THE GREAT DEVIL-TREE.
In pursuance of their design of making signals from the summit of
Roraima, the two friends made further explorations of the northern
side. And this led them into an adventure, one day, that had well-nigh
proved fatal to them both.
On mentioning their intention to Monella, he had at first objected;
but, upon Leonard's reminding him of the anxiety and distress
Templemore's mother and _fiancée_ might be, too probably were, in, he
had given a reluctant consent.
"Your friends, Dr. Lorien and his son, talked of coming back again,"
he remarked. "Do you think they are likely to make the journey with
Matava, and to be coming to seek for you?"
"Certainly they are coming into this neighbourhood, after orchids,"
Leonard replied; "and, now you speak of it--though I had not thought
about it lately--the news Matava will probably take back may cause
such anxiety that they may hurry to get here sooner than they would
otherwise have been likely to, in order to make inquiry about us on the
spot."
"Matava might lead them to the cavern, if they came to Daranato," said
Monella thoughtfully.
"Yes; of course that is possible."
"And a very little ingenuity or a small charge of powder would force an
opening; and their way would then be easy to get up here?"
"Certainly."
Monella's face clouded.
"That must not be; you must clearly understand that you must tell me in
time if there seems any such probability. I wish not to seem unfriendly
towards your friends--and personally I liked them--but to allow them to
come in here would be as the beginning of a flood, as the letting out
of water. It cannot, must not be."
"Well, after all, it is only a supposition," observed Jack. "Time
enough to deal with it, if the occasion actually arise. They were going
on to Rio on some law business which was likely to occupy them some
time; they might be detained there indefinitely, they said."
"Quite so," Monella answered decisively. "Only, remember, I rely upon
you to inform me in time. And be very cautious and vigilant upon that
side of the country, for, as you know, it is in that direction that
Coryon and his people have their habitation."
In their walks they were often accompanied by one or both of Ulama's
pumas, and on the day referred to the male one, 'Tuo,' as it was
called, came after them when they had gone a little way, and trotted
quietly beside them; and this, as it turned out, saved their lives.
They came upon a place they had not seen before. Two great iron gates
of highly finished workmanship, and picked out with gold, shut in
a narrow opening in a high rock. They were such as might form the
entrance to a public garden. A broad road wound round from the inside
of the gates; but outside, where Templemore and Elwood were, the rocks
rose up fifty or sixty feet, or even more, on either side; and though
they followed them a considerable distance on both sides of the gates,
the rocks still towered up precipitously for as far as they could see.
"This can scarcely be the entrance to Coryon's 'domain,'" said Jack,
"or there would be some people about on guard. It must be some kind of
public place."
"A cemetery, perhaps," suggested Leonard.
"I believe you've hit it. Well, there's a gate open, so I suppose
there's no harm in our having a peep inside."
"Suppose some one were on the watch, and were to pop round and close
and lock the gates when we were inside and out of sight," said Leonard
suspiciously. "Monella warned us to be wary and to suspect traps."
"We have our revolvers; and, if the worse came to the worst, we could
climb over these rocks."
In the result they went inside; then made their way to a wide terrace
that ran round an extensive area of horseshoe shape, half natural, half
artificial, as they judged. This terrace extended several hundreds
of yards in both directions from the point at which they stood; but
it narrowed off considerably on one side of the horseshoe. Above and
behind it, cut out of the rock, were other terraces, like steps or rows
of seats, but broad below and narrowing as they got higher. These went
all round, almost to the top of the rocks. It was, in fact, a vast
amphitheatre where many thousands of people could stand or sit. At the
farther end it was open; and in the centre was a large arena sunk some
fifteen feet below the main terrace on which they stood.
This arena opened out into a deep defile beyond, from the rocky heights
of which there issued a rushing stream of water that flowed into a
large, dark-looking pool below.
But what at once riveted their attention, almost to the point of
fascination, was an extraordinary-looking tree that stood in the arena.
