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肩書を与える: Wings in the Night
Author: Robert E.Howard
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Language: English
Date first 地位，任命するd:  May 2006
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Wings in the Night

by

Robert E.Howard

A SOLOMON KANE STORY

First published in Weird Tales, July 1932

This e-調書をとる／予約する 版: 事業／計画（する） Gutenberg Australia, 2020

Weird Tales, July 1932

持つ／拘留するing those keen fangs at bay, Kane managed to draw
his dirk and 急落（する），激減（する） it 深い into the monster's 団体／死体.

A Solomon Kane story of Darkest Africa and nightmare 存在s
with slavering fangs and talons 法外なd in shuddersome evil.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. — THE HORROR ON THE STAKE

SOLOMON KANE leaned on his strangely carved staff and gazed in scowling perplexity at the mystery which spread silently before him. Many a 砂漠d village Kane had seen in the months that had passed since he turned his 直面する east from the Slave Coast and lost himself in the mazes of ジャングル and river, but never one like this.

It was not 飢饉 that had driven away the inhabitants, for yonder the wild rice still grew 階級 and unkempt in the untilled fields. There were no Arab slave-raiders in this nameless land—it must have been a 部族の war that 荒廃させるd the village, Kane decided, as he gazed sombrely at the scattered bones and grinning skulls that littered the space の中で the 階級 少しのd and grasses. These bones were 粉々にするd and 後援d, and Kane saw jackals and a hyena furtively slinking の中で the 廃虚d huts. But why had the slayers left the spoils? There lay war spears, their 軸s 崩壊するing before the attacks of the white ants. There lay 保護物，者s, mouldering in the rains and sun. There lay the cooking マリファナs, and about the neck-bones of a 粉々にするd 骸骨／概要 glistened a necklace of gaudily painted pebbles and 爆撃するs—surely rare 略奪する for any savage 征服者／勝利者.

He gazed at the huts, wondering why the thatch roofs of so many were torn and rent, as if by taloned things 捜し出すing 入り口. Then something made his 冷淡な 注目する，もくろむs 狭くする in startled unbelief. Just outside the mouldering 塚 that was once the village 塀で囲む towered a gigantic baobab tree, branchless for sixty feet, its mighty bole too large to be gripped and 規模d. Yet in the topmost 支店s dangled a 骸骨／概要, 明らかに impaled on a broken 四肢.

The 冷淡な 手渡す of mystery touched the shoulder of Solomon Kane. How （機の）カム those pitiful remains in that tree? Had some monstrous ogre's 残忍な 手渡す flung them there?

Kane shrugged his 幅の広い shoulders and his 手渡す unconsciously touched the 黒人／ボイコット butts of his 激しい ピストルs, the hilt of his long rapier, and the dirk in his belt. Kane felt no 恐れる as an ordinary man would feel, 直面するd with the Unknown and Nameless. Years of wandering in strange lands and warring with strange creatures had melted away from brain, soul, and 団体／死体 all that was not steel and whalebone. He was tall and spare, almost gaunt, built with the savage economy of the wolf. 幅の広い-shouldered, long-武装した, with 神経s of ice and thews of spring steel, he was no いっそう少なく the natural 殺し屋 than the born swordsman.

The brambles and thorns of the ジャングル had dealt hardly with him; his 衣料品s hung in tatters, his featherless slouch hat was torn and his boots of Cordovan leather were scratched and worn. The sun had baked his chest and 四肢s to a 深い bronze, but his ascetically lean 直面する was impervious to its rays. His complexion was still of that strange, dark pallor which gave him an almost 死体-like 外見, belied only by his 冷淡な, light 注目する，もくろむs.

And now Kane, 広範囲にわたる the village once more with his searching gaze, pulled his belt into a more comfortable position, 転換d to his left 手渡す the cat-長，率いるd 突き破る N'Longa had given him, and took up his way again.

To the west lay a （土地などの）細長い一片 of thin forest, sloping downward to a 幅の広い belt of savannas, a waving sea of grass waist-深い and deeper. Beyond that rose another 狭くする （土地などの）細長い一片 of woodlands, 深くするing 速く into dense ジャングル. Out of that ジャングル Kane had fled like a 追跡（する）d wolf with pointed-toothed men hot on his 追跡する. Even now a 浮浪者 微風 brought faintly the throb of a savage 派手に宣伝する which whispered its obscene tale of hate and 血-hunger and belly-lust across miles of ジャングル and 牧草地.

The memory of his flight and 狭くする escape was vivid in Kane's mind, for only the day before had he realized too late that he was in cannibal country, and all that afternoon in the reeking stench of the 厚い ジャングル, he had crept and run and hidden and 二塁打d and 新たな展開d on his 跡をつける with the 猛烈な／残忍な hunters ever の近くに behind him, until night fell and he 伸び（る）d and crossed the 牧草地s under cover of 不明瞭.

Now in the late morning he had seen nothing, heard nothing of his pursuers, yet he had no 推論する／理由 to believe that they had abandoned the chase. They had been の近くに on his heels when he took to the savannas.

So Kane 調査するd the land in 前線 of him. To the east, curving from north to south ran a straggling 範囲 of hills, for the most part 乾燥した，日照りの and barren, rising in the south to a jagged 黒人／ボイコット skyline that reminded Kane of the 黒人／ボイコット hills of Negari. Between him and these hills stretched a 幅の広い expanse of gently rolling country, thickly treed, but nowhere approaching the 濃度／密度 of a ジャングル. Kane got the impression of a 広大な upland 高原, bounded by the curving hills to the east and by the savannas to the west.

Kane 始める，決める out for the hills with his long, swinging, tireless stride. Surely somewhere behind him the 黒人／ボイコット demons were stealing after him, and he had no 願望（する） to be driven to bay. A 発射 might send them 飛行機で行くing in sudden terror, but on the other 手渡す, so low they were in the 規模 of humanity, it might 送信する／伝染させる no supernatural 恐れる to their dull brains. And not even Solomon Kane, whom Sir Francis Drake had called Devon's king of swords, could 勝利，勝つ in a pitched 戦う／戦い with a whole tribe.

The silent village with its 重荷（を負わせる） of death and mystery faded out behind him. Utter silence 統治するd の中で these mysterious uplands where no birds sang and only a silent macaw flitted の中で the 広大な／多数の／重要な trees. The only sounds were Kane's cat-like tread, and the whisper of the 派手に宣伝する-haunted 微風.

And then Kane caught a glimpse の中で the trees that made his heart leap with a sudden, nameless horror, and a few moments later he stood before Horror itself, stark and grisly. In a wide （疑いを）晴らすing, on a rather bold incline stood a grim 火刑／賭ける, and to this 火刑／賭ける was bound a thing that had once been a 黒人／ボイコット man. Kane had 列／漕ぐ／騒動d, chained to the （法廷の）裁判 of a Turkish galley, and he had toiled in Barbary vineyards; he had 戦う／戦いd red Indians in the New Lands and had languished in the dungeons of Spain's Inquisition. He knew much of the fiendishness of man's inhumanity, but now he shuddered and grew sick. Yet it was not so much the ghastliness of the mutilations, horrible as they were, that shook Kane's soul, but the knowledge that the wretch still lived.

For as he drew 近づく, the gory 長，率いる that lolled on the butchered breast 解除するd and 投げ上げる／ボディチェックするd from 味方する to 味方する, spattering 血 from the stumps of ears, while a bestial, 動揺させるing whimper drooled from the shredded lips.

Kane spoke to the 恐ろしい thing and it 叫び声をあげるd unbearably, writhing in incredible contortions, while its 長，率いる jerked up and 負かす／撃墜する with the jerking of mangled 神経s, and the empty, gaping 注目する，もくろむ-sockets seemed 努力する／競うing to see from their emptiness. And moaning low and brain-shatteringly it 密談する／（身体を）寄せ集めるd its 乱暴／暴力を加えるd self against the 火刑／賭ける where it was bound and 解除するd its 長，率いる in a grisly 態度 of listening, as if it 推定する／予想するd something out of the skies.

"Listen," said Kane, in the dialect of the river tribes. "Do not 恐れる me—I will not 害（を与える） you and nothing else shall 害（を与える） you any more. I am going to loose you."

Even as he spoke Kane was 激しく aware of the emptiness of his words. But his 発言する／表明する had filtered dimly into the 崩壊するing, agony-発射 brain of the man before him. From between 後援d teeth fell words, 滞るing and uncertain, mixed and mingled with the slavering droolings of imbecility. He spoke a language akin to the dialects Kane had learned from friendly river folk on his wanderings, and Kane gathered that he had been bound to the 火刑／賭ける for a long time—many moons, he whimpered in the delirium of approaching death; and all this time, 残忍な, evil things had worked their monstrous will upon him. These things he について言及するd by 指名する, but Kane could make nothing of it for he used an unfamiliar 称する，呼ぶ／期間／用語 that sounded like Akaana. But these things had not bound him to the 火刑／賭ける, for the torn wretch slavered the 指名する of Goru, who was a priest and who had drawn a cord too tight about his 脚s—and Kane wondered that the memory of this small 苦痛 should ぐずぐず残る through the red mazes of agony that the dying man should whimper over it.

