Page:The Cave Girl - Edgar Rice Burroughs.pdf/114

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
100
THE CAVE GIRL

Morning found Nadara sleeping in a sturdy tree upon the trail along which Waldo had followed Korth. She had discovered the footprints of the two men the evening before while she had been searching unsuccessfully for the trail which Waldo had followed after the battle. She hoped now that the spoor might lead her to Thandar’s cave, to which she felt it quite possible he might have returned by another way.

When the girl awoke she again took up her journey, following the tracks as unerringly as a hound up through the hilly country, across the divide and down into the jungle to the very watering place at which her tribe had drank a few days earlier. Here she made a brief stay.

Then on again down the river, back through the jungle and onto the divide once more. She was much mystified by the windings of the trail, but for days she followed the fading spoor until, becoming fainter and fainter as it grew older, she lost it entirely at last.

She was quite sure by now, however, that it led from her tribe’s former territory, and so she kept on, hoping against hope, that soon she would come across the fresh track of Thandar where he had passed her on his return journey to his home.

Nadara had eluded the old man when she started upon her search for Thandar, so it was that the old