“It’s certain death, Master,” Kouram replied.
Philippe hesitated momentarily, and was then seized by vertigo. “We’ll take four riflemen, Kouram—the rest can rejoin the Goura-Zannkas.
Kouram made no objection. He had said what he had to say. “All right.” He pointed to four riflemen, who did not baulk, being full of a fatalistic confidence in the white man, and perhaps feeling safer with Philippe than with Warzmao’s warriors.
Philippe examined the canoe rapidly and could not discover any defect. “Let’s get aboard.”
A few minutes later, the canoe was gliding over the lake. Kouram was paddling like a Pacific islander; Philippe, who had maneuvered canoes of a sort before, made use of the primitive oar comfortably.
The crossing took nearly an hour; then they perceived a flat gray shore, with a low ceiling. There was something sinister about both the water and the shore.
The expedition seemed wretchedly vain. They disembarked, however, and advanced at hazard. The shore was, in fact, only a sort of promontory; as on the other side, there was nothing to the right and left but a granite wall, and they ended up in yet another tunnel. Before going into it, Philippe paused. No logic was guiding him, and the entire subterranean incursion was contrary to all reason. They would have needed to catch up with the fugitive Squat Men quickly, with sufficient forces to fight them. Now, the latter had the advantage, and doubtless an overwhelming superiority, which would permit them to pick their moment to wipe out the little troop…but the force of inertia pushed Philippe to go on to the end.
For ten more minutes he went forward warily. At intervals, the corridor became very narrow—so narrow that it would have been impossible to march two abreast.
Suddenly Kouram—who had taken the lead—stopped dead. There was a turning. A light seemed to filter from the granite wall.
“Look, Master!”
Philippe was already running forward. They both reached the place from which the light was coming at the same time.
Through an oval opening with jagged edges—a sort of natural bull’s-eye window—they saw a grotto, palely illuminated—and a feminine form sitting in the middle of it. Not a native, or a Squat Woman, but a white woman, ornamented with the golden hair of legendary princesses.
Philippe as gripped by a frantic joy. “Muriel!” he cried. He could not help himself.
The young woman shivered and raised her head. Her great slate-blue eyes fixed their gaze on the oval window. “Who’s calling me?” she said, in a low and almost indiscernible voice.
“Me…Philippe…”
She reached the opening in two strides.
“You!” she moaned. “You!” Pale, thin and a trifle haggard, she had evidently endured long suffering. “My father?” she asked. “All of you?”
“Safe and sound—but how are you, Muriel?”
“Oh—be careful! They’re watching you…they’re following you…they’re waiting for the moment when they can catch you in a trap. There are no other creatures as stubborn.”
“But how are you?” he repeated.
In the bluish light she wore a melancholy smile. “They haven’t done me any harm yet. Their actions are incomprehensible to me. I’m in the hands of their sorcerers. At times, one might think that they were worshipping me—at others, they seem menacing. I don’t know. I’m expecting something horrible.” She passed her hand over her forehead; her pupils were dilated. “Get away!” she murmured. “They’re masters of the underworld…they must know that you’re here. Get away!”
“I have to save you.”
“How can you? This grotto doesn’t communicate with any other.”
“Where does the light come from?”
“From above—the sky…the grotto opens on to a volcanic islet in the middle of the lake. Oh! Wait a moment…”
She passed her hand over her forehead again, in a desolate and fearful gesture.
“Tell me!” said Philippe, avidly.
“I can’t. Go back the way you came. It’s your only chance of salvation.”
“Muriel, I beg you: talk to me!”
“You mustn’t risk your life needlessly!”
“We shan’t turn back! I’ll save you or die. Tell me, Muriel!”
“I can’t!”
“I swear to you that we won’t abandon you!”
“My God!” she sighed. “Well, I think your tunnel communicates with the islet—but you can’t get to it. They’re there!”
A growl interrupted her. Three thickset silhouettes had emerged.
