The Congo Rovers Part 12

In the meantime Smellie and I had produced our knives and had undertaken to skin and cut up the animal, some juicy steaks from which were soon spluttering on pointed sticks before the fire. The cooking operations being thus put in satisfactory progress, our little black friend borrowed my knife and plunged once more into the forest depths, to return again shortly afterwards with a huge gourd full of deliciously clear cool water.

The antelope steaks were by this time ready, and we all sat down to breakfast together. For my own part, I must say I thoroughly enjoyed the meal; but I was sorry to observe that Smellie ate with but little appet.i.te, drinking large quant.i.ties of water, however. The poor fellow made no complaint, but I could tell by his haggard look, his flushed cheeks, and his glittering eyes that it was quite time his wounds were attended to, or we should be having him down with fever in the bush, and then Heaven alone could tell when we should--if ever--be able to rejoin the _Daphne_.

But we were not to be allowed to sink tamely into a state of despondency or apprehension; our sable lady friend proved to be, like the rest of her s.e.x, a great talker, and she seized the opportunity afforded by the discussion of breakfast to plunge into an animated conversation. She began by introducing herself, which she managed in quite an original fas.h.i.+on. Pausing for a moment, with a piece of steak poised daintily on a large thorn, she pointed to herself and remarked "Mono;" then touched Smellie and me lightly on the breast and added "Ingeya;" "Ingeya." We nodded gravely to signify that we understood, or thought we did; upon which she pointed to herself once more and observed, "Mono Lubembabemba."

"Which, being interpreted, means, as I take it, that her ladys.h.i.+p's name is Lubem by--something. Your most obedient servant, Miss Lubin by--"

She laughed a very pretty musical little laugh at Smellie's elaborate a.s.sumption of mock gallantry and his bungling efforts to p.r.o.nounce the name.

"Lubem-ba-bemba," she corrected him; and this time the gallant second lieutenant managed to stumble through it correctly, at which there was more laughter and rejoicing on the lady's part. Then I was called upon to repeat the name, which, having paid the most praiseworthy attention whilst Smellie was receiving his lesson, I managed to do very fairly.

Then, flushed with her success, Miss Lubembabemba made a further attempt at conversation. Pointing to herself and repeating her name, she next pointed to Smellie and asked:

"Ingeya?"

Her meaning was so evident that Smellie answered at once, with another elaborate bow:

"Harold Smellie; at your service."

"Halold-smellie-at-o-serveece!" she repeated with wide-opened eyes of wonder at what she doubtless thought a very extraordinary name.

We both burst involuntarily into a laugh at this really clever first attempt to reproduce the second lieutenant's polite speech; at which she first looked decidedly disconcerted, but immediately afterwards joined heartily in the laugh against herself.

"No, no, no," said Smellie, "that won't do; you haven't got it quite right _Harold_; Harold."

"Halold?" she repeated. And after two or three attempts to put her right--attempts which failed from her evident inability to p.r.o.nounce the "r"--Smellie was obliged to rest content with being henceforward called "Halold."

Then, of course, she turned to me with the same inquiry:

"Ingeya!"

"d.i.c.k," said I.

This time she caught the name accurately, and then, to show that she clearly understood the whole proceeding, pointed to Smellie, to me, and to herself in rotation, p.r.o.nouncing our respective names.

"Yes," commented Smellie approvingly, "you have learned your lesson very well indeed, my dear; but we shall never be able to remember that extraordinary name of yours--Lubemba--what is it--you know; besides, it will take us a dog-watch to p.r.o.nounce it in full; so I propose that we change it and re-christen you after the s.h.i.+p, eh? Call you 'Daphne,'

you know. How would you like that? You--Daphne; I--Halold, since you _will_ have it so; and this strapping young gentleman, d.i.c.k. Would that suit you? Daphne--Halold--d.i.c.k;" pointing to each of us in turn.

Her ladys.h.i.+p seemed to take the proposal as a tremendous compliment, for her face lighted up with pleasure, and she kept on pointing round the circle and repeating "Halold--d.i.c.k--Daphne" until breakfast was concluded. And thenceforward she refused to answer to any other name than Daphne, a.s.suming an air of the most complete unconsciousness when either of us presumed to address her as "Lubembabemba" (the b.u.t.terfly).

Breakfast over, I thought it was high time to attend to our wounds. The first requirement was water--plenty of it, and this want I managed with some little difficulty to explain to Miss Daphne. Comprehending my meaning at last she intimated that a stream was to be found at no great distance; and we at once set off in search of it, our little black friend carrying along with her a live ember from the fire, which, by waving it occasionally in the air, she managed to keep glowing.

