Anting-Anting Stories, Sargent Kayme [uplifting novels TXT] 📗

“Yes. This is very singular. There is no doubt but the book is now nothing but a charm.”

“Yes. I found that out.”

“But I feel sure it was originally something more than that. Something very strange.”

“What?”

“It purports to be the record of the doings of a man who seems to have died here many years ago, written by himself. It tells a strange story, which, if true, may be of great importance now. To make sure the record would be kept the writer made the natives believe it was a charm, while its being written in Latin kept the nature of its message from them.”

“Have you read it?”

“Most of it. Sometimes a word is gone—faded out;—and a few words I cannot translate;—I don’t remember all my Latin. I have written out a translation as nearly as I can make it out.” He handed a paper to the captain, who read:

“I, Christopher Lunez, am about to die. Once I had not thought that this would be my end,—a tropic island, with only savages about me. I had thought of something very different, since I got the gold. Perhaps, after all, there is a curse on treasure got as that was. If there is, and the sin is to be expiated in another world, I shall know it soon. I did not—”

Here there was a break, and the story went on.

”—— all the others are dead, and the wreck of our ship has broken to bits and has disappeared. Before the ruin was complete, though, I had brought the gold on shore and buried it. No one saw me. The natives ran from us at first, far into the forest, and ——”

The words which would have finished the sentence were wanting.

“Where three islands lie out at sea in a line with a promontory like a buffalo’s head, I sunk the gold deep in the sands, at the foot of the cliff, and dug a rude cross in the rock above it. Some day I hope a white man guided by this, will find the treasure and—”

“There was no more,” said the lieutenant, when the captain, coming to this sudden end looked up at him. “The last few pages of the book are gone, torn out, or worn loose and lost. What I have translated was scattered over many pages, with disconnected signs and characters written in between. The book was evidently intended to be looked upon as a mystic talisman, probably that the natives on this account might be sure to take good care of it.

“All of the Tagalogs who can procure them, carry these ‘anting-anting.’ Some are thought to be much more powerful than others. Evidently this was looked upon as an unusually valuable charm. Sometimes they are only a button, sewed up in a rag. One of the prisoners we took not long ago wore a broad piece of cloth over his breast, on which was stained a picture of a man killing another with a ‘barong.’ He believed that while he wore it no one could kill him with that weapon; and thought the only reason he was not killed in the skirmish in which he was captured was because he had the ‘anting-anting’ on.”

“Do you believe the story which the book tells is true?” the captain inquired.

“I don’t know. Some days I think I could believe anything about this country.”

“Have you shown the book to any one else, or told any one what you make out of it?”

“No.”

“Do not do so, then. That is all, now. I will keep the book,” he added, putting the little brown volume inside his coat.

Several days later the officer in charge of the quarters where the native prisoners were confined reported to the captain: “One of the prisoners keeps begging to be allowed to see you, sir,” he said. “He says you told him he might go free. Shall I let him be brought up here?”

“Yes. Send him up.”

“Well?” said Captain Von Tollig, when the man appeared at headquarters, and the orderly who had brought him had retired.

“The little book, Señor. You said I could have it back, and go.”

“Yes. You may go. I will have you sent safely through our lines; but the book I have decided to keep.”

The man’s face grew ash-colored with disappointment or anger. “But, Señor,” he protested. “You told me ——”

“I know; but I have changed my mind. You can go, if you wish, without the book, or not, just as you choose.”

“Then I will stay,” the Tagalog said slowly, adding a moment later, “My people will surely slay me if I go back to them without the book.”

“Very well.” The captain called for the guard, and the man was taken back to prison; but later in the day an order was sent that he be released from confinement and put to work with some other captured natives about the camp.

During the next two or three weeks a stranger to Tagalog methods of warfare might very reasonably have thought the war was ended, so far as this island, at least, was concerned. The natives seemed to have disappeared mysteriously. Even the men who had been longest in the service were puzzled to account for the sudden ceasing of the constant skirmishing which had been the rule before. The picket lines were carried forward and the location of the camp followed, from time to time, as scouting parties returned to report the country clear of foes. The advance would have been even more rapid, except for the necessity of keeping communication open at the rear with the harbour where two American gunboats lay at anchor.

As a result of one of the advances the camp was pitched one night upon a broad plateau looking out upon the sea. Inland the ground rose to the thickly forest-clad slope of a mountain, to which the American officers felt sure the Tagalogs had finally retreated. Early in the evening, when the heat of the day had passed, a group of these officers were standing with Captain Von Tollig in the center of the camp, examining the mountain slope with their glasses.

“What did you say was the name of this place?” one of the officers asked a native deserter who had joined the American forces, and at times had served as a guide to the expedition.

“That is Mt. Togonda,” he answered, pointing to the hills before them, “and this,” swinging his hand around the plateau on which the camp’s tents were pitched, “is La Plaza del Carabaos.”

The captain’s eyes met those of Lieutenant Smith.

“La Plaza del Carabaos” means “The Square of the Water Buffalos.”

As if with one thought the two men turned and looked out to sea. The sun had set. Against the glowing western sky a huge rock at the plateau’s farthest limit was outlined. Rough-carved as the rock had been by the chisel of nature, the likeness to a water buffalo’s head was striking. Beyond the rock three islands lay in a line upon the sunset-lighted water. Far out from the foot of the cliff the two men could hear the waves beating upon the sand.

“This is an excellent place for a camp,” the captain said when he turned to his men again. “I think we shall find it best to stay here for some time.”

Perhaps a month of respite from attack had made the sentries careless; perhaps it was only that the Tagalogs had spent the time in gathering strength. No one can ever know just how that wicked slaughter of our soldiers in the campaign on that island did come about.

The Tagalogs swept down into the camp that night as a hurricane might have blown the leaves of the mountain trees across the plateau; and then were gone again, leaving death, and wounds worse than death, behind them.

When our men had rallied, and had come back across the battle-ground, they found among the others, the captain lying dead outside his tent. A Tagalog dagger lay beside the body, and the uniform had been torn apart until the officer’s bare breast showed.

The first full moon of the month shone down upon the dead man’s white, still face.