By Sheer Pluck: A Tale of the Ashanti War, G. A. Henty [100 books to read in a lifetime .TXT] 📗

attacks of fever, but the constant use of quinine enabled him to resist their effect, and he was now to some degree acclimatized, and thought no more of the attacks of fever than he would have done at home of a violent bilious attack.

This was not the case with Mr. Goodenough. Frank observed with concern that he lost strength rapidly, and was soon unable to accompany him in his walks. One morning he appeared very ill.

“Have you a touch of fever, sir?”

“No, Frank, it is worse than fever, it is dysentery. I had an attack last time I was on the coast, and know what to do with it. Get the medicine chest and bring me the bottle of ipecacuanha. Now, you must give me doses of this just strong enough not to act as an emetic, every three hours.”

Frank nursed his friend assiduously, and for the next three days hoped that he was obtaining a mastery over the illness. On the fourth day an attack of fever set in.

“You must stop the ipecacuanha, now,” Mr. Goodenough said, “and Frank, send Ostik round to the Germans, and say I wish them to come here at once.”

When these arrived Mr. Goodenough asked Frank to leave him alone with them. A quarter of an hour later they went out, and Frank, returning, found two sealed envelopes on the table beside him.

“My boy,” he said, “I have been making my will. I fear that it is all over with me. Fever and dysentery together are in nine cases out of ten fatal. Don't cry, Frank,” he said, as the lad burst into tears. “I would gladly have lived, but if it is God's will that it should be otherwise, so be it. I have no wife or near relatives to regret my loss—none, my poor boy, who will mourn for me as sincerely as I know that you will do. In the year that we have been together I have come to look upon you as my son, and you will find that I have not forgotten you in my will. I have written it in duplicate. If you have an opportunity send one of these letters down to the coast. Keep the other yourself, and I trust that you will live to carry it to its destination. Should it not be so, should the worst come to the worst, it will be a consolation to you to know that I have not forgotten the little sister of whom you have spoken to me so often, and that in case of your death she will be provided for.”

An hour later Mr. Goodenough was in a state of delirium, in which he remained all night, falling towards morning into a dull coma, gradually breathing his last, without any return of sensibility, at eight in the morning.

Frank was utterly prostrated with grief, from which he roused himself to send to the king to ask permission to bury his friend.

The king sent down to say how grieved he was to hear of the white man's death. He had ordered many of his warriors to attend his funeral. Frank had a grave dug on a rising spot of ground beyond the marsh. In the evening a great number of the warriors gathered round the house, and upon the shoulders of four of them Mr. Goodenough was conveyed to his last resting place, Frank and the German missionaries following with a great crowd of warriors. The missionaries read the service over the grave, and Frank returned heart broken to his house, with Ostik, who also felt terribly the loss of his master.

Two days later a wooden cross was erected over the grave. Upon this Frank carved the name of his friend. Hearing a week afterwards that the king was sending down a messenger to Cape Coast, Frank asked permission to send Mr. Goodenough's letter by him. The king sent for him.

“I do not wish any more troubles,” he said, “or that letters should be sent to the governor. You are my guest. When the troubles are settled I will send you down to the coast; but we have many things to write about, and I do not want more subjects for talk.”

Frank showed the letter and read the address, and told the king that it was only a letter to the man of business of Mr. Goodenough in England, giving directions for the disposal of his property there.

The king then consented that his messenger should take the letter.

At the end of December, when Frank had been nearly three months at Coomassie, one of the Germans said to him:

“The king speaks fairly, and seems intent upon his negotiations; but he is preparing secretly for war. An army is collecting on the Prah. I hear that twelve thousand men are ordered to assemble there.”

“I have noticed,” Frank said, “that there have been fewer men about than usual during the last few days. What will happen to us, do you think?”

The missionary shook his head.

“No one can say,” he said. “It all depends upon the king's humor. I think, however, that he is more likely to keep us as hostages, and to obtain money for us at the end of the war, than to kill us. If all goes well with his army we are probably safe; but if the news comes of any defeat, he may in his rage order us to be executed.”

“What do you think are the chances of defeat?” Frank asked.

“We know not,” the missionary said; “but it seems probable that the Ashantis will turn the English out of the coast. The Fantis are of no use. They were a brave people once, and united might have made a successful resistance to the Ashantis; but you English have made women of them. You have forbidden them to fight among themselves, you have discouraged them in any attempts to raise armies, you have reduced the power of the chiefs, you have tried to turn them into a race of cultivators and traders instead of warriors, and you can expect no material aid from them now. They will melt away like snow before the Ashantis. The king's spies tell him that there are only a hundred and fifty black troops at Cape Coast. These are trained and led by Englishmen, but, after all, they are only negroes, no braver than the Ashantis. What chance have they of resisting an army nearly a hundred to one stronger than themselves?”

“Is the fort at Cape Coast strong?” Frank asked.

“Yes, against savages without cannon. Besides, the guns of the ships of war would cover it.”

“Well,” Frank said, “if we can hold that, they will send out troops from England.”

“They may do so,” the missionary asserted; “but what could white troops do in the fever haunted forests, which extend from Coomassie to the coast?”

“They will manage somehow,” Frank replied confidently. “Besides, after all, as I hear that the great portion of Ashanti lying beyond this is plain and open country, the Ashantis themselves cannot be all accustomed to bush fighting, and will suffer from fever in the low, swamp land.”

Three days later the king sent for Frank.

“The English are not true,” he said angrily. “They promised the people of Elmina that they should be allowed to retain all their customs as under the Dutch.