MAXWELL'S LAST MARCH
Maxwell was never addicted to losing time, and, thanks to Miss Castro's
efforts, he had a clear start of Rideau, when he left Little Mahu.
Redmond, being warned by a message posted on from the cable station
farther along the coast, had a number of picked men ready; and Amadu
declared that they were sturdy cattle. Both traders had done their
utmost, and by dint of working night and day, Maxwell was able to leave
their factory two days after he reached it.
They followed him to the compound gate, where Gilby gazed longingly at
the forest and then sighed as he surveyed the line of brawny men, each
of whom stood waiting beside his burden. Their clothing was simple.
Broad folds of white cotton hung over one shoulder, and, drooping to the
knee, were belted at the waist by a band from which a matchet hung. A
number of the men also carried long flintlock guns.
"They're warranted free from civilization, and fit for almost anything,
if you drive them with a tight rein," Gilby said.
"The niggers are fit enough," agreed Redmond. "If I were you, Maxwell, I
wouldn't spare them. Nobody has heard anything of Rideau since he
reported you as hopelessly hemmed in, but there's not much happens in
this region he does not get news of, and it's my humble opinion he'll
turn up somewhere along your trail just when you least desire to see
him. As you probably know, news travels very fast in this country. That
fellow must have some influence with the nigger headmen or the chiefs of
the Leopards, or somebody would have cut his throat long ago. You'll
have to push on your fastest to keep ahead of him."
"I quite appreciate the necessity," Maxwell replied quietly. "But if it
were not for my comrade's sake I think I'd wait for him. It strikes me
that I am wasting precious time now, and I'll leave you with my best
thanks for your assistance."
One trader thumped him on the back, the other grasped his hand.
"Good luck!" cried Redmond. "We'll put a spoke in Rideau's wheel if we
can."
"You're the sort of man I take to!" Gilby added. "We'll use up a whole
quarter's allowance, and turn this place inside out when you come back
again."
Maxwell beckoned to Amadu, and waved his hand to the traders, as his
carriers picked up their loads; and the two stood gazing after him until
the steamy forest swallowed the long line of plodding men. They never
saw him again, and it was some time before any news of his movements
reached them, but meanwhile Gilby nearly brought about the death of
Rideau's principal assistant, and ever afterward regretted he did not
wholly do so.
That evening Gilby was returning with a gun in his hand from a prowl
beside a lagoon soon after darkness fell, when his boot became unlaced
near the factory boys' quarters, which stood at some distance from the
white men's dwelling. Gilby seated himself on a fallen log, and remained
a few minutes glancing meditatively, but unseen himself, toward a group
of dusky figures crouching around a cooking-fire just outside the
edifice. They sat with their backs toward the long, low shed, and,
because the fire had sunk, the light was dim and fitful. Accordingly,
Gilby saw, though the negroes did not, a shadowy form crawl without a
sound down the slope of thatch. With suspicions aroused, Gilby reached
out for his gun. It was a heavy big-bore, and there was a large-shot
cartridge in either chamber.
Still, he was distinctly puzzled until the crawling object resolved
itself into a man, who dropped noiselessly from the overhanging eaves,
and the next moment appeared before the astonished negroes, as though he
had fallen from the clouds. It was cleverly done, and Gilby could see by
the negroes' attitude that they were impressed. The stranger was
evidently one of the wandering magicians who are a power in that
country, and wanted something from the Krooboys. Gilby, having suffered
by the visits of similar gentlemen, determined to demonstrate to his
servants the hollowness of such trickery, and furnish the intruder with
cause to regret having frightened them. He could see the dusky figures
shrink backward until the stranger checked them with an imperious
gesture, and asked questions in some native tongue. As Gilby crept
carefully nearer, the man's appearance seemed to be familiar. He wore a
broad palm-leaf hat low down on his forehead, but as the firelight
leaped up the trader felt almost certain that he had before him Rideau's
headman.
"If you lib for move a foot, I'll shoot you!" he shouted, pitching up
the gun.
There was a murmur, apparently of relief, from the Kroos, and, though
Gilby afterward said he did not run, the stranger's figure grew less
distinct. It had almost vanished when he called again, and, receiving no
answer, pressed the trigger. A wisp of smoke blew into his eyes, he
heard the lead smash through the frail boarding of the shed; but though
he was a tolerable shot there was no other sound beyond the concussion
flung back from the palms above. Gilby, dashing forward, searched all
the surrounding bush before he returned to the Krooboys, having found
nothing.
"What did them Ju-ju man lib for want?" he asked.
"He done ask us how many boy them white man take, and when he lib for
bush, sah," answered a trembling negro.
"I'll stop half your rations if the next time he comes one of you
doesn't lib for get out soffly, soffly, and tell me," said the trader.
"I'll also flog any boy who tells him what he wants to know!"
