CHAPTER XII
IN THE HANDS OF SLAVE-TRADERS
The ebon form of the Krooman giant seemed everywhere at once.
In the moonlight his terrible axe flashed incessantly and every timeit fell a shriek or a muffled groan showed that it had found itsfatal mark. The huge form of the warrior black seemed, however, tobear a charmed life. Again and again one of the attacking forcewould fire at him, but the bullets seemed to be warded off by somesupernatural force. He was immune alike to bullets and arrows--withwhich latter the natives attached to Muley-Hassan's force battled.
Billy and Lathrop fought with unflinching courage, pouring out aleaden hail into the onslaught that again and again seemed as if itmust drive the attacking force back. But fighting at suchdesperately uneven odds could not in the nature of things last long.There came a minute when Billy, turning to reload, found that beforehe could snatch up a handful of cartridges a huge Arab was on top ofhim.
Lathrop's clubbed rifle struck the fellow helpless the next minuteand sent his long, cruel knife with a ringing crash to the floor.
Before Billy's half breathed "Thanks, old man," had left his lips,however, another of Muley-Hassan's followers had rushed in and themoment would have been Lathrop's last but that Billy drove his fistinto the fellow's face with a crashing blow that knocked him on thetop of his fallen comrade. It was hand-to-hand fighting then with avengeance. Billy seized hold of the muzzle of an Arab's revolver asit was thrust into his very face, and twisted it upward as it wasdischarged. Seizing up a camp chair Lathrop swung it round his headlike a club and scattered the brains of a native follower ofMuley-Hassan.
But strategy was to put an abrupt end to the fight even if it couldhave continued much longer.
Billy was bleeding from a cut over the forehead which blinded him,and Lathrop had got two nasty knife thrusts, one in the arm and theother in the fleshy part of the calf of his leg, when they weresuddenly attacked from the rear by half-a-dozen slavers. The nextminute, wounded and bound, they were as helpless as two capturedpuppies.
The fight was over, but the Arabs had come out of it with a badlycrippled force.
Of the twenty-five men who had attacked the adventurers' camp tenhad been killed outright and half a dozen others so badly woundedthat they could not move. Hardly one of them had not received someminor injury, and the very fact that they had made such a poorshowing against two American boys and a Krooman armed only with anaxe, filled Muley-Hassan with savage rage.
Furiously the slave-dealer ordered the two boys brought before him.A huge fire had been lighted by his followers and in the glare castby this he received them. It was a wild scene and the two boyshardly knew whether they were awake or dreaming, as they wereroughly hustled into the presence of their captor.
Diego de Barros, his cruel, thin lips curled in a sneer that showedhis yellow teeth, stood by the side of Muley-Hassan, the latter atall determined-looking man with a crisp, curly black beard and asinister cast of features. A long burnoose of white, worn after theArab style, hung from his head and framed his dark features, whichwere just then overspread by a frown as black as thunder.
Outside the circle of firelight lay the bodies of the victims of theKrooman's axe and the boys' bullets. All who could do so ofMuley-Hassan's followers were gathered about him, as the two youngAmericans were brought face to face with the man they had such goodreason to fear.
"So these are the young Americans?" he asked as Billy and Lathropreturned his hawk-like gaze unflinchingly.
"No, sir," spoke up Diego, "they are not. Wiseman has just told methat the Chester boys have flown in their air-ship and these are thecubs left behind to guard the camp."
At Wiseman's name mentioned in such a connection both the boysstarted.
"What! they have gone?" thundered the Arab chief.
"Yes, sir," stammered Diego, his coward nature aroused at the sightof his superior's fury.
"And by this time they are rifling the ivory cache. That foolWiseman shall pay dearly for this. Bring him to me," shouted theArab.
Desperate as was the boys' position they could not restrain a startof amazement as Professor Wiseman, his face pale as ashes to hisvery lips, came tremblingly forward.
"You were attached to this boys' camp to prevent by all means theirsailing till I attacked the camp and made them prisoners, were younot?" demanded Muley-Hassan angrily.
Wiseman stammered something in reply.
"You are a coward as well as a fool," went on the slave-dealer, acruel sneer breaking over his face; "but you have blundered for thelast time. Take this fool away and kill him!" he ordered, turningaway as if there was an end of the business.
Pitiful cries broke from the lips of the unhappy professor as heheard his death-warrant thus pronounced. He threw himself on hisknees and begged and pleaded in a loud screeching tone for a littlemore time. But the chief was obdurate.
"Take him away," was all he said, and his men, not daring to disobeyhis orders any longer, fairly dragged the unfortunate prisonertoward the river bank. There was a short, sharp scream that chilledevery drop of blood in the boys' bodies and then a splash.Professor Wiseman had paid the price of his treachery.
It was not till long after that the boys heard the full measure ofhis villainy. How posing as a naturalist he had wandered up anddown the Ivory Coast for years acting as the secret agent ofMuley-Hassan and making arrangements for the smuggling of slaves andillicitly procured ivory out of the country. He was tooaccomplished a rascal to be suspected and his learned appearancemade it still more improbable that he should be engaged in anyillegal trafficking. It was small wonder, too, that he had startedwhen Frank mentioned the name of Luther Barr, for it was Luther Barrwhom he had betrayed to Muley-Hassan and advised him of thewhereabouts of the wily old New Yorker's ivory cache. As soon as heheard Frank mention the name he had of course surmised that thepretended hunting expedition was merely a blind to cover a bold dashto recover the ivory, though how they were to discover itswhereabouts he could not imagine till, by prying and listening, helearned that they had a map of the locality of the stolen stuff.