Philippe’s first impulse was to seize his rifle, but the Squat Men had already surrounded Muriel and dragged her away. Maranges hesitated; it was impossible to aim accurately at the moving group.
“Don’t shoot!” Muriel shouted, plaintively. “It will only irritate them!”
He understood the futility and peril of an intervention…and a moment later, Muriel had disappeared; the cave was empty. Nothing remained but the hope of reaching the rocky island indicated by the young woman.
“Come on!” cried Philippe, launching himself into the tunnel.
Kouram and the riflemen followed him.
After running for ten minutes, a light mingled with that of the electric torch. The track ceased to be horizontal, and a rather steep slope rose up in front of the little troop. They climbed it impetuously and found themselves in the open air, in a circular crater with jagged edges, which reflected the Moon’s melancholy light. Through a gap they could see the lake, in which the image of the constellations trembled.
“Look! Look!” shouted Kouram.
A canoe was drawing away from the shore, and in the canoe they could see Muriel held by five Squat Men. This time, Philippe was carried away by instinct. Convinced that the young woman would be lost forever if he did not save her now, he raised his rifle.
A shot rang out; one of the Squat Men spun round and dropped his paddle. The other four uttered frantic howls. Already, the rifle had thundered a second time, the bullet hitting a second Squat Man in the head. The survivors started paddling desperately, but with marvelous precision, Philippe shot two more men. The last one threw himself upon Muriel…
That was the supreme moment. The head of the savage and that of the young woman were so close that the slightest deviation would be fatal. Sometimes, they were both in the same line of sight.
Eyes dilated, his hand trembling, Philippe waited…
The man had grabbed hold of Muriel, and seemed to be trying to throw her into the lake.
Vigorous, accustomed to sports, she struggled. Momentarily, she pushed the brute back; their skulls were two feet apart. Then a wild determination took hold of Maranges; his hand ceased trembling—and the last Squat Man tumbled into the water.
The natives howled enthusiastically.
Muriel had seized one of the paddles and was coming back toward the islet. An immense emotion caused Philippe to tremble from head to foot. When the young woman landed, tears were running down his cheeks.
She saw those tears; and a pink tint invaded her pale face. “Oh!” she murmured. “It’s as if the world had just been born.”
He bowed, and raised the young woman’s small hand to his lips. She looked at him gravely, troubled by a joy so profound that it was painful. Raising her joined hand toward the heavens, she said: “Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord!”36 Then she said to Philippe: “After my father, you are the one who has given me life!”
“Oh, Muriel!” he whispered. “It seems to me that I would be dead, if you had been carried off!”
They remained momentarily in marvelous silence. Images rose up in tumult, with the incomparable glare that they assume in young people. Then Muriel went on: “We have to get away from here. They might surge out of the ground at any moment. I don’t know what miracle allowed you to come through the tunnels, nor why I was so poorly guarded.” She studied the inlet where she had landed. “Yesterday, there were more than 30 canoes here. Where are they? Ext
raordinary things must have happened…”
“We’ve attacked them, and defeated them, with the help of the Goura-Zannkas!” said Philippe.
“The Goura-Zannkas?”
“Black men with whom we have made alliance. Many Squat Men were able to flee, though. Perhaps there’s fighting elsewhere.”
“Where’s my father?” Muriel asked, anxiously.
“He’s at the camp.”
“We must hurry, Philippe.”
“We’ve left Dick Nightingale and a company of men in the tunnels. They’re waiting for us!”
“We can’t go back the way you came!”
“What are we going to do, then?”
“Land on the shore of the lake—then send word to our friends.”
“So long as they haven’t been surprised by the Squat Men!”
“How did you get into the underworld?”
“From an island to the north. The entrance was sealed by a stone.”
“I know the island—that’s where it’s necessary to send the warning. Did they all descend underground?”
