AN AWAKENING.
Ten or a dozen tall savages were advancing through the somewhat sparse
scrub. Yielding to a first impulse of self-preservation, Laurence, quick
as thought, stepped behind the stem of the tree-fern. Then he peered
forth.
His first glance, keen and quick, took in every detail. His assailants
were fine warrior-like men, ferocious looking, in great crested headgear
of plumes. Their bodies were adorned with cow-hair circlets, but, save
for a short kilt of cat's-tails and hide, they were quite unclad. They
carried large shields of the Zulu pattern, and a sheaf of gleaming
spears--some light, others heavy and strong with the blade like a
cutlass.
Who, what could they be? he wondered. They were too fine and stately of
aspect--with their lofty, commanding brows, and clear, full glance--to
belong to any of the tribes around. They were not Wangoni--they wore too
striking a look to come of even that fine race. Who could they be?
His conjectures on that head, rapid as they were, ceased abruptly, for a
perfect volley of spears came whizzing about him, several burying their
heads deep within the stem of the tree-fern. Well indeed for him that
he had so rapidly placed even that slight rampart between himself and
his enemies.
Deeming parley better than fight, under the circumstances, Laurence
began quickly upon them in a mixture of Swahili and Zulu, declaring that
he could be no enemy to them or to their race. But a loud mocking laugh
drowned his words; and, seeing that the savages had suddenly half
crouched behind their shields for a charge, his quick, resourceful brain
grasped the situation at once. A puff of smoke, a jet of flame from
behind the tree-fern. One of the warriors fell forward on his shield,
beating the earth with his great limbs in the throes of death.
They had hardly reckoned upon this. Crouching low, now they glide away
among the scrub, keeping well within cover. But that solitary,
determined man, flattened there against the tree-fern, draws no hope
from this. Their manoeuvre is a simple one enough. They are going to
enfilade the position. Surrounded on all sides, and by such foes as
these, where will he be? for he has no cover.
But in Laurence Stanninghame's stern eyes there is a lurid battle-glow,
a very demon light. His enemies will have his life, but they will
purchase it at a long price. A dead silence now reigns, and through it
he can hear the stealthy rustle made by his foes in their efforts to
surround him. Were he in the comparative security of cover, or behind a
rampart of any sort, he might hope, by a superhuman effort of quick
firing, to hold them back. As it is, he dare not move from behind his
tree, suspecting an intention to draw him thence.
The sun flames blood-red upon the lagoon and upon a flight of
flamingoes winnowing above the mirror-like surface, and, as though the
situation were not deadly and desperate enough, the shimmer of light and
water has, even in that brief glance, brought a spot in front of his
eyes, at the moment when, if ever, his sight should be at its clearest
and quickest. The odds against him are indeed terrible. He can hardly
hope to come through; yet to his assailants it well may prove the
dearest victory they have ever won.
A dark body, creeping among the scrub--just a glimpse and nothing more.
His piece is at his shoulder, and the trigger is pressed. He has not
missed--of that he is sure. But the echoes of his shot are swallowed up,
drowned in a hundred other echoes reverberating upon the dim silence of
the scrub.
Echoes? No. The screech and tear of missiles very near to his own head,
the smoke, the jets of flame from half a hundred different points--all
this is sufficient to show that these are no echoes. His own people have
come up. He is rescued, but only just in the nick of time.
"Look out," he shouts in stentorian tones. "Don't fire this way.
Hazon--Holmes, I'm here! Keep the fools in hand. They are blazing at
me."
But the crash of the volley drowns his voice, and the scrub is alive
with swarming natives armed with firelocks of every description. Yet,
above the volley and the savage shouts, Laurence can hear the hoarse,
barking yell, can descry the forms of his late enemies--such as are left
of them--as they flee, leaping and bounding, zigzagging with incredible
velocity and address, to avoid the hail of bullets which is poured after
them.
He can realize something more--something which sends through his whole
being a cold shudder of dismay and despair. Not his own people are these
otherwise so opportune arrivals. Not his own people, but--the
inhabitants of the villages his own people are on their way to
raid--fierce and savage cannibals by habit, but with physique which will
furnish excellent slaves. He has literally fallen from the frying-pan
into the fire.
