At his cries Kali came running up, and after him the two men who were to
relieve the guards, and then all the Wa-himas and Samburus assembled,
howling and roaring around the place where the crime had been committed.
The greatest noise and confusion ensued, the underlying keynote being
one of fear. The negroes were not so much disturbed on account of the
men having been murdered and a crime committed as they were at having
lost their last drop of water, now absorbed by the parched earth of the
jungle. Several threw themselves on the ground and pulled up lumps of
earth with their fingers and sucked out the remaining moisture. Others
cried that wicked spirits had killed the guards and slit the bags. But
Stasch and Kali knew how much credit to give to these tales. M’Kunji and
M’Pua were missing from the howling throng. More than the murder of two
guards and the theft of water had taken place. The water-bags left
behind, having been torn, proved that it was done for revenge; it meant
death for the whole caravan. The priests of the wicked Msimu had taken
revenge on the good Msimu. The sorcerers had taken revenge on the young
king because he had brought their deceptions to light and had not
permitted them to continue deceiving the stupid Wa-himas. But now death
hovered over the caravan like a hawk over a flock of doves.
Kali remembered, when it was too late, that he had been so sad and also
so busy that he had forgotten to have the sorcerers bound, as he had
done every evening since their attempt to escape. It was also evident
that the two negroes guarding the water had lain down and gone to sleep,
with the inherent thoughtlessness of their race. This had made the work
of the villains easy and permitted them to escape unpunished.
Quite a time elapsed before the excitement subsided and the party
recovered from its dismay. The evil-doers could not as yet have gotten
far away, for the ground under the slit bags was damp and the blood of
the murdered guards was not quite dry. Stasch ordered the fugitives to
be pursued, not with the sole purpose of punishing them, but also to
recover the last two water-bags. Kali immediately mounted a horse and
with several riflemen started in pursuit. It occurred to Stasch, who had
first thought of accompanying them, that because of the excitement and
the disturbed state of the negroes he could not possibly leave Nell
alone with them; so he remained behind, but he ordered Kali to take Saba
with him.
He was greatly afraid there would be an uprising, and he felt sure that
the Samburus would revolt. But in this he was mistaken. Negroes are
given to revolt, and sometimes even for trivial reasons, but when
overpowered by misfortune, and especially when the merciless hand of
death weighs heavily on them, they yield without making any attempt at
resistance. This applies not only to those whom Islam has taught that it
is useless to struggle against fate, but to all without exception. Then
neither fear nor the agony of their last moments can awaken them from
their lethargy. This was the case now. As soon as the first excitement
was over and the Wa-himas and the Samburus realized that they must
eventually die, they lay down quietly on the ground to wait for death;
therefore no rebellion was to be expected; on the contrary, it was
doubtful if they would get up the following morning and be willing to
continue the journey.
Stasch felt deeply sorry for them.
Kali returned before daybreak, and immediately placed in front of Stasch
two torn bags, in which not a drop of water remained.
“Great Man,” he said, “Madi, apana!”
Stasch wiped his forehead, which was streaming with perspiration from
fright and worry; then he asked:
“And M’Kunji and M’Pua?”
“M’Kunji and M’Pua are dead,” answered Kali.
“You have killed them?”
“Lion or wobo killed them!”
And he began to relate what had happened. They found the corpses of the
two criminals at quite a distance from the camp, where they had been
killed. They lay side by side; both had had their skulls crushed in from
behind, their shoulders torn, and their backs eaten. Kali conjectured
that a wobo or a lion had appeared before them in the moonlight and that
they had fallen on their faces to beseech it to spare their lives. But
the terrible beast had killed them both; then, having satisfied its
appetite, it scented the water and tore the bags to pieces.
“God has punished them,” said Stasch, “and the Wa-himas will now be
convinced that the wicked Msimu can save no one.”
And Kali repeated:
“God has punished them, but we have no water.”
“Ahead of us, far off toward the east, I have seen mountains. There must
be water there.”
“Kali has also seen them, but to get to them are many, many days——”
A short silence ensued.
“Sir,” said Kali, “good Msimu, Bibi, should pray to the Great Spirit for
rain or for a stream of water.”
Stasch made no reply, but moved away. He saw Nell’s little white figure
in front of the tent, for the screams and howls of the negroes had
awakened her some time before.
“Stasch, what has happened?” she asked, hurrying toward him.
He laid his hand on her little head and said gravely:
“Nell, pray to God for water—or we are all doomed to die!”
And so the little girl raised her small, pale face to heaven; fixing her
eyes on the silver disk of the moon, she prayed for deliverance to Him
who in heaven guides the stars, and on earth tempers the wind to the
shorn lamb.
