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In Search of the Okapi

by Ernest Glanville · English · Gutenberg #17615 · 556,976 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: In Search of the Okapi

Author: Ernest Glanville


        
Release date: January 28, 2006 [eBook #17615]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17615

Credits: E-text prepared by Charles Klingman


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IN SEARCH OF THE OKAPI ***


E-text prepared by Charles Klingman



IN SEARCH OF THE OKAPI

A Story of Adventure in Central Africa

by

ERNEST GLANVILLE

Author of "The Diamond Seekers" "The Fossicker" "Tales from the
Veld" etc.

Illustrated by William Rainey, R.I.







Chicago A. C. McClurg & Co.
1904




CONTENTS

   CHAP.

       I. THE HUNTER

      II. A NOVEL CRAFT

     III. THE CANOE ADRIFT

      IV. THE STORY OF MUATA

       V. TROUBLE BREWING

      VI. THE FLIGHT

     VII. THE THOUSAND ISLANDS

    VIII. THE BULLS AND THE WILD DOGS

      IX. A LION'S CHARGE

       X. A NIGHT IN THE REEDS

      XI. A TRAP

     XII. THE MAN-EATERS

    XIII. THE TREE-LION

     XIV. THE OVERHEAD PATH

      XV. FIGHT WITH A GORILLA

     XVI. ACROSS THE LAGOON

    XVII. THE PLACE OF REST

   XVIII. THE FIGHT IN THE DEFILE

     XIX. THE MAKER OF LAWS

      XX. THE SECRET WAY

     XXI. A VOICE FROM THE DEAD

    XXII. A TERRIBLE NIGHT

   XXIII. THROUGH THE VAULTS

    XXIV. LETTING IN THE RIVER

     XXV. THE CRY IN THE NIGHT



IN SEARCH OF THE OKAPI



CHAPTER I

THE HUNTER

"Dick, why do you study Arabic so closely?"

"To understand Arabic."

"And further?"

Dick Compton closed his book and placed it carefully in a leather
case.

"It is a pity you were born curious, Venning, otherwise you would
have made an excellent companion for a studious man.  'Why do I wish
to understand Arabic?' Why do you stand on one leg watching a
tadpole shed its tail."

"Excuse me, I always sit down to watch a tadpole."

"Yet I have seen you poised on one leg for an hour like a heron,
afraid to put down the other foot lest you should scare some
wretched pollywog. Why?"

"I do it for the love of the thing, Dick. What is a page of your
crooked signs compared with a single green pond and all that it
holds?"

"By Jove! Is that so--and would you find a volume in a caterpillar?"

"Why not? Listen to me, Dick.  Take the silver-spiked caterpillar,
with a skin of black satin and a length that runs to four inches. He
lives his life in the topmost boughs of an African palm--a feathered
dome amid the forest--and there beneath the blue sky he browses till
he descends into the warm earth to sleep in chrysalis form before he
emerges as a splendid moth, with glass windows in his wide wings to
sail with the fire-flies through the dark vaults of the silent
woods."

"All that from a caterpillar?"

"That and much more, Dicky."

"And where will this study of the caterpillar lead you, Godfrey? One
can't live on a caterpillar."

"Yet there is one kind--fat and creamy--that makes good soup."

"Ugh, you cormorant! But tell me seriously, what is the end of your
studies--where will they lead you?"

"To Central Africa."

"Do you mean that, Venning?"

"I do, Dick. There is one spot on the map of Africa that is marked
black. That spot is covered over hundreds of square miles by the
unexplored forest. Think what that means to me!"

"Fever most likely--or three inches of spear-head."

"A forest big enough to cover England! Just think of the new forms
of life--from a new ant to an elephant or hornless giraffe. The
okapi was discovered near that great hunting-ground--and, who is to
say there are not other animals as strange in its untrodden depths?"

"Is it a wild-fowl, the okapi?"

"A wild-fowl, you duffer!" exclaimed Venning, indignantly. "Haven't
you heard of the dwarfed giraffe, part zebra, discovered by Sir
Harry Johnston? It lost the long neck of the original species which
browses in the open veld by the necessity to adapt its habits to the
changed conditions of life within the forest."

"Your neck is rather long, my boy, from much stretching to watch
things. Look out that you don't have it shortened. And so you intend
to visit Central Africa? That is very curious!"

"I don't see anything curious about it."

"Nor do I, as to one thing.  If a fellow is crazy about butterflies,
he may as well roam in Africa as a lunatic with a net as anywhere
else; but the curious part of the matter is, that my study of Arabic
is intended to prepare me for a trip to the very same place."

"Compton, you don't mean it," said the other, jumping from his seat.

"I do, most decidedly."

"But what has Arabic got to do with the Central African Forest?"

"Quite as much as your short-nosed elephant or long-tailed
hippopotamus. I also wish to discover  something that has been lost.
Don't open your mouth so wide."

"Is it an animal, Dick?"

"Good gracious, no! I don't care twopence about an animal, except it
is for the pot, or unless it wants me for dinner. No; mine is
another search.  It is connected with my father."

"Yes," said Venning, quietly; for his friend had suddenly grown
grave.

"When I was a little chap, about seventeen years ago, my mother
received a letter dated from the 'great forest.'"

"It contained only these words, 'Good-bye.' With it there was a
letter in Arabic, written by my father's headman. That letter was
seven months on its travels, and since then no other word have I
heard."

Venning muttered something in sympathy.

"My mother," continued the other, "died five years ago, without
having learnt the meaning of the message in Arabic. She had a wish
that no one but I should read the letter, and often she told me that
if it contained any instructions or directions, I was to carry them
out. Well, I have interpreted the Arabic signs."

"Yes, Dick; and----"

"And I can't quite make out the meaning. There is a reference to the
journal my father kept, with the  statement that it was safely
hidden; but then follows a reference to a Garden of Rest, to certain
people who  protected him, and to a slave-trader who did him an
injury. These references to me are a mystery; but what is clear is
his desire to have his journal recovered from the Arab slave-dealer,
described merely as 'The Wolf.'"

"And that is why you wish to go to Central Africa?"

"That is why, Venning. I must recover my father's journal if it
exists; I must, if it is not too late, find out how he died; I must
find out who are the wild people, and what is the Garden of Rest."

"The Garden of Rest! That sounds peaceful, but it is very vague,
Dick, as a direction. A garden in a forest hundreds of miles in
length will take some finding."

"I have a clue."

"So."

"There is mention of the 'gates' to the garden, whose summits 'are
in the clouds'--twin mountains, I take it."

"Even so, Dick, I think I should have more chance of finding my new
animal than you would have of hitting off your garden."

"Well, you know now why I have been studying Arabic. I have a little
money, and no ties."

"Like me. By Jove! why shouldn't we go out together?"

"Because we have some sense, I suppose," said Compton, coolly. "Have
you ever roughed it?"

"I have slept out in the New Forest--often."

"Oh, that's picnicking, with the bark of the fox in place of the
lion's roar, and good food in place of 'hard tack,' and perhaps the
attentions of a suspicious keeper instead of a surprise attack by
wild men of the woods. An explorer needs experience."

"Yes, and he must buy his own experience; but tell me how he can,
unless he makes a beginning."

"Now we come to the point, Venning. He should begin with some one
who already has experience."

"I see. And you will wait till some seasoned explorer kindly asks
you to join him? You'll have to wait a precious long time."

"I'm not so sure," said Dick Compton, with a knowing smile.

"Have you found your explorer, Dick?" shouted Venning, eagerly.

Compton produced a leather purse and extracted a slip of paper cut
from an advertisement column, and passed it to his friend.

"By Jove! eh, that's splendid!" spluttered Venning, in his
excitement as he glanced at the paper.

"Read it over."

Venning read the notice--

"A GENTLEMAN, who is an experienced traveler, being about to enter
upon an expedition into Central Africa, would like to make
arrangements with two young men of education and of means to bear a
share of the expenses to accompany him.--Apply, for further
particulars, to D. H., No. 109  Box, Office of this paper."

"Let us write at once to D. H.," he said eagerly.

"I have seen him."

Venning took a deep breath and stared at his friend.

"I saw him this very morning," said Compton, quietly.

"And----------"

"He said you were too young! Eh? Go on--go on!"

"And I told him I thought I could find a friend who would join me."

"You mean to say that he agreed to take you?" cried Venning, jumping
up.

Compton nodded.

"Oh, splendid! And you will take me to him? You're a brick. What is
he like, eh? Is he old or young, eh?"

Compton kept cool outwardly, but he could not subdue the glitter of
his dark eyes, or keep the colour out of his cheeks.

"He is about five feet four. I can look over his head."

"Oh!"

"There are grey hairs in his beard."

"Quite old; old and little! What bad luck! He will have to look up
to us."

"Well, you know, he can't help being small, can he?"

"I suppose, like most little men, he is as vain as he can stick,
bumptious, and fidgety," said Venning, despondently.

"He struck me as being very quiet. At any rate, you can judge for
yourself, as we are due to see him within half an hour. You must
tell him that you are a naturalist, as he intends writing a book, in
which a great deal of space will be given to animals. He said he
felt a 'bit shaky on his pins' when it came to scientific terms."

"I should be glad to help him there," said Venning; "but it is too
good. He would never take a youngster like me."

"He said he would rather have a youngster who would carry out his
own views about treating a subject, than a man who would try to
teach him his business. Come along and see him for yourself."

"Within half an hour the two friends who had just left school
entered a room which was part library, part museum, armoury, dining-
room, and cabin, so crammed it was.

"This is my friend Venning, Mr. Hume."

"Glad to see you, Venning. Sit down anywhere."

Compton sat down between the horns of a bleached buffalo skull, but
Venning stood like one in a trance. His hand had been swallowed up
by a huge palm and thick iron-like fingers, and he was staring down
on a pair of the broadest shoulders he had seen, with an arching
chest to match. This was the pigmy he had imagined--this man with
the shoulders of a giant and the chest of a Hercules. Then his eyes
ranged over the walls, gradually recovering their animation.

"Know 'em," said Mr. Hume, waving a bronzed hand towards the wall.

"I think so, sir."

"Just reel off the names."

Venning reeled off the names of a score or more of animals without
hesitation, and Mr. Hume looked pleased.

"There are some men," he said, "who come in here and talk over me
and round me and under me about fur and feather, and they can't tell
a bighorn from a koodoo by the horns on the wall. Now, my friend,
you knew those over there in the corner were the horns of a koodoo,
but do you know his habits?"

"No, sir; but I spent a month watching a Dartmoor deer."

"A month! Can't learn anything in a month, boy; but you've struck
the right book. The pages that are spread out under the sky hold the
right teaching, for those who wish to learn about animals. There are
writers who make a study of structure; they argue from bones, and
classify; but bones don't tell us about the living flesh and blood.
You take my meaning?"

"You make a difference between the structure of animals and their
habits."

"That's so, my lad. Ever read Jeffreys, and the sketches by the 'Son
of the Marshes'?"

"They're splendid."

Mr. Hume nodded and filled a pipe, having a footlong stem, made out
of the wing-bone of an albatross.

"I want to describe the personal habits of animals in their
surroundings. I said 'personal' habits. Do you take me?"

"No, sir."

"You think I should use another word, and say, perhaps,
'distinctive' habits. I say personal. Now, you take a lion--a bush
lion or a veld lion, a yellow lion or a black lion, young or old.
That lion, whichever one you take, is a lion by himself. He's got
his own character and his own experience. All lions have ways in
common because they're built alike. They're heavy and muscular
because they've got to pull down big game; and because they're heavy
they move slowly, and because they move slowly they've got to adopt
common tactics in hunting. Good; but one lion differs from another,
and so with other animals, right away through the list. So, I say,
one must study the personal habits of animals in their own back
yard, so to say, before he can give a true description of them. Do
you take my meaning?"

"I should like nothing better than to study animals in their home,"
said the boy, burning with excitement.

"And the two of you think you would like to join me in my
expedition?"

Mr. Hume looked at them out of calm yellowish eyes as if he were
studying them.

"We should," they said eagerly.

"Think it will turn out a picnic--a glorified sort of camping-out,
with black fellows to wait on you, and a lot of shooting and
fishing? Is that your idea?"

"We were talking about that this morning," said Compton, "and we
came to the conclusion that exploring was hard work. We are prepared
for rough living."

"That's right. And you tell me that you are free to go without
giving anxiety to relatives, eh?"

"We neither of us have near relatives."

Mr. Hume stood up and felt each one over in turn, making them draw
deep breaths.

"Seem sound," he mused, "in wind and limb. But there is one thing.
The great danger in Central Africa is from fever--not from animals
or blacks." Here he took down a bottle of white powder, and placed a
large pinch in a wine-glass of water.  "Quinine is the traveler's
stand-by, but there are some who cannot take quinine, It has no
effect on them, and such people have no business to set foot in
fever districts. Drink this?"

Compton emptied the glass with a wry face, and Venning, when his
turn came, shuddered; but they got the dose down, and smiled.

"Now," said Mr. Hume, "you both of you give me references to the
headmaster of your school, and I will give you one in return. I will
make inquiries about you, and I would advise you to make inquiries
about me. You can come back here to-morrow afternoon, and if we are
mutually satisfied, we will then fix up a contract."

"I don't think we require a reference," said Venning.

"Why not?" said Mr. Hume, sharply.

"Because," blurted out Venning, turning red--"because you have lived
among animals."

Mr. Hume laughed heartily with a deep rumbling laugh.

"Animals are tricky, boy; and yet," he added, "there may be a
meaning in what you say. They have a dignity in death that is grand.
Go and make your inquiries, lads. I am Dave Hume, the hunter, and my
life has been passed in wild lands, but there are some in London who
know me."

He rose up to open the door, and Venning overtopped him by inches,
yet he did not look either small or unwieldy. His step was springy,
and his head, poised on a massive neck, was well set, with the chin
raised. He was a man, evidently, who had always looked the world
straight in the face. His eyes had a yellowish tinge, and in their
colour and their calm they reminded Venning somehow of a lion, an
impression heightened by the tawny hue of a long beard.

The next day, the references having been satisfactorily followed up,
the contract was entered upon, and the two boys paid over the sum of
Pounds 50 each to David Hume, who in his turn agreed to let them
share in any profits which the expedition might make, from any
source whatever.

"Profits, Mr. Hume?" they asked.

"Profits from hunting, from trading, or from discovery. I don't say
that we shall make anything. The chances are, of course, that we may
lose all before we are a month out, but it is always well to be
business-like. There is gold in Central Africa. We may discover a
gold reef. There are new animals in the forest. We may catch an
okapi, and if we could land it in England it would fetch a large
sum. We might snare a live gorilla, and there is not a gorilla in
the zoological gardens of Europe."

"A gorilla!" said Venning, thinking of a picture he had seen of an
erect man-ape bending a rifle-barrel into an arch as if it were a
cane.

"A gorilla!" said Compton. "I should like to find the Garden of
Rest."

"You have heard his story, Mr. Venning?" said the hunter, nodding
his head at Compton.

"Yes, sir."

"Well, it was because of that story that I have taken you two into
my expedition; otherwise I should have been obliged to decline your
services on account of your youth. But the story interested me, and
I will do my best to help Compton in his search."

"Thank you," said Compton, quietly.

"The Garden of Rest!" mused the hunter. "That, I take it, would be
an Arabian phrase; for such a term would not occur to a native, who
is too often idle to  attach much value to a state of rest. It
sounds peaceful;  but I have it in my mind that if we ever reach the
place,  it will be only after much hard work, much suffering, and
danger. You understand that this is no pleasure excursion?"

"We do, sir," said Compton; "yet we expect to get much pleasure from
the expedition."

"Another word. I am not an exacting man; but there is one thing I
will not tolerate, and that is disobedience. It is well to
understand that now;" and there came a stern expression into those
singular eyes.

"That is only right," said Compton; and Venning agreed.



CHAPTER II

A NOVEL CRAFT

A month was devoted to preparation--a month that was full of
pleasure to the two friends, for they came into close touch with
Dave Hume the hunter, and learnt to regard him almost as a brother.
Ordinarily, he was curt in his speech and cold in manner, especially
with strangers; but at night, when he had shed his boots and coat,
he would talk to them freely of his hunting experiences, and listen
with interest to their opinions. He never laughed at their mistakes,
nor damped their enthusiasm, but he got the best out of them by a
fine courtesy that seemed part of his nature.

Thus it was that when, early in the first week, Venning said he had
an idea for a boat that could be easily carried round the cataracts
and worked without much labour, he was at once encouraged to give
plans and specifications.

"I read once about a 'sneak-box'--a flat-bottomed shooting canoe--
that could carry a sail and serve at the same time as a cabin."

"I have used one myself duck-shooting. Go on."

"Well, sir, I built a boat on the plan given, and spent a holiday
one year on the Broads. It drew very little water, and was easily
managed. However, you know all that. But what I was thinking about
was a design for a larger boat of the kind, with a propeller
attached to it which could be worked by lever."

"By a lever?"

"Perhaps you have seen a lame man working a bicycle by a lever--
well, after that principle. There would be a steel rod with cog-
wheels, and one man could work the lever as the lame cyclist does
without the labour of  rowing." Venning waited nervously for the
criticism.

"At any rate the lever would be a relief after the paddles," said
Mr. Hume, gravely.

"But that is not all," continued the inventor, hastily. "I would rig
up a light American windmill amidships, which could work the screw
and get more speed with a following wind in conjunction with a sail
rigged up forward."

"Bravo, my boy!" said Mr. Hume, laughing. "How many revolutions of
the screw to the minute do you expect to get out of your windmill?"

"That depends on the power of the wind, sir. Do you think it is a
mad scheme?"

"It would impress the natives," said Compton, "and at any rate we
could start wheat-milling, you know, in case we came to the end of
our resources."

"There's no wheat in Central Africa, you duffer! Besides, sir, it's
mainly a question of gear. With a lever, cog-wheels, and a running
chain after the pattern of the cycle chain, one could----"

"And ball bearings," suggested Compton, slyly.

"Yes; and ball bearings--the friction would be reduced, and we could
get more power out of a screw and propeller than we could from four
paddles."

"You may be right," said Mr. Hume, thoughtfully.

"We don't want to take a large party, and I confess the water
transport has bothered me very much. The wind-mill, I am afraid, we
must leave to some other time, but the other part of your scheme is
worth placing before practical men, and I will give you a letter to
a friend of mine who had a boat built on the Thames."

Venning saw the friend the very next day; the friend gave him an
introduction to a member of a great firm of torpedo-boat builders on
the Thames, and this gentleman very kindly gave the matter five
minutes' attention.

"Your idea, eh?" said the great designer. "Explain what advantage
you expect to gain."

"Less labour in working than with paddles, and greater speed."

"Humph! Well, my lad, you leave the matter with me, and I will
report. You can look over the yards if you like."

Venning spent the rest of the morning among the wicked-looking
sharks of the Navy, and he went back depressed with the thought that
his "sneak-box" was merely a plaything. However, he picked up
confidence when the next day brought an offer from the builders to
turn out an aluminium sneak-box in three divisions, with capacity
for a crew of six, to be worked on occasion by two men pulling at
levers, driving the propeller by means of endless chains and cog-
wheels, the gear to be made of best oil-tempered nickel-steel, with
hardened ball bearings. Each division, when detached, of such weight
that it could be easily carried by three men, but no guarantee given
that the propeller would give the speed desired.

"That is good enough for us, I think," said Mr. Hume.

"They give no guarantee," remarked Compton, cautiously.

"No; but they would not undertake the work unless they had some
belief in the idea, and if the propeller proves useless, we can at
the worst unship it. In any case we must have the boat, and we could
not improve on the makers."

The order was given, and by the fourth week the little boat was
launched on the Thames for its first trial. It looked workmanlike in
spite of its wide beam and shallow draught, for the great designer
who had fashioned the lines of the fastest destroyer afloat had
himself drawn up the plans after giving a day's careful thought to
the job. The shaft, which rested on nickel-steel sockets, with ball
bearings supported by nickel-steel ribs for lightness, was protected
by a water-tight casing, and all the other parts made of the very
best metal, so as to secure both lightness and strength, with a
complicated set of cog-wheels to take off the strain. The steering
was by a neat wheel right forward, where the look-out man could have
an uninterrupted view. Forward, too, was the socket for the metal
mast. The boat was fifteen feet in length, with a beam of four feet
amidships, tapering fore and aft, with a well in the centre, and the
remaining space covered in with a light aluminium deck, strengthened
by oak bends. There was sleeping-room for two, so that with a crew
of four there would have to be four watches of three hours each. The
peculiar features of the long, low craft were the two levers rising
above the after-deck through slots, which gave each a thrust of
about one and a half feet, and two  saddle-like seats borne on stout
supports, one near the stem facing the bows, and the other further
forward facing the stem. Venning perched himself on one seat,
Compton on the other, one of the hands took the wheel, and Mr. Hume
and the designer sat in the well.

Compton's clear-cut face, with well-formed jaws, showed no other
sign of interest than a rather amused smile, but Venning's fair
features were flushed with excitement and nervous expectation, A man
pushed the boat out. It moved at first sluggishly.

"Full speed ahead!" cried out Mr. Hume.

Venning pulled his lever over, and as he shot it back Compton pulled
his, the two moving to and fro easily as if they had been rowing a
steady stroke.

"She moves, she moves!" cried Mr. Hume, with a shout.