How he curses his raw folly in making his presence known! But for this
he might have slipped away unnoticed during the scrimmage. Now they come
crowding up, brandishing their weapons and yelling hideously. Although
inferior both in aspect and stature to those they have just defeated,
these barbarians are formidable enough; terror-striking their wildly
ferocious mien. Many of them, too, have filed teeth, which imparts to
their hideous countenances the most fiend-like appearance.
Is it that in the apparently fearless attitude, the stern, even
commanding glance of this solitary white man, there is something that
overawes them? It may be so, for they stop short in their hostile
demonstrations and commence a parley. Yet not altogether does Laurence
Stanninghame feel relieved, for a sudden thought surges through his
brain which causes a shade of paleness to sweep over his firm, bronzed
countenance. What if this were but a scheme to get him into their power?
What if he were not suffered to die fighting, to fall into their hands
alive? Why, then, his fate was certain--certain and inexpressibly
horrible. He would be butchered like a calf--butchered and eaten--by
these repulsive wretches. Such would be his end. Now, however, to make
the best of the situation!
But little can he make of their tongue. Then he tries them in Swahili.
Ah! several of them have a smattering of that. They have come to his aid
at a critical moment, he puts it--he is willing therefore to call them
friends. Yet it was a pity they had. He had already killed two of his
assailants and was prepared to kill them all, one after another. It was
only a question of time. After all, if anything, the new arrivals had
rather spoiled his sport.
These stared. The tone was one of patronage, of condescension. This
white man was but one; he was alone, and in their power, yet he spoke to
them as a great chief might speak. Yet, was he but one? Was he alone or
were many others not far off? Perceptibly their own replies took on a
respectful air.
The while, Laurence kept every sense on the alert, indeed even to its
uttermost tension. Was this parley designed to keep him preoccupied
while others stole up treacherously to strike him down from behind? To
guard against this idea he stepped boldly forth from the tree-fern and
advanced towards the half-threatening crowd.
"Where are those we have slain?" he said. "Let us examine them."
"Yonder," answered some in a wandering tone, while others on the
outskirts of the crowd scowled and muttered.
Leisurely, and now moving actually among these people, did Laurence fare
forth to look upon the bodies of his late assailants. The thoroughly
bold and fearless line he had adopted had told, as he was all but sure
it would. These wild barbarians, armed to the teeth, had only to stretch
forth a hand and slay him, yet somehow they refrained.
The slain warriors were lying as they fell, and even in death Laurence
could not but admire their noble proportions, and the set and martial
expression of their countenances. Six lay dead, while another, sorely
wounded, was promptly beheaded by the new arrivals. These, their savage
instincts all afire, set to work to hack the heads off each corpse;
then, tying grass ropes around the ankles, the trunks were dragged away
to the village.
To the latter now they invited Laurence. To hesitate might be an act of
weakness sufficient to cause his slaughter. To acquiesce, on the other
hand, was it not an act of unexampled foolhardiness thus to place
himself more absolutely within the power of these savage cannibals? His
policy of boldness had availed so far; it would not do to break down at
the last moment. So he accepted without a shade of hesitation.
"How is your tribe named?" he asked, as they proceeded along.
"Wajalu," replied the man who had done chief spokesman, rather a
good-looking native, with almost a Zulu cast of countenance.
"And the head man of yonder village, who is he?"
"I am he. I--Mgara," was the reply, with a satisfied smile.
"And those we have slain, they seemed fine fighters. Of what race were
they?"
"Ba-gcatya."
Laurence looked grave, but said nothing. Strange rumours, mysterious and
vague, had reached him already--rumours relating to an immensely
powerful tribe inhabiting the dark and unexplored country away to the
north, whose raids were extending more and more, whose wrath fell alike
upon all--upon Arab slave-hunter and the prey sought by the latter--a
Zulu-speaking tribe said to have taken its origin in some hardly
recorded exodus in the days of Tshaka--Zulu alike in its habits and
customs, and in the despotism of its ruler. This nation was known as the
Abagcatya or Ba-gcatya, "The People of the Spider." Hazon, too, believed
in its existence, and Hazon was a first-class authority on such
subjects. And now the warriors who had attacked him, and upon whom the
tables were so strangely turned, were Zulu in aspect, and bore Zulu
shields. The thing began to look serious. What if that handful of
warriors was the outpost of a huge _impi_? Would not the vengeance of
the latter be fearful and complete?
