Read "When Super-Apes Plot" by Wilder Anthony online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
WHEN Hardin and Batu were startled by the rifle shot and Irene's screams for help, the Dyak had been a little in front of his companion and almost in the act of lowering himself into the cockpit where the twin engines were situated. In this part of the seaplane it was very dark, and although he turned instantly Batu could not see his employer. He heard him, however, run to the side and dive overboard, and he followed as quickly as he could, but he was just far enough behind to be still some twenty yards from the beach when the sounds of a tremendous struggle and the subsequent silence told him that Hardin had been overcome.
For a while he treaded water there in the dark, listening and straining his eyes for some clew to what was going on. He heard a few guttural remarks among the Bamangani which told him that all of his friends had been made prisoners; then he saw a number of dark forms leave the beach and heard a rustling of the vines which showed that the ape-men had proceeded inland. From this he guessed that the captives had been carried to the camp, from which they would probably be next day transported to the Bamangani village at the base of the volcano. Satisfied that he could do nothing to help his friends just then, the Dyak turned around and slowly swam back to the Condor.