Zero the Slaver: A Romance of Equatorial Africa

by Lawrence Fletcher

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

  "QUOD DIXI DIXI."

  As soon as opportunity offered, Grenville closely questioned theChieftain of the Stick as to the manner in which his party, commanded byLeigh, had been expelled from the cavern, where all had thought them sosecurely entrenched, and now it was that our friends received anotherstriking proof of Zero's intense cunning, and of the absolutely perfectknowledge which the man possessed regarding the mountain fastnesses inthe immediate neighbourhood of his quarters.

  Foolishly enough, the little band had failed to notice the singular factthat the air in the cave was at all times fresh and crisp, instead ofbeing extremely heavy and "muggy," as is ordinarily the case in long,unventilated caverns; and it was only now that they realised the truth,which was that Muzi Zimba's home was situated in the very heart of animmense volcano, which had been extinct for ages, but whose finalconvulsions had probably torn the range in two, and formed the kloof, orpass, of the Dark Spirit of Evil.

  This fact, however, was perfectly well-known to their astute andunscrupulous foe, and, appreciating his knowledge at its right strategicvalue, and sending on by night a large party provided with an immenserope-ladder, Zero had occupied the adjacent heights above and in therear of Leigh's position, and had actually dropped three hundred mendown through the very crater of the extinct volcano; and the firstintimation which the defenders of the cave had received of the presenceof this large force in their immediate rear, came to them in theobjectionable form of a well-aimed volley poured into their very backsat point-blank range, just at the moment of the delivery, by Zero withhis main army, of a furious attack upon their defences in the mouth ofthe cave.

  To turn their attention to the force ambushed in their rear would, ofcourse, have been to let the slaver-chief in upon them, when the cavernwould have literally become a shambles, and every man of the party wouldhave died a dog's death, for the ambushed foe was securely entrenchedbetween the position of our friends and the entrance of the mountainburrow leading to the old well.

  Choosing the least of two evils, Leigh drew his men together, and thenlaunched them like a thunderbolt down the hill and into the very heartof Zero's force, which they drove before them like chaff before thewind. Then, getting right through the ranks of the slavers, ourfriends, to the utter bewilderment of the foe, ignored altogether thecover of the forest, and commenced to fall back steadily upon Equatoria,in order, of course, to effect a junction with Grenville and Kenyon,whom Zero, perhaps naturally, imagined to be lying dead in the cavernalong with poor Ewan and upwards of a score of the Atagbondo, who hadfallen victims to the first treacherous and fatal discharge of theambushed foe.

  In the running fight which had ensued, the loss on the side of ourfriends had not been worth speaking of, whilst Leigh, with his repeatercharged with explosive bullets, had dropped an enemy on every hundredyards of ground from the mountain to the skull-shaped knoll. But whenthe slavers once sighted the mighty volumes of smoke ascending fromtheir burning town, they naturally scented something extremely wrong,and Zero's active mind instantly jumped to the likeliest solution of themystery, and told him that Grenville and the great Zulu, both of whom hehated beyond expression, were revenging themselves upon his force athome, and stamping out his town.

  This caused the slaver to throw the whole of his available force, at anycost, upon the desperate little band, and drive them in upon the townpell-mell, with fearful loss upon both sides, for the Atagbondo hadcontested every inch of ground, with a stubborn valour little short ofincredible when it is borne in mind that to rifle, spear, and axe, theycould only oppose their rough-hewn wooden clubs.

  Of the Zanzibari carriers nothing had been seen since the verycommencement of the fight, for they had been placed for safety in thehindmost cavern of all, as being worse than useless to the fightingbrigade; but whether the cowards were still in hiding there, or whetherthe ambushed slavers had found and massacred the wretched men forthwith,was, of course, as yet unknown, though, as the slavers in the cavern hadfollowed our friends out when they fled the spot, it was more thanprobable that the fellows were still where their masters had left them.

  Seeing, however, that the Mormon leader was almost certain to have theirold location searched for the baggage and belongings of the party,Grenville thought it much better to make a virtue of necessity, and tocommunicate the position of affairs to the old man without furtherdelay, adding that, on the whole, he almost thought he would prefer tolet even the Mormons divide the goods and chattels of his friends,rather than see them calmly appropriated by such a wretched craven crew.

