"What hour is it?" he asked.
"Past twelve. It is not good to sleep in the moonlight, my friend."
Rideau's face was a study of evil passions, but his reason resumed the mastery. The fact that the glasses were missing was significant, and perhaps he recognized that the woman might prove no contemptible adversary; for he answered Dom Pedro calmly.
"Your wine is too good, and I have slept so well that it seems I have missed the steamer. Well, there are other means of transit, and, if it is not too late, you and I have business to talk about."
A light shone in a window of the factory for an hour after this, and when Victor Rideau walked somewhatunevenly toward his quarters, Dom Pedro cursed him under his breath.
The next morning he demanded a surf-boat and Krooboy crew, and when his host had provided them, he sought speech with his daughter before embarking. Rideau did not look his best that morning. His eyes were heavy, the color of his face was mottled in patches; and he was in a dangerous humor. Miss Castro, however, did not avoid him.
"It is to be hoped that you passed a good night," she said.
Rideau could not have failed to notice the boldness of the challenge. He looked at her steadily, and his glance expressed desire rather than resentment. The girl grew hot beneath his gaze as he surveyed her critically, after the manner of one appraising a costly bargain.
"I slept well—so well that I missed the steamer—and awakened with a heaviness I can guess the cause of. You have a bold spirit—and that pleases me; but you are dangerous, señorita—so dangerous that even if you were not otherwise very desirable, I dare not let you go."
Miss Castro returned no answer, and the man added threateningly:
"If you have not a promise to make me when I return from this journey, it will be very bad for Dom Pedro."
The girl clenched one hand tightly, but her voice was clear as she answered him.
"You shall have your promise now. If you come back from the Leopards' country, I will marry you."
Rideau appeared both gratified and perplexed.Possibly he felt that he should seal the bargain; but the girl's attitude did not encourage him, and he had learned that it was not judicious to press her too hardly. So he answered with a bow which had in it little Latin grace.
"Then one must defer his happiness. The señorita will not forget."
"I have given my word," said Miss Castro calmly. "You may claim the fulfilment of my promise if we are both alive when two months have passed."
Rideau shivered slightly as he turned away. He had inherited more than a trace of superstition from one side of his ancestry, and there was an unusual significance in the speaker's tone, and he had heard stories respecting her powers of prediction. A few minutes later he departed eastward in a surf-boat, and it was not a blessing which Dom Pedro, standing on the beach, sent after him.
Maxwell was never addicted to losing time, and, thanks to Miss Castro's efforts, he had a clear start of Rideau, when he left Little Mahu. Redmond, being warned by a message posted on from the cable station farther along the coast, had a number of picked men ready; and Amadu declared that they were sturdy cattle. Both traders had done their utmost, and by dint of working night and day, Maxwell was able to leave their factory two days after he reached it.
They followed him to the compound gate, where Gilby gazed longingly at the forest and then sighed as he surveyed the line of brawny men, each of whom stood waiting beside his burden. Their clothing was simple. Broad folds of white cotton hung over one shoulder, and, drooping to the knee, were belted at the waist by a band from which a matchet hung. A number of the men also carried long flintlock guns.
"They're warranted free from civilization, and fit for almost anything, if you drive them with a tight rein," Gilby said.
"The niggers are fit enough," agreed Redmond. "If I were you, Maxwell, I wouldn't spare them. Nobody has heard anything of Rideau since he reported you as hopelessly hemmed in, but there's not much happens in this region he does not get news of, and it's my humble opinion he'll turn up somewhere along yourtrail just when you least desire to see him. As you probably know, news travels very fast in this country. That fellow must have some influence with the nigger headmen or the chiefs of the Leopards, or somebody would have cut his throat long ago. You'll have to push on your fastest to keep ahead of him."
"I quite appreciate the necessity," Maxwell replied quietly. "But if it were not for my comrade's sake I think I'd wait for him. It strikes me that I am wasting precious time now, and I'll leave you with my best thanks for your assistance."
One trader thumped him on the back, the other grasped his hand.
"Good luck!" cried Redmond. "We'll put a spoke in Rideau's wheel if we can."
"You're the sort of man I take to!" Gilby added. "We'll use up a whole quarter's allowance, and turn this place inside out when you come back again."
Maxwell beckoned to Amadu, and waved his hand to the traders, as his carriers picked up their loads; and the two stood gazing after him until the steamy forest swallowed the long line of plodding men. They never saw him again, and it was some time before any news of his movements reached them, but meanwhile Gilby nearly brought about the death of Rideau's principal assistant, and ever afterward regretted he did not wholly do so.
That evening Gilby was returning with a gun in his hand from a prowl beside a lagoon soon after darkness fell, when his boot became unlaced near the factory boys' quarters, which stood at some distance from the white men's dwelling. Gilby seated himself on a fallen log, and remained a few minutes glancing meditatively,but unseen himself, toward a group of dusky figures crouching around a cooking-fire just outside the edifice. They sat with their backs toward the long, low shed, and, because the fire had sunk, the light was dim and fitful. Accordingly, Gilby saw, though the negroes did not, a shadowy form crawl without a sound down the slope of thatch. With suspicions aroused, Gilby reached out for his gun. It was a heavy big-bore, and there was a large-shot cartridge in either chamber.
Still, he was distinctly puzzled until the crawling object resolved itself into a man, who dropped noiselessly from the overhanging eaves, and the next moment appeared before the astonished negroes, as though he had fallen from the clouds. It was cleverly done, and Gilby could see by the negroes' attitude that they were impressed. The stranger was evidently one of the wandering magicians who are a power in that country, and wanted something from the Krooboys. Gilby, having suffered by the visits of similar gentlemen, determined to demonstrate to his servants the hollowness of such trickery, and furnish the intruder with cause to regret having frightened them. He could see the dusky figures shrink backward until the stranger checked them with an imperious gesture, and asked questions in some native tongue. As Gilby crept carefully nearer, the man's appearance seemed to be familiar. He wore a broad palm-leaf hat low down on his forehead, but as the firelight leaped up the trader felt almost certain that he had before him Rideau's headman.
"If you lib for move a foot, I'll shoot you!" he shouted, pitching up the gun.
There was a murmur, apparently of relief, from theKroos, and, though Gilby afterward said he did not run, the stranger's figure grew less distinct. It had almost vanished when he called again, and, receiving no answer, pressed the trigger. A wisp of smoke blew into his eyes, he heard the lead smash through the frail boarding of the shed; but though he was a tolerable shot there was no other sound beyond the concussion flung back from the palms above. Gilby, dashing forward, searched all the surrounding bush before he returned to the Krooboys, having found nothing.
"What did them Ju-ju man lib for want?" he asked.
"He done ask us how many boy them white man take, and when he lib for bush, sah," answered a trembling negro.
