The rock was split into two nearly equal parts, exactly over the
fissure where the powder had exploded. One of the blocks remained
upright, resting against the side of the mountain, but the other,
propelled by the severe shock and detached from the main body, had
toppled over completely.
MM. Desrioux and de Pommerelle saw, open before them, a large gap,
three yards wide, without a single obstruction in it.
They took a few steps forwards, reached the spot where the granite
block had stood for so many years, centuries perhaps, and came to a
sudden halt.
The ground was giving way beneath their feet; they found themselves
on the brink of an abyss some thirty yards deep; the plain was not on
the same level as the road blocked up but a few moments previously by
the rock.
But they went on, clinging to, and supporting themselves by the side
of the mountain, and they then saw that the rock they had displaced
not only opened out the horizon to their view, but also afforded them
a means whereby they might reach the country just exposed to their
gaze. In fact, after having turned a somersault in the air, the top
of the rock had fallen on to the plain, whilst its base, resting
against the mountain, remained on the spot previously occupied by it.
It was exactly like the floor of a bridge which has given away; one
of its sides remained fixed to the supports on the right bank of the
river, the other was engulfed in the stream.
All the caravan had to do was to slide down an inclined plain of
granite, thirty yards long. But, before committing themselves to this
descent, and overcoming the very last obstacle which separated them
from the plain, MM. Desrioux and Pommerelle looked around them, and
were dismayed.
Nothing could be seen on the vast expanse before them but people
running in terror in all directions; naked women, raising their hands
to heaven and hurrying away with rapid strides; men jostling each
other in utter confusion or, stupefied by fear and incapable of
movement, throwing themselves down on the ground and seeking to bury
themselves in it. The grass of the plain was strewn with arms of
every description—lances, arrows, bows, and shields, cast away by the
fugitives to render their flight more rapid. In the distance,
however, were seen close, compact bodies of men, battalions reforming
and being continually reinforced by the accession of stragglers.
These soldiers belonged, no doubt, to the victorious army, who,
having taken to flight at the commencement of the engagement, were
now reappearing to rejoice over the victory of their comrades, and to
plunder and massacre the enemies against whom the remainder of their
force had so valiantly fought.
But when, after having scanned the distant horizon, MM. Desrioux and
de Pommerelle turned their eyes to the foreground of the tableau,
their astonishment was converted into stupefaction.
A kind of entrenched camp, with a circular ditch round it, met their
eyes. It must have been, a few moments previously, taken by assault,
and its defenders put to the sword. More than three hundred dead
bodies lay there; some on the ground, some on the sides of the ditch,
and others on boxes and baggage heaped up in one corner to serve as
ramparts, or scattered far and wide, broken open and smashed to
pieces, showing that plunder, as well as massacre, had been going on.
Underneath the rock, just where it had fallen, was to be seen, in a
perfect lake of blood, a hideous mass of mangled corpses, of detached
limbs, and flesh in strips. In the midst of all these corpses a few
poor wounded wretches were heaving, struggling, making superhuman
efforts to avoid the touch of the bodies on whom death had laid his
icy hand, and to escape a living tomb among the dead; the very
mountains echoed the piercing shrieks which resounded over this
ghastly scene.
MM. Desrioux and de Pommerelle had then arrived too late, at the end
of the battle where one of the two forces had suffered defeat. The
upheaving of the rock had only served to augment the number of the
victims; the block of granite, in pitching headlong on the plain,
had, no doubt, crushed beneath its ponderous weight the remnant of
the Europeans left in the camp, for there could be no doubt but that
the baggage, tents, and rifles strewn upon the ground belonged to
Europeans.
From the camp the gaze of our two travellers wandered to a space,
about twenty yards square, where were stationed the survivors of this
vast hecatomb. At first they only perceived a confused group, whence
were proceeding shouts and signs apparently intended for themselves.
Little by little the details became more distinct; Arab bûrnus, linen
tunics, European clothes could be distinguished. Then a few white
faces stood out from the black and bronzed features surrounding them.
M. Desrioux could look no longer; his eyes closed, he grew deadly
pale, his limbs gave way beneath him, and if M. de Pommerelle had not
caught him and propped him up against the side of the mountain, he
would inevitably have fallen down the abyss.
His eyes had rested on her whom he felt he should see—he had
recognised Madame de Guéran.