This tree had no leaves, but branches only. In colour it was of a
sombre violet-blue, tinged in places with a ruddy hue. The trunk was
about thirty feet in height, and eight or nine feet in diameter. The
branches, which were many--a hundred or more probably--drooped over
from where the trunk ended and trailed about the ground. But what was
most astonishing, these branches were all in motion. Though there was
no wind, they waved to and fro, ran restlessly along the ground like
lithe snakes, and intertwined one with another, at the same time making
a harsh, rustling sound.
Straight in front of where they stood was a long pier of masonry that
ran out towards the tree, which was not in the centre of the arena but
was nearer to that part of the terrace where it grew narrow. In order
the better to observe the object that had so roused their curiosity,
the two young men walked across the terrace and some distance along
the pier; and, when they had proceeded a little more than half its
length, one of the long trailing branches--some of them appeared to be
two hundred or three hundred feet in length--came up over the end of
the pier, and, with a rustle, made its way swiftly towards them. It
was within two or three feet of where they stood looking at it, when
the puma, with a loud growl, sprang forward and bit at it. Immediately
the branch curled itself round the animal's body and began dragging
it along the pier towards the tree. Then two or three other branches
advanced and went to the assistance of the first one, coiling round the
poor puma and dragging it farther along, despite its teeth and claws
and its desperate struggles. In succession, other branches crept up
over the end of the stonework, and, just in time, Jack seized Leonard
and dragged him back.
"For Heaven's sake come away, man!" he exclaimed in horror. "That tree
is _alive_, and will drag us off, if once one of those branches touch
us!"
They had stepped back only barely in time, for a moment after a
trailing branch swept over the very spot on which they had halted. When
assured that they were really out of reach, they stood fascinated, but
filled with horror, while they witnessed the unavailing fight made by
the poor animal that had saved their lives. More branches came to the
aid of the others; they coiled round its mouth and closed it; round
its legs and bound them; and soon, helpless, a mere bundle in the
coiling, curling branches, as it were, it was drawn off the pier to the
ground below. Then it was rolled on and on till it had almost reached
the tree-trunk, where were shorter but thicker and stronger branches
waiting for it. These, in their turn, soon coiled round it; then,
slowly, they bent upwards, carrying the poor animal in their relentless
grasp, and lowered it into a hollow in the centre of the top of the
trunk, where it almost disappeared from sight. Then all the thicker
branches coiled round it and shut it completely out from view, forming
a sort of huge knot round the top of the tree and remaining motionless;
while the longer and more slender branches continued to play restlessly
about, seeking for further prey. Then, without a word, the two turned
away; nor did they speak till they found themselves safely outside the
great gates. Then they looked, horror-struck, at each other.
Jack was the first to break the silence.
"Great heavens!" he exclaimed. "What an escape! What an awful monster!
What a frightful death! And that poor animal--that saved us both! What
shall we say to the princess? Talk of 'traps'! If this gate was left
open as a 'trap'--and it looks to me so--we have reason indeed to be
thankful!"
"What _is_ it?" Leonard asked at last.
"A 'devil-tree.' It is a carnivorous tree. I've seen a small one
before; in a forest in Brazil that we were working through. One of the
dogs got caught in it and was nearly killed before we cut it free with
our axes. And then it was badly hurt, and so was I; a branch caught
hold of my hand and tore some of the flesh off it. And where we cut
this branch it _bled_! A dark crimson-blue liquid oozed out that stank!
Oh, there, I can't tell you what the stench was like! I've smelt _some_
bad smells in my time, but that beat anything I ever came across! But
that was only a small bush. I had no idea they could grow into great
flesh-eating monsters like this! Why, that thing must have been there a
thousand--ah--two thousand years, I should say. Fully that."
"But," said Leonard, "why is it kept here? who feeds
it--and--what--is--it--fed--on?"
He asked this last question slowly, and looked at the other in blank,
horrified amazement.