"I'll stop half your rations if the next time he comes one of you doesn't lib for get out soffly, soffly, and tell me," said the trader. "I'll also flog any boy who tells him what he wants to know!"
"Were you trying to shoot yourself, Gilby?" asked Redmond, meeting him at the foot of the stairway. "I'd try to hang out here on top as long as possible, if I were you."
"I was trying to shoot one of those confounded Ju-ju men, more fool me. The beggar got away, and, though of course it was trickery, he did it cleverly. I believe it was that brute of Rideau's."
"Then it would have saved somebody a lot of trouble if you had held straighter. Rideau doesn't usually make his movements plain, but it will be unlucky for Maxwell if those two rascals are on his trail."
Maxwell in the meantime was pushing north with feverish haste. He did not know what had happened at the factory, but he feared many things, and guessedthat his rival would miss no opportunity to prevent his joining hands with his comrade. Still, he could not forecast what his plan would be, and could only redouble his precautions and make Amadu solemnly promise to carry relief to the threatened camp if disaster overtook him personally. Also he traveled very fast, for Maxwell possessed the gift of getting the utmost out of his men, and because news flies swiftly through the African bush, that perhaps accounted for his being able to cover the distance he did before misfortune overtook him.
The rains had set in, when, with Amadu some paces behind him, he plodded one day through thick jungle before his men. The deluge had ceased during the last hour, but the narrow path ran water, while the cane, which grew higher than a tall man's head on either side, shook down drenching showers alike on soaked white man and naked negro. Belts of thick steam drifted across it in places. There was no sound but the splash of moisture and the fall of weary feet, but Maxwell, with his pistol loose in its waterproof holster, marched the more cautiously. He had faced numerous perils in his time, and had learned never to run an unnecessary risk; and the jungle he traversed was particularly suitable for an ambush.
Amadu, who recognized this, also was vigilant, and swept the cane on either side with searching eyes. He endeavored to persuade his master to travel in his hammock; but unavailingly. Therefore he carried the long Snider rifle with its breech well covered by his arm, and felt at times with wet fingers for the hilt of the short, straight blade, which hung at his side. He was a tolerable shot, but like most of the Moslem tribesmen deadly with the steel.
"These men march well," said Maxwell. "We should reach the camp within a week if nothing hinders us. Tell them to spread out a little and keep their matchets ready. The cane is getting thicker."
Amadu moved backward along the plodding line, and when he turned to rejoin his master, Maxwell was some distance in front of him. The path twisted sharply round a thicker clump of cane, and suddenly Amadu caught a glimpse of a tiny black patch among the dripping stems. Nevertheless, he evinced no sign of notice until he was certain that the black strip formed part of a human arm; and then he was called upon to make an eventful decision. The dusky soldier of fortune knew that if an ambush had been planted among the cane the lurking foe would, should both pass apparently unobservant, hold their fire until, by a volley poured into the main body, they could spread panic and cut the column in two. That might mean the loss of many black men; but Amadu counted these as beasts of burden in comparison with his master. He guessed that almost before he could pitch up his rifle a poisoned arrow or a charge of ragged potleg would strike down the white man. So he held on stolidly, with dusky lips set tight, hoping that Maxwell might not see what he had until the corner was passed. Then there might still be time to crawl in upon the enemy from behind.
Maxwell walked straight on until he turned and glanced over his shoulder; then he shook the moisture from his jacket, and in doing so, let his hand slip from its lower corner to his revolver holster. He turned again, with death, as it were, suspended above his head; and Amadu gasped as he approached the thicker clump of cane. There was now no sign of an enemy's presencein all the jungle; only the splashing and panting of the carriers behind.
Suddenly the white man's hand swept out level with his shoulder, and almost at the same instant a bright flash blazed from the cane. Then the quick ringing of a rifle broke through the dull thud of the flintlock and the pistol's second crack, and Maxwell, reeling a little, hurled himself into the thicket.
With a roar to those who followed, Amadu plunged in too, a score of clamorous black men with naked blades hard behind, and was just in time to spring upon a naked man who strove to clear an entangled foot from the creeper withes. The short blade twice passed through him; and wrenching it free with an exultant laugh, Amadu floundered on. For a space he and his followers smashed through that strip of jungle, but found only a smoking rifle and one flintlock gun; then calling off the rest, he led them back to the path. Maxwell was sitting there in a pool of water.
"Send those boys back," he said thickly. "One of those brutes missed me, the other did not. One can't always guess aright, Amadu, and I thought there were at least a score of them."
Amadu groaned. He could see that his master was hard stricken, for he looked faint and cold, and did not usually converse with his subordinates in that kind of English. Still, he understood the first sentence, and drove the curious black men back beyond the corner before he stooped over the speaker. Maxwell's face was distorted and clammy. There was a stain on the side of his jacket, and it plainly cost him an effort to speak.
"Did you lib for chop them bush boy, Amadu?"
"One of him, sah," was the grim answer. "He done leave them rifle."
"Let me see," said Maxwell. "That is an old chassepot. Rideau had a number of them. You don't quite follow? Well, you got the wrong man, Amadu. Don't stand there, but slit up this jacket. Chop them doff piece up the side of him."
Amadu did it with the still wet blade, and groaned again when Maxwell, turning his head a little, looked down at the slow, red trickle from his right side, then passed his hand across his lips and nodded when he saw what there was upon it.
"Take them lil' silver bottle out of my pocket and pull the top off him," he said very slowly; and when Amadu had done so he gulped down a draught of lukewarm brandy before he spoke again.
"I don't suppose it's much use, but you may as well take the knife that's in the pocket, and feel if there's any potleg near the top. Well, why don't you do it? You need not be frightened. It won't bleed much—that way."
Amadu shivered as he probed the wound. Maxwell's face grew grayer, and after a downward glance out of half-closed eyes he shook his head and stretched out one hand for more of the brandy. Then there was a heavy silence for several minutes.
"If I could lie still with ice to suck until somebody brought a surgeon there might be a chance; but that's out of the question here," he said in a rambling fashion, and then roused himself. "You don't understand. Well, I'll try in the little I know of your own idiom. We have made two great journeys together, but nowit is written that I shall shortly set out on a longer one alone, Amadu."
Maxwell spoke thickly, but there was a wry smile on his lips as he watched the big dark-skinned alien, who, rending his cotton robe, bound a pad of wet leaves upon the injured side.
"It is useless, Amadu." Maxwell coughed once or twice. "Listen. Because of something you may remember you dare not fail me, and this is my word to you. I made a promise which must be kept, and you will carry me to the white man's camp before six days are over, alive or dead."
Amadu looked eastward across the jungle, spread his palms outward, and then bent his head.
"By fire and salt, and the beard of the Prophet it shall be so," he said in his own tongue. "And I would it may also be written that I shall still follow my master should these dogs of bushmen meddle again."
