A DESPERATE BETROTHAL
At the farthest limit of the cave we leaned upon the rock, and looked at
that wicked, weaving head. Twice before had I seen it, but never in such
circumstances as this. On both occasions we had been men alone. The
peril had been distributed, so to speak, amongst us all. But with a
girl, and a beautiful girl moreover, with whom I happened to be
desperately in love—to have that outrageous atrocity mouthing upon her
and me alone, and to feel that any accident might send her into its
bestial maw—Good God! it might turn any brain. I stood between Gwen and
the entrance and tried to smile into her face.
“I wouldn’t look that way, if I were you,” said I persuasively. “He’ll
take himself off directly, I hope.”
Her lips were very white and they trembled unrestrainedly, but she
smiled back into my eyes—a ghostly, uncertain sort of smile, though, I
must confess.
“I don’t mind. Not much at least.” Then with a strained attempt to look
at the humorous side of it she added, “What an opportunity for M.
Lessaution and his squirt.”
I loved to see the pluck of her, and answered cheerfully.
“Garlicke will be distracting the brute’s attention directly with that
Männlicher rifle,” said I. “I happen to know he took it up with him when
we moved camp, for use in just such a possibility as this. He’ll be
trying the effect of the bullet with the top bitten off,” I added to
keep the light side of the question uppermost, though it was a watery
sort of sprightliness at the best.
From the edge above, where the weight of the great body was pressing, a
lump of granite fell, and splashed into splinters in the narrows of the
gulf. It widened the mouth of the fissure by a foot or more. The
horrible trunk surged forward a yard or two, and one of the huge legs,
dropping from between the belly and the rock, slid into the opening. The
five white claws waggled and gripped at empty space, and the gloom in
the cave increased. Fidget was beyond barking now, and backed against
the uttermost crevices with a sort of bleating gasp. I think that never
have I seen unadulterated terror more plainly expressed on an animal’s
features.
With the increased room for the body, the long sinuous neck came forward
a like space. The thin snout was now fairly in the cavern. The nauseous
breath hissed at us in gusts—sickening as a plague wind.
Suddenly the lithe neck stiffened. The evil eyes concentrated their gaze
upon Gwen. Their stare seemed to go past my cheek with the searing
directness of a flash-light. In an instant the memory of the power that
lay in that wicked glare came back to me.
I dashed forward and clapped my palms upon Gwen’s face, calling to her
wildly to close her eyes. I gathered her to my bosom—and oh, the ecstasy
of it, even in that desperate stress—and stammered incoherently of the
fatal trap that lay in that unwinking gaze. She was content enough to
bury her face in the folds of my loose jacket, and thus for a moment we
stood shuddering. Fidget crept and fawned shiveringly about Gwen’s
skirts.
I kicked my foot against an object on the floor. It was the tin of
mustard Gwen had been carrying when she started on that mad race down
the boulders. It was new and shining, just out of store. I held it
before my face to look at the reflection therein.
Finding his efforts unavailing, the Monster was drawing his head back
into the outer part of the cave, relaxing his tense glare. We turned to
face him. He curved his neck into a half-circle, his great throat
muscles working with swallowings. Then with a sudden dart he flung it
out upon us, gaping wide his mouth.
With a rasp and a roar his breath burst upon us, and upon the wall of
rock at our back, hissing stridently like a gale through taut rigging.
It beat us back almost irresistibly in the return draught, thrusting us
out from the back of the cave toward his waiting lips. For one desperate
moment we swayed in that noisome gust, and my free arm—for one still
encircled Gwen’s waist—whirled in the air frantically as I braced myself
to meet it. But as its first strength died down I flung myself with Gwen
upon the ground, and grasping at a ledge hung on with despair’s own
grip.
In the case of Fidget the Monster’s wile defeated his object. The
back-swirl of his breath whisked the little dog like a leaf past the
lowering head and on into the outer cleft. With a sound half bark, half
squeal, she leaped upon the unwieldy body before the neck could coil
itself out of the inner cave. We heard her yapping pass swiftly out
among the boulders, and die away up the empty lake-side.
