Zero the Slaver: A Romance of Equatorial Africa

by Lawrence Fletcher

  CHAPTER TWO.

  A NIGHT OF HORROR.

  No serious mishap befell our pair of adventurers until they neared theKatonga River, but just here they dropped in for a streak of ill-luck,which was like to have brought the expedition to a premature and utterlydisastrous termination.

  Leaving their men in camp one morning, Leigh and Kenyon had set out tothoroughly and carefully explore a mighty kloof, or gorge, in theadjacent hills, expecting to complete their investigations easily in acouple of hours or thereabouts.

  As the pair entered this natural mountain fastness, however, it rapidlydeveloped into a deep gorge, along which trickled a stream of water sotiny that it frequently lost itself altogether amongst the stones whichserved it for a bed.

  On either hand great grey barren walls shot up like precipices, whilstmighty scarped-out rocks seemed to hang over the very heads of theexplorers, the giant walls elsewhere being thickly fringed towards theskyline with trees and bushes, many of the former absolutely hanginghead-downwards, and appearing to maintain their precarious tenure ofexistence solely by the aid of magnificent festoons of creepers, whichhung from tree to rock, and from rock to tree, these gigantic parasitesabsolutely sustaining the decayed trunks of many a long-dead monarch ofthe woods, which they had enfolded in their tenacious and eventuallyfatal embrace; higher still the foliage upon the very summit of thecliffs looked like narrow gleaming threads of green and gold against thedull background of soft sandstone rock. Within the kloof it wasunquestionably more or less dark at the best of times, but just nowdarker than usual, for a vast white cloud, which the pair had noticed inthe distance when they entered the pass some hours before, had graduallyand ominously settled down, until it seemed to hang like a veritablecurtain of rich, fleecy wool directly over the chasm; and as our friendswere in the act of discussing the advisability of taking the back trackto camp, and returning to complete their investigations on the morrow,this cloud suddenly burst over their very heads, and in one short momenttransformed their rocky road into an angry, swelling torrent ofleaden-coloured water, alive with branches, trees, and stones, and thisnow rushed foaming and roaring down the awful pass, sweeping everythingbefore it, and threatening each instant to engulf the two wretched men,who had saved themselves for the nonce by hanging on to a tree trunkwhich was jammed cross-wise in the narrow gully of rock.

  Suddenly Leigh gave a gasp, turned white as death, and relaxed his hold,but ere the water could sweep him away he was in the iron grasp of theAmerican; many an enemy had known to his bitter cost what it was to feelthe clutch of the detective, but never had that grip of steel stood afriend in so good a stead as now.

  A floating log had struck Leigh violently on the side, dislocating a riband causing him to swoon away. For several anxious moments it seemed toKenyon that one or both of them must go, but to his intense relief hesuddenly noticed that the rush of the water was becoming less swift, andLeigh at the same time pulling round again to some extent, the twainwere soon in comparative safety from the water, which vanished almost asrapidly as it had appeared.

  By this time, however, evening was coming on, and this, in the depthstenanted by our friends, quickly meant the darkness of Erebus, andunpleasant though it was, they had no alternative but to sit patientlyon their friendly log and wish for daylight. The unfortunates had noteven the consolation of a smoke, for both tobacco and matches had beenreduced to a mere pulp by the water, nor had they aught in the shape offood or drink save a handful of unpleasantly damp peppermints owned bythe American, and a pint of good brown brandy in Leigh's flask.

  Now most people will concede that under such circumstances theconsumption of the brandy was not only permissible but distinctlyadvisable, though very few, perhaps, would care to tackle thepeppermints.

  Not so, however, our friends, for not once nor twice had they beenindebted at a pinch entirely to these simple "sweets" for keeping bodyand soul together during long days and anxious nights, when, with savagefoes following keen-eyed and red-handed on their tracks, any stoppagefor food or fire would have meant certain sudden death.

  All that Kingsley has said regarding the use of the "divine weed" may bere-written, and with much more truth, in favour of the harmless and notmore odorously objectionable peppermint. "A lone man's companion, ahungry man's food, a sad man's cordial, a chilly man's fire;" all this,and more, did the despised peppermint prove to our friends that awfulnight, and needless to say they appreciated their oft-tried food at itshonest value. Under the coldest conditions it was acceptable to adegree, and almost equally so under a blazing sun, with the thermometerregistering 80 degrees in the shade, for whilst it comforted the insideof the body, it cooled the fevered palate by causing every breath ofburning tropic air to rush into the mouth like draughts of nectar, ladenwith a welcome icy message from the far unlovely north.

  Slowly the hours passed away, so slowly that the American thought hiscompanion would die of exposure, for he was still suffering keenly fromthe blow his side had received, and never was dawn more welcome to manthan when those two miserable mortals at last saw it blushing goldenupon the trees far above them, followed by the glorious sun glintingupon the damp metallic-looking rocks, till the whole angry chasm wasbathed in a tremulous reddening glow of lovely light and shade.

  A weary way it seemed back to camp; indeed, it is doubtful in theextreme if Leigh would ever have reached it, had the pair not been methalf-way by their anxious sable retainers, who did not in the leastdegree appreciate the honour of being left in unsupported possession ofthis great lone land; these men very soon had their masters undercanvas, and after a steaming cup of coffee, stowed them away insidetheir blankets and left them to the undisturbed enjoyment of theirwell-earned repose.

  For several days Leigh was in a high fever, consequent upon thedislocated rib, but this having been carefully put to rights by theskilful Kenyon, he rapidly mended, and their camp being fortunatelyplaced in a healthy position, he was completely recovered at the end ofa few weeks, and again ready and eager to betake himself to the searchfor his cousin.

  With returning health, Leigh had betrayed an increased desire to extractprecise information from Kenyon as to the why and wherefore of theirpresent position, but all the satisfaction he could obtain from thatworthy was a laconic assurance that so far they had made no mistakes,and that at that moment they were either very near their destination, orelse were on the tail-end of a trail which had been blinded withconsummate skill Kenyon had, he himself said, been very far from idleduring Leigh's illness, and had thoroughly exploited the district, andtaken a number of photographs in the immediate vicinity; but he had cometo the conclusion that nothing of practical utility could beaccomplished until Leigh was fit to return with him to the pass andagain take up the thread of search where they had dropped it, and headded that if naught of Richard Grenville was written on its silentwalls, he would then be completely nonplussed.

  Kenyon, as Leigh had long since learned, was no ordinary policedetective; he was a shrewd and skilful tracker, a man born and broughtup on the frontier of the Far West, and his experience had been dearlybought in many an Indian fight and foray before he gravitated to NewYork to try his hand at journalism as favoured by the New World.

  A crack shot with the revolver, and no mean exponent of the beauties ofthe Winchester repeater, he was at all times a man to be feared by hisfoes, and to be looked up to by his friends, as a veritable tower ofstrength.

  Of Leigh we need say little, beyond remarking that he was in the primeof manhood, was as strong as a bull, and had lost none of his skill withthe rifle, whilst he had derived a new, and to his enemies a doublydangerous energy, begotten of his loves and of his hates; to him itseemed that, could they but find his cousin Dick, nothing would beimpossible with such heads and hearts as Grenville and Kenyon possessed,especially if he were himself there to take a third hand at the game.