  Our friend accordingly asked an audience of the aged Prophet--for bythis high-sounding, but somewhat empty, title the old man was designatedby his own people--and informed him that in the old hermit's cave uponthe northern mountains there lay very much valuable baggage andammunition, which, unless it was instantly looked after, would probablybe opened and appropriated by the thievish bearers, and he added that itwould be quite unnecessary to send an armed force to take possession, asthe wretched cowards would run away at the first sight of an armed man.

  The prophet briefly acknowledged the information, and then dismissedGrenville, first, however, promising that the little party should havethe use of their own well-stocked medicine-chest immediately upon itsarrival in Equatoria--a favour which Kenyon had most earnestly impressedupon our friend the absolute necessity of inducing the Mormon to grant,if by any means in his power he could prevail upon him to do so.

  Just before nightfall the Zanzibaris made their unwilling appearance,bearing their master's baggage, and being driven along, like sheep forthe slaughter, by a couple of formidable-looking and heavily-armedMormons, and the whole property of the little band was at once depositedin the public hall, with the exception of the much-desiredmedicine-chest, which was delivered, without loss of time, to thewaiting Kenyon, who particularly required its contents for immediate usein poor Leigh's case, the complications of which were already causingthis amateur doctor much mental worry and very grave anxiety, as thepatient after becoming conscious for a few moments, had again relapsedinto a state of complete coma.

  That night all slept an uneasy, troubled sleep, for the common hall waspacked to suffocation with men, women, and children; and as almost allthe late combatants were more or less wounded--many very severely so--the building was more like a hospital than anything else, and no one wasparticularly sorry when the great doors were opened in the morning, andan announcement was made by the officer on guard that all must leave theplace to obtain food, and that the Holy Three would sit in judgment uponthe prisoners at high noon that very day.

  This judgment was a very impressive affair, and was held in the publichall. In two long lines sat the combatants of the previous day, facingone another on opposite sides of a square, and all closely guarded bythe Mormon host. At the head of the room sat the Ancient Prophet,supported by two other very venerable-looking men--these three being theaccredited representatives in Africa of the Mormon Holy Three--whilst atthe lower end of the square, huddled together like frightened sheep,were the women and children of Equatoria, who knew not what to expectfrom the stern judges, whose iron code of laws was, they were wellaware, as unchanging as the laws of the Medes and Persians.

  Kenyon, who was, of course, by profession, a physiognomist, completelyforgot all his own personal danger in the absorbing interest which hetook in the varied and changing expressions of the anxious faces whichsurrounded him on every hand.

  The fallen and discomfited slavers looked what they were--partly sullen,partly indifferent, and wholly despairing, for well they knew that nomercy could be expected at the hands of the tribunal into whose clutchesthey had fallen; Zero, utterly mad with rage, and sulky as a bear;whilst it almost made the beholder laugh to notice the striking faces ofAmaxosa the Zulu, and Barad, the Chieftain of the Stick. The eyes ofthese men were positively like coals of fire, and were absolutelyriveted on the hated countenance of the slaver-chief, who seemed almostunea
sy under the burning intensity of their threatening gaze.

  Grenville, chivalrous as ever, was busily endeavouring to infuse hopeand comfort into the heart of poor Lady Drelincourt, who was the onlyperson in the assembly allowed to sit in the presence of the judges.

  When perfect silence had been obtained, the old Prophet rose to his feetand commenced a direct and startling indictment of Zero and his band ofruffians, who had, he said, robbed and pillaged the fraternity of theElect in the most impudent and bare-faced manner, and had, moreover,murdered out of hand a number of messengers, who had been sent to themwith positive instructions from head-quarters, to return at once to SaltLake City, report themselves without delay to the Holy Mormon Trinity,and render a full account of their stewardship; and in consequence ofZero's disregarding these definite and repeated commands, the Prophethad, he explained, been sent out with a very great array of the Saintsby the Three Unsleeping Ones, who watched over the welfare of the onetrue faith, and whose written instructions he carried with him, todemolish the stronghold of these audacious rebels, and to execute fullyretributive justice upon these men of sin, whose evil and wicked doingshad come up, with very evil savour, into the nostrils of the Holy Oneswho dwelt across the seas, whilst in Africa he had himself found that,owing to the outrageous conduct of these reprobates, the very name ofMormonism had become a by-word for all that was wholly and irredeemablybad.

