The Perfume of Egypt, C. W. Leadbeater [scary books to read .TXT] 📗
- Author: C. W. Leadbeater
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I am afraid I laughed again, which was rude of me, but he really did look so utterly ridiculous in his impotent rage, and with a great lump already rising between his eyes, where my father had struck him.
“I shall do no such thing”, I said; “and if you dare to touch me, my father will repay you for it when he comes back”.
He half raised his sword, and for a moment it looked very much as though my career would be cut short then and there. But somehow he controlled himself, and an evil glint came into his one available eye (the other was fast closing under the influence of the blow). He turned and called Antinahuel.
“Perhaps,” he said, “your men can manage to make this young coxcomb change his mind.
Don’t you think so?”
A slight disdainful smile passed over Antinahuel’s face.
“Perhaps they may,” and he signed to some of his men, who came up and began to drag me away. Martinez said no further words to him, but turned upon my little brother Gerald.
“You, at least, you little spawn of the devil, put your foot on that cross and repeat after me the words which I shall say to you.”
“Don’t you do it, Gerald,” I shouted back to him, as I was being dragged off; “remember S. Agnes!”
For not long before we had left home, our mother had told us the legend of S. Agnes, a Roman maiden of thirteen, who, it was alleged, had died for the sake of her faith sooner than perform some act of sacrifice which was against her conscience. Or perhaps she refused to be betrothed to what she called a heathen — I am not quite sure after all these years. But I know that the story had recently been told to us, and that we had both greatly admired the little girl’s heroism.
I wrenched myself free sufficiently to look back and see what the little boy did. He looked up quite bravely into the furious face of Martinez, and said in his clear childish treble:
“I will not do it. You are a very wicked man.”
What followed next I do not like to tell, even though I really believe now in my inmost heart that it was the act of a madman. Martinez whirled his sword above his head and cut the child down as he stood looking up in his face. When he saw the little body lying before him I think even he was ashamed, for he threw down his sword and turned away, muttering something about not having meant to do it. Even his officers, a set of hardened ruffians, showed some disgust on their faces, and all drew back as Martinez walked hurriedly into his tent.
What this meant to me, who loved that little brother more than my own life, I can hardly tell you. What I did I cannot justify; I can only tell you that I also was half-mad with grief and rage. But then and there I, a captive in the hands of ruthless savages, and little likely, so far as could be seen, to live to see tomorrow’s sun, registered with all the force of burning hate a solemn vow that I would never turn aside from the pursuit until I had slain Martinez in revenge for the death of my brother. I was wrong, of course, but I was only a young boy, and the provocation was terrible.
Meantime I soon had my own affairs to think of. The Indians dragged me away to the borders of the forest, and after a little searching they found what they wanted — two young and flexible trees growing only a few yards apart. Four or five threw themselves upon each tree, and by their united weight and strength bent down the tops until they came almost together, and then they proceeded to tie me between these two tops, the right arm and leg to one, the left arm and leg to the other; and as soon as that was done to their satisfaction the men let go the trees, which instantly sprang back as far as they could and left me hanging between them. A diabolically ingenious woodsman’s substitute for the mediaeval rack of the Inquisition.
To be left hanging in such a position for hours under such a nerve-rending strain is an experience which I would rather not try to describe; nor need I tell in detail how they stood jeering underneath as I hung in mid-air as though on an invisible S. Andrew’s cross. Nor how they pelted my aching body with fragments of broken bottles, or struck at me from beneath with long lianas, torn from the neighbouring trees. I will not harrow your feelings with a description of the unnameable tortures which they inflicted upon me all through that weary day.
But this at least I can say, that however horrible were the sufferings all through the day, only the one overpowering feeling burned ever stronger and stronger within my heart and mind — black, bitter hatred of Martinez, and the resolve to be revenged upon him for my brother’s death. So entirely was I wrapped up in this that I believe for the most part I gave no answer to their repeated enquiries whether I would not now take the required oath. But I know that sometimes I replied by calling down curses upon their heads and threatening that dire vengeance should overtake them. It is best to draw a veil over this. Let me say only that their ingenuity was diabolical and their resources seemed endless.
