It was simple. Wit must
play the greater part, wit that invades a sleeping camp, risks its
life, and laughs at its victory. So would she work in the late hours
when revelry had worked its own undoing. Now she would learn the camp
and the safest side of it, the place of the captives and a way of
escape. With thought and eager plan she pushed from her mind the look
of McElroy's body.
She would--
In the darkness she stopped with inheld breath. Her groping foot had
touched an object, a soft object that stirred and rolled over on its
side and presently sat up. So near it was that she could feel the
movements of its garments, which fact told her it was human.
Then, without warning, a hand shot out and caught her knee in a grip of
steel. With all her strength the girl tore away, leaping backward. But
a tangle of vines snatched at her foot and she fell crashing forward
with a figure prone upon her, and in the darkness she fought silently
for life.
As in the camp of the Nakonkirhirinons the thin veneer had slipped
away, so now in the forest its heavier counterpart fell from this woman
and she turned savage as the thing with which she fought.
Of superb stature and strength, she was a match for the man, and two
pairs of hands searched for a throat, two bodies strained and struggled
for the mastery.
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