  The Prophet then brought forward a number of witnesses to proveunauthorised deeds of violence and of blood against Zero and his band,all being without exception classed in the one dreadful category, andthe testimony of one of these not only proved the slaver-chief to havebeen guilty of countless murders in Africa, but deposed that, in thespeaker's own un-regenerate days, he had himself been an eye-witness ofthe shooting of Mr Harmsworth in New York--this diabolical andcold-blooded murder having, as Kenyon had opined, been committed by thehand of Zero, in revenge for what he considered to be a personal slight.

  The aged Prophet then consulted briefly with the two elders who were hisco-representatives in Africa of the Mormon Trinity, and, once againrising to his feet, briefly and clearly pronounced _sentence of death_.

  The whole of the renegade band would die by the rifle at sundown thatvery night, and their carcases would be thrown to the wild beasts ofprey, whilst Zero himself would be _crucified at noon on the followingday_, and his body would be left to the vultures and the crows.

  The sentence was evidently what all had foreseen; for, with theexception of a very few despairing shrieks from the women, there wasneither voice nor sound.

  The old Mormon concluded his harangue by saying that the women andchildren would be conveyed by his men to the nearest seaport town, andtheir passage paid to any civilised country they desired to reach, afterwhich the Brotherhood of the Saints entirely washed their hands of them.For a brief instant one could have heard a pin drop, then from the poorcreatures at the bottom of that living square there went up one mightygasp of intense relief, followed by a babel of blessings upon theirancient judge, from which it was quite clear that the poor wretches, whowere, most of them, more sinned against than sinning, had fully expectedto find themselves and their little ones devoted to the same red graveas their wicked lords and masters.

  As the old Prophet ceased speaking, Kenyon suddenly started to his feet,holding up his hand to attract the attention of the judges, and whensilence again reigned supreme, and when every eye in that vastassemblage was curiously fixed upon him, quietly but clearly, he spokeout.

  "Sir," he said, "I know, and fully admit, your powers of judgment here,by the right of might; but you also are an American, as I am, and I,therefore, ask that, in courtesy to the Stars and Stripes, you will evenyield to my prior claim upon the body of this scoundrel, Zero, and allowthe executioner of the States, to end his sinful life."

  "Who art thou, and whence knowest thou me?" queried the astonishedMormon.

  "I, sir," was the cool reply, "am Stanforth Kenyon, of the New YorkDetective Force, and I have followed this fellow hither from the NewWorld, just as you have done, and, having been the first to find him, I,therefore, think my claim the best, and my case, the Harmsworth murder,on American ground, being now indubitably proved by your own witness,this Zero can no longer now escape the law."

  "By repute, I know you well, Detective Kenyon," came the answer, "butUncle Sam, for once, goes empty-handed. The Elect, as you very wellknow, recognise no law outside themselves, and allow no interferencewith their affairs, on the part of the unbelieving and accursedGentiles. Nay," as Kenyon attempted to speak again, "I cannot hear youfurther. I sit here, with my colleagues, as the representatives of theheaven-taught Holy Three, and what I _have_ said I _have_ said."

  Then, after another short conference with his fellows, the old Mormonannounced that the business of the meeting was now concluded, and thathis decision with regard to the disposal of the remaining prisonerswould be announced at noon next day.

  All were at once returned to their prison in the common hall, with theexception of the wretched slavers, who, to the number of nearly threehundred, were immediately led out to execution, and were shot, like maddogs, in accordance with the unchanging decree of the Mormon Holy Three,whilst Zero, heavily ironed, was forthwith consigned to the condemnedcell in the public building, knowing that he must, in a few hours,suffer the extreme agonies of the awful death by torture, which he hadhimself often and often inflicted upon his helpless and unresistingfellow-creatures.