and he glared through the rushes at the hideous Sicto.
"Well, it shall be Papita's after all!" Piang said and he smiled. He
crept toward the little craft to see if there were paddles in it. There
were two, and Piang suddenly remembered that part of the Dyak betrothal
ceremony takes place upon the water.
Long Piang pondered as he watched the preparations for Papita's
betrothal. He examined the _cotta_, counted the praus, and his keen
eyes followed the creek to its sharp turn. He crawled past the bend
to make sure that the stream was navigable. Satisfied that he could
escape through its waters, Piang began to cut rushes, and, squatting
in the protecting undergrowth, busily worked while he indignantly
listened to the loquacious Sicto telling his followers that Papita
was no slave, but a maiden of royal Bogobo birth. He and his father
had kept it secret because they intended her for his wife, and at
last he had captured the girl from Kali Pandapatan. Faster and faster
flew Piang's fingers, and finally a basket began to shape itself out
of the rushes. Soon Piang had two perfect baskets, and he slung them
over his shoulder. While Sicto and his villains were celebrating the
coming wedding, Piang quietly slipped back through the jungle, back
to the brook where the medicinal clay had cured the bee stings. When
he returned later, he handled the baskets with great care and chuckled
softly to himself.
A second beating of tom-toms thundered through the barrio. The bride
was coming. Down an avenue made for her by hostile looking women,
crept a tiny, terrified figure. It was draped in the softest Eastern
stuffs; jeweled anklets and bangles tinkled merrily. A gauzy veil of
wondrous workmanship swathed the figure, but through it all Piang
recognized his beloved Papita. Slowly she approached the altar;
fearfully she raised her eyes to the man who awaited her there. Her
little feet faltered, and the priestess supported her. Papita leaned
heavily against the woman. Three soft notes of a mina-bird floated
over the barrio, and Papita became suddenly alive. Again the notes
stole through the jungle. The bride threw back her veil.
"The unwilling maid seems to have forgot her woe," said one scornful
woman to another. "Now that she is about to become our chief's first
wife, she does not weep and cry to be taken home."
The priestess commenced the ceremony that was to last all
night. Chants, prayers, admonitions, all, Papita responded to with
renewed vigor, and her eyes furtively glanced toward a spot near the
curve of the creek where a slender reed swayed unceasingly. After
many hours the priestess led the way to the water and Ynoch placed
Papita in her gala vinta and pushed her out into the stream. He got
into another, and the two boats nosed each other while the crowd
showered them with oils and perfumes. When the command came to part,
each boat shot off in an opposite direction. A maiden and a bridegroom
are each supposed to meditate for the last time on the advisability of
the union before the final ceremony; so reads the Dyak marriage laws.
As indifferently as a queen, Papita plied her paddle, paying no heed
to the unfriendly eyes and mutterings of the Dyaks; she seemed in no
haste and managed her vinta with amazing skill for one so small. Only
once she seemed to lose control; her vinta cut deep into the tall
rushes near the bend of the creek. Had the Dyaks been less intent on
exhibiting their scorn, they might have noticed that when the boat
drew back from the rushes it rode deeper in the water, and the little
figure labored harder at the paddle as the vinta turned the bend and
passed from sight.
"Piang! is it you?"
As Papita spoke, the form lying in the bottom of the vinta slowly
unfolded like a huge jack-knife. The merry eyes twinkled, the youthful,
firm mouth curved at the corners, and Piang, the adventurer, smiled
up at the astonished girl.
"But yes, Chiquita, did you think that Piang would suffer the outcast
Sicto to kidnap his little playmate?" Piang took up the paddle and
the vinta shot forward. Silently the two bent to the task, every
moment increasing the distance between them and their enemies.
"Will they catch us, Piang?"
"Of course not, my Papita. Piang, the charm boy comes to rescue
you." The proud head went up with arrogant superiority.
"But there are many hidden cut-offs and creeks between us and the
river, Piang; Sicto will surely trap us." The terrified expression
in the girl's soft eyes touched Piang's heart.
"Have no fear, Papita. Let Sicto overtake us and he will be sorry. Put
your ear to the baskets."
As the girl bent over the two baskets, lying in the bottom of the
vinta, a frown puckered her brow. A dull hum, like a caged wind
protesting in faint whispers, rose from them. Gradually a smile broke
over her face, and she laughed softly.
"Yes; Sicto will be sorry if he overtakes us," she whispered.