There was the thud of a bullet on the thick hide, and the crack of a
rifle followed smartly on the shot. A flake or scale of parchmenty skin
floated past the cave mouth, and rustled slowly into the depths below;
not by so much as the flicker of an eyelid did the brute show that he
had felt anything. Another shot followed, with the same result. They
clattered on—above a score of them—but they worried him no more than the
buzzings of mosquitoes. Finally one must have hit a wart-like
excrescence on his shoulder. A lump about the size of my fist fell with
a flop upon the stones, glanced ruddily for a second, and bounced on
into the depths below. But it left a tell-tale smear upon the granite,
and scarlet drops trickled down the hanging neck, dripping in a small
pool at the threshold of the cave. Yet the Monster lay unheeding, and we
began to gasp with the unutterable murkiness of his breathing, which
filled the air.
At Gwen’s request I passed her the tin of mustard, and she held it like
a smelling-bottle to her nostrils, to get relief from the disgusting
fog. We began to pass it backward and forward to one another, and it was
then that an inspiration—I think I may justly call it that—flashed into
my brain.
With the tin in my hand I turned to face the great head again, waiting
till the thin lips parted in one of their deep-drawn breaths. Then I
tossed my missile accurately toward the open jaws, and like a flash of
crimson the gums gaped wide and the yellow teeth closed upon it. For a
single instant we saw it gleam brightly between them.
There was a scrunch and a grinding sound among the great fangs, and then
the yellow powder sank bitingly into the saliva. The brute opened his
mouth, and a bellow pealed out of the strained throat, enveloping us in
a volume of merciless sound and hot, putrid air. The long pink tongue
slavered and twisted between the burning gums, showing ruddy streaks
where the metal had gashed it. In one such ragged wound a remnant of the
bright tin was still sticking; the flaming paste of powder and saliva
was filling the torn veins with agony.
He dashed his head desperately from side to side, slamming it on the
hard rock sides of the cavern. His unearthly screams threatened to burst
our ear-drums. He beat the air with his great clumsy foot, and we could
hear the thunderous boom of his great tail against the timbers of the
ship.
Finally with the swiftness of an escaping bird the tortured head fled
out of the cave mouth, and we heard his great carcass drag and rustle
from the cleft. The blessed sunlight began to flow down to us again, and
the filthy stench began to fade.
I let go my grip upon the rock, and, more unwillingly, my encirclement
of Gwen’s waist. I looked inquiringly into her eyes as I helped her up.
She staggered as she rose, and for one delightful moment clung to me. I
felt that mere courtesy bade me tender again my support, and so for two
or three delicious seconds we stood. Then she found her voice and the
ghost of a smile.
“I think you’re quite the cleverest person I ever met,” she said
gratefully. “How on earth did you come to think of the mustard?”
“I really haven’t the least idea,” said I honestly. “His mouth was there
and I had the tin in my hand. It seemed the most natural thing in the
world to throw it in. The effect was more than I dared to hope for.”
She drew herself unostentatiously away from my arm as she spoke, and
leaned against the rocks behind her.
“Well,” she remarked, “we’ve saved poor little Fidget, at any rate. Even
if we’re doomed to be devoured we shall have the satisfaction of knowing
that.”
“We!” said I rebukingly. “Should _I_ ever have been such a
sentimentalist as to risk a horrible death for a dog?”
“I rank above Fidget in your opinion then, as you have chosen to
accompany me into this trap. You do me too much honor,” and she bowed to
me charmingly.
I couldn’t quite command myself to answer this in any ordered phrase,
but I suppose the expression on my face must have spoken. At any rate
Gwen blushed delightfully, and continued rather hurriedly, “Don’t you
think we might make a run for it now?”
“I’ll reconnoitre,” said I, “and see if he’s really taken himself off or
not.”
