Page:The Cave Girl - Edgar Rice Burroughs.pdf/241

 your people and all my people have been slain by the Great Nagoola. Come down. Let us live together in peace. There is no other left in all the world.”

Nadara laughed at him.

“Come down to you!” she cried, mockingly. “Live with you! I would rather live with the pigs that root in the forest. Go away, or I will finish what I have commenced, and kill you. I would not live with you though I knew that you were the last human being on earth.”

Thurg pleaded and threatened, but all to no avail. Again he tried to clamber to her side, but again he was repulsed with well-aimed missiles. At last he withdrew, growling and threatening.

For weeks he haunted the vicinity of the cliff. Nadara’s meager food supply was soon exhausted. She was forced to descend to replenish her larder and fill her gourd, or die of starvation and thirst. She made her trips to the forest at night, though black Nagoola prowled and the menace of Thurg loomed through the darkness. At last the man discovered her in one of these nocturnal expeditions and almost caught her before she reached her ledge of safety.

For three days he kept her a close prisoner. Again her stock of provisions was exhausted. She was desperate. Twice had Nagoola nearly trapped