GOD SENDS A GUIDE
To be lost in the desert or in a land like the elephant country is bad,
but to be lost in the dense parts of the tropical forest is far worse.
You are in a horrible labyrinth, a maze, not of intricate paths but of
blinding curtains. I am speaking now of that arrogant jungle, moist and
hot, where life is in full ferment, and where the rubber vine grows and
thrives; where you go knee-deep in slush and catch at a tree-bole to
prevent yourself going farther, cling, sweating at every pore and
shivering like a dog, feeling for firmer ground and finding it, only to be
led on to another quagmire. The bush pig avoids this place, the leopard
shuns it; it is bad in the dry season when the sun gives some light by
day, and the moon a gauzy green glimmer by night, but in the rains it is
terrific. Night, then, is black as the inside of a trunk, and day is so
feeble that your hand, held before your face at arm's length, is just a
shadow. The westward part of the forest of M'Bonga projects a spur of the
pestiferous rubber-bearing land into the isthmus of healthy woods. It was
just at the tip of this spur that Berselius and his party were entangled
and lost.
The two porters were Yandjali men, they knew nothing of these woods, and
were utterly useless as guides; they sat now amidst the leaves near the
tent eating their food; dark shadows in the glow-worm light, the
glistening black skin of a knee or shoulder showing up touched by the
glimmer in which leaf and liana, tree trunk and branch, seemed like marine
foliage bathed in the watery light of a sea-cave.
Adams had lit a pipe, and he sat beside Berselius at the opening of the
tent, smoking. The glare of the match had shown him the face of Berselius
for a moment. Berselius, since his first outcry on finding the path gone,
had said little, and there was a patient and lost look on his face, sad
but most curious to see. Most curious, for it said fully what a hundred
little things had been hinting since their start from the scene of the
catastrophe--that the old Berselius had vanished and a new Berselius had
taken his place. Adams had at first put down the change in his companion
to weakness, but the weakness had passed, the man's great vitality had
reasserted itself, and the change was still there.
This was not the man who had engaged him in Paris; this person might have
been a mild twin-brother of the redoubtable Captain of the Avenue
Malakoff, of Matadi and Yandjali. When memory came fully back, would it
bring with it the old Berselius, or would the new Berselius, mild,
inoffensive, and kindly, suddenly find himself burdened with the
tremendous past of the man he once had been?
Nothing is more true than that the human mind from accident, from grief,
or from that mysterious excitement, during which in half an hour a
blaspheming costermonger "gets religion" and becomes a saint of
God--nothing is more certain than that the human mind can like this, at a
flash, turn topsy-turvy; the good coming to the top, the bad going to the
bottom. Mechanical pressure on the cortex of the brain can bring this
state of things about, even as it can convert a saint of God into a devil
incarnate.
Was Berselius under the influence of forced amendment of this sort?
Adams was not even considering the matter, he was lost in gloomy
thoughts.
He was smoking slowly, holding his index and middle fingers over the
pipe-bowl to prevent the tobacco burning too quickly, for he had only a
couple of pipefuls left. He was thinking that to-morrow evening the pouch
would be empty, when, from somewhere in the forest near by, there came a
sound which brought him to his feet and the two porters up on hands and
knees like listening dogs.
It was the sound of a human voice raised in a sort of chant, ghostly and
mournful as the sound of the falling dew. As it came, rising and falling,
monotonous and rhythmical, the very plain song of desolation, Adams felt
his hair lift and his flesh crawl, till one of the porters, springing
erect from his crouching position, sent his voice through the trees--
"Ahi ahee!"
The song ceased; and then, a moment later, faint and wavering, and like
the voice of a seagull, came the reply--
"Ahi aheee!"
"Man," said the porter, turning white eyeballs and glinting teeth over his
shoulder at Adams.
He called again, and again came the reply.
"Quick," said Adams, seizing the arm of Berselius, who had risen, "there's
a native here somewhere about; he may guide us out of this infernal place;
follow me, and for God's sake keep close."
Holding Berselius by the arm, and motioning the other native to follow, he
seized the porter by the shoulder and pushed him forward. The man knew
what was required and obeyed, advancing, calling, and listening by turns,
till, at last, catching the true direction of the sound he went rapidly,
Berselius and Adams following close behind. Sometimes they were half up to
the knees in boggy patches, fighting their way through leaves that struck
them like great wet hands; sometimes the call in the distance seemed
farther away, and they held their pace, they held their breath, they clung
to each other, listening, till, now, by some trick of the trees, though
they had not moved and though there was no wind, the cry came nearer.
"Ahi, ahee!"
