Page:The further side of silence (IA furthersideofsil00clifiala).pdf/280

 a twig, and presently began to scale the steep side of the hill. The earth was black, sodden, and slippery; the jungle was dense, and set with the cruel thorn thickets which cover the slopes of the interior; the gradient was like that of a thatched roof; and the climb made even Laish and Te-U pant with labour- ing breath, while old Sem-pak's lungs pumped pain- fully, emitting a noise like the roaring of a broken- winded horse. Up and up they scrambled, leaving hardly any trace of their ascent, and with that extraor- dinary absence of avoidable sound to which only the beasts of the forest, and their fellows, the wild Sakai, can attain. They never halted to take breath, but attacked the hill passionately, as though it were an enemy whom they were bent upon vanquishing; and at last the summit showed clearly through the tree trunks and underwood ahead of them.

Then Laish, who was leading, stopped dead in his tracks, gazing in front of him with the rigidity of a pointer at work; and the next moment, uttering an indescribable cry, half yell, half scream, he was tumbling down the slope, bearing the two women with him, rolling, falling, scrambling, heedless of the rending thorns and of the rude blows of branches, until they once more found themselves in the bed of the stream from which they had started to make the ascent. Old Sem-pak fell prone upon the ground, her chest heaving as though it imprisoned some wild thing that was seeking to effect its escape. Her eyes and those of her companions were wild with terror.