"Heavens! What a glorious thing is the light of day!" exclaimed Hoste,
looking around as if he never expected to behold that blessing again,
instead of having just been restored to it.
"Let's hope that philosophical reflection will console us throughout our
impending ducking," rejoined Eustace drily. "We are going to get it in
half an hour at the outside."
Great storm clouds were rolling up beyond the Bashi Valley. The same
brooding stillness, now greatly intensified, hung in the air; broken
every now and again by fitful red flashes and the dull, heavy boom of
thunder. The far off murmur of the river rose up between its
imprisoning _krantzes_ and steep forest-clad slopes to the place where
their halt was made.
They had emerged safely to the upper air with their unfortunate and
oft-times troublesome charge. Recognising the impracticability of
conveying the latter along the perilous causeway which had taxed their
own powers so severely, they had elected to try the other way out, to
wit, the vertical shaft, beneath which they had passed shortly after
first entering the cavern, and, after a toilsome climb, by no means free
from danger, burdened as they were with the unhappy lunatic, had
regained the light of day in safety.
But their difficulties and dangers were by no means at an end. For the
first, they were a long way above the spot where they had left their
horses. To regain this would take several hours. It was frightfully
rugged and tangled country, and they had but an hour of daylight left.
Moreover a tremendous thunderstorm was working up, and one that, judging
by the heavy aspect of the clouds, and the brooding sense of oppression
in the atmosphere, threatened to last the best part of the night. For
the second, they had every reason to believe that these wild and broken
fastnesses of bush and rock held the lurking remnants of the Gcaleka
bands who were still under arms, and should these discover the presence
of intruders, the position of the four men, dismounted, scantily
supplied with food, and hampered with their worse than useless charge,
would be serious indeed.
The latter they still deemed it necessary to keep carefully secured.
His transition to the upper air had effected a curious change in him.
He was no longer violent. He seemed dazed, utterly subdued. He would
blink and shut his eyes, as if the light hurt them. Then he would open
them again and stare about him with a gaze of the most utter
bewilderment. A curious feature in his demeanour was that the world at
large seemed to excite his interest rather than its living inhabitants.
In these, as represented by his rescuers, he seemed to evince no
interest at all. His gaze would wander past them, as though unaware of
their presence, to the broad rugged river-valley, with its soaring
_krantzes_ and savage forest-clad depths, as if he had awakened in a new
world. And indeed he had. Think of it! Seven or eight months spent in
utter darkness; seven or eight months without one glimmer of the blessed
light of Heaven; seven or eight months in the very bowels of the earth,
in starvation and filth, among living horrors which had turned his
brain; the only glint of light, the only sound of the human voice
vouchsafed to him being on those occasions when his barbarous tormentors
came to taunt him and bring him his miserable food! Small wonder that
the free air, the light, and the spreading glories of Nature, had a
dazing, subduing effect on the poor lunatic.
His own safety necessitated the continuance of his bonds--that of his
rescuers, that he should be kept securely gagged. It would not do, out
of mistaken kindness, to run any risks; to put it in the poor fellow's
power to break forth into one of his paroxysms of horrible howls, under
circumstances when their lives might depend upon secrecy and silence.
It would be time enough to attempt the restoration of the poor clouded
brain, when they should have conveyed him safe home again. It was a
curious thing that necessity should oblige his rescuers to bring him
back bound as though a prisoner.
Their camp--rather their halting place, for caution would preclude the
possibility of building a fire--had been decided upon in a small bushy
hollow, a kind of eyrie which would enable them to keep a wide look out
upon the river-valley for many miles, while affording them a snug and
tolerably secure place of concealment. In front a lofty _krantz_ fell
sheer to a depth of at least two hundred feet. Behind, their retreat
was shut in by a line of bush-grown rocks. It was going to be a wet and
comfortless night. The storm was drawing nearer and nearer, and they
would soon be soaked to the skin, their waterproof wraps having been
left with the horses. Food, too, was none too plentiful--indeed, beyond
some biscuit and a scrap or two of cold meat, they had none. But these
were mere trivial incidents to such practised campaigners. They had
succeeded in their quest--they had rescued a friend and comrade from a
fate ten thousand-fold more hideous than the most fearful form of death;
moreover, as Hoste had remarked, the light of day alone, even when seen
through streaming showers, was glorious when compared with the utter
gloom of that awful cave and the heaving, hissing, revolting masses of
its serpent denizens. On the whole they felt anything but down-hearted.
