Hair-Breadth Escapes: The Adventures of Three Boys in South Africa

by H. C. Adams

  CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

  FRANK AND NICK REBEL--A HAZARDOUS DETERMINATION--A SUDDEN DEPARTURE--AWOUNDED BUFFALO--OMINOUS SOUNDS--RESCUE AT THE LAST MOMENT.

  Of all the party, De Walden was now the only one who was contented toremain in his present position. He was, indeed, in a more contentedframe of mind than any he had enjoyed since he first entered the CapeColony. It seemed as if his wishes, so long frustrated, had on a suddenreceived their full accomplishment--as though the seed he had beenvainly sowing for so many years, had sprung up to ripeness in an hour.Not only had he his band of regular worshippers, who every Sundaypublicly attended his ministrations; not only had he his school filledwith boys and girls, learning, with an intelligence which would hardlyhave been found among European children of the same age, the rudimentsof Christianity--but there were several adult converts, who were so faradvanced that they were almost ready to receive baptism; and many more,though they had not openly given in their adhesion to the new doctrines,were gravely and seriously considering the matter. If things shouldcontinue to go on as favourably as at present, such an impression wouldbe made in the course of a few months on the whole tribe, as couldhardly fail to end in their open profession of Christianity. De Waldenhad seen much of life--much in particular of missionary life; and feltinwardly assured that he would not be permitted to accomplish so great awork, without strong and determined opposition. He marvelled at hissuccess from day to day; but meanwhile it was his duty to go on infaith, thankful for the mercy shown so far, and prepared to face thereverse, as soon as it should appear.

  Ernest Warley, we have seen, felt perplexed and embarrassed by hisposition as regarded Ella; but the Basuto village had, nevertheless, anattraction for him, which would have made it full of delightful andabsorbing interest, if his conscience had not every day pricked him morekeenly as to the mischief he was unwillingly doing. But Wilmore andGilbert, who had not the same sources of interest as either De Walden orWarley, began at last find their sojourn so intolerably wearisome, thatthey to could no longer endure it. "I tell you what it is, Frank," saidGilbert one day, when they had lain down to rest, under the shade of alarge oomahaama overshadowing their hut, after an hour's practice atthrowing the assegai, with which sport they had endeavoured to relievethe tedium of an idle morning--"I tell you what it is; if I stay heremuch longer, I shall go downright melancholy mad. They can't put meinto an asylum, because, I suppose, there are no articles of that kindto be met with hereabouts. But they'll have to appoint keepers, andextemporise a straight waistcoat of rhinoceros hide, and shave my head,and all the rest of it."

  "I am pretty nearly as bad as you are, Nick," returned Wilmore."There's De Walden for ever teaching those niggers, and there's Ernestfor ever dangling about Ella; and very pleasant I dare say, they findit. But you and I don't particularly fancy young darkies, and haven'tany girls to talk to, seeing Miss Ella has no ears for any one butErnest. I am tired of trying to learn Basuto, or to throw an assegai,or shoot with one of their bows and arrows, which are about big enoughfor a child of ten years old. If we could only go out with our gunsevery day--"

  "We are not to go out again," interrupted Nick. "The powder's runningso very short, that there are not above a dozen charges left. So wemust learn assegai throwing and archery, if we mean to have any sport infuture."

  "I shall never make a hand at either," said Frank. "A fellow must beborn to it, to knock things over as these Basutos do. Well, I agreewith you, I don't think I can stand this much longer, without goingstark crazy."

  "Suppose we _don't_ stand it, Frank," suggested Gilbert. "It quiterests with ourselves. No one can compel us."

  "I don't quite understand you," said Wilmore. "How can we helpourselves?"

  "By taking ourselves off," answered the other.

  "Look here. They say we ought to remain until the messengers returnthat were sent to Cape Town, and that it would be hard upon Lavie, if hewere to come here and find us gone. Very good. But De Walden andWarley both mean to remain with Queen Laura; so that whenever he maycome (if he _does_ come) he will find them, and that will answer everypurpose. But you and I may go our way, and leave them to go theirs."

  "What! you propose that we two should set off for Cape Town alone, hey?Could we find our way, think you?"

  "I don't see why we shouldn't. We know the exact position of Cape Town,and the pocket compass, which Lavie gave me, will enable us to go at allevents in the right direction. It will take a long time, no doubt--"

  "Three or four months, at least," said Wilmore.

