The Land of Terror

'There’s the village!' barked Long Tom.

The cluster of thatched huts had been lost among the coconut palms at the lagoon edge. They looked like shaggy, dark beehives on stilts.

Natives dashed about, excited by the plane. They were well-built fellows, gaudy pareusof tapacloth, made from the bark of the paper mulberry, girded about their hips. Many had tropical blooms in their hair, a number of the women wearing a blossom over an ear. Some of the men had scroll-like designs in blue amaink upon their bodies, making them quite ugly, judged by civilized standards.

Several prahusappeared on the lagoon, each boat filled with perturbed natives. The brown men grasped spears, and knives of bamboo as sharp as a razor, which could be sharpened again simply by splitting a piece from the blade.

'They seem kinda excited!' Monk grunted.

'Yes — entirely too excited!' Doc replied thoughtfully.

* * *

DOC’S big plane wheeled over the atoll as gracefully as a mighty gull. It dipped. With a swis- s-s-hof a noise, the floats settled on the glass-smooth lagoon.

The prahusfilled with natives fled as though the very devil was after them. Thousands of koi, a black bird which travels in dense flocks, arose from the luxuriant jungle. As Doc cut the motors, they could hear the excited notes of cockatoos.

'I don’t like the way they’re acting,' Doc warned. 'We’d better keep our eyes open, brothers!'

He grounded the plane near the cluster of thatched huts. Tall palm trees showed evidence of being cultivated for coconuts — at least, they were fitted with the ingenious native traps for the destructive tupacrab.

The traps consisted of a false 'earth' well up the tree. The crabs, wont to descend the palms backward, upon touching these 'earths,' would release their grip on the tree under the impression they were on the ground, thus falling to destruction.

Suddenly Ham gave a startled yelp, and dropping his sword cane, clapped a hand to his leg. An instant later, the fiendish, chuckling echoes of a rifle shot leaped along the lagoon.

Some one was sniping at them!

More bullets buzzed loudly near the plane.

Ham was barely scratched. He was the first to dive out of the plane and take shelter among the palms. The others followed, guns ready.

Doc’s golden eyes noted a surprising thing. The shot seemed as much of a shock to the natives as to the flyers!

After a moment, Doc’s perceptive ears caught a word or two of the native language. He recognized the lingo — it was one of the myriads of vernaculars in his great magazine of knowledge.

'Why do you treat peaceful newcomers in this fashion?' he called in the dialect.

The natives were impressed by hearing their language spoken in such perfect fashion by the mighty bronze man. Soon they replied.

For some minutes, strange words clucked back and forth. The tension subsided visibly. The very power of Doc’s pleasant voice seemed to spread good will.

'This is strange!' Doc told his fellows, none of whom comprehended the native tongue. 'They don’t know who fired that shot. They’re trying to tell me they thought there were no rifles on the island!'

'They’re liars!' Monk grinned. 'Or else the bumblebees here are made out of lead.'

'They’re wrong, of course,' Doc replied thoughtfully. 'But I’m sure they did not know there was a rifle here. There was apparently but one gun, at that.'

'We’d better stop gabbing and hunt for the sniper!' Ham clipped waspishly. 'In case you’ve forgotten, he nearly winged me!'

'Keep your shirt on, Ham.' Doc indicated natives who were prowling off through the tropical growth. 'They’re instituting a search for the hidden marksman.'

* * *

THE sniper was not located, though. The natives searched briskly for a time, but the natural languidness common to tropical folk soon caused them to lose interest when they found nobody. Standing around in groups and staring at the white men, especially their mighty leader of bronze, was much more interesting.

'It never fails!' Monk chuckled. 'Doc is a sensation wherever he goes!'

Ham cast his eyes over the crowd surrounding Monk. This was only slightly smaller than the group about Doc. Monk’s incredible homeliness and titanic, apelike frame had them utterly agog.

'You don’t do so bad!' Ham jeered. 'They figure you’re the missing link!'

But he regretted the insult a moment later when Monk cornered a native and gravely explained, by gestures, that the tribe must watch the many pigs running about, or Ham would steal them. It didn’t help matters when fully thirty natives ran up with squealing porkers in their arms and tried to thrust the gifts onto Ham.

Renny was entertaining and overawing the islanders by the amazing feat of crushing hard coconuts in one vast hand.

Johnny and Long Tom, well-armed and alert, moved into the jungle to get breadfruit which weighed several pounds apiece and were pitted on the surface like a golf ball. Delicate, beautiful orchids were like varicolored butterflies in the shadowed, luxuriant growth. The hunters also gathered coconuts, so as to make feikai, or roasted breadfruit mixed with coconut-milk sauce.

Oliver Wording Bittman wandered alone into the jungle, but returned soon and kept close to Doc, as though for protection.

Doc busied himself performing a minor operation upon an ill native. He was thus engaged when an exciting development occurred.

A machine gun blatted a procession of reports. By the terrific swiftness of the shots, Doc knew it was one of the guns he had himself invented.

A man screamed with a mortal wound.

Kar-o-o-m!

A tremendous explosion brought a tremor to the hut in which Doc was operating upon the native. He and Bittman rushed out.

Near the plane, a sooty cauliflower of smoke had sprouted. Bits of dйbris still swirled in the air. It fell about a gruesome, torn thing upon the lagoon edge. The dismembered body of a man!

'It was one of Kar’s gunmen!' Renny called. Renny held a smoking machine gun. 'The fellow had a bomb, with the fuse already lighted! He was running to throw it in the plane when I saw him and shot.'

'Sure it was one of Kar’s men?' Doc inquired.

'You bet. One of the four we hoped to trap on the Sea Star!'

'

That is too bad,' Doc declared regretfully. 'It means the yacht which took them off the Sea Starwas speedy enough to get here ahead of us.'

'You think Kar is right here on this coral atoll?'

Instead of replying, Doc proceeded to question what his accurate judgment told him were the most intelligent of the natives. What he learned cast an important light on the situation.

'Listen to this!' he translated for his friends. 'I asked the natives if they had seen a ship, but they haven’t. Then I asked them if they had sighted a man-made bird that flies, such as ours. And the answer explains their terror at our arrival.'

'You mean Kar came around in a plane and bombed or machine gunned them?' Ham queried.

'Nothing so simple as that! The reply they gave me was utterly fantastic. They claim great, flying devils nearly as large as our plane sometimes come from Thunder Island to seize and devour members of the tribe. They thought we were such a flying devil.'

'They must drink caterpillar liquor!' Monk snorted.