"Take her over the mile," said the designer to the steersman; and he
pulled out his watch with exactly the same look of calm interest he
showed when presiding over the trial of the fastest craft afloat.

The shining aluminium boat answered to her helm, slipped through the
muddy waters in a graceful curve, and then steadied for the straight
course.

"Let her go, boys."

The levers worked to and fro with an easy swing; there rose the hum
of the chains moving easily below, and the quickened churning of the
propeller blades.

The designer glanced from his watch to the bank, which was fast
slipping away, and nodded his head at Mr. Hume.

"Easy all. I think she will do;" and he nodded at Venning. "Ten
minutes."

"Ten minutes!"

"A mile in ten minutes--six miles an hour!"

"And it was as easy as nothing," said Venning--"wasn't it, Dick?"

"Like cutting bread," said Compton.

"Very good, I think; but you must remember that she carries no
cargo. Now we'll try her with the sail alone, and then with the sail
and screw combined, and then with the screw and oars, for you will
see that I have fitted row-locks."

Under a fair breeze the boat skimmed along at a merry pace, with no
wave worth speaking of; and with the sail and screw she put on an
additional four miles, and with the oars an extra three, making from
nine to ten miles an hour.

"I congratulate you, Mr. Venning," said the designer, as they
stepped out, thoroughly pleased.

"I am sure, sir, we thank you," said the boy, warmly.

"Eight," said Mr. Hume; "and we are thoroughly pleased with the
craft, every one of us."

"She is a beauty," put in Compton--"a real beauty; and I think she
would be perfect if a light awning could be fixed up over the after-
deck."

"That could be done easily.

"It would be an improvement, certainly," said Mr. Hume.

"I will rig up brackets to hold the rods for the awning."

"And we could fix up mosquito curtains round the sides. That is A 1.
Now, what is her name to be?" And Mr. Hume looked at Venning.

He had thought of a name, and was prompt with it--the Okapi.

"And what does that mean?" asked the builder, with a smile.

Venning explained, and the name was adopted.

"Now," said the builder, "if Mr. Venning will come down to-morrow
afternoon, my workmen will take the Okapi to pieces in his presence
before packing it for delivery in the docks, and explain thoroughly
how it is to be put together. I will give orders for several extra
plates with fittings to be placed in one of the divisions, so that
if you have an accident you will have the material for repairing the
mischief. You understand, aluminium cannot be soldered, but you
could cover a hole by means of nuts and screws."

Venning was in time next day to receive his instructions, and made
in his note-book an outline sketch of each part. While he was so
engaged, Mr. Hume, with Compton, were seeing the outfit packed for
the steamer, every purchase having been made with great judgment, so
that nothing superfluous figured in the list. Their armament
consisted of one double express for Mr. Hume, two sporting carbines
for the boys, three Mauser revolvers, and one fowling-piece, strong
hunting-knives, as well as four Ghoorka knives for cutting a path
through the forest. As far as possible all their food-stuff was
concentrated in tabloids and essences; each had his own special tin-
lined  medicine-case, in addition to the common drug-chest; each
his own water-bottle of double canvas, a material which, permitting
evaporation, keeps the water cool; and each his regulation "billy,"
or cooking-tin. As for clothing, it was a mixture of luxury and
rough wear, of the best silk underwear, cellular shirts of a light
blue, and yellow chamois-skin breeches, warranted to grow tougher
with use. Putties were discarded, as likely to give harbourage to
"jiggers," which bore into the toes, in favour of soft leather high
boots, tightly fastened at the knee; and the outfit included needles
for the making of moccasins, or  veld schoen, from the hides of the
larger antelope.

"Why do you select all blue shirts, Mr. Hume?" asked Venning.

"On account of the mosquitoes."

"Consider the feeling of the gorillas," said Compton, dryly.
"Perhaps they would prefer green."

"They may find us green enough for their taste, Compton; but I am
not joking. Mosquitoes have a preference for some colours and an
aversion for others. They dislike blue most of all, so you see I
have a purpose in selecting blue--not only for the shirts, but for
the mosquito curtains."

"All these precautions for a wretched fly."

"Exactly. A mosquito's gimlet carries more terrors for the explorer
than the elephant's trunk, and his hum is more dreaded than the roar
of the lion. The mosquito is fever-winged, alert, and bloodthirsty.
He carries the germs of malaria with him; and malaria kills off more
men than all the reptiles and wild animals combined."

"Is there no way of fighting?" asked Compton, impressed.

"Oh ay; they are fighting him on the West Coast by draining the
swamps, where he breeds about the villages. But who can drain the
swamps of the Congo, or let light into the Great Forest?"

"Then we stand a fair chance to catch malaria?"

"A better chance," said Mr. Hume, grimly, "than we have of catching
the okapi. Fear the mosquito, but at the same time take every
precaution against its attack. I have an idea myself that nature has
provided a safeguard."

"Quinine?" said Venning.

"Quinine is an antidote. I mean a preventive--but that is your
department, Venning. It will be one of your duties to study the
little brute, and you may make a great discovery, for instance, it
has been discovered that the mosquito dislikes certain colours. Why?
It may be that he would show more distinctly on one colour than on
another, and so fall an easy victim to an insect-eating bird. But it
may be that the leaves of some plant of a particular hue, or the
juices of the plant, are distasteful to the insect. Flies don't like
the leaves of the blue-gum, and I guess mosquitoes have their likes
and dislikes. Find the plant they dislike, and we may defy them."

They had no accommodation for such a luxury as a tent, but instead
they purchased canvas hammocks, each with a waterproof covering, and
a roll of green canvas with strong eyelet-holes, to serve the
purpose of a tent, in addition to a canvas awning with bamboo rods,
to cover the whole boat in case they were not able to land for any
length of time.

It was a pleasant time for the boys, and when at last they were
pitching down the Channel into the Bay of Biscay, having meanwhile
passed through a miserable twenty-four hours, they inhaled the
strong salt air and clapped each other on the back.

It was grand!

They stood in the bows, one hand on the rail, the other on the brim
of a hat, and tasted the salt with a smack of the lips. The wind
blew its life into their eyes, brightened them, toughened their
skins, reddened them, and the spray, drying on the red, softened the
colour to a fine healthy brown. Then the good ship heeled over and
rolled back with a swing of the yards, and the first roller from the
Atlantic went majestically by. They were on the old, old track of
the adventurers, of the sea-rovers, of the great captains, of the
empire builders, and before them, far off in the fastness of the
Dark Continent, was the Great Forest with all its secrets fast held.



CHAPTER III

THE CANOE ADRIFT

They passed in time the rocks that guard Madeira, the green bay of
Funchal, the peak of Teneriffe, and then the ship turned on its heel
to the West Coast, and, while yet a thousand miles away, was
welcomed by two messengers--a shrike and a hawk-moth, who had sailed
along some upper current of air with red sand from the Sahara to
filter down at last on to a firm resting-place.

They went away down into the Gulf of Guinea, and with many a call by
the way to discharge cargo,  approached the mouth of the Congo,
whose flood gave a tawny colour to the sea. So far they had seen
nothing but the squalid fringe of the Continent, and the damp heat
had steamed them and tried them, but the young explorers had not
lost the fine edge of their imagination. They knew that hundreds of
miles back in the unexplored heart of the land there were secrets to
be unraveled, and though they shed their warmer clothing, they
retained their ardour. The river somewhere in its far reaches held
for them, and them alone, new forms of life--the  grandfather of all
the crocodiles, a mammoth hippo; and  somewhere in the forest was
some huge gorilla waiting to offer them battle. Moreover, were these
not the gates of the Place of Rest?

"Surely," said Compton, as they steamed slowly into the night off
the mouth of the great river, "thy slave is not cast down because
the black children of the mud-house at our last calling-place did
mock us with their mouths, and the man, their father, wore the silk
hat and frock-coat of civilization?"

"Perish the thought," said Venning, throwing a banana peel at a
brilliant flash of phosphorescent light in the oily waters. "Yet the
man-who-was-tired, he of the parchment face, who sat on a verandah
with his feet on the rail, prophesied that within seven days we
should be sighing for English bacon in the country where a white man
could breathe."

"There is no snap in the air; but I can breathe freely. See;" and
Compton took a deep breath.

"That is the teaching of the hunter," said Venning, wisely. "Deep
breathing gives a man deep lungs. That is his teaching. Also this,
that a man should keep his skin clean and his muscles supple by hard
rubbing after the bath. Therefore, I did ask the bo'sun to turn the
hose on us in the morning when they clean down the decks. It is good
friction."

"And he has another saying--that it is good for the skin to apply
oil with the palm of the hand till the skin reddens. I have a smell
about me like a blue gum-tree, for the ointment he gave contains
eucalyptus oil."

"And the fat of a goat. There is much virtue in goats' fat, and the
eucalyptus is not to the taste of the trumpeter."

"The mosquito?"

"Even so."

"Then why don't you say so in good English?" and Compton dropped
away from his high-flown speech. "I bet that's a shark kicking up
all that phosphorescence."

"He swims in fire, like the--like the----"

"Sprat!"

"Like Apollo, you lean-minded insect. With every sweep of his tail
he sends out diadems of liquid gems, and his broad nose shovels fire
before him like a----"

"Stoker. Exactly; and if we had a lump of fat pork and a hook we
could drag him up and collect a basketful of jewels.  I dare say he
is leering up at us with a green and longing eye."

"Did you hear that cry?" asked Venning, suddenly.

"No." "Was it the shark whispering, do you think?"

"Shut up and listen."

They leant over the rail and peered into the night. The drowsy air
throbbed to the measured beat of the engines, but they scarcely
noticed that accustomed sound.

"There it is again."

"Yes. I heard something like a sheep bleating."

"Would a sheep be swimming out here, you ass?"

"The shark's off--look!" and they saw a streak of fire shoot
forward.

"And there goes another. By Jove, they must have heard the cry!"

"I'm sorry for the sheep then," muttered Compton.

They bent far forward, listening intently, and following the course
taken by the sharks as defined by the gleaming wake. The leadsman
swung out the sounder as the vessel slackened down with a yell from
the escape-valve that drowned all other sounds with its deafening
clamour.

"By the deep nine!" cried a bass voice.

The bell in the engine-room signaled the skipper's order, and the
ship felt her way once more. Again there was silence, save for the
throb of the engines and the grating of the steering-chain at
intervals.

"I have not heard the cry again," said Compton.

"Can you see anything over there--follow the line of my finger--
there, just by that gleam?"

"Yes; I think there is something."

"Then I think the captain ought to know;" and Venning ran off first
to Mr. Hume.

"Something afloat, eh?" and Mr. Home rose from his deck-chair.

"Some one in distress, I think," They went on to the bridge, and
Venning began his story; but the captain cut him short by wheeling
round to the rail.

"Ahoy, there--ahoy!"

A startling response came in a long, quivering wail out of the dark
sea.

"By the lord," muttered the captain, "what's that?"

"Jackal," said Mr. Hume.

"Impossible! We are miles from the shore."

"Jackal, sure enough. Maybe sent adrift by a flood, and taken to a
tree."

The captain laughed. "I thought it was a hoodoo at least.  Well,
lad"--turning to Venning--"you don't want me to pick up a creature
like that?"

"I don't think it is far away, sir. I think I see a tree or boat,
and if you would lower me over the bows and ease the vessel----"

"Well?"

"Perhaps I could pick it up."

"You are not afraid of being bitten?"

"I think it would know I meant it good."

The skipper laughed good-humouredly. "Well, you're a plucky lad,
and, at any rate, I'd not be losing time." He touched the bell, and
motioned to the steersman. The ship slowed down and came round. "Mr.
Bobbins, just sling this young gentleman over the port-bows, and
have a light lowered.  Do you still stick to your bargain?"

Venning answered by sliding off the bridge and climbing up into the
bows, where a knot of sailors had gathered at the gangway. A rope
was looped round his thigh, so as to give his arms play, and two men
stood to pay him over and down.

"Here she is!" sang out the mate.

The bell rang out, "Stop her," and Venning went over, catching the
rope above his head with his left hand, and taking a turn round with
his right foot. There was a scraping sound against the side of the
vessel.

"I've got hold," he shouted. "It's a tree--no, a boat." Then, "By
Jove!"

"What is it?" cried several together, excited by the startled
exclamation.

"Lower the light!" The lantern sank over the side, but those above
could not see well because of the bulge of the hull.

"Now lower me. I shall get in and make fast."

"Take care!" cried Mr. Hume.

"Look out for the sharks, sir," sang out a sailor. "There's one
coming up."

"Lower away, please--quick!"

The men lowered. "That's right. I'm in the boat, or whatever it is.
Now let down the lantern."

Those leaning over the side saw Venning reach up for the lantern,
and then they heard a snarling and snapping.

"Stand ready to haul in!" cried the captain. "That brute will attack
the boy. One of you men go down."

The snarling continued, mingled with soothing cries from Venning;
and then the weird howl burst forth anew, daunting the sailor who
was carrying out the captain's order.

The mate stepped forward. "Stand aside!" he cried, and swung himself
over and down. He reached Venning's  side, and they saw him peering
about him.

"By thunder!" he muttered.

"What is it?" demanded the captain, irritably. "D'ye expect me to
spend the whole night here?"

"A minute, sir. Let over a running tackle, and we'll have the whole
thing aboard."

"Lively there! Lower the tackle, and don't stand staring with your
mouths open. Swing out those davits."

The davits swung out, the tackle ran through the pulleys into the
water with a splash, and the mate shifted the unknown craft, with
its mysterious freight, amidships. A few moments he occupied in
getting the tackle into position.

"Haul in!" he shouted.

"Heave!" roared the captain, in a state of high excitement; and the
sailors, wrought up to a pitch, heaved with a will.

The captain, Mr. Hume, and Compton, peering over the side, saw a
long, narrow canoe rising up, with the forms of the mate and Venning
standing amidships, and some huddled object aft.

The canoe swung clear of the rails, the tackle was made fast, the
davits swung in, and then the canoe was slowly lowered to the main
deck.

"Why, it's a man," shouted Compton.

"And a dog," muttered the sailors, falling back. "With a mouthful of
teeth."

The mate and Venning stepped out as the canoe reached the deck, and
the mate turned the lantern full on the huddled group, showing a
jackal, with raised mane and bared teeth, crouching over the
prostrate form of a man, whose teeth also were bared, and whose eyes
seemed to glare with the same fury that showed in the flaming green
eyes of the animal.

"What a pair of demons!"

"The man is gagged and bound, captain," said Venning.  "If the cook
will bring a piece of meat for the jackal, I think I can get to the
man without trouble."

"You've done very well, Venning," said Mr. Hume, quietly. "Leave
this matter to me; it is more in my line."

With his eyes on the jackal, he placed his hand on the side of the
canoe and moved forward gently while he spoke in Kaffir. "Peace,
little friend," were his words, as he afterwards explained to the
amazed captain. "We are hunters both, eh? We know each other, eh?
There is no harm in me towards you. You know it, little hunter; you
know it well."

It was strange to hear the deep accents of an unknown tongue,
strange to see a man using speech in complete gravity to a wild
animal, but stranger than all to note the effect on the animal
itself.

At first the red mouth opened wide and the green eyes flamed up, but
as the strong hand crept nearer, the glare went out under the steady
gaze of the man's tawny eyes, and next, with a whimper, the jackal
crept forward on its stomach, till the sharp black nose smelt the
man's hand.

"We are friends, little hunter, we three;" and the great fingers
passed over the yellow body up towards the face of the bound man.
"Friends--together--for we are hunters all--you, myself, and this
poor one here with his speech cut off." "We will see to that, eh?"
The fingers were on the man's face, and with a twist the gag was
out, and the man drew in his breath with a great sob.

"Ow--ay, that is better; now a little water."

Still keeping his eyes fixed on the man and his beast, Mr. Hume held
out a hand for a cup, and with a moistened handkerchief bathed the
cracked and swollen lips. The eyes of both the man and his beast
continued fixed on the hunter, following his every movement, and
never straying to the ring of faces round, showing white in the
glare of the light. The strong fingers moved swiftly here and there,
loosening the hide ropes that bound the legs and arms, and then
rubbing ointment with a strong smell of eucalyptus into the bruised
skin.

"So--now a little broth for the man, cook, and a scrap of meat for
the jackal. Gently, gently, cook; don't scare them, and don't crowd
in, you others."

"Ay, ay," burst out the captain, in a sudden fury. "What's the whole
ship's company doing here? Is this a garden-party, Mr. Robbins?"

"Get forward!" roared the mate, in a voice that sent the jackal
almost crazy with renewed fright; and at the creature's wild cry the
sailors hurried off, muttering that they had taken a whole cargo of
misfortune aboard.

The hunter looked reproachfully at the mate, who was mounting to the
bridge, and then began once more to soothe the frightened animal,
which in time took a bit of raw meat he proffered.  The man drank
his broth, and then sat up to stare about him with quick glances.
When lying down he had seemed black, but, now that he was in the
light, it was seen that he was more mahogany than black, with a more
prominent nose and thinner lips than are usually found with the
negroid stock. His hair, however, was in little tufts, and the white
of his eyes had the smoky hue of the negro. As he sat, Mr. Hume
rubbed the back of his neck, and fed him with broth, a mouthful at a
time, and as this went on the fierce black eyes again and again
returned from their swift, suspicious range to the hunter's face.

"He seems to grow stronger," said Venning.

"Fetch a rug from my cabin; we will make him a bed in his own canoe.
He will rest easier there till the morning."

The rug was brought, and the man nodded his head as it was arranged
comfortably; then, with another long intent look at the hunter, he
settled himself down with a sigh, spoke a word to his strange
companion, which at once curled itself at his feet, and was asleep.

"Now, boys," said Mr. Hume, "you go to bed. I will watch here, and
in the morning, maybe, we will find out the mystery."

In the morning the steamer was on the yellow waters of the Congo,
and the boys forgot even about the strange couple in their first
view of the mighty river; but the sight of a native-manned canoe,
shooting out from the mist which hung in wisp over the waters,
recalled the incident. They found Mr. Hume in an easy-chair,
drinking his early morning cup of coffee, and at his feet,
stretching along the scuppers, was the canoe, still with its crew
aboard and asleep, though the jackal slept apparently with one eye
open.  The canoe was, they saw, made out of a single tree-trunk, and
was thickly coated with the slime of the river, a heavy, sodden,
roughly shaped craft, most unlike the light boat that skimmed into
view from out the mist.

"What do you make of it?" said Mr. Hume, after the two boys had made
a long inspection.

"It seems to me," said Venning, "that the jackal has a very dark
coat."

"That is so; it is unusually dark. What does that suggest to you?"

"Well, as the colour is adapted to the nature of the country in
which the animal hunts, I should say that the jackal came from a
wooded district."

"Good. And what is your opinion, Compton?"

Compton bent down to examine the bows.  "Look here, sir," he said;
"there is a prayer to Allah carved in Arabic on a leaden medallion,
and fixed into the wood."

"Is that so?" and the hunter looked at the signs with interest. "I
had not seen that. And it means----"

"That Arabs had something to do with the making of the canoe."

"Umph! I doubt very much if it is Arab-built. That talisman may have
been found by a native and fixed on--though that is impossible;" and
Mr. Hume pondered. "The Arabs may have taken the canoe from the
native owner and fixed in the medallion."

"He's awake," said Venning; and the three of them saw that the man,
without so much as a movement of surprise at his awakening under
such altered circumstances, was keenly observing them.

After he had gravely inspected each in turn, he sat up and raised
his hand in salutation. The rug slipped off his shoulders, showing
his bare breast, with every rib exposed, and clearly outlined in
blue was the form of an animal.

"A totem!" exclaimed the hunter.

"Otter," said Venning.

"Ask the steward if he has the porridge ready that I ordered."

Venning ran off, and returned with a basin of thick oatmeal
porridge. The man took it gravely, made another salutation, and ate
the whole.

"There's nothing wrong with him," said Mr. Hume, with a smile. "Now
we'll get him out of that and fix him up comfortably. I like his
looks, and have hopes that he will be useful."

They removed him to a deck-chair, whither he was followed by the
jackal, who was in such a state of  suspicion that he declined food.

"What I think," said Mr. Hume, in answer to the boys, who wanted his
explanation, "is this--that the man and the jackal have come from
the interior."

"From the Great Forest?"

"Probably from the Great Forest; for these reasons--that the men who
shaped the canoe had no knowledge of the coast-built craft with
their high bows; that the man is of a different race from the coast
tribes; and because the jackal, from his dark markings, is evidently
from a thickly wooded region. That is merely a theory, which does
not help us much, and certainly does not explain how he came to be
bound and gagged in a canoe at sea hundreds of miles from the
forest. However, the main point is that we have got him, and having
got him, will keep him."

"Against his will, sir?"

"Oh, I reckon he will be only too thankful for our protection."

"I should think, sir," said Venning, "the fact of his totem being an
otter proves that his tribe derives its living mainly from fish."

"That is plausible; but it may, again, be a sign of chieftainship,
and a chief I have no doubt he is. Maybe he was sent adrift by some
rival faction; but that can scarcely be, for he would not have
survived a long journey; and, again, the canoe would have gone
aground."

"There is another explanation," said Compton, with a grin. "He may
not have come down the river at all. He may have been set adrift
from one of those ships we passed for insubordination."

