No one can be more wise than destiny.
The short equatorial twilight was drawing to an end, and all Nature
stood in silence, while Night crept up to claim the land where her reign
is more autocratic than elsewhere on earth. There is a black night above
the trees, and a blacker beneath. In an hour it would be dark, and,
in the meantime, the lowering clouds were tinged with a pink glow
that filtered through from above. There was rain coming, and probably
thunder. Moreover, the trees seemed to know it, for there was a limpness
in their attitude as if they were tucking their heads into their
shoulders in anticipation of the worst. The insects were certainly
possessed of a premonition. They had crept away.
It was distinctly an unlikely evening for the sportsman. The stillness
was so complete that the faintest rustle could be heard at a great
distance. Moreover, it was the sort of evening when Nature herself seems
to be glancing over her shoulder with timorous restlessness.
Nevertheless, a sportsman was abroad. He was creeping up the right-hand
bank of a stream, his only chance lying in the noise of the waters,
which might serve to deaden the sound of broken twig or rustling leaf.
This sportsman was Jack Meredith, and it was evident that he was
bringing to bear upon the matter in hand that intelligence and keenness
of perception which had made him a person of some prominence in other
scenes where Nature has a less assured place.
It would appear that he was not so much at home in the tangle of an
African forest as in the crooked paths of London society; for his
clothes were torn in more than one place; a mosquito, done to sudden
death, adhered sanguinarily to the side of his aristocratic nose, while
heat and mental distress had drawn damp stripes down his countenance.
His hands were scratched and inclined to bleed, and one leg had
apparently been in a morass. Added to these physical drawbacks there was
no visible sign of success, which was probably the worst part of Jack
Meredith's plight.
Since sunset he had been crawling, scrambling, stumbling up the bank
of this stream in relentless pursuit of some large animal which
persistently kept hidden in the tangle across the bed of the river. The
strange part of it was that when he stopped to peep through the
branches the animal stopped too, and he found no way of discovering its
whereabouts. More than once they remained thus for nearly five minutes,
peering at each other through the heavy leafage. It was distinctly
unpleasant, for Meredith felt that the animal was not afraid of him,
and did not fully understand the situation. The respective positions of
hunter and hunted were imperfectly defined. He had hitherto confined his
attentions to such game as showed a sporting readiness to run away, and
there was a striking novelty in this unseen beast of the forest, fresh,
as it were, from the hands of its Creator, that entered into the fun of
the thing from a totally mistaken standpoint.
Once Meredith was able to decide approximately the whereabouts of his
prey by the momentary shaking of a twig. He raised his rifle and covered
that twig steadily; his forefinger played tentatively on the trigger;
but on second thoughts he refrained. He was keenly conscious of the fact
that the beast was doing its work with skill superior to his own. In
comparison to his, its movements were almost noiseless. Jack Meredith
was too clever a man to be conceited in the wrong place, which is
the habit of fools. He recognised very plainly that he was not
distinguishing himself in this new field of glory; he was not yet an
accomplished big-game hunter.
Twice he raised his rifle with the intention of firing at random into
the underwood on the remote chance of bringing his enemy into the open.
But the fascination of this duel of cunning was too strong, and he crept
onwards with bated breath.
It was terrifically hot, and all the while Night was stalking westward
on the summits of the trees with stealthy tread.
While absorbed in the intricacies of pursuit--while anathematising
tendrils and condemning thorns to summary judgment--Jack Meredith was
not losing sight of his chance of getting back to the little village
of Msala. He knew that he had only to follow the course of the stream
downwards, retracing his steps until a junction with the Ogowe river was
effected. In the meantime his lips were parted breathlessly, and there
was a light in the quiet eyes which might have startled some of his
well-bred friends could they have seen it.
At last he came to an open space made by a slip of the land into the
bed of the river. When Jack Meredith came to this he stepped out of the
thicket and stood in the open, awaiting the approach of his stealthy
prey. The sound of its footfall was just perceptible, slowly diminishing
the distance that divided them. Then the trees were parted, and a tall,
fair man stepped forward on to the opposite bank.
Jack Meredith bowed gravely, and the other sportsman, seeing the
absurdity of the situation, burst into hearty laughter. In a moment or
two he had leapt from rock to rock and come to Meredith.
“It seems,” he said, “that we have been wasting a considerable amount of
time.”
“I very nearly wasted powder and shot,” replied Jack, significantly
indicating his rifle.
“I saw you twice, and raised my rifle; your breeches are just the colour
of a young doe. Are you Meredith? My name is Oscard.”
“Ah! Yes, I am Meredith. I am glad to see you.”
They shook hands. There was a twinkle in Jack Meredith's eyes, but
Oscard was quite grave. His sense of humour was not very keen, and he
was before all things a sportsman.
“I left the canoes a mile below Msala, and landed to shoot a deer we
saw drinking, but I never saw him. Then I heard you, and I have been
stalking you ever since.”
“But I never expected you so soon; you were not due till--look!” Jack
whispered suddenly.
