Adventure stories; Fantasy fiction; Tarzan (Fictitious character) -- Fiction
But Usula had heard strange tales in the village of Obebe the cannibal
where rumor had brought him in search of his beloved master, The Big
Bwana. Obebe had seen nor heard nothing of Tarzan of the Apes. Not for
years had he seen the giant white. He assured Usula of this fact many
times; but from other members of the tribe the Waziri learned that a
white man had been kept a prisoner by Obebe for a year or more and that
some time since he had escaped. At first Usula thought this white man
might have been Tarzan but when he verified the statement of the time
that had elapsed since the man was captured he knew that it could not
have been his master, and so he turned back along the trail toward
home; but when he saw the child's bone along the trail several days
out he recalled the story of the missing Uhha and he paused, just for a
moment, to look at the bone. And as he looked he saw something else--a
small skin bag, lying among some more bones a few feet off the trail.
Usula stooped and picked up the bag. He opened it and poured some of
the contents into his palm. He knew what the things were and he knew
that they had belonged to his master, for Usula was a head-man who knew
much about his master's affairs. These were the diamonds that had been
stolen from The Big Bwana many moons before by the white men who had
found Opar. He would take them back to The Big Bwana's lady.
Three days later as he moved silently along the trail close to the
great thorn forest he came suddenly to a halt, the hand grasping his
heavy spear tensing in readiness. In a little open place he saw a man,
an almost naked man, lying upon the ground. The man was alive--he saw
him move--but what was he doing? Usula crept closer, making no noise.
He moved around until he could observe the man from another angle and
then he saw a horrid sight. The man was white and he lay beside the
carcass of long-dead buffalo, greedily devouring the remnants of hide
that clung to the bleaching bones.
The man raised his head a little and Usula, catching a better view of
his face, gave a cry of horror. Then the man looked up and grinned. It
was The Big Bwana!
Usula ran to him and raised him upon his knees, but the man only
laughed and babbled like a child. At his side, caught over one of the
horns of the buffalo, was The Big Bwana's golden locket with the great
diamonds set in it. Usula replaced it about the man's neck. He built
a strong shelter for him nearby and hunted food, and for many days he
remained until the man's strength came back; but his mind did not come
back. And thus, in this condition, the faithful Usula led home his
master.
They found many wounds and bruises upon his body and his head, some
old, some new, some trivial, some serious; and they sent to England for
a great surgeon to come out to Africa and seek to mend the poor thing
that once had been Tarzan of the Apes.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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