"Ships do not carry canoes or jackals," said Venning, who had made
up his mind that the castaway was from the forest, and from nowhere
else.

They went down to breakfast, and the morning was occupied in getting
their kit and packages together. At noon the steamer was berthed at
a pier, and their packages were transferred to a paddle-wheeler,
which was to take them over three hundred miles up the wide estuary
to a Belgian station. Thence, perhaps, they would proceed hundreds
of miles further by another river steamer before they took to their
own boat.

"Why, we may be days before we really get to work," said Venning,
when the vastness of the Congo was forced on his attention by a
casual reference to "hundreds of miles."

"Days--weeks, my boy, before we come to the fringe of our field. The
river is more than half the length of the Continent; its length is
half the distance by sea from Southampton to the Cape, and, next to
the Amazon, it pours a greater body of water into the sea than any
river in the world."

"Africa," said Compton, "seems to be the driest and the wettest, in
parts, of any country; and all its great rivers, except the Nile,
run to waste."

"They'll keep," said Mr. Hume.  "When the old world gets tired, worn
out, and over-populated, it will find use for these big, silent,
deserted rivers, that would carry the ships of the world on their
yellow waters."



CHAPTER IV

THE STORY OF MUATA

They went from the wide estuary into the true river, with a width
that opened out at times to twenty miles; and while the white men
sweltered on the sticky decks, the rescued man grew in strength.
When they reached Stanley Pool his skin was like satin again, with a
polish on it from the palm-oil he rubbed in continually.

And when he found his strength he found use for his tongue, and in
the speech he made to his rescuers. Mr. Hume caught the meaning of a
few words of Bantu, Compton detected a phrase or two in Arabic, and
Venning, who had been schooling himself since they passed Banana
Point at the river mouth, picked out other words in the tongue of
the river tribes.

The meaning of his speech, when they had made a mosaic of the
different understood facts, was this--that he was a great man in his
own land, but only a child now, being without arms or men, but that
if the white men ever came to his place, he would be a father and a
mother to them. He would throw his shield before them, and protect
them with bow and spear.

After this they sat together learning a polyglot speech that would
serve roughly as a medium of exchange.

And this was the story of the chief, slowly put together out of
these talks--

"I am Muata the chief. The kraal of my house is toward the setting
sun, but the fire no longer burns on the hearth. The men-robbers
fell upon the place in the early morning.  The people were scattered
like goats before the lion. Many were taken by the men-robbers, and
many were slain; and among them my father.

"The chief's wife, my mother, fled with me into the Great Forest.
Many days she lived on roots, and the 'little people' found her in
her wanderings. They took her by crooked paths far from the land of
her people. Ohe!

"Through the dark woods--through the dark and terrible woods,
through the mist and the rain, with much pain, she followed them as
they went before her like shadows. And in the folds of her blanket
she bore me on her back. It is true.

"She was straight as the palm when she fled from the kraal, and when
after long journeying she set me down at the hiding-place, she was
thin and bent. Thin and bent was the chief's wife, she who had
maidens to wait on her.

"At the hiding-place in the forest there were people whose kraals
had been burnt by the men-robbers. Outcasts  they were, of many
tribes, living together without a chief; but the place was fat, and
they grew fat, being without spirit.

"And Muata the child played with other children and grew. He grew on
the fatness of the land, and when he could walk, his playmates were
the young of the jackal; his playthings were the bow and the spear.

"Ohe! Muata grew to strength like the lion's cub in the knowledge of
the hunt. She, even his mother, taught him to follow the trail,
showed him the leaf bruised by the foot of a man traveling, showed
him the tracks of the beasts, taught him the cries of the animals.

"She rubbed the oil into his skin, set him to hurl the spear, to
shaft the arrow, to hit the mark; set him to run and swim, to creep
like a snake, to bound like the buck.

"So Muata grew in the ways of a hunter; and when the men of the
place went on the hunt, Muata went with them--went as a hunter, and
the hut of his mother had meat to spare.

"Then the chief's wife took the boy to the headmen, and the witch-
doctors. They drew on his body the sign of the otter--he who is
cunning and brave, who is at home on land or in the water. They made
him a warrior, he who was a boy, because there was always meat in
the hut of his mother.

"But his mother spoke. 'O Muata, hunter of the wild pig, take your
spear and your bow, and the quiver of arrows with the iron heads.
You will hunt men.' Thus it came that Muata went alone on the war-
trail. With him went his mother, who carried the pots and the
sleeping-mat, she who carried nothing at her kraal.

"The trail led into the Great Forest toward the rising sun, and
there were dangers between the sunrise and its setting--dangers
between the setting of the sun and its rising.

"A man-ape of great stature, hairy and fierce, stood before us in
the path. He lifted his brows at us, and bared his teeth. Muata was
afraid, but his mother called to him softly--called to him not to
run, called to him to drive this thing from her path.

"Muata notched an arrow and smote the man-ape in the neck. Yoh! He
stood like a man upright, and roared. His roar was like the roar of
a lion in pain. Foam came from his lips, and his eyes were fierce.

"The knees of Muata shook; his blood was like water. He was afraid,
but his mother laughed and cracked her fingers. The man-ape drew
near, but she stood--she the chief's wife. So Muata the boy notched
an arrow, and would have loosened it, but she spoke--'Let him come
still nearer, O warrior.'

"Muata grew stronger at the word. The man-ape came nearer. Three
paces away he stood--and his head was above the head of Muata, his
arms were like a young tree, and the chest was like the chest of two
men. He opened his mouth and the arrow flew into his throat, bit
deep till the point stood out behind. He clutched the shaft with his
hands, rocked, and fell, and Muata, taking his spear, thrust it
between the great ribs.

"Yoh! the man-ape was dead, and the chief's wife broke the great
teeth from the jaw, and cut off the hairs above the eyes. She burnt
them, and mixed them with his blood, for Muata to drink.  Muata
drank and was strong.

"So those two passed through the forest, through the silent dark of
the woods, in pain and hunger. Passed out into the plains where
there were kraals and yellow men in white coverings.

"And the chiefs wife spoke: 'Behold, it is for this I have suffered
much for thee, Muata. What I have sown in sorrow and pain I will
reap in your strength. Look and look again! Those are of the race
who destroyed the kraals of your people. They are men-hunters,
kraal-burners, slayers of children. Steal upon them where they walk
idly, and for each arrow slay a man.'

"Muata waited on these men a day and a night, and when he sought his
mother on the edge of the forest his quiver was empty, and the
chief's wife spoke: 'Where did the arrow strike, O warrior?'  And
Muata answered, 'In the throat, O my mother.'  And the chief's wife
said again, 'It is well; but the warrior sees to it that he can
recover his arrow.  And your quiver is empty.'  So Muata returned
and recovered his arrows, for the men lay where they fell, the
living having gone into the kraals in fear.

"So Muata and the chiefs wife went slowly back to the place of
hiding. And because Muata had slain the man-ape and the robbers--
they who slay children--the chief's wife sought out the headmen, and
spoke: 'Oh, listen! This is Muata, the son of a chief. He has slain
the man-ape, and for each arrow that was in his quiver a man-robber.
It is fit that he be your chief.' But they laughed, and the chiefs
wife held her peace.

"And again, after the crops were gathered, Muata went again on the
war-trail alone--went to the river, followed it down the bank, and
the little people led him to a kraal in the wood by the river bank--
a kraal with a high fence, the kraal of the yellow men-robbers.
Muata dived beneath the fence with a short spear in his hand. With
his spear he slew the man who watched by the gate, opened the gate,
and put fire to the huts. The yellow men ran, some into the forest,
and there the little people found them; others fled into a canoe to
cross; Muata swam after, and with his spear ripped open the bottom,
so that it filled and sank.

"And again, when the place of hiding was reached, the chief's wife
sought out the headmen and spoke, saying that Muata was a chief's
son. They put her aside with words, saying there was no proof of
this last thing he had done. But Muata whistled, and the little
people came forward, saying the chiefs son had destroyed the kraal
of the  evil-doers. Then the headmen took counsel, and again put the
chief's wife off.

"The chief's wife bowed her head, but, seeing that she was weak, and
that her mind was fixed on the thing she asked for, Muata took the
matter into his own hand. He bade the women prepare a big hut for
his mother--he put a stick to their shoulders; and when a man sought
to slay him there in the presence of them all, Muata smote the man
under the arm with his spear. So they built the great hut, and women
waited on the chief's wife, his mother, carried water for her, cut
the wood, and built the fire.

"So Muata was chief, and year by year he led the men of the place
against the yellow robbers, till the name of Muata was feared.

"The would Muata take to himself wives, and would drink beer, and
grow fat; but his mother counseled with him, saying he was a boy--
saying he was only at the beginning of the path. And Muata listened,
for she was wiser than all, and he set his heart on the plan she put
before him to win back the land of his people.

"Thus Muata the chief was still a warrior and a hunter. He followed
the spoor into the fastnesses of the woods, and trained the young of
the jackal to drive the buck towards him.

"Ohe! it was ended. The evil-doers, the child-slayers,  the robbers
of men, sent spies into the forest, and when Muata returned from his
hunting there was wailing at the kraal, and the fire was dead on the
hearth. And the women cried, 'O chief, they have taken the lioness;
they lured her out with tales of ill that had befallen Muata, even
the young lion. So she went forth between the gates, and they, the
robbers, carried her away.'

"Muata turned on his heel straightway. He sought the trail of the
man-thieves. It was plain and level. It led through the forest, and
by night his jackal led him on the scent. By day he followed; by
night and day Muata went on the track to the river. At the river he
heard news. They had gone on the river towards the setting sun.

"Muata took a canoe from the river people, and with his jackal he
followed, while the sun rose and set many times, and he came to the
father of rivers.

"The waters were wide, and his canoe was like a leaf carried here
and there. His heart was sad, but the spirit of his mother
prevailed. He followed, and a man came to him saying that the yellow
men were near at hand, and sick of the sickness that shakes. Muata
gathered together his strength and pushed on. Ohe! and he fell into
the hands of his enemies like a child. He went among them sleeping,
and when he awoke his hands and limbs were bound.

"And the enemy mocked him, saying, 'Is this Muata?' saying, 'even
the ant will make him cry aloud;' and they smeared fat on him. They
shook the ants over him, and they bit deep. They reviled him, they
spat on him, as day by day he followed in the canoe tied to their
greater canoe. They made plans about him to kill him, but the chief
man said even a dog had his price. So they forebore to slay Muata,
but they carried him down the father of waters to where there was a
still greater canoe with wings. They put a gag into his mouth to
still his voice, but in the night the jackal bit through the rope,
and Muata was alone on the waters.

"Then the jackal cried suddenly, and Muata was borne out of the
water, and he was fed.

"That is the story of Muata, and his heart goes out to the white men
who brought him out of the darkness."




CHAPTER V

TROUBLE BREWING

That was the story of Muata!

The white boys looked and wondered. This man who had been through so
many dangers could not be much older than they were. If his story
were true, he had shown endurance, courage, and a force of character
that set the stamp of greatness upon him as greatness would be
reckoned among his kind.

Was it true that he had slain a gorilla with bow and arrow, that he
warred successfully against the Arab slave-hunters? Had he subdued a
band of men by sheer force of will?

The boys believed him.  They did not stop to ask whether the story
was probable.  They formed their opinion upon the manner of the
young chief--upon his grave dignity, and upon the absence of a
boastful spirit.

"If his story is true," said Mr. Hume, "he owes much to his mother."

"Where is your mother?" asked Compton.

"The chief's wife is not a woman," said Muata. "And yet she is a
woman. She beguiled them in the forest by pretence of great
submission and fear of the woods. So they trusted her to bring
firewood, believing she would not go far from the camp. But she was
watching  for sign of the little people. This I know, for she
vanished in the woods near the river. And the yellow hunters of men
knew not how she had gone; but they left word to people by the river
to say to me that my mother had been carried away in a canoe."

"And what will you do now?"

"See, I am no one--a liver on kindness, a slave at the gate. But in
time Muata will return to the place of hiding."

"Better stay with us, Muata. We go into the forest ourselves. We
will give you food, and teach you how to use the weapon of the Arab
hunters. You will hunt for us, work in the canoe for us, and, maybe,
we will go with you to your hiding-place."

"The forest is dark and terrible. Why, will my father enter the
darkness with his sons?"

"We go to hunt, and for the love of the woods and the water. Has not
a hunter joy in the hunting?"

"I know it;" and the chief observed them intently, as if he were
unpersuaded. "The ways of white men are strange. Muata hunts to keep
the hut supplied with meat, but the white man carries his meat with
him. When he kills he leaves the meat and takes only the horns or
the skin of the thing he has slain. Muata is not a child. When he
sees a single vulture in the sky, he knows there are others coming
behind.  A white man comes out of the beyond into the black man's
country. He is soft-spoken; he is a hunter only. Mawoh! and behind
him comes an army."

"What do you know about white men, Muata?"

"The wise men at the hiding-place talked. They knew one such. He
lived among them. His ways were strange. He talked with the trees;
he sought among the rocks; he communed with spirits. He was
harmless, but the wise men said others would follow on his trail
doing mischief. So I ask, my father, why do you wish to enter the
forest?"

"Because," said Compton, leaning forward, "my father was lost in the
forest, and I would find him. Tell me, where is the white man your
old men talked of?"

"The forest takes, the forest keeps," said Muata, lifting a hand
solemnly.

"Do you mean," asked the boy, quietly, "that the white man does not
live?"

"The people dealt well by their white man. They gave him food; they
carried water for him, and built his fire. Even I, as a child,
carried wood to him and listened at his knees."

"I am not blaming the people; but I want to find the place that is
called the Place of Rest, where my father lived; perhaps where he
died."

"This, then, is the hunting?" said the chief, softly.

Mr. Hume recognized the suspicion in the altered tone and suave
manner of the chief.

"We have spoken," he said sharply. "We go into the forest to hunt
and to seek without anger against any. We thought you would have
worked in well with us; but I see you are a man of a crooked mind."

"Softly, my father," said the chief, quietly. "Is it wise that a
chief should listen to the counsel of strangers without taking
thought for his people?"

"We saved the chief's life."

"The chiefs life is his own"--Muata snapped his fingers--"but the
secret of the hiding-place is the life of the people. Go slowly, my
father. Muata would work for you and with you; his shield is your
shield; his eye is your eye; but the secret of the hiding-place is
not his to give away."

"Then you must land here on the bank among your enemies."

The chief glanced at the far-off wooded banks, with lines of smoke
rising from cooking-fires.

"I have no weapons," he said.

"We cannot help that," said Mr. Hume, with indifference.  "Either
you agree to take us to the Place of Rest, or you land."

Muata rose up, looked under the flat of his hand all around, then
let the cotton sheet they had given him slip to the deck. The jackal
started up, with his ears pricked and his eyes fixed on his master's
face. The chief caught hold of a wire rope and jumped on to the
rail, where he steadied himself.

"What will you do?" asked Mr. Hume.

Muata turned round and pointed to the otter on his chest.

"You don't mean to say," said Venning, indignantly, "that you are
going to let him swim ashore? Why, the bank is miles away, and the
crocodiles are in between."

Muata's glance fell on the jackal, and he spoke to it. The animal
whined, then crouched.

"A favour, my father," he said. "If the beast followed me, he would
be food for the crocodiles. Place him on land when you reach the
bank, for the sake of good hunting."

"I will do so."

The chief took another long glance around, then drew himself up for
the dive.

"Stop," said Mr. Hume.

Muata looked round.

"Your shield is our shield. So be it. We will not ask you to lead us
to your hiding-place. Is that so, Compton?"

"When he leads us," said Compton, nodding his head, "it will be at
his own will."

"At any rate," muttered Venning, "he has proved himself to be a man;
but I wonder if he would have reached the shore?"

As he spoke the jackal howled, and the chief, who was still standing
on the rail, slipped and fell with a splash. They ran to the side,
and the jackal, with another howl, sprang to the rail and thence
into the river, where a second or two later it was in the troubled
wake of the steamer, beating frantically with its fore paws.

"Man overboard!" shouted Mr. Hume. "Stand by with a rope."

But the Belgian skipper on the little bridge held to his course,
while a small knot of coloured passengers aft stood laughing and
chattering.

"Stop her, you swab," cried Mr. Hume; then, as the man took no
notice, he ran to the wheel, thrust aside the steersman, and jammed
the wheel over.

The displaced man, with an oath, flung himself at the hunter with
the sympathy of the passengers, who, ceasing their laughter,
advanced with menacing cries.

Before the boys had time to comprehend the situation, Mr. Hume
settled the matter out of hand. Letting go the wheel, he caught his
assailant by the waistband, and with a heave flung him overboard.
Then with a quick right and left he sent two of the others reeling.

"Now," he roared at the skipper, "back her, or by the Lord I'll
fling you in as well."

"Fetch the rifles," said Compton to Venning.

A moment later the two boys stood at the ready with their rifles,
and amid a babel of cries the skipper signaled "Stop her." The
steamer slowed up, swung gently round, and shaped back to where
three dark spots showed.

"There are four," cried Venning, at his first swift glance; "and one
is a crocodile. It is making for the jackal."

"Take the wheel, Compton," said Mr. Hume, quite calm again. "Give me
your gun, Venning."

The hunter, with the gun, went to the side and looked over. Nearest
him was the man he had thrown overboard;  beyond was the jackal,
making a great splashing; and further on was the face of Muata, who
was crying out encouragement to his faithful companion as he swam
swiftly towards it; and to the left, moving rapidly towards the
jackal, was the crocodile, swimming in a great swirl, with only his
eyes showing, and the end of his snout. The hunter steadied himself
with a shoulder against a stanchion, and then, without hurry or
excitement, and after a look round the deck at the people, to see if
there was any further mischief brewing, took deliberate aim and
fired.

A shout went up, and the very people who had a minute before been so
hostile, now were abject in their praise of Mr. Hume, for the
crocodile span round and round in answer to the shot.

"Stand by with a rope, Mr. Compton," cried the hunter, taking
command as if by right; and Compton obeyed promptly, but without
excitement.

The first man caught the line and swarmed up wet, but subdued in
spirit, casting an appealing glance at his late assailant. Muata, in
the mean time, reached the half-drowned jackal, held it by the
scruff of the neck with one hand, and, turning over on his back,
waited for the rope. This flung and seized, he also climbed on
board, but there was nothing abject in his appearance. Standing with
his head thrown back and his nostrils quivering, he glared a moment
at the group of natives; then, seizing a bar of iron, he made a
bound forward, uttering a wild war-whoop.

There would have been bloodshed had not Mr. Hume, with surprising
quietness, flung himself forward and seized the chief round the
waist.

Compton, cool and ready, wrenched the bar away; and, seeing this,
the natives plucked up spirit, calling on the white man to throw the
"black dog" to the crocodiles, which had been attracted by the blood
of their wounded fellow, still beating the water in his flurry.

Venning, however, stepped between with his rifle, and the uproar
ceased once more.

"Now," said Mr. Hume, holding the chief by his arm, "what does this
mean? What harm have those men done you?"

"My father has the lion's grip. Mawoh! Muata was a babe in his
arms."

"That may be, but it is no answer."

"What harm! Did not my father hear the jackal give tongue?"

"I heard; and those jackals there"--indicating the watching group--
"yelped at me, so that I flung one into the water. But--what then?
Do you seek to slay when your beast howls?"

"My father does not know, then."

"I want to know, for it seems to me you were all mad together."

"Ohe! it is the madness that slays. Ask of those mudfish there for
news of the man who stood behind them to slay Muata, who had the gun
aimed to shoot when Muata leapt into the water. Ask them, and they
will lie."

"What manner of man was this?"

"One of those who hound me in the canoe--even one of the man-hunters
who seized my mother."

Mr. Hume looked at the boys. "Did either of you see an Arab on
board? Muata says a man was about to fire at him when he sprang
overboard."

"I thought he fell," said Compton. "I saw no one with a gun."

"Nor I," said Venning; "but the Arab may have gone below."

Mr. Hume hailed the captain. "My man said an attempt was made on his
life. Have you taken an Arab onboard?"

"I have some mad English on board," said the captain, gruffly; "and
I will see they do not stay on longer than I can help."

"As to that we will see."

The captain nodded his head and signaled full speed ahead, turning
his back on the Englishman.

"I think we can manage the lot," said Compton, coolly.

Mr. Hume laughed. "Perhaps so; but it would be very awkward to be
detained at the next station as prisoners, or to be sent back. We
must let the matter slide."

"Shall we search the ship, sir?"

Mr. Hume shook his head. "Suppose we found some suspicious
passenger. What then? There was no actual attempt on Muata, and we
have only his word; besides"--and he glanced at the angry captain--
"there is no need to look for trouble--it will come."

He was right. At the next station, reached within a few hours, the
captain lodged a complaint to the  authorities in the persons of the
Belgian officials, who  were evidently charmed with the opportunity
of teaching the Englishmen a lesson.

First of all, they placed Muata in chains straight away on their
finding that he was a dangerous person. When Mr. Hume protested,
they placed him under restraint; and that done, they pronounced
judgment. The English would pay a fine of Pounds 100, surrender
their weapons, and return to Banana Point by the next steamer down.

"Is that all?"

"That is all. But stay. As you will be possibly detained a
fortnight, there would be a charge for  maintenance."

