After the construction of the shelter the activities of the three
became localized. They ranged less widely, for there was always
the necessity of returning to their own tree at nightfall. A river
flowed near by. Game and fruit were plentiful, as were fish also.
Existence had settled down to the daily humdrum of the wild--the
search for food and the sleeping upon full bellies. They looked
no further ahead than today. If the youth thought of his past and
of those who longed for him in the distant metropolis it was in
a detached and impersonal sort of way as though that other life
belonged to another creature than himself. He had given up hope
of returning to civilization, for since his various rebuffs at the
hands of those to whom he had looked for friendship he had wandered
so far inland as to realize that he was completely lost in the
mazes of the jungle.
Then, too, since the coming of Meriem he had found in her that
one thing which he had most missed before in his savage, jungle
life--human companionship. In his friendship for her there was
appreciable no trace of sex influence of which he was cognizant.
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