Through the deepening night, a roar came to the fugitives. A deep,
cruel howl; tom-toms beat a ragged and violent alarm; savage war-cries
rent the air, bounding back from one echo to another. Papita's hand
wavered at her paddle. Piang's stroke grew swifter, surer. The outraged
bridegroom had returned from his meditations to find himself brideless.
"How will they come, Piang?" Papita's voice trembled.
"Some by water, some by land. Work, Papita."
And so the deadly tropic night closed about them. The little
nut-shell sped down the river, past snags, skulking crocodiles,
and many unseen dangers. The jungle came far out over the water,
dangling her treacherous plant-life above them, ready to drag them
from the vinta: it crept beneath them, shooting up in massive trees
that obstructed their passage--trees loaded down with parasites,
intertwined, interlaced in hopeless confusion, each trying to crush
and climb over the other in the fight for supremacy.
Where the creek empties into the Cotabato River, Piang paused; there
were suspicious-looking shadows close to the bank, and he reached
for his precious baskets.
"Work slowly, Papita," he whispered, and the trembling girl kept
the vinta just moving. From its ominous silence, the jungle crashed
into chaos.
"Le le le le iiiiiio!" shrieked the echoes.
Piang was ready.
"Le le le le iiiiiio!" he tauntingly replied.
Kneeling in the bow of the vinta, he hastily lighted a green resinous
torch and stuck it upright. It gave forth the pungent, heavy perfume
of the jungle pitch. Waiting until his enemies were almost upon him,
Piang raised one basket above his head and opened the trap. A sudden
buzz and whirl filled the air; Piang reached for the second basket and
held it in the smoke of the torch, ready to open. For a few moments,
nothing happened, but the enemy slackened their pace, and the war
cries were silenced. Finally yells of rage and pain broke from them:
"Badjanji!" they screamed. The little insects, infuriated at the
treatment they had received, fairly pounced upon the defenseless
Dyaks. No jungle pest is so dreaded as the enraged honey-bee. Its
envenomed stings are poisonous, deadly, and often cause more painful
wounds than bolos. The men fought desperately. Tauntingly Piang
laughed, swiftly he and Papita paddled, and the smoke from the torch
enveloped them in its protecting waves. Coming abreast of the war-prau,
Piang loosed the other basket of bees.
On sped the vinta, and ever nearer came the great estuary that gave
upon the Celebes Sea. The sounds of the sufferers grew fainter,
and finally Papita and Piang were again alone in the great night.
"They will return and assemble the war fleet, Papita; they will
pursue us into the ocean. If the water is rough, we cannot cross the
bay to Parang-Parang in this vinta. We must hide near the coast and
make our way homeward on foot."
Morning fairly burst upon them. Twilight in the tropics is a name only,
for the sun rises and disappears abruptly, and it is day or night
in a few moments. The early light showed the ocean in the distance,
and at the same moment sounds behind made Piang listen anxiously.
"They are coming, Papita; we must hide."
As Piang headed for the bank, he noticed a thin stream of smoke
trembling above Bongao. He paused and trained his eye on the
blur. Suddenly he dug his paddle into the water.
"Papita, quick! The _Sabah_ is coming!"
Again the vinta shot forward, down through the shifting, treacherous
delta, out into the ocean. Louder grew the beating of paddles against
the Dyak war-praus, and Piang could hear the war chant. He knew that
Sicto cared little for ships; he had evaded too many of them. Only
the _Sabah_, Sicto feared, but he would probably take a chance on
this being the Chino mail boat or a Spanish tramp. That the Dyaks
would take the chance and follow, Piang was sure.
The sea was choppy and fretful. The little bride boat danced and
careened about recklessly. Between the _Sabah_ and Piang lay Bongao,
and straight for Bongao he headed, skilfully keeping the vinta
steady. A white mist rose, as if to hide the vinta from the pursuers,
but when the fleet reached the river's mouth a yell announced that
they had been discovered. The race was for life, for more than life,
and the boy seemed possessed of a supernatural strength. Nearer came
the smoke, and finally around the point of Bongao, burst the little
gunboat. At first the Dyaks did not heed the stranger, so used were
they to hurling contempt at island visitors, but when in answer to
Papita's signal, as she stood up waving her disheveled wedding veil,
there came a shrill whistle, they paused in dismay.
In a very short time Papita and Piang were raised over the side of the
_Sabah_, and General Beech and Governor Findy were questioning them.