"Were you trying to shoot yourself, Gilby?" asked Redmond, meeting him
at the foot of the stairway. "I'd try to hang out here on top as long as
possible, if I were you."
"I was trying to shoot one of those confounded Ju-ju men, more fool me.
The beggar got away, and, though of course it was trickery, he did it
cleverly. I believe it was that brute of Rideau's."
"Then it would have saved somebody a lot of trouble if you had held
straighter. Rideau doesn't usually make his movements plain, but it will
be unlucky for Maxwell if those two rascals are on his trail."
Maxwell in the meantime was pushing north with feverish haste. He did
not know what had happened at the factory, but he feared many things,
and guessed that his rival would miss no opportunity to prevent his
joining hands with his comrade. Still, he could not forecast what his
plan would be, and could only redouble his precautions and make Amadu
solemnly promise to carry relief to the threatened camp if disaster
overtook him personally. Also he traveled very fast, for Maxwell
possessed the gift of getting the utmost out of his men, and because
news flies swiftly through the African bush, that perhaps accounted for
his being able to cover the distance he did before misfortune overtook
him.
The rains had set in, when, with Amadu some paces behind him, he plodded
one day through thick jungle before his men. The deluge had ceased
during the last hour, but the narrow path ran water, while the cane,
which grew higher than a tall man's head on either side, shook down
drenching showers alike on soaked white man and naked negro. Belts of
thick steam drifted across it in places. There was no sound but the
splash of moisture and the fall of weary feet, but Maxwell, with his
pistol loose in its waterproof holster, marched the more cautiously. He
had faced numerous perils in his time, and had learned never to run an
unnecessary risk; and the jungle he traversed was particularly suitable
for an ambush.
Amadu, who recognized this, also was vigilant, and swept the cane on
either side with searching eyes. He endeavored to persuade his master to
travel in his hammock; but unavailingly. Therefore he carried the long
Snider rifle with its breech well covered by his arm, and felt at times
with wet fingers for the hilt of the short, straight blade, which hung
at his side. He was a tolerable shot, but like most of the Moslem
tribesmen deadly with the steel.
"These men march well," said Maxwell. "We should reach the camp within a
week if nothing hinders us. Tell them to spread out a little and keep
their matchets ready. The cane is getting thicker."
Amadu moved backward along the plodding line, and when he turned to
rejoin his master, Maxwell was some distance in front of him. The path
twisted sharply round a thicker clump of cane, and suddenly Amadu caught
a glimpse of a tiny black patch among the dripping stems. Nevertheless,
he evinced no sign of notice until he was certain that the black strip
formed part of a human arm; and then he was called upon to make an
eventful decision. The dusky soldier of fortune knew that if an ambush
had been planted among the cane the lurking foe would, should both pass
apparently unobservant, hold their fire until, by a volley poured into
the main body, they could spread panic and cut the column in two. That
might mean the loss of many black men; but Amadu counted these as beasts
of burden in comparison with his master. He guessed that almost before
he could pitch up his rifle a poisoned arrow or a charge of ragged
potleg would strike down the white man. So he held on stolidly, with
dusky lips set tight, hoping that Maxwell might not see what he had
until the corner was passed. Then there might still be time to crawl in
upon the enemy from behind.
Maxwell walked straight on until he turned and glanced over his
shoulder; then he shook the moisture from his jacket, and in doing so,
let his hand slip from its lower corner to his revolver holster. He
turned again, with death, as it were, suspended above his head; and
Amadu gasped as he approached the thicker clump of cane. There was now
no sign of an enemy's presence in all the jungle; only the splashing
and panting of the carriers behind.
Suddenly the white man's hand swept out level with his shoulder, and
almost at the same instant a bright flash blazed from the cane. Then the
quick ringing of a rifle broke through the dull thud of the flintlock
and the pistol's second crack, and Maxwell, reeling a little, hurled
himself into the thicket.
With a roar to those who followed, Amadu plunged in too, a score of
clamorous black men with naked blades hard behind, and was just in time
to spring upon a naked man who strove to clear an entangled foot from
the creeper withes. The short blade twice passed through him; and
wrenching it free with an exultant laugh, Amadu floundered on. For a
space he and his followers smashed through that strip of jungle, but
found only a smoking rifle and one flintlock gun; then calling off the
rest, he led them back to the path. Maxwell was sitting there in a pool
of water.
"Send those boys back," he said thickly. "One of those brutes missed me,
the other did not. One can't always guess aright, Amadu, and I thought
there were at least a score of them."
Amadu groaned. He could see that his master was hard stricken, for he
looked faint and cold, and did not usually converse with his
subordinates in that kind of English. Still, he understood the first
sentence, and drove the curious black men back beyond the corner before
he stooped over the speaker. Maxwell's face was distorted and clammy.
There was a stain on the side of his jacket, and it plainly cost him an
effort to speak.