"Be good enough," said Mr. Hume, producing a document,  "to read
that paper. It is a passport from the President of the Congo State--
your king--authorizing Mr. Hume and party to proceed with his
servants by land or water anywhere within the State for purposes of
exploration."

The officers examined the document with sour faces, and one of them
made an observation in a low tone.

"Precisely," said the other.  "This document," he remarked, turning
to Mr. Hume, "is not in order. It has not been visaed by the
officers at the sub-stations."

"But it was initialed by your superior at the coast."

"It must go back to the sub-stations for endorsement."

Mr. Hume put a restraint on his temper. "And how long will that
take?"

"Who knows? Perhaps a month."

"And in the mean time?"

"In the mean time, m'sieur, you will remain our guests."

"Is there no other way?"

"Monsieur must surrender himself to the unpleasant delay. There is
no other way."  "Unless--but m'sieur would not perhaps face the
expense."

"Explain, gentlemen."

"There is a special transport for State business, but to call upon
the service for other than State purpose there would be a charge of
ten pounds per day."

"I see." Mr. Hume saw that these gentlemen wished to make money out
of him. "Very good. I will myself go to the sub-stations by your
special transport, and if the Governor says the charge is
reasonable, I will pay on my return. I think that will meet the
matter."

But it did not at all meet the matter, and the junior officer at
once informed his senior that unhappily the special transport had
that very morning developed a leak in the boiler.

There followed an embarrassing delay. The authorities waited for Mr.
Hume to make a business-like proposal, but the hunter remained
grimly silent. The two officers whispered.

"Observe, m'sieur," said the senior, clearing his throat, "my
colleague suggests a middle way. If you will place sum demanded by
the State in these cases, in the nature of a surety for good faith,
we may permit you and your friends to proceed."

"My servant also?"

"Your servant?"

"The man you have bound."

"Ohe! Pardon, m'sieur; you are not aware that he is an offender
against the laws--a notorious criminal. He will be detained and
tried."

"I will remain to attend his trial, unless a sum will secure his
freedom also?"

"There is a price on his bead."

"Offered by the slave-hunters?"

The shot went home. The officers had been hand in glove with the
lawless traders, but they did not want the matter bruited about by
meddlesome Englishmen. They scowled.

"He has broken the peace," said the senior, sharply; "he has slain
the servants of the State. Am I to understand that you claim to be
his master, responsible for his conduct?"

"No, m'sieur," exclaimed the hunter, quickly, fearing he had gone
too far, and shifting his ground. "The man is a stranger; do with
him as you please; but as for us, since we are here, we will, with
your permission, make the place our headquarters. We could not be in
better hands."

"You wish to wait for another steamer while your passports are
visaed?"

"We will proceed in our own boat, which we would put together."

"Ah, you have a little boat?"

"A very small boat, m'sieur, with barely room for four men. We
should be honoured to have your opinion on its qualities, and also
upon our stores and their suitability."

Venning looked at Mr. Hume with puzzled eyes. He could not
understand his callous abandonment of Muata.

"But," he began, "we cannot----"

"I think it is an excellent place," said Compton, quickly; "and
perhaps these gentlemen would be good enough to assist us with
advice out of their great  experience."

"We should be delighted," said Mr. Hume, politely.

The senior officer stroked his huge moustache with an air of renewed
importance.

"There are two spare rooms in my little house," murmured the junior--
"one for the stores, the other for sleeping quarters."

"It is understood," said Mr. Hume, "that we pay rent, and also that
we pay for the protection you may afford us. I insist on that,
messieurs."

The senior nodded a dignified assent, but he was not quite won over,
and retired to his quarters, while his junior inspected the landing
of the goods, including the sections of the boat. In the afternoon,
however, after his nap, the senior succumbed to the influence of a
good cigar, and condescended to sample some of the stores. He was
even pleased to crack a few jokes over the novel machinery for
working the screw of the Okapi by levers, and in the  evening he
invited Mr. Hume to a friendly game of cards, thoughtfully including
in his invitation a bottle of brandy and a box of cigars, for, said
he, he wished to wash out the execrable taste of the everlasting
manioc.

All the day Muata stood bound to a post in the square, the central
figure of a ring of squatting natives, who chewed manioc and
discussed his approaching fate with much satisfaction.

He was there, an erect, stoical figure, when the boys sought their
room in the little thatched house--a room bare of furniture, divided
from the next compartment by hanging mats of native make.

"It's a beastly shame," said Venning, for about the fourth time, as
he stared out at the black faces reflected in the blazing log-fires.

"What is a shame?" asked Compton, who was inspecting the  partition
before seeking his hammock.

"You know well enough. Not a soul stands by the chief; even his
jackal bolted as soon as he jumped ashore."

"Because Muata ordered him. He is probably watching from  the dark."

"All the worse for us, then. I never thought Mr. Hume would have
knuckled down so easily. Hark at him shouting over the game."

"What is the game, do you think?"

"Cards," snorted Venning, in disgust.

"So! Queer sort of partition this;" and Compton moved the mat aside.
"No need for doors, you see. Hulloa! Who are you?"

"Me Zanzibar boy, master," exclaimed a soft, oily voice.

"Then clear out."

"Me put here watch my master--see black fellows no steal."

"Oh, I see.  Chuck a cake of tobacco, Venning. Here! You like that?"

"Ver good," said the boy, reaching out a yellow hand for the
tobacco.

Venning crossed over and peered into the other room. "You boy," he
said, "tell me, what will they do to Muata?"

The Zanzibari chuckled. "You want know, eh?"

"We don't care. One black fellow does not matter," said Compton,
coolly.

"You brute!" muttered Venning, but stopped as Compton's hand gripped
him.

The Zanzibari chuckled again. "What you give, eh, if cut loose that
Muata?"

"What do you say?"

"You pay me? Good. In night Muata is loose. He run up river. Bymby
master go along in little boat, pick Muata up, eh? What you pay?"
and the boy chuckled softly.

"Suppose I tell your white master, you rascal?"

"Wow! You tell, they kill poor Zanzibar boy."

"Then clear out," said Compton, launching a kick; "and if I see any
more of you I will tell."

The boy turned sulky. "Me guard--me stay."

"You go," said Compton, "or I will call your masters, and let them
deal with you."

Growling under his breath, the self-styled "guard" slunk soft-footed
out of the room.  Compton struck a match and looked around the
apartment, then turned to Venning with a grin.

"That is the game," he whispered.

"I think I understand," Venning replied softly. "That fellow was
testing you?"

Compton nodded.

"And you think Mr. Hume has not forgotten Muata?"

"I am sure he has not."

They crept into their hammocks, but not to sleep, and they were wide
awake when Mr. Hume entered noisily some two hours later.

"To-morrow night," he shouted boisterously.

"With pleasure, and the night after, for good visitors are rare,"
called the Belgian.

"And good hosts also. Touching those two men you promised as the
crew for my boat?"

"They will be here to-morrow evening," said the senior officer,
thrusting a head round the mat. "Ah, you are comfortable, eh? Yes, I
sent a messenger to Hassan's camp by the vessel which brought you.
Rest well."

"They are good fellows, these Arabs," said Mr. Hume, with
enthusiasm--"good fellows. I remember once----"

"To-morrow night," said the officer, as he withdrew, laughing.

Mr. Hume hummed cheerfully as he prepared for bed, taking no notice
of his young comrades, who were regarding  him with silent
disfavour.  With one yawn after another he blew out the light, and
struggled into his hammock, to fall asleep almost at once.

Venning's uneasiness returned. He tossed restlessly, listening to
the unaccustomed noises from without, and as the hours went by, and
at last the sound of talking about the fires died off in a lazy
drone, the desire to see what had become of Muata was too strong to
resist. Softly he lowered himself to the earth-floor, but, soft as
he moved, others had heard.

"Are the mosquitoes troublesome?"

Venning started at the deep voice so unexpected. "I did not know you
were awake, sir."

"I sleep very lightly my boy."

"As you are awake, sir, I would like to say----"

But he stopped as the mat rustled.

"Come in," said Mr. Hume.

"Me guard, great master"--in the same soft, oily tones Venning had
heard before. "Hear noise. Think may be thieves."

"Mosquitoes, not thieves," said Mr. Hume, quietly. "Bring a light."

The Zanzibar boy complied, and, holding a taper above his head,
looked not for mosquitoes, but at the rifles in the corner.

"The skeeters, master," he muttered, with an evil squint at Compton,
who was blinking at the light.

"Better get back into your hammock, Venning. You can go, boy; and
keep a good watch, for we are coming to the thieves' hour."

The man showed his white teeth in a grin as he withdrew.

"Don't stir from your hammocks until I do," said Mr. Hume, very
sternly, in a whisper; then louder, "Good night, Venning."

"Good night, sir," said Venning, convinced that the master was alive
to the game, and more easy in his mind.

As he dropped off to sleep he heard the wail of a jackal, and next
he was awakened by the sound of a native chanting. It was already
daybreak, and Mr. Hume stood on the verandah, having drawn the mats
aside.

The sun, striking under the thatch, shone on the hunter's tawny hair
and beard, and Venning wondered how for a moment he could have
doubted the courage of a man with such a lion-like head. But he was
to receive another shock.

"Silence, dog!" roared the hunter, addressing the singer, evidently.

Compton, who was sitting on his hammock dressing, looked out.

"By Jove," he muttered, "he's shouting at Muata!"

Venning jumped down to the floor and looked out. Muata was still
bound to the post, and, with his face to the sun, was chanting his
words of greeting or of farewell in tones that lacked the deep
chest-notes of his war-cry.

One of the natives, hearing the order of the white man, flung a
stick at the chief with an insult; but Muata, nothing heeding, sang
on his slow song in a voice that was almost like a woman's.

"Must white men lose their sleep because a robber is to die?" roared
the hunter again.

Venning snatched up a beaker of water and ran out barefooted. He
held the water to the chiefs mouth. Muata turned his smouldering
eyes on the boy, sucked in a mouthful of the water, and then shot it
out over Venning's outstretched arm.

Venning dropped the mug, and went back with a red face to see the
two officers regarding him with sour faces.

"Serve you right," shouted Mr. Hume, in apparent fury. "When will
you learn to treat a black like the brute he is?"

"Quite so," said the senior officer, showing himself. "I am glad to
find you have no ridiculous sentiment."

"Ah! good morning, my friend," said Mr. Hume, heartily. "As for my
young comrade, you must pardon him."

"He has his lesson," said the officer, dryly, as he pointed to the
soaked pyjama.

"The man woke me with his singing. I have seen men shot for less
than that."

"In good time," said the officer, with a sinister look, "the
accusers will be here to-night, and to-morrow"--he made a gesture--
"to-morrow you can also choose the two men you need for your boat's
crew."

After breakfast, Mr. Hume had an opportunity of speaking without the
fear of being overheard, for they finished putting the Okapi
together, and worked her out by the levers into the river, where she
gleamed in the sun.

"I dare say you think I am a brute," he said, "and I don't blame
you; but if we mean to save Muata's life, we must appear to be
altogether indifferent to his fate. Those men are keeping a close
watch on us."

"I know it," said Compton.

"You do, eh?"

"That Zanzibar boy was spying on us last night before you came, and
he tried to get us to bribe him to free Muata."

"I hope you were not so foolish as to fall into the trap?" said the
hunter, sharply.

"I kicked him out of the place," said Compton. "I told Venning you
were playing a game for Muata's life."

"You did me justice?" said Mr. Hume, with his gaze on Venning.

"It seemed to me terrible to leave him without a word of
encouragement," said the boy; "but I am awfully sorry I doubted you,
sir."

"You don't now, eh? Well, that's all right, and I think the chief
knows too. That is why he spouted the water over you."

"A strange way of showing his gratitude," laughed the boy, with a
reddening face at the thought of the outrage.

"Not so strange. He saw the Belgians, and did it to put them off
their guard."

"That ought to help us in our plans for his escape."

"We have plans, have we?"

"You have," said Compton, confidently; "and your plan is our plan."

"Thank you," said the hunter, quietly. "If the plan is to succeed,
it must work to-night. I do not fear these people here, but I must
say I fear the Arabs who are expected this evening."

"I understand that you will choose two of those Arabs as boatmen?"

"The Belgians have arranged that, Compton, not I. Have you any
suggestions to offer?"

"I think, sir, that we should get all our things stored in the boat
to-day," said Venning.

"Eight; and then?"

"And then," said Venning, his face all alight with ardour--"and
then--why, sir, then you shoot one of the hippos over there on that
little island. Shoot two; and while all the people in the village
are cutting them up for a great feed, we could free Muata
undetected."

"That is not so bad," said Compton, judiciously.

"Not at all," said Mr. Hume. "But when Muata is free, what is to
become of him--suppose, that is, he can get away unobserved?"

"I have it," said Compton. "The Zanzibar spy suggested it. Let Muata
wait for us up the river, and we will pick him up."

Mr. Hume stroked his beard for some moments in silence.

"We'll, try that plan," he said finally; "but don't show any
excitement. The native, remember, is a very keen observer. Now pull
the boat in."



CHAPTER VI

THE FLIGHT

In the afternoon the village hummed with excitement. The word had
gone round that the new white man who had shot the crocodile would
give a feast, and the people squatted in rows on the bank watching a
couple of their stalwart fellows preparing a canoe for an expedition
after the river-horse.  When Mr. Hume appeared with his Express in
company with the Belgian officers, who were indifferent sportsmen,
the people saluted him with a feeling of gratitude for favours to
come in the shape of fat meat.

"Good luck," said the junior officer, "but I back the animals; they
are very wary and very fierce."

"What is the betting?" cried the hunter.

"Oh no, my friend!" exclaimed the senior. "Keep your money for to-
night; and don't drown yourself. We must have one game, you know."

"Very well. By the way, Compton?"

"Yes, sir."

"You and Venning may as well amuse yourselves by getting the stores
on board in case we leave to-morrow."

"That depends on how the game goes," replied the officer. "If you
win, we must keep you for a return match."

"That is only fair. But I may lose; so, my lads, go on with the
packing."

The boat went off up the river hugging the banks, and the whole
village sat down to watch the stalk, all but a few who went to and
fro between Venning at the house and Compton in the boat, carrying
the stores. The two officers turned in, with mats drawn, to enjoy
their siesta, and the guards on duty sought the shade of the trees
by the bank to watch the hunt.

The hunt was not a matter to be decided out of hand, by a swift
paddle straight up to the sand-bank in the river, and a chance shot.

The canoe crept up slowly and passed out of sight. The old hunters
in the watching crowd took counsel together, and then the chief of
them announced what would happen. The "slayer of crocodiles" would,
he declared, get above the island and then slowly descend with the
current upon the river-horse.

"May he shoot straight and his powder be strong," shouted a river-
man; "for it is the father of bulls who sleeps there--he who has
eaten many canoes."

"It is the same," said the old hunter; and, taking a pinch of snuff,
he began to tell the deeds of the old bull hippo.

So the drowsy afternoon passed lazily away to the watchers, and
wearily to the white boys. Their thoughts were in the canoe, and,
moreover, they were irritated by the slowness of the men who carried
the parcels. No man would carry more than one package at a time, and
after each journey he sat down to rest and discuss the chances for
and against the feast.

When the shadows were creeping across the deserted square--deserted
save for the man bound to the post, Venning for the hundredth time
looked across with an aching desire to rush over and cut the bonds.
As his eyes ranged sadly over the bronzed figure, he detected a
movement in the shadow of a hut opposite. Looking more attentively,
he saw the round ears of a jackal, and then made out the sharp face
resting between the outstretched paws, and the yellow eyes fixed
intently on the chief.

Muata lifted his head slowly, as if it were top heavy for the
muscles of his neck, and his gaze went sideways to see if any
watched.

Venning nodded eagerly from the shelter of the room; made a movement
with his hands as if he were cutting; pointed up the river and
spread his arms like a swimmer.

Muata let fall his head again, with his chin on his naked breast;
and the carriers ranged up for the last load. A shout from the bank
made them hurry. Several people who had gone to see about their
fires rushed, yelling, across the square to the bank.

"It was as I said," shouted the old black hunter. "See where he
creeps down-stream on the bull." "Wow! he has hidden the canoe in
leaves. It is as a tree floating."

"Ow ay, we smell meat!" sang a big man, stamping his feet.

"We smell meat--red meat, fat meat; the red meat of the fat cow for
the women; the tough meat of the old bull for the men;" and the
women clapped their hands.

The Belgian officers were awakened, and stepped out of their
darkened rooms. They found the village empty, save for Venning
stooping over his last parcel, and Muata at his post with what
looked like a yellow native our lying at his feet.

"The bull opens his mouth!" chanted the old hunter. "He wakes from
his sleep! There is the smell of man on the wind! He looks around!
He sees a tree borne on the current! He will surely eat lead!"

Venning picked up his parcel and followed the officers. Out of the
comer of his eye he saw the seeming yellow cur lift its head and
smell at the thongs which were bound about the prisoner's legs. Then
he hurried on.

"Wow! the bull drives, the cow into the water. He is cunning. Ow ay,
he knows."

"What does he know, old talker?" asked one of the officers.

"The cow is fat," laughed the old man.  "The hunter would shoot the
fat cow first, and so the bull makes her take the risk. He is wise."

"He is shameless!" screamed the women.

"See them?" said Compton, offering his glasses to Venning and
pointing up-stream.

Far up Venning saw three dark objects on the shining glance of the
vast river. One, the canoe fringed with branches, slowly drifting
upon the other two, raised but a few feet above the water on a
gleaming yellow sand island. One hippo, with its huge head swinging,
was standing up, looking not unlike an overfed prize pig. Then the
other rose, and the two walked towards the water.

"Wow! the old bull keeps on the safe side. I said it; he is wise."

"Shameless!" cried the women.

"Wherefore does the crocodile-slayer delay? Surely he knows the body
will sink in the river if it reach the water."

"The smoke! He fires!"

"The cow is down! To the boats children--to the boats!"

Men and boys made a rush, and, out of a tremendous uproar of
splashing and shouting, half a dozen canoes were flying at full
speed for the cow's meat, altogether indifferent to the future
proceedings.

"The smoke again! The bull has it! He is down; he is up; he is in
the water! Wow! Look out, O 'slayer of crocodiles!'"

"But the cow lies still!" cried a woman, anxiously.

"Oh ay, there will be meat for the feast. But what of your man in
the canoe if the bull seize him?"

"It is his risk," said the woman, calmly.

Venning dropped the glass, and he and Compton stood looking from the
island to the old hunter, who seemed to know every point in the game
better than they could follow through the glasses.

"Ah, it is well. They tear the branches from the canoe. They row
straight for the island. The white man jumps--the men tumble out--
wow-wow!--the bull takes the canoe in his jaws. It will go hard with
those who go for the meat if he get among them."

"The white man leaps in the water!" shouted another. "But he holds
his gun above him. He reaches the sand; the others crawl up also.
They run! I do not see the bull!"

"There are crocodiles!" shrilled a woman, pointing with an arm
heavily ringed with brass bangles.

"This is not their fight, mother."

"But they will take our meat."

"It is the bull I think of."  "Will he meet the canoes, or will he
face the three on the island? The white man sees the canoes; he
waves them to go back, but they smell meat; they keep on."  "What is
this? He points his gun at them. They stop; they turn back."

"A pity," said one of the officers, with a grin.  "We should have
seen sport."

"But the sport is not over," said the other. "I back the bull.
Remember how he put you to flight, my friend. What is the meaning of
this, old man?"--this to a hunter.

"Surely, O great one, it means one thing. The white man is afraid
the canoes would draw the bull away. He wishes the bull to land--to
attack him."

"More fool he, ay, my friend," said the officer, with a sneer.

"One of the men on the island is pointing," said Compton, who had
taken up the glasses again. "I see something in the water where the
canoe went down."

"I said it," shouted the old black; "the bull will fight. Stand,
fast, O white man, for it is either you or he."

Those watching saw the bull land and hurl himself with amazing
swiftness at Mr. Hume.

"Why doesn't he shoot?" yelled Compton.

"Wow! the white man springs aside. The bull squeals; he staggers; he
is down. Behind the ear. I say it. There the bullet went in. There
will be much meat." The old man took snuff, and cast a proud look
around as if he alone had done the deed.

"By Jove!" muttered Venning, wiping his forehead. "It seemed a near
squeak."

The two officers went back to their cool rooms, and the crowd broke
up, the women and children going off dancing to collect firewood.
The little fleet of canoes descended on the island, and in a few
minutes the carcasses were hidden by bands of naked men, who slashed
and cut, while crocodiles, attracted by the blood, appeared from all
directions. In a very short time the fleet returned, and Mr. Hume,
standing in a heavily laden craft, ran a greater risk than when he
faced the savage old bull, for the gunwales were flush with the
water, and the men were utterly reckless as they dashed along at the
head of the flotilla.

As the men leapt ashore, women seized the meat, and the village at
once entered upon the wild orgy of the feast, forgetting Mr. Hume
and all else in the one desire to start their jaws on the half-
cooked flesh.

"Is all aboard?" asked Mr. Hume, as he jumped ashore.

"Everything," said Compton.  "We watched your shot, sir; it was
splendid."

"Well, that part of the plan has gone off all right. It will be a
more difficult job to free Muata and get away ourselves."