I climbed gingerly out of the cleft, and very cautiously raised my head
above the edge. No, by no manner of means was he gone. He was lying
about fifty yards away, banging his head upon the ground and lashing the
boulders with his tail; some of them were smitten to splinters as I
watched. His mouth still dripped yellow saliva, and his teeth were
meeting with resounding cracks. His tongue still lapped itself about his
tortured lips, and in his agony he rolled over, writhing upon his back
and beating his four great limbs convulsively toward the sky. Lumps of
his scaly skin were scattered about on the granite as feathers scatter
from a shot bird. His nails clattered as they swept an overhanging mass
of granite in one of their aimless gyrations. Finally there was one last
angry flurry of legs and tail, and he rolled back upon his belly; his
horny eyelids closed; his head sank wearily upon his fore-arms.
As I turned to tell Gwen I kicked a stone beside me. It fell with a
metallic clang, and in a moment the green eyes were open and staring at
me. He lifted his head, and his huge limbs began to shove his carcass
back toward me. There was a revengeful glare in those baleful eyes, and
I popped back into the cleft like a rabbit into his burrow.
I heard him come dragging along above. Then, looking up, I saw the thin
snout just overlap the edge and lie still. Evidently he was settling
down to his sentinelship. Afraid of another dose of the biting pain we
had inflicted, he did not dare to venture his head again into our cave.
He meant to starve us out.
Gwen looked up hopefully as I returned, but I had to shake my head at
her glance of inquiry.
“No good just at present, I’m afraid. He’s like the hosts of Midian,
prowling and prowling around.”
“Well, I suppose it can’t be helped. But I do wish we’d had something a
little more nutritious than mustard, useful as it’s been. I’m simply
starving. It’s more than lunch-time by half-an-hour.”
“That can be arranged,” said I airily. “I’ll nip up the other side of
the ship and get aboard. I can get hold of plenty of stuff in the
pantry.”
“As if I should allow it for a moment. I forbid it absolutely,” and she
brought her little foot with a stamp upon the rock floor.
I still edged toward the cave mouth, explaining that the danger was
practically nil, though well did I know the contrary. Still a man can’t
sit still to watch a particularly sweet woman starve, even if he has to
risk a bit to bring her victual.
“I cannot stand the ignominy of starvation,” I assured her, “not to
mention the discomfort.”
She came toward me with her eyes so sweetly appealing that I felt sick
with temptation. “If you go,” she said almost tearfully—there really was
a humid look in her blue eyes—“I shall simply die of fright. I won’t be
left alone.”
I hesitated and was lost. She put her hand upon my sleeve, and looked up
searchingly into my face. “Please, please, please, don’t go. I really am
very frightened.”
Goodness knows what I should have done next. Probably taken her in my
arms and sworn neither to leave her then nor ever again, regardless of
Denvarre or any question of mere honor. But fate took matters out of my
hand.
The brute above us gave a hiccough; I believe he meant it for a sneeze,
but as a minor explosion of sorts it might have held up its head with
cordite cartridges or an oil motor-car. Gwen, whose nerves were, as you
may imagine, a trifle beyond control by now, gave a cry and fled into my
arms, which opened of themselves to receive her. And so for a minute we
stood silent and listening, while my pulses rioted within me.
After a moment or two we were aware that the fœtid odor of the great
Beast was being overpowered by a resistless smell of sulphur. This was
doubtless giving our friend a sore throat, and titillating his nostrils.
I hoped devoutly that the unpleasantness of it would be too much for
him. He snorted once or twice again, and then a faint steam began to
rise from the depths, as I had seen it do in the morning. Far below us I
could hear the faint lap of water upon the stones.
Then a horrible fear took possession of me. The water was rising, hot
from some volcanic spring. Shortly it would gurgle out at our feet and
flood our refuge. Then we should have the necessity before us of
deciding whether we would drown—or perchance be parboiled—or step
resignedly into the jaws of the Monster outside.
