Stanley Obroski had never before welcomed a dawn with such enthusiasm.
The new day might bring him death, but almost anything would be
preferable to the hideous discomforts of the long night that had
finally dragged its pain-racked length into the past.
His bonds had hurt him; his joints ached from long inaction and from
cold; he was hungry, but he suffered more from thirst; vermin crawled
over him at will and bit him; they and the cold and the hideous noises
of the mourners and the dancers and the drums had combined to deny him
sleep.
All these things had sapped his strength, both physical and nervous,
leaving him exhausted. He felt like a little child who was afraid and
wanted to cry. The urge to cry was almost irresistible. It seemed to
offer relief from the maddening tension.
A vague half-conviction forced its way into the muddy chaos of his
numb brain--crying would be a sign of fear, and fear meant cowardice!
Obroski did not cry. Instead, he found partial relief in swearing. He
had never been given to profanity, but even though he lacked practice
he acquitted himself nobly.
His efforts awoke Kwamudi who had slept peacefully in this familiar
environment. The two men conversed haltingly--mostly about their hunger
and thirst.
"Yell for water and food," suggested Obroski, "and keep on yelling
until they bring it."
Kwamudi thought that might be a good plan, and put it into execution.
After five minutes it brought results. One of the guards outside the
hut was awakened. He came in saying things.
In the meantime both the other prisoners had awakened and were
sitting up. One of these was nearer the hut doorway than his fellows.
He therefore chanced to be the first in the path of the guard, who
commenced to belabor him over the head and shoulders with the haft of
his spear.
"If you make any more noise like that," said the guard, "I'll cut out
the tongues of all of you." Then he went outside and fell asleep again.
"That idea," observed Obroski, "was not so hot."
"What, Bwana?" inquired Kwamudi.
The morning dragged on until almost noon, and still the village slept.
It was sleeping off the effects of the previous night's orgy. But
at last the women commenced to move about, making preparations for
breakfast.
Fully an hour later warriors came to the hut. They dragged and kicked
the prisoners into the open and jerked them to their feet after
removing the bonds from their ankles; then they led them to a large hut
near the center of the village. It was the hut of Rungula, chief of the
Bansutos.
Rungula sat on a low stool before the doorway. Behind him were ranged
the more important sub-chiefs; and on the flanks, forming a wide
semicircle, were grouped the remainder of the warriors--a thousand
savage fighting men from many a far-flung Bansuto village.
From the doorway of the chief's hut several of his wives watched the
proceedings, while a brood of children spewed out between their feet
into the open sunshine.
Rungula eyed the white prisoner with scowling brows; then he spoke to
him.
"What is he saying, Kwamudi?" asked Obroski.
"He is asking what you were doing in his country."
"Tell him that we were only passing through--that we are friends--that
he must let us go."
When Kwamudi interpreted Obroski's speech Rungula laughed. "Tell the
white man that only a chief who is greater than Rungula can say _must_
to Rungula and that there is no chief greater than Rungula.
"The white man will be killed and so will all his people. He would have
been killed yesterday had he not been so big and strong."
"He will not stay strong if he does not have food and water," replied
Kwamudi. "None of us will do you any good if you starve us and keep us
tied up."
Rungula thought this over and discussed it with some of his
lieutenants; then he stood up and approached Obroski. He fingered the
white man's shirt, jabbering incessantly. He appeared much impressed
also by Obroski's breeches and boots.
"He says for you to take off your clothes, Bwana," said Kwamudi; "he
wants them."
"All of them?" inquired Obroski.
"All of them, Bwana."
Exhausted by sleeplessness, discomfort, and terror, Obroski had felt
that nothing but torture and death could add to his misery; but now
the thought of nakedness awoke him to new horrors. To the civilized
man clothing imparts a self-confidence that is stripped away with his
garments. But Obroski dared not refuse.
"Tell him I can't take my clothes off with my hands tied behind my
back."
When Kwamudi had interpreted this last, Rungula directed that Obroski's
hands be released.
The white man removed his shirt and tossed it to Rungula. Then the
chief pointed at his boots. Slowly Obroski unlaced and removed them,
sitting on the ground to do so. Rungula became intrigued by the white
man's socks and jerked these off, himself.
Obroski rose and waited. Rungula felt of his great muscles and jabbered
some more with his fellows. Then he called his tallest warrior and
stood him beside the prisoner. Obroski towered above the man. The
blacks jabbered excitedly.
Rungula touched Obroski's breeches and grunted.
"He wants them," said Kwamudi.
"Oh, for Pete's sake, tell him to have a heart," exclaimed Obroski.
"Tell him I got to have something to wear."
Kwamudi and the chief spoke together briefly, with many gesticulations.
