The Sign of the Spider

by Bertram Mitford

  CHAPTER XIV.

  A DREAM.

  Under the shade of a large tree-fern a man is lying asleep.

  Around the wilderness spreads in rolling undulation, open here for themost part, though dotted with clumps of bush and trees, which seem tohave become detached from the dark line of forest. This, on the onehand, stretches away into endless blue; on the other a broad expanse ofwater--apparently a fine river, actually a chain of lagoons--withreed-fringed banks; and here and there a low spit, where red flamingoesroost lazily on one leg. Beyond this again lies an unbroken line offorest.

  The man is arrayed in the simple costume of the wilderness--a calicoshirt, and moleskin trousers protected by leather leggings. Abroad-brimmed hat lies under his head, to which, indeed, it serves assole pillow. He is heavily armed. The right hand still grips an Expressrifle in mute suggestion of one accustomed to slumber in the midst ofperil. A revolver in a holster rests beside him, and in his leathernbelt is a strong sheath knife. Now and again he moves in his sleep, andat such times his unarmed hand seems instinctively to seek out somethingwhich is concealed from view, possibly something which is suspendedround his neck by that light but strong chain. Thus hour after hourrolls over him, as he slumbers on in the burning equatorial heat.

  The sleeper turns again uneasily, and as he does so his hand again seeksthe steel chain just visible through his open shirt, and, instinctivelyworking down it, closes over that which is secured thereto; then, asthough the effect is lulling, once more he is still again, slumberingeasily, peacefully.

  The sun's rays, slanting now, dart in beneath the scanty shade of thetree-fern, and as they burn upon the dark face, bronzed and hardened byclimate and toil, the sleeper's lips are moving, and a peculiarly softand wistful expression seems to rest upon the firm features. Then hiseyes open wide. For a moment he lies, staring up at the green frondswhich afford shade no longer, then starts up into a sitting posture. Andsimultaneous with the movement here and there a faint circular ripplewidens on the slimy surface of the lagoon, as each of those dark specks,representing the snout of a basking crocodile, vanishes.

  Laurence Stanninghame's outward aspect has undergone some change sincelast we beheld it, now more than two years ago. The expression of thedark, firm face, burned and bronzed by an equatorial sun, heavilybearded too, has become hard and ruthless, and there is a quickalertness in the penetrating glance of the clear eyes which tells of anever-present familiarity with peril. Even the movement of sitting up, ofsuddenly awakening from sleep, yet being wide awake in a moment,contains unconsciously more than a suggestion of this.

  A rapid, careful look on all sides. Nothing is stirring in the sultry,penetrating heat; the palmetto thatch of clustering huts away beyond theopposite bank might contain no life for all of it they show. Hardly abird twittering in the reeds but does so half heartedly. The man's facesoftens again, taking on the expression it wore while he slept.

  While he slept! Why could he not have slept on forever, he thought, hiswhole being athrill with the memory revived by his dreams? For hisdreams had been sweet--wildly, entrancingly sweet. Seldom, indeed, weresuch vouchsafed to him; but when they were their effect would last,would last vividly. He would treasure up their recollection, would goback upon it.

  Now, slumbering there in the torrid heat, by the reed-fringed,crocodile-haunted lagoon, his dreams had wafted him into a more thanParadise. Eyes, starry with a radiant love-light, had laughed into his;around his neck the twining of arms, and the soft, caressing touch ofsoothing hands upon his life-weary head; the whisper of love-tones,deep, burning, tremulous, into his ear. And from this he had awakened,had awakened to the reality--to the weird and depressing surroundings ofhuman life in its most cruel and debased form; to the recollection ofscenes of recurring and hideous peril, of pitiless atrocity, whichseemed to render the burning, brassy glare even as the glare of hell;and to the consciousness of similar scenes now immediately impending.Yet the remembrance of that sleeping vision shut him in, surrounded himas with a very halo, sweet, fragrant, enthralling, rolling around hissoul as a cloud of intoxicating ether.

  Upon a temperament such as that of Laurence Stanninghame the life of thepast two years was bound to tell. The hot African glow, the adventurouslife, with peril continually for a fellow-traveller, a familiarity withweird and shocking deeds, an utter indifference to human suffering andhuman life, had strangely affected his inner self. Callous to the woesof others, yet high strung to a degree, his nature at this timepresented a stage of complexity which was utterly baffling. Thatmesmeric property to which Hazon had alluded more than once as one ofthe effects of the interior was upon him too. It seemed as though he hadsomehow passed into another world, so dulled was all recollection of hisformer life, all desire to recall it. Yet one memory remained undimmed.