"I tell you what it is, Hoste," said Shelton, seizing the moment when
Eustace happened to be beyond earshot. "There have been a good many
nasty things said and hinted about Milne of late; but I should just like
to see any one of the fellows who have said them do what he did.
Heavens! The cool nerve he showed in deliberately going down into that
horrible hole with the chances about even between being strangled by
poor Tom there, or bitten by a puff-adder, was one of the finest things
I ever saw in my life. It's quite enough to give the lie to all these
infernal reports, and I'll take care that it does, too."
"Rather. But between you and me and Josane there, who can't understand
us," answered Hoste, lowering his voice instinctively, "it's my private
opinion that poor Milne has no particular call to shout `Hurrah' over
the upshot of our expedition. Eh? Sort of Enoch Arden business, don't
you know. Likely to prove inconvenient for all parties."
"So? All the more to his credit, then, that he moved heaven and earth
to bring it about. By Jove! I believe I'd have thought a long while
before going down there myself."
"Rather. But I can't help being deuced sorry for him."
If need hardly be said that Hoste had indeed put the whole case into a
nutshell as far as Eustace was concerned. Even then, lying there on the
brink of the cliff above-mentioned, and whither he had withdrawn on the
pretence of keeping a look out, but really in order to be alone, he was
indulging in the full bitterness of his feelings. All had come to an
end. The cup had been dashed from his lips. The blissful glow of more
than earthly happiness in which he had moved for the past few months,
had turned to blight and ruin and blackness, even as the cloudless
sunlight of the morning had disappeared into the leaden terrors of the
oncoming storm. Would that from it a bolt might fall which should
strike him dead!
Even in the full agony of his bitterness he could not wish that the
awful fate of his cousin had ever remained a mystery, could not regret
the part he had borne in rescuing him from that fate. It might be that
the minutes he himself had spent, helpless at the bottom of the noisome
pit, had brought home to his mind such a vivid realisation of its
horrors as those surveying it from the brink could never attain.
Anyway, while musing upon his own blighted life, his dream of love and
possession suddenly and cruelly quenched, he could not wish the poor
wretch back in such a living hell again.
Yet for what had he been rescued? Of what value was the life of a
raving, gibbering maniac to himself or the world in general? And this
was the thing to which Eanswyth was now bound. A warm, beautiful,
living body chained to a loathsome, festering corpse; and his had been
the hand which had forged the links, his the hand which had turned the
key in the padlock. He could not even lay to his soul the flattering
unction that the unfortunate man would eventually succumb to the after
results of his horrible sufferings. Lunatics, barring accidents, are
proverbially long-lived, and Tom Carhayes had the strength and
constitution of an elephant. He would be far more likely to injure
other people than himself.
Meanwhile, those left in camp were resting appreciatively after their
labours, and conversing.
"_Amakosi_," said Josane, with a queer smile. "Do you think you could
find `The Home of the Serpents' again?"
"Why, of course," was the unhesitating reply. The old Kafir grinned.
"Do you mean to say you don't believe we could?" said Hoste, in
amazement.
"Yes, _amakosi_. I do not believe you could," was the unhesitating
rejoinder.
"What--when we have only just come out of it?"
The old Gcaleka grinned harder than ever.
"I do not believe you could light on the exact way in from either side,"
he repeated.
"Well, by Jove! I believe he's right," said Hoste dubiously, as he went
over in his mind the inexplicable way in which both entrances were
concealed, and that by the hand of Nature.
"Right about what?" said another voice, whose owner rejoined the circle
at that moment.
"Why, what do you think Josane is trying to cram us with, Milne? He
swears we couldn't find the entrance of, that infernal hole again."
"Well, I don't believe we could," said Eustace quietly. "But that's no
great disadvantage, for I suppose none of us will ever be smitten with
the remotest inclination to try."
"Not I, for one," assented Hoste. "I wouldn't go through those awful,
beastly heaps of snakes again--faugh!--not for a thousand pounds.
