Kitabı oku: «Clutterbuck's Treasure», sayfa 8

CHAPTER XXII
I AM MOURNED FOR DEAD

My steed was doomed; that was clear enough, for it still stood, helpless and terrified, rooted to the spot and quaking with abject, nerveless fear. Apparently terror had completely bereft it of the power to move, for from the moment (only half a minute ago, in spite of all this talk and telling!) when it caught sight of the "rogue" in full pursuit of M'ngulu until now, it had stood with forefeet apart, ears cocked forward, eyes and nostrils dilated, trembling and snorting, and insensible to direction from the saddle.

As for me, seeing that my horse was doomed, and that if I had still been mounted I should probably have shared its fate, I thanked Heaven for my escape and sprang back into the bush without further ado, leaving the poor brute to its evil destiny. Safe behind a dense, thorny bush I was free to reload my rifle and watch, if I desired it, the elephant's behaviour with regard to his victim.

This was not a very pleasant sight, and the idea of what would have become of me had I remained in the saddle, trying to get the horse to move, until too late, made me quite faint. It is enough to say that when the "rogue" had done with the poor beast there was not an unbroken bone in its body; for he had knelt upon it, danced upon it with his huge feet, gored it with the stumps of his tusks, thrown it hither and thither, and torn it to bits with his trunk, and, in a word, vented upon it an abandonment of fury which was absolutely terrific to behold.

So quickly did he perform his work, in the madness of his rage, that I, who was obliged to set to work cautiously and with little movement for fear of attracting his attention, had not finished loading my rifle when the second act of the tragedy began.

It was M'ngulu who reappeared next upon the boards. He came galloping up, wailing and weeping at full voice, under the impression, I suppose, that I had fallen a victim as well as my horse; and as he dashed past the elephant's nose, he first spat at it and cursed it, and then fired off his rifle in a very "promiscuous" manner, one handed. This, though it did not injure the elephant, served to enrage him yet further; and involved M'ngulu in a second race for life.

Of this race and of its upshot I was not a witness, for our good nigger and the raging "rogue" at his heels passed immediately out of my sight, and it was only when I heard in the distance first one shot and then two more that I knew where to look for the hunt. Having now reloaded my rifle, I felt justified in rejoining the chase on foot; and careered away at my best pace in the direction of the shooting. I presently encountered both Jack and the nigger galloping back to meet me so rapidly that I thought at first they were pursued, and hid myself behind a tree in order to save my own skin and perhaps get a telling shot as the brute passed me. But there was no elephant, and M'ngulu was weeping and wailing, and Jack's face looked white and scared and haggard.

"Jack!" I shouted as the pair rode by. "Hold on a bit! Where's the?"—

Jack pulled up in a instant, so did M, who ceased wailing on the spot, and, jumping off his horse, commenced dancing around Jack and me in a manner that made me suspect for a moment that the madness of the elephant had infected him.

"Good Heavens, man!" cried Jack, "I thought you were done for. This fool of a nigger has been telling me you were dead—'White man Peter dead—kill,' he has been saying, and crying and wailing fit to raise the dead."

"I wish he could raise my dead horse," I said; and I described to Jack my own escape.

"Great scissors!" cried Jack. And for some little time such foolish and unmeaning expressions as "Cæsar!" "Snakes alive!" "Scissors!" and so on were the only remarks I could get my friend to make.

"I don't know which was the bigger fool," he said at last, "your horse that wouldn't go or mine that wouldn't stay. This fool of a beast of mine took me half a mile away before he would consent to return, and I only got a look in at the hunt thenthanks to old M here, who kindly brought the elephant to me as I was not allowed to go to the elephant."

"Still," I said, "I think your horse was less of a fool than mine under the circumstances. It's no fault of my poor brute that I was not made jam of by that raging beast. By the bye, I suppose you killed it between you, as you are here and the elephant is not?"