"Your master is one of the infidel," replied Maxwell. "Now see that none of these others know what has overtaken me, and call up the hammock men."
Maxwell was leaning on Amadu's shoulder when the hammock appeared round the bend, and none of the black men who lifted him into it guessed how hard he had been hit; and the monotonous carrying chanty drowned the groans he could not quite suppress. The heavens were opened as the march began again, and the rain rushed down. It lashed the negroes' oily skins until they tingled, the trail became a streamlet, and the mire in places fouled them to the knee; but Amadu, having given his promise, saw to the keeping of it with a terrible persistence, and they trudged on doggedly, the dripping hammock always before them. As oneworn-out bearer stumbled another replaced him, and the march progressed until long after darkness fell, and after a few hours' halt in drifting mist it began again.
So the long days and black nights passed. There were odd flashes of sunlight, and once or twice the moon looked down; but between these times the air was filled with the steam of the saturated earth or with a rush of lukewarm water.
Late one night, when the weary carriers lay camped for a brief rest in thick forest, Maxwell beckoned Amadu. He lay in the slung hammock, a lantern burning behind his head.
"You will start in two hours. I must reach the camp before another night comes. My time is short," he said.
Amadu, looking down at him gravely, saw that the words were true; but he strove to deny them in his own tongue.
Maxwell smiled wearily, answering him in English beyond his complete comprehension.
"I have known many men of lighter tint I could part from more easily, Amadu. If we reach the camp before another night comes you shall have my big elephant gun."
The dusky man stood upright.
"I carried an Emir's standard. Will you bribe me with a gun to keep the oath I swore?"
Maxwell must have been in a state of torment about that time, but he was in his own way a man of extravagant pride, and it was perhaps to deny his weakness that he spoke again.
"Yet it is a good gun," he said, with a trace of his old dryness. "Once you will remember at over ahundred paces it drove a smooth ball through a rash bushman's head. You could keep it in remembrance—couldn't you?"
The alien stooped and laid one of the thin hands on his own bent head, then dropped it suddenly, for from somewhere far off a faint sound scarcely more than audible trembled across the forest. Maxwell strove to raise himself to listen, but before he could speak his lieutenant sprang bolt upright, and his voice rang out. It was the sound of firing, and even at that distance something warned the listeners that the quick beat of it betokened modern rifles.
The hammock-bearers, who feared their new master rather more than the old, came up at the double; bundles were thrown hurriedly on to woolly crowns; the tired men swung into line; and the little camp grew empty.
Amadu, limping behind the hammock, laughed.
"If it be the will of Allah, I shall see that big gun make even a bigger hole in more than one heathen's head!"
Hilton Dane sat with a fouled rifle across his knees in an angle of the stockade protecting what had been the hospital camp. It was, however, a hospital no longer, for some of the sick had recovered, and the rest had died. Dane considered that he might have saved more of them had he been more skilled in medicine, but he had done his best according to his abilities; and none of the poor wretches seemed to blame him. Still, there were times when he felt like a murderer as some unfortunate sufferer's eyes turned in his direction, beseeching help, and he could do nothing but watch him die. They died, for the most part, as apathetically as they had lived, the heathen with the uncomplaining stolidity which had carried them through much hardship and cruelty, and those who followed the prophet testifying that it was Allah's will.
Dane remembered it all that morning as he looked round upon the remnant left him, for it seemed hardly possible that any would see another day. When the pestilence relaxed its grip he had resumed the mining, until the tribesmen hemmed them in. Once the foe tried to storm the camp, and failed so signally that beyond creeping up and firing into it, they had not repeated the attempt until the preceding night, when a few succeeded in passing the defenses. These, however, did not survive very long. On the other hand, thegarrison could not get out, and though they had no lack of water, one cannot subsist upon fluid alone, and there was very little else.
The men lay about the stockade with their rusty guns beside them, the negro, Bad Dollar, filing his matchet, as he did continually. The man Dane called Monday, however, crouched close beside him. A curious friendship had sprung up between the two, and they would talk long together with mutual satisfaction, though neither of them fully understood his companion.
A ravine cut the camp off from the forest in the rear, and beyond the front stockade the ground fell steeply to the river. There was forest across it, but only the tops of the higher trees rose out of the mist which shrouded all the plain below.
"You tink Cappy Maxwell perhallups come to-day, sah?" asked Monday.
"He will certainly come some day," Dane answered with a cheerfulness he found it hard to assume. "It would be opportune if he came just now, especially as he might be too late to-morrow. A miss is rather better than a mile in the present case, but you let too many of your black friends get in last night, Monday."
The dusky man, for he was not a negro, looked up at the speaker doubtfully and shook his head.
"I no savvy all them palaver, sah, but Cappy Maxwell too much fine white man. All them black boy tink each morning they go look him. Cappy Maxwell say he lib for heah, and them boy believe him."
Dane glanced at the dejected objects, even then staring down expectantly into the drifting mist, then at the tally of days that would never be wholly forgottenwhich he had scored on a post of the stockade. A deeper notch marked each seventh, and after many calculations he had gashed a few across to indicate the probable date of Maxwell's departure from Little Mahu. The black men did not understand the meaning of those scores and regarded the making of them as a religious ceremony, but Dane fancied that Maxwell might understand if he reached the camp too late. Then, perhaps because he was overwrought, he became conscious of an extravagant pride in his friend. Those half-naked Africans had waited, trusting in Maxwell's promise patiently and long, and trusting it implicitly still. This, it seemed to him, was no small testimony.
"I tink we look Cappy Maxwell one time, sah," Monday began again.
"If he is alive, you will," Dane answered as sturdily. "Stop those boys' chattering. Something is going on down yonder now."
Monday stood up staring at the mist.
"Them parrot scream, sah, and them monkey talk. I tink them dam bushmen lib for come back again."
"Then don't let your boys start shooting until they crawl close in," Dane answered, with an indifference assumed to reassure the rest "Some of those fellows can't hit anything with a gun, and you had better keep a few as a standby in case they come in with a run. Let them wait until the bushmen lib for climb the stockade, and then split their heads with the matchets. You understand me?"
Monday apparently did so, for he moved off with a grin which betokened nothing pleasant for the bushmen; and Dane sat still with his eyes fixed on the forest. Something was evidently happening, but the mist wasthick, and he could not see into its dim recesses. His few men were worn down by hunger and continuous watching, and he feared that if the foe pushed the attack with vigor they would certainly get in. There was no doubt that the garrison would make a grim last stand if they did, but that appeared at the best a poor consolation, and Dane became sensible of a coldly murderous indignation against the bushmen.