We had not very far to go--most fortunately, for I saw that Smellie's wounds were momentarily giving him increased uneasiness and pain. A walk of about a quarter of an hour took us to a sequestered and most delightful spot, where we were not only perfectly concealed from chance wanderers, but where we also found a small rocky basin full of deliciously cool and pure water, which flowed into it from a tiny stream meandering down the steep hill-side. In this basin we laved our hurts until they were thoroughly cleansed from the dry hard coagulated blood, and then we set about the task of bandaging them up. Daphne, who, by the way, seemed to have little or no idea of surgery, made herself of great use to us in the bathing process, when once she understood what was required; but when it came to bandaging she found herself unable to help us further, and sorrowfully confessed herself beaten. We were compelled to convert our s.h.i.+rts, the only linen in our possession, into bandages; and poor Daphne, to her evident extreme sorrow, had no linen to sacrifice to our necessities, or indeed any clothing at all to speak of. The costume of a Congoese belle, according to her rendering of it, was a petticoat of parti-coloured bead fringe about twelve inches deep, depending loosely from the hips; the rest of her clothing consisting entirely--as Mike Flanaghan would have said--of jewellery, of which she wore a considerable quant.i.ty. I may as well here enumerate her ornaments, for the information and benefit of those who have never enjoyed the acquaintance of an African beauty. In the first place she wore a circular band of metal, about two inches wide, round her head and across her forehead. This band, or coronet, had a plain border of about half an inch wide, and inside this border, for about an inch in width throughout its length, the metal was cut away in very fine lines, forming an intricate and really elegant lace-like pattern. Then she wore also a very large pair of circular ear-rings, similarly ornamented, these ornaments being so large and heavy that they had actually stretched the lobes, and so spoiled the shape of what would otherwise have been a very pretty pair of ears. Upon each of her plump, finely- shaped arms, between the shoulder and the elbow, she wore four or five ma.s.sive armlets of peculiar but by no means unskilled workmans.h.i.+p; and lastly, round each ankle she wore a single anklet of similar workmans.h.i.+p. On the previous night, when this rather lavish display of jewellery had first attracted my casual notice, I had imagined it to be bra.s.s; but now, seeing it again in the full light of day, I discovered it to be _gold_, almost or quite pure, as I judged from its softness.

To return to our subject Daphne's first task on our arrival at the pool had been to kindle another fire; and, after helping us as far as she could to doctor our wounds, she next undertook an exploration of the forest in our immediate neighbourhood, returning in about an hour's time with three long, thin, straight shafts of a kind of bamboo, and three small uprooted saplings. These articles she forthwith plunged into the fire, and after an hour's diligent work manipulated the bamboos into three very effective lances or javelins, and the saplings into three truly formidable clubs, the knotted roots being charred and trimmed until they formed rounded heads as large as one's two fists put together. One of each of these weapons she presented both to Smellie and to me, retaining one of each for herself; and thus armed, we were ready to set out once more upon our travels. But it was high time that our wanderings should be conducted with something like method. Our object was, of course, to rejoin the s.h.i.+p with the least possible delay; and before making a fresh start Smellie thought it would be just as well to acquaint our companion with this our desire. He accordingly undertook to do so, and a very amusing scene resulted; but he succeeded at last in making his wish clearly understood, and this achieved we once more resumed our march.

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

FAITHFUL UNTO DEATH.

By the time that we were finally ready to start it was about noon, and the heat had become intensely oppressive. The refres.h.i.+ng zephyrs of the morning had died completely away, and the motionless atmosphere, rarefied by the burning rays of the sun, was all a-quiver. Not a beast, bird, or insect was stirring throughout the whole length and breadth of the far-stretching forest aisles. The gra.s.s, the flowers, the leaves of the trees, the graceful festoons of parasitic creepers, were all as still as though cut out of iron. The stagnant air was saturated to oppressiveness with a thousand mingled perfumes; and not a sound of any kind broke in upon the death-like stillness of the scene. It was Nature's silent hour, the hour of intensest heat; that short interval about noon when all living things appear to retire into the most sheltered nooks--the darkest, coolest shadows; the one hour out of the twenty-four when absolute, unbroken silence reigns throughout the African forest.