"You say that Dato Ynoch is pursuing you?"
"Yes, yes, that is him in the first prau," excitedly replied Piang.
"Well, Piang, it is Ynoch that brings the _Sabah_ here to-day. We
thank you, my boy, for tempting him into the open."
When the Moro boy disclosed Ynoch's identity, a grim smile settled
over Governor Findy's face.
"Man the guns, Captain!" commanded General Beech in his dignified,
quiet way.
The Dyaks were scattering in the wildest confusion, making their
way back to the river with all speed, but the _Sabah_ relentlessly
pursued. A sudden darkening shadow startled the captain of the _Sabah_,
and he pointed toward the mountains.
"Something queer hatchin' over there, General."
A dense mist hid the hills; only old Ganassi Peak stood out, dignified
and stern. Like a dirty piece of canvas, one cloud balanced itself on
Ganassi's shoulder and rapidly spread itself around the peak. It seemed
to sap the very life from Ganassi, as it enveloped it in a chilling
embrace. Slowly the cloud loosed its hold and bounced along on the
lower hills. In its center it seemed to bear a restless, struggling
mass, and the passengers on the _Sabah_ watched it nervously. Strange
things happen very suddenly in the sunny Celebes. Fascinated, they
watched the odd cloud lumbering toward them, dipping and lifting its
burden. It sailed over the mountains, flitted past the jungle and
reached the ocean, where it hovered and waved as if undecided which
way to go. At times, like canvas, it would belly down in the middle,
almost burst, right itself, and come sailing on. Again and again the
heavy contents pulled the cloud to earth, but valiantly struggling
with its burden, it resisted. The cloud brought with it a death-like
mist, damp and choking, and the sunshine was abruptly put out. The
thing hesitated over the _Sabah_, dipping and sucking itself back,
as if made of elastic; it wandered about aimlessly and paused over
the fleeing Dyaks. Finally as if discouraged and strained beyond its
endurance, it gave up.
With shrieks and cries the Dyaks watched it. Tons and tons of water
burst from the cloud, striking the sea with a hiss that sent the
spray high in the air.
"Waterspout!" yelled the captain and ordered the _Sabah's_ engines
stopped. In horror they beheld the crazy column careen about, obeying
its master, the capricious wind, and following any stray current;
around and around the spiral, grinding mass of water veered and circled
aimlessly. It danced and capered about the ocean like some malignant
monster loosed from torment, and finally, as if by direct intent,
started for the river's mouth. The Dyaks saw it coming, and in their
puny efforts to escape, looked like ants before an elephant. The five
streams, flowing through the delta of the Cotabato River, seemed to
draw the vicious waterspout toward them, and on it went, directly
in the wake of the doomed Dyaks. Tensely the _Sabah's_ passengers
followed the course of the spout. The whirling Nemesis descended upon
the pirates; their cries of anguish came faintly through the roar and
hiss of water; crude Dyak prayers, shrieked by terrified worshipers,
smote upon their ears, and finally, like a whirlwind, the waterspout
pounced upon its victims. It caught at them with a thousand arms;
it tossed them up, bore them down, tore them from the light eggshell
praus, crushing them to bits.
Through the entire fleet stalked the monster, dealing out death and
destruction to all, and, when there remained naught to vent its wrath
upon, like an insatiate giant, it turned toward the jungle. Straight
up the river it marched, rooting up trees, tearing down banks, and
gradually vanished in the distance, leaving wreckage and disaster in
its path.
Silenced by the terrible spectacle, the Americans seemed to huddle
closer together for protection, or comfort. But two figures stood
out alone on the _Sabah's_ deck.
Papita's eyes were fastened on Piang, on the charm that dangled from
his necklace of crocodile teeth; Piang was lost in Ganassi Peak. His
eyes were filled with a divine awe as he silently faced his beloved
peak, where dwelt his wonder man, the Hermit Ganassi. Every element
of his being, his very attitude, proclaimed that his spirit was
pouring out a thanksgiving to his patron, whose prayers to Allah,
the Merciful, had sent the waterspout to destroy his enemies. The
Christians, boasting a greater God, were put to shame by this artless
exhibition of a faith that they could never feel, and their eyes were
filled with admiration as they looked upon this Moro boy, transfigured
in his faith, as he muttered softly:
"There is no God but Allah!"
THE END
NOTES
[1] _Bichara_ means meeting and corresponds to the East Indian word,
_durbar_.