The Kunaga river was "down"; which is to say that the heavy rains of the
last three days, especially among the foot-hills wherein it took its
source, had converted it into a red, rolling, turbid torrent, of
inconceivable swiftness and power. A comparative trickle at ordinary
times, now the great raging flood surged within a few feet of
overlapping its ample bed, submerging the lower of the trees fringing
its banks well-nigh to their tops. A grand spectacle those seething red
waves, hissing and rearing as they encountered some obstacle, then the
crash as this gave way, and the mighty current, unchecked, poured onward
with a savage roar. Great tree-trunks rolled over and over in the
flood, and now and then, bodies of drowned animals, sheep, cattle,
horses, swept helplessly down.
"Someone's the poorer for the loss of his whole span," remarked Warren,
as a number of drowned oxen were whirled by. "Likely the river first
came down in a wall--it does sometimes--and caught the whole lot bang in
the middle of a drift."
"Most likely," assented Lalante. "But I've never seen the river as full
as this. Isn't it grand?"
The two were standing on a high, scaur-like bank where the Kunaga swept
round one side of Le Sage's farm, and just below the krantz above which
its owner and Wyvern had held their somewhat inharmonious discussion.
They had strolled down to look at the river. The two youngsters had
accompanied them, but now had wandered away on their own account.
The rain had ceased but the sky was veiled in an opaque curtain; the
high _rand_ beyond the Kunaga river valley being completely hidden by a
grey and lowering murk. The unwonted gloom seemed to add to the terror
of the forces of the bellowing flood. The scene on the whole was dreary
and depressing to the last degree. Yet no depression did it convey to
the hearts of the dwellers on this _veldt_, for after it the land would
smile forth a rich and tender green, and flocks and herds grow fat, and
game be plentiful--and, not least, it meant an ample storage of water in
dams and tanks against months, it might be, wherein not another drop
should fall.
Warren had taken to coming over to Le Sage's of late, and would
generally stay the night there, or even two. From Lalante he would meet
with a frank and cordial welcome. She liked him for his own sake--and
in addition was he not a friend of the absent one; upon whom and upon
whose good qualities he had the tact to lose no opportunity of dwelling.
"I can't, for the life of me, get at the secret of poor old Wyvern's
ill-luck," he would say, for instance. "He's one of the finest fellows
I've ever known, and yet--he can't get on. I own it stumps me."
"But it doesn't stump me," grunted Le Sage. "He's got no head-piece."
"You're wrong there, Le Sage, if you'll excuse my saying so. Head-piece
is just what he has got. Too much of it perhaps."
And the speaker had his reward in Lalante's kindling face and grateful
glance; and the friendship between them ripened apace.
Warren was playing his game boldly and with depth. He could afford to
praise the absent one, being as firmly convinced that that fortunate
individual would never return as that he himself was alive and
prosperous. And he meant it too. There was no pretence in his tone.
He had no personal animus against Wyvern for occupying the place with
regard to Lalante which should have been his. Wyvern stood in his way,
that was all, and--he must be got out of it. That he would be got out
of it Warren, as we have said, had no doubt whatever, and then--after an
interval, a time-healing interval, to whom would Lalante listen and turn
more readily than to Wyvern's best friend? Herein Warren was true to
himself--i.e. Number 1.
Now, on their stroll down to the river the topic of the absent one had
come up; his coolness and courage upon one or two occasions when call
had arisen for the exercise of those valuable attributes--and here on
the bank, after the first comments upon the scene before them, the topic
was revived.
"I wonder why women are always such blind worshippers of mere pluck,"
Warren remarked.
"But you wouldn't have us hold cowardice in respect, would you?"
"You can't respect a negative--and cowardice is a negative."
"Well then, a man who is a coward?"
"Why not? I know at least two men who are that, and I happen to hold
them in some considerable respect. That astonishes you, does it?"
"Well, yes, naturally," said Lalante, with a laugh, and wondering
whether he was serious.
"Naturally, but illogically. That blind, instinctive shrinking from
risk which we call cowardice is constitutional, and its subject can no
more help it than he could have helped being born with a club foot, for
instance."
"You do put things well," said Lalante. "All the same you'll never
persuade the world in general that a coward is anything but a pitiable
object."
"If by that you mean deserving of pity, why then I agree with you--if of
contempt, then I don't. I'll tell you another who doesn't."
"Who's that?"
"Wyvern."
"How do you know?"
"Because I've seen him give practical proof of it."
The girl's face softened and her eyes filled.
"Him? Oh, he's goodness itself," she murmured. "He hasn't a fault,
except that of being unfortunate."
"Which isn't a fault. The fact is we are all cowards on some point or
other, and a good many of us all round, though we succeed in hiding it.
Look at that river now, that swirling, roaring monster against which the
strongest swimmer would have that much chance," with a snap of the
finger and thumb. "I should be uncommonly sorry to be put to the test
of having to jump in there after some other fellow who had tumbled in.