Under Daphne's leaders.h.i.+p we struck off on a westerly course through the green shadows of the forest, and toiled laboriously forward until the dusky twilight warned us of the necessity for seeking a resting-place wherein to pa.s.s the coming night. This was found at length in the centre of a wide clearing or break in the forest; and Smellie and I, at Daphne's expressively--conveyed pantomimic suggestion, forthwith set about gathering the wherewithal to build a fire, whilst the damsel herself undertook the task of providing a supper for the party. Our task was barely completed when her dusky ladys.h.i.+p returned with three grey parrots and a pair of green pigeons, as well as a large gourd of water, from which we eventually managed to make a very satisfying supper. A circle of fires was then built about our camping-place, and we flung ourselves down in the long gra.s.s to sleep, two at least of the party being, as I can vouch, thoroughly done up.

We managed to get perhaps a couple of hours of sleep, and then our rest was completely destroyed for the remainder of the night by a well- sustained attack on the part of countless ticks, ants, and other inquisitive insects, which persisted in perambulating our bodies and busily taking sample bites out of our skins in an evident effort to ascertain the locality of the tenderest portions of our anatomy.

Next morning I discovered with the greatest concern that Smellie was downright ill, so much so that it soon became evident it would be quite impossible for us to prosecute our journey, for that day at least.

Daphne's distress at this unfortunate state of affairs was very keen, but she was a pre-eminently sensible little body, seeing almost at a glance what was wanted; and promptly diverting her sympathies into a practical channel, she at once set off in search of a more suitable abiding place than the one we had occupied through the night. This she at length found in an open glade at no great distance; and thither we promptly removed our patient, the rapidly-increasing seriousness of his symptoms admonis.h.i.+ng us that there was little room for delay.

Our new camping-place was a lovely spot, being an open amphitheatre of about ten acres in extent surrounded on all sides by the forest, and having a tiny rivulet of pure sparkling fresh water flowing through it.

Daphne of course at once took the lead in the arrangements necessary for what threatened to be a somewhat protracted sojourn; and by her directions (it was singular how rapidly we were learning to make ourselves mutually understood) I proceeded in the first instance to clear away the gra.s.s, as far as possible, from a circular s.p.a.ce some fifteen feet in diameter, within a few yards of the bank of the stream.

Daphne, meanwhile, having borrowed Smellie's knife, went off into the forest, from which she soon afterwards returned with a heavy load of long tough pliant wands. Flinging these upon the ground, she next busied herself in lighting a fire on the partially cleared s.p.a.ce, employing me to procure for her the necessary materials; and when a large enough bonfire had been constructed, and the embers were all red- hot, she spread them carefully over the whole of the s.p.a.ce upon which I had been working, and thus effectually destroyed what gra.s.s I had been unable to remove. This done our next task was to cut all the wands or wattles to a uniform length of about twenty-seven feet and point them at both ends; after which, by driving the ends into the soil on opposite sides of our cleared circle of ground, we soon had complete the framework of a hemi-spherical bee-hive-like structure. A second load of wattles was, however, necessary to strengthen this framework to Daphne's liking, and leaving poor Smellie for the nonce to take care of himself, the pair of us set out to procure them. Daphne led me to a dense brake wherein immense numbers of these wattles were to be found, and leaving me to cut as many as I could carry, proceeded further afield in quest of building material of another sort I had completed my task and was back in camp preparing my load for use when Daphne returned; and this time she came staggering in under a tremendous load of palm-leaves, which I rightly guessed were to be used for thatch. So we toiled on during the whole of that day, which, like the preceding, was intensely hot, and by dusk our hut was so far complete as to be capable of affording us a shelter during the succeeding night. By mid-day of the following day it was quite finished; and an efficient shelter having thus been provided for Smellie from the scorching rays of the sun, we were then in a position to give him our undivided attention, of which he by that time stood in most urgent need.

The ensuing fortnight was one of ceaseless anxiety to Daphne and myself, poor Smellie being prostrate with raging fever and utterly helpless during the whole of that time. Fugitives as we were, and in a savage country, it was quite out of our power to procure a.s.sistance, medical or otherwise. We were thrown completely upon our own resources, and we had nothing whatever to guide us in our inexperience. Daphne, to my surprise, appeared to possess no knowledge whatever of the healing art; and thus the treatment of our patient devolved solely upon me. And what could I do?

I had no drugs; and had I had access to the best appointed apothecary's shop I should still have lacked the knowledge requisite for a right use of its contents. So we were obliged, no doubt fortunately for the patient, to allow Nature to take her course, merely adopting such simple precautionary measures as would suggest themselves to anyone possessed of average common sense. We provided for our patient a comfortable, fragrant, springy bed of a species of heather; cleansed and dressed his wounds as often as seemed necessary; kept him as cool as possible, and fed him entirely upon fruits of a mild and agreeable acid flavour.

