smashed the lock, took a rifle and

  until Kirk had an impelling desire to plunge

  bayonet and walked through the door that led

  into that vast wilderness and go on and on. He

  out of quarters. Five minutes and he was

  tried, with occupation, to crowd this longing

  swallowed up by the jungle.

  out. He would take the trumpeter’s bugle, go

  “T’e bloomin’ idjot," said "Cockney"

  to the edge of the little clearing and practice

  Simpkins, to no one in particular. “An’ ’is

  service calls for hours. And most of all did he

  time hexpired hin six weeks.”

  practice the "call to arms.”

  Coming fresh from lighted quarters

  He liked that: its long-drawn, high-

  into the darkness of matted foliage, Kirk was

  keyed first note, set to catch attention: and the able to see but poorly, so he ,tore his face and

  quick rushing action the whole call suggested.

  hands cruelly] on brambles and horny shrubs.

  It was thrilling, it was the echo of some wild

  Still he worried on for several hours,

  strain in his own make-up. It carried a staggering, falling, bleeding and cursing. At suggestion of stirring adventure that might be

  last he lay down between two clumps of

  waiting out there, beyond the limit. So Kirk’s

  bamboo with interlacing tops and slept, while

  bugle practice only served to increase the all around the jungle creatures chattered and jungle’s lure and the lure grew to be an buzzed their disapproval of the intruder.

  obsession.

  It is more than probable that no

  And then the crisis came. It came, too,

  attempt was made to follow Kirk that night;

  with all the startling swiftness of real surely it would have been foolish, futile.

  melodrama. Shortly after dark, one evening,

  Godard may have ordered out a searching

  Kirk rose from his cot and without word or

  party the next day but if he did Kirk never saw

  warning, walked to the back end of quarters,

  or heard them.

  jerked down a fire-ax and crossed to a corner

  Kirk rose early the next morning to the

  where was the locked door to the chatter of monkeys and the piping of birds.

  quartermaster stores. One blow, with the pick

  Some mangoes and a large pomelo constituted

  at the back of the ax, gouged out the lock. He

  his breakfast; after which he set out to put

  threw the door open and walked in. The other

  distance between himself and, Subong. The

  men lay on their cots, heads propped on matter of distance was much in his mind for elbows and watched, silent, fascinated.

  the next few days with the result that he bored

  They could see Kirk moving about in

  many miles into the jungle.

  The Call of the Jungle

  3

  When, at last, he felt himself safe his

  He never would have found it other than by

  next care was to find a soft stone and whet the

  accident, for the entrance, overhung by a large

  blade of his bayonet to a cutting edge. In

  boulder and grown about with vines and

  Kirk’s day bayonets were made of the best

  shrubbery, was invis
ible twenty steps away.

  steel but they were not made with sharp edges

  The place was dark inside and Kirk

  and a cutting implement is essential in the

  had no matches so he resorted to primitive

  jungle.

  methods to get fire. He took dead, dry grass

  He was now in a virgin wilderness,

  and ground it between his hands till he had a

  vast and incomparable. Here, nature reigned

  small heap of fine chaff. Then, over the chaff,

  supreme, had reigned for centuries not he held a hard stone and struck it a sharp blow numbered. Often Kirk spent says in working

  with the back of his baydne’t. A spark fell, a

  his way around some seemingly endless few dry twigs he added, and the cave was stretch of swamp lilies. At other times he

  soon brightly lighted, to the consternation of

  loafed for days on the banks of some still lake

  numerous bats and other dark-loving

  whose ebony waters were peopled with creatures.

  snakes, moss-grown logs and monstrous water

  This cave was about half-way up to

  lizards. And yet again he came upon huge

  Iriga’s summit and here Kirk rested for two

  natural arbors wherein the dew never dried

  days. And while plundering among the clefts

  and fungi hung from decayed branches in in the walls he found a small, silver bugle of marvelous variegation.

  the type regulation in the Spanish army. It was

  And always he had a feeling of probably left there by some small detachment intimacy with these things, a dim sense of

  of Spanish soldiers who, at some time, hid in

  having known the like before. Even living on

  the cave to elude pursuing natives. At any rate

  wild fruit, berries and roots—as he was the bugle was a pleasant find for Kirk.

  obliged to do—seemed a remotely familiar

  He stuffed its bell with leaves, so that

  habit. And what the average man would have

  the sound would not carry to any great

  counted the hardships of such a life were

  distance—one never knows when the Filipino

  pleasures to Kirk. He was spellbound, beauty-

  is near—and thrilled again to his favorite call,

  drunk; this was his kingdom, the place he had

  the "call to arms." And when he left the cave searched the earth to find. For him, far and

  and started, once more, on his journey the

  alone in that vast jungle, the world had turned

  little silver bugle hung at his belt.

  young again. The obligations and burdens of

  As Kirk drew near the mountain-top

  civilization, gathered with the centuries, thing edible grew scarce and water became a slipped from his shoulders and he knew problem. It was not pleasant up here like it primeval freedom.

  was down in the lowland; he felt peevish and

  weak. Decidedly something was wrong. Yet

  SO FAR his general direction had been south

  he had no thought of going back; some streak

  and parallel to the mountain range. But of tenacity in him would not let him quit till suddenly, for some inexplicable whim, he he had reached the summit of Mt. Iriga. He sat turned east and began to climb the more down to rest; and upon looking up the slope niggardly steeps of Mt. Iriga. Here wild fruit

  saw a species of mountain goat making its

  was less plentiful and the soft roots that he

  way downward.

  found so nourishing in the lowland were not to

  It was the first game he had seen on

  be had. Still he kept resolutely on and upward.

  the trip and all at once he realized what was

  And one day he stumbled square into a cave.

  wrong; he had, eaten no meat for three weeks.