After a sleepless, noisy, and distracted night the sun appeared on the
horizon with the suddenness that prevails only at the equator; at once
it was bright daylight. Not a drop of dew on the grass, not a cloud in
the sky.
Stasch ordered the riflemen to gather the negroes together, and he
addressed a few words to them. He explained that it was impossible to
return to the river, for they knew full well that they were five days’
or five nights’ journey from it. But, on the other hand, no one could
tell whether they might not find water in the opposite direction. In
their immediate neighborhood a spring, a tiny stream, or a pool might be
found; for although no trees could be seen, it often happens that on
open plains where seeds are blown away by hurricanes there is water,
though no trees. The day before they had seen several large antelope and
ostriches running eastward, which was a sign that there must be a
watering-place somewhere in that direction. Therefore any one not a fool
or chicken-hearted, but having a brave heart like the lion and buffalo,
would prefer to march on, even though suffering tortures from thirst,
rather than to remain lying on the ground waiting for the hawks and
hyenas to devour them. At these words he pointed with his hand to some
hawks flying in circles over the caravan, the harbingers of disaster.
Nearly all the Wa-himas, whom Kali had ordered to arise, stood up when
they heard these words; being accustomed to despotic rule, they did not
dare to show the least resistance. Many of the Samburus, however,
because their king Faru had remained behind at the lake, did not want to
get up again, and they said to one another: “Why should we seek death
when death is seeking us?”
Thus the caravan, now reduced by nearly one-half, broke camp, and even
this exertion caused the men much torture and pain. For twenty-four
hours no one had tasted a drop of water or any other liquid. Even in a
cooler climate this would have caused most acute suffering, and what
must it mean to these—now laboring in this African furnace, in which,
even if water be drunk in plenty, the perspiration follows so rapidly
that one can wipe it off his skin almost the same moment it is
swallowed. It was certain that many of the party would collapse by the
way from exhaustion and sunstroke. Stasch protected Nell from the sun as
best he could, and would not allow her for a second to put her head out
of the palanquin, the roof of which, by the way, he had covered with a
piece of white percale to make it a double protection against the
blighting rays. He used the water still remaining in the rubber bag to
make some strong tea and served it to her without sugar, because sweets
increase thirst. The girl pleaded with tears in her eyes for him to
drink, too, and at last he put the bottle, in which scarcely a few
thimblefuls of water remained, to his lips, and moving his throat,
pretended to drink. At the same moment, as he felt the touch of moisture
on his lips, it seemed to him as though a flame were burning in his
chest and stomach, and that if he could not extinguish it he would drop
dead. Red circles began to glimmer before his eyes, terrible stinging
pains shot through his jaw as of a thousand needles. His hand trembled
so that he came near spilling the last precious drops, but he only
moistened his tongue and reserved the rest for Nell.
Another day of suffering and fatigue ensued, which was fortunately
followed by a cool night. The next morning the burning heat again beat
down and not a breath of air was stirring. The sun, like a spirit of
evil, devastated the parched soil with its deadly fire. The edge of the
sky down near the horizon was a pale hue, and as far as the eye could
reach not even a bush could be seen. Nothing—only a burned, desert
plain, covered with tufts of blackened grass and heather. Occasionally a
slight rumble of thunder was heard in the far distance, but coming from
a clear sky it was a sign of drought, not of rain.
At noon, when the heat was at its worst, it became necessary to halt.
The caravan rested in gloomy silence. Two horses had dropped down, and a
number of negroes had fallen behind. During this rest no one thought
about eating. The eyes of all were sunken, their lips cracked, and on
them were dried clots of blood. Nell gasped like a languid little bird,
so Stasch handed her two rubber-bags; and crying out, “I have drunk, I
have drunk!” ran toward the other side of the camp, fearing that if he
remained he would take the water away from her or ask her to share it
with him. Perhaps this was the most heroic thing he had done during the
entire journey. His sufferings increased under these tortures. Red
circles continually glimmered before his eyes. Such a terrible pressure
was in his jaws that he could open and shut them only with difficulty.
His throat was parched and feverishly hot, there was no saliva in his
mouth, and his tongue was dry as wood.
But this was only the beginning of the torture for him and for the
caravan. The rumbling of thunder near the horizon, a sign of drought,
continued. About three o’clock, when the sun turned toward the western
side of the heavens, Stasch ordered the caravan to march. He placed
himself at its head and led it toward the east. He had now scarcely
seventy men, and now and then one of these would lie down beside his
burden never to rise again. The thermometer went down a few degrees, but
even then it was murderously hot. The motionless air was filled with
suffocating humidity, and they could scarcely breathe. The animals also
suffered. Saba’s sides heaved up and down, and he panted laboriously;
not a drop of froth fell from his tongue, which was black and hanging
out of his mouth. King, who was used to the dry African jungle, did not
seem to suffer much, but still he began to be troublesome. A strange
light shone in his tiny eyes. He still answered Stasch, and especially
Nell, who occasionally talked to him, with a grunt, but when Kali
thoughtlessly passed him by King snorted threateningly and waved his
trunk so frantically that the boy would probably have been killed had he
not sprung quickly aside.