During that fortnight Smellie was undoubtedly hovering on the borderland between life and death, and but for the tireless and tender solicitude of Daphne I am convinced he would have pa.s.sed across the dividing line and entered the land of shadows. I soon saw that this poor ignorant black girl, this unsophisticated savage, had, all unknowingly to Smellie, yielded up her simple untutored heart a willing captive to the charm of his genial manner and gallant bearing; and as the crisis approached which was to decide the question of life or death with him, the unhappy girl established herself beside him and seemed to enter upon a blind, dogged, obstinate struggle with the Grim Destroyer, with the life of the unconscious patient as the stake.

As for me, I was wretched, miserable beyond all power of description.

Knowing but little of Smellie, save as my superior officer, until the terrible night when we found ourselves fellow-captives doomed to a cruel death together, I had since then seen so much that was n.o.ble and good in him that I had speedily learned to _love_ him with all my heart, ay, with the same love which David bore to Jonathan. And there he lay, sick unto death, and I was powerless to help him.

At length, leaving him one day under Daphne's care, I sallied forth to seek a fresh supply of fruit for him, and, wandering farther than usual afield in my misery and abstraction, I discovered a fruit-bearing tree quite new to me. The fruit--a kind of nut somewhat similar to a walnut--had a very strong, but by no means unpleasant, bitter taste, and it suddenly occurred to me that possibly this fruit might prove to be a not altogether ineffective subst.i.tute for quinine. At all events, I was resolved to try it, on myself first, if necessary, and I gathered as many of the nuts as I could conveniently carry.

On my arrival at the hut I showed them to Daphne, and tried to find out whether she knew anything about them; but for once we failed to comprehend each other, and I was obliged to carry out my original intention of experimenting upon myself. With this object I opened the nuts and set the kernels to steep in water in a gourd basin (upon setting up housekeeping we soon acc.u.mulated quite a number of gourd utensils). I observed with satisfaction that the water soon began to acquire a brown colour; and after my decoction had stood for about three hours I found that its flavour had become quite as strong as was desirable. Fearing to take much at the outset, lest I should unwittingly be swallowing poison, I drank about a quarter of a pint, and then, with some anxiety, awaited the result. It was about noon when I swallowed the potion, and two hours afterwards I was more hungry than I remembered to have ever been before. So far, good; I determined to wait until night, and then, if no worse result than hunger revealed itself, try the effect of my new medicine upon Smellie. By sunset I had come to the conclusion, that whatever else my decoction might be, it was not a poison, and with, I must confess, a certain amount of fear and trepidation, I at last prevailed upon myself to administer the draught, sitting down forthwith to watch and await the result. By midnight the most that could be said of our patient was that he was no worse; and, encouraged on the whole by this negative result, I then administered a second and larger dose. Next morning I thought I detected signs of improvement, and by sundown the improvement was no longer doubtful; the dry, scorching feeling of the skin had given place to a cool healthy moisture; the pulse was slower; the fevered and excited brain at length found rest, and the patient at last even pleaded guilty to a feeling of hunger.

Jubilation now reigned supreme in our palm-leaf hut; the fatted calf (in the shape of a parrot of gorgeous plumage) was killed--and devoured by the patient with something approaching to relish--and my reputation as a great medicine-man was thenceforth fully established.

From this time Smellie began to slowly mend, thanks as much, probably, to Daphne's tireless nursing and a.s.siduous care as to the relentless perseverance with which I administered my new medicine; and in little more than a week he was able, with a.s.sistance, to totter into the open air and sit for half an hour or so under the shadow of a rough awning of thatch which Daphne and I had with some difficulty contrived to rig up for him.

Our little black friend still continued to devote herself wholly to Smellie, waiting upon him hand and foot, watching beside him night and day, fanning him with a palm-leaf, or feeding him on delicious fruit whilst he lay awake under his rude shelter drawing in fresh life and renewed health at every inspiration of the delicious, perfume-laden air, and s.n.a.t.c.hing brief intervals of rest only whilst he slept. In consequence of this arrangement the furnis.h.i.+ng of the larder devolved wholly upon me, and I soon acquired a considerable amount of skill in bringing down my game, princ.i.p.ally birds, either by a dexterous cast of my club, or by means of a long reed tube, like an exaggerated pea- shooter, from which I puffed little reed darts to a great distance with considerable force.