"He's dead," said Jack. "You made two good holes in him, but in the wrong place. M'ngulu brought him by me, and I put in a lovely bull's-eye in the forehead. He went down like a sheep, but struggled upon his knees again. Then I put in a second near the same spot, and M fired off his piece and nearly knocked my cap off—he never went near the elephant. He is a free cannonader, is M; I don't think we'll give him rifles to hold in future, Peter—at least, not loaded ones."

We were now at the scene of the bad elephant's demise, and Jack showed me where he had stood, and where M'ngulu, and how it had all happened. M's bullet had really passed very close to Jack's head, it appeared, for the tree trunk was splintered by it a foot or two above the spot where Jack had been standing.

There lay the "bad 'un," terrible even in death; a big, vicious, mangy, bony, ungainly elephant as ever went mad and was expelled by a respectable herd. His tusks had been good, but they were spoiled by his first fall, and though we collected the pieces, and M deftly dug out the roots, they were useless as specimens. We made them over to M, however, who sold them, I daresay, for a good price.

After this we shot two or three other elephants before returning southwards; but in each case it being we who hunted them and not they us, as in the instance of the "bad 'un," the record of our achievements would be uninteresting in comparison, and I shall leave the tale of them to the imagination of my readers, who know well enough how the thing is done, and resume the thread of our history proper, which must be pursued without further digressions; and those who have skipped the hunting adventures may now read on in the certainty that the Treasure business will in future be strictly "attended to," and that they will not be called upon to skip again, unless, indeed, it be from pure excitement in the incidents of the legitimate story of the hidden money.

Had we known it, we were on the brink, even now, of a very terrible incident indeed.

CHAPTER XXIII
A RUDE AWAKENING

Our hunting trip over, Jack and I left M'ngulu, our Somali hunter, and the nigger driver in charge of the ox-waggon, which was to follow us at leisure to Vryburg. On their arrival we purposed to sell oxen and horses and waggon, pay off our men, and depart by train for Cape Town, thence to England, and thence again to our new treasure island in the Gulf of Finland.

As on our ride from Vryburg, we now took nothing with us excepting our light rifles and ammunition, our one remaining revolver, brandy, blankets, a small supply of tinned food, and two small kegs of water (of which we had learned the necessity by the bitter experience of our two days' waterless wanderings in the jungle near Ngami).

It was but a hundred or so of miles to Vryburg, but we were determined to enjoy the return ride thoroughly, and to keep ourselves in food by the way through the medium of our rifles, though we did not look to have anything in the way of adventures, since our friends James Strong and Clutterbuck were no longer by to afford us the excitement of a race to the treasure ground, with its added interest of possible shots from behind or from an ambush.

I cannot say that I was sorry to feel that Strong was well out of the way, and probably half-way to England by now. I do not like the feeling, when travelling, that every tree may have an enemy behind it, only waiting for an opportunity to put a bullet into you as you come along. I am a plain man, and like a quiet manner of travelling best—the civilised kind, without the excitement of ambushes and cock-shots, and so on.

We did not go far each day, for there was no hurry. M'ngulu and the nigger were going to spend a few days at Ngami, to rest the oxen, before starting after us; but we ourselves would rather pass our time in the veldt than at Vryburg. So we hunted antelopes, and shot all manner of birds that looked queer but tasted excellent, and we camped out at night, and enjoyed life amazingly, as any two young Britons would under similar circumstances; for we had had a successful and delightful hunting expedition, and we were on our way home to England with the secret of the treasure safely buttoned up in our breast pockets; the object of our journey had been attained; the present moment was full of delight—what could any man desire more than this?

We were no longer afraid of lions at night. As a matter of fact, they were rare enough so far south, and in all probability the one we had shot at Ngami, before the waggon reached us, was the same animal which had captured and devoured poor Strong, junior, that terrible night at the treasure field. There were plenty farther north, as we well knew. But now we were thirty or forty miles south of Ngami, and on the highroad to Vryburg, and there was not much danger of a night surprise from any of our old friends.

