The Gorilla Hunters, R. M. Ballantyne [chrysanthemum read aloud .TXT] 📗

the mandate of the king; besides, his honour and credit as a fetishman was at stake; moreover, no doubt he felt somewhat emboldened by the presence of such a large number of men—there were certainly several hundreds on the ground—so, all things considered, he thought it best to accept the post of leader with a good grace. Stepping quickly forward, he cried, “Let torches be brought, and I will lead the way.”

A murmur of approbation ran through the crowd of blacks, who, like a flock of sheep, felt bold enough to follow a leader blindly.

While the consultation was going on outside, we were making hasty preparation for defending ourselves to the last extremity. Peterkin, in particular, was extremely active, and, to say truth, his actions surprised us not a little. I once or twice fancied that excitement had turned his brain. He first dressed up his head in a species of wild turban made of dried grass and tall sedgy leaves; then he put several patches of red and white earth on his black face, as well as on his body in various places, and fastened a number of loose pieces of rag, torn from a handkerchief, and bits of tattered leaves to his arms and legs in such a manner as to give him an extremely wild and dishevelled appearance. I must say that when his hasty toilet was completed he seemed to me the most horrible-looking demon I had ever conceived of. He next poured out nearly a whole flask of gunpowder on a ledge of rock, the edge of which was visible from the entrance to the cave, while the rock itself concealed him from view. Last of all, he took up the three cones of moistened gunpowder which the reader will remember he had made before we left the cave to attack the village. One of these he placed among the grass and branches on his head, the other two he held in his hands.

“Now, boys,” he said, when all was ready, “all I have to ask of you is that you will stand by with matches, and when I give the word light the points of those three cones of gunpowder simultaneously and instantly, and leave me to finish the remainder of my part. Of course you will be prepared to back me up with your rifles if need be, but keep well out of sight at first.”

We now saw the drift of our eccentric friend’s intention, but for my part I felt little confidence in his success. The plan seemed altogether too wild and absurd. But our danger was imminent. No way of escape seemed possible, and it is wonderful how readily men will grasp at anything in the shape of a ruse or stratagem, no matter how silly or wild, that affords the most distant chance of escape from danger. Jack, too, I could see from the look of his face, put little faith in the plan; and I observed an expression on the countenance of our negro guide which seemed to indicate that his respect for Peterkin’s wisdom was on the wane.

We had not to wait long. The doctor, with several torch-bearers, suddenly darted in with a shout, followed closely by the warriors, who yelled furiously, in order, no doubt, to keep up their courage.

Alarmed by such an unusual hubbub in their usually quiet domain, the bats came swooping from their holes in the walls by hundreds, and the torches were extinguished almost instantly. The savages who were near the entrance drew back in haste; those who had entered stood rooted to the spot in terror.

“Now!” whispered Peterkin eagerly.

We struck our lights at once and applied them to the points of the gunpowder cones, which instantly began to spout forth a shower of sparks with great violence. Peterkin darted out from behind the rock with a yell so appalling that we ourselves were startled by it, having forgotten that it formed an element in his plan. In passing he allowed a few sparks to fall on the heap of powder, which exploded with so bright a flame that the whole cavern was illuminated for an instant. It also set fire to the ragged scraps with which Peterkin had decked himself out—a result which had neither been intended nor anticipated—so that he rushed towards the mouth of the cave howling with pain as well as with a desire to scare the savages.

The effect of this apparition was tremendous. The negroes turned and crushed through the narrow entrance screaming and shrieking with terror. The bats, no less alarmed than the men, and half suffocated with smoke, fled out of the cave like a whirlwind, flapping their wings on the heads of the negroes in their flight, and adding, if that were possible, to their consternation. The negroes ran as never men ran before, tumbling over each other in their mad haste, dashing against trees and crashing through bushes in their terror, while Peterkin stood leaping in the cave’s mouth, smoking and blazing and spurting, and unable to contain himself, giving vent to prolonged peals of demoniacal laughter. Had the laugh been that of negroes it might have been recognised; but Peterkin’s was the loud, violent, British guffaw, which, I make no doubt, was deemed by them worthy of the fiends of the haunted cave, and served to spur them on to still greater rapidity in their wild career.

Returning into the cave’s innermost recess, we lighted one of the torches dropped by the savages, and placing it in a sort of natural niche, seated ourselves on several pieces of rock to rest.

