Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1917-10-31
CHAPTER l.
PauIvitch 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
davits.
Presently the attention of every man
was drawn from his dreaming or his
gOssiping to the northern bank of the
river. There, screaming at them in a
cracked falsetto, and with skinny arms
outstretched, stood strange appari-
ton of a man.
"Wot in thunder?" calculated one of
the crew.
"a white mani" muttered the mate
and then: Man the oars, boys, and
Wen just pull over an see what he
wants"
When they came close to the shore
they saw an emaciated creature with
scant white locks, tangled and matted.
The thin, bent body was naked save
for loin cloth. Tears were rolling
down the sunken, pockmarked cheeks.
The man jabbered at them in strange
tongue.
''Rooshun," hazarded the mate.
"Savvy English?p he called to the
man.
The scarecrOw did, and in that tongue,
brokenly and haltingly, as though it
had been many years since he had used
it, he begged them to take him with
them away from this awful country.
Once on board the Marjorie w. the
stranger told his rescuers a pitiful tale
of privation hariships and torture, ex-
tending over 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
che 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 supplanted the thick dark hair that
had once covered his head. His limbs
were bent and twisted he palked with
a shutting, unsteady gait, bis body
doubled forward. His teeth were gone
knocked out by his savage masters.
Even his mentality was but a sorry
mockery of what it once had been.
They took him aboard the Marjorie
W., and there they fed and nursed him.
He gained a little in strength, but his
appearance never altered for the bet
ter-a human derelict, 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 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 at an enormous cost. What the
product was none on board the Mar
jorie W. knew. except the scientists;
nor is it of any moment to US, other
than that ii led the ship to a certain
island off the coast of Africa after
Alexis Paulvitch 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 Paulvitch asked to accompany
them-he. too, was firing of the blight
Of
ship.
The island was heavily timbered.
Dense jungle ran down almost to the
beach. The scientists were far inland.
prosecuting their search for the valu-
able commodity that native rumOr
upon the mainland had led them to be-
lieve might be found here in market
able quantity.
The ships company fished, hunted
and explored. Paulyitch shufled up
and down The beach or lay in the shade
of the great trees that skirted it,
One day, as the men were gathered
at a little distance. inspecting the body
of panther that had fallen to the gun
of one of them who had been hunting
inland, Paulvitch lay sleeping beneath
his tree. He was awakened by the
touch Of a hand upon his shoulder.
With a start he sat up to see a huge
anthropoid ape squatting at his side,
inspecting him intently.
The Russian was thoroughly fright
ened. lie gla need toward the sailors
they were a couple Of hundred yards
away
Again the ape plucked at his shout
ders, iabbering plaintiYely. Paulyiteh