And to Kane's horror, the 黒人／ボイコット spoke of his brother who had 補佐官d in the binding of him, and he wept with infantile sobs. Moisture formed in the empty sockets and made 涙／ほころびs of 血. And he muttered of a spear broken long ago in some 薄暗い 追跡（する）, and while he muttered in his delirium, Kane gently 削減（する） his 社債s and 緩和するd his broken 団体／死体 to the grass. But even at the Englishman's careful touch, the poor wretch writhed and howled like a dying dog, while 血 started もう一度 from a 得点する／非難する／２０ of 恐ろしい gashes, which, Kane 公式文書，認めるd, were more like the 負傷させるs made by fang and talon than by knife or spear. But at last it was done and the 血まみれの, torn thing lay on the soft grass with Kane's, old slouch hat beneath its death's-長，率いる, breathing in 広大な／多数の／重要な, 動揺させるing gasps.

Kane 注ぐd water from his canteen between the mangled lips, and bending の近くに, said: "Tell me more of these devils, for by the God of my people, this 行為 shall not go unavenged, though Satan himself 妨げる／法廷，弁護士業 my way."

It is doubtful if the dying man heard. But he heard something else. The macaw, with the curiosity of its 産む／飼育する, swept from a 近づく-by grove and passed so の近くに its 広大な／多数の／重要な wings fanned Kane's hair. And at the sound of those wings, the butchered 黒人／ボイコット man heaved upright and 叫び声をあげるd in a 発言する／表明する that haunted Kane's dreams to the day of his death: "The wings! the wings! They come again! Ahhh, mercy, the wings!"

And the 血 burst in a 激流 from his lips and so he died.

KANE rose and wiped the 冷淡な sweat from his forehead. The upland forest shimmered in the noonday heat. Silence lay over the land like an enchantment of dreams. Kane's brooding 注目する，もくろむs 範囲d to the 黒人／ボイコット, malevolent hills crouching in the distance and 支援する to the far-away savannas. An 古代の 悪口を言う／悪態 lay over that mysterious land and the 影をつくる／尾行する of it fell across the soul of Solomon Kane.

Tenderly he 解除するd the red 廃虚 that had once pulsed with life and 青年 and vitality, and carried it to the 辛勝する／優位 of the glade, where arranging the 冷淡な 四肢s as best he might, and shuddering once again at the unnameable mutilations, he piled 石／投石するs above it till even a prowling jackal would find it hard to get at the flesh below.

And he had scarcely finished when something jerked him 支援する out of his sombre broodings to a 現実化 of his own position. A slight sound—or his own wolf-like instinct—made him whirl.

On the other 味方する of the glade he caught a movement の中で the tall grasses—the glimpse of a hideous 黒人／ボイコット 直面する, with an ivory （犯罪の）一味 in the flat nose, 厚い lips parted to 明らかにする／漏らす teeth whose とじ込み／提出するd points were 明らかな even at that distance, beady 注目する，もくろむs and a low slanting forehead topped by a mop of frizzy hair. Even as the 直面する faded from 見解（をとる） Kane leaped 支援する into the 避難所 of the （犯罪の）一味 of trees which circled the glade, and ran like a deer-hound, flitting from tree to tree and 推定する／予想するing at each moment to hear the exultant clamour of the 軍人s and to see them break cover at his 支援する.

But soon he decided that they were content to 追跡（する） him 負かす／撃墜する as 確かな beasts 跡をつける their prey, slowly and 必然的に. He 急いでd through the upland forest, taking advantage of every bit of cover, and he saw no more of his pursuers; yet he knew, as a 追跡（する）d wolf knows, that they hovered の近くに behind him, waiting their moment to strike him 負かす／撃墜する without 危険 to their own hides.

Kane smiled bleakly and without mirth. If it was to be a 実験（する） of endurance, he would see how savage thews compared with his own spring-steel resilience. Let night come and he might yet give them the slip. If not—Kane knew in his heart that the savage essence of his very 存在 which chafed at his flight, would make him soon turn at bay, though his pursuers より数が多いd him a hundred to one.

The sun sank 西方の. Kane was hungry, for he had not eaten since 早期に morning when he wolfed 負かす／撃墜する the last of his 乾燥した，日照りのd meat. An 時折の spring had given him water, and once he thought he glimpsed the roof of a large hut far away through the trees. But he gave it a wide 寝台／地位. It was hard to believe that this silent 高原 was 住むd, but if it were, the natives were doubtless as ferocious as those 追跡（する）ing him.

Ahead of him the land grew rougher, with broken 玉石s and 法外な slopes as he 近づくd the lower reaches of the brooding hills. And still no sight of his hunters except for faint glimpses caught by 用心深い backward ちらりと見ることs—a drifting 影をつくる／尾行する, the bending of the grass, the sudden straightening of a trodden twig, a rustle of leaves. Why should they be so 用心深い? Why did they not の近くに in and have it over?

Night fell and Kane reached the first long slopes which led 上向き to the foot of the hills which now brooded 黒人／ボイコット and 脅迫的な above him. They were his goal, where he hoped to shake off his 執拗な 敵s at last, yet a nameless aversion 警告するd him away from them. They were 妊娠している with hidden evil, repellent as the coil of a 広大な／多数の／重要な sleeping serpent, glimpsed in the tall grass.

DARKNESS fell ひどく. The 星／主役にするs winked redly in the 厚い heat of the tropic night. And Kane, 停止（させる）ing for a moment in an 異常に dense grove, beyond which the trees thinned out on the slopes, heard a stealthy movement that was not the night 勝利，勝つd—for no breath of 空気／公表する stirred the 激しい leaves. And even as he turned, there was a 急ぐ in the dark, under the trees.

A 影をつくる／尾行する that 合併するd with the 影をつくる／尾行するs flung itself on Kane with a bestial mouthing and a 動揺させる of アイロンをかける, and the Englishman, parrying by the gleam of the 星／主役にするs on the 武器, felt his 加害者 duck into の近くに ４半期/4分の1s and 会合，会う him chest to chest. Lean wiry 武器 locked about him, pointed teeth gnashed at him as Kane returned the 猛烈な／残忍な grapple. His tattered shirt ripped beneath a jagged 辛勝する／優位, and by blind chance Kane 設立する and pinioned the 手渡す that held the アイロンをかける knife, and drew his own dirk, flesh はうing in 予期 of a spear in the 支援する.

But even as the Englishman wondered why the others did not come to their comrade's 援助（する）, he threw all of his アイロンをかける muscles into the 選び出す／独身 戦闘. の近くに-clinched they swayed and writhed in the 不明瞭, each 努力する／競うing to 運動 his blade into the other's flesh, and as the superior strength of the Puritan began to 主張する itself, the cannibal howled like a rabid dog, tore and bit.

A convulsive spin-wheel of 成果／努力 pivoted them out into the starlit glade where Kane saw the ivory nose-（犯罪の）一味 and the pointed teeth that snapped beast-like at his throat. And 同時に he 軍隊d 支援する and 負かす／撃墜する the 手渡す that gripped his knife-wrist, and drove the dirk 深い into the 黒人／ボイコット ribs. The 軍人 叫び声をあげるd, and the raw acrid scent of 血 flooded the night 空気／公表する. And in that instant Kane was stunned by a sudden savage 急ぐ and （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域 of mighty wings that dashed him to earth, and the 黒人／ボイコット man was torn from his 支配する and 消えるd with a 叫び声をあげる of mortal agony. Kane leaped to his feet, shaken to his 創立／基礎. The dwindling 叫び声をあげる of the wretched 黒人／ボイコット sounded faintly and from above him.

緊張するing his 注目する，もくろむs into the skies he thought he caught a glimpse of a shapeless and horrific Thing crossing the 薄暗い 星／主役にするs—in which the writhing 四肢s of a human mingled namelessly with 広大な／多数の／重要な wings and a shadowy 形態／調整—but so quickly it was gone, he could not be sure.

And now he wondered if it were not all a nightmare. But groping in the grove he 設立する the ju-ju 突き破る with which he had parried the short stabbing spear that lay beside it. And here, if more proof was needed, was his long dirk, still stained with 血.

Wings! Wings in the night! The 骸骨／概要 in the village of torn roofs—the mutilated 黒人／ボイコット man whose 負傷させるs were not made with knife or spear and who died shrieking of wings. Surely those hills were the haunt of gigantic birds who made humanity their prey. Yet if birds, why had they not wholly devoured the 黒人／ボイコット man on the 火刑／賭ける? And Kane knew in his heart that no true bird ever cast such a 影をつくる／尾行する as he had seen flit across the 星／主役にするs.

He shrugged his shoulders, bewildered. The night was silent. Where were the 残り／休憩（する） of the cannibals who had followed him from their distant ジャングル? Had the 運命／宿命 of their comrade 脅すd them into flight? Kane looked to his ピストルs. Cannibals or no, he went not up into those dark hills that night.