"Take them off, Bwana," said the former. "There is nothing else you can
do. He says he will give you something to wear."
As he unbuttoned his breeches and slipped them off, Obroski was
painfully aware of giggling girls and women in the background. But the
worst was yet to come--Rungula was greatly delighted by the gay silk
shorts that the removal of the breeches revealed.
When these had passed to the ownership of Rungula, Obroski could feel
the hot flush beneath the heavy coat of tan he had acquired on the
beach at Malibu.
"Tell him to give me something to wear," he begged.
Rungula laughed uproariously when the demand was made known to him; but
he turned and called something to the women in his hut, and a moment
later a little pickaninny came running out with a very dirty G string
which he threw at Obroski's feet.
Shortly after, the prisoners were returned to their hut; but their
ankles were not bound again, nor were Obroski's wrists. While he was
removing the bonds from the wrist of his fellow prisoners a woman came
with food and water for them. Thereafter they were fed with reasonable
regularity.
Monotonously the days dragged. Each slow, hideous night seemed an
eternity to the white prisoner. He shivered in his nakedness and sought
warmth by huddling close between the bodies of two of the blacks. All
of them were alive with vermin.
A week passed, and then one night some warriors came and took one
of the black prisoners away. Obroski and the others watched through
the doorway. The man disappeared around the corner of a hut near the
chief's. They never saw him again.
The tom-toms commenced their slow thrumming; the voices of men rose in
a weird chant; occasionally the watchers caught a glimpse of savage
dancers as their steps led them from behind the corner of a hut that
hid the remainder of the scene.
Suddenly a horrid scream of agony rose above the voices of the dancers.
For a half hour occasional groans punctuated the savage cries of the
warriors, but at last even these ceased.
"He is gone, Bwana," whispered Kwamudi.
"Yes, thank God!" muttered the white man. "What agony he must have
suffered!"
The following night warriors came and took away the second black
prisoner. Obroski tried to stop his ears against the sounds of the
man's passing. That night he was very cold, for there was only Kwamudi
to warm him on one side.
"Tomorrow night, Bwana," said the black, "you will sleep alone."
"And the next night--?"
"There will be none, Bwana--for you."
During the cold, sleepless hours Obroski's thoughts wandered back
through the past, the near past particularly. He thought of Naomi
Madison, and wondered if she were grieving much over his disappearance.
Something told him she was not.
Most of the other figures were pale in his thoughts--he neither liked
nor disliked them; but there was one who stood out even more clearly
than the memory picture of Naomi. It was Orman. His hatred of Orman
rose above all his other passions--it was greater than his love for
Naomi, greater than his fear of torture and death. He hugged it to his
breast now and nursed it and thanked God for it, because it made him
forget the lice and the cold and the things that were to happen to him
on the next night or the next.
The hours dragged on; day came and went, and night came again. Obroski
and Kwamudi, watching, saw warriors approaching the hut.
"They come, Bwana," said the black. "Good-bye!"
But this time they took them both. They took them to the open space
before the hut of Rungula, chief of the Bansutos, and tied them flat
against the boles of two trees, facing one another.
Here Obroski watched them work upon Kwamudi. He saw tortures so
fiendish, so horrible, so obscene that he feared for his reason,
thinking that these visions must be the figments of a mad brain. He
tried to look away, but the horror of it fascinated him. And so he saw
Kwamudi die.
Afterward he saw even more disgusting sights, sights that nauseated
him. He wondered when they would commence on him, and prayed that it
would be soon and soon over. He tried to steel himself against fear,
but he knew that he was afraid. By every means within the power of
his will he sought to bolster a determination not to give them the
satisfaction of knowing that he suffered when his turn came; for he had
seen that they gloated over the agonies of Kwamudi.
It was almost morning when they removed the thongs that bound him to
the tree and led him back to the hut. Then it became evident that they
were not going to kill him--this night. It meant that his agony was to
be prolonged.
In the cold of the coming dawn he huddled alone on the filthy floor of
his prison, sleepless and shivering; and the lice swarmed over his body
unmolested. He had plumbed the nadir of misery and hopelessness and
found there a dull apathy that preserved his reason.
Finally he slept, nor did he awaken until mid-afternoon. He was warm
then; and new life seemed to course through his veins, bringing new
hope. Now he commenced to plan. He would not die as the others had
died, like sheep led to the slaughter. The longer he considered his
plan the more anxious he became to put it into execution, awaiting
impatiently those who were to lead him to torture.
His plan did not include escape; for that he was sure was impossible,
but it did include a certain measure of revenge and death without
torture. Obroski's reason was tottering.
When he saw the warriors coming to get him he came out of the hut and
met them, a smile upon his lips.
Then they led him away as they had led the three blacks before him.