I looked fixedly at Gwen as these terrors hunted each other through my
brain, and I suppose my thoughts shadowed out upon my face.
She turned her eyes to mine as I held her, looking questioningly at me,
as if she would read my very soul. A sob and gurgle from the rising
water sounded out bell-like and clear, moaning distinctly across the
silence. I knew by the shudder that ran through her that she was
realizing what must happen when it lapped up to us. Her face fell upon
my breast; her hands rose tremblingly to my shoulders; so for a few
moments we stood, and silence hung between us.
The white clouds of steam began to weave and whirl fantastically across
the mouth of the cave. The warm, damp air played about us. The suck and
splash of the waters sounded ever nearer and clearer from below. Above
we could hear the wheeze and the occasional gasp of the watching
Monster, and his feet moved restlessly, sending down showers of little
stones into the abyss, where they no longer clattered into emptiness,
but fell with splashings into the growing flood. Then a thrill pulsed
through the rocks, and we could feel the sickening heave and roll of the
earth as a new eruption shook the crater. In a second or two the roar of
it came dully down to us, drowning the sound of the rifle shots which
still pattered at intervals on the rocks, or thudded on that
sensationless hide.
Finally the water rose to view, creeping with slow, silent tide up the
rocks, gaining inch by inch upon the sides of the cleft. A wreath of
steam hung mistily upon its surface. I bent and touched it with my
finger. It was warm—about eighty degrees I should imagine—but not
unbearable.
I stepped again to the cave mouth and peered up. The cruel snout still
projected over the edge above, waiting, waiting remorselessly. As I
watched the triangular head moved forward a space, and, turning
sideways, looked down at me with hot, revengeful eyes. I stepped back
into the shadow of the cave, and down flashed the head, hanging in
eager, swaying motion before us, gloating for the moment when we should
be thrust out to it by the rising flood.
I slushed back to the end of the cave—the water was now at our knees—and
took Gwen in my arms, shielding the gruesome sight from her with my
breast. She drooped into my embrace again, trembling, but with a little
thankful sigh for companionship in this last desperate pang.
“It’ll soon be over,” I said as steadily as I could, while my hand
brushed her hair smoothingly. “Just a little struggle, and then a dream
that carries you right across the border, and—and I shall be there to
meet you. Do you see, dear?”
I had no right to call her dear, I know, she being Denvarre’s and not
mine, but it was the last time, and, poor little soul, she wanted
comfort for the last wrench. She looked up at me, and I could see that
her lips were parched and dry, though there was a curious light shining
in her eyes.
“Is there no chance at all?—are you sure?” she whispered, and for all
the horror that was closing down upon us, a smile shone in her eyes.
“None, I fear,” said I; “but—but I don’t think it’ll be bad—people who
have been nearly drowned say that——”
“Ah, I don’t mean that. Only I wanted to tell you before the end—I meant
to tell you in any case, but it’s easier now. Vi only found out this
morning that mother had led you to think that we had accepted those
two—but—but it isn’t so. Lord Denvarre asked me, but I told him I didn’t
think I possibly could—only—he wanted me to wait six months and see—and
then we met again, and—I knew—then——” But my lips upon hers stayed her,
and my arms went fiercely about her again.
“My darling, my darling,” I cried, “and I thought you’d forgotten me
utterly, and taken Denvarre for all he could bring you. And now,
sweetheart, now—oh, my God,” I groaned, “what can I do, what can I do?”
Her voice was quite steady, and she leaned forward to put her face up to
mine. “Then you still want me, dear,” she whispered. “Well, I’m yours
till—till the end,” and a tiny sob shook her voice for a moment. “But I
want a gift from you before we part, my darling,” and she touched my
cheek with a little soft caress.
“A gift?” I stared back into her eyes, devouring with hungry gaze the
sweet face that was mine, only to be lost to me again.
“Yes, dear. You have your revolver.”