Now he must sleep, if all the devils of the 年上の World were on his 跡をつける. A 深い roaring to the 西方の 警告するd him that beasts of prey were aroam, and he walked 速く 負かす／撃墜する the rolling slopes until he （機の）カム to a dense grove some distance from that in which he had fought the cannibal. He climbed high の中で the 広大な／多数の／重要な 支店s until he 設立する a 厚い crotch that would 融通する even his tall でっちあげる，人を罪に陥れる. The 支店s above would guard him from a sudden 急襲する of any winged thing, and if savages were lurking 近づく, their clamber into the tree would 警告する him, for he slept lightly as a cat. As for serpents and ヒョウs, they were chances he had taken a thousand times.

Solomon Kane slept and his dreams were vague, 大混乱／混沌とした, haunted with a suggestion of pre-human evil and which at last 合併するd into a 見通し vivid as a scene in waking life. Solomon dreamed he woke with a start, 製図／抽選 a ピストル—for so long had his life been that of the wolf, that reaching for a 武器 was his natural reaction upon waking suddenly.

His dream was that a strange, shadowy thing had perched upon a 広大な／多数の／重要な 支店 の近くに by and gazed at him with greedy, luminous yellow 注目する，もくろむs that seared into his brain. The dream-thing was tall and lean and strangely misshapen, so blended with the 影をつくる／尾行するs that it seemed a 影をつくる／尾行する itself, 有形の only in the 狭くする yellow 注目する，もくろむs. And Kane dreamed he waited, spellbound, while 不確定 （機の）カム into those 注目する，もくろむs, and then the creature walked out on the 四肢 as a man would walk, raised 広大な／多数の／重要な shadowy wings, sprang into space and 消えるd.

Kane jerked upright, the もやs of sleep fading. In the 薄暗い starlight, under the arching Gothic-like 支店s, the tree was empty save for himself. Then it had been a dream, after all—yet it had been so vivid, so fraught with 残忍な foulness—even now a faint scent like that exuded by birds of prey seemed to ぐずぐず残る in the 空気／公表する. Kane 緊張するd his ears. He heard the sighing of the night 勝利，勝つd, the whisper of the leaves, the far-away roaring of a lion, but naught else. Again Solomon slept—while high above him a 影をつくる／尾行する wheeled against the 星／主役にするs, circling again and again as a vulture circles a dying wolf.

2. — THE BATTLE IN THE SKY

DAWN was spreading whitely over the eastern hills when Kane woke. The thought of his nightmare （機の）カム to him and he wondered again at its vividness as he climbed 負かす／撃墜する out of the tree. A nearby spring slaked his かわき and some fruit, rare in these highlands, 緩和するd his hunger.

Then he turned his 直面する again to the hills. A finish 闘士，戦闘機 was Solomon Kane. Along that grim skyline dwelt some evil 敵 to the sons of men, and that mere fact was as much a challenge to the Puritan as had ever been a glove thrown in his 直面する by some hot-長，率いるd gallant of Devon.

Refreshed by his night's sleep, he 始める，決める out with his long 平易な stride, passing the grove that had 証言，証人／目撃するd the 戦う／戦い in the night, and coming into the 地域 where the trees thinned at the foot of the slopes. Up these slopes he went, 停止（させる）ing for a moment to gaze 支援する over the way he had come. Now that he was above the 高原, he could easily make out a village in the distance—a cluster of mud-and-bamboo huts with one 異常に large hut a short distance from the 残り／休憩（する） on a sort of low knoll.

And while he gazed, with a sudden 急ぐ of grisly wings the terror was upon him! Kane whirled, galvanized. All 調印するs had pointed to the theory of a winged thing that 追跡（する）d by night. He had not 推定する／予想するd attack in 幅の広い daylight—but here a bat-like monster was 急襲するing at him out of the very 注目する，もくろむ of the rising sun. Kane saw a spread of mighty wings, from which glared a horribly human 直面する; then he drew and 解雇する／砲火／射撃d with unerring 目的（とする） and the monster veered wildly in 空中 and （機の）カム whirling and 宙返り／暴落するing out of the sky to 衝突，墜落 at his feet.

Kane leaned 今後, ピストル smoking in his 手渡す, and gazed wide-注目する，もくろむd. Surely this thing was a demon out of the 黒人／ボイコット 炭坑，オーケストラ席s of hell, said the sombre mind of the Puritan; yet a leaden ball had 殺害された it. Kane shrugged his shoulders, baffled; he had never seen aught to approach this, though all his life had fallen in strange ways.

The thing was like a man, inhumanly tall and inhumanly thin; the 長，率いる was long, 狭くする, and hairless—the 長，率いる of a predatory creature. The ears were small, の近くに-始める，決める and queerly pointed. The 注目する，もくろむs, 始める，決める in death, were 狭くする, oblique and of a strange yellowish colour. The nose was thin and 麻薬中毒の, like the beak of a bird of prey, the mouth a wide cruel gash, whose thin lips, writhed in a death snarl and flecked with 泡，激怒すること, 公表する／暴露するd wolfish fangs.

The creature, which was naked and hairless, was not unlike a human 存在 in other ways. The shoulders were 幅の広い and powerful, the neck long and lean. The 武器 were long and muscular, the thumb 存在 始める，決める beside the fingers after the manner of the 広大な／多数の／重要な apes. Fingers and thumbs were 武装した with 激しい 麻薬中毒の talons. The chest was curiously misshapen, the breast-bone jutting out like the keel of a ship, the ribs curving 支援する from it. The 脚s were long and wiry with 抱擁する, 手渡す-like, prehensile feet, the 広大な／多数の／重要な toe 始める，決める opposite the 残り／休憩（する） like a man's thumb. The claws on the toes were 単に long nails.

But the most curious feature of this curious creature was on its 支援する. A pair of 広大な／多数の／重要な wings, 形態／調整d much like the wings of a moth but with a bony でっちあげる，人を罪に陥れる and of leathery 実体, grew from its shoulders, beginning at a point just 支援する and above where the 武器 joined the shoulders, and 延長するing half way to the 狭くする hips. These wings, Kane reckoned, would 手段 some eighteen feet from tip to tip.

He laid 持つ／拘留する of the creature, involuntarily shuddering at the 悪賢い, hard, leather-like feel of the 肌, and half-解除するd it. The 負わせる was little more than half as much as it would have been in a man the same 高さ—some six and a half feet. Evidently the bones were of a peculiar bird-like structure and the flesh consisted almost 完全に of stringy muscles.

Kane stepped 支援する, 調査するing the thing again. Then his dream had been no dream after all—that foul thing or another like it had in grisly reality lighted in the tree beside him—a whir of mighty wings! A sudden 急ぐ through the sky! Even as Kane whirled he realized he had committed the ジャングル-farer's unpardonable 罪，犯罪—he had 許すd his astonishment and curiosity to throw him off guard. Already a winged fiend was at his throat and there was no time to draw and 解雇する／砲火／射撃 his other ピストル. Kane saw, in a maze of thrashing wings, a devilish, 半分-human 直面する—he felt those wings 乱打するing at him—he felt cruel talons 沈む 深い into his breast; then he was dragged off his feet and felt empty space beneath him.

The winged man had wrapped his 四肢s about the Englishman's 脚s and the talons he had driven into Kane's breast muscles held like fanged 副／悪徳行為s. The wolf-like fangs drove at Kane's throat, but the Puritan gripped the bony throat and thrust 支援する the grisly 長，率いる, while with his 権利 手渡す he strove to draw his dirk. The birdman was 開始するing slowly and a (n)艦隊／(a)素早いing ちらりと見ること showed Kane that they were already high above the trees. The Englishman did not hope to 生き残る this 戦う／戦い in the sky, for even if he slew his 敵, he would be dashed to death in the 落ちる. But with the innate ferocity of the fighting man he 始める，決める himself grimly to take his captor with him.

持つ／拘留するing those keen fangs at bay, Kane managed to draw his dirk, and he 急落（する），激減（する）d it 深い into the 団体／死体 of the monster. The bat-man veered wildly and a rasping, raucous screech burst from his half-throttled throat. He floundered wildly, （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域ing frantically with his 広大な／多数の／重要な wings, 屈服するing his 支援する and 新たな展開ing his 長，率いる ひどく in a vain 成果／努力 to 解放する／自由な it and 沈む home his deadly fangs. He sank the talons of one 手渡す agonizingly deeper and deeper into Kane's breast muscles, while with the other he tore at his 敵's 長，率いる and 団体／死体. But the Englishman, gashed and bleeding, with the silent and tenacious savagery of a bulldog, sank his fingers deeper into the lean neck and drove his dirk home again and again, while far below awed 注目する，もくろむs watched the fiendish 戦う／戦い that was 激怒（する）ing at that dizzy 高さ.

They had drifted out over the 高原, and the 急速な／放蕩な-弱めるing wings of the bat-man barely supported their 負わせる. They were 沈むing earthward 速く, but Kane, blinded with 血 and 戦う／戦い fury, knew nothing of this. With a 広大な／多数の／重要な piece of his scalp hanging loose, his chest and shoulders 削減（する） and ripped, the world had become a blind, red thing in which he was aware of but one sensation—the bulldog 勧める to kill his 敵.

Now the feeble and spasmodic （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域ing of the dying monster's wings held them hovering for an instant above a 厚い grove of gigantic trees, while Kane felt the 支配する of claws and twining 四肢s grow 女性 and the 削除するing of the talons become a futile flailing.

