Free trader-journal. (Ottawa, Ill.) 1916-1920, 1917-10-20
Copyright by
Frank A. Munsey Co.
CHAPTER !.
Paulvitch and an Ape.


The Marjorie WIS long boat was
floating down the broad Ugambi with
ebb tide and current. Her crew were
lazily enjoying this respite from the
arduOus labor of rowing upstream.
Three miles below them lay the Mar
jorie herself, quite ready to sail SO
soon as they should have clambered
aboard and swung the long boat to its
davis.
Presently the attention of every man
was drawn from his dreaming or his
gosAping to the northern bank of the
river. There, screaming ut them in Il
cracked falsetto. and with skinny arms
OutStretched stood Il strange appari.
tionsof man.
Not IN thunder?' calculated one Of
the crew.
X white mnn!" muttered the mate.
andsthetf: '.afdfi me oars, boys, and
Wen just pull over an see what he
wants."
When they came close to the shore
theys saw an emaclatcd creature with
scant hite ,ckS. i4nglca and Iiaft,I.
The thin, Lent body WAS max d 80 va
for n loin cloth. Tears were rolli..s.
down the sunken. pockmarkcd checks.
Thednan jabbered at them in II strange
tongue.
"Rooshun," hazarded the mate.
"Savvy English he called to the
man.
The scarecrow did, and in that tongue,
br0kenly and haItingly, as though it
had been many years since he had used
1t, he begged them to take him with
them away from this awful country.
Once on board the Marjorie W. the
stranger told his reScuers Il pitiful tale
Of privati0n. hardshipS and torture, eX-
tending over Il period of ten years.
How he happened to have come to
Africa he did not tell them, leaving
them to assume that he had forgotten
the Incidents of his life prior to the
frightful ordeals that had wrecked him
mentally and physically. His name, he
said, was Alexis PaulvitCh.
A few scraggly yellow-white locks
had suppanted the thick dark hair that
had once covered his head. His limbs
were bent and twisted he walked with
shllflllng, unsteady gait, his body
doubled forward. His teeth were gone
knocked out by his savage masters.
Even his mentality was but sorry
mOckery of what it once had been.
They tool; him aboard the Marjorie
W., and there they fed and nursed him.
He gained little in strength, but his
appearance never altered for the bet
teri human dereict, battered and
wrecked they had found him; human
derelict, battered and wrecked, he
would remain until death claimed him.
Alexis Paulvitch could easily have
passed for eighty.
The Marjorie W. had been chartered
by a. syndicate of wealthy manufac-
turers equipped with a laboratory and
staff of scientists and sent out to
search for some natural product which
the manufacturers who footed the bills
had been importing from South Amer
lea ut an enormous cost. What the
product was none on board the Mar
jOrie, w. knew except the scientists !;
nor Ia 1t Of any moment to us, other
than that It led the ship to Il certain
island off the coast of Africa after
Alexis Pauvitch had been taken
aboard.
The ship lay at anchor off the coast
for several weeks. The monotony Of
life aboard her became trying for the
crew. They went often ashore and
finally Pnulvtch asked to accompany
them--he, too, was firing of the blight
Ing sameness Of existence upon the
ship.
The island was heavily timbered
Dense jungle ran down almost TO the
beach. The scientists were far inlund
prosecuting their search for the valu.
able commodity that native rumof
upon the mainland had led them to be-
lleve might be- found here in market
able quantity.
The ships company fshed, hunted
and explored, ,PaWyltch .shuIiled up
and down the beach or lay In the shade