  Adventure

  4

  He rose, rested his rifle on a boulder and took

  About thirty paces from where he lay

  careful aim. The goat rolled over and over

  hid was a lone shack, apparently unoccupied.

  down-hill and lodged in a lava-rift not ten feet

  There was no sound or movement about it, so

  from where Kirk stood. He found a thin, flat

  Kirk gave it but little thought and started to

  stone, placed it in the center of a sizable pile

  move on to a better view of the barrio which

  of brush and started a fire. By the time he had

  stretched away farther down the slope. Then

  the goat skinned the stone was hot enough to

  his eye wandered back to the shack and at a

  fry meat.

  small window with bamboo bars across it, he

  It was late in the afternoon when Kirk

  saw the face of a white woman. He crawled

  finished his feast, so he camped for the night.

  nearer and raised his head above the

  The next morning he ate a hearty breakfast of

  shrubbery. The woman saw him and pressed

  goat meat and with renewed strength and her finger to her lips in the sign for silence, vigor again started up the rugged slope. But as

  then turned away from the window. Kirk

  the fierce sun climbed up in the east Kirk

  guessed, even then, who she was. In a few

  became thirsty, terribly thirsty, and he looked

  minutes she came back

  in every nook and cranny for water. But

  “No one is near,” she said, “but we

  everywhere he was marked for disappointment

  must talk very low. I am Madeline God—“

  and his thirst grew and his tongue became

  “I know it,” he interrupted. “I am

  thick and fuzzy. He sat down in despair and

  Private Kirk from your brother’s company at

  began to chew green twigs and from that Subong. Can you get out of that shack?”

  sprung an idea. The thing that he had thought

  “No. The door is fastened on the

  of, is of course, not new. But to Kirk it was

  outside and the bars across the window, as you

  original, positively a discovery. He jumped

  can see, are woven into the thatching.”

  up, drew his bayonet, frantically, and “boxed”

  “Where is the door?”

  a tree. To his great joy the cup, thus formed,

  “On the opposite side and facing the

  slowly filled with clear sap. Kirk drank it with

  barrio.”

  a leaf and the problem of water was solved.

  “You’ll have to get out by the

  That night he slept on the very apex of the

  window,” Kirk decided. “Do they keep a

  summit.

  guard over you at night?”

  The next morning Kirk was surprised

  “After about ten o’clock. There is a

  at the difference between Iriga’s eastern and

  small porch at the door and one of them brings

  western sides. On the west, from whence he

  his mat and sleeps there.”

  came, only a few scattering trees clung, here

  “Then we’ll have to get started as soon

  and there, in the dry lava. But to the east, the

  as it is dark. What time do they give you

  early morning sun played its brilliant rays on a

  supper?”

  verdant slope, well studded with trees and

  “About dark and whoever brings it

  slashed with sparkling streamlets.

  always hurries away to his own supper.”

  Less than a mile to the south, cluster
ed

  “That’s good,” said Kirk, “it will give

  down among the trees, was a small barrio.

  us three hours’ start. They are not likely to

  Kirk decided to investigate the place at close

  miss you till the fellow comes on guard. I’ll

  range, so he turned to the western slope and,

  come this evening shortly before dark, and

  keeping below the ridge on that side, made his

  wait till the gugu brings your supper and

  way south till he was opposite the barrio.

  leaves. Then we’ll get busy.”

  Then slowly, carefully, with his rifle ready, he

  “But how will you manage it?”

  crawled up and peeped over the ridge.

  “I haven’t figured it yet,” he told her,

  The Call of the Jungle

  5

  “but I’ll have a way doped out by night. In the

  have taken exercise every day and am in good

  meantime, sleep if you can. There’s hiking to

  condition.”

  be done tonight. And now we had better stop

  They both knew the value of

  talking before we are heard.”

  conserving their energy, so they refrained

  Kirk settled down and studied the even from the questions that each was curious situation for some time; then he crept to his

  to ask and spoke only when absolutely

  own side of the ridge and found a safe place to

  necessary. Thus, in comparative silence, they

  pass the day. First he spent an hour putting a

  pursued their way down the slope, Miss

  fresh edge on his bayonet and after that Godard walking at Kirk’s side with a swinging stretched out and slept.

  step as springy as his own. Behind them was

  the menace of savage pursuit, before them a

  A LITTLE before dark the man was back at

  vast, untracked wilderness and yet they were

  his station near the girl’s prison, after a short cheerful, undaunted.

  wait he saw a native bring her supper and then