"Did you lib for chop them bush boy, Amadu?"
"One of him, sah," was the grim answer. "He done leave them rifle."
"Let me see," said Maxwell. "That is an old chassepot. Rideau had a
number of them. You don't quite follow? Well, you got the wrong man,
Amadu. Don't stand there, but slit up this jacket. Chop them doff piece
up the side of him."
Amadu did it with the still wet blade, and groaned again when Maxwell,
turning his head a little, looked down at the slow, red trickle from his
right side, then passed his hand across his lips and nodded when he saw
what there was upon it.
"Take them lil' silver bottle out of my pocket and pull the top off
him," he said very slowly; and when Amadu had done so he gulped down a
draught of lukewarm brandy before he spoke again.
"I don't suppose it's much use, but you may as well take the knife
that's in the pocket, and feel if there's any potleg near the top. Well,
why don't you do it? You need not be frightened. It won't bleed
much--that way."
Amadu shivered as he probed the wound. Maxwell's face grew grayer, and
after a downward glance out of half-closed eyes he shook his head and
stretched out one hand for more of the brandy. Then there was a heavy
silence for several minutes.
"If I could lie still with ice to suck until somebody brought a surgeon
there might be a chance; but that's out of the question here," he said
in a rambling fashion, and then roused himself. "You don't understand.
Well, I'll try in the little I know of your own idiom. We have made two
great journeys together, but now it is written that I shall shortly set
out on a longer one alone, Amadu."
Maxwell spoke thickly, but there was a wry smile on his lips as he
watched the big dark-skinned alien, who, rending his cotton robe, bound
a pad of wet leaves upon the injured side.
"It is useless, Amadu." Maxwell coughed once or twice. "Listen. Because
of something you may remember you dare not fail me, and this is my word
to you. I made a promise which must be kept, and you will carry me to
the white man's camp before six days are over, alive or dead."
Amadu looked eastward across the jungle, spread his palms outward, and
then bent his head.
"By fire and salt, and the beard of the Prophet it shall be so," he said
in his own tongue. "And I would it may also be written that I shall
still follow my master should these dogs of bushmen meddle again."
"Your master is one of the infidel," replied Maxwell. "Now see that none
of these others know what has overtaken me, and call up the hammock
men."
Maxwell was leaning on Amadu's shoulder when the hammock appeared round
the bend, and none of the black men who lifted him into it guessed how
hard he had been hit; and the monotonous carrying chanty drowned the
groans he could not quite suppress. The heavens were opened as the march
began again, and the rain rushed down. It lashed the negroes' oily skins
until they tingled, the trail became a streamlet, and the mire in places
fouled them to the knee; but Amadu, having given his promise, saw to the
keeping of it with a terrible persistence, and they trudged on doggedly,
the dripping hammock always before them. As one worn-out bearer
stumbled another replaced him, and the march progressed until long after
darkness fell, and after a few hours' halt in drifting mist it began
again.
So the long days and black nights passed. There were odd flashes of
sunlight, and once or twice the moon looked down; but between these
times the air was filled with the steam of the saturated earth or with a
rush of lukewarm water.
Late one night, when the weary carriers lay camped for a brief rest in
thick forest, Maxwell beckoned Amadu. He lay in the slung hammock, a
lantern burning behind his head.
"You will start in two hours. I must reach the camp before another night
comes. My time is short," he said.
Amadu, looking down at him gravely, saw that the words were true; but he
strove to deny them in his own tongue.
Maxwell smiled wearily, answering him in English beyond his complete
comprehension.
"I have known many men of lighter tint I could part from more easily,
Amadu. If we reach the camp before another night comes you shall have my
big elephant gun."
The dusky man stood upright.
"I carried an Emir's standard. Will you bribe me with a gun to keep the
oath I swore?"
Maxwell must have been in a state of torment about that time, but he was
in his own way a man of extravagant pride, and it was perhaps to deny
his weakness that he spoke again.
"Yet it is a good gun," he said, with a trace of his old dryness.
"Once you will remember at over a hundred paces it drove a smooth
ball through a rash bushman's head. You could keep it in
remembrance--couldn't you?"
The alien stooped and laid one of the thin hands on his own bent head,
then dropped it suddenly, for from somewhere far off a faint sound
scarcely more than audible trembled across the forest. Maxwell strove to
raise himself to listen, but before he could speak his lieutenant sprang
bolt upright, and his voice rang out. It was the sound of firing, and
even at that distance something warned the listeners that the quick beat
of it betokened modern rifles.
The hammock-bearers, who feared their new master rather more than the
old, came up at the double; bundles were thrown hurriedly on to woolly
crowns; the tired men swung into line; and the little camp grew empty.
Amadu, limping behind the hammock, laughed.
"If it be the will of Allah, I shall see that big gun make even a bigger
hole in more than one heathen's head!"