  "Lilith, my soul!" he murmured, his eyes wandering over the brassy,glaring expanse of water and dried-up reed-bed, as though to annihilatespace and distance. "Lilith, my life! It is time I looked once more uponthat dear face which rendered my dreams so sweet."

  His hand, still clasping something within his breast, was drawn forth,that which hung by the steel chain still inclosed within it. A small,flat metal box it was, oblong in shape, and shutting so tightly that atfirst glance it was hard to see where it opened at all. But open it did,for now he is holding what it contains--holding it lovingly, almostreverently, in the palm of his hand. It is a little case, green velvetworked with flowers, and in the center, spreading fantastically inspidery pattern in dark maroon, is a monogram--Lilith's. And in likemanner is this same monogram inlaid upon the lid.

  Two tiny portraits it contains when opened--photographic portraits,small, yet clear and delicate as miniatures. Lilith's eyes gaze forth,seeming to shine from the inanimate cardboard as though with thelove-light of gladness; Lilith's beautiful form, erect in characteristicattitude, the head slightly thrown back, the sweet lips compressed, justa touch of sadness in their serenity, as though dwelling upon therecollection of that last parting; even the soft curling waves of hair,rippling back from the temples, are lifelike in the clearness of theportrait.

  The strong, sweet dream-wave still enclouding his brain, Laurence standsgazing upon these, and his heart is as though enwrapped with a dulltightening pain.

  "Sorceress! and does the spell still enthral me here?" he murmurs,"here, and after all this time. Have you forgotten me? Perhaps. No, thatcannot be and yet--Time! Time dulls everything. Time brings changes.Perhaps even the memory of me is waning, is becoming dulled."

  But the softening love-light in the pictured eyes seems to contradictthe conjecture. Here, in the hot brassy glare of the far wilderness, inthe haunts of bloodshed and wrong, that sweet, pure image seems clothedas with a divinity to his hungry gaze.

  "Others can see you in life; others can hear the music of your voice, mybeloved; others can look into the light of those eyes, can melt to theradiance of your smile, while I--only the image is mine, the tiny oblongof hard inanimate cardboard," he murmurs, in a tone that is halfweariful, half passionate. "And now for the words!"

  A slip of folded paper occupies the side of the little tin box. This heextracts and unfolds with a touch that is almost reverent, and, as hiseyes wander over the writing, his every faculty of soul and mind andbeing is concentrated in rapt love upon each word. For not every daywill he suffer his eyes to rest upon them, lest too great familiaritywith them should dull them with a mechanical nature when seen so often.They are kept for rare occasions, and now, his waking thoughts sweetwith the influence of the recent dream, he reckons just such anoccasion.

  The history of the box, the portraits, the letter, was a strange one.After that last parting, as Laurence was wending his way in thedarkness, he became aware that his breast pocket contained somethingwhich was not there before. He drew it forth. It was small, flat, hard,oblong. By the light of successive vestas he proceeded to investigate,and there, in the flickering glow, Lilith's sweet eyes gazed out at himfrom the cardboard, daintily framed w
ithin the work of her fingers, evenas here in the burning glare of the equatorial sun; and there, too,within the box, lay a folded slip of paper covered with herhandwriting--her last words to him, drawing out, perpetuating the echoof her last spoken ones. With a thrill of love and pain, he had stoodthere in the darkness until his last vesta had burned out, and then theletter was not half read, but from that moment the box and its contentshad rested upon his heart day and night--through scenes of blood and ofwoe, through every conceivable phase of hardship and starvation andperil--had rested there as a charm, or amulet, which should shield himfrom harm. And as such, indeed, its donor had intended it.

  And now his eyes, wandering over the paper, as though devouring everyword, are nearing the end:

  "Does this come as a surprise, my darling--a very sweet surprise? [itran.] I mean it to be that. 'Is it for good or for ill, this love ofours?' you have said. Surely for good. Keep, then, this image of me, mybeloved. Never part with it, day or night, and may it ever, by the verystrength of my love for you, be as a talisman--a 'charm'--to standbetween you and all peril, as you say the mental image of me has alreadydone; how, I cannot see, but it is enough for me that you say so. Andthe consciousness that I should have been the means of averting evilfrom you is sweet, unutterably so. May it continue, and strengthen me asit will mysteriously shield you, while we are far apart. My Laurence! myideal!--yes, you are that; the very moment my eyes first met the firmfull gaze of yours I recognized it. I knew what you were, and my heartwent out to you."