With a last burst of 力／強力にする he drove the reddened dirk straight through the breastbone and felt a convulsive （軽い）地震 run through the creature's でっちあげる，人を罪に陥れる. The 広大な／多数の／重要な wings fell limp—and 勝利者 and vanquished dropped headlong and 急落する-like earthward.

Through a red wave Kane saw the waving 支店s 急ぐing up to 会合，会う them—he felt them flail his 直面する and 涙／ほころび at his 着せる／賦与するing, as still locked in that death-clinch he 急ぐd downward through leaves which eluded his vainly しっかり掴むing 手渡す; then his 長，率いる 衝突，墜落d against a 広大な／多数の／重要な 四肢, and an endless abyss of blackness （海，煙などが）飲み込むd him.

3. — THE PEOPLE IN THE SHADOW

THROUGH colossal, 黒人／ボイコット basaltic 回廊（地帯）s of night, Solomon Kane fled for a thousand years. Gigantic winged demons, horrific in the utter 不明瞭, swept over him with a 急ぐ of 広大な／多数の／重要な bat-like pinions and in the blackness he fought with them as a cornered ネズミ fights a vampire bat, while fleshless jaws drooled fearful blasphemies and horrid secrets in his ears, and the skulls of men rolled under his groping feet.

Solomon Kane （機の）カム 支援する suddenly from the land of delirium, and his first sight of sanity was that of a fat, kindly native 直面する bending over him. Kane saw he was in a roomy, clean and 井戸／弁護士席-ventilated hut, while from a cooking マリファナ 泡ing outside wafted savoury scents. Kane realized he was ravenously hungry. And he was strangely weak. The 手渡す he 解除するd to his 包帯d 長，率いる shook, and its bronze was dimmed.

The fat man and another, a tall, gaunt, grim-直面するd 軍人, bent over him, and the fat man said: "He is awake, Kuroba, and of sound mind." The gaunt man nodded and called something which was answered from without.

"What is this place?" asked Kane in a language he had learned that was 類似の to the dialect the 黒人／ボイコット had used. "How long have I lain here?"

"This is the last village of Bogonda." The fat man 圧力（をかける）d him 支援する with 手渡すs as gentle as a woman's. "We 設立する you lying beneath the trees on the slopes, 不正に 負傷させるd and senseless. You have raved in delirium for many days. Now eat."

A lithe young 軍人 entered with a 木造の bowl 十分な of steaming food, and Kane ate ravenously.

"He is like a ヒョウ, Kuroba," said the fat man admiringly. "Not one in a thousand would have lived with his 負傷させるs."

"Aye," returned the other. "And he slew the akaana that rent him, Goru."

Kane struggled to his 肘s. "Goru?" he cried ひどく. "The priest who 貯蔵所d men to 火刑／賭けるs for devils to eat?"

And he strove to rise so that he could strangle the fat man, but his 証拠不十分 swept over him like a wave, the hut swam dizzily to his 注目する，もくろむs, and he sank 支援する panting, where he soon fell into a sound, natural sleep.

*

Later he awoke and 設立する a わずかな／ほっそりした young girl, 指名するd Nayela, watching him. She fed him, and feeling much stronger, Kane asked questions which she answered shyly but intelligently.

This was Bogonda, 支配するd by Kuroba the 長，指導者 and Goru the priest. 非，不，無 in Bogonda had ever seen or heard of a white man before. She counted the days Kane had lain helpless, and he was amazed. But such a 戦う／戦い as he had been through was enough to kill an ordinary man. He wondered that no bones had been broken, but the girl said the 支店s had broken his 落ちる and he had landed on the 団体／死体 of the akaana. He asked for Goru, and the fat priest （機の）カム to him, bringing Kane's 武器s.

"Some we 設立する with you where you lay." said Goru, "some by the 団体／死体 of the akaana you slew with the 武器 which speaks in 解雇する／砲火／射撃 and smoke. You must be a god—yet the gods bleed not and you have just all but died. Who are you?"

"I am no god," Kane answered, "but a man like yourself. I come from a far land まっただ中に the sea, which land, mind ye, is the fairest and noblest of all lands. My 指名する is Solomon Kane and I am a landless wanderer. From the lips of a dying man I first heard your 指名する. Yet your 直面する seemeth kindly."

A 影をつくる／尾行する crossed the 注目する，もくろむs of the shaman, and he hung his 長，率いる.

"残り／休憩（する） and grow strong, oh man, or god or whatever you be," said he, "and in time you will learn of the 古代の 悪口を言う／悪態 that 残り／休憩（する）s upon this 古代の land."

*

And in the days that followed, while Kane 回復するd and grew strong with the wild beast vitality that was his, Goru and Kuroba sat and spoke to him at length, telling him many curious things.

Their tribe was not aboriginal here, but had come upon the 高原 a hundred and fifty years before, giving it the 指名する of their former home. They had once been a powerful tribe in Old Bogonda, on a 広大な／多数の／重要な river far to the south. But 部族の wars broke their 力／強力にする, and at last before a 一致した 反乱, the whole tribe gave way, and Goru repeated legends of that 広大な／多数の／重要な flight of a thousand miles through ジャングル and swampland, harried at every step by cruel 敵s.

At last, 切り開く／タクシー／不正アクセスing their way through a country of ferocious cannibals, they 設立する themselves 安全な from man's attack—but 囚人s in a 罠（にかける） from which neither they nor their 子孫s could ever escape. They were in the horror-country of Akaana, and Goru said his ancestors （機の）カム to understand the jeering laughter of the man eaters who had hounded them to the very 国境s of the 高原.

The Bogondi 設立する a fertile country with good water and plenty of game. There were numbers of goats and a 種類 of wild pig that throve here in 広大な／多数の／重要な 豊富. At first the 黒人／ボイコット people ate these pigs, but later they spared them for a good 推論する／理由. The 牧草地s between 高原 and ジャングル 群れているd with antelopes, buffaloes and the like, and there were many lions. Lions also roamed the 高原, but Bogonda meant "Lion-slayer" in their tongue and it was not many moons before the 残余s of the 広大な／多数の／重要な cats took to the lower levels. But it was not lions they had to 恐れる, as Goru's ancestors soon learned.

Finding that the cannibals would not come past the savannas, they 残り／休憩（する）d from their long trek and built two villages—Upper and Lower Bogonda. Kane was in Upper Bogonda; he had seen the 廃虚s of the lower village. But soon they 設立する that they had 逸脱するd into a country of nightmares with dripping fangs and talons. They heard the （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域 of mighty wings at night, and saw horrific 影をつくる／尾行するs cross the 星／主役にするs and ぼんやり現れる against the moon. Children began to disappear and at last a young hunter 逸脱するd off into the hills, where night overtook him. And in the grey light of 夜明け a mangled, half-devoured 死体 fell from the skies into the village street and a whisper of ogreish laughter from high above froze the horrified on-lookers. Then a little later the 十分な horror of their position burst upon the Bogondi.

At first the winged men were afraid of the 黒人／ボイコット people. They hid themselves and 投機・賭けるd from their caverns only at night. Then they grew bolder. In the 十分な daylight, a 軍人 発射 one with an arrow, but the fiends had learned they could 殺す a human, and its death 叫び声をあげる brought a 得点する／非難する／２０ of the devils dropping from the skies, who tore the slayer to pieces in 十分な sight of the tribe.

The Bogondi then 用意が出来ている to leave that devil's country and a hundred 軍人s went up into the hills to find a pass. They 設立する 法外な 塀で囲むs, up which a man must climb laboriously, and they 設立する the cliffs honeycombed with 洞穴s where the winged men dwelt.

Then was fought the first pitched 戦う／戦い between men and bat-men, and it resulted in a 鎮圧するing victory for the monsters. The 屈服するs and spears of the 黒人／ボイコット people 証明するd futile before the 急襲するs of the taloned fiends, and of all that hundred that went up into the hills, not one 生き残るd; for the akaanas 追跡（する）d 負かす／撃墜する those that fled and dragged 負かす／撃墜する the last one within bowshot of the upper village.

Then it was that the Bogondi, seeing they could not hope to 勝利，勝つ through the hills, sought to fight their way out again the way they had come. But a 広大な／多数の／重要な horde of cannibals met them in the 牧草地s, and in a 広大な／多数の／重要な 戦う／戦い that lasted nearly all day, 投げつけるd them 支援する, broken and 敗北・負かすd. And Goru said while the 戦う／戦い 激怒（する）d, the skies were thronged with hideous 形態／調整s, circling above and laughing their fearful mirth to see men die 卸売.

So the 生存者s of those two 戦う／戦いs, licking their 負傷させるs, 屈服するd to the 必然的な with the fatalistic philosophy of the 封鎖する man. Some fifteen hundred men, women and children remained, and they built their huts, tilled the 国／地域 and lived stolidly in the 影をつくる／尾行する of the nightmare.

In those days there were many of the bird-people, and they might have wiped out the Bogondi utterly, had they wished. No one 軍人 could 対処する with an akaana, for he was stronger than a human, he struck as a 強硬派 strikes, and if he 行方不明になるd, his wings carried him out of reach of a counterblow.