Our first act was to look earnestly in each other’s faces; our next to burst into peals of laughter.

“I say, comrades,” I exclaimed, checking myself, “don’t we run some risk in giving vent to our feelings so freely?”

“No fear,” cried Peterkin, who was still smoking a little from unextinguished sparks. “There is not a man in the whole crew who will draw rein till he is sitting, with the teeth still chattering in his head, at his own fireside. I never saw men in such a fright since I was born. Depend upon it, we are safe enough here from this day forth.—Don’t you think so, Mak?”

Our guide, who was now trying to reassure his trembling bride, turned, with a broad grin on his sable countenance, and said—

“Safe? ho! yis, massa. Dere not be a man as’ll come to dis yere cuvern for de nix tree hun’r year or more. Massa Peterkin be de most horriboble ghost dey ever did saw, an’ no mistake. But, massas, we mus’ go ’way quick an’ git to our camp, for de king sure to go dere an’ see if you no hab someting to do wid it all. Him’s a bery clebber king, am Jambai—bery clebber; him’s no be bughummed bery easy.”

“Humbugged, you mean,” said Jack, laughing. “You’re right, Mak; we must set off at once. But what are we to do with poor Okandaga, now that we have got her?”

This was indeed a puzzling question. It was impossible to take her to our camp and account to the negroes for her appearance in a satisfactory manner; besides, if Jambai took it into his head to pursue us, in order to ascertain whether we had had anything to do with the rescue, our case would be hopeless. It was equally impossible to leave her where she was, and to let her try to make her escape through the woods alone was not to be thought of. While we pondered this dilemma an idea occurred to me.

“It seems to me,” said I, “that men are seldom, perhaps never, thrown into a danger or difficulty in this world without some way of escape being opened up, which, if they will but grasp at it promptly, will conduct them at last out of their perplexities. Now, it has just occurred to me that, since everything else seems to be impossible, we might send Okandaga into the woods, with Makarooroo to guide and defend her and to hunt for her. Let them travel in a line parallel with the river route which we intend to follow. Each night Mak will make a secure shelter for her, and then return to our camp as if he had come in from hunting. Each morning he will set off again into the woods as if to hunt, rejoin Okandaga; and thus we will journey together, as it were, and when we reach the next tribe of natives we will leave the girl in their charge until we return from the gorilla country. What do you think of that plan?”

“Not a bad one,” replied Jack; “but if Mak is away all day, what are we to do for an interpreter?”

“Make him describe to us and to the men the day’s route before leaving us,” suggested Peterkin; “and as for the talking, we can manage that well enough for all needful purposes by a mixture of the few phrases we know with signs.”

In the excitement of this whole affair we had totally forgotten our two prisoners, who lay not far from us on the ground, gagged and pinioned. We were now reminded of their presence rather abruptly. We must have secured their fastenings badly, for during the time we were conversing they managed to free themselves, and made a sudden dash past us. Jack’s eye fortunately caught sight of them in time. He sprang up, rushed at the one nearest him, and throwing out his foot as he passed, tripped him up. It chanced that at that spot there was a deep hole in the floor of the cavern. Into this the poor wretch plunged head first, and he was killed on the spot. Meanwhile, the other gained the outlet of the cave, and had almost escaped into the forest, when Makarooroo darted after him with the speed of an antelope. In a few seconds we heard a cry, and shortly after our guide returned with his knife clotted with blood. He had overtaken and slain the other negro.

I cannot convey to the reader the horror that filled me and my two companions at this unexpected and melancholy termination of the affair. Yet we felt that we were guiltless of rashly spilling human blood, for Jack had no intention of killing the poor negro whom he tripped up; and as to the other, we could not have prevented our guide from doing what he did. He himself deemed it justifiable, and said that if that man had escaped to the village, and told who it was that frightened them out of the cave, they would certainly have come back and murdered us all. There was truth in this. Still we could not but feel overwhelmed with sadness at the incident.

We were now doubly anxious to get away from this cave, so we rapidly finished the discussion of our plan, and Jack arranged that he should accompany what may be termed the overland part of our expedition. This settled, we washed the charcoal off our persons, with the exception of that on our faces, having been advised by King Jambai himself to hunt with black faces, as wild animals were quicker to perceive our white skins than their black ones. Then we resumed our garments, and quitting the haunted cavern, set out on our return journey to the camp.