And, indeed, time was when Laurence Stanninghame's blood would have
boiled with rage and disgust at the indignities offered to the remains
of these noble-looking warriors. The trunks dragged along by the heels
seemed nothing now but a bleeding mass. The heads, too, stuck upon spear
points, were borne aloft above the rabble. To them were all sorts of
mockeries addressed.
Now, however, it was different. The hardening process had been, if
anything, all too complete. A man had his hands full even if occupied
solely in taking care of himself--this had become the sum total of his
creed.
As they drew near the village, the Wajalu set up the most hideously
discordant war-song he had ever heard in his life. They were met in the
gate by a crowd of women howling and blowing horns, and otherwise adding
to the horrific tumult. These, on beholding the stranger, imagined him a
prisoner, and began clamouring for his death, pointing to the
bloodstained place of slaughter where such were wont to be immolated.
And then once more, hearing the shout of demoniacal laughter which arose
from some of the fighting men, noting a ferociously sardonic grin upon
not a few faces, Laurence felt his former misgivings all return.
Accustomed as he was to perilous situations, to horrifying sights, the
strain upon his nerves was becoming painfully intense. Fortunate,
indeed, for him that those nerves were now hardened to the cold
consistency of cast steel by almost daily trial.
"Men of the Wajalu," he began, in a decisive, commanding voice, "well is
it for all here that I am among you this day as a friend and guest, for,
but for that, this village was doomed. You know not who I am, but you
shall know in time. Then you will know that but for my presence here
to-day the spear and the slave-yoke would have been your portion, that
of your village the flames. Now I give you your lives."
The words, hurriedly rendered to those who could not understand by those
who could, perhaps more the haughty indifference of his tone, his
bearing, his appearance in general, hard and determined, overawed the
crowd. No further voice was raised against him. Their advances of
hospitality became even profuse.
He was shown to the best hut. But before he entered it he could not
avoid seeing the bodies of his late assailants in process of
dismemberment as though they had been slaughtered cattle, and, inured as
he was to horrible and sickening sights, never had he been conscious of
so overpowering a feeling of repulsion as now. The cannibal atrocities
of these human beasts, the glowering heads stuck all over the
stockade,--the latest addition thereto being those of the slain
Ba-gcatya,--the all-pervading influence of death brooding over this
demoniacal haunt, even as the ever-present circlings of carrion birds
high in mid-air--all this weighed upon his mind until he could have
blown out his own brains for sheer horror and loathing.
But upon this dark, enshrouding shadow, piercing, partly dispelling it,
came a ray of searching light--sweet, golden, penetrating. The vision of
his midday slumbers--Lilith. But a few hours had gone by since that
dream, and within them he had fought fiercely for his life; and now, in
this hell-haunt, the sweet entrancement of it came back to charm away,
as with a hallowed spell, the black horrors that hung over his soul as
though on vulture wing.
Presently Mgara entered, followed by people bearing food--cooked
goat-flesh and millet and plantains. From the smoking meat Laurence
recoiled with a loathing he could hardly repress. It was too suggestive
of the foul and fearful feast proceeding outside; and even when the
chief, with a furtive half-smile, assured him he might safely partake of
it, yet he could not touch it, contenting himself with the other fare,
cereal and vegetable.
After some further talk Mgara withdrew, and Laurence, left alone, gave
his meditations the rein once more. Never had he loathed the sinister
occupation upon which he was embarked as he did now, possibly because
the term of the undertaking was nearing its end. "I predict you will
come back with what you want," Lilith had said, and her words had been
fully verified. He had gained riches--even beyond his wildest dreams,
but how he had gained them--trafficking in human flesh and blood, yea,
even human life--she should never know. It seemed to him as though he
were already returning with that which should place all the world at his
feet.
But for once he seemed to forget that he had not yet returned--not yet.
And as the drums and yelling of the barbarous orgy outside gradually
sank into the silence of night, even that, strange to say, failed to
remind him.