Hallo! It's coming!"
A roll of thunder--longer, louder, nearer--caused them to look upward.
The whole heavens were shrouded in masses of black, angry clouds,
sweeping slowly onward.
Then, as their glances sought the earth again, a quick whistle of
amazement escaped Shelton. It found a ready echo in a startled
ejaculation from the others.
"Where is he?"
For the place occupied by the unfortunate lunatic knew him no more. He
had disappeared.
For a second they stared blankly into each others' faces, then all four
moved forward instinctively.
He had been sitting idly, vacantly, perfectly quietly staring into
space. In the height of their conversation they had given little heed
to his presence. Well, he could not go far, for his legs were so
secured as to preclude him making steps of ordinary length.
The place was bushy, but not very thickly so. Spreading out they
entered the scrub by the only side on which he could have disappeared.
"There he is!" cried Hoste suddenly, when they had gone about fifty
yards.
Slinking along in a crouching attitude, slipping from bush to bush, they
spied the poor fellow. That was all right. There would be no
difficulty now.
No difficulty? Was there not? As soon as he saw that he was discovered
he began to run--to run like a buck. And then, to their consternation,
they perceived that his legs were free. By some means or other he had
contrived, with a lunatic's stealthy cunning, to cut the _reim_ which
had secured them. They could see the severed ends flapping as he ran.
"Well, we've got to catch him, poor chap, so here goes," said Hoste,
starting with all his might in pursuit.
But the maniac wormed in and out of the bushes with marvellous rapidity.
Shelton had tripped and come a headlong cropper, and Hoste was becoming
blown, but they seemed to get no nearer. Suddenly the bush came to an
end. Beyond lay a gradual acclivity, open and grassy, ending abruptly
in air.
"Heavens!" cried Eustace in a tone of horror. "The _krantz_!"
His tones found an echo in those of his companions. The precipice in
front was a continuation of the lofty perpendicular cliff which fell
away from the front of their halting place. Any one who should go over
that giddy brink would leave no sort of shadow of uncertainty as to his
fate. They stopped in their pursuit.
"Tom!" cried Eustace persuasively, "Come back, old chap. It's going to
rain like fits in a minute. You'll be much snugger at the camp."
The lunatic, now half-way across the open, stopped at the voice and
stood listening. Then he ran forward again, but at a decreased pace.
Heavens! He was only twenty yards from the brink. His pursuers were
more than twice that distance behind. Any move forward would inevitably
have the effect of driving him over.
"What _are_ we to do?" gasped Hoste, exhausted by the mingled exertion
and excitement.
"We had better leave him alone, and watch him from where he can't see
us," was Eustace's reply.
The poor fellow had now gained the very brink. Then he turned, but his
pursuers had deftly concealed themselves behind a small bush which
opportunely grew in the midst of the open. His hands were still tied
fast, and the gag was in his mouth. If only they could have reached
him.
He stood for a moment, balanced on the edge of the abyss, looking _into
it_. Then he turned again. There was a horrible leer of triumphant
insanity upon the distorted face as his gaze failed to discover the
presence of anybody likely to prove hostile.
The thunder rolled out heavily from overhead, and the figure of the
maniac stood in bold relief against the leaden sky, photographed in
black relief against the red flashes of lightning which played with
well-nigh unintermittent incandescence athwart the storm cloud beyond.
There he stood, his features working horribly, the tangled masses of his
beard and hair floating in the fitful gusts which came whistling up from
the dizzy height. Never, to their dying day, would the spectators
forget the sight. Yet they could do nothing.
With a choking cackle, like an attempt at a laugh, the maniac turned
again to the awful height. The spectators held their breaths and their
blood ran cold. Then they saw him gather his legs beneath him and
spring far out into space.
Petrified with horror, they rushed to the brink and peered over. The
smooth rock face fell without a break down to the tree-tops at a dizzy
depth beneath. These were still quivering faintly as though recently
disturbed. But at that moment heaven's artillery roared in one vast
deafening, crackling roll. The air was ablaze with vivid blue flame,
and driven before the tornado blast, sheet upon sheet of deluging rain
crashed down upon them, beating them to the earth by the very weight and
fury of its volume.