Avon Fantasy Reader No. 11 — page 64: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The big man reached out and gave Loaga’s arm a shake. At the pressure the head-man twisted and beads of sweat broke out on his face. “May a boa swallow me, but you might be a wood-man yourself, master,” he grunted and stood caressing his bruised arm. “By Mumbo, your pinch shows how the Baloongas need courage to face the wood-men. How can we get it except through the broiled meat of brave men?” The big Englishman turned away from the head-man and moved back down the street. For the Baloongas to hang their bravery and prowess in hunting gorillas on cannibalism; the idiocy of the custom bit at Mogglesby’s necves. Again he thought of bringing down English soldiers and wiping out the whole village; murdering them en masse because they insisted on murdering one another singly. That seemed right to Mogglesby. His thoughts were interrupted by the continued pounding down the street. The thoroughfare was still wrapped in pray shadows. The girl and her well sweep pestle formed a charcoal study against the stake wall that sur- rounded the village. She wore only a skirt of grass about her loins and her slender body lifted and fell to the rhythm of. her work. The white man walked on, pondering what he must do to stamp out the curse of the Baloongas when this was flung from his thoughts by the barley girl venting a wild shriek. The end of the pestle sweep banged to the ground. The next moment Mogglesby saw the girl flying for a hut, screaming as if demented. Then. he saw a big shadowy form run along the top of the staked fence. It made a long simian leap to the ground and flashed after the girl with horrible speed. The huge Englishman dashed at the thing, bellowing for Loaga at the top of his lungs. The next instant the simian had the girl around the waist and was scuttling back to the staked fence, bearing a hideous resemblance to a great hairy spider with a fly. Mogglesby sprinted forward. As he went, he stooped, seized a stone and flung it with a stiff arm, like a cricket bowler. He prayed God he would miss the girl. And the missile did thud against the broad back of the simian just above the buttocks. Its bounds broke down into a scrambling shuffle. The thing flung a glance backward over its high shoulders and must have seen the Englishman on top of him and a dozen black men with assegats just behind, for suddenly it dropped the girl, and went up the stakes at a swift hand-over-hand ascent, whipped its body to the other side and dropped just as a half dozen spears plunked into the top of the stockade. Negroes and white man went flying pell-mell for the gate and dashed around to the place where the gorilla had taken the wall. Sure enough, they saw it shuffling off toward the banana field. The Baloongas flew after it with poised spears, yelling and howling. The animal came to bay immediately in front of a heavy curtain of banana leaves and made its stand. There was something horribly human in its fangs and sunken eyes and enormous reach. It started back at the warriors. The Baloongas dashed up within ten feet of the monster and let fly their spears. The devilish looking thing roared, tried to tear out the blades that impaled 62 COMiclOOkKS.COM