  "About that, I judge," rejoined Gilbert. "But then we shall betolerably sure to fall in with some Dutch village or farm before we havegot half-way; and the Dutch are hospitable, though not civil to theEnglish. They couldn't turn us out into the wilderness, anyhow."

  "No, I suppose not," said Frank, "particularly as we have got money topay for what we want. But then, Nick, how are we to subsist till wereach one of these villages or farms. The nearest, I believe, are fullytwo hundred miles off, if we went ever so straight. With only sixcharges in our guns--"

  "We must reserve our fire for great emergencies," interrupted Nick. "Ihave my knife, any way, and we have learned something by this time,remember, and know where to find the roots and fruits these fellows eat.Besides, it's the season for birds' eggs now, and there'll be heaps ofthem."

  "Yes, and we can take a lot of mealeys with us," added Wilmore. "Theywill go into a small compass and last a long time. Well, Nick, I don'tmind, if I go in for this with you. So far as I can see, we may waithere, day after day, for the next twelvemonth; and I'd rather take mychance of being devoured alive by the wild beasts, or knocked on thehead by the savages, than have to go through that. When do you proposethat we should make a start?"

  "Well, we must first of all lay in a store of mealeys--I always meant totake them: and I should like to get out of De Walden the nearest way tothe banks of the Gariep. I've an idea that if we could reach that, wemight make another raft like that on which we made our voyage to theisland, and float on it till we came to the place where we were carriedaway by the flood. We should both know that again."

  "That's not a bad idea, Nick. We should find plenty to eat as we wentalong. We could store up a lot of figs, or dates or bananas on theraft--enough to last us a week, I dare say; and the current runs prettyswift, I expect. Only how about the falls at different parts of theriver? I've heard there are several places where there are rapids, oractual cascades."

  "I don't think there are between this and the place I was speaking of.Anyhow we must be on the look out, and if we see any reason to think weare getting near one, we must run ashore. Of course there must be somerisk, you know."

  "Of course. Well, I am game to go, and I think we had better make astart as soon as possible. Suppose we look up the mealeys to-morrow andthe next day--Tuesday, that is, and Wednesday, and set out on Thursday."

  "We had better set out on Wednesday night. There is a full moon then,which will light us as well as broad day would. And it would give us astart of ten hours or so before we were missed."

  "Very good. I have no objection. It is the pleasantest time fortravelling during the warm weather."

  On the Wednesday evening, accordingly, the two boys set out on theirexpedition. Nick had managed skilfully to extract the information hedesired from the missionary, without exciting his suspicions; and theyhad had no difficulty in gathering a heap of ripe mealeys, as large asthey could carry in their knapsacks, unobserved by any one. They werecareful to take no more than the exact amount of powder, which theyconsidered to be their share of the remaining stock. Frank also wrote afew lines, addressed to Warley, in which he told him, that they hadfound their life of late so unendurable that they had resolved to braveevery toil and danger, rather than continue to undergo it. He beggedthat no attempt might be made at pursuit; because in event of theirbeing overtaken, they were resolved positively to refuse to return tothe Basuto village. Lastl
y, he assured Ernest, that if they succeededin reaching Cape Town, they would take care that steps were immediatelytaken for securing his safe journey thither.

  Having left this letter on the table, where it would be sure to be foundon the following morning, the two lads set forth under the brightmoonlight, and travelled in safety some fifteen or sixteen miles throughthe night and into the next day, when the burning heat warned them thatit was time to rest. They started again an hour or two after sunset,and again pursued their way through almost unbroken solitude, trackingtheir way partly by the aid of Gilbert's compass, partly by theirrecollection of Mr De Walden's information. So many days passed on,until the whole of their store of provisions was exhausted, and theywere fain to supply themselves with anything eatable, which the desertor forest could furnish.

  But here they found, for the first time, their calculations fail them.The plains they traversed were either wastes of arid sand, or ranges offorest producing haak-doorns and kamel doorns and mimosas in abundance,and occasionally sycamores and acacias, but none of the fruit trees theyhad reckoned on finding. At the end of the second day, they wereobliged to expend some of their dearly cherished ammunition in firing ata gemsbok, which came full upon them in one of the turnings of theforest, and which they were fortunate enough to wound with the firstshot they fired, and kill with a second.