There was a crackle of undergrowth far below, then a sound as of men splashing through the river which ran high and swollen; but Dane was short of ammunition, and did not consider it advisable to fire blindly into the mist. He felt himself quivering with suspense. Staring down the steep face of the bluff, he waited, ready to drive a bullet through the head of the first assailant who rose out of the vapor. Then the noise ceased altogether, and the ensuing silence became maddening. How long this lasted Dane could never tell, but he grew cold and hot by turns as he waited, until a sound that was wholly unexpected became faintly audible. It was not the rustle made by the passage of a stealthy foe, but more resembled the approach of men marching in some order. While the blood pulsed within him he saw that the camp boys glanced from him to the vapor under the influence of an overwhelming excitement. But though the sound came nearer, the mist, which was thicker than ever, still hid all below, until a negro's head rose out of it, and Dane saw that he carried a hammock pole. Then a wild shout went up, and Monday's yell rang through all the rest:
"Cappy Maxwell lib!"
There was an end of all discipline. Weapons went down clattering, and famishing men, who during manyweary days had vainly scanned the forest, poured out through the stockade gate and raced madly down the slope to welcome those who had brought them the long expected help. For a moment Dane stood stupidly still, almost too dazed to realize what had come about, vacantly wondering how Maxwell had forced a passage without firing a shot. Then the contagion seized him and, leaping down from the stockade, he followed the rest. His perceptions were yet clouded by a bewildering sense of relief, but it struck him that the hammock-bearers came on in an ominous silence. When he reached them, Amadu looked at him curiously, as though he would have spoken, but, brushing past, Dane tore the wet matting aside.
Then he stepped suddenly backward, breathless and aghast. Maxwell lay huddled in a limp heap upon the drenched canvas, almost unrecognizable. His face was distorted and shrunken, his jacket reddened in patches, and his lips were cracked and black. His eyes had grown dim and glassy, and when he spoke his very voice seemed changed.
"Have I altered so much that you don't know me, comrade?"
"You have brought us our lives, Carsluith, but God knows I would rather have stayed on here forever than to see you come like this," said Dane.
Maxwell moved a little, and there was the ghost of a smile in his half-dosed eyes.
"I really couldn't help it. I hardly think I shall trouble you long. A bushman back in the forest shot me."
"Don't!" Dane answered hoarsely. "It can't be so bad as that. I won't believe it!"
Maxwell let his hand fall into his comrade's palm as though to convince him.
"I am afraid it is. I have been holding on to my life desperately—because I wanted to see you before I went," he said brokenly.
The touch of his clammy hand struck a cold chill through Dane, who, turning abruptly, bade the hammock boys carry their burden with all speed to the tent. What he saw there convinced him that Carsluith Maxwell had made his last adventurous march, and that the best to be hoped for him was a painless passing to his rest. Maxwell also knew it, and though Dane could say nothing because of the choking sensation in his throat, he looked up at him and nodded.
"Hopeless, isn't it? This case is beyond your skill," he said faintly. "We have been good comrades, but even the best partnership can't last forever. Still, you might do what little you can, for there are things I want to tell you."
Dane went out to seek for his case of drugs, and just then, as if in mockery, a blaze of sunshine beat down on clustering negroes and rain-beaten camp. Swayed by a sudden gust of grief and passion, the man shook his fist at the river and cursed what lay beneath it. It seemed to his overwrought fancy that the stain of blood was on the gold, the blood of the staunchest comrade any man ever starved or fought beside. Though their friendship had been neither lengthy nor demonstrative, the hardships and perils undergone had woven a bond between them that knit them as close as brothers. Nevertheless, Dane had yet to learn all that his comrade had done for him.
Maxwell slept or lapsed into unconsciousness allafternoon, but he revived a little by nightfall, and beckoned his comrade near him. The night was black and hot. Because Dane had given stringent orders, no negro's voice reached them, and they seemed utterly alone, hemmed in by the darkness of Africa. Dane could hear only the river moan below, and he found it necessary to cough huskily, for again, as he remembered one other night when they sat there together filled with bright hopes for the future, an obstruction gathered in his throat. Maxwell told him of his journey, in a low, strained voice, halting for breath at frequent intervals, and every word burned itself into the listener's memory. Maxwell always put things vividly and tersely.
"It was a wonderful march; but I have let you talk too much," said Dane, when he concluded. "So it was by Lilian's help you fitted out the expedition, and she rode all night across the mountains to warn Chatterton. It was what one might have expected. God bless her!"
"Amen," said Maxwell, with full solemnity. "The talking can't make much difference now—I shall have a long rest to-morrow. There is still something I must say, and even if I am blundering it seems best to speak. We are very blind when we think we see most clearly, Hilton."
Dane looked at the speaker with some bewilderment as he let his head fall back on the matting, and lay still gasping. Five long minutes passed before he spoke again.
"Will you raise me a little, Hilton? My breath comes short."
Dane slipped one arm beneath his shoulder before Maxwell continued.
"It is strange that neither of us guessed; but all was for the best, maybe. The knowledge might have severed our friendship—I hardly think much more than that would part us now. Though twice I came near doing so, I never told you that I asked Miss Chatterton to marry me."
It was only by an effort that Dane held his arm motionless so that it still supported the dying man. It seemed the strangest of all the strange happenings that they two should have braved so much together for the love of the same woman.
Maxwell saw his blank surprise, and smiled feebly.
"You asked Lilian Chatterton to marry you?" Dane repeated dazedly.
"Very foolish of me, was it not? But there is no reason for such surprise that I should desire it; and I promptly discovered my folly. I also gathered there was somebody who might please her better. Now you have the simple fact, but as there is an inference you must listen still. How could I have guessed the truth—after what I saw at the Hallows Brig? It appeared impossible to me that any man who had won Miss Chatterton's approval could find pleasure in——"
"Stop!" cried Dane, striving to hold his excitement in check. "You were mistaken, Carsluith. It was only out of pity, and because the imprisonment of her brother would bring destitution upon her, that I met that girl."
"I can take your word," Maxwell said quietly. "That was the one point which troubled me. Strange, isn't it, that on my last night I should talk in this fashion; but when one's grasp on material things grows feeble the others assume their due value. Yes, I lovedLilian Chatterton—as I love her still—though it was madness to think that she, fresh and bright with innocent light-heartedness, could stoop to mate with a somber man like me. But raise me a little. I can't see you clearly, Hilton."
Dane did as he was bidden, and Maxwell continued:
"I want you to remember that it was my fault, Hilton. Miss Chatterton never suspected until I spoke that night we passed you at Hallows Brig. I had a suspicion you admired her before that time, but it vanished completely then. You see how each trivial incident fitted in. She was very gentle, but I knew her decision was final—and still I did not see the truth."
As Maxwell looked into his comrade's eyes a quiver ran through Dane.
"I am bewildered, and it seems brutal to ask you questions now," he said huskily. "But you have more to tell."
Maxwell's eyes signified assent, but he paused to gather breath.
"It is only because I am dying. Otherwise, you would never have heard this from me, but it seems best for both that you should know. It was naturally not for—my—sake Miss Chatterton made that midnight journey."
