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some almost to grotesqueness, though even such added to the charm and
romance of the landscape as the giant cacti render weirdly beautiful the waste
spots of the sad Mohave. And over all the sun shone huge and round and red, a
monster sun above a monstrous world, its light dispersed by the humid air of
Caspak--the warm, moist air which lies sluggish upon the breast of this great
mother of life, Nature's mightiest incubator.
All about me, in every direction, was life. It moved through the tree-tops and
among the boles; it displayed itself in widening and intermingling circles upon the
bosom of the sea; it leaped from the depths; I could hear it in a dense wood at my
right, the murmur of it rising and falling in ceaseless volumes of sound, riven at
intervals by a horrid scream or a thunderous roar which shook the earth; and
always I was haunted by that inexplicable sensation that unseen eyes were
watching me, that soundless feet dogged my trail. I am neither nervous nor
highstrung; but the burden of responsibility upon me weighed heavily, so that I
was more cautious than is my wont. I turned often to right and left and rear lest
I be surprised, and I carried my rifle at the ready in my hand. Once I could have
sworn that among the many creatures dimly perceived amidst the shadows of the
wood I saw a human figure dart from one cover to another, but I could not be
sure.
For the most part I skirted the wood, making occasional detours rather than
enter those forbidding depths of gloom, though many times I was forced to pass
through arms of the forest which extended to the very shore of the inland sea.
There was so sinister a suggestion in the uncouth sounds and the vague glimpses
of moving things within the forest, of the menace of strange beasts and possibly
still stranger men, that I always breathed more freely when I had passed once
more into open country.
I had traveled northward for perhaps an hour, still haunted by the conviction that
I was being stalked by some creature which kept always hidden among the trees
and shrubbery to my right and a little to my rear, when for the hundredth time I
was attracted by a sound from that direction, and turning, saw some animal
running rapidly through the forest toward me. There was no longer any effort on
its part at concealment; it came on through the underbrush swiftly, and I was
confident that whatever it was, it had finally gathered the courage to charge me
boldly. Before it finally broke into plain view, I became aware that it was not
alone, for a few yards in its rear a second thing thrashed through the leafy jungle.
Evidently I was to be attacked in force by a pair of hunting beasts or men.
And then through the last clump of waving ferns broke the figure of the foremost
creature, which came leaping toward me on light feet as I stood with my rifle to
my shoulder covering the point at which I had expected it would emerge. I must
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