Then, at last, a dim red glow shone through the foliage before them and
bursting their way through the leaves they broke into an open space where,
alone, by a small fire of dry branches and brushwood, sat a native, stark
naked, except for a scrap of dingy loincloth, and looking like a black
gnome, a faun of this horrible place, and the very concretion of its
desolation and death.
He was sitting when they caught their first glimpse of him, with his chin
supported on his hand, but the instant he saw the faces of the white men
he rose as if to escape, then the porter called out something that
reassured him, and he sat down again and shivered.
He was one of the rubber collectors. He had reached this spot the day
before, and had built himself a shelter of leaves and branches. He would
be here for ten days or a fortnight, and his food, chiefly cassava, lay in
a little pile in the shelter, covered over with leaves.
The porter continued speaking to the collector, who, now regaining the use
of his limbs, stood up before the white men, hands folded in front of him,
and his eyes rolling from Berselius to Adams.
"M'Bassa," said Adams, touching the porter, pointing to the collector, and
then away into the forest in the direction he fancied Fort M'Bassa to be.
The porter understood. He said a few words to the collector, who nodded
his head furiously and struck himself on the breast with his open hand.
Then the porter turned again to Adams.
"M'Bassa," said he, nodding his head, pointing to the collector, and then
away into the forest.
That was all, but it meant that they were saved.
Adams gave a great whoop that echoed away through the trees, startling
bats and birds in the branches and losing itself without an echo in the
depths of the gloom. Then he struck himself a blow on the chest with his
fist.
"My God!" said he, "the tent!"
They had only travelled an eighth of a mile or so from the camping place,
but they had wandered this way and that before the porter had found the
true direction of the call, and the tent, provisions, and everything else
were lost as utterly and irrevocably as though they had been dropped in
mid-ocean.
To step aside from a thing--even for a hundred yards--in this terrible
place was to lose it; even the rubber collectors, from whom the forest
holds few secrets have, in these thick places, to blaze a trail by
breaking branches, tying lianas and marking tree trunks.
"True," said Berselius in a weary voice, "we have lost even that."
"No matter," said Adams, "we have got a guide. Cheer up, this man will
take us to Fort M'Bassa and there you will find the road again."
"Are you sure?" said Berselius, a touch of hope in his voice.
"Sure? Certain. You've forgotten Fort M'Bassa. Well, when you see it, you
will remember it, and it will lead you right away home. Cheer up, cheer
up; we've got a fire and a bit of shelter for you to sleep under, and
we'll start bright and early in the morning, and this black imp of Satan
will lead you straight back to your road and your memory--hey! Uncle
Joe!"
He patted the collector on the naked shoulder and a faint grin appeared on
that individual's forlorn countenance; never had he come across a white
man like this before. Then, bustling about, Adams piled up the fire with
more sticks, got Berselius under the shelter of the collector's wretched
hut, sat himself down close to the fire, produced his pipe, and proceeded,
in one glorious debauch, to finish the last of his tobacco.
This rubber collector, the last and the humblest creature on earth, had
given them fire and shelter; they were also to be beholden to him for
food. His wretched cassava cakes and his calabash of water gave them their
breakfast next morning, and then they started, the collector leading,
walking before them through the dense growth of the trees as assuredly as
a man following a well-known road. It was a terrible thing for him to
leave his post, but the white men were from M'Bassa and wished to return
to M'Bassa, and M'Bassa was the head centre of his work and the terrible
Mecca of his fears. White men from there and going to there must be
obeyed.
This was the last phase of the great hunt. Berselius had been slowly
stripped by the wilderness of everything now but the clothes he stood up
in, his companion and two porters. Guns, equipment, tents, stores, the
Zappo Zap, and the army of men under that ferocious lieutenant, had all
"gone dam." He was mud to the knees, his clothing was torn, he was mud to
the elbows from having tripped last night and fallen in a quagmire, his
face was white and drawn and grimy as the face of a London cabrunner, his
hair was grayer and dull, but his eyes were bright and he was happy. At
M'Bassa he would be put upon the road again--the only road to the thing he
craved for as burning Dives craved for water--himself.
But it was ordained that he should find that questionably desirous person
before reaching M'Bassa.
They had been on the march for an hour when Adams, fussing like a person
who is making his first journey by rail, stopped the guide to make sure he
was leading them right.
"M'Bassa?" said Adams.
"M'Bassa," replied the other, nodding his head. Then with outspread hand
he pointed before them and made a semicircular sweep to indicate that he
was leading them for some reason by a circuitous route.
He was making, in fact, for open ground that would bring them in the
direction of the fort by a longer but much easier road than a direct line
through the jungle. He was making also for water, for his scant supply had
been exhausted by his guests, and he knew the road he was taking would
lead him to broad pools of water. Adams nodded his head to imply that he
understood, and the man led on.