"It can't live without food," he continued. "And it must want a lot
too. Whoever can take the trouble to get it food of the only kind--as I
suppose--that it would care for? And why is it there in the middle of
that strange place? One would almost think it was kept there as a kind
of show or curiosity; and yet--we have never heard about it all the
time we have been here! And it is there, with the gate open, no fence
to guard people, or notice to warn them. Well! It's a mystery to me!"
But if they had been astounded and horror-stricken at what they had
seen, they were still more mystified and upset by Ulama's behaviour
when they told her of their adventure; for she fainted right off and,
when she recovered, seemed so overcome with terror as to be unable to
say a word. No explanation would she give; save that now and then she
murmured, almost in a moan, to herself,
"Then it _is_ true! And I never knew! It is horrible--too horrible!"
When Leonard expressed his sorrow about the puma, she hardly seemed to
notice it.
"Ah yes!" she said once. "Poor Tuo! I shall miss him--and such a death,
too! But oh, he saved you and your friend! And then, he was but an
animal--but the others!"
At her express desire they promised not to speak to any one else about
it.
"I will tell you why--or you will know why--later," she added. "But you
can speak privately to Monella about it; to no one else just now!"
When they found an opportunity of speaking to him about it, he looked
very grave.
"You have had a narrow escape," he said. "Heaven be thanked you did
escape. I cannot explain more to you now, but may be able to do so
shortly. Meantime, please do as the princess says, and keep this matter
to yourselves."
All this time Leonard's relations with Ulama had remained unchanged;
they had not been placed on any settled footing. Monella had asked him
to take time to make up his mind, and had intimated that nothing would
be said or done meanwhile. Leonard had, however, been too impatient to
put his fate to the test to be able to wait after the encouragement
Monella had given to him. But, whether Ulama had spoken on the subject
with her father, he knew not; for it so happened that he had not seen
her alone since their love-scene in the boat.
And now she was evidently much discomposed about their adventure with
the 'devil-tree'; though she did not refer to it again.
Naturally too, the recollection of it was very much in the minds of the
two young men. Leonard asked Templemore, one day, what the branches of
the one he had seen were like.
"They were covered with small excrescences," he replied, "that are
suckers and piercers in one. They pierce the flesh and then suck the
blood. The whole affair is a sort of gigantic vegetable 'octopus,'
or devil-fish, only that it has a hundred or more 'arms' or branches
instead of eight, as the octopus has. I have heard of devil-fish
having been caught as large as eighty feet in length, on the coast of
Newfoundland. But I never knew that its vegetable prototype grew to
anything like the size."
"Of course I have seen devil-fish," said Leonard thoughtfully; "but
they have a mouth--a great beak--to which their arms carry the food. Do
you think it is the same here? You saw that the branches carried the
poor puma up into a hollow in the top of the trunk. Do you suppose the
thing has a kind of mouth there?"
"Goodness only knows! It must be an awful sort of affair, if it is so.
The whole thing is monstrous and uncanny. Don't let us talk about it!"
But, as a result of this experience, they sought in another direction
for a likely place from which to make their intended signals; and
finally they found one convenient for their purpose. Then they made two
or three trips to the canyon to bring up the requisite powder. They
also brought back from the secret cave a number of things Monella
wanted. From the first, at his suggestion, they had told no one except
the king, Ulama, and Zonella, of the means by which they had gained
access to the mountain; and these had promised to keep the knowledge to
themselves.
"The place has evidently been so long unvisited," Monella had remarked,
"that probably most of those who once knew of it have forgotten all
about it. No need to remind them just now. Many years ago, as I have
been informed, a project was started for filling it up."
"Filling it up!"
"Yes, and if you go to the other end of the canyon--that by which we
entered--you will find, even now, in the thick wood that everywhere
surrounds the top of the canyon, vast numbers of great boulders that
were quarried from the surrounding cliffs and hauled to the edge in
readiness to be thrown down. They lie, in fact, just over the cavern we
came in by. There they have remained for a very long time, it seems.
Had that intention been carried out, all our work in cutting through
the forest and finding the entrance to the cavern, as you can see,
would have been thrown away."