Maxwell smiled wistfully as he let his head sink back again; and Dane, drawing his arm away, said nothing for a few minutes. It was wonderful news he had heard, but the price which had been paid for his safety was unbearably heavy.
"You are a very staunch friend—and this makes itthe harder for me to lose you. If only there was anything a man could do to prevent it! Carsluith, rouse yourself! I can't lose you!"
"It makes it the easier for me to go," said Maxwell. "If what I hope for happens, you will always be kind to her, Hilton. Just moisten my lips with the brandy."
There was silence afterward, for Maxwell lay breathing unevenly with his eyes closed, and Dane was swayed in turn by satisfaction and a crushing sense of loss. He suffered from remorse as well. Maxwell dying had revealed a side of his nature his comrade now knew he should have seen manifested in his actions if not in his words.
It was the sufferer who first spoke again.
"It was Rideau who brought misfortune upon us from the beginning, and to judge by the rifle the bushman left, he was the instigator of the last attack."
"May worse befall me if I do not repay him fully before I leave Africa!" Dane said, solemnly.
Maxwell appeared to smile as he had always done when his partner was unusually emphatic.
"He had excuses, Hilton, and I am past all desire for vengeance now. For one thing he recognized the señorita's gift to you. Still, for the sake of Miss Castro—and she promised to help me—I would advise you not to let him go free to continue his persecution of Dom Pedro. We both owe her a good deal, and I would like you, if possible, to tell her so. You might add my respectful remembrance, too. There is yet another point. Whatever my share of this gold may be, I bequeath it to you, with my blessing, on condition that you send the boys back happy, with as much clothas they can carry, to wherever they came from. The poor devils served us faithfully. When I have rested, I would like to see Amadu. Then I think my work will be finished, and I can only await the summons to answer for what I have failed in. It will come before sunrise, Hilton."
An hour passed slowly while Dane listened to the ticking of his watch; then Maxwell opened his eyes again, and Dane beckoned to Amadu, who stood waiting without. He came in, still wearing the straight blade which had struck the murderer down, and stood like a bronze statue beside his master.
"I want to thank you for faithful service, Amadu," Maxwell said weakly. "You shall have the gun—you have won it—and whatever else you wish besides. We made two great journeys together, but I cannot take you with me now."
The big man bent until Maxwell's thin hand rested on his head. What they said Dane failed to comprehend, but Amadu seemed to do him homage, and when he rose, he moved slowly, with raised palms and head bent, backward out of the tent. Then as Maxwell's eyes closed he crouched in the entrance, with the steel, which caught the lamplight, lying naked across his knee.
"Often I lib for watch them white man so," he said softly. "No djinn or devil go near him now."
Maxwell said little further. He slept or lay unconscious for some time, and then just smiled for a moment as his eyes rested on the grim sentinel with the bronze limbs and raw blue draperies, guarding the entrance. When he next roused himself he laid his chilly hand on one of Dane's, and showed a faint signof pleasure when his comrade's fingers closed upon it. Once again he murmured, but it was rather by the movements of his lips than by audible sound that Dane gathered the message:
"You will tell her I kept my promise."
That was his last effort, for when the night was almost gone the fingers which lay limp in Dane's grew rigid. Then Dane stood up stiffly, desolate, knowing that the spirit of Carsluith Maxwell had passed to find such rest as may be reserved for the souls of loyal gentlemen. But the dust claims that which sprang from it quickly in that land, and the comrade he left to mourn over him found his own endurance heavily taxed before the aliens who had helped him at his task took up their stations with weapons girt about them, a barbaric guard of honor, at the dead man's head and feet. It was Amadu who strapped the big revolver by its lanyard to his master's wrist, when, scattering a few of the heavy-scented lily blossoms, Dane folded the tired hands. Then they kept their vigil together, and it did not seem incongruous that dusky cattle thief and soldier of fortune should watch beside the English adventurer. Humanity is greater than color and creed, and it was as those who had suffered together they did their dead due honor.
The rain had ceased and a dazzling sunrise flamed across the forest when Dane stooped for a last glance at Carsluith Maxwell. The pain had faded from his face, and he lay in impressive serenity as one who rested with his work well done. Then the lonely survivor went out into the brightness of the morning with a grief that found no expression mingled in his heart with the lust of vengeance.
Nature, untrammeled by human inventions, takes her own way swiftly in the fever land, and the sun had hardly cleared the cottonwoods when Dane found himself mechanically following a tattered hammock borne high on the heads of dusky men. Though there was somber cloud above, dazzling brightness beat into their set faces, and flashed on glistening blade and long gun-barrel borne by those who marched behind. There was no word spoken. Only the patter of naked feet and the jingle of steel broke through the impressive hush, for that morning every leaf hung limp and still. It was with all solemnity that Carsluith Maxwell set out on his last journey.
Dane halted by the eastern gate of the stockade, watching the black men swing past him file by file; they were as strange a company as ever followed a British gentleman to his grave—Moslem bandit, woolly haired bush thief, stalwart, heathen Kroo, brown desperadoes who had fought the French under the banner of the great Sultan, and two-legged beasts of burden from the steaming swamps. Still, unstable and unreasoning, with the light-heartedness of a child and the cruelty of a devil, as many were, it gave the watcher a mournful pleasure to see that one and all had come to pay respect to their dead leader;and he showed his wonder when Amadu cried aloud, and the glinting flintlocks swung together, with muzzles to the rear. Dane guessed that the dusky adventurer had not learned to reverse arms in the service of any hinterland Emir.
He followed, seeing as one walking in a dream, the sinuous line of sable limbs and white and blue draperies wind on through deepening shadow. When Amadu cried again, the moving figures fell apart on either hand, and Dane was left with their leader and the bearers beside a shallow trench, on which one shaft of sunlight fell. He cast his ragged hat down on the sand, and in a voice which seemed to belong to some other person recited such fragmentary portions of the last office as he could remember. No one moved among all the silent company, but there was an inarticulate murmur when at last the solemn words broke off.
Dane remembered nothing further beyond the dull thud of shovels; his eyesight seemed to fail him, until presently he found himself moving dejectedly back to camp behind the straggling company. He must have slept when he reached his tent, for the sun was low when Monday and Amadu stood outside the entrance, calling him. When he rose wearily, Amadu pointed to the groups of men waiting without.
"Them boy lib for savvy what you do now, sah," he said in the coast palaver.
"I can't tell them just yet," Dane answered. "What do they wish themselves?"
It was a few moments before his meaning dawned upon Amadu, for the white man felt too dazed to frame his thoughts in other than everyday English.
"Them carrier bushmen lib for beach and goback to his own country one time," said Amadu. "Say this country belong to the Ju-ju."