Kali’s eyes were bloodshot, the veins of his throat were swollen, and
his lips were cracked like those of the other negroes. Toward five
o’clock he approached Stasch, and with great difficulty moved his throat
sufficiently to say in a hollow voice:
“Great Man, Kali can go no farther. He will stay here for the night.”
Stasch controlled the pain in his jaw and answered with difficulty:
“All right; let us halt. The night will bring relief.”
“It will bring death,” whispered the young negro. The negroes threw down
the burdens, but they did not lie down immediately, as the fever, which
had thickened their blood, was now at its height. Their hearts and the
pulses in hands and feet beat so heavily that it seemed they must burst.
The skin on their bodies, dry and shriveled, began to itch. In their
bones they felt an intense restlessness, and a fiery heat seemed to
consume their throats and intestines. Many walked restlessly up and down
between the piles of baggage. By the rays of the dying sun, others,
farther away, could be seen, following each other among the parched
bushes until their strength was utterly exhausted. Then one by one they
fell to the ground, not resting quietly, but twitching more
spasmodically than before. Kali sat down, in Turkish fashion, next to
Stasch and Nell, with his mouth open and gasping for air. Between
breaths he begged beseechingly:
“Bwana Kubwa, water!”
Stasch looked at him with a glassy stare and was silent.
“Bwana Kubwa, water!”
And after a while:
“Kali die——”
Therefore Mea, who for some reason was able to bear the thirst better
than any one else, sat down beside him, and putting her arms around his
neck, said in a soft, melodious voice:
“Mea will die along with Kali——”
A long pause ensued.
* * * * *
Meanwhile the sun went down and the night clothed the landscape in
darkness. The heavens became dark blue. In the southern sky shone the
cross. Over the plain glittered myriads of stars. The moon rose and its
light pervaded the darkness, and in the west the pale twilight of the
zodiac spread far and wide. The atmosphere became a huge glittering
flood. An even more brilliant glow spread over the landscape. The
palanquin, which they forgot to remove from King’s back, and the tents
shone as if made of white marble. The world sank into deathlike silence;
sleep enveloped the earth. And in the midst of nature’s tranquil
peacefulness Stasch and his followers writhed in pain, waiting for
death. On the silver background of the twilight the huge form of the
elephant stood out distinctly. The moonlight illuminated the tent,
Stasch’s and Nell’s white clothes, the spaces between the bushes of
heather, the dark, cramped, and distorted bodies of the negroes and the
baggage-strewn ground. Saba sat on his hind legs in front of the
children and howled sadly with head turned toward the moon. Not a
thought was left in the soul of Stasch—nothing but dumb despair. He
felt there was no help, no way out, that all their terrible fatigue and
hardships, all the sufferings and courageous deeds done on the terrible
journey—from Medinet to Khartum, from Khartum to Fashoda, from Fashoda
to the unknown lake—had been utterly useless, and that they could not
escape the inexorable end of the struggle—death. It appeared all the
more dreadful to him since it would come on the last stretch of the
journey—at whose end lay the ocean. Oh, he could never take Nell to the
coast, nor put her on the ship for Port Said; he could never give her
back to her father, nor fall into his father’s arms and hear him say
that he had acted like a brave boy and a true Pole! It was all over! In
a few days the sun would shine but on lifeless bodies; then it would dry
them up like the mummies that sleep the everlasting sleep in Egyptian
museums!
His brain was turning from the pain and heat and fever; he saw visions
of death struggles, and there came to him strange sounds. He distinctly
heard the voices of the Sudanese and the Bedouins crying, “Yalla!
Yalla!” as they mercilessly whipped their frightened camels. He saw
Idris and Gebhr. The Mahdi smiled at him with his thick lips and asked:
“Will you drink of the fountain of truth?” A lion standing on a rock
gazed at him, then Linde gave him a jar of quinine and said: “Make
haste, for the little one is dying!” Then he only saw a pale, sweet
little face and two little hands stretched toward him.
Suddenly he shuddered; for a moment consciousness came back to
him—close to his ear Nell’s soft, sad, pleading voice whispered:
“Stasch—water!”