  Collecting a heap of dry grass and wood, they succeeded, by the help ofLavie's burning-glass, which had been the doctor's parting gift toFrank, in lighting a fire, at which they roasted a considerable part ofthe gemsbok's flesh, and having made a hearty meal upon it, stored theremains in their knapsacks. A considerable supply of meat was thusobtained, and for two or three days they fared well enough, especiallyas there was a fall of rain, which gave them plenty of water.

  But the line of country through which they passed continued as barren ofthe means of supporting existence as ever, and they were presentlyreduced to the same straits as before. They began, indeed, now to besomewhat alarmed at their situation. They had reckoned that it would bea fortnight's journey to the banks of the Gariep; but they had been tendays on their route, and had not, so far as they could calculate,accomplished half the distance. Each of them had only two charges ofpowder left, and it was evident that their guns alone could be reckonedon, as furnishing them with food in the country where they were nowtravelling. Their condition was rendered worse by two unsuccessfulattempts which they made to shoot a buffalo on the day after the lastbatch of gemsbok meat had been consumed. They had come on the track ofa herd of buffaloes, which they had resolved to follow, and after manyhours of careful stalking, they had got so near to the herd at sunset asto venture a shot. But, just as in the former instance, though theanimal was hit, and it might be severely wounded, it did not fall, butwas able to make off with the rest of the herd.

  "Oh, Frank, what will become of us?" exclaimed Nick, as he witnessedthis mishap. "If we don't get food somewhere to-night, I feel as if Ishould perish of hunger."

  "Never say die, Nick," said Frank, cheerily. "Look here! This brute ishit hard, I'm sure of that; and I'm pretty sure, too, that he won't holdout very long. Just look what lots of blood he has left behind him.They'll be quite enough to enable us to track him, even by this light.We'll follow up the blood-marks until we find him. Even if another shotshould be necessary, we shall still have a charge apiece left, if weshould be attacked. If we kill the buffalo it will supply us with foodfor a long time to come, and it is very unlikely that the country willcontinue as bare of all fruit, as it has been since we left thevillage."

  "All right, Frank," returned Nick; "that is the best way of viewing itat all events. I'll just take a hole up in my belt to stop theimportunities of my stomach, and then we'll be off after the buffalo.We may as well go that way as any other, at all events."

  They set out accordingly, following without difficulty, by the help ofthe moon, the course taken by the herd across the open plain and theintervening patches of scrub for two or three hours. The marks of bloodwere plainly enough visible all the way, sometimes in large patches, asthough the wounded animal had stopped behind the rest through momentaryweakness; and then again only a drop here and there, as if it had againexerted its remaining strength to overtake the herd. At last they cameto a spot where a larger puddle than any before stained the adjacentgrass and sand, and then the marks no longer followed the general track,but turned aside into a deep thicket, through which the two boys hadconsiderable difficulty in following its course.

  They had advanced some distance, when Nick suddenly laid his hand on hiscompanion's arm.

  "Did you hear that?" he said.

  "Hear what?" returned Wilmore.

  "I fancied I heard a shot fired," said Gilbert, "but I suppose I musthave been mistaken."

  "A shot! Who could there be in these parts to fire one? It was thefall of a large stone from the cliffs, most likely. They are oftendislodged by the wind, and make a noise like the report of a gun. Comealong, we shall not have much further to go, I expect."

  "Hist!" exclaimed Nick, again stopping. "I am quite sure I hearsomething now, though in a different quarter from that in which Ifancied the gun was fired."

  "What do you hear?" asked Wilmore, stopping and listening with all hisears.

  "A kind of low growling, or groaning," answered Nick; "or perhapsgrinding of teeth. It is very indistinct; but I am certain that I hearit."

  "It is the poor brute in his dying agony," said Frank. "Push on. Wemust be close to him now."

  By this time the dawn had begun to break, and the daylight diffuseditself rapidly over the scene. The beams of the rising sun showed thatthey were, as Frank said, close on the buffalo's trail. The grass wastrampled down, as if by heavy footsteps, and blood, evidently onlyrecently shed, stained the bushes and long grass in profusion. And nowthe sound heard by Nick became plainly audible to Frank also.

  "Cock your gun, Nick!" he said. "He may have life enough left in him togive us some trouble yet."