Here Kane interrupted to ask why the Bogondi did not make war on the demons with arrows. But Goru answered that it took a quick and 正確な archer to strike an akaana in 空中 at all, and so 堅い were their hides that unless the arrow struck squarely it would not 侵入する. Kane knew that the natives were very indifferent bowmen and that they pointed their 軸s with chipped 石／投石する, bone, or 大打撃を与えるd アイロンをかける almost as soft as 巡査; he thought of Poitiers and Agincourt and wished grimly for a とじ込み／提出する of stout English archers—or a 階級 of musketeers.

But Goru said the akaanas did not seem to wish to destroy the Bogondi utterly. Their 長，指導者 food consisted of the little pigs which then 群れているd the 高原, and young goats. いつかs they went out on the savannas for antelope, but they 不信d the open country and 恐れるd the lions. Nor did they haunt the ジャングルs beyond, for the trees grew too の近くに for the spread of their wings. They kept to the hills and the 高原—and what lay beyond those hills 非，不，無 in Bogonda knew.

The akaanas 許すd the Bogondi to 住む the 高原 much as men 許す wild animals to 栄える, or 在庫／株 lakes with fish—for their own 楽しみ. The bat-people, said Goru, had a strange and grisly sense of humour which was tickled by the sufferings of a howling human. Those grim hills had echoed to cries that turned men's hearts to ice.

But for many years, Goru said, once the Bogondi learned not to resist their masters, the akaanas were content to snatch up a baby from time to time, or devour a young girl 逸脱するd from the village or a 青年 whom night caught outside the 塀で囲むs. The bat-folk 不信d the village; they circled high above it but did not 投機・賭ける within. There the Bogondi were 安全な until late years.

Goru said that the akaanas were 急速な／放蕩な dying out; once there had been hope that the 残余s of his race would outlast them—in which event, he said fatalistically, the cannibals would undoubtedly come up from the ジャングル and put the 生存者s in their cooking マリファナs. Now he 疑問d if there were more than a hundred and fifty akaanas altogether. Kane asked him why did not the 軍人s then sally 前へ／外へ on a 広大な／多数の／重要な 追跡（する） and destroy the devils utterly, and Goru smiled a bitter smile and repeated his 発言／述べるs about the prowess of the bat-people in 戦う／戦い. Moreover, said he, the whole tribe of Bogonda numbered only about four hundred souls now, and the bat-people were their only 保護 against the cannibals to the west.

Goru said the tribe had thinned more in the past thirty years than in all the years previous. As the numbers of the akaanas dwindled, their hellish savagery 増加するd. They 掴むd more and more of the Bogondi to 拷問 and devour in their grim 黒人／ボイコット 洞穴s high up in the hills, and Goru spoke of sudden （警察の）手入れ，急襲s on 追跡（する）ing parties and toilers in the plantain fields, and of the nights made 恐ろしい by horrible 叫び声をあげるs and gibberings from the dark hills, and 血-氷点の laughter that was half-human; of dismembered 四肢s and gory grinning 長，率いるs flung from the skies to 落ちる in the shuddering village, and of grisly feasts の中で the 星／主役にするs.

Then （機の）カム 干ばつ, Goru said, and a 広大な／多数の／重要な 飢饉. Many of the springs 乾燥した，日照りのd up and the 刈るs of rice and yams and plantains failed. The gnus, deer, and buffaloes which had formed the main part of Bogonda's meat diet withdrew to the ジャングル in 追求（する），探索（する） of water, and the lions, their hunger 打ち勝つing their 恐れる of man, 範囲d into the uplands. Many of the tribe died, and the 残り／休憩（する） were driven by hunger to eat the pigs which were the natural prey of the bat-people. This 怒り／怒るd the akaanas and thinned the pigs. 飢饉, Bogondi, and the lions destroyed all the goats and half the pigs.

At last the 飢饉 was past, but the 損失 was done. Of all the 広大な／多数の／重要な droves which once 群れているd the 高原, only a 残余 was left, and these were hard to catch. The Bogondi had eaten the pigs, so the akaanas ate the Bogondi. Life became a hell for the 黒人／ボイコット people, and the lower village, numbering now only some hundred and fifty souls, rose in 反乱. Driven to frenzy by repeated 乱暴／暴力を加えるs, they turned on their masters. An akaana lighting in the very streets to steal a child was 始める，決める on and 発射 to death with arrows. And the people of Lower Bogonda drew into their huts and waited for their doom.

And in the night, said Goru, it （機の）カム. The akaanas had 打ち勝つ their 不信 of the huts. The 十分な flock of them 群れているd 負かす／撃墜する from the hills, and Upper Bogonda awoke to hear the fearful cataclysm of 叫び声をあげるs and blasphemies that 示すd the end of the other village. All night Goru's people had lain sweating in terror, not daring to move, harkening to the howling and gibbering that rent the night. At last these sounds 中止するd, Goru said, wiping the 冷淡な sweat from his brow, but sounds of grisly and obscene feasting still haunted the night with demon's mockery.

In the 早期に 夜明け, Goru's people saw the hell-flock winging 支援する to their hills, like demons 飛行機で行くing 支援する to hell through the 夜明け. They flew slowly and ひどく, like gorged vultures. Later the people dared to steal 負かす／撃墜する to the accursed village, and what they 設立する there sent them shrieking away. And to that day, Goru said, no man passed within three 屈服する 発射s of that silent horror. And Kane nodded in understanding, his 冷淡な 注目する，もくろむs more sombre than ever.

FOR many days after that, Goru said the people waited in 地震ing 恐れる. Finally in desperation of 恐れる, which 産む／飼育するs unspeakable cruelty, the tribe cast lots, and the loser was bound to a 火刑／賭ける between the two villages, in hopes that the akaanas would 認める this as a 記念品 of submission so that the people of Bogonda might escape the 運命／宿命 of their kinsmen. The custom, said Goru, had been borrowed from the cannibals who in old times worshipped the akaanas and 申し込む／申し出d a human sacrifice at each moon. But chance had shown them that the akaanas could be killed, so they 中止するd to worship them—at least that was Goru's deduction, and he explained at much length that no mortal thing is worthy of real adoration, however evil or powerful it may be.

His own ancestors had made 時折の sacrifices to placate the winged devils, but until lately it had not been a 正規の／正選手 custom. Now it was necessary; the akaanas 推定する／予想するd it, and each moon they chose from their 病弱なing numbers a strong young man or a girl whom they bound to the 火刑／賭ける.

Kane watched Goru's 直面する closely as he spoke of his 悲しみ for this unspeakable necessity, and the Englishman realized that the priest was sincere. Kane shuddered at the thought of a tribe of human 存在s thus passing slowly but surely into the maws of a race of monsters.

Kane spoke of the wretch he had seen, and Goru nodded, 苦痛 in his soft 注目する，もくろむs. For a day and a night he had been hanging there, while the akaanas glutted their vile 拷問-lust on his quivering, agonized flesh. Thus far the sacrifices had kept doom from the village. The remaining pigs furnished sustenance for the dwindling akaanas, together with an 時折の baby snatched up, and they were content to have their nameless sport with the 選び出す／独身 犠牲者 each moon.

A thought （機の）カム to Kane.

"The cannibals never come up into the 高原?"

Goru shook his 長，率いる; 安全な in their ジャングル, they never （警察の）手入れ，急襲d past the savannas.

"But they 追跡（する）d me to the very foot of the hills."

Again Goru shook his 長，率いる. There was only one cannibal; they had 設立する his 足跡s. Evidently a 選び出す／独身 軍人, bolder than the 残り／休憩（する）, had 許すd his passion for the chase to 打ち勝つ his 恐れる of the grisly 高原 and had paid the 刑罰，罰則. Kane's teeth （機の）カム together with a vicious snap which ordinarily took the place of profanity with him. He was stung by the thought of 逃げるing so long from a 選び出す／独身 enemy. No wonder that enemy had followed so 慎重に, waiting until dark to attack. But, asked Kane, why had the akaana 掴むd the 黒人／ボイコット man instead of himself—and why had he not been attacked by the bat-man who alighted in his tree that night?

The cannibal was bleeding, Goru answered. The scent called the bat-fiend to attack, for they scented raw 血 as far as vultures. And they were very 用心深い. They had never seen a man like Kane, who showed no 恐れる. Surely they had decided to 秘かに調査する on him, take him off guard before they struck.

Who were these creatures? Kane asked. Goru shrugged his shoulders. They were there when his ancestors （機の）カム, who had never heard of them before they saw them. There was no intercourse with the cannibals, so they could learn nothing from them. The akaanas lived in 洞穴s, naked like beasts; they knew nothing of 解雇する／砲火／射撃 and ate only fresh, raw meat. But they had a language of a sort and 定評のある a king の中で them. Many died in the 広大な／多数の／重要な 飢饉 when the stronger ate the 女性. They were 消えるing 速く; of late years no 女性（の）s or young had been 観察するd の中で them. When these males died at last, there would be no more akaanas; but Bogonda, 観察するd Goru, was doomed already, unless—he looked strangely and wistfully at Kane. But the Puritan was 深い in thought.