She, as did Kali, rested her hope on him. But as he had given her the
last drops of water twelve hours before, he now controlled himself and
cried out with a voice full of emotion, pain, and despair:
“Oh, Nell, I only pretended to drink! For the last three days I have not
tasted a drop!”
And holding his head in despair, he ran away that he might not see how
she suffered. Blindly up and down between the tufts of grass and heather
he ran, until his strength was utterly exhausted and he sank down on one
of the bushes. No weapon of any kind was in his hand. A leopard, lion,
or even a large hyena would have found him easy prey. But only Saba came
running up, sniffing at him and howling, as if he, too, were asking for
help.
No one came to their assistance. Only the calm, indifferent moon looked
down upon them from above. For a long time the boy lay as if lifeless.
When a cooler breath of wind, unexpectedly blowing from the east,
restored him to his senses, he raised himself and tried to stand and go
to Nell.
Now there blew another cool breath of wind. Saba ceased to howl, turned
toward the east, and began to expand his nostrils. Suddenly he barked
once in a sharp bass tone and then a second time, and ran on straight
ahead. For a time he seemed to be silent, but soon his bark was heard in
the distance. Stasch stood up, and staggering about on his benumbed
legs, looked in the direction taken by Saba. The lengthy journeys, the
long sojourn in the jungle, the necessity of keeping all his senses
strung up to their highest pitch, and the incessant dangers he had
encountered had taught the boy to observe everything that was going on
about him. And so, notwithstanding the tortures he suffered at the
moment, and though he was only semi-conscious, he began from instinct to
note the movements of the dog. After a while Saba returned, but he
seemed disturbed and very restless. Several times he looked up at
Stasch, walked around him, ran away in the heather sniffing and barking,
and again returned, and at last taking hold of the boy’s clothes, he
began to drag him toward the opposite side of the camp.
Stasch had now fully regained his presence of mind.
“What is that?” he thought. “Either the dog has gone mad from thirst or
he has scented water. But no!— If there were water near by he would
have run there to drink and his throat would be wet. But if the water be
far off he has not scented it—for water has no scent. He is not pulling
me toward some kind of prey, for this evening he refused to eat. Then
what can it mean?”
And suddenly his heart began to beat faster in his breast.
“Perhaps the wind has brought him the scent of human beings?—
Perhaps—perhaps there is a negro village in the distance?—perhaps one
of the kites— O merciful Jesus! O Jesus!——”
A faint ray of hope spurred him on; he felt stronger and tried to run
toward the camp, in spite of the resistance of the dog, who continually
barred the way. From the camp Nell’s white form shone out and her weak
voice reached him; soon afterward he stumbled over Kali lying on the
ground, but he took no heed of anything. Reaching the piece of baggage
in which the rockets were kept, he tore it open, took one out, with
trembling hands bound it to a bamboo post, pushed it into the earth, and
lighted the fuse.
Soon a red snake shot up, spluttering noisily into the air. Stasch
caught hold of the bamboo rod with both hands to prevent himself from
falling, and gazed fixedly into the distance. The pulses in his hands
and temples beat hard and his lips moved in fervent prayer. He felt that
in this his last breath his heart was calling on Heaven for help.
A second, a third, a fourth minute elapsed. Nothing—and again nothing!
The boy’s hands fell at his side, his head sank to the ground, and
dreadful pain filled his tortured breast.
“In vain! In vain!” he moaned. “I shall go and sit down by Nell, and we
shall die together.”
At the same moment far, far off in the silvery background of the moonlit
night a fiery streak rose into the air and broke into golden stars,
which slowly fell to the ground like large tears.
“We are saved!” cried Stasch.
Then the people, half dead but a moment ago, sprang up, running to and
fro, jumping over the grass and tufts of heather. After the first
rocket, a second and a third were sent up. Then a gust of wind brought
the echo of a peculiar cracking sound, very evidently caused by distant
shots. In reply Stasch ordered all the rifles fired off, and from that
time the guns answered each other without intermission, and the noises
became more and more distinct. The boy now mounted a horse, which also
had—as if by a miracle—regained some strength, and holding Nell before
him, galloped over the plain toward the sound of deliverance. Saba ran
alongside, and behind him tramped the huge King. The two camps were
several kilometers apart, but each party was hurrying toward the other,
and so the ride was not a long one. The flashes from the guns could now
be seen. Another rocket, the last, arose in the air, at a distance of
not more than several hundred feet away. Then numerous lights shone. A
slight swell of the ground hid them for a while, but when Stasch mounted
it he found himself face to face with a line of negroes holding burning
torches in their hands.
At the head of the line marched two Europeans wearing English helmets
and carrying guns.
At a glance Stasch recognized Captain Glen and Dr. Clary.