"Yes," he said, ramming the tobacco down with his little finger; "six
days ago when I came over here to watch them melons mopping in the
sunshine I saw at once one was gone--and gone, too, without so much as
leaving any sign but a straight cut through the stem to show how it
went, not a footprint, nor a bruised leaf, nor anything. Yes, that was
the smallest of the six; and next morning another was gone, the next
biggest, and there was no mark on the ground. I tell you that want of
sign made me queer, and when that night I yeard a splashing down there
in the pool--and there's no sound, mind you, that comes so mysterious as
the sudden splash of water out of the night--I wondered if the Kaffir's
devil was climbing out of the pool, or if the little brown man, the
Tikoloshe, was up to his mischief. There was that splash, loud and
sudden, as if the big tail of a monstrous snake had come down smack on
the water; then there was a humming all around me in the air. Have you
got a match?"
He struck the match on his corduroys, lifting his knee to stretch the
breeches taut, and his hollow cheeks nearly met inside as he puffed,
then he held the glow of the expiring match before me.
"There was a humming in the air all around me, and my skin tingled all
over jes'sif the wind were whipping the sand against my wet body when
coming from a sea bathe, and in the centre of that melon patch I seed a
spark of fire like that dying match, jes' one dull spark of fire without
any ray from it. That was all. Next morning the third melon was gone--
clean gone."
"Yes; and you ate it."
"I grow melons--I don't eat 'em. The next day I set a spring-gun with
the string from the fourth melon to the trigger, and in the middle of
the night I woke up with a start to the report of the gun and to a long
terrible wail, that seemed to come out of the depth of the sky and from
the heart of the earth. It just went soughing and sighing and wailing
through the house, and round it and over it, so that your eyes would
follow it up and down and round, as though there was some living person
there screeching. I tell you an ole rooster that was perched on the
foot of my bedstead fell down in a dead faint, so that I had to pour a
teaspoonful of brandy down his throat."
"The melon must have given you indigestion."
"Look here, sonny; if you play any longer on that string you'll wear it
out. In the morning there was one melon left, the spring-gun having
blown the fourth one to smithereens--pieces of it being scattered all
over the ground--though there was not a fragment of skin or hair or
feather to show what sort of thing it was had carried off the fifth
melon. There was one left. The biggest of the lot--a great dark-green
ball of liquid fire and honey, that would ha' fetched first prize at any
show. I made up my mind to save that one, so I built a kraal round it
with stakes driven in a foot deep, and roofed in with saplins, and over
all a fence of thorns. And when the dark came on I sat out there with
the gun and the bull's-eye lantern. I tell you I've suffered a lot in
trying to keep those six melons of yours--and that night there was a
stillness in the air that brought out all my sufferings on the stretch
like fiddle-strings. It was dead quiet far into the night, with the
stars blinking, and the voice of the sea appearing to pass overhead,
when of a sudden there came that splash from the pool, loud and
startlin'. I stood up to look down into the valley, then I slipped
inside."
"What did you see?"
"See! nothing; but I felt there was something crawling up that hill--and
through the air all around there came that humming. Yes, I slipped
inside; but on the bank I left that lantern glaring like a great eye
over the melon patch. I could not sleep for a melancholy sound in the
air, half whistle, half moan; and when I went into the middle room to
look out of the window, I'm gummed ef that bull's-eye lantern wasn't
standing on the table with the slide shut. That very same lantern I'd
left all ablaze on the bank--and in the room there was a smell of crabs,
a damp, muddy smell, and beyond the window was a smoulderin' fire--the
same dull spark-like point I had seen on the first night."
"Your pipe is out; do you want another match?"
"A match is not much good without baccy. Thankye, sonny. So I climbed
into bed again, or rather--for I'm not ashamed of being afraid--under
the bed, and there I was when I yeard the old rooster say good-morning
to the sun. The first thing I did was to look at the melon patch, and--
what'jer think--"
"Go on, you wretched old fabricator."
"I seed that last water-melon sliding down the hill."
"Sliding? Wasn't it walking?"
"Yes, sliding--not rolling, as you'd expect a round thing to do down a
steep like that, but jes' gently sliding, as though it were resting on a
coat. There was nothing by it, nothing at all, and it was the most
surprisin' sight I ever seed to watch that fine melon softly skimming
over the grass and dodging all the stones. I was so lost,
flabbergasted, unbalanced by this sight that I never saw what was
awaiting the melon, down by the pool, until the last thing, when it
slid, all of a sudden, into a dark hole. Into a dark hole--a sort of
tunnel level with the take-off into the pool--and that hole, that
tunnel, sonny, was the throat of the big devil-snake. All in a moment I
saw that. The melon disappeared, the jaws of the snake came together,
and a column of water shot into the air as he slid back into the pool."
"So; and that's where the six melons went?"
"Five, sonny; five--one of 'em was blown to smithereens by the gun. The
five of 'em were swallowed by that devil-snake."
"And how did he cut the stems so clean?"
"That's where the mystery comes in, sonny. I expect you'll have to take
six of the best that are left, sonny; and I'm going into town next week
to get some dynamite to blow the bottom outer that pool. That
devil-snake might take it into his head to swallow me one of these
fishing nights."