Hence we were somewhat careless when on the watch over the camp fire. Nominally we still took our sleep in turn and watched during the interval; but as a matter of fact, the function of watching was honoured by us in the breach more than in the observance, and it often happened that we both slept soundly for hours together. Thus when, on the fourth night, a most unexpected and alarming surprise broke over us, like a thunderclap from a clear sky, we found that we had been living in a fool's paradise.

For once, old Jack—generally so much more to be depended upon than I, being a more gifted person all round, and infinitely smarter and more wide awake than your humble servant, the present scribe—old Jack, the acute, was caught napping. It was his watch, and he ought, undoubtedly, to have been awake—wide awake. Instead of that he was asleep—fast asleep—when, as he described the event afterwards, he was awakened by being stirred in the ribs by someone's foot.

Assuming that it was I who took this liberty with him, Jack lashed out with his own foot, and hacked someone violently upon the shin, eliciting an oath which, I am glad to say, Jack instantly realised could not have proceeded from lips so refined as mine.

"Come, sit up!" said a strange and yet familiar voice, with added expletives which I omit. It may be taken as understood that in the subsequent conversation there was an oath to every three words of one of the speakers, for this was a person who, I may tell you, was quite unable to speak the Queen's English without a large admixture of strong language: there are such people—more than are needed.

Jack opened his eyes with a start, and recognised James Strong. Then he twisted round and felt for his rifle, which lay at his side ready for emergency; but he could not find it.

Strong, who held a revolver in his left hand, laughed aloud.

"No, no," he said; "I've seen to it; you taught me that trick, you know. See there!"

Jack followed Strong's eyes to the fire, and there he beheld the butts of our two rifles blazing merrily among the twigs and logs.

"Burn nicely, don't they?" said Strong. "Now chuck that revolver of yours in. No, no! none of that, my lad; if you turn the muzzle anything like in my direction I shoot. I can get mine off long before yours is pointed my way. Drop it out of the pouch, anyhow it comes. You needn't touch it. Open the pouch and shake it out—so!"

Jack was obliged to obey, for Strong's revolver covered him all the time, and Strong was a man to shoot in a moment if it suited him. Jack's revolver fell at his feet.

"Kick it towards me!" said Strong, and Jack was obliged to do so. Strong kicked it into the fire.

"Now then," he said, "that little matter being settled, hand me up the letter you took from Clutterbuck's tin box."

"I haven't it," said Jack; "Godfrey has it."

"Turn out your pockets," said Strong. "You took a copy; I saw you do it. Now, please, no shilly shally—out with everything."

Strong turned over with his foot the few articles which Jack produced from the pocket of his Norfolk jacket. The copy of our precious document was not there.

"Take off that waistcoat," said Strong; "Or, stay, what do I care where you have hidden the blessed thing? Look here, I give you one minute to produce it."

There was nothing to be done. Poor Jack was obliged to reveal the secret places of his waistcoat lining, and to bring out the required document. What else could he do? The man with the revolver is bound to have the last word. If I had been awake, instead of sleeping like a pig by the fire, we might have had him; as it was, Jack was at his mercy.

"Now," said Strong, "go away into the bush; step out one hundred yards, and stay there while I negotiate this snoring tomfool here!"

Jack, feeling, as he said afterwards, that a worm would have appeared a dignified creature in comparison with himself, stepped out his hundred yards, or pretended to; as a matter of fact he remained behind a thorn bush about seventy paces away, determined to rush in at any risk if the fellow threatened me any harm.

Then Strong woke me as he had awakened Jack, by stirring me with his foot, and I am thankful to think that I too "landed him one" for his trouble; for I lashed out just as Jack did, and my foot certainly encountered some portion of his frame, and as certainly elicited flowers of speech which I omit.

"Come, get up!" he said sulkily; "the game's played out."

I started to my feet, feeling for my rifle; it was gone, as the reader knows. Only half awake, I stared at Strong; then I looked round for Jack, who had disappeared.

Strong's revolver covered me all the while, just as he had held Jack in peril of instant death.