[Illustration:
“IT’LL SOON BE OVER,” I SAID....
_Page 296._
]
I thrust her back from me wildly. My God, how could she ask it? I, to
send the bullet into that dear heart that beat for me. I, to give her
death, who longed with every passionate impulse of my being to give her
life, who would have perilled not only my unworthy body but my very soul
to save her pain. The thought of it was more than could be borne; the
doing of it—Merciful God! it was impossible.
“_Please_, my darling. I should only struggle when the last moment came,
and fight out into his jaws.” She pressed back close to me again,
looking up at me with a pleading that was terrible. “Just one embrace,
my own, and then——” and her hands rose round my neck, and for one
delicious instant her dear lips pressed passionately against mine. Then,
with a little triumphant smile she drew back, and repeated quietly,
“Now, dear.”
The water was at my shoulders, and it was only by holding Gwen tightly
to me that I kept her face above the surface. There was but a bare three
inches between my pistol hand and the roof. I looked at the cartridges
with some faint hope that they might be wetted, and that this last
terrible duty might be yet taken from me. But the brass cases had held
only too well. I raised my revolver, pointing it downward, and looked
into those dear eyes. Her eyelids drooped as the steel barrel shone, and
I felt her fingers tighten upon my arm. The water was at my lips, but
with one supreme effort I raised her to me. One last look into the
dearest face in all the world—one last kiss—one touch of that golden
hair—then——
Crash—crash—crash—outside was a grating roar, and caught by the rising
tide the ship surged forward. The bulge of it swung against the cave
mouth, and in an instant caught and gripped the pendant neck, sawing and
grinding its flesh against the jagged edges. The prisoned head in its
agony beat frantically against the surface, and the water shot right and
left in angry ripples as the breath of the Monster’s scream burst upon
it.
The revolver dropped from my hand. I snatched Gwen to me, and dived into
the hot, turbid flood—down beneath the struggling head, down beneath the
ship’s keel, out into the warm stillness of the cleft beyond.
Gasping and choking from our sudden immersion I dragged my darling over
the edge, and half-led, half-carried her up the rocky slope, leaving a
long wet drip upon the granite. The enraged and baffled yelling of the
captured Beast rang out piercingly among the cliff echoes; the lashings
of his great tail smote upon the empty hold of the ship as upon a drum.
In his vain attempts to draw his neck from the trap he drove and spurred
at the boulders frantically, and the clatter of his long nails upon the
pebbles sounded like the scratchings of some monstrous cat.
Our clothes were sodden and heavy, and our nerves unstrung from terror
and excitement. We were in no condition for a swift escape. My own state
of mind I can in nowise describe, such a confusion of fright and ecstasy
raged therein. Firstly, the horrors of a hideous death still hung over
us, though for the moment passed by. My pulses still tingled with the
sick despair of that last terrible moment. Death had been my betrothal
gift to my love—death to save her from agony. Another second, and she
would have received it at my hand. Thank God that there are few who can
realize the æons of torture that swelled into those few instants of
good-bye. Death was still at our backs, and might follow hard upon our
footsteps, but I was so uplifted in the knowledge of my darling’s love,
and in learning that no point of honor stood between us, that I scarce
gave a thought to remembering that we might yet stand together in the
Valley of the Shadow.
Up the slope we toiled, and very like one of those terrible hills that
we climb in dreams did it appear. Gwen clung to me desperately, her dear
eyes hunted and shining with affright. Her knees trembled—she strove to
run, but her dripping skirts caught her limbs and made her stumble.
Still up we reeled, the pebbles spinning from our unsteady feet, the
smooth rock silt churning to mud upon our shoes. From above came cries
of encouragement, and from the heights I seemed to see dark forms speed
down toward us. Another crash echoed from behind. I threw a quick glance
across my shoulder. The _Racoon_ was slanting back from the cave mouth,
and the Monster was free. I saw him turn and crawl slowly from the pool
in which the ship was beginning to right herself and sit swan-like.