Venning described how he had seen the jackal approach the chief, and
as he and Mr. Hume went into the village, leaving Compton in the
boat, they cast an anxious glance at the square already agleam with
fires in the growing dusk. Muata was still at the post, his head
drooping and his body relaxed.

"That's bad," muttered the hunter; "he looks quite exhausted."

"Perhaps he's shamming."

"Let us hope so. In any case we may have to wait until past
midnight, as I am afraid our hosts will not let me off. It would be
better if we could get away early."

Fortune favoured them, for as the Zanzibar boy approached  with a
message from the officers, there arose the sound of rifle-shots from
the forest beyond. The people in the square shouted a reply, and
presently a party of men, dressed in long white robes, appeared.
They halted in the square, and the leader came on alone. He stooped
to stare into the face of Muata as he passed,  then approached.

"Welcome, Hassan! My people are feasting; thanks to the skill of my
friend here;" and the Belgian who had come forward indicated Mr.
Hume.

The Arab peered into Mr. Hume's face and salaamed, with an evil
smile on his wide, thin-lipped mouth.

"I am thankful," he said in the native dialect, "for your kindness
in bringing back my slave"--pointing towards Muata.

"It was a small thing," said Mr. Hume.

"But it pleases me; and when you reach my zareba, all that is mine
to command is yours."

He looked at Venning, and the boy noticed that the pupils of the
eyes had a white speck, which gave to them a sinister appearance.

"Good," said the Belgian. "We will have a night. Pardon me for a
short time while I discuss a little matter touching the reward for
Muata with my friend Hassan."

The two went off, the Arab casting a ferocious look back at the
chief.

Venning tugged at the hunter's arm.  "Look," he whispered.

Muata was slipping down the post, as if his legs had utterly given
way. The party of new-comers were stacking  their arms at the
"indaba" house at the end of the square, and the village people were
talking, laughing, and eating. Muata reached the ground, but not in
a state of collapse, for the next instant the two watchers saw him
crawl to the shadow of a hut, where he remained as if stretching his
limbs.

"Come," said Mr. Hume, in a fierce whisper, recovering from  his
surprise; and the two went swiftly to the river.

Compton had already cast off and was holding by the boat-hook.

"Bring her in."

The Okapi ran her stern into the bank, and the two stepped aboard,
Mr. Hume going forward to the wheel, with his rifle in his hand.

"Shove her off; run as silently as you can out of hearing, and then
work the levers."

Compton looked inquiringly at Venning as he picked up the oars, and
then at the village, from which came a loud babble.

"Is he free already?"

Venning nodded.

"Good;" and then they bent themselves to the oars with every nerve
on the quiver, and their eyes on the shore.

"Stop! Back-water!"

Obediently they stopped the way of the boat and backed her,
wondering what had gone wrong. A turn of the wheel sent them in
among the canoes. There was a flash of steel, a plunge of the strong
arm down into the boats, accompanied by a ripping noise. Then the
hunter waded ashore, and with his great hunting-knife ripped up the
boats lying on the bank. Quickly he was back at his place.

"Now, off!"

Again they pushed off, the boys with their excitement increasing
after this interlude, which showed them the imminence of danger. A
few long strokes took the Okapi well out; then she was put about
with her nose up-stream.

"The levers now, my lads!"

They perched themselves on the saddle-seats, and at the clanking of
the levers the beautiful craft slipped swiftly up-stream.

Then out of the dark there rose the mournful howl of a jackal,
almost instantly replied to by a similar call at a distance.

"The chief calling to his jackal," said Mr. Hume. "Thank Heaven, he
has got away. Now I will let him know we are also off;" and he, too,
gave the jackal  hunting-cry.

Back out of the darkness came the chief's exultant war-cry, and on
it a furious shout from the village, followed by the discharge of a
rifle, and the rolling alarm of a war-drum. Then shone out the glare
of torches at the river bank, and a savage yell announced that the
men had discovered the injury done to the canoes.

One of the purchases made in London had been a lamp with very fine
reflectors. This Mr. Hume fixed on a movable bracket within reach of
his arm as he sat at the wheel, and when the lights at the village
faded astern, he lit the lamp, in order to thread a passage by its
light through the dark waters. As the noise of shouting, the
drumming, and the report of fire-arms died down, other sounds
reached their strained hearing--the booming of the Congo bittern,
the harsh roar of a bull crocodile, and the cries of water-birds.

Then Venning laughed--a little short nervous laugh. "We have done
it," he said.

"We have, indeed," said Compton.

"But if we can only pick up Muata and his jackal, we should be all
right. Just a nice party."

The rudder-chains clanked; the boat set up a heavy wash as she
turned from her course.  There was a splashing, and something
snorted almost in Venning's face.

"Nearly ran into a hippo!" sang out Mr. Hume. "We must keep out into
mid-river; it's too risky inshore. Tell me when you are tired."

"We're quite fresh yet," replied Compton. "It is easier than
sculling."

"Moves like clockwork," said Venning, gaily. "I could keep on all
night."

"We'll have to keep on all night and all to-morrow," muttered Mr.
Hume; and in a few minutes he relieved Compton, making him put on a
heavy coat before taking the wheel. "It's the chill that is
dangerous. In an hour you will relieve Venning."

Turn and turn the boys relieved each other at intervals, but Mr.
Hume swang to his lever till the dawn, when the mast was stepped,
the sail spread, and the spirit-lamp got out for the making of
coffee. After breakfast the awning was spread, the mosquito curtains
stretched round, and the boys were ordered to sleep. They demurred
at first, but the hunter rather sharply insisted, and no sooner were
they stretched on the rugs than they were asleep. The yoke had been
slipped over the rudder, and, using the lines, Mr. Hume sailed the
Okapi single-handed, taking her across the lake-like width till he
was under the wooded hills of the south bank, where he beat about
for an hour or so in the hope that Muata might have covered the
distance at the native's trotting-pace. It was, he told himself, not
likely, however, that the chief could have done so, after being for
hours bound to a post; and after a time he beat out again into mid-
stream afar off, so that no village natives should spy upon the
craft. He did not share in the triumph of his young companions.  Too
well he knew that they had risked everything by their secret
departure; but he could not see that any other course was open to
them, as if they had remained it would have been difficult for them
to prove that they were not concerned in Muata's escape.  He knew,
too, that if he had abandoned the chief, as the price of security,
the boys would have lost all faith in him.

What, however, he did feel was, that the responsibility rested on
him. If a mistake had been made it was his mistake, and if the boys
suffered from it the blame would be his.

So he beat out into mid-stream, where the sail of the low-lying
craft would be but a speck when viewed from the shore, and with a
beam wind laid her on a course which she kept almost dead straight,
with a tack at long intervals only.  In the shade of the awning the
boys slept the dreamless sleep of the healthy, and he let them sleep
on till the sun stood almost above the mast, sending down a blaze
that scorched. Then he beached the Okapi on the shelving shore of a
sand-spit, without vegetation of any kind to give shelter to
mosquitoes, and awoke them.

"All hands to bathe!" he shouted; and the three of them were soon
in, and no sooner in than out; for, according to the hunter, the
virtue of a bathe was not in long immersion, but in friction. "With
their heads well protected, but their bodies bare to the sun, the
friction was obtained by rubbing handfuls of the dry, clean sand
over limbs and body till the skin glowed.

"Now I will snatch a few winks while you work the levers, until the
wind springs up again."

Mr. Hume stretched himself forward under the awning after unstopping
the mast; and the two friends, after tossing a bucket of water over
the canvas awning, took their seats, clad in pyjamas and body-belts
only, and bent gaily to the levers which "click-clanked" merrily.
Their feet were naked, for Mr. Hume had taught the lesson that the
feet should be cool and the head protected; their arms were bare to
the elbow, of a fine mahogany hue; their movements were brisk; but
the best evidence of health was in the clearness of their eyes.
Fever shows its touch in the "gooseberry" eye, dull and clouded; in
the moist pallor of the skin, and in a general listlessness. Even if
they are free from fever, white men in Central Africa often grow
listless because of insufficient nutriment. Their flesh-diet is
chiefly the white meat of birds, and their blood-cells are really
starved by the small amount of nitrogenous matter. A deficient diet
in its turn is a frequent cause of diarrhoea and constipation, two
of the most common complaints among new chums. In his hunting
expeditions Mr. Hume had learnt his lesson from experience, and he
accordingly was a martinet on the rules of health. All the drinking-
water was first boiled. The boys could wear as little as they liked
during the heat of the day, so long as they protected their heads
and necks, but on the approach of evening they had to get into warm
and dry under-garments; they had to keep a sharp watch for the
striped "anophele" mosquito, were taught to spray the puncture, if
they were tapped by the mosquito lancet, with chloride of ethyl, and
had to submit occasionally to a hypodermic injection of quinine. The
nitrogen they got from condensed meat juices.

"This is very much more like what I expected," said Venning, looking
from the broad river to the distant wooded banks, and from the dark
forest to the blue sky.

"I can see two string of duck, a whole crowd of ibis on a little
island, a crocodile and a hippo."

Compton, who was facing the stern, glanced over his shoulder, then
directed his gaze aft again.

"We seem to be traveling slowly," he growled.

"There's no hurry, is there?"

Compton raised his head a little, and looked under the shelter of a
hand.

"They're coming," he said briefly.

"Eh?"  Venning stopped, and looked back.  The water glimmered under
the sun like a vast silver sheet. "I can see nothing."

"Don't you see a dark smudge. Well, that is the smoke from a
steamer. I thought at first it came from a land-fire. But it does
not. Send her along."

Venning quickened up, and for some minutes pedals and levers worked
at almost racing speed.

"We cannot keep this up. Give him a call!" Venning shouted, and Mr.
Hume looked round.

"Bid you call?"

"They are after us," and Venning jerked his head back, while still
bending to his work.

The hunter loosened the canvas awning, and stood up for a long look
aft. Then he faced about, and threw a quick glance up-river.

"Keep her straight for that wooded island," he said, pointing ahead
towards the south bank; and Venning pulled the steering-line to
place the Okapi on a new course.

Mr. Hume took in the awning and packed it away. "Now, my lads," he
said, "we'll just face the position. That's the fort launch racing
up, and she could overhaul us in two hours. If we surrender we
should be safe from violence, but they would probably confiscate our
boat or detain us for weeks. If we resist they would be justified in
running us down. What shall we do?"

"Escape," said Compton.

"Of course," Venning chimed in.

"By attempting to escape," continued Mr. Hume, "we as good as admit
that we aided and abetted Muata, and, if captured, they would make
it harder for us."

"At any rate, we meant to free Muata."

"Besides, we must escape," said Compton, with  determination.

The perspiration was rolling off their faces, for, as soon as they
worked at high pressure, they felt the pull of the screw.

"Come forward, both of you," said Mr. Hume, rolling up his sleeves.
"Compton, you take the wheel, and Venning, you get out the guns."

They obeyed him, and he, kneeling on the aft-deck between the two
levers, grasped one in either hand, and got more speed out of the
Okapi than they had by their united efforts. The muscles stood out
like ropes on his brawny arms, and the levers smoked in the slots.

"Keep her to the north of the island."

The boat hummed along, drew up to the nose of the island, skirted
its reedy side, where stood a hippo eating at the rank grass, and
then dropped it astern.

"Good," said Mr. Hume, with a great grunt of satisfaction,  as he
swept his eyes over the river.

"See those dark spots ahead? They must be the first of the thousand
islands that stretch away right up to the Loanda river. If we can
get into them we are safe."

"Can I help?" asked Venning, having set out the rifles in the well,
with the ammunition handy.

"Whistle for a wind.  That's all. Fix your eyes on the islands,
Compton, and slip in where they are thickest."

"Ay, ay," muttered Compton, frowning under the stress of his
excitement.

Venning searched for the field-glasses, and as the island they had
passed sank low astern, he swept the river for sign of the pursuing
launch.

"By Jove!" he muttered, with a start.

"Well?"

"She has shifted her course. I can see the white of her hull right
under the trees on the south bank."

"She must have gained a lot, then," grunted Mr. Hume, "if you can
see her hull."

"She's making out again. Perhaps she put in to speak a native
village, and maybe they have not seen us; we are low in the water."

"They'll see us soon enough. Tell me when she passes the island we
just left."

"She's making across. No, she's turning. Ah, now she's pointing
straight for us. I can see several people in her bows."

"Now turn your glasses on the islands ahead."

Venning turned round, and looked up-stream.

"Is the launch nearer than the islands?"

"I can see a stork standing on the edge of the water. The first of
the islands is nearest." He turned again to watch the launch.
"There is more smoke--they are stoking up."

The launch was unquestionably coming up hand over hand, and it was
not long before Venning could see the foam at her bows, and the flag
of the Congo Free State flying at her stern. Then he saw a ball of
smoke.

"She is firing!" he yelled.

Compton never took his eyes off the little cluster of reeds ahead
that marked the first of the thousand islands.

"Keep her going!" he shouted.

Mr. Hume smiled grimly, for he was doing the work of two men.

"They are loading the gun!" cried Venning. "Oh, if I only could
help!" He buttoned and unbuttoned his coat, then picked up the
sculls, and fell to rowing with fierce energy. "The smoke!" he
cried. Then, a moment later, "What's that noise?" as a menacing
sound with a shrieking whistle to it smote on his ears.

There was no need for an answer. The shot struck the water about a
hundred yards short, and skipped by, wide of the Okapi, but still
too near to be pleasant.

"Keep on!" shouted Compton, fiercely.

The levers clanked furiously, and Venning, who had suspended his
sculling under the menace of the shot, tugged again at his work.

The steam-whistle of the launch sounded a series of sharp, jerky
calls, followed by the firing of a Mauser bullet. Venning's heart
was pumping blood at express speed under the violence of his
efforts, and his eyes in a wild stare were fixed on the approaching
craft, which had now brought its living freight within recognizable
distance. He could distinguish the two Belgian officers and the
swart face of the Arab chief, Hassan. He could see the men with
rifles, aiming, as it seemed, straight at him, and then he ducked
his head as he saw the smoke once more belch from the seven-pounder.
At the same moment he was nearly capsized by the sudden swerve of
the Okapi, as she almost turned on her keel. The shot struck the
water so close that the spray drenched them. Compton looked round
and shouted aloud--

"They're aground! Hurrah!"

Venning, recovering himself, saw the men on the launch hurled to the
deck.

"Hurray!" he shouted.

"Keep on!" shouted Compton; and, after another five minutes' burst,
the Okapi swept behind one island and passed in between two others.
"Now," he said, "give me the levers."

"You're welcome," said Mr. Hume, wiping the moisture from his brow
and taking a huge breath.

He went forward to the wheel, and threaded the Okapi through narrow
passages between islands of all shapes and sizes, until after having
got into such a fastness as would be impracticable for the launch to
reach, he ran the boat on a shelving sandbank. Then, before anything
else was attempted, the awning was fixed, and they settled down for
a needed rest. Next the boys smacked each other on the back.

"Was it by accident or design, Compton, that you led them into the
shallows?"

"I saw we could not reach the shelter of the island, and was feeling
bad, when I caught a ripple on the water to the right. I edged the
Okapi on after the first ball shot was fired, and as we drew nearer
I was sure there was a long sandbank. When I made that sharp turn as
the second shot was fired, I could see the outline of the bank just
under water, and turned to avoid it."

"It was a mercy you altered our course just at that moment,
Compton."

"Wasn't it? It was touch and go. We stood to be run down or knocked
into smithereens in another minute;" and Venning shook Compton's
hand.

"Did you see them go over like ninepins," laughed Compton, "when
they struck? But I'm not claiming any credit, you know. If it had
not been for Mr. Hume----"

"We all did our share," said the hunter, "and we have every cause to
be thankful; but we must not imagine that the chase is over."



CHAPTER VII

THE THOUSAND ISLANDS

They shoved off again, and Compton, being the least tired, took the
sculls and pushed on slowly in search of an anchorage for the night.
They passed many likely places, but Mr. Hume had one objection or
another to them, and the spot that finally satisfied him was a small
wooded island flanked by others of larger size, and so placed that
if they were menaced from any side there would be an opening for
escape in the opposite direction. The channel into which they
steered was so narrow that the branches of the trees joined
overhead, and when they tied up, the Okapi was completely hidden.
Before forcing their way into the leafy tunnel, they had taken down
the awning, but now, after having broken away many branches, they
refixed the canvas roof and drew the mosquito-curtains round, after
which they sought out and killed all the insect pests that remained
within the nets. There was no danger in showing a light, and
accordingly the lantern was hung amidships, the spirit-lamp lit, to
prepare a nourishing and at the same time "filling" soup. They made
a hearty meal, got into warmer clothing, oiled the rifle-barrels,
arranged their rugs, and prepared for the night, which came on them
with a rush, heralded by the noise of birds seeking their accustomed
roosting-places. Such an uproar the boys had not before heard. It
seemed as if the Zoological Gardens had emptied its noisiest
inhabitants.  Parrots flew across the river, every one talking at
the top of its voice, while colonies of ibis croaked out the news of
the day in gruff, discordant notes; cranes flying laboriously, with
long legs trailing, emitted their deep "honks;" frogs lifted up
their voices from out the reeds, and at intervals came the booming
cry of the shovel-beaked bittern, and the harsh, baboon-like bark of
the green-crested toucan. The noise of the home-going of the winged
multitudes ceased as the night drew its black mantle over the river.

Out of the spell of silence there grew presently other voices, soft
whisperings, deep sighings; mysterious sounds telling of things
stealthy and oppressed by the stillness; abrupt splashings that
startled by their suddenness: grunts, rumblings, and the roar of
bull crocodiles. It must not, however, be supposed that there was a
continuous succession  of sounds. Each noise had its own place, and
there would be often long intervals between one sound and another.

Venning, who had the first watch, found this out. He would hear a
startling splash, followed by a snort and the snap of jaws; then all
would be quiet for several minutes, when, from another direction,
would come perhaps a heavy sigh; then another interval of silence,
again a splash, and so on until the impression grew on him that the
beasts and reptiles who made the noises were working slowly towards
him in a circle.

It was his first night on guard in the wilderness, and he felt the
uneasiness of the hunter who discovers how limited are his senses
compared with those of the wild creatures about him. Man, himself
the most secret, the most cunning, the most deadly, and, if truth
must be told, the most bloodthirsty, for he kills too often for the
love of killing, is the most helpless in the dark. His sense of
hearing, of sight, and of smell, fail him--thanks to a wise
provision of Nature in the interests of her other children--for if
man had the eyes of a cat, the nose of a wolf, and the hearing of a
deer, he would have cleared the earth of its creatures, who would
have had no rest night or day.

All the time, too, the river talked, as it rolled its great flood
along, sending up a soft volume of song from the innumerable sounds
produced as it washed along the islands and foamed against the rocks
of the shores. Presently, down the narrow channel, there came a rush
of water which rocked the boat, and next Venning heard close at hand
a strange noise, which he took to be made by a large animal cropping
at the river-grass. He looked about for a weapon, and, picking up
the long boat-hook, lashed his hunting-knife to the iron hook at the
top, converting it into a lance. He had read of hippos swamping
boats by seizing the narrow bows or keel in their vast jaws, and he
wished to be prepared for a possible attack. Presently the boat
again rocked as another animal took to the water, then the new-comer
dislodged the other with a snap of the jaws, and the first, with a
complaining grunt, surged down the channel. Venning could see
nothing in the inky blackness, but he knew the beast had seen the
Okapi from the short note of alarm it sounded. Immediately the alarm
was repeated. Snorts and splashes arose from all sides. Some great
beast who had been standing unnoticed within a few yards of the
boat, crashed through the bushes into the water with an uproar that
woke the sleepers.

"What is it?" cried Compton.

Mr. Hume made a dart for his rifle.

The Okapi rocked and heaved, was lifted at the bows to fall back
with a splash.

"Hippo," gasped Venning, making a drive with his weapon through the
mosquito curtains. "Got him!--no!--missed!"

"What's that you've got there, Venning?"

"Sort of harpoon."

"By gum!" said Mr. Hume, taking the weapon, "I'm glad you missed the
beggar. I would not give much for our chances if he turned crusty in
this place."

The hippo reappeared aft with a snort, and, much to their relief,
continued down the channel into the wider waters.

"Find the watch pleasant?" asked Compton, sleepily, as Mr. Hume
turned in.

"Awfully cheerful," said Venning, earnestly; "but I'm not selfish,
and you can take your turn at it on the tick of the hour."

Compton dived for his rugs, and Venning once more returned to his
duties with his harpoon over his knees, and a string of winged
visitors entering joyously by the hole he had made in the curtain.
He pinned his handkerchief  over the rent to stop further free
entrance, then made war on those which had entered--an amusement
which carried him well into the fourth and last hour of the first
watch.  Then he sat up to listen for the old sounds--the groans and
the snorts--but they had ceased. A mist, like a wet blanket, had
settled down over the Okapi, over the islands and the river; and,
though any sounds made on the water were startlingly distinct,
confined as the sound-waves were by the mist, the creatures had
evidently gone to sleep. There was, however, one visitor faithful to
him. The light of the lantern, which showed the rolling wreaths of
the mist, just reached the water, and in the reflection he saw two
greenish points. After long looking, he made out that these were the
eyes of a crocodile, whose body was half in and half out of the
water, the tail end of him being anchored on the little island. At
eleven o'clock he roused Compton by dragging at his ankle.

Compton sat up, rubbed his eyes, and drew his rug over his
shoulders.