No man could have blamed the carriers. They had in their own fashion done their utmost, and Dane almost shared their opinion about the locality; but he pointed to other men of lighter color and soldierly aspect.
"Do these want to lib for their own country one time, too?" he asked.
Amadu laughed mirthlessly, and fingering the hilt of the straight blade glanced at Monday, whose face was very grim, and the little negro, Bad Dollar, crouching close by with a polished matchet in his hand.
"They say they follow you if you be fit to hunt them Leopard or go chop them dam Rideau."
"They shall have an answer to-morrow," said Dane. "Monday, see there is order in the camp. Tell them no man is fit to reach the coast himself, and must wait until I go with him. There is something I want to ask you, Amadu. What you did was well done, but who taught you how, when a white soldier is buried, men carry the gun. Your master has gone, and I am Cappy now."
As it were mechanically, the big dusky alien closed his heels together, while his hand went up to his ragged turban and fell again with a rigid precision.
"I had suspected it already," said Dane, half-aloud. "Sit down and tell me about it. Monday, see no boy leaves the camp."
The others disappeared, and Dane was glad when the man obeyed him. He was respectful and intelligent, and Dane felt the need of company. It seemed that the same feeling troubled Amadu.
"The white man has guessed," he said, in a strangely mixed idiom. "I carried an Emir's standard in the North, in the dry country where men fear Allah, and there is corn and tobacco. My master mocked at the Sultan, refusing his tribute, and the Sultan's horsemen came upon us while we slept. They wore fine iron chain and carried the guns which come south through the desert from where no man knows, but for an hour a handful of us held the gate with the sword. Then when other gates went down and the huts burned behind us, some one brought my master's horse, and he rode out upon them. There were less than a score of us living then, but we carried the standard almost through their midst, and when my master went down, I and three others stood over him. The Sultan had fewer men and horses when at last a gun-butt struck me down."
Amadu flung his head up as he halted, and his eyes glittered when they fastened on the listener's face.
"The Sultan was served by men, and not by such as the heathen who follow the little white man," he said.
Dane could draw the intended inference, and when he nodded Amadu appeared satisfied.
"When I lay in the grass next morning only the wall remained of the town," continued the dusky soldier of fortune. "There were sufficient heads hung about it already, so I fled south to serve the White Queen, as others of my people had done. We would follow the strongest, and knew how the great Emir of the West had mocked the white men who do not speak your tongue. So I came south and learned the drill, and wondered if the English were mad when they sent a lad with the face of a woman to lead us. There were twenty of us, allbroken men who had lived by the sword, and some laughed when for the first time our officer spoke to us. Others answered him openly, and, perhaps not understanding all, he said no word to them; but when one night four men returned carrying plunder they had stolen from the heathen, and, mocking at his orders, threatened him, he shot their leader. He stood alone before us, very slight and slender, with the smoke of the pistol curling about him, and any one of those who stood by could have crushed him with their hand; but we went back to our huts when he told us, and henceforward obeyed him.
"It happened that when time had passed, and we knew our officer, as he knew us, we went up with him to chastise certain thieves, and came upon a stockade across the path, with many men who carried guns behind it. The sun hung low over the forest, and we feared treachery when one held out a palm branch; but refusing to heed us, our officer went forward alone to speak with the heathen. He stood as he used to stand, with one hand on his side, so, holding in the other only a little cane, the stockade ten paces from him, and we waiting, as he had bidden us, it may be a hundred, behind him. A wise man would not have done so, but the one who led us feared nothing. He spoke, and his voice came clear through the shadow as he stood twisting his cane a little, one lonely white man demanding submission from the heathen. Then a gun flashed, and he fell forward on his face, and with a cry for vengeance we swept the stockade. The heathen did not wait for the steel, and most of them escaped, for darkness fell suddenly upon the forest.
"We knew they would fly to the stronghold of a thiefin the country of the white men who speak a different tongue, where, when certain thieves had done so, our leader might not follow; but when we had buried him we made a plan, and swore to send many of the bushmen after him. The night was far spent when we crept softly about the stockade of that heathen village, but men drunk with palm wine made merry within, doubtless boasting how they had slain our leader. It was one who had served the Sultan, climbing the stockade, drove his bayonet through the watcher at the gate, and no man saw us slip from hut to hut until we gathered softly about the headman's house, where in honor of the strangers who had killed a white man there was feasting.
"Three we could count on held the door, the rest went in, and there remained no one living when they came out again. Then we burned the village, and I went back to the outpost of the next white Captain and told him what we had done. He had eyes like the Captain Maxwell, and listened very quietly, tapping with his fingers on the table—so—but another white man whom I did not know, smote it, calling upon Allah in the speech of the English.
"Then the Captain looked hard at me, asking, 'You had no order?'
"'No. He was our master, and those bush thieves killed him treacherously,' I said boldly, and one white man nodded to the other.
"'You were wise to speak the truth in this,' said the Captain. 'Your master would never have given that order; but there are men who will not believe the rest of your tale.'
"'By salt and by fire,' I was answering, when he lifted his hand.
"'I said there are men who will doubt you, and say you shot your leader. Even if that is not so, you have killed many of our good friends' people.' When he said this the listening white man laughed a little. 'Their nation will demand restitution, and it is possible the Commissioner will hang you for what you did—which would not please me, for you are a good soldier, Amadu. Now you must wait in prison until we hear from him.'
"Again the white man smiled, and I could not read all that was in the Captain's face as he looked at me, but his friend spoke, in the speech of the English, saying that if he did something he would be condemned. So I was laid in prison, and stayed there several days, fearing greatly that I, who had carried the Emir's standard, should hang like a common bushman, until one night the comrade who brought me rations set down a treble quantity.
"'Am I to hang, a fat man, to please the white men who speak differently?' I asked him, but he answered nothing.
"It was near midnight when I heard the silver whistle, and a sound of running feet, after some one called the guard. Now I did not wish to hang, and Allah gave me understanding. The roof was of whitened iron, but the door was not strong, and they had left me my rifle, which was not usual. The door went down at the second blow, and no man saw me as I fled for the bush, taking the rifle and three days' food with me. Still, I knew it would not be well for me to remain in the country of the English, and when no man would hire me, I took service with my last master. Two I had were killed before him, but neither was hisequal, and I shall not find such another in all Africa—though my service is not completed yet."
Again there was a mutual understanding between the pair, and when Dane nodded Amadu went out softly. The story had interested and also encouraged him, for he knew he would not be left without a helper in what he had still to do. Now that the numbness which followed the blow had begun to pass, there was sufficient to occupy his attention, and Dane never closed his eyes that night. The gold won would suffice to cover the cost of the two expeditions, and leave a balance which would enable him to launch his invention. Dane feared that, situated where the mine was, no company could be induced to handle it. It appeared certain that the climate, the sicknesses, and the hostility of the natives would between them prevent any private adventurers from working it successfully. Nothing could be done for some months at least, until the rains had ceased; and before morning the one white man who knew the river's secret had decided to keep it and send no more of his countrymen to their deaths in the Leopards' country. At the best, the mine lay in no-man's-land, and he had not even a black ruler's doubtful concession for reckless speculators to operate upon.