"Jack!" I screamed. I do not know what I thought. I believe I had an awful fear that Strong had murdered and buried him. "Jack, where are you?" To my intense relief Jack shouted back—

"All right, Peter; do as he tells you, just now!"

Strong laughed loudly, and swore atrociously.

"D'you hear that?" he said. "You are to do just as I tell you; the captain says so. If you don't, your brains will fly in about two seconds. Your rifles are burnt, so is your revolver; your smart friend wasn't quite acute enough to-night, and he's a prisoner. Hand up the letter, or cheque, or bank order, or whatever it may be that you took out of Clutterbuck's tin box that night. You thought I was asleep, curse you, but that's where you spoiled yourselves."

I handed Strong the document he asked for. "There goes," I thought, "my chance of the treasure!"

Strong glanced at it and pocketed the paper.

"Any bank-notes in that pocket-book?" he said; "if so, hand them over." I had thirty pounds in cash, which he took. I had subscribed the rest to make up Clutterbuck's two hundred pounds.

"Now," resumed Strong, "if you move a finger while I'm in sight I shoot. Come, hands up! Stand!"

He left me standing like a confounded statue, with my hands over my head. Then he laughed, swore a disgusting oath at me, loosened the bridle of his horse, which was tied to a tree quite close at hand, and started to ride away.

CHAPTER XXIV
STRONG SPRINTS AND GAINS A LAP

Jack was at my side in a moment.

"Quick," he whispered "let's mount and be after him; I shall never be happy again until I have kicked that fellow within an inch of his grave!"

We dashed into the wood for our horses—they were not where we had left them. Of course they were not; the man would have been a fool to leave us our horses—we might have raced into Vryburg before him, and got him arrested! Strong was about as perfect an example of a scoundrel as you would find in Africa or any other continent, but no fool!

We stood and stamped and murdered our native language, diving to the lowest depths of our vocabularies for expressions of hatred and rage and of abuse, and the promise of future dire vengeance. We still stood and raged, when suddenly Strong came riding back.

"You have disobeyed orders," he said; "don't blame me for enforcing discipline. Go back to your place, you—Henderson, or whatever your name is!—hands up, you other!"

"I shall have it out of you, one day, for this, you infernal scoundrel," said Jack, whose temper was now beyond his control. "Get down and fight me on the ground—you may have your revolver, I'll use my fists."

"You fool!" rejoined Strong with an oath; "a man does not ask a leopard to spit out his teeth before attacking him. Go back to your place, I tell you, or I fire!"

Jack did not move.

"You are a murderer already," he said, "and you know it. What have you done with Clutterbuck and his money, you scoundrel? That's his pistol you hold; do you think I don't know it? Never fear, you shall hang one day, my friend!"

For answer James Strong fired his revolver straight at Jack's head. I do not think he had intended from the beginning to murder us. Either he had calculated that his plans would work out without the need of killing us; or he had reflected that his own skin would be the safer, when in England, if he spared ours; for inquiries would certainly be set on foot if Henderson disappeared though few would know or care whether poor I disappeared or not.

But when Jack accused him of murdering Clutterbuck, his comrade—a crime which in all probability he had actually committed, though Jack only drew his bow at a venture—Strong changed his mind and suddenly determined that it would be the safer plan to shoot us both down. Accordingly, he first fired at Jack and missed him clean. Then he fired another shot and missed again, and swore, and turned his pistol on me and fired three shots at me; at the third I fell, feeling a sharp pain in my shin-bone—my leg would not support me.

Jack had drawn a log from the fire and was about to hurl it at Strong when he fired his last shot, at Jack this time, and rode away into the grey of the early morning, before the last named could launch his clumsy missile at him. The shooting of the six shots did not occupy altogether more than ten seconds.

Jack sprang to my side, white and terrified.

"For Heaven's sake, Peter, where are you hurt?" he gasped. "Can you speak? Are you dying? Where is the pain?"

"My leg," I said, writhing, for the pain was very severe. "It's only a broken leg—but it'll lose us the race!"