"And what stopped it?"
"It is said that the people threatened a rebellion. The belief in the
eventual return of Mellenda--of whom you have heard--is deep-seated;
and, though the people here are anxious enough to keep to themselves,
they would not assent to closing irrevocably the only means by which
their hero could gain admittance, should he ever come."
"Do they expect him to come with a host of followers--a conquering
army--or do they expect the great lake to come back, and that he will
arrive with a grand fleet of ships?" Templemore asked, with somewhat of
a sarcastic smile.
Monella passed his hand across his brow in the half-dreamy manner
that was his at times, as though striving to collect his thoughts, or
to arrest and force into shape some half-formed conception that had
flitted across his mind and escaped his grasp. For a minute he stared
vacantly away into the distance and was silent. Then, with a look as
though of pain at failing to catch the fleeting image, he turned away,
saying simply,
"I cannot tell you."
During the days that followed, Templemore passed much of his time in
the museums; time that Elwood spent in a lover's dream of happiness
with Ulama. In the relics of the former history of this strange
people, Templemore took a deep interest; and in the archives and
ancient manuscripts he found many evidences of the former existence of
scientific and engineering knowledge that astonished and perplexed him.
On the true meaning and import of some of these he sought the help of
Monella, who would frequently accompany him in these visits, and, from
his better knowledge of the language, was able to assist him to unravel
their curious contents.
"These people must once have been great engineers and architects!" he
exclaimed in surprised admiration on one of these occasions.
Monella smiled and made reply,
"There is nothing so surprising in that, if you comprehend the true
significance of the gigantic earthworks still extant in many places on
this continent. Have you seen any of them?"
"No; but I have both heard and read of them."
"I have seen them; and I tell you your mind can form no idea of their
extent, of the scientific knowledge and the prodigious amount of time
and labour that must have been expended on them, unless you actually
see them. They are of various forms, mostly geometrical figures upon
a vast scale--miles in extent. The wonderful thing is that a certain
figure is repeated exactly in different places hundreds of miles
apart. Yet you shall take your cleverest engineers of the present day,
give them the advantages--or supposed advantages--of all your modern
discoveries and machinery, and scientific instruments, and, say,
unlimited workpeople to do their building, and _then_ it would tax all
their skill to construct a work _exactly_ similar to one of those great
figures. Yet now, upon some of them, trees are growing that must be
over a thousand years old!"
"And what were they for--what was their object?" Templemore asked.
Then there came over the other's face again that curious look as of one
seeking for a lost recollection; but it seemed to evade him, and he
answered somewhat as before,
"I think I ought to be able to tell you," he replied, "but I cannot now
seem to remember."
It was while thus together one day that Templemore asked him for some
further information concerning the 'Plant of Life.'
"You have told me," he said, "that your people, with whom you lived in
that secluded valley high up in the Andes, had with them the 'karina'
and cultivated it. Therefore I suppose you yourself have been in the
habit of taking it?"
"Always. And in my travelling to and fro in the world I always had with
me a good supply of the dried herb. I was accustomed to leave stores
of it in certain towns, so that if I lost what I had with me by any
accident, there was more within easy reach."
"I see. But what I am puzzled about is this: why, if the virtues of
the plant are so great, do people ever die at all? And why do some live
longer than others?"
"As to the first question," Monella answered, "man was never intended
to live on this earth for ever. The human frame _must_ wear out sooner
or later. As to the second query, some constitutions are naturally
stronger than others, and these endure longer, just as is the case in
the world outside where the plant is not known. The effect of the plant
is simply to keep the blood pure, if originally pure. If, however,
there is an inherited taint, that taint will make itself felt sooner
or later and undermine the vitality of the system. In this case the
plant will only result in ensuring a somewhat longer life than would
otherwise have been the case. Sooner or later the vitality will fall
off and gradual decay set in, although (the blood being kept still
pure) ordinary diseases are kept at bay. Lastly, there is the question
of the will."