What Dane had seen and suffered had humbled his pride. Maxwell's last news still thrilled him, and he determined he would do what might better have been done earlier—ask the woman for whose sake he had pressed on into that forest to wait until he had made further progress in his legitimate profession. So far, the way was clear, but even before his comrade left him a desire for vengeance had been growing stronger withinthe survivor, and now a sullen fury filled the lonely man, who had pledged himself to demand a full account for any breach of trust, and had not hitherto failed his promise.
At sunrise, leaving his tent unrefreshed, he called the men together and addressed them first collectively.
"I will take you all back to the coast, and you will receive more than you bargained for when you get there," he said, rendering it, however, into the seaboard tongue. "Still, as the bushmen may try to stop us on the way, you will not start until you are rested, and I think you ready. We may not go quite the shortest way, but no boy shall suffer for it who serves me well."
There was an approving shout when the listeners grasped his meaning, but Dane called Amadu and Monday aside.
"Before or after I take these boys to the coast, I have an account to settle with Rideau. You will help me?" he said; and when he had made his purpose plainer, a dozen of his special bodyguard came forward, protesting their willingness to follow.
They set to work at once, and there was much to be done. Arms required to be stripped and oiled, loads packed for transport, and Dane drilled his men an hour or two each day. A number of days passed before all was ready, and then the combined forces looked fit for whatever they might have to do; their leader recognized that the work might be arduous.
It was early in the morning, and all waited for the word to march, when Dane stood bareheaded beside a little cross on the bluff beyond the camp. For a few moments his eyes grew misty as he glanced downat the date and name he had painfully hacked upon it. He felt that he would never meet the equal of the man who slept beneath.
"Good-by, comrade. You will be long remembered," he murmured thickly; then he solemnly recorded a vow that while Rideau went free and unpunished his own affairs would wait. Dane owed the dead man a duty, and he had taken upon himself a pledge which he meant to discharge thoroughly.
It was with as little parade of weapons as possible that the expedition headed for the coast, for the men had their orders and Amadu saw they were carried out. Those who carried matchets wore them hidden under their cotton robes, while at times the rank and file were allowed to straggle unchecked, with small semblance of discipline, in a drawn-out line. The discipline, however, was there, and disaster would have overtaken any bushmen who attempted to profit by the apparent lack of it. Dane did not order defenses of any kind to be raised at night, and generally had his tent pitched apart from the main camp; so that when they had made wide detours through dense forest and reeking swamp, some of the black men commenced to murmur as well as wonder at his recklessness. Amadu, Monday, and the negro, Bad Dollar, with whom he held long conferences, realized, however, that their leader was by no means inconsistent, even if they did not know that he was to all intents and purposes the victim of a monomania.
When it was too late forever to tell him so, he realized what his fallen comrade had been to him; and remembering how Maxwell reached the river camp, it was with difficulty that he refrained from breaking out into fitsof baresark rage at the thought of their third partner's treachery. The knowledge that it was necessary to pit an intelligence unhampered by senseless fury against the enemy's cunning alone restrained him; for he felt that Rideau, who had probably heard by this time of his relief, even if he did not know it earlier, would strike again to ensure his own personal safety. He had no lack of opportunity, but, either by accident or by judgment, for long refused to fall into the trap, however temptingly Dane baited it.
The expedition wandered southward leisurely, and Dane grew more savagely sullen as they passed dripping forest and foul morass in safety, until at last he ordered his tent to be pitched one sunset, fully a hundred yards from the camp. The light was failing when he stood outside it looking about him with a curious suggestion of anticipation in his face. They had reached the southern fringe of the Leopards' country, and another week's march should place them in touch with French officials. The forest was comparatively open, the cottonwoods growing well apart; and gazing between the long rows of towering trunks streaked by blue wood smoke, Dane could catch the shimmer of a sluggish creek. It was deep and miry, and haunted, as he had seen, by huge saurians, but a little produce evidently came down that way, for the bush path on either side was connected by a native ferry.
As he made a last survey the light died out; and his lamp was lighted when Amadu, Monday, and Bad Dollar came softly into the tent. Dane stood upright, but the rest crouched low among the cases, that they might not reveal their presence on the illuminated canvas. Monday growled a protest as he noticed how his master's figure was projected against it by the light; but his comments fell unheeded, for there was a definite purpose behind the white man's imprudence.
"Again I found the footsteps," Amadu reported, using a mixture of several tongues, as well as broken English. "The men who made them were tired, and have doubtless followed us far. They will surely be satisfied when they see us resting to-night."
Monday grinned wickedly; Bad Dollar flung back his woolly head and broke into a silent laugh; and Dane felt a thrill of satisfaction as he glanced at the speaker. The four formed a curiously assorted company; but one purpose dominated each of them equally, and the leader was contented with his assistants.
"One wore boots and trod in the soft places as no black man would," said Amadu, reading the unspoken question in the white man's eyes. "Another wore sandals, and went cunningly, as did the rest, walking as we do upon our naked feet. Still, they left this behind them among the thorns."
He held out what Dane was not surprised to see, a small tuft of leopard's fur, and laughed harshly.
"Ho, ho! We shall try whether they are devils with lead and steel!"
"The ferry canoe?" asked Dane briefly; and Amadu nodded.
"I go to see to it, and afterward it will need good witchcraft to find it. If any one would go south in a hurry he must swim to-night."
"There are crocodiles in that stream," smiled Dane. "You will take men you can trust and hide them where the path winds down to the water, Amadu. Monday, you will see that until I call, no boy leaves the camp, but let them lie down with their matchets beside them. Bad Dollar will wait with me; and I will borrow Cappy Maxwell's gun to-night, Amadu."
Sitting low among the cases now, Dane made careful preparations for his own share in the approaching tragedy. That it would prove one he felt certain. He cleaned Maxwell's gun with a loving care, polishing the inside of the barrel until it glistened, and touching each part of the action with oil. The weapon was a heavy, single eight-bore, with a rubber pad on the heel; part of this Dane cut away, leaving the steel bare, because he knew that at close quarters the butt of a heavy gun may prove as deadly as the muzzle. It was with a curious stirring of recollections that he saw the dead man's initials cut into the elevated rib, and because of them his face was the sterner as he laid down the weapon. At short range in the darkness it was likely to prove more formidable than any rifle, and—for Dane was wholly under the influence of the monomania—his own safety counted for little if he could use it with due effect.