As a matter of fact, my leg was not broken, as the term is generally understood—there was no bone setting required; but the bullet had carried away a splinter of my shin-bone, having all but missed me, but taking, as it were, a little bite out of me as it passed.

Nevertheless, trivial as the wound was, this misfortune delayed us three weeks at Vryburg; for though Jack doctored me with all the devotion and skill that he could command, the weather was hot, and I suppose there were some wretched little bacilli about of the kind "to play old gooseberry with open wounds," as Jack learnedly expressed it; for my shin became very painful and inflamed before we reached Vryburg, and I was obliged to take to my bed at the hotel there and remain in it for a tantalising spell of three weeks.

As for our journey to Vryburg, I performed it in the waggon. Jack carried me, or half carried me, back to a village on the highroad which we had passed through on the previous evening without stopping, and there we awaited the arrival of the waggon, sleeping in a native hut and collecting, I suppose, the bacilli that were destined to play the part with my wound which Jack described as "old gooseberry." Had we stayed in that village on the previous evening we should have learned that a white man had been living in the place for a month, waiting for friends to come down from Bulawayo, and that he was living there still. This was, of course, our friend Strong, who had deliberately waited a month for us, in ambush, and had sallied after us when we passed through, and caught us napping, as described, over our camp fire.

But we learned another significant fact bearing upon this matter. When the white man originally came to the village a month ago, he was, we were told, accompanied by a friend who lived with him in a hut which the white men made for themselves. But after about a week the little white man disappeared, and the big white man explained that he had gone on to Cape Town, being tired of waiting.

But after another week—that is, a fortnight ago—Umgubi, who was a kind of village herdsman, and looked after the cattle belonging to the chief men of the place, came upon the body of the little white man in a nullah with steep banks two miles or so off the road. Then the big white man said that the little one must have gone astray and fallen down into the nullah, or else an eland or some other big animal had attacked him and pushed him down; and all the natives of the village said that he must have terribly offended his gods for so great a misfortune to have happened to him, and that doubtless an eland had pushed him over into the nullah, or else he had fallen over by himself without the eland.

Only, if that was the case, said our informant innocently, why was there a bullet-hole in the back of his head!

It was when M'ngulu and the nigger had arrived with our waggon and translated the tale for us that we heard the details of this story of Strong's villainy; and I may honestly say that, though shocked to hear of poor Clutterbuck's end, I was not altogether surprised. It was a comfort to think that we had done our best for him by furnishing him with a pistol, while Strong was left quite unarmed. If Clutterbuck, with so great an advantage, was unable to retain the upper hand, there could be, after all, no one to blame but himself.

How Strong dispossessed him of the revolver; by what stratagem or plausible arguments or threats he succeeded in persuading Clutterbuck to part with all that stood between himself and his murderous companion; and how, when he had obtained the weapon, he used it for his fell purpose, will, I suppose, never be known. Perhaps the dark tale of deceit and murder will be revealed at the last tribunal of all; but it is certain that the tragedy must remain one of the mysteries in this life.

Meanwhile, where was the murderer? Half-way towards Hogland and my hundred thousand pounds?

As for ourselves, we determined to collect what evidence we could in order to bring the miscreant before the judges at Cape Town, if we could catch him there; but events proved that the fox was not to be so easily run to earth as we had hoped.

To this end we telegraphed from Vryburg, just a week after our own interview with James Strong, explaining that we had evidence of his connection with a murder, and giving his name and appearance.

But when, three weeks later, we reached Cape Town, we found to our disappointment that the police had utterly failed to find Strong. No person of that name, or answering to the description, had either been seen or had taken passage by any of the late steamers bound for home. The nearest approach to our description of the man "wanted" was of one Julius Stavenhagen, who had sailed in the Conway Castle before our telegram was delivered.

Jack and I looked at one another on receiving this information. If this were Strong himself—and we had a firm conviction that such was the case—then he had not only escaped just chastisement for his crime, but he had also obtained a three weeks' start of us in the race for Clutterbuck's Treasure.