The League of the Leopard Part 23

The Lord he give me sense too much."

"Rideau is a capable rascal and this explains a good deal," said Maxwell, when he had handed the cripple over to the Krooboy cook. "The man with the scarred forehead is clearly an influence among the Leopards. Otherwise Rideau might never have overtaken us. His prudence in promising to double the toll demanded on his safe return strikes me as highly commendable; and one can only presume that, seeing us successful in spite of his efforts, he determined to cast his lot in with us for a time."

Dane's answer was fierce and emphatic; and Maxwell smiled.

"Over-confidence is a weakness of yours, Hilton. Now it is no doubt flattering to one's pride to disdain petty suspicions and precautions; but having done so, isn't it illogical to grow feverishly indignant when you are victimized?"

"You need not waste time in moralizing. It is much more necessary to discover why Rideau cleared out in a hurry, and what he is doing now."

"I don't know, but it will be high time to move when we do. Meanwhile, we can only wait. It will become apparent presently."

Dane left him, and went back to his task, stolidly determined that he would have a reckoning with M. Victor Rideau before he sailed from Africa. Hilton Dane, though by no means a fool, possessed neither his comrade's power of deduction nor his insight into the weakness of human nature; but he was, nevertheless, likely to prove an even more dangerous enemy when his natural generosity, being abused, had changed into vindictiveness. It is generally well to avoid the righteous indignation of the good-humored man when his patience is exhausted; and Dane's patience was not of the longest.

The time dragged slowly by until, when those the plague had spared were well on the way to recovery, chance supplied the partners with the final clue. A man swathed in ragged cotton and of comparatively light color halted one morning to beg a little food at their camp, and Maxwell grew eager when he found that Amadu could understand him. Headman Shaillu's villages had been stricken by the plague, he said, and that ruler, either to avoid contagion or to prevent the spread of disaffection among his people, had marched them out on a campaign against his northern neighbors. He had been badly beaten, and the tribesmen had summoned every petty chieftain who had suffered by his depredations to join them in retaliating. They would probably wait until the rains were over, the stranger said, though this was not certain; but once they started, they would spare nothing on their march; and as their priests had a special animus against white men, he considered they would certainly storm the camp.

It was dark when Dane and Maxwell held their final conference, and they sat moodily silent a while before either spoke. The sufferings and hards.h.i.+ps undergone had left their mark on them; it is possible that Maxwell's British acquaintances might scarcely have recognized him, as he sat huddled, as it were, together under the smoky lamp. Even his ironical humor had deserted him along with every personal characteristic save the courage and certain racial instincts that were ineradicable.

Dane was reminded of an ancient portrait in Culmeny as he watched him.

The old moss-trooper had looked much the same--lean and dour and grim; and the observer could recognize the same baleful light in his wolfish eyes. It was not an unnatural reversion, for the customs of modern Africa are not greatly different from those of Britain in bygone days.

It was hotter than ever, and a darkness that could be felt hung over the tent.

"We have had several of these talks, Hilton, but never one half so important as that before us now," said Maxwell at length. "Rideau's whole intentions are clear at last. He learned what was threatening long before we did, and profited by the sickness as an excuse for escaping and leaving us to our fate. The gold? Please wait until I have concluded. These tribesmen are mere predatory nomads, with no knowledge of mining, and after burning every village they come across they will vanish into the bush again. Therefore, our partner clearly expects that if the pestilence fails to remove us the spearmen will; and he no doubt hopes to return when there is peace again, and clean out this river without our a.s.sistance."

Dane smote the camp table hard with his fist, and was sullenly pleased to see that he had not lost all his strength, for one of the thin boards split.

"Then I solemnly pledge myself to carry out the second portion of our compact. The vile, treacherous scoundrel shall not escape if I live," he declared.

Maxwell raised his hand, but there was an ominous light in his eyes as they met those of his companion.

"That may come later; but in the first place the severely practical aspect of this affair requires to be dealt with. To begin, less than half our men are, even yet, capable of steady marching, and our numbers would be quite insufficient to convoy those too weak to walk safely through a hostile country. Therefore we have to choose between two evils. The first possible course would be to leave all the sick and weakly, and striking due south, not by the way we came, endeavor to reach the coast with what gold we have won. We could return when it appeared safe to do so. I put it before you, without expressing my own opinion, dispa.s.sionately."

Dane did not falter, but he remembered that in all probability there was gold enough in the river to enable him to market his patent with at least a hope of success, and this implied a prospect of winning Lilian.

Of late his hopes that he would eventually do so had grown steadily stronger; and during many a lonely watch, when he recalled her delicate beauty, the longing for her had almost mastered him. As Maxwell had pointed out, one way to realize his ambitions was still open; but Dane knew that he could not go home with the blood of the men who had trusted him upon his hands.

"That course is impossible!" he said hoa.r.s.ely.