About a fortnight after Smellie had exhibited the first symptoms of improvement I went out foraging as usual, and, having secured the necessary supplies, was within a quarter of a mile of our hut, on my return journey, when I suddenly discovered a negro stealing cautiously along from tree to tree before me. His actions were so suspicious that my curiosity was aroused, and, placing myself in ambush behind the nearest tree, I resolved to watch him. He was making straight for our hut, dodging from tree to tree, and lurking behind each until he had apparently satisfied himself that the coast ahead was perfectly clear.

Such excessive caution on the stranger's part, coupled with the fact that he carried four broad-pointed spears, seemed to me to indicate a purpose the direct reverse of friendly, and I came to the conclusion that it would be well to shorten the distance between him and myself a trifle, if possible. This, however, was not by any means easy to do until the skulking savage had arrived within sight of the hut, when he paused long enough to allow of my creeping up to within a dozen yards of him, when the reason for his hesitation became apparent. Smellie and Daphne were under the awning outside the hut, and my mysterious friend could advance no further without pa.s.sing into the open clearing, and so revealing himself.

We remained thus for fully half an hour, the savage so intently watching the couple under the awning that he had not the remotest suspicion of being himself watched. At the end of that time, the sun having set meanwhile, Smellie staggered to his feet, and, leaning on Daphne's shoulder, pa.s.sed into the hut.

My mysterious neighbour maintained his position for some five minutes longer, and then, springing from his hiding-place, made a dash for the hut at full speed, I following. When I emerged from the forest into the open amphitheatre in the centre of which stood our hut, the savage was some fifty yards ahead of me, running like a hunted deer. I began to fear that he was bent on mischief of some kind, and--now that it was too late--keenly regretted the indecision which had allowed him to remain so long unchallenged. In my anxiety to check his speed I raised a shout.

At the sound he glanced over his shoulder, saw me in hot pursuit, and paused for an instant, das.h.i.+ng forward the next moment, however, more rapidly than ever.

My shout was evidently heard by the occupants of the hut, for Daphne immediately afterwards appeared at the entrance. At the sight of the figure bounding toward her she uttered a little cry and put out her hands protestingly, calling out to him at the same time. I could not catch the words she uttered, and if I could have done so it is very improbable that I should have understood them, but it struck me that they conveyed either a warning or an appeal. Whatever they were, he paid no attention to them, but still rushed forward, brandis.h.i.+ng a spear threateningly. In another second or two he reached the hut and endeavoured to force an entrance. To this, however, Daphne offered the most energetic opposition, obstinately maintaining her position in the doorway. The savage then strove to _force_ his way in, but Daphne still persisting in her opposition he drew back a pace, and, raising his arm with a savage cry, drove the broad-bladed javelin with all his brutal strength down into her bare bosom. The poor girl staggered under the force of the blow, and with a stifled shriek and an appealing cry to "Halold," reeled backward, and fell to the ground inside the hut.

Meanwhile, the savage, leaving the javelin quivering in the body of his victim, turned to meet me, s.n.a.t.c.hing another javelin with his right hand from his left at the same instant; and as he did so I recognised our former enemy, the fetish-man or witch-doctor of Daphne's village. I was by this time within arm's-length of him, and, quick as light, he made a lunge at me. By a happy chance I succeeded in parrying the stroke with the blow-pipe which I held in my left hand, and then, springing in upon him, I dealt him so tremendous a blow with my heavy, knotted, hard-wood club that his skull crashed under it like an egg-sh.e.l.l, and he fell a brainless corpse at my feet.

Entering the hut I found Smellie on his knees beside the lifeless body of Daphne.

"Too late, Hawkesley! you were just too late to save this poor devoted girl," he murmured. "Only a few seconds earlier, and you would have been in time to arrest the murderous blow. She is quite dead; indeed her death must have been instantaneous. See, the blade of the javelin is quite a foot long, and it was completely buried in her body; it must have pa.s.sed clean through her heart. Poor girl! she was indeed faithful unto death, for it was my life that yonder murderous wretch thirsted for. You doubtless recognised him--the fetish-man who strove so hard to terrify us on the night of the sacrifice in the village! I am convinced that, in his anger and chagrin at our escape, he has patiently hunted us down, determined to make us feel his vengeance in one way if he failed in the other. Poor Daphne clearly read his intention, I am sure; and it was her resistance, her defence of poor helpless me, that brought this cruel death upon her. Well, G.o.d's will be done! The poor girl was only an ignorant savage, and it is hardly possible that she can ever have heard His holy name mentioned; but for all that she had pity upon the stranger and him who had no helper, and I cannot but believe that she will therefore receive her full reward. It only remains now to so dispose of her body that it shall be secure from violation by the birds of the air and the beasts of the field. But how is that to be done?"