Gold! What ideas that one word opens out--what magic it contains! But
credit must be given to Doctor Bolter for the fact that it was no sordid
love of the yellow metal that prompted him to search for gold.
He wanted it for no luxury; he had no wealthy man's desires to quell;
all he wished was to make that grand discovery that would prove the
Malay Peninsula to have been the Ophir to which King Solomon's ships
came in search of treasure; and of this he wanted ample proof, such as
he could lay before a committee of learned men. How was it to be
obtained?
Doctor Bolter asked himself this question a dozen times over, but no
answer came. He asked the question as he stood there up to his knees in
water, examining his pannikins full of sand and gravel, which he took
from the bottom of the little river, where it now displayed all the
characteristics of a mountain stream.
He tried several pannikins full, scooping up the sand and gravel from
likely places, and after picking out the larger stones, washing
carefully till nothing remained after the water had been drained off but
pure sand.
This he would examine in the full light of the sun, seeking in vain for
little water-worn nuggets or specks and scales of gold; but for some
time his efforts were unsuccessful; and they went on higher and higher,
the shallowness, and the difficulties of the journey increasing at every
stride, till, trying at a spot where the rapid stream swirled round the
end of a great mass of stone, the doctor washed a pannikin of sand, and
then uttered a grunt of satisfaction, for there at the bottom,
glittering in the sunshine, were dozens of tiny specks of gold mingled
with the grit.
"Plenty like that, master, the farther up the stream we go," said the
chief boatman. "It comes out of the mountains where the wicked spirits
live."
"Indeed," said the doctor, sarcastically; "then we must go up and see
the wicked spirits. Do you think they will be at home?"
"It is very dreadful, master, and we shall all be killed! They send
down little specks of gold like that in the water; but if we went up to
try and get the great pieces stuck in the mountain side, they would
smite us, and our people would see us no more."
"Well, we will risk that," said the doctor. "Go on."
The Malays sighed, and looked piteously at the doctor, whom they
considered as dangerous as a spirit if not obeyed; for they knew he had
strange medicines, and a lightning apparatus that sent sparks through
them, and made their hands hold tightly by a couple of handles. Yes, he
was a wonderful and dangerous man that doctor, whom nothing seemed to
hurt, and they felt compelled to obey him.
They plied the paddles, then, sending the sampan through the sparkling
water, till a few minutes after, when there was a loud grating noise,
for they were aground.
The Malays sprang out, and wading and lifting the boat, they dragged it
on into deeper water, jumped in and paddled on again, but only to get
once more aground; and this occurred for a few times, after which the
paddles had to be set aside, and the men waded and dragged the boat to a
standstill.
The doctor had found gold in small quantities, and that proved gold to
be there, but nothing more, and he rubbed his ear with a vexatious
movement.
He knew that there was gold in the little streams that came down from
the mountains, and probably there was a great deal more there in the
mass. But that did not prove this to have been the place visited by
Solomon's ships, and he was as far off the goal as ever.
"One thing is very evident," muttered the doctor, ill-humouredly, as he
made a vicious blow at and missed a teasing fly, "Solomon's ships never
came up this river, and we can get no farther without walking. Here,
drag the boat under the shelter of that rock, and let's have a feed and
a rest. The sun is unbearable!"
The men eagerly drew the boat over the stones, amidst which the pellucid
water trickled and sparkled, placed it well in the shadow of a towering
mass of rock, and then, in the comparative coolness, a good meal was
made, after which first one and then the other dropped off to sleep.
The sun was setting when the doctor awoke from a dream of being
somewhere undergoing a punishment for his sins by being buzzed at by
flies that he could not knock off his face and ears.
He felt annoyed on seeing how the day was spent; but a little
consideration told him that the men were almost knocked up by their
exertions, and that they would be the better for the rest.
"Well," said the doctor, "how are we to manage now? Will the stream
grow deeper higher up?"
"No, master," replied the Malay; "the boat can go no farther. We must
walk."
"Humph! and carry the provisions?" said the doctor.
"Yes, if the master wishes to go up to the mountains."
"Why, you are afraid, Ismael!" said the doctor.
"Yes, master, we are both afraid; but if he says we must go, his
servants will follow him right up where the spirits dwell. Look--see,"
he whispered. "There is one waving its hands to us to tempt us.
Don't--no, don't look, master, or you may die."