  As he spoke he turned the corner of a large mass of prickly pear, whichhad been partly forced aside and partly torn away by the passage of someheavy body, and came upon a sight which was as alarming as it wasunexpected.

  The carcass of the buffalo lay on the ground, already partiallydevoured. Standing over it were a male and female panther (or tiger, asthe natives of South Africa are wont to call them), engaged in tearingthe flesh from the ribs with their long white shining teeth. Theanimals were as big as an ordinary English mastiff, and the glare oftheir large yellow eyes showed that the ferocity of their nature wasfully awakened. Frank fell back, as soon as his eye lighted on them,conscious that his best hope of escape lay in instantly withdrawing fromthe spot; but Nick, who had already raised his gun before he had come insight of the enemy he was about to encounter, drew his trigger, scarcelyaware of what he was doing, wounding the male panther severely, but notmortally, in the chest. With a fierce howl of agony and rage combined,the tiger sprang straight upon him; and if he had not beenextraordinarily light of limb and quick of eye, the next moment wouldhave been his last. But the moment the charge left the barrel, heperceived the imminence of the danger threatening him, and, dropping hisgun, he sprang lightly on one side. The brute's claws and teeth justmissed their aim, but the body, in passing, struck him with sufficientforce to prostrate him insensible on the ground. The wounded pantherhad no sooner recovered from its spring, than it turned back to fastenon its fallen enemy; but Frank, stepping instantly up, with readypresence of mind, applied the muzzle of his rifle to its ear, as it wason the very point of bending its neck, and it fell lifeless on theground.

  But the boys were now left quite helpless. The last charge had beenfired, and the remaining panther, which had stood motionless since thedischarge of the gun, watching as it were the issue of the struggle, nowgave evident signs that it was about to avenge its mate. Erecting itstail, it uttered a low growl, which swelled gradually into a savageroar. Another minute and his teeth w
ould have been fastened in thelad's throat; but before the animal could make its leap, the sound ofpattering feet was heard, and a large dog, bounding through the bushes,sprang on the tiger and caught it by the throat. The brute turnedsavagely on its new assailant, and a furious combat commenced; the tigertearing the ribs of the mastiff with its claws, but unable to shake offthe hold it had fastened on its throat Frank gazed with blank amazementat the appearance of this unexpected champion, which seemed to havefallen from the skies for his deliverance; and his astonishment wasincreased when he perceived, as he presently did, that the dog was noother than his long-lost, faithful Lion! How he could be still living,and still more, what could have brought him there, he could notconceive. But it was no moment for speculation. His favourite wasmatched against an antagonist which, if it did not prove victor in thestruggle, might at all events inflict the most deadly wounds before itcould be overcome. Frank stooped, and drew the strong clasped knifewhich Nick always carried in his belt. Opening this, he stepped forwardto the spot, where the two animals, now covered with dust and blood,were savagely rending one another; he waited for the moment when thepanther's breast became exposed, and plunged the knife into it up to thehilt. The stab was mortal. Unfastening the grip of its teeth on Lion'sside, the brute endeavoured to seize this new enemy; but it could notdisengage itself from Lion's hold. Its jaws collapsed, its savage eyesgrew filmy and dim, and in another minute the mastiff was tearing andshaking the inanimate carcass of its adversary.

  "Lion! Lion! dear old boy!--are you much hurt," exclaimed Frank,running up, and throwing his arms round his favourite's neck; "howeverdid you come here? and where have you been all these weeks and months?I can hardly believe, even now, that it is really you."

  "Yes, it really him--it Lion for sure. Kobo and he make friends--knoweach other ever so long," said a tall Bechuana, who had now joined theparty, and stood with a grin on his black face. "But, Master Nick--henot hurt, is he?"

  "What, Kobo, you too here!" exclaimed Frank. "But we'll talk about thatpresently. We must see to Nick here. I declare I almost forgot him inthe surprise and joy at seeing old Lion again. But men before dogs. Iam pretty sure, though, Gilbert isn't hurt. He's only stunned by theweight of the leopard's body, when he sprang on him."

  They raised the lad between them, and soon had the satisfaction ofseeing him open his eyes, and draw in a long breath; and then, afteronce or twice stretching himself, and feeling his chest and ribs,declare that he wasn't a pin the worse, and would be ready for hisdinner, as soon as ever Kobo could supply him with any!