He had then dispatched native canoe-men to Muley-Hassan and apprisedhim of the coming of the boys, and Diego had been at once sent outby the Arab to secure possession of the map if possible and, failingthat, to destroy the boys' canoes. That the aeroplane would alsohave been put out of commission there is little doubt, if Diego orWiseman could have found an opportunity. The brutal Arab could thenhave disposed of the expedition at his leisure. But the GoldenEagle II was too closely guarded for the two spies to be able toharm it.
The Kroomen porters attached to the camp had, as old Sikaso hadforecast, fled into the jungle at the first attack of the Arab'sfollowers and they did not put in an appearance till long after themarauders had left the camp.
But what puzzled the boys, as they stood facing the Arab withProfessor Wiseman's scream still ringing in their ears, was "Whathad become of the old warrior."
He could not have turned traitor. His valiant behavior in theskirmish made that impossible to consider a minute. But it wasequally certain that he was nowhere to be seen. What could havebecome of him? A dread that he was dead oppressed both boys as theystood there waiting for the Arab to speak.
Muley-Hassan seemed to be considering.
He twisted the ends of his jet-black mustaches like a man lost inthought, and the firelight playing on his bold reckless featuresshowed there an expression of deep perplexity. But it was noquestion of mercy that was agitating his mind.
It was whether he would kill the boys right there or sell them intoslavery.
To his money-making mind the latter idea commended itself. Twostrong youths such as they were would fetch a good price anywhere,and so it came about that Billy and Lathrop--who had fully expectedto share the Professor's fate--were flung by no gentle hands intotheir bullet-riddled tent and left to pass the night as best theycould. Two men were posted to watch them and a rough cuff on th
ehead rewarded Billy's single attempt to speak to Lathrop.
The next day at dawn the camp was the scene of great activity. Thedead were carried into the forest a short distance and buried, whilethe wounded were attended to with such rough surgery as Muley-Hassanknew. In this work Diego, his lieutenant, who seemed to be a sortof Jack-of-all-trades--outside of his regular occupation ofscoundrel--aided him; bandaging the cuts and extracting the bulletsof his companions with some skill.
The boys were then given to eat some sort of stew in a big woodenbasin and being just healthy American boys and not heroes of romancethey ate heartily of the compound and felt better. Muley-Hassanhimself examined the cut on Billy's forehead and Lathrop's twowounds and pronounced them mere scratches.
Just as it appeared that a start was about to be made the signalbell of the wireless rang. As our readers know it was Franksignaling from the Moon Mountains.
A sudden idea seemed to strike Diego at this. He calledMuley-Hassan aside and talked earnestly with him for a few seconds,then he came up to the boy and demanded fiercely which one of themit was that understood wireless.
Lathrop replied that he did, and the next minute wished that he hadbitten out his tongue before he had admitted it; for Diego, in arough tone, ordered him to sit down at the instrument and reply thatall was well at the River Camp.
"And, mind you, youngster--no tricks," he said savagely, "or I'llkill you as dead as mutton. I understand the Morse code myself andcan tell what you are sending; and send slow so that I can get everyletter."
Lathrop was in a quandary. To refuse to sit down at the instrumentmeant instant death.
He could tell that by the look in Diego's eyes and from what he hadseen of him he knew he would not stop at a little thing like amurder to drive home a point.
The question was, did the man really understand telegraphy? If hedidn't and was only, bluffing Lathrop determined to inform Frank ofthe true state of affairs. Otherwise it would do neither himselfnor the others any good to try to trick Diego.
With a prayer on his lips that the Portuguese might not have beenstating the truth about his knowledge of wireless the boy started tosend. He had in his mind the message he would try to get through:
"We have been attacked. Get help and follow us."
But he had hardly tapped out with a hesitating finger the first wordof his message when he felt a bullet whiz by his ear and the reportflashed so close to him that it deafened him and scorched his skin.
"Thought I was bluffing did you, eh?" sneered the Portuguese, "comenow, no tricks; send out what I tell you or the next bullet willcome closer."
And so it came about that the queer hesitating message that Frankreceived at Moon Mountains was sent out.
Immediately it was dispatched Muley-Hassan gave the order to advanceand his ragged followers, carrying the worst wounded in improvisedlitters, set out toward the northwest.
"We are going to the Moon Mountains," whispered Billy to Lathrop,"at least it looks that way. I overheard Muley-Hassan say to Diegothat we'd have to hurry to get the ivory--"
Lathrop's reply was cut short by a scene that sent the angry bloodto both boys' faces.
Before the camp was abandoned for good and the plunge into theforest began, Muley-Hassan gave a sharp order and directed severalof his men set about demolishing the camp. Diego himself smashedthe field wireless of which Frank and Harry had been so proud. Hehacked it to atoms with one of the heavy axes. The tents andprovision boxes were next piled in a heap and set in a blaze.
As the column of dark smoke rose from the ruins of the once happycamp into the clear sky the order to advance was given and the trainonce more moved forward.
They had hardly deserted the clearing before, from the river bank,half a hundred wild figures appeared.
They were similar in appearance--only even more wild-looking thanthe savages fought off by Frank, Harry and Ben the previous day.Like the others their slashed and scarred faces and clay-daubed lipsshowed them to belong to one of the fierce cannibal tribes of theBambara region.
Their leader, a tall, thin savage of exceptionally repulsiveappearance, motioned with his fingers to his thick lips for absolutesilence among his followers.
Clutching their great broad-headed war-spears the next moment thesavages slipped into the forest in the direction the Arab and hisband had gone. Steadily they advanced with the quiet stealthy treadof panthers on the track of their prey.
Boy Aviators in Africa; Or, an Aerial Ivory Trail Page 12
