"We must be pretty near the train by this time," said Dick; "unless--"
"Unless what?" demanded Doc.
"We might not be on the right trail," suggested the other. "We might be
lost after all."
"Gee, don't say that, Dick. If we're lost now, we'll never find our way
out. We'll have to stay in this jungle until we--"
"Until we what?"
"I don't like to say it."
"You mean until we die?"
Doc nodded his head and the boys moved on in silence, each intent upon
his own gloomy thoughts. Behind them, just out of sight, came the black
warrior, Zopinga. Presently Doc stopped.
"Dick!" he cried. "Do you smell something?"
Dick sniffed the air. "Smells like smoke," he said.
"It is smoke," exclaimed Doc, "and I can smell food cooking, too.
We're saved, Dick! We're saved! It's the train! Come on!" and both boys
broke into a run.
A hundred yards of brisk running brought them to a sudden stop. Before
them lay a clearing in the forest at the trail's end. In the centre
of the clearing was a palisade of poles surrounding an enclosure.
Above the top of the palisade they could see the cone-shaped roofs
of grass-thatched huts and, through the open gates that faced them,
they could see the huts themselves and half-naked black people moving
about. Outside the palisade some women were hoeing in a little patch of
cultivated ground.
Dick and Doc took one look at the scene before them before they faced
one another in silent consternation. So different from what they had
expected had been this outcome of their hopes that both boys were
shocked into utter speechlessness for a moment. It was Doc, as usual,
who first regained control of his tongue.
"We're lost, after all," he said. "What are we going to do?"
"Maybe they're friendly natives," suggested Dick.
"Maybe they're cannibals," suggested Doc.
"I don't believe there are any cannibals any more," said Dick.
"I don't intend to take any chances on that. There _may_ be."
"Let's sneak back the way we came then," whispered Dick. "They haven't
seen us yet." Simultaneously the two boys turned to retrace their steps
and there, blocking the trail they had just trod, stood a huge, black
warrior scowling savagely at them. In his hand was a sharp spear.
"Golly!" exclaimed Dick.
"Gee!" ejaculated Doc. "What shall we do?"
"We ought to be nice to him," said Dick.
"Good morning!" said Doc, politely, with a smile that was nothing if
not strained. "Nice morning, isn't it?"
Zopinga, who had stood silent thus far, now broke into a torrent of
words, not one of which the boys understood. When he had ceased, he
again stood immovable.
"Well," remarked Dick, casually, "I guess we'd better be getting along
back to the train. Come on, Doc," and he started to move along the
trail past Zopinga. Instantly the sharp point of the spear was at the
pit of his stomach. Dick stopped. Zopinga pointed toward the village
with his left hand and prodded Dick with his spear.
"I guess he's inviting us to lunch," suggested Doc.
"Whatever he's inviting us to do, I guess we'd better do it," said Dick.
Reluctantly the two boys turned toward the village; behind them walked
Zopinga, proudly herding his captives in the direction of the gates. At
sight of them the women and children working in the fields clustered
about, jabbering excitedly. The women were hideous creatures whose ears
and lower lips were horribly disfigured, the lobes of the former having
evidently been pierced during their youth to receive heavy ornaments
which had stretched the flesh until the lower part of the ear touched
the shoulder, while their teeth, like those of Zopinga, were filed to
sharp points, though fortunately for the peace of mind of Dick and Doc,
neither boy understood the significance of this.
Some of the children threw stones and sticks at the boys and each time
a hit was scored, Zopinga and the women and all the children laughed
uproariously. Encouraged and emboldened by this applause one of the
older children, a particularly hideous boy, rushed at Doc from the rear
and swung a blow at his head with a heavy stick. Dick, while attempting
to ward off the missiles that were rained upon him, had fallen a few
steps behind Doc, which proved a very fortunate circumstance for his
cousin as the black boy would have cracked Doc's skull if the blow had
landed squarely upon its target.
Even as the little fiend was in the act of swinging the cudgel Dick
leaped in front of him and seizing his wrist with his left hand
dealt the youth a blow in the face with his right fist that sent him
sprawling upon his back.
Doc turned just in time to witness Dick's act, though he did not fully
realize how close and how grave had been his peril, and the two boys
instinctively drew together, back to back, for mutual protection, as
each was confident that Dick's attack upon the black youth would bring
down the wrath of all the others upon them.
"Good old Dick!" whispered Doc.
"I suppose we're in for it now," said Dick, gloomily; "but I had to do
it! He'd have killed you."
[Illustration: "I suppose we're in for it now!"]
"We couldn't be in for anything worse than we were getting before," Doc
reminded him. "Look at 'em now! I think it did 'em good."
For an instant the blacks were so surprised that they forgot to throw
anything at the boys; then they commenced to laugh and jeer at the
discomfitted youth sitting on the ground nursing a bloody nose and
while they were occupied by this new diversion, Zopinga herded the boys
into the village and hurried them into the presence of a very fat negro
who sat in conversation with several other warriors beneath the shade
of a large tree.
"This guy must be the chief," said Doc.
"I wish we could talk to him," said Dick. "Maybe he'd send us back to
the railroad, if we could explain that that was where we want to go."
"I'll try," said Doc. "P'r'aps he may understand English. Say, Big
Boy!" he cried, addressing the fat negro. "Do you savvy English?" The
black looked up at Doc and addressed him in one of the innumerable
Bantu dialects, but the American boy only shook his head. "Nothing
doing along that line, Uncle Tom," said Doc, with a sigh, and then,
brightening: "Hey, Parley voo zong glaze?"
Notwithstanding the bumps and bruises that he was nursing Dick was
unable to restrain his laughter. "What's the matter?" demanded Doc.
"What's so funny?"
"Your French."
Doc grinned. "I must be improving," he said. "No one ever recognized my
French as French before."
"Your friend there doesn't recognize it even as speech. Why don't you
try making signs?"
"I never thought of that. Good old Dick! Every once in a while he shows
a gleam of intelligence. Here goes! Watch me, Rain Cloud." He waved
his hand at the negro to attract attention; then he pointed off in the
general direction that he thought the railroad lay, after which he
said: "Choo! Choo!" several times. Then he pointed first at Dick and
then at himself; walked around in a small circle looking bewilderedly
from one direction to another. Stopping in front of the black he
pointed at him, then at Dick, then at himself and finally out through
the forest toward an imaginary railway and again said: "Choo! Choo!
Choo! Choo!"
The negro considered him a moment through red-rimmed, bleary eyes; then
he turned toward his fellows, jerked a grimy thumb in the direction of
Doc, tapped his forehead significantly with a forefinger and issued a
few curt instructions to Zopinga, who stepped forward and pushed the
boys roughly along the village street toward its far end.
"I guess he understood your sign language all right," said Dick.
"What makes you think so?" demanded Doc.
"Why, he thinks you're crazy--and he's not far off."
"Is that so?"
Zopinga halted before a grass hut shaped like a bee-hive, with a single
opening about two and a half or three feet high, upon either side of
which squatted a warrior armed as was their captor. Zopinga motioned
for the boys to enter and as they dropped upon their hands and knees to
crawl into the dark interior, he accelerated their speed with the sole
of a calloused foot and sent them, one by one, into darkness that was
only a bit less thick than the foul stench which pervaded the noisome
den.