He lifted his head, and I saw the blood flow in streams from his gashed
throat. It steamed as it made puddles upon the cold rocks. He sniffed
the breeze. Then his evil eyes settled their stare in our direction. The
huge body began to waddle and slide toward us.
I caught Gwen up in my arms and fled upward, terror thrusting me on. She
gave one gasp of protest; then she settled into my embrace with a little
sigh of relief as she nestled to me. So the race for life began.
I ran almost unseeingly, the great pulses throbbing and thrumming in my
bosom. Now and again I stumbled; once I nearly fell. Gwen’s arm came
with a jolt against a boulder top. I cursed my awkwardness, hurrying on
and trying to pick my way amongst the great, loose lumps more carefully.
Some rubble gave beneath my feet. I rolled over sideways; somehow—though
how I can’t say myself—I managed to fall upon my elbows and save my
burden from harm. I rocked up to my feet, and saw as in a dream the
cliff-foot two hundred yards away, and upon it the forms of men who ran
toward me.
I turned my face over my shoulder again. The Brute was a short
half-furlong away—his tongue lolling from his wide expectant jaws. He
strained his neck toward us, his eyes aglint; he seemed almost to trot
rather than waddle in his greedy haste. Determination and despair drove
me forward as with a goad; I panted with the horror of his oncoming.
Above me sat Garlicke, rifle in hand, breaking the clean outline of the
ridge against the sky. The rifle was silhouetted thin and delicate as a
needle against the brightness. A spurt of blue smoke burst from the
muzzle, and the crack of it rang across the hollow. I heard a thud as
the bullet struck the mass of hungry desire behind me, and glanced again
quickly, hoping for effect. A red weal shone upon one of the horny
eyelids. He stopped, blinking stupidly, and half-stunned by the shock.
But the ball had not penetrated, and with a puzzled swinging of the
wounded neck he resumed his scrambling, ungainly gait.
Still a hundred yards, and my eyes grew dizzy. A red mist seemed to
close upon them, which, lifting now and again, showed me surrounding
objects defined as on the slides of a magic lantern. My breath rasped
with such a wheezing whistle that I looked wonderingly to see whence the
sound could come. My arms were like wire ropes, strained to the
breaking. My legs shuffled painfully under me. I felt the strength going
out from me as water leaks from an unbunged cask. The sound of
Garlicke’s shots struck fainter and fainter upon my ears. I stumbled
again, and only saved myself from plunging forward by an instinctive
straightening of my shoulders. The sunlight was shadowing to a night—a
black darkness that could be felt.
Then, dimly, a familiar voice broke upon my ears; I was conscious of a
hand seizing my arm; of some one struggling with me for Gwen. Yet,
thought I, we will die together. Then the friendly hand, leaving this
useless striving, dragged me forward; behind me some unseen power was
thrusting me with mad shoves up the Titan steps of the cliff face.
Suddenly came clearness of vision, and I knew Denvarre and Gerry, who
were hauling and jerking me up the crevices of our rock of defence. Gwen
was still in my arms, and below, the great monster scrabbled at the
cliff-foot, reaching up his neck in raging, ravenous disappointment.
So, Denvarre dragging and Gerry butting like some benevolent goat, from
niche to niche I stumbled with my burden, the little stones rattling
down in their thousands upon the Beast below. Upon the top I staggered
forward into the shelter of the tarpaulin, and laid Gwen down upon the
rocky floor. Then, in the sudden impulse of her love, and in her
revulsion from that great dread, she flung her arms about me as I
stooped over her, and before them all kissed me on the lips. And who was
I that I should not kiss back once and again?
So my love and I came to an understanding, and sealed our betrothal as
the shadow of death passed from us—passing as a cloud when the breeze is
strong and out leaps the sun; while above us the mountain still belched
fire and molten stone, and below the Beast prowled, and sought hungrily
for our blood. And I take it that never have man and maid plighted troth
in stranger circumstance.