As though escaping from the clutches of some hideous nightmare, I felt
the power of movement returning. My arms and legs twitched playfully,
the warm blood coursed through my back again, my hair subsided, and my
mouth instinctively opened to let forth a loud cry for help.
Croft was at my side instantly, tugging at the dead weight which lay
across my legs. Bruised and shaken, I wriggled my way back to freedom.
Then we staggered over to the cage, gulped down a brandy, pocketed our
revolvers and returned to the fray.
Ten minutes later, all the gorillas, except Little Willie, were safely
bound, the gas was turned off and we were sitting in the cage again,
slowly recuperating. The perspiration was streaming from me, my hands
and knees were trembling, and I felt as weak as a man recovering from a
severe attack of influenza.
"It--never rains--but it pours!" panted Croft.
"Yes!" I gasped. "Even the perspiration! . . . We're understaffed. It's
too much--for only two of us."
Having no desire for further captures that afternoon, we presently
fired half-a-dozen revolver shots to scare off any intending intruders
and then let up the balloons with a string of five Stars and Stripes
and Union Jacks attached, as a signal to the aerodrome.
With a very luke-warm interest, after so much excitement, we watched
the gorillas slowly regain consciousness, and listened sympathetically
to the male's language when he fully awoke to the general state of
affairs. It must have been extremely galling to find himself sitting
bound, helpless and dazed, after the dramatic and promising appearance
which he had made only a few minutes previously. But to suffer this
indignity in full view of his womenfolk must indeed have been draining
the cup of misery to the dregs.
Whether or not the others were taunting him I do not know, but after
listening to some of their softer and more ladylike remarks, he broke
out into a terrible paroxysm of fury, glaring in our direction and
barking and roaring at us for quite five minutes with hardly a pause
for breath. Add to this deafening noise the encouraging screams of the
three young females, the croaks of the old grandmother, and the harsh
yells of Little Willie as he dashed to and fro, deliberately fanning
the flames of hatred and revenge. The result may be imagined. Our
bruised nerves threatened to give way under the strain.
"Give 'em a little gas, for the love of glory!" shouted Croft.
In this way we quietened them down, until Gran'pa arrived from the
aerodrome, followed by a single file of stretcher bearers.
"This is very gratifying, George," he said. "When I counted those flags
I could hardly believe my eyes. You get extraordinary luck. Everything
you touch seems to turn to--gorilla!"
The gas having been cut off, the chorus of hate broke loose again.
"We can't have this din," shouted Gran'pa.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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