"What's the countersign, comrade?" he asked, with a yawn.

"Countersign?"

"Yes; when the watch is relieved he has to say something or other,
as a guide to the new man."

"Oh, I see. Well, let me introduce you to the companion of  your
watch. See those green points out there?"

"Yes--like dull glass."

"That's your new chum. He's been there an hour without moving, and
it's no good trying to stare him down."

"What is it?"

"Crocodile. Good night. Wish you joy;" and Venning crept  under his
waterproof sheet with a sigh of relief.

Neither of the two boys smoked, taking the advice of Mr. Hume, who
persuaded them that tobacco acted as a poison when used too early,
and spoiled good hunting. It lowered the action of the heart,
affected the hearing and the sense of smell. In place of a pipe,
therefore, Compton found comfort in chewing, not tobacco, but a meat
lozenge. As he chewed he watched the two little dull green spots,
and the crocodile watched him with the deadly patience that so often
brings grist to the mill, or, rather, food to his jaws.

It was not a pleasant companionship, and Compton, after a long
attempt to stare the reptile down, turned his back to it and watched
the efforts of several large moths to get at the light through the
mosquito curtains. He could not so much see them as hear them, from
the way they bumped into the net, and the little soft splash they
made as they dropped into the water. By-and-by there came another
sound, made by some large fish, who had also been attracted by the
light, and then by the fat moths.

The news that these were good eating quickly spread under water, and
presently there was quite a gathering about the boat. Then Compton
turned to look at his unwelcome watcher. He was still at his post,
his eyes still fixed in an unwinking stare, but seemingly brighter
than before. Yes, he was evidently nearer. He was moving! Compton
picked up the boat-hook with its dagger-ended spear, and prepared
for the attack. Slowly, almost without a ripple, the reptile
slithered into the water; then came a rush, a snap of jaws, a swirl
of waters, and something heavy and wet came right through the
mosquito nets, landing in the well of the boat with a tremendous
whack.

"Look out," yelled Compton; "keep out of his reach."

"What the dickens is it now?" roared Mr. Hume, as a series of
resounding thwacks arose out of the well.

Compton drove his harpoon into the well, and held on like grim
death, as the impaled thing lashed out to free itself.

"A crocodile!" he shouted. "I can't hold him down much longer."

"Crocodile be blowed!" shouted Mr. Hume, unhooking the  lantern and
directing its light into the well. "It's a fish."

"But," said Compton, "I saw the crocodile. It came straight for the
boat. Venning saw it too."

"It was over there," said Venning, peering into the dark.

"Then the fish must have jumped aboard to escape the crocodile.
Anyway, we can have fish-steak for  breakfast," and Mr. Hume quieted
the fish with a blow on the head.

"I made sure it was the crocodile," said Compton, in an aggrieved
tone. "Look at the hole in the curtains; there'll be tons of
skeeters aboard."

"You turn in and I'll smoke," said the hunter, who smoked enough for
three; and, with his pipe filled and lit, he took up the watch.

Once more the little party settled down to pass the night, and this
time there was no disturbance until, in the chill of the early
morning, the sleepers were awakened to get in the awning, to make
all shipshape aboard, and to prepare breakfast. The fish was not
handsome-looking, but he cut up into really good steaks, which were
grilled on a gridiron fitted over the stove, and, with hot coffee
and a biscuit apiece, they ate a meal which made them proof against
the depressing surroundings.

Both Compton and Venning, as soon as there was light enough, took a
careful look around for the crocodile; but though that wily brute
was probably near, he did not show himself. They could, however, see
the track made by the hippo when he had broken through into the
water, and Mr. Hume, stepping ashore, went up this track to spy
around. He returned with the report that the natives were signaling
from village to village by columns of smoke sent up from fires fed
with damp wood to make a heavy smoke.

"They will be keeping a sharp look-out, and we had better remain
here."

"It seems to me," said Compton, "that we have been here already a
week."

"Quite that," said Venning.

"The time has seemed long because you have been receiving new
impressions."

"I thought it was a fish I received," murmured Compton.

"Each impression," continued the hunter, "is a sort of milestone in
your memory, so that an hour crowded with several of these
milestones will appear to be longer than a whole blank day. You will
get used to such interrupted nights--that is, if our journey does
not end here."

"Oh, come, sir, we have dodged them beautifully."

"The feeling of security is the beginning of disaster," said Mr.
Hume, oracularly. "The rule of the bush is to keep your eyes
skinned."

"What is the order of the day, then?"

"The order of the day is to watch and wait. Venning will crawl on to
the little island on our right and watch the south hank. You,
Compton, will take the head of the large island on our left, and I
will watch from the other end. If any of us see danger, we will give
the whistle of the sand-piper. Each will take water and food, and
each, of course, will keep himself hid."

"We take our guns, of course?"

"Best not. A gunshot would bring a host down upon us. Don't be
discouraged," continued the hunter, as he saw the boys' faces drop.
"We have got the advantage of position, and we've got grit--eh?"

He nodded cheerfully, and they smiled back, and then each crept out
to his allotted post. The first part of the watch was by no means
bad--so the boys decided when they had settled down, Venning under a
bush palm and Compton behind a log. There was a pleasant freshness
in the air; and as the broad river uncoiled under the mist, it
disclosed fresh beauties, till the lifting veil revealed the wooded
heights and the tall columns of smoke, grey against the dark of the
woods and black against the indigo blue of the sky. They marked
where the hippos stood with their bulky heads to the sun, and saw
the crocodiles on the sands of other islands lying motionless with
distended jaws. And then the birds came to the hunting. Strings of
dark ibis, of duck, and storks; small kingfishers all bejeweled, and
greater kingfishers in black and white. The air was full of bird-
calls, of the musical ripple of waters, of the hum of the forest
moved by the morning wind.

By-and-by, however, the sun got to work in earnest, and the pleasure
went out of the watching as the air grew hot and steamy. The sand-
flies and the mosquitoes found them out, and blessed the day that
brought two tender white boys into their very midst. They gathered
to the feast in clouds, but these boys were not there for the fun of
the thing. They drew gossamer veils over the brims of their felt
hats, and gathered them in about their necks. They pulled their soft
high boots up to their knees and secured them there; and, moreover,
they smeared an abomination of grease and eucalyptus oil over their
hands. The mosquitoes set up a shrill trumpeting that could be heard
ten paces away, and held a mass meeting to protest; whereupon the
father of all the dragon-flies, a magnificent warrior in a steel-
blue armour, saw that a conspiracy was afoot, and swept into the
midst with a whirr and a snap, a turn here and a flash there, that
scattered the host in a twinkling of a gnat's eye.

The islands shimmered in the glare as if they were afloat; the
hippos took to the water, and a deep and drowsy silence fell upon
the great river. But man, ever restless, was astir, and through the
stillness there was borne to the three a soft continuous humming,
that merged quietly into the short, clamorous throbs of an engine at
work under pressure.

The launch was afloat again! Mr. Hume caught the trail of the smoke
first, and Compton next. They marked the course under the north bank
right up to a bend about six miles off, and they judged that the
launch had stopped there, as the smoke went up in a straight thin
column. Then Venning saw a canoe dart out from the south bank,
followed by two others from different points. The sun struck like
fire on gun-barrel and spear-head, and gleamed on the wet paddles.
He moistened his parched lips with a taste of water from his filter-
bottle, and gave the call. The answer came, and he drew his friends
to him with a low whistling. As they came crouching, he pointed
upriver.

"Three canoes put out. Two are hidden behind that outside island,
and there is the other creeping round the end."

"Oh ay," said Mr. Hume. "If they're after us, they will have placed
outlooks in the tallest trees;" and with his glass he swept the
forest.

"They could not see us at that distance."

"But they could see our boat as soon as we appeared in open water.
We'll stay where we are."

"Then we shall need our guns."

"It is not our guns that will save us, my lad, but strategy. Any one
could fire off a rifle, but it takes nerve to keep cool in readiness
to do the right thing at the right time."

"But," said Compton, obstinately, "we don't want to be caught
undefended."

"Leave this matter with me," said the hunter, sternly. "See that
crocodile asleep on that stretch of sand? He's our best protector.
Why? Because he is asleep. The natives, seeing him, would think we
were not near. We will, however, keep watch together."

They returned to the boat, made all ready for an instant departure,
in case they were discovered, then settled down to wait and watch
once more. Gradually the strain wore off, the old silence fell upon
the scene, and their eyes grew heavy from sheer monotony. The night
had seemed long, bat the day was worse.

Then the boys rubbed their eyes and lifted their heads. Where there
had been a bare stretch of water white under the sun between two
islands a quarter of a mile off, there appeared a long canoe, with a
tall spearman standing in the bows, and a full crew behind.

The man in the bows looked straight down the channel to their lair,
where in the narrow cut the Okapi lay hidden behind a screen of
leaves. Then he moved his hand to the right, and the canoe,
silently, without a ripple almost, skirted the island on that side,
into whose reedy sides the men darted their glances. Again the hand
was moved, and the long boat crept across to the island on the left,
which was swept by the sharp suspicious eyes of the natives. Again
the bowman directed his gaze into the narrow opening, and this time
he looked long. There was one small island to pass, and if the canoe
kept on the north side, it would have to come right into the hiding-
place; if it kept to the south, it would reappear at the end of the
passage by which the Okapi had entered.

In either case, the danger of discovery seemed certain. The three
pairs of eyes from behind the tall grass were glued to the man's
face. They saw him start, then move his hand to the left, and as the
canoe went stealthily out of their view round the south side, they
heard the sullen plunge made by a crocodile as, disturbed from his
sleep, he took to the waters.

Then the three crept back to the boat. "Pull her through the
screen," whispered the hunter, as he caught up his rifle, "but make
no noise;" and he took up another position ashore, this time facing
the other end of the channel.

With great caution the boys coaxed the Okapi through the trailing
branches, so that she would be hidden from view if the natives
looked up the channel. Then they waited and waited for ages before
the hunter showed himself.

"Well?" they asked in a whisper.

"They have passed on."

"And?" they said, watching his face.

"I don't quite like it. They may have no suspicions, but I think
they have; for one man pointed up in this direction."

"If they suspected anything they would have stopped surely."

"Perhaps not. The native doesn't like the look of a trap, and it
maybe that they passed on with the intention of returning at night.
Or they may have gone for the other boats." Mr. Hume stood up to
glance shorewards.

"Would it not be better to move on?" said Venning.

"If we could be sure that we should not be seen from the land, that
would be the move." He stroked his beard. "I guess we'll move," he
said, "just about dusk, for I'm pretty sure in my mind that they did
take particular notice of this channel, and my policy is always to
listen to your instincts."

"Instincts," muttered Compton; "call them nerves."

Mr. Hume laughed. "About the time you were born, Dick, I was playing
a lone hand in Lo-Ben's country as trader and hunter, when a loss of
nerve would have meant loss of life. See! So just leave this to me,
and shove her along."

Compton grinned back at the hunter, and tugged at his oar, for the
levers clanked too loud for this work. They crept along to another
berth a little way off, and tied up in the shadow of the bank; and
they had scarcely settled themselves when they heard again the beat
of engines. The launch was returning, and was returning in answer to
a signal that the game had been found! A pungent smell of smoke
suddenly reached them, and, standing up, they saw over the reeds
that a fire had been made on one of the neighbouring islands.

That was the signal!

Glancing shorewards they saw that more canoes were putting off--dark
smudges on the water, but growing clearer as the crews dashed the
paddles. But there were enemies even nearer. As they pulled the
Okapi closer into the shadows a boat swept into view, and, evidently
obeying directions given from the island where the fire was, took up
a position overlooking the first hiding-place of the Okapi.  All the
time the launch drew nearer, racing evidently to take advantage of
the brief spell of light before the dark, and the canoes raced from
the shore to take part in the great man-hunt. As they drew near, the
fleet scattered, some going up-stream, others down, and the
remainder dashing straight on in among the islands.

As they scattered to take up their positions, there came a report
from the launch's gun.

It was the signal for the drive to begin, and as the echo rolled
away, a deep silence followed the previous uproar. The savage look-
out men, standing erect in the sharp bows of the long canoes,
motioned to the paddlemen to  stop, and all heads were turned to the
wind to catch any sound in case the hunted should attempt to move
away. Fierce eyes were directed towards one spot, where the fire
blazed on the island over against the place where the Okapi had laid
up.

Not a whisper had come from the three in the boat. After they had
first seen the signal smoke, which told them so plainly that Mr.
Hume's suspicions were justified, they had crouched low, watching
every move that was visible to them.

A canoe rounded their hiding-place and crept stealthily by towards
the narrow passage with its screen of bushes, every man fixing his
gaze directly ahead, the broad nostrils quivering, and spears
grasped in the hands that were not busy with the paddles.

Then through the silence there came the sharp yap of a dog who has
struck the scent, and next the loud, excited bark. Too cautious to
land on the suspected island themselves, some of the canoe-men had
drawn near from the north side and thrown a cur on the island to
find the white men in their supposed hiding. The dog had, of course,
struck the spoor and found the dark hiding, empty, but suspicious-
looking. In his fear he gave tongue. The gun from the launch fired,
a yell rose from every side, and all the canoes near dashed forward.

Mr. Hume shoved out, and the Okapi slipped up-stream  undetected
under the uproar, darting from one island to another, and keeping as
near the banks as  possible.  They were doing splendidly!  The enemy
was behind; it seemed that they must reap the advantage of their
caution and resourcefulness, when, without any  intimation of
danger, they came right upon a canoe lying in mid-channel between
two of the innumerable islands.

"Back-water!" cried Mr. Hume, at once.

The boys obeyed without, of course, any knowledge of the course, and
the Okapi slackened down.

"Well met, my friends," came a voice they knew; and the two looked
over their shoulders.

"Dished, after all!" muttered Compton, bitterly; then he snatched up
his rifle.

"Hassan thought you would come along this way," went on the junior
officer--for it was he; "but I doubted, and yet here you are."

"The praise be to Allah," remarked Hassan, piously, as he glanced
along his rifle.

The Okapi had lost the little way she was making, and began to move
with the current away from the canoe. Mr. Hume suddenly spoke for
the first time since his order.

"Turn that canoe round!" he roared; and his Express leapt to his
shoulder. The boys followed suit.

The paddle-men promptly ducked their heads, and one of them called
out in his lingo that this was the slayer of crocodiles and of the
great bull.

"But, my friend----" began the Belgian, who now, together with
Hassan and several Arabs in the stern of the canoe, came under the
levelled barrels.

"Oblige me," said the hunter. "Compton, cover that Arab Hassan with
your rifle, and Venning, take the man to the right. If they move
their weapons, shoot."

Hassan snarled and turned a furious face to the Belgian. "This is
your folly!" he hissed. "Why didn't you fire at once?"

Mr. Hume repeated his orders in the native tongue, and the cowed
men, using their paddles, turned the long canoe round.

"Now, keep straight on in silence, till I tell you to stop. Follow
them"--this to the boys, who immediately picked up their sculls.

The Belgian glanced back. "Come," he said, "this is not amiable.
See, we could, had we liked, have caught you in an ambush."

"And so your friend Hassan advised you, eh?" replied Mr. Hume; "but
you thought we would surrender at discretion. You see, you were
mistaken. Now just listen to me. Do not look back again, or this
rifle may go off. Out with the sculls, lads."

Hassan growled out curses at this complete turning of the tables
upon him, but the natives bent to their paddles. They bad no wish to
be shot down in the cause of the slave-hunter, however ready they
would have been to have fallen on the Englishmen if the advantage
had been with them.

The darkness was coming on fast as the strange procession passed up
the channel to thread the intricate passages among the clustering
islands. In a few minutes the canoe would be almost hidden from
sight; but the very last thing Mr. Hume wanted was to keep company.

"Baleka!" he cried. "Quicker! I have your heads in one line. One
bullet would stretch you all dead. Quicker!" he roared.

The broad paddles flashed, the water churned fiercely, and the long
canoe shot off into the dusk; and as it sped on the hunter pulled
the wheel over, altering the course of the Okapi, and taking it
towards the open water between the islands and the south bank.

"By Jove! you did that splendidly," said Compton. "I thought it was
all over."

Venning laughed that little nervous laugh of his. "I wonder why they
gave in like that?"

"We had the drop on then," said Mr. Hume, grimly; "and we knew our
own minds. Now, then! up with the sail, and, dark or not, we must
get on."

Very smartly and silently the boys hoisted the sail, and as the
Okapi beat up they heard a great uproar from the left. Apparently
Hassan was using violent language to the Belgian officer for not
having ambushed the "dogs of Englishmen." Then several rifle-shots
were fired from the canoe, and answered from the people down-stream,
who were still searching for their prey. But the Okapi slipped on,
making a musical ripple under her bows, until she beat up under the
great wall of woods on the south bank, when she tacked away into the
gathering darkness, feeling for the wind. Down-river was the glare
of fires at different spots, where the men had landed from the
different canoes; but there was no light ahead through the whole
vast width of the river, and they dare not even rig up their own
lamp to get what little guidance it could give. The wind was fitful,
and the direct progress was slow, so that when the glow went out of
the sky they were still within hearing of the shouting.  Indeed, it
seemed that the shouting gained on them, as if the men in Hassan's
boat were keeping their place in the renewed pursuit, and directing
other crews as to the line they should take.

Then the sail napped idly against the mast as the wind died down,
and as they unstepped the mast before depending on the screw, a fire
sprang out right ahead, sending up a tall column of flame that flung
its reflection far across the waters.

"We must make out into the islands again," said Mr. Hume; but, as
the boat pointed on the new course, an answering flame sprang up,
and then another and another at brief intervals, until from the fire
on the bank there was a semicircle of flame from island to island
barring their advance.

"There must be an army out," muttered Venning.

"It is one canoe, but most likely Hassan's, firing the dried reeds
as they pass from island to island."

"Then the flames will die out soon."

"Yes, they will die down; but in the mean time other canoes will
come up, and if there are men on the shore waiting, they will see us
outlined against the reflection."

Even as he finished there came a shrill cry from the shore, followed
by the wild beat of the war-drum, and next by the sound of paddling.

"Shall we make a bolt for it?" asked Compton.

"Not yet," said the hunter; and he brought the Okapi stem on for the
deep shadows under the bank.

The oars moved softly, covered by the noise of the paddling, and the
Okapi slipped out of the reflection into the darkness, while the
canoes dashed straight on, passing about one hundred yards behind
her stem.

"Easy now," whispered Mr. Hume, "and keep quite still."

The oars were drawn in as the Okapi, caught in a current,  was borne
right into the bank at a spot where the trees came down to the
brink. Mr. Hume caught a branch, and the stern swung round. Before
them, about a quarter of a mile off perhaps, was the great fire they
had first seen, still fed by natives, whose dark figures stood out
and disappeared as they moved about. Out on the river they could
hear the noise of paddles, and of men calling to each other.

Near them on the bank something moved, and above the swishing of the
current they heard the low whine of an animal.

Mr. Hume pricked his ears at the sound, and crept into the well,
where the boys sat anxiously watching.

"Put on your coats," he muttered.

Again there came the whine, then the sound of an animal scrambling,
and next the patter of feet.

"A dog," whispered Venning.

"I advise keeping on," said Compton.

"And I," replied Mr. Hume, "advise that we have something to eat.
Will you serve us, Venning?"

They ate hungrily, for through the day they had been too much
excited to think of food. And as they feasted their eyes were on the
move, and their ears on the stretch. Their manoeuvre had apparently
succeeded, for the canoes were all beating up towards the fires
under the belief that the Okapi had kept on, and there was no
suspicious movement  by the people on the shore. So they remained
where they were, keeping themselves in position by holding  on to
the branches. To the boys it was a weird scene, with the blood-red
glow on the waters and the sense of vastness and of wildness. They
were not afraid, but they could not help a feeling of weariness, and
they edged nearer the hunter for the comfort of his presence. For a
long time they watched, sitting silent; and by-and-by the fires on
the islands died down one by one, until only the flare on the bank
remained as a beacon to those on the river. Then the sound of
paddling drew near again.

Again the whine came from behind the screen of trees, and there was
a rustling among the branches.

Taking a bit of the dried meat he had been eating, Mr. Hume tossed
it through the leaves. There came a sniff, a snap of the jaws, and a
whimper. The hunter shifted his rifle till it pointed through the
boughs.

"Peace," said a low voice.  "It is Muata and his beast. They hunt me
yet."

"Us also, O chief!"

The canoes came rushing in. Already some of the crews had landed
near the fire; but others were coming down-stream, hugging the banks
for safety, or, maybe, having a last look for the Englishmen.

"It is Muata!" cried Venning, in a joyous whisper. "Muata and his
jackal. What luck!"

"S-sh!"

A canoe went by some distance out, after it another, and as they
swept into the darkness, a third announced its presence, coming more
slowly and closer in. While it was nearly opposite the hiding the
howl of the jackal rose from out the bush, wringing a startled
exclamation from the two boys by its suddenness.

"What devil's noise is that?" sang out a voice they recognized as
that of the Belgian officer.

A sharp order was given, the paddles ceased, and the canoe, looming
long and black on the water, drifted towards the Okapi.

"I have heard that cry before," said a rasping voice. "Be ready with
your weapons. Allah the merciful may yet deliver those we seek."

"What would they be doing here inshore?" asked the Belgian.