"Yes," agreed Maxwell with impressive quietness. "We have, it is said, outgrown superst.i.tion, but I can't help thinking misfortune would follow the money we made that way. They have done their best for us, poor devils. Therefore, we come to the second alternative. This camp could be further stockaded into a very strong position, and you or I must hold it against all comers. While one of us does so, the other, with a couple of picked men, will strike straight for the coast, catch the first mailboat, and, if he can't persuade an agent to believe and finance him by the sight of a few ounces of gold, cable home for a credit to be opened by telegraph on some big trading firm. My bankers should manage that. Then he will return with a strong expedition. Speed affords the one chance for success, for if Rideau heard of the attempt, he and the Leopards would frustrate it; and both are doubtless watchful; but two or three men traveling night and day might escape observation. They must start unburdened, with just sufficient food, abandoning all idea of carrying treasure. The one question is, who is to go?"

Dane was conscious of a grim satisfaction. Everything pointed to him as the one to stay, and he had no desire to return home with nothing more than expectations; while, hara.s.sed as he had been by many enemies, deserted, and betrayed, the prospect of trying conclusions with an open foe came as a relief to him.

"You have the money, and brains, Carsluith, and you must go," he said.

"I have the brute strength, and, I think, to-night some of its ferocity.

I can promise that all the savages in Africa shall not turn me out of this camp. Neither would I be sorry if they attempted it."

As Maxwell turned toward him the smoldering fire was plainer in his eye.

"Are you not forgetting that other men are born with the same pa.s.sions?

Break that twig into unequal lengths, shut your eyes, and draw. The man who picks the longest stays."

They were equal at the second draw, and Dane grew feverishly anxious as he thrust in his hand again. Then he threw the twig on the table triumphantly.

"It points to me," he said.

"So be it," Maxwell answered quietly. "Then we will get ready two loads of provisions. I start at sunrise to-morrow, taking Amadu and one other man with me."

The night was far spent before the preparations were finished and they lay down to sleep; and Maxwell was dressed and equipped when his comrade awakened.

"I could not bring myself to disturb you earlier," he said, when Dane glanced at him reproachfully. "We will eat a morsel of breakfast, and then I will start."

Dane could swallow nothing, but Maxwell ate a little, though he seemed to force his appet.i.te. Then they walked silently together as far as the stockade gate, where Maxwell turned and held out his hand.

"G.o.d knows whether I will reach the coast. This gold, with whatever you can add to it, is yours if I fail," he said. "If I live I will come back and join you should I come alone!"

"Whether you come late or early you will find me or my bones here," Dane answered huskily, for there was a painful contraction in his throat.

Their hands met in a strenuous grasp, and with a hoa.r.s.e "Good luck!"

following him, Maxwell strode out through the gate. Dane watched him descend the slope to the river, while all the camp boys capable of motion cl.u.s.tered about the one who stayed, and Monday squatted at his feet. They were all very silent until a murmur went up as the white man, halting on the edge of the forest, turned toward them. He raised his shapeless sun-hat high above his head, answering Dane's salute; and long afterward the latter sighed each time that lonely figure rose out of the blurred memories.

A horrible sense of loneliness oppressed the man left behind, and there came upon him an irrepressible desire for speech.

"He has gone, Monday," he said, patting the naked shoulder of the big dark-skinned alien, who looked up at him sympathetically; "but if he lives he will certainly come back; and you and I in the meantime are going to keep his place warm for him. You don't understand? Well, you probably will when several hundred yelling devils come round this way at midnight wanting to get in. Still, I don't think we'll make a bad show between us, even then."

The dusky man caught a glimpse of his meaning, for he grinned and nodded when Dane continued:

"You don't feel quite sure what I'm saying yet. I don't care, so long as you sit up and listen patiently. I'm feeling very low and lonely this morning, Monday."

The listener appeared to consider, and then rose upright, saying solemnly:

"Cappy Maxwell, say we lib for this place, then we dam well lib. Cappy Maxwell fine white man too much. Suppose them low bushmen come we dam well go chop him."

CHAPTER XV

THE BOARDING OF THE KABUNDA

It was a hot and steamy night when trader Redmond sat with his comrade Gilby in an upper room of their factory perched above a beach swept by smoking surf, which was even heavier than usual that night. The factory was not a desirable residence, even for West Africa, where there are not many places where a fastidious white man would care to live; but neither Redmond nor his comrade was particular, and so long as they could make a good percentage on the factory's turnover, they disregarded the dirt, smells, and insect legions. Redmond was pale and round-shouldered; Gilby lank and tall; and their speech was usually vivid and their tempers quick.

Redmond strolled toward the window and swore at the surf. He had some justification, for the whole heave of the southern ocean hurled itself thundering upon the hammered beach. The factory windows rattled as each breaker dissolved into long sheets of foam which surged far up the trembling sand, while the steamy haze of spray veiled almost to its summit the lofty bluff behind the edifice.

"No use lighting the signal fire. There's not a surf-boat on the coast could run a load of produce through. The _Kabunda_ can either blow her whistle off or go on again," he said. "It's even too bad to venture off light, and screw an odd bottle of liquor out of her purser."

"It always is when the markets are rising and we have cargo waiting,"

grumbled Gilby. "As to the liquor, you can go yourself if you want it.

I'm not over-keen on playing that game with the _Kabunda_'s new factotum again. It takes a good deal to stir me, but that man has no sense of humor, and was positively insulting. 'No cargo in your confounded boat?'

growls he. 'Well, the next time you stop this mailboat just because you're thirsty, we'll heave you over the rail!'"