Presently he reloaded half a dozen cartridges with heavy B pellets, crimping the wads down almost affectionately, and thrust one into the chamber and the rest into his pocket. Never were cartridges filled with greater care. Then he laid two of the colored lights Maxwell had brought beside the tent door, made sure he could find them by feeling alone, and placed a tin match-box in one pocket where it could be most quickly grasped.
At last all was ready, and Dane sat perched high on a deal case between the lamp and the canvas for a while. Any one in the forest could, of course, see him clearly; but though Dane expected his foes would strike that night he did not fear a long-range shot. Rideau, he knew, must have recognized that his late associatecould lay a formidable complaint before the authorities, who, regarding his inland journeys with suspicion, would be glad to fasten any charge upon him, and perhaps equally glad of an excuse to send an expedition up into the Leopards' country.
After lying for a time on the matting at one end of the tent, he rose and turned the lamp out; the watching then was not cheerful, and it was comforting to feel the weight of the big gun upon his knee. The last hum of voices had died away in camp, the fires burned low, and except for an occasional floundering beside the creek, the bush was strangely silent. The darkness was now intense. The wild animals would await moonrise to begin their hunting; what Dane expected would happen before then. He could not see Bad Dollar, who crouched somewhere near the entrance of the tent, though he heard his file grate softly upon a matchet, and could picture him running a black thumb along the keen-edged blade at every cessation.
Confused memories crowded upon Dane, with Maxwell stalking through them all. He saw him again, alert, indomitable, resourceful, quelling the mutinous, cheering the dejected, and tending the sick. He saw him gasping his life away in that very tent, with, regardless of his own agony, words which would brighten all his partner's future upon his lips; and again a gust of passion stirred the lonely man in every fiber. It passed, and—for Dane was not for the time being wholly sane—left behind it a coldly murderous resolution.
Suddenly there was a touch upon his leg. Without a sound Bad Dollar had wriggled toward him. Turning as silently as he could, Dane crawled to the entrance, where he crouched with his right heel beneath him, behind the drawn-back sheeting which hung slackly. It was so dark that he could scarcely distinguish the nearest cottonwood; but though his ears failed to localize any definite sound he became conscious of some danger approaching. Under different circumstances Dane would have felt distinctly uneasy, knowing, as he did, that the thick gloom sheltered those who sought his life. Then, however, he feared only that he had not accurately loaded the cartridge, or that the damp had spoiled the fulminating mixture inside its cap; and his fingers were woodenly steady as they tightened on the gun.
He felt with one hand for the socket of the signal light and found it, stretched out a foot and pressed it against Bad Dollar when he touched him again warningly; and then the vague sensation of impending danger grew into shape at a recognizable sound. Noiselessly almost, but not quite, somebody or something was crawling toward the tent.
Dane suspended his very respiration as he strained his eyes, and listened. He could see nothing, and his ears seemed filled with a dull throbbing, but in spite of this he could hear the faintest of rustlings on two sides of the tent at once, and knew that, because no white man could move in such a manner, his dusky enemies were coming. One seemed to be making for the end of the tent, where his bed was spread; the other was creeping toward the entrance to prevent the escape of the victim in case his comrade failed at the first attempt. It was done with so little noise that Dane found it hard to realize he had creatures of flesh and blood to deal with, and not the malevolent devils the bushmen believed in. Bad Dollar made no further movement, and Dane crouched woodenly still, only sliding his forefinger inside the guard of thetrigger when at last a spray of leaves swished softly a few yards away.
Then he heard somebody breathing close beside him, and knew that sudden death stood hidden behind the slacker sheeting which began to roll back very slowly; and yet, while the throbbing in his ears grew louder, he remained impassive another few seconds. He had awaited that moment patiently; and he meant to strike decisively, for his dead comrade's sake. There was no light. The night was black and thick; but some sense beside that of the optic nerve made it evident that part of the moving sheeting was more rigid than the rest because it rested against human flesh. Knowing that at the next move the assassin would fall over him, Dane felt for that portion of the sheeting with the muzzle of the gun while his forefinger contracted on the trigger.
The barrel found something that yielded as he added the last ounce of pressure; there was a detonation; the white man fell backward with his eyes filled with smoke and two fingers gashed by the trigger guard; and something that struggled convulsively fell upon the canvas and bore it down.
The tent collapsed behind Dane as he slipped from under it; but knowing how the heavy B-shot would at that distance smash through bone and muscle, he paid no more attention to this assailant. First he snapped out the spent cartridge and crammed another home, then, striking a match, touched the signal light. It smoldered for a moment, then a column of blue fire swept aloft, and its radiance which beat athwart the towering trunks showed a striking spectacle.
Close behind the white man a shapeless heap of fur and black flesh lay quivering upon the over-turned tent.Half-seen for a second a dim figure, whose garments were not those of a native, vanished among the remoter trunks. Men with weapons came flitting out of the shadows which shrouded the camp; and about thirty yards away a monstrous object with the head of a beast and the legs of a man was slinking toward a creeper festoon. Dane flung the gun to his shoulder and fired as it ran, but the glare of the light beat transversely along the barrel, blinding him. Springing clear of the filmy smoke, he saw the second assailant was still running, and he sprang forward without waiting to reload. The light would last but a few more seconds. Still, the object moved at twice his speed, and might have escaped but that as he blundered on, choking in his haste, a diminutive figure ran forth to meet it, and the beast flung an upper limb aloft. Dane saw the spear which had been meant for his destruction draw back to stab; but the negro, Bad Dollar, sprang sideways, and his broad matchet, long filed to a razor-edge, flared under the last flicker of the light as he swung it round his head. Then there was sudden darkness, a thud and a crash.
Dane, guessing that Bad Dollar's matchet had bitten deep, and that his carrier comrades would see his victim did not escape, turned at top-most speed in the direction of the creek. Men came running behind him; but a heavier sound was audible through the patter of their feet, and he knew that one who was not barefooted fled for his life near ahead. He was running fast, but Dane, flinging the gun down, knew that he was gaining, and remembered that the man he sought would find his passage barred across the creek. So they ran, straining every sinew in a desperate race. Now and then one smashed through a thorn brake, or staggered,catching his foot in a creeper vine, but neither went down, and the gurgle of the creek grew nearer all the time. Dane raised his voice, and though his cry was barely articulate it proved sufficient, and as Amadu's hail came back in answer the footsteps before him grew slower, and a tongue of flame shot up.
So far there had been no miscarriage, and to furnish light for the climax a torch had been kept ready by one of Amadu's men. It showed first the group of grim black figures which guarded the narrow path to the water through tall cane, and then a man in European dress who stood still, gasping with fear and rage.
It was Victor Rideau.
"See that no boy fires on him unless he moves!" Dane made shift to cry; and Rideau, turning, met him face to face.
"I have expected you a long time," Dane said brokenly, for the race had taxed his strength, and once more he was shaken by a fit of futile rage. "Now I can't tell you how I regret we did not meet just five minutes earlier."