The canoe was spacious enough to accommodate Muriel, Philippe and the natives. For a quarter of an hour they paddled in silence. The lake lived its savage existence; here and there, some animal, displaying a misshapen mouth or a scaly back, advertised the eternal extermination of one creature by another.
After a brief hesitation, Philippe had steered the boat toward the northern island. If they found the Goura-Zannkas and the flotilla of canoes there, that would be immediate aid. Perhaps, after all, the Squat Men had temporarily abandoned the struggle. Their defeat had been crushing. Like most savages, they would take their time before seeking revenge…
One of the men uttered an exclamation. He pointed to the north-west, where a somber swarm of canoes was visible. Yet more Squat Men!
A dark anxiety squeezed Philippe’s heart. The northern isle was more than two miles away. Would the survivors, who were closer to the island than Philippe and his companions, have time to block the way?
“Quickly!” the young man exclaimed.
The order was unnecessary. The rowers had understood the danger; they were giving their maximum effort. For two minutes, it was impossible to gauge the antagonist’s chances The Squat Men’s canoes were moving forward as rapidly as their imperfect construction and paddling permitted. It was a matter of reaching the southern tip of the island before the Squat Men could cut off the route. Two of their canoes were forging some distance ahead of the rest.
“No one fire!” said Philippe. The ammunition was running low. Sure of his own skill, Philippe wanted to keep it for himself. “Is your rifle fully loaded?” he asked Kouram.
Kouram nodded.
The two canoes were approaching the zone of uncertainty. One of them, especially, was advancing at a dangerous velocity. Then, slowly, Philippe raised his weapon.
“One man, at least!” growled Kouram.
He was not mistaken. The shot rang out; a Squat rower collapsed.
The men started laughing, while Philippe selected a new victim. A second later, another Squat Man dropped his paddle—and almost at the same time, furious cheers resounded on the island.
They saw the tall silhouette of Warzmao appear on top of the red rock.
Disconcerted, the Squat Men abandoned the fight. The two leading canoes rejoined the bulk of the flotilla, which disappeared over the starlit waters.
On the island, they found the warriors, augmented by a contingent led by Warzmao. They sent a messenger to look for the men in the underworld.
“This time, I think we’re safe!” said Kouram.
Philippe thought so too. Once they had reached the shore, where a part of the Goura-Zannkas forces was waiting—after the expedition had come back from the caverns—the Squat Men would almost certainly renounce any immediate pursuit.
As long as nothing has happened to Dick! Philippe thought.
That anxiety was soon dissipated. Dick and his companions emerged from the red rock. Then the victory was dazzling. Warzmao and his warriors studied the luminous young woman that the Phantom Chief had recovered from the bowels of the Earth with a mystical admiration. Their faith in the invincibility of the white men took the proportions of a dogma. They knew that the Squat Men’s ambushes had multiplied in the underworld for centuries; they could not imagine that a feeble troop of men had succeeded in escaping them, while liberating the strange creature with the golden hair.
On the shore they met up with the bulk of the Goura-Zannkas. No alarm having disturbed them in their task, they had gathered the wounded and the prisoners for a solemn feast. There were more than 50 of them.
“It will be a great feast,” Kouram remarked; he was not in the least shocked by cannibalism.
“It’s frightful!” said Muriel.
“By Jove!” said Dick. “It’s not important.”
Warzmao’s warriors set off for their native forest. Roughly led away, the captives and the wounded followed in the rear-guard. Others were carried, lying on shields or woven branches. The ancestors of the Goura-Zannkas had done likewise in the times when the kings of Assyria had had vanquished enemies flayed “as bark is stripped from trees” and the times when the Hyksos had invaded Egypt. Nothing had changed since those distant eras, and doubtless eras more ancient still. The Goura-Zannkas had the same weapons, the same tools, the same rituals and the same enemies. Many a time, on bellicose nights, Squat warriors had been led away like this to serve as fodder—and many a time, too, had not defeated Goura-Zannkas been mutilated and tortured by victorious Squat Men?