  The blood surged hotly, in a dark flush, beneath Laurence Stanninghame'sbronzed face, as he pictured the full force and passion of those partingutterances murmured into his ear instead of confided only to cold,inanimate paper; then the demon of cynicism ingrained within him cameuppermost with hateful and haunting suggestions:

  "She is safe? Yes. But those words were penned more than two years ago.More than two years ago! That is a long time for one in the full glow ofher glorious youth. More than two years ago! And in the joy and delightof living, what charm has the memory--the daily fading memory--of theabsent for such as she? Think of it, oh, fool, not yet free from theshackles of the last illusion! Think of circumstances, of surroundings,of temperament, above all, of such a temperament as hers! Is your matureknowledge of life to go for nothing that you are so easily fooled? Ha,Ha!"

  Thus laughed the demon voice in mocking gibe. But he--no, he would notlisten; he would stifle it. Those words were the outcome of onelove--the love of a lifetime, and nothing less.

  Suddenly, with multifold splash, and a great winnowing of wings, aflight of cranes and egrets arose from the bank some little distancefarther down. Dark forms were moving among the reeds. All the instinctsof a constant familiarity with peril alert within him, Laurence had in amoment replaced the case and its contents. His Express was grasped inreadiness as he peered forth eagerly from his place of concealment. Hewas the crafty, ruthless slaver once more.

  Then the expression, stealthy, resolute, which his discovery had evoked,faded, giving way to one of half-interested curiosity, as he saw thatthe potential enemies--more or less redoubtable assailants--were merelya few small boys, wandering along the reed-fringed bank, jabberinglight-heartedly as they strolled.

  Suddenly there was a splash, a smothered cry, and a loud burst of shrilllaughter. The sooty imps were dancing and capering with glee, gazing atand chaffing one of their number who had fallen from the bank--high andperpendicular there--into the water among the reeds. But almost assuddenly the cachinations turned to a sharp yell of terror and warning.The reeds swayed in a quivering line of undulation, as though somethingwere moving through them--something swift and mighty and terrible--andso it was. The black boy, who could swim like a fish, had thrown himselfclear of the reeds, deeming his chances better in the open water, butafter him, its long grisly snout and cruel beady eyes flush with thesurface, glided a large crocodile.

  Half instinctively the unseen spectator put up his piece, then droppedit again. He might shoot the reptile, but what then? All their planswould be upset--the villages would be alarmed, and his own life greatlyjeopardized. Too steep a price by far to pay, to save one wretchedlittle black imp from being devoured by a crocodile, he told himself.The road to wealth did not lie that way; and the cruel sneer thatdrooped his lips as he lowered his weapon was not good to behold, as hestood up to witness the end of this impromptu hunt, whose quarry washuman.

  The boys on the bank were shouting and screaming, partly for help,partly in the hope of scaring the hideous saurian. That wily reptile,however, heeded them not one atom. His great jaws opened and closed witha snap--but not on the crunch of human flesh, not on the crackle ofhuman bones. The wretched little native, with incredible dexterity, hadswerved and dived, just eluding the hungry jaws by no more than a hair'sbreadth. But to what avail?

  For the smooth surface of the lagoon was now rippling into longfurrow-like waves. Dark objects were gliding through the water withnoiseless rapidity, converging on the point where the human quarry hadnow risen to breathe. More of the dreadful reptiles, with which thelagoons were swarming, had found out there was prey, and were bearingdown to obtain their share. From his concealment, Laurence could see itall--the glistening of the hideous snouts, the round woolly head andstaring, terror-stricken eyeballs of the miserable little victim. Then,with a wild, piercing, soul-curdling shriek, the latter disappeared, andthere arose to the surface a boil of foam, bubbling upon the slimy waterin a bright red stain. Below, in the depths, the crocodiles were rendingasunder their unexpected prey.

  "The moral of that episode," said the concealed spectator to himself, ashe turned away, "is that little boys should not play too near the bank.No, there is yet another--the incredibly short space of time in whichthe refined and civilized being can turn into a stony-hearted demon; andthe causes which accomplish such transmogrification are twain--theparting with all his illusions, and the parting with all his cash."

  These ruminations were cut short in a manner that was violent, not tosay alarming. Two spears whizzed past him with a vicious, angry hiss,one burying itself deep in the stem of the tree-fern just behind him,the other flying into empty space, but grazing his ear by very fewinches indeed. Then, in the wild, barking, hoarse-throated yell,blood-curdling in its note of hate and fury, Laurence Stanninghamerealized that he was in a tight place--a very tight place.