Oscard turned on his heel, and the next instant their two rifles rang
out through the forest stillness in one sharp crack. Across the stream,
ten yards behind the spot where Oscard had emerged from the bush, a
leopard sprang into the air, five feet from the ground, with head thrown
back, and paws clawing at the thinness of space with grand free sweeps.
The beast fell with a thud, and lay still--dead.
The two men clambered across the rocks again, side by side. While they
stood over the prostrate form of the leopard--beautiful, incomparably
graceful and sleek even in death--Guy Oscard stole a sidelong glance at
his companion. He was a modest man, and yet he knew that he was reckoned
among the big-game hunters of the age. This man had fired as quickly as
himself, and there were two small trickling holes in the animal's head.
While he was being quietly scrutinised Jack Meredith stooped down, and,
taking the leopard beneath the shoulders, lifted it bodily back from the
pool of blood.
“Pity to spoil the skin,” he explained, as he put a fresh cartridge into
his rifle.
Oscard nodded in an approving way. He knew the weight of a full-grown
male leopard, all muscle and bone, and he was one of those old-fashioned
persons mentioned in the Scriptures as taking a delight in a man's
legs--or his arms, so long as they were strong.
“I suppose,” he said quietly, “we had better skin him here.”
As he spoke he drew a long hunting-knife, and, slashing down a bunch
of the maidenhair fern that grew like nettles around them, he wiped the
blood gently, almost affectionately, from the leopard's cat-like face.
There was about these two men a strict attention to the matter in hand,
a mutual and common respect for all things pertaining to sport, a quiet
sense of settling down without delay to the regulation of necessary
detail that promised well for any future interest they might have in
common.
So these highly-educated young gentlemen turned up their sleeves and
steeped themselves to the elbow in gore. Moreover, they did it with a
certain technical skill and a distinct sense of enjoyment. Truly, the
modern English gentleman is a strange being. There is nothing his soul
takes so much delight in as the process of getting hot and very
dirty, and, if convenient, somewhat sanguinary. You cannot educate the
manliness out of him, try as you will; and for such blessings let us in
all humbleness give thanks to Heaven.
This was the bringing together of Jack Meredith and Guy Oscard--two
men who loved the same woman. They knelt side by side, and Jack
Meredith--the older man, the accomplished, gifted gentleman of the
world, who stood second to none in that varied knowledge required
nowadays of the successful societarian--Jack Meredith, be it noted,
humbly dragged the skin away from the body while Guy Oscard cut the
clinging integuments with a delicate touch and finished skill.
They laid the skin out on the trampled maidenhair, and contemplated it
with silent satisfaction. In the course of their inspection they both
arrived at the head at the same moment. The two holes in the hide, just
above the eyes, came under their notice at the same moment, and they
turned and smiled gravely at each other, thinking the same thought--the
sort of thought that Englishmen rarely put into intelligible English.
“I'm glad we did that,” said Guy Oscard at length, suddenly. “Whatever
comes of this expedition of ours--if we fight like hell, as we probably
shall, before it is finished--if we hate each other ever afterwards,
that skin ought to remind us that we are much of a muchness.”
It might have been put into better English; it might almost have sounded
like poetry had Guy Oscard been possessed of the poetic soul. But this,
fortunately, was not his; and all that might have been said was left to
the imagination of Meredith. What he really felt was that there need
be no rivalry, and that he for one had no thought of such; that in the
quest which they were about to undertake there need be no question of
first and last; that they were merely two men, good or bad, competent or
incompetent, but through all equal.
Neither of them suspected that the friendship thus strangely inaugurated
at the rifle's mouth was to run through a longer period than the few
months required to reach the plateau--that it was, in fact, to extend
through that long expedition over a strange country that we call Life,
and that it was to stand the greatest test that friendship has to meet
with here on earth.
It was almost dark when at last they turned to go, Jack Meredith
carrying the skin over his shoulder and leading the way. There was no
opportunity for conversation, as their progress was necessarily very
difficult. Only by the prattle of the stream were they able to make sure
of keeping in the right direction. Each had a thousand questions to
ask the other. They were total strangers; but it is not, one finds, by
conversation that men get to know each other. A common danger, a common
pleasure, a common pursuit--these are the touches of Nature by which men
are drawn together into the kinship of mutual esteem.
Once they gained the banks of the Ogowe their progress was quicker, and
by nine o'clock they reached the camp at Msala. Victor Durnovo was still
at work superintending the discharge of the baggage and stores from
the large trading-canoes. They heard the shouting and chattering before
coming in sight of the camp, and one voice raised angrily above the
others.
“Is that Durnovo's voice?” asked Meredith.
“Yes,” answered his companion curtly.
It was a new voice which Meredith had not heard before. When they
shouted to announce their arrival it was suddenly hushed, and presently
Durnovo came forward to greet them.
Meredith hardly knew him, he was so much stronger and healthier in
appearance. Durnovo shook hands heartily.
“No need to introduce you two,” he said, looking from one to the other.
“No; after one mistake we discovered each other's identity in the
forest,” answered Meredith.
Durnovo smiled; but there was something behind the smile. He did not
seem to approve of their meeting without his intervention.