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Updated: June 26, 2025
Warruk looked steadfastly at the light flickering on the riverbank, far, far away. He turned his gaze in the other direction where lay the untold miles of untrodden wastes that were his kingdom, to have and to hold so long as he chose. He faced the river; the turtle battalions were emerging from the water as before, causing scarcely a ripple.
When the break in the wall of the insects' domicile admitted a flood of daylight into the heretofore darkened interior, the ants rushed out in a solid stream to investigate the cause of the disturbance; and the ant-eater's whip-like tongue promptly gathered them up by the thousands. Warruk watched the proceedings from his perch in the tree.
At the same time she chided him for his disobedience and again tried to impress upon him the peril of venturing too near the outer world while she was away. And childlike, Warruk remembered the lesson for a period of exactly one day. Again Suma was away, working havoc among the smaller wildfolk. Time hung heavy and the light of the world beyond his horizon exerted a stronger fascination than ever.
In a flash the scale-covered coils would be thrown about the cub, crushing him into pulp. Warruk shot forward as if hurled from a catapult not at the snake, but over its head, soaring above it a distance of fully two feet. He struck the side of the circular prison with a thud, rebounded instantly and landed on the neck of the great serpent before it could turn to follow his movements.
The latter were the treasures the ruthless creature sought and after crushing the shells it lapped up their contents with audible gusto. Warruk could endure the scene no longer. His enemy, busily engaged in the pleasurable task of eating, might be easier to handle; or, at least he could inflict painful injury to his lower extremities.
He struck at it, ran after it and jumped on top of it but it always escaped him; for the puzzling thing was only the shadow cast by a bunch of trumpet-flower dangling high overhead. The antics of Warruk had not escaped the watchful eye of Myla, the bereft monkey. And in her eagerness to see the better she descended to the lower branches and leaned far out over the ridge of the windfall.
Mad with hate and fury she raced along the ground roaring and whining in turn while Myla bounded through the leafy canopy high overhead; and in chorus with the cries of anguish from below, and the triumphant chatter of the monkey, came the screams of Warruk terror-striken and helpless, rushing headlong to certain doom.
The separations became of longer duration the pleasure of the reunions less and less. And, presently Suma lost all thought of Warruk as the time for choosing a mate drew near. As for the cub he was free; free as the wind that swept the wild wastes of land and water comprising the desolate pantenal country. And he reveled in his new liberty.
That is exactly as Nature intended it should be for, if either man or beast spent the time brooding over the many things that could happen, life would be a perpetual torment and probably of short duration. Warruk, the black Jaguar, lived with a measure of joyousness that was brimming over. He was thrilled with the vastness of his world and with the possibilities that arose each day.
And Warruk, even if the urge to explore and to conquer new fields were not impelling him, fled the scenes of desolation and guided by instinct made for the broad river where food and water must be abundant. Both by day and by night he travelled, stopping for a short rest only during the early morning hours. Nor was he alone.
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