"The _will_?"
"Yes; that has a most powerful influence. If a man who has inherited
a constitution that is absolutely sound, from ancestors who have
possessed the same through many generations, and if he has, in
addition, a strong _will_, powerful beyond the average, he may live
longer--if he is so minded."
"I--do not understand you," said Templemore, somewhat puzzled.
Monella gazed at him with a smile that was full of sadness.
"You would," he answered, "if you were old yourself; if you had
outlived all that made life worth having--your wife, and others you
love, your ambitions, your hopes. _Then_ does the soul grow weary,
and restless as well; it is like unto a bird that is caged whose time
for migration has come. It will either fret or pine itself to death,
or beat itself to death against the bars of its cage. Only two things
can then keep the soul from taking its flight; the _will_ to live to
complete some unfinished work, or a delight in a worldly, wicked life.
A nature superlatively evil, like Coryon's, may enable its possessor
to live on and on for an indefinite time; where better men take the
'falloa' and die. Or a man, not himself enamoured of life upon this
earth, may exert his _will_ to carry out to its end some great work to
benefit his fellow-creatures, and he too may keep the 'falloa' at arm's
length for an unusually long period. In other words, the 'falloa' is a
form of melancholia, of weariness with the world, of an inward sense
that life's work is completed. It is the result of that feeling that we
are told took possession at last even of him who has been called the
Wise Man of the World--King Solomon--whose wisdom and riches and power
only brought him to the same point I have indicated--that at which the
soul declares that all earthly things are but vanity."
On another occasion, Templemore was accompanied by Zonella and Colenna;
and the latter took him into a gallery he had not before seen, the door
being usually kept locked.
In it, to his surprise, were ranged hundreds of stands of arms and
military uniforms, helmets, spears, shields, swords, daggers, and red
tunics, all kept in splendid condition, as though for instant use. All
the helmets had little silver wings at their sides, and the shields
were engraved in the centre with a strange hieroglyphic, the same that
he had noticed chiselled upon the fronts of many of the principal
buildings.
"There," said Colenna, "are the arms and uniforms of Mellenda's
soldiers. Over in Myrlanda, in the great temple of the White Priests,
are hundreds more; all kept ready for use, as you see these here. You
see the silver wings upon the helmets, similar to those on that of
Mellenda's suit that stands in the other gallery. And that figure upon
the shields is the sacred sign that was engraved upon his signet-ring.
It signifies his seal or sign-manual. Wherever you see that mark, it
refers to him; on a building it implies that he designed or built it.
His royal colour was red, as the king's to-day is blue; and these red
tunics are for his soldiers."
"When they come," said Jack, discreetly repressing the incredulous
smile that almost forced itself upon his lips.
"When _he_ comes," said Colenna, lifting his hat reverently. "Yes, when
_he_ returns to us."
"You don't believe in that, I know," interposed Zonella; "yet we all
do; and it is a good thing we do, I think, for I fear many in the land
would go mad under their dread of Coryon, if they did not believe in a
happier future for the country. But there," she added sadly, "it does
not matter to _you_. You have no interest in what may go on here in the
future. You intend to go back to your own country, and care little for
the sorrows or the fate of those you leave behind."
Colenna had walked away some little distance, to examine a shield that
he thought was not quite so bright as it should be.
"Not care!" Jack exclaimed, impulsively. "Why, how can you say that? It
is that thought that grieves me all the time I am here; that makes me
doubt how I shall ever be able to make up my mind to leave. To leave
behind one's dearest----"
Zonella turned to him quickly, with a heightened colour and a bright
look. This was so unexpected that he stopped and hesitated.
"Well?" she said. "You said your dearest----"
"My dearest friend, Leonard--of course," he answered, looking at her in
some surprise.
But Zonella's face paled, and she turned away.
"Let us go," she said with a shiver, as though a cold wind had blown
upon her. "This old gallery is kept locked up so much it gets to smell
musty, and makes one feel quite faint."