"They would be here because it is here they would not expect us to
search. I think I see something gleam."

In the water by the shore there was a faint splash, and again the
jackal whined.

Mr. Hume pressed his hand on Compton's shoulder, forcing him into
the well; and he did the same by Venning.

"Surely," said the Belgian, "it is something. Shall we call in the
other canoes, and guard the place till daylight?"

"I will have them now," said Hassan, with fury.

"They will not look on another sun;" and he gave the order to his
men to kill when they closed in. "It is they who let free the thief
of the forest--the dog Muata."

"You lie, O woman stealer; Muata freed himself;" and out of the
water, out of the blackness, came the voice, without warning, "Muata
is here, by your side, man-thief."

The Arab fired, and the flash from his discharged rifle flamed into
the water, into which he peered with features convulsed.

"Kill him!" he yelled.

"Muata!" cried the paddlers. "Haw! To the shore, to the shore, or we
perish! The water-wolf, he!"

"Yavuma!" cried the voice from the water; and the canoe heeled over
as the chief rose under the sharp bow. "Yavuma!"--he wrenched a
paddle from one of the men and hurled it at the Arab. The crank
craft rolled as some of the excited men in the stem tried to use
their spears. "Yavuma!"--this time with a triumphant whoop, and the
canoe turned over!

With a couple of powerful strokes the swimmer had his hand on the
Okapi.

"O great one," he cried, "Muata is come to work and to watch--to be
your shield and your spear."

Mr. Hume reached out a strong hand and pulled the chief on board.

Muata gave a low cry, and with a frightened whimper the jackal shot
out from the bank and lighted on the deck. Then the Okapi slid out
silently into the river.

"By Jenkins!" gasped Venning.

"It beats all," laughed Compton. "Well done, Muata."

As the capsized crew struggled to the shore they yelled abuse and
threats, but their power for mischief had gone with the loss of
their weapons. Some of them went off down the bank shouting for the
canoes that had gone on, and others made their way to the fire; but
Mr. Hume and Muata took a spell at the levers, heedless of the noise
made, and under their powerful arms the boat was soon far out in the
waste of waters--safe, at any rate, for that night.



CHAPTER VIII

THE BULLS AND THE WILD DOGS

After an hour or so Muata was sent forward as look-out, and with his
jackal by his side, apparently aiding him in his task, he showed
such eyes for the night that they kept on safely till the morning,
when the sail was hoisted, and by breakfast-time they judged they
had covered about forty miles--quite enough for safety. They ran the
Okapi in among the islands which still stretched away as far as they
could see, and made fast, to eat and to sleep. The noon heat woke
them. They sat up under the awning and talked of the great drive, of
Muata's escape, and of his wonderful luck in finding them--though he
made out that there was nothing strange about it, since from the
woods he had seen the preparations for the hunt, and had, too, made
out the Okapi in the dusk. For the rest, his jackal had scented out
the white man's lair, and all he, the chief, had to do was to upset
the canoe of the Arab.

"That was no great work for Muata--the otter, the water-wolf," he
said.

"And how did the chief escape?"

"Before the shouting arose that Muata was gone, he found a calabash
of fat for the cooking, by the door of a hut. Some fat he rubbed on
the soles of his feet to kill the scent. Then he sent the jackal
into the woods and crawled into a hut, being stiff from the binding.
In the hut he remained, rubbing the fat into the joints, till the
people came back to the feast."

"The feast was made by us, so that while the people ate we could
loosen your bonds."

"Wow! Never yet have I known any to give such thought to a
stranger."

"It is our way to stand by those who stand by us."

"It is a great word that;" and the chief turned the thought over in
his mind. "Ow aye! They came again to the feast, and Muata went out
into the woods in peace."

"And was that all?"

"There was a man gathering fruit in the morning as I passed through
a garden, and his knife I took."

"And what did the man do?"

"He took a message to my father, the chief," said Muata,
enigmatically. "The chief's son has been like a hunted dog. His
stomach hungers for red meat. His spirit thirsts for the hunt. Wow!
O hunter, set your shining boat for the shore, and let us follow the
trail. There be buffalo in the lands beyond the hills which line the
river."

"That's a splendid idea!" cried Venning.  "I'm beginning to get
mouldy. A trip ashore would be ripping, now that we have distanced
our pursuers."

"I second that motion," said Compton, with a longing glance
shorewards. "Do you know, sir, that we have not shot a thing since
we entered the Congo?"

"I have no objection," said the hunter. "And we must have a good
supply of biltong before we enter the forest; but we cannot afford
to take risks. Just examine the shore for a creek, and at dusk we
will run across."

The boys passed the afternoon searching the south bank for signs of
a creek, and in the evening the Okapi shaped her course across to a
likely spot they had marked out. But though they found a creek, it
was not one that commended itself as a hiding to Mr. Hume, and it
was not till after a wearisome hunt for hours in the dark that they
found a channel leading through the hills which he agreed to follow
up; and then, when they had entered about a mile, Muata, with his
jackal, was landed to "feel" around for native paths or villages.
Muata, after a long absence, reported all safe as far as he could
judge, and they tied up. In the morning they found themselves in the
thick of the woods, and pushed on down a dark and sluggish stream
strewn with fallen timber, till they came to a pool in a gorge. Here
they resolved to leave their boat.

They took the Okapi to pieces, stowed them away in a dry cavern in
the krantz, covered them with the tarpaulins, and pushed on down
through the gorge on foot, emerging beyond the hills which bordered
the Congo into a rolling country, park-like in appearance. They
studied the land well before they continued, first for signs of
native villages, and next for game. Smoke rose far away to the
right, but nearer, the country seemed deserted, and as plenty of
game appeared in sight, they determined to camp on the slopes of the
hill. So they looked about for a good pitch, and made choice of a
sunny spot at the foot of a rocky cliff, not far from the stream
they had followed, and well screened from view by a thicket of bush
in the front. They stowed away their blankets in a small cave at the
base of the cliff, and then started off for the first hunt, the boys
in a fine state of excitement. They struck into a game-path leading
through thick scrub, and five minutes from the start there was a
sullen snort, a tremendous crashing in the woods, as if, at least, a
herd of elephant were stampeding. Mr. Hume dashed down the game-
path, and before the boys could see what manner of beast it was, he
had fired and bowled it over with a bullet behind the ear.

"A bit of luck," he said, as they reached him.

"What is it?" asked Venning, glancing around with bright eyes.

"A buffalo, over there."

The two boys saw a dark form on the ground, half hidden by a bush,
and were running forward.

"Quietly," said the hunter. "Always approach dangerous game
cautiously when they are down--especially buffalo;" and with his
finger on the trigger he went up slow-footed.

But the buffalo was stone-dead--a great bull with an immense boss
between the bend of his sharp horns.

"It's the luck of hunting," said Mr. Hume, as the boys walked round
the great beast. "Some days you never get a shot, and other times
you find game at your back door, so to speak. One of you boys will
stay with Muata to skin and cut up. It will be a good lesson."

The two looked at each other, and then away over the plain. Skinning
and cutting up was not exactly amusing.

"All right; I'll stay," said Venning.

"Each in his turn," said the hunter. "Come along, Compton;" and they
went off, as Venning turned up his shirt-sleeves.

It was hard work, this cutting up, but Muata was a master at the
job, and Venning learnt his lesson thoroughly.

The great hide was taken off in one piece without a slit; then long
strips of meat were cut off and hung over the branches of a tree.
When the rest of the meat had been stripped off, they packed it all
away in the hide, slung the bundle to a sapling, and, with each end
of the pole on a shoulder, they slowly carried the whole to the
camp. Venning hoped that his labours were over; but they had only
completed one task.  They had now to build a scaffolding on which to
hang the strips, after each had been well peppered to keep off the
flies, for the drying and smoking. This took another slice out of
the day; and when Venning had washed in the river, and cooked and
eaten his buffalo-steak, he resigned himself to the study of insects
in place of the pursuit of game, while Muata, who had melted down
the fat from the kidneys, sat and rubbed the oil into his limbs till
his skin shone.

"Have you seen many buffalo?" asked Venning, with a keen eye on a
bit of crooked stick that had seemed to move.

"Many."

"And you understand their ways?"

"I have watched as you watch the stick that is not a stick."

Venning picked up an insect--a strange creature which had adapted
itself to its surroundings by pretending to be a dried twig.

"Tell me what you saw."

"I saw the twin bulls when they were calves, and I saw them when
they led the herd, and when they lost the leadership. I watched
them. Ow aye, I knew their ways. Sometime, when I was yet a boy, I
could understand what they said."

"What they said, chief?"

"See, the creatures are like men in their ways, and men are like
animals--each man like to one kind of animal. Haw! So I judged what
the buffalo would say if he could talk like men."

"And what was the talk? Tell it me; for I also have given speech to
animals when I have watched alone."

"I will tell you what I thought when I was young, and watched the
things of the forest. The wisest among the people I have met is a
woman; and among the things of the forest, the wisest were even a
buffalo cow who never had calf, and the mother of the yellow pack,
who had white eyes in her long head. Haw!

"Now, the pack hunted on the same veld where a troop of buffalo
grazed, but the bull who led the troop was wise. He took counsel
with the old cow that was calf-less, and the pack could never find
the fat heifers or the younger calves unguarded. In the troop were
two young bulls--brothers; and these I had watched grow--watched
from my hiding. They were strong and fierce, and they eyed the old
bull full. Scarcely would they turn from his path. Wow! One morning
the old bull stood in the game-path, considering in his mind how it
came to happen that the earth had been fresh turned. While he stood,
the young bulls pressing behind suddenly put their horns to his
flanks and urged him forward. Mawoh! The old bull stepped on to the
newly turned earth, and went down into a pit that the hunters had
dug. He called to the troop to run from the danger, and they crashed
through the wood to the open glade.

"Haw! A young dog of the pack heard the bellow from the earth, and
creeping near, he looked down upon the great bull. Then, with his
nose to the ground, he ran upon the trail of the troop till he saw
them in the opening. The young bulls moved among the cows. They
pushed the old cow aside, and later went through the tall grass into
a shallow vlei, where they wallowed in the mud. Then the young dog
ran back to the pack. This is what he said, as I understood--

"'Behold, O mother,' he said, 'the great bull, even the leader, is
fallen in the trap made by man in the path.'

"Who leads the troop now--the old cow or the two brothers?"

'The young bulls, O mother, and they lie in the mud.'

"Then the she-dog called the pack together. I heard the call, and
knew there would be hunting. She called them and made a plan. I saw
afterwards the plan she made. The young dogs she sent round to the
far side of the vlei, and she came with the biggest of the pack to
the side nearest the forest. From the edge of the wood she looked
out on the open. The old cow stood alone, with her head turning now
this way, then that way. The others grazed with their calves. The
heifers stood foot-deep in the water near the bulls.

"The old dog turned to the pack. 'This comes of the folly of the
young,' she said; and her white eyes ran from dog to dog. 'Those two
lie like pigs. We will eat buffalo to-night. Scatter and wait.'

"Three dogs went to the right of her and three to the left. They
stretched themselves in the grass. The old cow blew through her
nostrils. She struck the ground, and the cows with the young calves
ran to her. They gathered in a bunch, heads out. From beyond came
the hunting-cry of the young dogs. The heifers moved, but the bulls
kept still.' It is but a dog yapping after a hare,' they said.
'Stand you still.'

"But the hunting-cry drew nearer. The cows lowered their heads,
bellowing, and the heifers ran. Wow! The young dogs cut one out, and
raced her right to where the great mother of the pack crouched. As
the heifer came by, the white jaws snapped at her belly, and bit
deep, so that blood flowed, and on the scent of the blood the pack
went into the forest. They ate buffalo that night.

"The young bulls rose from the mud. They ran to and fro in the open;
their eyes were red, and the foam dripped from their black lips.
Wow! they were angry, Ow aye, they were covered with shame and mud.
The old cow moved away, and the cows with young followed her. The
heifers, trembling in their limbs, would have followed also, but the
bulls headed them off. There was much talk in the forest over this.
They said the bulls had learnt wisdom. No dog would take a member of
the troop again. The bulls tossed their horns. 'If a lion comes,'
they said, 'we would beat him off.'

"The pack tried again, and were beaten off; but the old she yawned.
'In a few days, my children,' she said, 'we will eat buffalo, even
of the meat of the young bulls. There never were two leaders in a
pack'--and her white eyes went to a dog who had hopes of the
leadership--'never; and in a day, or two days, these brothers will
fight. They will fight hard; and when the fight is done the pack
will steal upon them. When they stand panting, with lowered heads
and feet wide apart, we will bite at the softness of their bellies.'
She licked her lips, and the tongues of the pack curled over their
lips also. So the young dogs were set to watch upon the brothers;
and it came to pass as the old mother said--the brothers fought. It
began in play. One swung his head at the other, and the other swung
back.

"When a grown bull swings his head, O white boy, who picked me out
of the sea, it is like the blow of a falling tree. There is the
weight of his head with the heavy horns, the arch of his neck, and
the power in his shoulders where the muscles lie. The blows roused
the fury in them. They looked sideways at each other, then their
tails went up, and they came together. Wow!! The noise rang far. The
hunting dogs ran swiftly to the pack, and as they ran there followed
them the noise of the fight.

"I stole near to watch. It was a battle. The ground was torn up as
in the hoeing, where their hoofs clung for a footing under the
pressure. First they pushed, head to head, nose near the ground, red
eyes looking into red eyes. The heifers stood in a cluster watching.
It was a still battle. They saved their breath, and as they breathed
the dust flew. For many minutes they pushed, swaying, one losing
ground for a time, then gaining it back. The foam gathered on their
lips and dropped to the ground. The sweat ran under their bellies.
Then one slipped, and the other struck under the shoulder. From the
lower rib to the back there ran a white mark. The white mark turned
black, and blood came out. At the pain of it the stricken bull
grunted and struck up.  His horn struck under the body, and with the
cracking of his joints he heaved the other over. Haw! He rolled him
right over and sprang at him. Wow!! He struck and stood back. The
other was on his feet swiftly. With the swiftness of a little cat he
gained his feet. So they stood with their heads up, staring with red
eyes. Again they came together. Again they shoved and strained, and
the dust caked on the blood that covered them. The ground beneath
them that was dry, was now muddy from the trampled blood. Then they
swung their heads and struck, grunting at the blows, and stood
apart, and came together, till the blood started from their ears.
Their breath came in gasps, and the silence was broken. From their
lips, all blood-covered, there came a moaning. Ow aye, the moaning
of a mother over her dead. The heifers ran forward, then back; they
ran round and galloped away, afraid--galloped into the forest.

"In my heart, O white friend, I was sorry for the brothers. The
moaning was the cry of sorrow that one felt for the other. 'O my
brother, I must slay you,' that was the meaning of the moaning.
Their tongues rolled out, swollen; their legs shook, their eyes were
covered with mist. Yet they swung their heads, and each time the
horns were wet with blood, and the moaning came always. Then they
came together, and went on their knees. Their muzzles were in the
mud; their hind legs were wide apart.

"Ow aye, I looked away and saw the white eyes of the mother of the
pack. She was creeping up. Her lips were wet; the hair on her neck
stood up. Behind her came others. I gave the low growl of a lion--
the cry he makes when he is angry at being disturbed. She threw up
her head and sniffed the air. Then she growled in her throat, for
there was no taint of lion in the air, but the taint of man! Her
white eyes found me out where I sat in a low tree, and there was
death in them. So I gathered the air in my lungs and shouted. A
man's shout is as much dreaded as the lion's roar. The dogs jumped
up, but the old mother called to them, and they crouched down.  The
brothers stood moaning head to head. I shouted again; I whistled.
Then the bulls drew apart. One fell slowly on his side; the other
smelt at the fallen one. Then he tried to bellow, but his tongue was
thick in his mouth. The she-dog crept forward, and I whistled loud.
This time he flung up his head and looked around. He saw the white
eyes above the grass; he saw the round ears everywhere around. Then
he smelt at his brother. Wow! He smelt at him; he licked the blood
from his nostrils.

"This is the law among the wild things--when one is down he is down.
The weak are driven forth by their fellows; the hurt are left. The
bull smelt at his brother; then again he flung his head up to look
at the white-eyed one, and he moved away for the vlei, moaning as he
went. The dogs let him pass; their eyes scarcely went to him, for
they were fixed on the fallen. They moved upon him in silence, a few
steps at a time, then crouched with hanging tongues; then a few more
steps; and as they closed in the fallen bull watched those he could
see. Meat for dogs! He a chief in the forest, who could toss the
largest dog the height of a tree! Wow! He gathered his hind feet
under him and lifted. Slowly he reached his feet, and the white-eyed
mother ran in open-mouthed. She gripped the sinews of his hind leg
and held on. The pack crowded in. Haw! It was no fight. The bull
looked after his brother, who was slowly moving to the vlei, moaning
as he went. Then, but for a little time, he fought as a chief should
fight when his foes are on him. With a swing of his head here, and a
swing there, he stove in the ribs of two of the pack; then he sprang
on another, flung him, as a boy would a stone, into the air, watched
him go up, watched him come down, then flung him up again, and fell
forward on his knees with his nose on the ground, and the pack
snapped the flesh from him in mouthfuls. The other bull turned not
at the howling of the pack. He walked on slow and straight to the
vlei, drank deep, and made a bed in the mud. He covered his wounds
with mud, and when his wounds were healed he was an outcast. The
troop had another leader, and the old cow led them all to another
grazing-ground."

"And what became of you, Muata?"

"Muata stayed in the tree. Mawoh! Muata was afraid. The mother of
the pack had not forgotten. Even while she ate she looked at him,
and when the milk-mothers with their young came to the forest,
having been called, she lay off and watched, with her evil eyes on
me. The jackals, smelling blood, howled, sitting on their haunches,
and a lion came up growling in his throat. But he did not come right
up; he stood a way off, watching,  and presently he stretched
himself on his stomach to wait. Haw! Even the lion will not attempt
to drive the pack from its kill. Ow aye, it is so. The old mother
never turned her eyes to watch the lion, but when the pups played,
having eaten their fill, she stood up. The pack looked at her and
moved off; then the lion rose and came forward. The old one stood
her ground, and the great one, when he was within three bounds of
her, also stood. The white eyes turned away from the yellow eyes--
they turned to me; then she yapped and went off after the pack. The
lion looked after her; then he stretched himself on the ground again
and stared. He lifted his head to the wind and sniffed. Mawoh! Well,
I knew the old mother had told him of my presence; but the lion
never looks up. It was well for me, for his mind was uneasy. A long
time he lay, while the jackals sat howling. Then he crept round the
tree and the carcase. Twice he crept round; then, as the smell of
the meal was too much, he trotted up to the carcass and growled at
his feast. His back was toward me, and I fled."

"And did you meet the white-eyed mother again?"

"The wisest among the people I have met," said Muata, gravely, "was
a woman; and among the creatures of the forest, the wisest was a
she-dog. It is in my mind that the leader of the pack was umtaguati.
Ow aye, she was a wizard; and it is not well to make war against
such."

Venning looked at the chief with curiosity.  "Are there many wizards
in the forest, Muata?" he asked with a smile.

"By day and night, many; but most by night. Our people will not
venture forth in the darkness of the forest for fear of the wizards
and the bad spirits that watch from behind the trees and follow
stealthily; but a spell was given to Muata. He could walk in the
night."

"Have you seen these--eh--spirits, Muata?" Muata put the question
aside. He rose and pointed to the east.

"The sun dies away and the hunters return."

"I don't hear them. Where are they?"  "The birds cry out and fly.
That is the sign that man is on the move; for hear, you who split up
the shining boat, birds will scold at a leopard or a great snake,
hovering around as they scold; but they fly from man. From nothing
else will they fly. From an eagle they will hide after giving the
warning call; but from man they fly."

A few minutes later the two arrived, Mr. Hume carrying an  antelope
on his shoulder.



CHAPTER IX

A LION'S CHARGE

They turned in very early after banking up leaves over the fires
under the biltong strips, to give them a good smoking during the
night, but in the small hours, when the night is at its quietest,
the moonlight, shining on Venning's face, woke him. The fires were
glowing bright, altogether too bright for safety, and he rose to
cover the glare with some green leaves. He looked at his sleeping
companions, for all, tired out by disturbed nights, slept on, except
the jackal, which had one eye open.

Venning sat awhile looking down upon the dim uncertain shadows that
came and went, as a fleecy mist-like cloud passed overhead.  Beyond
the fitful murmur of the wind there was no sound but the hooting of
a great homed owl somewhere from the woods above. Drawing his
blanket round him, and picking up his gun, he walked to a point on
the right overlooking the bed of the little river, and there he sat
down with his back to a rock and his gun over his knees. Scarcely
was he seated when the jackal startled him by its sudden appearance
at his side. He scratched its ears, and it sat close to him, staring
fixedly down on the river. Just below there was a stretch of sand in
the bed gleaming white under the moonlight, and Venning watched this
with the eye of a naturalist, in the hope of seeing some of the
great forms of animal life. And he had his hope, for several
creatures crossed the white patch, and each time the jackal was the
first to see them. The round ears would suddenly prick forward, the
sharp nose would twitch, and then Venning would dimly discover
something down there in the uncertain light. A porcupine he made
out, its quills gleaming and rustling as it went down to the water;
then a great wart-pig  with curved tusks; and next, after a long
interval, a fine buck with long powerful horns. A water-buck he
judged it to be from the length of its horns, and it stood there
long with its face up-stream, motionless, save for the constant
twitching of the large ears. He rested his elbows on his knees as he
sat and aimed at the shoulders, but did not fire, for fear of
alarming the camp; and  presently the buck, even as he watched,
vanished as softly and silently as it came. Then Venning's eyes
closed, his chin dropped, the gun settled between his knees, and he
was asleep.