の中で the 群れている of native legends he had heard on his wanderings, one now stood out. Long, long ago, an old, old ju-ju man had told him, winged devils （機の）カム 飛行機で行くing out of the north and passed over his country, 消えるing in the maze of the ジャングル-haunted south. And the ju-ju man 関係のある an old, old legend 関心ing these creatures—that once they had abode in myriad numbers far on a 広大な／多数の／重要な lake of bitter water many moons to the north, and ages and ages ago a chieftain and his 軍人s fought them with 屈服するs and arrows and slew many, 運動ing the 残り／休憩（する） into the south. The 指名する of the 長，指導者 was N'Yasunna and he owned a 広大な／多数の／重要な war canoe with many oars 運動ing it 速く through the bitter water.

And now a 冷淡な 勝利，勝つd blew suddenly on Solomon Kane, as if from a door opened suddenly on Outer 湾s of Time and Space. For now he realized the truth of that garbled myth, and the truth of an older, grimmer legend. For what was the 広大な／多数の／重要な bitter lake but the Mediterranean Ocean and who was the 長，指導者 N'Yasunna but the hero Jason, who 征服する／打ち勝つd the harpies and drove them—not alone into the Strophades 小島s but into Africa 同様に?

The old pagan tale was true then, Kane thought dizzily, 縮むing aghast from the strange realm of grisly 可能性s this opened up. For if this myth of the harpies were a reality, what of the other legends—the Hydra, the centaurs, the chimera, Medusa, Pan, and the satyrs?

All those myths of antiquity—behind them did there 嘘（をつく） and lurk nightmare realities with slavering fangs and talons 法外なd in shuddersome evil? Africa, the Dark Continent, land of 影をつくる／尾行するs and horror, of bewitchment and sorcery, into which all evil things had been banished before the growing light of the western world!

Kane （機の）カム out of his reveries with a start. Goru was tugging gently and timidly at his sleeve.

"Save us from the akaanas!" said Goru. "If you be not a god, there is the 力／強力にする of a god in you! You 耐える in your 手渡す the mighty ju-ju 突き破る which has in times gone by been the sceptre of fallen empires and the staff of mighty priests. And you have 武器s which speak death in 解雇する／砲火／射撃 and smoke—for our young men watched and saw you 殺す two akaanas. We will make you king—god—what you will! More than a moon has passed since you （機の）カム into Bogonda and the time for the sacrifice is gone by, but the 血まみれの 火刑／賭ける stands 明らかにする. The akaanas shun the village where you 嘘（をつく）; they steal no more babes from us. We have thrown off their yoke because our 信用 is in you!"

Kane clasped his 寺s with his 手渡すs. "You know not what you ask!" he cried. "God knoweth it is in my deepest heart to rid the land of this evil, but I am no god. With my ピストルs I can 殺す a few of the fiends, but I have but a little 砕く left. Had I 広大な／多数の／重要な 蓄える／店 of 砕く and ball, and the musket I 粉々にするd in the vampire-haunted Hills of the Dead, then indeed would there be a rare 追跡（する）ing. But even if I slew all those fiends, what of the cannibals?"

"They too will 恐れる you!" cried old Kuroba, while the girl Nayela and the lad, Loga, who was to have been the next sacrifice, gazed at his wife, their souls in their 注目する，もくろむs. Kane dropped his chin on his 握りこぶし and sighed.

"Yet will I stay here in Bogonda all the 残り／休憩（する） of my life if ye think I be 保護 to the people."

So Solomon Kane stayed at the village of Bogonda of the 影をつくる／尾行する. The people were a kindly folk, whose natural sprightliness and fun-loving spirits were subdued and saddened by long dwelling in the 影をつくる／尾行する. But now they had taken new heart by the Englishman's coming, and it wrenched Kane's heart to 公式文書，認める the pathetic 信用 they placed in him. Now they sang in the plaintain fields and danced about the 解雇する／砲火／射撃, and gazed at him with adoring 約束 in their 注目する，もくろむs. But Kane, 悪口を言う／悪態ing his own helplessness, knew how futile would be his fancied 保護 if the winged fiends swept suddenly out of the skies.

But he stayed in Bogonda. In his dreams, the gulls wheeled above the cliffs of old Devon, carved in the clean, blue, 勝利，勝つd-whipped skies, and in the day the call of the unknown lands beyond Bogonda clawed at his heart with 猛烈な／残忍な yearning. But he abode in Bogonda and racked his brains for a 計画（する）. He sat and gazed for hours at the ju-ju 突き破る, hoping in desperation that 黒人／ボイコット 魔法 would 援助（する） him, where his mind failed. But N'Longa's 古代の gift gave him no 援助（する）. Once he had 召喚するd the Slave Coast shaman to him across leagues of 介入するing space—but it was only when 直面するd with supernatural manifestations that N'Longa could come to him, and these harpies were not supernatural.

The germ of an idea began to grow at the 支援する of Kane's mind, but he discarded it. It had to do with a 広大な／多数の／重要な 罠（にかける）—and how could the akaanas be 罠にかける? The roaring of lions played a grim accompaniment to his brooding meditations. As man dwindled on the 高原, the 追跡（する）ing beasts who 恐れるd only the spears of the hunters were beginning to gather. Kane laughed 激しく. It was not lions, that might be 追跡（する）d 負かす／撃墜する and 殺害された singly, that he had to を取り引きする.

At some little distance from the village stood the 広大な／多数の／重要な hut of Goru, once a 会議 hall. This hut was 十分な of many strange fetishes which, Goru said with a helpless wave of his fat 手渡すs, were strong 魔法 against evil spirits but scant 保護 against winged hellions of gristle and bone and flesh.

4. — THE MADNESS OF SOLOMON

KANE woke suddenly from a dreamless sleep. A hideous medley of 叫び声をあげるs burst horrific in his ears. Outside his hut, people were dying in the night, horribly, as cattle die in the shambles. He had slept, as always, with his 武器s buckled on him. Now he bounded to the door, and something fell mouthing and slavering at his feet to しっかり掴む his 膝s in a convulsive grin and gibber incoherent 嘆願s.

In the faint light of a smouldering 解雇する／砲火／射撃 近づく by, Kane in horror 認めるd the 直面する of the 青年 Loga, now frightfully torn and drenched in 血, already 氷点の into a death mask. The night was 十分な of fearful sounds, 残忍な howling mingled with the whisper of mighty wings, the 涙／ほころびing of thatch and a 恐ろしい demon-laughter. Kane 解放する／自由なd himself from the locked dead 武器 and sprang to the dying 解雇する／砲火／射撃. He could make out only a 混乱させるd and vague maze of 逃げるing forms and darting 形態／調整s, the 転換 and blur of dark wings against the 星／主役にするs.

He snatched up a brand and thrust it against the thatch of his hut—and as the 炎上 leaped up and showed him the scene he stood frozen and aghast. Red, howling doom had fallen on Bogonda. Winged monsters raced 叫び声をあげるing through her streets, wheeled above the 長，率いるs of the 逃げるing people, or tore apart the hut thatches to get at the gibbering 犠牲者s within.

With a choked cry the Englishman woke from his trance of horror, drew and 解雇する／砲火／射撃d at a darting 炎上-注目する，もくろむd 影をつくる／尾行する which fell at his feet with a 粉々にするd skull. And Kane gave tongue to one 深い, 猛烈な／残忍な roar and bounded into the melee, all the berserk fury of his heathen Saxon ancestors bursting into terrible 存在.

Dazed and bewildered by the sudden attack, cowed by long years of submission, the Bogondi were incapable of 連合させるd 抵抗 and for the most part died like sheep. Some, maddened by desperation, fought 支援する, but their arrows went wild or ちらりと見ることd from the 堅い wings while the devilish agility of the creatures made spear thrust and axe 一打／打撃 uncertain. Leaping from the ground they 避けるd the blows of their 犠牲者s and, 広範囲にわたる 負かす／撃墜する upon their shoulders, dashed them to earth where fang and talon did their crimson work.

Kane saw old Kuroba, gaunt and bloodstained, at bay against a hut 塀で囲む with his foot on the neck of a monster who had not been quick enough. The grim-直面するd old 長，指導者 （権力などを）行使するd a two-手渡すd axe in 広大な／多数の／重要な 広範囲にわたる blows that for the moment held 支援する the screeching onset of half a dozen of the devils. Kane was leaping to his 援助（する） when a low, pitiful whimper checked him. The girl Nayela writhed weakly, 傾向がある in the 血まみれの dust, while on her 支援する a vulture-like thing crouched and tore. Her dulling 注目する，もくろむs sought the 直面する of the Englishman in anguished 控訴，上告.

Kane ripped out a bitter 誓い and 解雇する／砲火／射撃d point blank. The winged devil pitched backward with an abhorrent screeching and a wild ぱたぱたする of dying wings, and Kane bent to the dying girl. She whimpered and kissed his 手渡すs with uncertain lips as he cradled her 長，率いる in his 武器. Her 注目する，もくろむs 始める，決める.

Kane laid the 団体／死体 gently 負かす／撃墜する, looking for Kuroba. He saw only a 密談する／（身体を）寄せ集めるd cluster of grisly 形態／調整s that sucked and tore at something between them. And Kane went mad. With a 叫び声をあげる that 削減（する） through the inferno he bounded up, 殺すing even as he rose. Even in the 行為／法令／行動する of 肺ing up from bent 膝 he drew and thrust, transfixing a vulture-like throat. Then whipping out his rapier as the thing floundered and twitched in its death struggle, the 激怒（する）ing Puritan 告発（する），告訴（する）／料金d 今後 捜し出すing new 犠牲者s.