The second Malay threw himself flat in the bottom of the boat, and
covered his face with his hands.
"Well, I've seen worse things than that," said the doctor, grimly.
"Why, it's a woman; and she's coming this way."
"The spirits come in all shapes from the mountains to tempt people,"
said the trembling Malay. "Now, they are tigers, now they are
crocodiles, and sometimes women and men."
"Ah, the women are the worst kind of spirits," said the
doctor--"especially," he added to himself, "if they are middle-aged and
jealous of their husbands. Here, get up, sir; don't lie there; you're
crushing my specimens. That's only a Malay woman."
The figure was struggling slowly along, the rugged, rock-strewn bank of
the stream making her passage very arduous, for the little river was
running now in the bottom of a ravine like a huge rift in the mountain
side. The rocks towered up at a swift angle, and a traveller would have
found the best road to be decidedly in the bed of the stream.
The woman ashore, however, evidently preferred the dry land, and kept on
picking her way toilsomely from rock to rock, now descending into some
rift, and anon climbing forth once more into sight, and more than once
she seemed to fall.
She was quite a couple of hundred yards away still, and the doctor
watched her approach with growing interest, feeling no little compassion
for her, as he saw that she was evidently footsore, and struggled
towards them in a weary, halting manner, that grew pitiable as she
advanced.
At last the piled-up rocks grew evidently so difficult that the woman
toiled slowly down to the bed of the stream, where the doctor saw her
stoop and scoop up the sweet, cool water with her hand, evidently to
drink with avidity. After this she made an effort to continue her
course, but she seemed to totter and sink down upon a stone at the side
of the stream, waving her brown hand once more as if for help.
"Poor thing!" said the doctor, stepping out of the boat into the shallow
water, but only to be seized by the two Malays.
"No, no, master," they cried together; "you must not go. It is a
spirit, and it will kill you!"
"Let go, you silly, superstitious fellows!" cried the doctor, wrenching
himself free. "Women are very dangerous creatures, but I think I shall
get back safe."
Then, to the horror of his two men, he waded up the stream to where the
native woman sat back, half reclining against the rock, with her feet
washed by the running water.
As it is well known, when once the sun is below the horizon, the
twilight is extremely short in the tropics; and the fast-coming darkness
was deepened by the depth of the rocky ravine, so that as the doctor
waded carefully on to avoid a nasty fall, the figure of the woman in her
gay plaid sarong was beginning to look filmy and indistinct enough to
make anyone of superstitious tendencies doubtful of the reality of that
upon which he gazed.
But the doctor was made of too stern stuff to be troubled in this way,
even after the promptings of his companions; and wading on, with the
water feeling deliciously cool as it plashed musically about his feet,
he noted that the brown face looked fixed and strange, the lips parted,
revealing the black, filed teeth, and such an air of exhaustion
displayed in the eyes, that he hurried his steps.
"What is the matter?" he said, in the Malay tongue; but the woman did
not reply, only raised one hand feebly and let it drop.
Black, brown, or white, it was the same to Dr Bolter. Here was a
patient asking help in her mute way; and taking her hand, he quickly
felt her pulse.
"No fever. Exhaustion," he muttered, softly, laying her farther back,
so that after dipping some of the cold water in the cup of his
spirit-flask, and adding a few drops of some essence, he could trickle
it gently between the sufferer's lips.
She made an effort to swallow, and did so, uttering a low moan the next
minute, followed by a piteous sigh.
"Drink a little more," he said, in the Malay tongue; and she obeyed
mechanically, as he held the silver cup to her lips. "Poor girl," he
continued, to himself, "her feet are cut and bleeding, and she has hurt
herself with falling--Here! hoi! Ismael! Ali!"
The rocks echoed his cry, and the two men approached tremblingly.
"Come along, you stupid fellows!" he cried. "It is nothing to be afraid
of;" and after a few more angry admonitions the two boatmen came up and
helped to carry the insensible girl down to the boat, when, a snug place
close by in the rocks having been picked out, the sufferer was placed
upon a roughly-prepared couch formed of the doctor's overcoat and his
waterproof sheet; then a macintosh was laid over her, and she seemed to
fall off into a heavy sleep.
"That keeps us here for the night," said the doctor; and being hungry, a
fire was lit, and a capital little dinner of preserved game and fish
prepared, of which all partook, and then made preparations for passing
the night.