If the two young men had been able, in a few moments, to discover
their friends in the midst of the crowd and single them out on that
extensive battle-field, MM. de Morin, Périères, and Delange had seen
them for a long time, though without recognizing them. At the moment
when, driven out of their camp by the amazons, they had sought refuge
with their servants and surviving soldiers on the other side of the
entrenchment, at the very moment when they were defending themselves
with all the energy of despair, knowing full well that they, in their
turn, were about to be massacred as their companions had been,
suddenly a terrific detonation had sounded in their ears, and the
mountain had appeared and overwhelmed their enemies.
Dazzled by this miracle, and almost alarmed at their own escape, they
remained at first with their eyes fixed on the mountain, whose fall
had not only delivered them out of the hands of the Walindis, and
snatched them from imminent death, but had also opened up for them a
road to the east, the lakes, and to Europe.
But, as Parisians are somewhat sceptical on the score of miracles,
MM. Delange and de Morin, their momentary stupor over, gave M.
Périères the credit of their deliverance. Had not he conceived the
idea of blowing up the rock to secure a passage through the mountain,
and was it not, therefore, probable that he had put his theory into
practice? Périères, for his part, imagined that somebody had stolen
his idea, and he was looking with admiration on the thieves, whoever
they might be. The minds of all three of them were, nevertheless,
rather uneasy. They wanted to know how it had happened that the
mountain, instead of bursting open at the base, above the mine which
one of them must have sprung, revealed an aperture over their heads?
Whilst these thoughts passed through their minds, and their eyes were
fixed on the block of stone, of which one end had just rolled on to
the plain, and the other remained supported, thirty yards higher up,
beside the welcome aperture, two men appeared suddenly on the
threshold of this blessed gate, in the foreground of the triumphal
arch.
Under the shade of the two lofty mountains, between which they were
advancing, surrounded by shadow, they had all the appearance of
emerging from a sepulchre. But, once on the brink of the abyss, on
the platform of the uplifted rock, they were in the full glare of the
sun. Clothed in white, and radiant in the sunlight, they might have
been taken for two angels from heaven, who had lighted on the
mountain before continuing their flight down to earth.
It is quite possible that this sudden apparition contributed to the
flight of the amazons in a greater degree than the noise of the
explosion which accompanied the fail of the rock. After their first
consternation they might have rallied for another attack on the
Europeans, and for the rescue of their Queen; but, when they saw that
their motionless and immoveable hill, their sacred mount, had fallen
and crushed beneath it many of their number, and that it had opened
to give egress to supernatural beings, a thousand superstitious fears
took possession of them, and these terrible warriors became women
once more.
The surviving Nubians, the Arab interpreters, the Dinkas, and the
Monbuttoos, on the other hand, notwithstanding their amazement,
understood that heaven was protecting them; the mountain was their
ally, the two angels their deliverers. They, therefore, prostrated
themselves in gratitude to the God, the idol, or the sorcerer who had
saved them.
As for the Europeans, they thanked their deliverers from the depths
of their souls, but they did not endue them with any magic power or
supernatural influence. They had a simple explanation at hand; a
European caravan, advancing from the south-east to the north-west,
after having crossed the Blue Mountains, had found their road blocked
up by an immense rock, and, being unable either to get round or over
it, they had underminded it and blown it up. Their only idea had been
to open up a passage for themselves, and chance had willed that at
the same time they should do a like office for another caravan
proceeding in an opposite direction. Accident, which always appears
so improbable in romances, but which plays so large a part in human
life, had also contrived that the meeting of these two caravans, and
the fall of the mountain should take place at an opportune moment,
and in a propitious hour.
The idea never occurred to them that chance, or accident, was not
entirely responsible for what had occurred, and that they were face
to face with their friends, the Count de Pommerelle and Dr. Desrioux.
How could they possibly have supposed that these two men, one
detained, as far as they knew, in France by duty, and the other by
the force of habit and his own disinclination to move, would appear
in the heart of Africa, in 2° lat. N.?
M. Desrioux, on the contrary, who was entirely taken up with the
thought of Madame de Guéran, who had for so long a time been
journeying towards her, and expecting every moment to meet her, had
recognised her at once, or, perhaps, felt by inspiration that she was
at hand. It is more than probable, also, that she in her turn was
conscious of his presence before he was seen by his friends.