“Yes,” Philippe murmured, thinking about these things. “This is a scene of olden times.”
He was walking beside Muriel, pensively, and their gazes sometimes met, with a profound tenderness.
“These things will end one day,” she said.
“Undoubtedly—but perhaps by virtue of the disappearance of the Squat Men and Goura-Zannkas, under the bullets, bombs or whips of white men…for our civilization, Muriel, is the most homicidal that has ever appeared on Earth. In the last three centuries, we have caused the disappearance of more peoples and populations than all the conquerors of antiquity and the Middle Ages. Roman destruction was child’s play compared with ours. Don’t you live, Muriel, in a land as large as Europe, from which you have caused the red race to disappear?”
“Alas!” sighed the young woman. The image of her father appeared to her, so clear and so sweet that she avidly extended her arms, as if for a hug. “Are we far from the camp?” she asked.
“Two hours, perhaps.”
“What if it has been attacked during your absence?” she asked, fearfully.
“That’s almost impossible—isn’t it, Kouram?”
“Yes, Master. The Squat Men who attacked us on the lake shore were as numerous as the men of two clans. That almost never happens. The Blue Eagle is over there, with more warriors than Warzmao had—and what can the Squat Men do against the elephant-gun, the rifles and the machine-gun?”
These words reassured Muriel somewhat, and she told the story of her captivity.
The life of the Squat Men was not much different from that of animals. They slept a great deal, even during the day, but when they were active, they could march without respite and unhindered by darkness. They would never have abandoned their pursuit of the caravan. Their sorcerers had carried out mysterious sacrifices, in which warriors chosen by lot were immolated. They had been put to sleep with the aid of plants, and then the veins in their neck had been opened. Their blood had been collected by the chiefs. If the victims did not die, they were granted the mercy of their lives.
“I still don’t know why they spared me,” Muriel said. “It seemed that, to them, I was some sort of fetish whose presence would give them victory over their enemies.”
The blood-colored Moon was swelling in the Occident, where it was about to set. The jackals kept watch on the mass of upright creatures; their slender heads popped up occasional
ly, with their pointed ears, and then vanished into the semi-darkness. A lion displayed its thickset stature on top of a mound; its roar filled the air—then, astonished, it slipped away.
“We’re getting close!” said Philippe.
Muriel was exhausted, but they could now see the forest where men lived in the trees.
Suddenly, the column stopped. The advance guard fell back slowly toward the center. Scouts went running off, one by one.
“Are there more of these vermin?” Nightingale exclaimed.
Kouram exchanged signs with Warzmao. The young chief had climbed up on to a mound; his yellow eyes gleamed in the half-light.
“What is it?” Philippe asked.
“It’s not Squat Men!” said Kouram. “They’re warriors of a clan defeated by the Blue Eagle. They knew that Warzmao was leading a party composed entirely of Sons of the Star, while the Blue Eagle went in another direction. They must be intent on taking their revenge, Master.”
“I thought that half that clan had perished.”
“Warzmao did take half the Sons of the Star with him, and he’s bringing back even fewer.”
“Is the route blocked?”
“Yes, Master, all the way to the lake.”
Philippe climbed up on to the mound in his turn. The Moon had just set in the west. He could only see the confused forms of the ground and the vegetations. The Goura-Zannkas were also hiding in the long grass or hollows in the ground.
“Damn it!” groaned Nightingale. “This land is terribly uncomfortable. I need to get some sleep!”
“You probably can,” said Kouram gravely. “Warzmao will wait for daylight before resuming the march.”
“What if those sons of bitches attack?”
“We’ll wake you up.”
Here and there, a black body was crawling through the grass. Warzmao distributed his sentinels. A sovereign silence weighed upon the wilderness; the large predators had stopped hunting.
The Mysterious Force Page 26