On all 味方するs of him the people of Bogonda were dying hideously. They fought futilely or they fled and the demons coursed them 負かす／撃墜する as a 強硬派 courses a hare. They ran into the huts and the fiends rent the thatch or burst the door, and what took place in those huts was mercifully hidden from Kane's 注目する，もくろむs.

And to the frantic Puritan's horror-distorted brain it seemed that he alone was responsible. The 黒人／ボイコット 倍の had 信用d him to save them. They had withheld the sacrifice and 反抗するd their grim masters. Now they were 支払う／賃金ing the horrible 刑罰，罰則 and he was unable to save them. In the agony-dimmed 注目する，もくろむs turned toward him, Kane quaffed the 黒人／ボイコット dregs of the bitter cup. It was hot 怒り／怒る or the vindictiveness of 恐れる. It was 傷つける and a stunned reproach. He was their god and he had failed them.

Now he ravened through the 大虐殺 and the fiends 避けるd him, turning to the 平易な 犠牲者s. But Kane was not to be 否定するd. In a red 煙霧 that was not of the 燃やすing hut, he saw a 最高潮に達するing horror; a harpy gripped a writhing naked thing that had been a woman, and the wolfish fangs gorged 深い. As Kane sprang, thrusting, the bat-man dropped his yammering, mewing prey and 急に上がるd aloft. But Kane dropped his rapier and with the bound of a 血-mad panther caught the demon's throat and locked his アイロンをかける 脚s about its lower 団体／死体.

Once again he 設立する himself 戦う／戦いing in 中央の-空気／公表する, but this time の近くに above the hut roofs. Terror had entered the 冷淡な brain of the harpy. He did not fight to 持つ／拘留する and 殺す; he wished only to be rid of this silent, 粘着するing thing that stabbed so savagely for his life. He floundered wildly, 叫び声をあげるing abhorrently and thrashing with his wings, then as Kane's dirk bit deeper, dipped suddenly sidewise and fell headlong.

The thatch of a hut broke their 落ちる, and Kane and the dying harpy 衝突，墜落d through to land on a writhing 集まり on the hut 床に打ち倒す. In the lurid flickering of the 燃やすing hut outside that ばく然と lighted the hut into which he had fallen, Kane saw a 行為 of brain-shaking horror 存在 制定するd—red-dripping fangs in a yawning gash of a mouth, and a crimson travesty of a human form that still writhed with agonized life. Then, in the maze of madness that held him, his steel fingers の近くにd on the fiend's throat in a 支配する that no 涙／ほころびing of talons or 大打撃を与えるing of wings could 緩和する, until he felt the horrid life flow out from under his fingers and the bony neck hung broken.

Outside, the red madness of 虐殺（する） continued. Kane bounded up, his 手渡す の近くにing blindly on the haft of some 武器, and as he leaped from the hut a harpy 急に上がるd from under his very feet. It was an axe that Kane had snatched up, and he dealt a 一打／打撃 that spattered the demon's brains like water. He sprang 今後, つまずくing over 団体／死体s and parts of 団体／死体s, 血 streaming from a dozen 負傷させるs, and then 停止（させる）d baffled and 叫び声をあげるing with 激怒（する）.

The bat-people were taking to the 空気／公表する. No longer would they 直面する this strange madman who in his insanity was more terrible than they. But they went not alone into the upper 地域s. In their lustful talons they bore writhing, 叫び声をあげるing forms, and Kane, 激怒（する）ing to and fro with his dripping axe, 設立する himself alone in a 死体-choked village.

He threw 支援する his 長，率いる to shriek his hate at the fiends above him and he felt warm, 厚い 減少（する）s 落ちる into his 直面する, while the shadowy skies were filled with 叫び声をあげるs of agony and the laughter of monsters.

As the sounds of that 恐ろしい feast in the skies filled the night and the 血 that rained from the 星／主役にするs fell into his 直面する, Kane's last 痕跡 of 推論する／理由 snapped. He gibbered to and fro, 叫び声をあげるing 大混乱／混沌とした blasphemies.

And was he not a symbol of Man, staggering の中で the tooth-示すd bones and 厳しいd grinning 長，率いるs of humans, brandishing a futile axe, and 叫び声をあげるing incoherent hate at the grisly, winged 形態／調整s of Night that make him their prey, chuckling in demoniac 勝利 above him and dripping into his mad 注目する，もくろむs the pitiful 血 of their human 犠牲者s?

5. — THE CONQUEROR

A SHUDDERING, white-直面するd 夜明け crept over the 黒人／ボイコット hills to shiver above the red shambles that had been the village of Bogonda. The huts stood 損なわれていない, except for the one which had sunk to smouldering coals, but the thatches of many were torn. Dismembered bones, half or wholly stripped of flesh, lay in the streets, and some were 後援d as though they had been dropped from a 広大な／多数の／重要な 高さ.

It was a realm of the dead where was but one 調印する of life. Solomon Kane leaned on his 血-clotted axe and gazed upon the scene with dull, mad 注目する，もくろむs. He was grimed and clotted with half-乾燥した，日照りのd 血 from long gashes on chest, 直面する, and shoulders, but he paid no 注意する to his 傷つけるs.

The people of Bogonda had not died alone. Seventeen harpies lay の中で the bones. Six of these Kane had 殺害された. The 残り／休憩（する） had fallen before the frantic dying desperation of the 黒人／ボイコット people. But it was poor （死傷者）数 to take in return. Of the four hundred-半端物 people of Upper Bogonda, not one had lived to see the 夜明け. And the harpies were gone—支援する to their 洞穴s in the 黒人／ボイコット hills, gorged to repletion.

With slow, mechanical steps Kane went about 集会 up his 武器s. He 設立する his sword, dirk, ピストルs, and the ju-ju 突き破る. He left the main village and went up the slope to the 広大な／多数の／重要な hut of Goru. And there he 停止（させる）d, stung by a new horror. The 恐ろしい humor of the harpies had 誘発するd a delicious jest. Above the hut door 星／主役にするd the 厳しいd 長，率いる of Goru. The fat cheeks were shrunken, the lips lolled in an 面 of horrified idiocy, and the 注目する，もくろむs 星／主役にするd like a 傷つける child. And in those dead 注目する，もくろむs Kane saw wonder and reproach.

Kane looked at the shambles that had been Bogonda, and he looked at the death mask of Goru. And he 解除するd his clenched 握りこぶしs above his 長，率いる, and with glaring 注目する，もくろむs raised and writhing lips flecked with froth, he 悪口を言う／悪態d the sky and the earth and the spheres above and below. He 悪口を言う／悪態d the 冷淡な 星／主役にするs, the 炎ing sun, the mocking moon, and the whisper of the 勝利，勝つd. He 悪口を言う／悪態d all 運命／宿命s and 運命s, all that he had loved or hated, the silent cities beneath the seas, the past ages and the 未来 aeons. In one soul-shaking burst of blasphemy he 悪口を言う／悪態d the gods and devils who make mankind their sport, and he 悪口を言う／悪態d Man who lives blindly on and blindly 申し込む／申し出s his 支援する to the アイロンをかける-hoofed feet of his gods.

Then as breath failed he 停止（させる）d, panting. From the lower reaches sounded the 深い roaring of a lion and into the 注目する，もくろむs of Solomon Kane （機の）カム a crafty gleam. He stood long, as one frozen, and out of his madness grew a desperate 計画（する）. And he silently recanted his blasphemy, for if the brazen-hoofed gods made Man for their sport and plaything, they also gave him a brain that 持つ／拘留するs （手先の）技術 and cruelty greater than any other living thing.

"There you shall 企て，努力，提案," said Solomon Kane to the 長，率いる of Goru. "The sun will wither you and the 冷淡な dews of night will shrivel you. But I will keep the 道具s from you and your 注目する，もくろむs shall see the 落ちる of your slayers. Aye, I could not save the people of Bogonda, but by the God of my race, I can avenge them. Man is the sport and sustenance of titanic 存在s of Night and Horror whose 巨大（な） wings hover ever above him. But even evil things may come to an end—and watch ye, Goru."

In the days that followed Kane 労働d mightily, beginning with the first grey light of 夜明け and toiling on past sunset, into the white moonlight till he fell and slept the sleep of utter exhaustion. He snatched food as he worked and he gave his 負傷させるs 絶対 no 注意する, scarcely 存在 aware that they 傷をいやす／和解させるd of themselves. He went 負かす／撃墜する into the lower levels and 削減（する） bamboo, 広大な／多数の／重要な stacks of long, 堅い stalks. He 削減（する） 厚い 支店s of trees, and 堅い vines to serve as ropes.

With this 構成要素 he 増強するd the 塀で囲むs and roof of Goru's hut. He 始める，決める the bamboos 深い in the earth, hard against the 塀で囲む, and interwove and twined them, binding them 急速な／放蕩な with the vines that were pliant and 堅い as cords. The long 支店s he made 急速な／放蕩な along the thatch, binding them の近くに together. When he had finished, an elephant could scarcely have burst through the 塀で囲むs.