He was asleep, and he was awake again so suddenly that he did not
know he had slept until he saw the position of the gun. The jackal
plucked at his blanket. He remembered that something had disturbed
him, and he judged that the jackal had done the same thing just
before. He yawned and patted its head; but, instead of sitting down,
it ran a few yards, sniffed the air, whined, came back, glanced long
over its shoulder into the riverbed,  looked into Venning's face,
then ran off in the direction of the camp. As soon as it was gone
Venning felt lonely. He stood up, thinking to return to the camp,
then sat down again, for he heard the sharp stamp that an antelope
makes when alarmed, and he hoped to see it come into the moonlight.
So he settled down to watch again, and drowsiness fell upon his
eyes. He could see the white patch of sand, and as his heavy lids
were lowered and lifted between the drowsy intervals, he became
dimly conscious that there was something on the sand.  Yes; there it
was, something grey, short, and thick. A donkey, he told himself.
He smiled sleepily. A donkey! It was strange to see the old familiar
form out there in the wilderness. He wondered dreamily where it came
from; then a shadow cast by the moon on a passing cloud blotted out
the river-bed. He rubbed his eyes, and when the cloud had gone there
were two animals--donkeys, unmistakably--one larger than the other,
both with their heads turned upwards towards him. Another cloud
sailed by, and when it had passed he missed them, and, his curiosity
roused, he rubbed his eyes again for a closer scrutiny. Surely that
was not a bush on the bank? No! it moved. The donkeys were coming
towards him. One of them, the larger, moved forward quickly, then
stopped. Then a chill ran through him, his heart grew weak, his
breathing grew sharp, and the sweat suddenly started out all over
his face and body. That was no donkey standing there, with its huge
head now sunk almost to the ground, now lifted high, as it tried to
make out what manner of living creature it was crouching there by
the rock above!

Venning felt the hair stir on his head as the two animals stood
gazing at him, and then he knew. The one behind sank to the ground,
and with long steps began to creep round to the right. The moon
struck along its side, and showed the tawny hide and the whitish
under-parts of a lioness. The other, then, was a lion! With a sort
of gurgling in his throat he turned his eyes to it, and he saw it
trotting up straight for him, its shaggy mane giving to its head and
shoulders an enormous size. He felt spell-bound, incapable of moving
hand or foot. It was the silence of the ferocious beasts that
paralyzed him. Then the jackal howled behind him, and his blood
rushed through his veins. His tongue no longer clave to the roof of
his mouth, and when the great beast was within ten yards of him, he
let forth a terrific yell and jumped to his feet, with his rifle in
his hands.

The lion stopped suddenly in its charge with a low harsh grunt of
surprise. Never before in its hunting had it heard such a wild
uncanny noise. In one motion it stopped in its charge and swerved to
the right, and as it swerved the boy fired. The lion gave a mighty
bound, he heard it strike the ground with a heavy thud, and then it
seemed to disappear, though he knew it was near from the low
growling it set up.

From the camp there came a confused shouting, followed by the sound
of a man running.

Venning moistened his lips. "Look out," he shouted, "there is a lion
here."

"Where are you?"

"Here, by this rock."

"Stay there, and keep quite still."

The growling increased, and once more the same paralysis attacked
the boy so that he could scarcely breathe. Then some one stood at
his side, and the fear went from him at once.

"He's over there, somewhere; but I can't see him."

"I can. Get round the rock, my boy. He's lying flat with his head
between his paws, and it's a mercy you did not fire again and draw
his charge."

Venning moved round the rock, and Mr. Hume slowly followed. He
stopped awhile to listen to the incessant growling.

"You've hit him, but not, I think, mortally; anyway, we'll leave
him, if he will leave us. Move on towards the camp quietly--don't
run."

"No, sir," said Venning; but it required an effort not to make a
bolt for it when he saw the friendly gleam of the fire.

Mr. Hume followed slowly, with his head over his shoulder, towards
the place where the growling came from. When he reached the fire he
gave a great sigh of relief.

"Thank God. Now tell us what happened, my boy;" and he put his hand
on Venning's arm.

Venning started violently, for just then from the river there came a
harsh, growling call; and no sooner had it ceased than the ground
shook to a terrific roar.

"The lion answers the lioness," said the chief, calmly.

"Throw a little wood on the fire, Muata.  Now, my lad."

Venning told his story, and Compton listened with intense
excitement; but the hunter treated the whole thing calmly, with set
purpose. He had in his experience seen the effect of a terrible
shock, in the complete breakdown of the victim, and, personally, he
had known one man die from the shock to his system caused exactly by
the sudden and unexpected appearance of a lion at night. He kept
Venning's thoughts off the mental picture of the charging lion until
dawn, when all hands prepared for the hunt.

"If you hit him hard he will be lying near, and I guess it will be a
different matter meeting him by daylight--eh, my lad?"

Venning looked into the hunter's calm eyes, and felt strong. He went
straight to the rock against which he had crouched, and pointed to
the deep scars made in the hard ground by the sharp claws as the
lion had stopped his charge and wheeled.

Compton measured the distance from the rock to the claw-marks.

"Fifteen feet! By Jove! it was a narrow squeak. I would have yelled
like fits."

"I did yell."

Muata pointed to the ground.

"Blood spoor, eh? You did hit him. Put the jackal on the track,
chief," said Mr. Hume.

The jackal took one sniff at the ground, stared sharply around, then
peered up into his master's face.

"Search," said the chief, in his own tongue. "Follow the great one,
O little friend. The trail is laid; the great one has sought out a
moist spot; he lies angry and sore in the shade. Search and find."

The jackal looked intently into the chiefs face, sniffed at the
ground, ran forward a few yards, stopped, sniffed again with lifted
mane at a spot where the grass was pressed down, threw up his head
with eyes half closed, then ran down towards the river, stopping on
the bank to look back.

"That is where he joined his mate.  There is the spoor on the sand
going and returning. That is the round pad of the lion; just note
and compare it with the pads of the lioness over there. Just look,
and read the writing."

The two boys looked at the marks in the sand, and followed them down
to the moist ground on the edge of the water.

"They entered the river side by side," they said.

"That is plain; but the writing tells another story. See, this
footprint here is faint--very faint, eh? He did not rest his weight
on his left fore-foot.  Why, eh?"

"Because the bullet struck the left front leg," they both said.

"They learn the signs, Muata. They will be hunters yet. Tell them if
the lion be hard hit, chief."

Muata waded into the river, which reached to his armpits at the
deepest, and bent over something on the further shore. They
undressed, and waded through to him.

"Congela," he said, pointing to the bank. "The great ones came out
here. The great, great one was not sore hurt, for he came right
through, using all his feet to swim."

"It will be luck, then, if we find him," said the hunter.

"Bad luck," muttered Compton to Venning, with a grin.

"Forward, little friend!" cried Muata. "Search and find. It is a
great hunt this day. We follow the hunter of all things."

They slipped into their clothes and followed at a trot after the
jackal, which ran straight on, its bushy tail held low. It followed
the river down for a mile or so, then stopped, looking back at its
master.

Mr. Hume and the chief stood silently inspecting the hard ground,
then they walked on a few yards. The same thoughts seemed to come to
each, as the boys judged from their actions; for from the ground
their eyes ranged over the land, then were turned skywards. Muata
pointed a finger at a ringed crow flying with bent head.

"They killed," said Mr. Hume.

"Oh!! They killed."

"You see," said the hunter to the two boys, "the pair crouched here;
these circular marks in the sand were made by the swing of the
tails. They sighted game. One of them--the lioness, no doubt--worked
round to drive the game towards the lion."

"It is a guess," said Compton. "Perhaps the lion stopped because of
his hurt."

"No; the bleeding has stopped. They not only sighted game, but the
lioness drove it from the river-bed towards the lion, and the lion
brought it down."

"Oh, come," said Compton. "How can you tell that?"

"From the spoor"--laconically. "He sprang twice--here, where he
alighted the first time; and the second spring landed him on to the
neck of an antelope powerful enough to struggle on into that thicket
of reeds. There the two of them pulled it down."

"And there he is!" shouted Venning.

He pointed to the right of the reeds, and there was a great
yellowish beast walking away at a slow walk, with its head sunk.

"The lioness," said the hunter. "Venning, keep by me, but a little
behind. Compton, when I whistle, fire into the reeds."

Compton nodded his head, and the two went off, while Muata sat down
as a spectator.

Mr. Hume walked steadily up to within fifty paces of the reeds on
the upper side, then whistled. Immediately Compton fired.

The lion was there. He signified his presence by a low growl, but he
did not move. Compton fired again, and this time the reeds shook,
and a great shaggy head appeared, with its yellow eyes fixed on the
boy. Mr. Hume made a slight noise, and the great head turned at once
in his direction. For a moment the lion exchanged glances, then with
a growl he turned into the reeds to reappear further on, going
slowly in the direction of the lioness.

"It is your shot, Godfrey; take him just behind the shoulder."

Venning's heart was thumping against his ribs; but he steadied
himself for the shot, and fired. The lion sprang forward, snarling,
and faced about towards his enemies. Then up went his tail, and with
a savage growl he charged straight down to within about thirty feet,
when he stood for a moment, as is the way of the charging lion if
his enemy stands fast. The pause was enough; and before the huge
muscles of the flanks and backs could be set in motion to hurl the
great body forward, a bullet, crashing into his breast, laid him out
helpless in the throes of death.

"Your first lion, Godfrey."

"But you killed him," said Venning, pulling himself together with a
great effort; for he had been through a very severe ordeal.

"The first hit counts. See here, your bullet last night struck him
above the elbow, just missing the bone, and your second shot hit him
low down in the ribs."

"My word," said Compton, as he came up, his eyes blazing with
excitement, "it was grand to see that charge. Yes, and to see how
you two stood. My heart was in my mouth."

"It's a simple shot," said the hunter. "All you have to do is to
keep perfectly cool and wait for the lion to come to his stand."

"Very easy," muttered Compton, with a grimace, as he looked at the
white fangs and the cruel-looking claws, finishing off that mighty
weapon the lion's forearm, capable  of battering in a man's head at
one blow.

The chief stood looking from the lion to the hunter. "Ye be
brothers," he said, "ye two; both great men of the hunt; chiefs by
your own right wherever you go."

"When I was young," said Mr. Hume, "I shot lions for the pride of
the victory; but long since I gave that up, and only when a lion
seeks me have I gone out to kill him."

"Ye be brothers," said the chief. "The great one stands alone, for
he is merciful in his strength. The spotted one kills for the love
of killing. He will kill, if the chance comes, many times more than
he can eat. The warrior will slay of his enemies all his spear can
reach. The great one eats and is satisfied. The rest may live till
he be hungry. I know, for I have met him face to face in the path. I
say to him, '''Inkose' (chief), the path is yours.' I have stood
aside, and the 'inkose' has gone on his way in peace.'

"If you carried a rifle, chief, it might be otherwise. Take the
claws, Venning; we cannot find room for the skin."

The claws were cut off, and they returned to the camp for breakfast.



CHAPTER X

A NIGHT IN THE REEDS

It was good to sit around the glowing embers where the buffalo-steak
sizzled and threw out an odour that made their mouths water, good to
sip the hot coffee and to look out upon the great wilderness rising
up to the distant watershed of the lower bank of the Congo. From the
cliff above starlings flew out to seek their feeding-haunts where
the big game fed; and there was a familiar visitor near them in the
black and drab stone-chat, whose scolding chirp they had so often
heard in England among the gorse and bramble. The metallic cry of
guinea-fowl down by the little river had a farm-yard ring; but the
chatter of parrots flying overhead was still new, and so with many
other calls, so that they sat munching in silence, with eyes and
ears too much engaged for speech, even if the buffalo-steak had not
given their mouths other occupation. They saw the vultures speeding
from out the uttermost reach of the blue vault to feed upon the
carcass of the dead monarch, the whereabouts of the feast having
been detected from their distant haunts by a keenness of sight which
for swiftness outdoes wireless telegraphy. They swept on like
frigates of the sky, heads thrust down, and the vast wings seeming
to bear them on without beat or motion.

After breakfast the two boys left the camp for a little hunt on
their own account, while Mr. Hume remained to help the chief cure
the buffalo hide. They struck out down the river, passed the reeds
out of which the lion had sprung, saw the cluster of vultures
standing round the body of the lion, and then they saw a troop of
antelope  grazing in a patch of mimosas. After a careful stalk,
Compton fired, and the herd dashed off together, with the exception
of one, which took its own course at a slower gait.

"You hit him, Dick."

"Yes; and we'll get him. You go to the left, and I'll keep him away
from the river."

The two dashed off, each on his own line, and for several minutes
the stricken animal led them through fairly open country, with every
promise of a speedy run, for it was evidently hard hit. Then, taking
advantage of an old watercourse, it turned to the right, and when
Compton recovered the track he had lost touch with Venning. He gave
a "coo-ee," and then getting a view of the antelope making down to
the water, he turned it with another shot, and sprinted to overtake
it. Yard by yard he gained in this final burst, and shifted his
rifle to his left hand in order to have his right free to use the
hunting-knife. Another effort and he was almost within touch; but
the buck also had a reserve of power, and, gathering its quarters,
it made a couple of bounds, which carried it into the shelter of a
thin sprinkling of reeds. Compton responded, and in a few strides
was so near that he flung himself forward in an effort to get
astride the animal's back. The buck slipped forward, letting him
down, and, when he rose he saw the white tail whisking round a
corner in the reeds. On he dashed down a narrow path, which twisted
and turned so sharply that he could only see a few yards ahead; but
he was never in fault, as when he could not see the game he could
hear it plainly, so he never slackened. The chase went on always
with the prospect of success tantalizingly before him, until at last
he was at fault in a little clearing where the reeds had been beaten
down, and from which there branched several lanes. He stopped to
listen, but the buck had stopped too. Then he searched for the
blood-trail, and, finding it, set off once more, and this time,
after another chase lasting about ten minutes, the buck was
overtaken and despatched. Then he threw himself on his back and
panted for breath. When he had recovered he sat up and wondered, for
his hands and bare arms were bleeding from a number of cuts that
began to smart most painfully. The sharp saw-like edges of the reeds
bad cut into his flesh, and in the excitement he had not noticed the
injuries.  Thanks, however, to the regulations enforced by Mr. Hume,
he carried in the pouches of his belt a little store of quinine,
vaseline, and meat lozenges. He rubbed the vaseline on the cuts,
mopped his face, and felt all right. Then he put his hand to his
mouth and gave a "coo-ee." The call was strangled in the reeds. He
called again, fired off his gun, and waited, but he could hear
nothing but a soft whispering.  The reeds reached above his head,
and he could see nothing but the matted stems around him and the
blue sky overhead. He gave a grunt of impatience, lifted the buck,
hoisted the body on his shoulder, brought the fore legs round on one
side, the hind legs on the other side, and secured them before him
with his handkerchief. Then he stooped for his rifle, and plunged
into a path with the object of tramping straight through to the
outer edge, when he would get his bearings for the camp.

This was more easily intended than carried out; for the reeds closed
in so as to hamper his movements, and in a short time the path ran
into other tracks, which doubled here and there without any decided
direction, and led him into little dens. In one of these there was
the bleached skull of a buffalo, and he sat down on this to
consider.

He got the direction of the sun from the shadows, made a rough guess
at the points of the compass, and then started off again, picking
out a path that seemed wider than the others, and which led in the
right way. After steady tramping, he found himself back at the very
spot where he had killed the antelope. It was a nasty shock, but, in
no way dismayed, he tried to pick up his old spoor, and after a
patient search he hit it off, and went on with a little laugh. He
hesitated when he entered another little open space, but finally
kept on in the same direction, and finding the way easier, stepped
out confidently, although the weight of the buck was beginning to
tell, combined with the closeness of the air in these long aisles.
At last the reeds thinned, and he stepped out into the open. He
slipped the legs of the buck over his head to stretch himself, and
then a little cry of disgust broke from his lips, for the place he
had come to was not the outskirts of the reeds at all, but merely an
open space, larger than any he had met before, with a little grass
mound in the centre. Mounting this, he could see a run of trees in
the distance, and in between a sea of green leaves, giving back
myriad points of light under the rays of the sun. Queer soft noises
came out of the white rows of reeds all around, and from the vast
expanse a continual murmur that was something like the moaning of
the wind in the pines.

He fired his gun off and listened. A faint far-off answer he thought
he heard; but when he fired again he could detect no sound but the
whispering murmur. He cut a couple of stout reeds, fitted one into
the other, tied his handkerchief to the top, and planted the pole on
the mound. Then he placed the buck at the foot of the pole, covered
it with an armful of reeds, took a long look around, and started off
once more. He was resolved to keep straight on, path or no path, but
after a tussle with the serried ranks of reeds, with their razor-
like leaves, he soon gave up that idea as hopeless, and took again
to the paths--going very slowly, and taking his direction at
intervals. But, try as he would, there were the kinks and twists in
the paths which turned him out of his course. The endless game-
tracks formed a worse snare than any he had been in of human
contrivance; and at places, moreover, the ground was boggy, catching
hold of his feet, and exhausting him by the heavy going. Several
times animals broke cover and crashed away unseen. At one spot in
the ooze he saw the form of a huge crocodile, and at another place
the menacing head of a python was reared above the tops of the
reeds, with his forked tongue  flickering about the blunt nose.
These sights, and the sudden snorts from unseen beasts, bred in him
a growing feeling of uneasiness, which in turn weakened his powers
of reasoning,  so that he blundered hither and thither in a sort of
reckless fury, until he went flat, face downwards, in black mud,
that gripped him at every point. If he had struggled he would have
been hopelessly bogged, but luckily he recovered his wits, and set
himself slowly to extricate himself. His left foot was in up to the
knee, and his left arm was sinking each moment, when he steadied
himself and drew his knife. Beaching out, he cut a swathe of reeds,
drew them towards him with the knife-blade, packed them under his
chin and breast, then rolled over on to this firmer support, after a
strong and steady pull. Repeating the performance, he managed to get
one knee on to a bedding of reeds, then with one violent effort
freed himself and reached hard ground.

This incident shook him up so, that coming, after another effort, to
the open where he had left the buck, he gave up the struggle, seeing
that he must think of some other plan if he wished to get alive out
of this prison.

First he rested until his strength came back, then he cleaned his
mud-covered rifle, and scraped the black ooze off his clothes with
the knife. Then he heard a murmur in the reeds--a snap, then a
rustle; a long pause, then a rustling again. He stood up with rifle
ready, and he saw a reed shake about ten yards away, then heard it
snap. He shouted, and the rustling ceased, to break out after an
interval on the other side. Again it was resumed in the front, and
in a little while it seemed to him that the reeds were alive with
the stealthy rustlings of beasts and reptiles, all moving towards
him. A reed bent again a little way off, and he fired in the
direction. There was a crash and a growl, followed by a peculiar
moaning from the opposite side. From somewhere deep in the sea of
green there came the hoarse bellow of a bull crocodile. Nothing now
could have induced him to enter that bewildering labyrinth again,
and he looked about with a shudder, for the day was sinking to its
close, and the night would soon be upon him. There was only one
thing that could protect him in the night, and that was fire. With a
feverish energy, regardless now of the rustlings about his little
island, he began to cut the tallest of the reeds that were hard and
sapless, and these he banked in six heaps round the base of the
mound; and when the task was done he reared a bigger pile in the
centre as a reserve.

Then the black of the night swept over the reeds quick almost as the
shadow of a cloud, and with the dark came a sad rustling, as of a
thousand whisperings. It was still and not still. Up in the sky was
the quietness of a still night, the stars watching and brooding over
the silence; but down below, in and out of the miles and miles of
avenues, stretching every way through the millions of smooth
gleaming stems, came a whispering as if creatures were moving tip-
toe, moving up nearer and nearer, treading  carefully, watching and
listening. An owl brushed like a shadow overhead, and his loud
"whoo-whoo" floated away in sadness and sorrow.

He sat with his back to the reserve heap of reeds, and waited with
his rifle over his knees for the signal to fire his first pile.
There was as yet no clear meaning in those mysterious whisperings.
What he listened for was a sound that he could interpret, and it
came very soon in the grunt of a leopard, harsh and grating. The
reeds rustled just before him, and then there came a sound, regular
and strange--a thump and a swish, then a thump and a swish. Creeping
forward, he put a match to the heap, then went back; and as the red
flame crackled through the hard shining stems, he saw a dark form
crouching beyond, the green eyes blinking in the reflection, and the
tufted tail nervously jerking from side  to side. It was that made
the strange noise. As the flame  grew, the leopard sprang up and
turned away, stopping for a  long stare over its shoulder.

Light fragments from the burning pile floated high up like fire-
flies, and far over the white sea of leaves shone the reflection.
Others saw it from the far outer edge, and through the night came
the report of a gun, and then faintly the echo of a "coo-ee." He
shouted back hoarsely, and though he k

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