Bomba the jungle boy

The great wind, the forerunner of the tropical thunderstorm, had come at the moment of Bomba’s greatest need.

All creatures of the jungle fly to shelter before the fury of the storm. Bomba knew this full well, as did all living creatures of these wilds, large and small.

At the first blast of that fierce gale the parrakeets flew screaming to shelter. The animals of the forests rushed for their dens and the earth dwellers scurried into their holes.

Even the savage vultures retreated before the onset of the gale and the rain of castanha nuts shaken from the bending trees. Broken wings and broken heads would have resulted from the downfall of those dreaded missiles, heavy enough with their cups to kill a man.

Scarcely had the vultures winged upward in retreat before a second and stronger rush of wind warned Bomba and the group of bleeding and mourning monkeys, in whose behalf he had fought so stoutly, that the storm was preparing to burst.

Some of the monkeys had lost their young, others their mates. What affected Bomba most was the sight of old Tatuc lying dead on the ground in a pool of blood, his teeth imbedded in the neck of the vulture that he had taken to death with him.

But there was no time for mourning now. Tragedies like these were common in the cruel jungle where the life of one thrived on the death of others. So while a bitter ache shot through Bomba at the loss of Tatuc, his best and oldest friend of the monkey tribe, he dared not linger in the spot.

He gave a sharp word of command to the monkeys, dazed by the loss of their chief, and bade them seek shelter in the upper branches of the trees.

They obeyed slowly, bewilderedly, scarcely seeming to care much what happened to them, leaving their dead behind them on the ground. They would furnish a fine feast for the hungry vultures when they returned to the battlefield, as Bomba knew they would when the storm had passed.

But Bomba could not bear to leave Tatuc there at the mercy of his foes. It revolted him to think that the vultures should have him. He had been unable to save his life, but something prompted him to one last act of affection for his old friend. So he picked up the body, threw it over his shoulder and as rapidly as he could made his way to a safer place.

It was high time. The trees were bending before the lashing of the wind. The heavy castanha nuts were already beginning to fall with heavy thuds upon the ground. The sky above the waving crests of the trees showed a weird, leaden gray. The storm was ready to burst.

Bomba had scarcely taken a dozen steps carrying his heavy burden when the tempest broke. The rain came down in a stinging, blinding deluge that scourged him as though with whips. The wind increased to a gale, which, luckily, was at his back. No living thing could have faced it without being swept from its feet.

Bomba was swept along almost without his own volition. Head down, with the dead body of Tatuc held close to his own, he progressed more by the sense of touch than sight, heading toward a deserted native hut that he knew lay at a little distance.

The lightning cut the black of the sky with vicious thrusts. Crash after crash of thunder seemed to shake the very ground beneath the lad’s feet. But he reached the hut at last, and, climbing the prostrate deep-notched tree trunk that led to its entrance, slippery now with the rain, he deposited his lifeless burden on the floor, composed of a few rotting boards.

It was a typical native hut of the jungle. Long ago it had been deserted by its one-time tenants. It consisted of a few upright poles set in the ground, with cross supports to hold them steady. The flooring was made of split pieces of palm trunks, sagging in places.

The walls had been made of the same material, but now only two sides were left standing, the others being open to the assault of wind and weather. A light framework of thinner saplings supported the flimsy roof. This was made of the leaves of the ubussu palm, placed so that they overlapped one another.

Hundreds of creeping insects crawled slimily beneath the roof and now and then dropped upon the shoulders and head of Bomba, as he sat hunched up and brooding beside the body of the dead monkey, Tatuc, leader of the flock.

Once it was a scorpion that fell on the lad, and he was forced to act quickly to kill the creature, before it could inject into his veins the deadly poison of its bite.

For a long time Bomba sat brooding beside his dead companion. The rain swept down in torrents. The lightning crashed and the thunder roared and all nature was in pandemonium.

But the storms of the jungle, fierce while they last, are seldom of long duration. When at last the rain ceased and the last reverberating peal of thunder died away in the distance, Bomba rose with a sigh and for a few moments left Tatuc alone on the broken flooring of the hut.

Then with the machete and a sharp stick that he found near by, he dug a rude grave for his friend. The ground was soft, and the task did not take long.

This done, Bomba went to the hut, lifted the body of Tatuc, bore it to the long narrow hole in the ground, and placed the remains in it.

The boy stood for several minutes, head bowed, heart heavy, looking mournfully at all that was left of the friend whom he had known and cherished for many years. Bomba had many fond recollections of that friendship. It had supplied in large part what he had lacked in human companionship. How many times a visit to Tatuc had relieved his sore and lonely heart!

“The vultures shall not have you, Tatuc,” he said simply.

Then he covered the body with palm leaves and over them put earth. He finished his work by piling up a cairn of heavy stones, so that no marauding beast of the jungle should search out the resting place of his friend.

Then Bomba threw himself face downward near the spot. He lay there for a long time motionless. He was swept by an intolerable sense of loss.

It seemed to him that he was a mere atom in the world. Who would care whether he lived or died? The white men were gone. He did not believe that he would ever see them again. Tatuc was gone. Casson was left. But Casson had become a mere child again and could not remember, did not want to talk, was wrapped in apathy, as much of a companion as a stone image.

But he had talked once, had almost remembered! Perhaps if Bomba were patient he would remember more one day. Then perhaps Bomba would learn more of what he meant when he had spoken those words that were indelibly engraven upon the boy’s memory, “Bartow,” “Laura.”

Bomba raised himself from the ground and for the last time stood beside the grave of Tatuc.

“Good-bye,” he murmured, and then he choked.

Turning and dashing the tears from his eyes, he plunged into the rain-drenched jungle.

Turned, though he knew it not, toward a more grisly peril than he had yet encountered!