The lions had come into the 高原 in 広大な／多数の／重要な numbers and the herds of little pigs dwindled 急速な／放蕩な. Those the lions spared, Kane slew, and 投げ上げる／ボディチェックするd to the jackals. This racked Kane's heart, for he was a kindly man and this 卸売 虐殺（する）, even of pigs who would 落ちる prey to 追跡（する）ing beasts anyhow, grieved him. But it was part of his 計画（する） of vengeance, and he steeled his heart.

The days stretched into weeks. Kane （死傷者）数d by day and by night, and between his stints he talked to the shrivelled, mummied 長，率いる of Goru, whose 注目する，もくろむs, strangely enough, did not change in the 炎 of the sun or the haunt of the moon, but 保持するd their life-like 表現. When the memory of those lunacy-haunted days had become only a vague nightmare, Kane wondered if, as it had seemed to him, Goru's 乾燥した，日照りのd lips had moved in answer, speaking strange and mysterious things.

Kane saw the akaanas wheeling against the sky at a distance, but they did not come 近づく, even when he slept in the 広大な／多数の／重要な hut, ピストルs at 手渡す. They 恐れるd his 力／強力にする to 取引，協定 death with smoke and 雷鳴.

At first he 公式文書，認めるd that they flew sluggishly, gorged with the flesh they had eaten on that red night, and the 団体／死体s they had borne to their 洞穴s. But as the weeks passed they appeared leaner and leaner and 範囲d far afield in search of food. And Kane laughed, 深く，強烈に and madly.

This 計画（する） of his would never have worked before, but now there were no humans to fill the bellies of the harpy-folk. And there were no more pigs. In all the 高原 there were no creatures for the bat-people to eat. Why they did not 範囲 east of the hills, Kane thought he knew. That must be a 地域 of 厚い ジャングル like the country to the west. He saw them 飛行機で行く into the 牧草地 for antelopes and he saw the lions take （死傷者）数 of them. After all, the akaanas were weak 存在s の中で the hunters, strong enough only to 殺す pigs and deer—and humans.

At last they began to 急に上がる の近くに to him at night, and he saw their greedy 注目する，もくろむs glaring at him through the gloom. He 裁判官d the time was 熟した. 抱擁する buffaloes, too big and ferocious for the bat-people to 殺す, had 逸脱するd up into the 高原 to 荒廃させる the 砂漠d fields of the dead 黒人／ボイコット people. Kane 削減（する） one of these out of the herd and drove him, with shouts and ボレーs of 石／投石するs, to the hut of Goru. It was a tedious, dangerous 仕事, and time and again Kane barely escaped the surly bull's sudden 告発（する），告訴（する）／料金s, but persevered and at last 発射 the beast before the hut.

A strong west 勝利，勝つd was blowing and Kane flung handfuls of 血 into the 空気／公表する for the scent to waft to the harpies in the hills. He 削減（する） the bull to pieces and carried its ４半期/4分の1s into the hut, then managed to drag the 抱擁する trunk itself inside. Then he retired into the 厚い trees nearby and waited.

He had not long to wait. The morning 空気／公表する filled suddenly with the （警官の）巡回区域，受持ち区域 of many wings, and a hideous flock alighted before the hut of Goru. All of the beasts—or men—seemed to be there, and Kane gazed in wonder at the tall, strange creatures, so like to humanity and yet so unlike—the veritable demons of priestly legend. They 倍のd their wings like cloaks about them as they walked upright, and they talked to one another in a strident, crackling 発言する／表明する that had nothing of the human in it.

No, Kane decided, these things were not men. They were the materialization of some 恐ろしい jest of Nature—some travesty of the world's 幼少／幼藍期 when 創造 was an 実験. Perhaps they were the offspring of a forbidden and obscene mating of man and beast; more likely they were a freakish offshoot on the 支店 of 進化—for Kane had long ago dimly sensed a truth in the heretical theories of the 古代の philosophers, that Man is but a higher beast. And if Nature made many strange beasts in the past ages, why should she not have 実験d with monstrous forms of mankind? Surely Man as Kane knew him was not the first of his 産む／飼育する to walk the earth, nor yet to be the last.

Now the harpies hesitated, with their natural 不信 for a building, and some 急に上がるd to the roof and tore at the thatch. But Kane had built 井戸／弁護士席. They returned to earth and at last, driven beyond endurance by the smell of raw 血 and the sight of the flesh within, one of them 投機・賭けるd inside. In an instant all were （人が）群がるd into the 広大な／多数の／重要な hut, 涙／ほころびing ravenously at the meat, and when the last one was within, Kane reached out a 手渡す and jerked a long vine which tripped the catch that held the door he had built. It fell with a 衝突，墜落, and the 妨げる／法廷，弁護士業 he had fashioned dropped into place. That door would 持つ／拘留する against the 告発（する），告訴（する）／料金 of a wild bull.

Kane （機の）カム from his cover and scanned the sky. Some hundred and forty harpies had entered the hut. He saw no more winging through the skies and believed it 安全な to suppose he had the whole flock 罠にかける. Then with a cruel, brooding smile, Kane struck flint and steel to a pile of dead leaves next to the 塀で囲む. Within sounded an uneasy mumbling as the creatures realized that they were 囚人s. A thin wisp of smoke curled 上向き and a flicker of red followed it; the whole heap burst into 炎上 and the 乾燥した，日照りの bamboo caught.

A few moments later the whole 味方する of the 塀で囲む was 燃えて. The fiends inside scented the smoke and grew restless. Kane heard them cackling wildly and clawing at the 塀で囲むs. He grinned savagely, bleakly and without mirth. Now a veer of the 勝利，勝つd drove the 炎上s around the 塀で囲む and up over the thatch—with a roar the whole hut caught and leaped into 炎上.

From within sounded a fearful pandemonium. Kane heard 団体／死体s 衝突，墜落 against the 塀で囲むs, which shook to the 衝撃 but held. The horrid 叫び声をあげるs were music to his soul, and brandishing his 武器, he answered them with 叫び声をあげるs of fearful, soul-shaking laughter. The cataclysm of horror rose unbearably, paling the tumult of the 炎上s. Then it dwindled to a medley of strangled gibbering and gasps as the 炎上s ate in and the smoke thickened. An intolerable scent of 燃やすing flesh pervaded the atmosphere, and had there been room in Kane's brain for aught else than insane 勝利, he would have shuddered to realize that the scent was of that nauseating and indescribable odour that only human flesh 放出するs when 燃やすing.

From the 厚い cloud of smoke, Kane saw a mewing, gibbering thing 現れる through the shredding roof and flap slowly and agonizingly 上向き on fearfully 燃やすd wings. Calmly he 目的（とする）d and 解雇する／砲火／射撃d, and the scorched and blinded thing 宙返り／暴落するd 支援する into the 炎上ing 集まり just as the 塀で囲むs 衝突，墜落d in. To Kane it seemed that Goru's 崩壊するing 直面する, 消えるing in the smoke, 分裂（する） suddenly in a wide grin, and a sudden shout of exultant human laughter mingled eerily in the roar of the 炎上s. But the smoke and insane brain play queer tricks.

KANE stood with the ju-ju 突き破る in one 手渡す and the smoking ピストル in the other, above the smouldering 廃虚s that hid forever from the sight of man the last of those terrible, 半分-human monsters whom another hero had banished from Europe in an unknown age. Kane stood, an unconscious statue of 勝利—the 古代の empires 落ちる, the dark-skinned peoples fade and even the demons of antiquity gasp their last, but over all stands the Aryan barbarian, white-skinned, 冷淡な-注目する，もくろむd, 支配的な, the 最高の fighting man of the earth, whether he be 覆う？ in wolf-hide and horned helmet, or boots and doublet—whether he 耐える in his 手渡す 戦う／戦い-ax or rapier—whether he be called Dorian, Saxon or Englishman—whether his 指名する is Jason, Hengist or Solomon Kane.

Smoke curled 上向き into the morning sky, and the roaring of foraging lions shook the 高原. Slowly, like light breaking through もやs, sanity returned to him.

"The light of God's morning enters even into dark and lonesome lands," said Solomon Kane sombrely. "Evil 支配するs in the waste lands of the earth, but even evil may come to an end. 夜明け follows midnight and even in this lost land the 影をつくる／尾行するs 縮む. Strange are Thy ways, oh God of my people, and who am I to question Thy 知恵? My feet have fallen in evil ways but Thou hast brought me 前へ／外へ scatheless and hast made me a 天罰（を下す） for the 力／強力にするs of Evil. Over the souls of men spread the condor wings of colossal monsters and all manner of evil things prey upon the heart and soul and 団体／死体 of Man. Yet it may be in some far day the 影をつくる／尾行するs shall fade and the Prince of 不明瞭 be chained forever in his hell. And till then mankind can but stand up stoutly to the monsters in his own heart and without, and with the 援助（する） of God he may yet 勝利."

And Solomon Kane looked up into the silent hills and felt the silent call of the hills and the unguessed distances beyond; and Solomon Kane 転換d his belt, took his staff 堅固に in his 手渡す and turned his 直面する eastward.

THE END

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