I suppose that they got tired of me at last, as I showed no signs of yielding to them, and they felt that they must do something to bring matters to a crisis. So they hung me from the branch of a tree by a rope passed under my shoulders, and then proceeded to light a fire beneath my feet, which were soon most horribly burnt. But at the same time the hot air and the smoke half-suffocated me, and evidently I must have fainted. I suppose this frightened them, for their orders were not to kill me; and so for that night they desisted from their cruel work. But of all this I know nothing.
I regained consciousness only slowly and confusedly, coming back into a strange and terrible sense of all-pervading pain, which seemed to fill the whole world. Gradually this world of acute anguish contracted and became more definite, until at last I realised myself as a small boy still alive upon the physical plane and in a condition of horrible suffering. I found myself bound to a tree, just at the borders of the forest, not far from the tent of Martinez — bound by a rope which passed round me and the tree many times, and so formed a support without which I must of course have fallen, as the soles of my feet were so shockingly burnt that it would have been quite impossible for me to stand upon them for a moment.
It was night, and the camp lay quiet before me, except for the sentinels who walked steadily up and down on their beats. Two of these were not far from me, one passing up and down in front of the commander’s tent, and the other taking a much longer beat along a certain section just outside of the nearest row of tents. No one seemed to be specially guarding me; indeed it was quite unnecessary, as I was not only securely tied, but I could not have moved a yard even if I had been free.
As may easily be imagined, my thoughts were of the saddest. My brother had been murdered before my eyes; my father was a fugitive in a trackless forest, which I knew to be full of wild beasts, and was furthermore being pursued relentlessly by men who knew no mercy. I had nothing to expect but certain death — probably of the most appallingly painful kind. So perhaps I need not be ashamed to acknowledge that for a time I felt absolutely despairing, and only wished that death might come even now to release me from further suffering. The conditions were so bad in every way that it seemed to me that they could not be worse, and I actually even prayed for death, saying that I could bear no more.
But just at this moment of utter weakness and despondency, I saw something which for the moment actually made me forget even that excruciating pain; for there, just in front of me, stood my brother Gerald, whom I had seen only a few hours before cut down by the sword of Martinez! Indeed, the mark of that cruel blow still lay across his head — a great ghastly wound cleaving the skull asunder. And yet somehow even that did not look terrible at all, for the expression of the face was so sweet that it quite overpowered the impression given by the wound. He stood before me exactly as in life, the flickering light of distant campfires fully upon him, and yet his form seemed also to be surrounded by a faint light of its own.
But the wonderful thing was the expression of the face. It was the same child-face I knew so well, changed in no particular, and yet showing so much more than it had ever shown before. That he himself was happy — radiantly happy, and utterly at peace — no one could have doubted for a moment; and yet the eyes were filled with pity (but pity obviously for me only, and not at all for himself) and with the desire to encourage and strengthen me. I tried to speak, but could not; nor did he on his side say a word; but he took a step forward, his face broke out into a radiant smile of love, and he laid his hand caressingly upon my breast. And then, in a moment, he was gone, just before the sentinel, who had reached the end of his beat, turned his face in our direction once more.
I find it difficult to describe the effect which this beautiful little apparition had upon me. All my manifold pains were still as insistent as ever — my whole body was still nothing but one mass of agony; and yet my mental attitude had in that moment become just the reverse of what it had been before. Remember that I knew nothing then of the astral world, nothing of the possibilities of life after death; so to me this was a special portent from heaven, a special sign from God Himself, who had permitted my brother’s spirit to return from the unseen world in order to cheer and comfort me in my trouble.
Inevitably then followed the certainty that, however hopeless the prospect might appear, somehow or other all would be well. Either, impossible as it appeared, I should somehow escape and recover, or else, if I was to die, I knew that I should die soon and painlessly, and be with my brother once more. Since outward circumstances were entirely unchanged, it is perhaps hard to comprehend that my despondency had vanished as though it had never been, and that I was now in a condition of eager expectancy — expectancy that something would happen, either death or some kind of liberation. What form this latter would take I could not imagine, and I remember reviewing the situation without being able to
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