That would be something of a test wouldn't it; and I'm perfectly certain
I should funk it?"
"It would. But I'm perfectly certain you wouldn't funk it," laughed
Lalante.
And then, paling their faces and curdling their blood, came a shrill
piercing scream of agony and terror. As they turned towards it a small
boy came rushing headlong through the sparse mimosas growing along that
part of the bank.
"He's in," he screamed. "Charlie. He's in the river--there."
Following his pointing finger they could see nothing, then, borne
swiftly down towards them, a head rose to the surface, showing an
agonised little face, in the last degree of terror, and a pair of hands
feebly battling with the vast might of the flood. A second more and
Lalante would have been in there too.
But that second was just sufficient for a pair of arms to close round
her, effectually holding her back.
"Not you, Lalante, d'you hear! I'm a strong swimmer. Now--let me go."
He almost threw her from him, and that purposely, for stumbling against
Frank, the terrified boy had promptly and firmly clutched hold of her.
She could not go into the water--and, incidentally, to her death--
without dragging him with her. In the same quick atom of time Warren,
with a straight, clear, springy leap, had felt the turgid waters of the
monster flood close over his head.
He had leaped to come down feet foremost, as was the safest. He risked
damaging his head the less, and could see for the fraction of a moment
longer the exact position of the drowning boy; and even that fraction of
a moment may mean the difference between life and death in a situation
such as this.
Not a second too soon had he jumped. As he rose to the surface the boy
was just sweeping past him. Darting forth an arm, he seized him by the
hand, but--still kept him at arm's length.
"Charlie," he said, "be plucky now and keep cool. Whatever happens,
don't grab hold of me. I won't let go of you but--don't grab me."
The boy, half-dazed, seemed to understand. The while the current was
whirling them down with frightful velocity. Suddenly something seized
Warren by the foot, dragging him down; then as the waters roared over
his head the awfulness of the moment came upon him that this was doom.
Then--he was free.
A last desperate violent kick had done it. What had entangled him was
really the fork in a bough of a sunken tree. But it was time, for on
rising to the surface his eyes were swelled and his head seemed to go
round giddily, and his breath came in laboured pants; but he had never
slackened his hold of the boy.
The latter was now unconscious, and consequently a dead weight. Warren,
wiry athletic man as he was, felt his strength failing. The flood was
as a very monster, and in its grip he himself was but a shaving, as it
roared in his ears, its spume blinding him as it tossed him on high with
the crest of its great churning waves. With desperate presence of mind
he strove to keep his head. As he rose on each great wave he saw the
long broad road of foaming water in front, bounded by its two dark lines
of half-submerged willows--then he saw something else.
An uprooted tree was bearing down upon him, its boughs thrashing the
water as the trunk rolled over and over in the surge. It was coming
straight at him, borne along more swiftly than he--and his burden. One
thrash of those flail-like boughs and then--his efforts would be at an
end.
Desperate, but still cool, he tried swimming laterally instead of with
the stream, and found that he could. Down came the swirling boughs,
like the sails of a windmill, where he had been but a moment before, and
this grisly peril passed on. No sooner had it done so than the
striver's foot touched something--something firm.
Something firm! Yes, it was firm. Among the whirl and lash of the
willow boughs, for by his diagonal course of swimming he had reached the
side here, where the swirl of the current, though powerful, was
comparatively smooth, and he had touched firm ground. Warren dared to
hope, with indescribable relief, that he was standing on the brink of
one of those deep, lateral dongas which ran up from the river-bed, one
similar to that which the Kafir had fallen into with the snake coiled
round his leg. He grasped the supple and whip-like boughs, still
carefully feeling out with the other foot lest he should flounder into
deep water again, and gave himself over to a breathe.
Charlie now began to show signs of returning consciousness, then opened
his eyes.
"Where are we? _Magtig_! Mr Warren, I thought I was drowned."
"Well, you're not, nor I either. So wake up, old chap, and hold on to
these twigs so as to give me a bit of a rest; for I can tell you that
sort of swim is no exercise for a young beginner."
The splashing, roaring flood whirled on, throwing up clouds of spume
where here and there great waves hurled themselves on to some
obstruction. Once the ghastly white head of a drowned calf rose up out
of the water just by them, a spectral stare in the lustreless eyes. The
lowering afternoon was darkening.
"I believe we could make for _terra-firma_--that means solid ground--if
we went to work carefully," said Warren. "What do you think, Charlie?
Shall we try? The swirl up here is fairly light, and you must think you
are only swimming in the kloof dam."
The boy looked out upon the roaring rush of waters and shuddered. Not
among this would their venture lead them, but among much smoother water,
to safety. Still, he was unnerved after his experience of that awful
force, his choking, suffocating, helpless, all but drowning condition.
But he was plucky to the core.
"All right. Let's try," he said. "But keep hold of my hand, won't
you."
"Of course," said Warren. And then once more they struck off,
entrusting themselves to the stream, or rather to its eddies.