by John Glasby
Nayland stared into the haze behind him. Gradually, he was able to make out the details. There was a faint, half-seen movement on the edge of the jungle a couple of miles away and a moment later, he could just make out the small column of men winding out of the trees like a trail of ants.
‘Get these porters moving,’ he said half-angrily. There was the tension of fear in his voice. ‘We’ve got to get to that village before Caltro overtakes us.’
Merrivale kept up a string of bitter comment as they pushed on as fast as possible, mostly it was barbed with resentment against the intolerable heat and the lazy natives. Nayland thrust his way forward with a strange, unflagging energy, maintaining an uneasy silence, too engrossed in his own thoughts for conversation.
They reached the lowermost foothills of the range with barely an hour of daylight left. Scrambling, sweating, slipping, they made their way into the jungle again, towards the native village. Here, it was a little easier to move. The trail was wider and most of the heat of the day had gone although some of it seemed to have been trapped by the trees and the canopy of leaves that closed in over their heads.
Somewhere behind them, probably only a quarter of a mile away, Nayland knew that Caltro was moving towards them, ready with some plan of his own to regain possession of the mask. If only he knew what the other intended to do.
Twenty minutes later, they entered the native village and stood in a little group while one of their guides explained their presence there.
‘Can you understand what he’s saying?’ asked Blake.
Nayland nodded. ‘He’s telling the Chief that we’ve brought back the mask and headdress of Shabaka but that there are some men behind us who seek to take it away again.’
‘That ought to stop Caltro, if anything can,’ muttered Merrivale.
The talks between the guide and the native chief went on for the best part of fifteen minutes. When they were finished, the guide came back.
‘The Chief says that you are all welcome to stay here in his village until you wish to return. He asks that you give the sacred relics back to him now.’
‘Very well.’ Nayland climbed to his feet and opened one of the packs. Taking out the mask and headdress, he handed them to the Chief.
‘There will be much dancing and feasting in the village tonight,’ said the guide. ‘They are celebrating the return of—’
He broke off, his gaze fixed on something at the far end of the clearing. Nayland turned his head, guessing what he would see before he actually did so.
A small group of natives stepped into the clearing and behind them, grossly fat, came Caltro.
He walked forward confidently, supremely sure of himself. Nayland watched him curiously. There was a strange look on the other’s face as he approached the Chief and said something to him, speaking rapidly in his own tongue.
‘What’s he saying?’ asked Merrivale softly.
Nayland licked his lips. ‘He’s telling him that he’s a powerful witchdoctor. That his spells are greater than any of those in the tribe, greater than Shabaka’s and that unless the mask and headdress are given to him, he will curse everyone in the village. There will be no rain for the crops and a plague of locusts will destroy everything they now have.’
‘He’s bluffing,’ muttered Merrivale.
Nayland shook his head. ‘He isn’t bluffing,’ he said harshly. ‘He can do everything he claims. I think the old Chief isn’t so sure either. He looks undecided.’
‘If he believes Caltro and gives him that mask, we’re finished,’ muttered Blake. He leapt forward, caught the guide by the arm and dragged him forward.
The Chief looked round in surprise as he saw them.
‘Tell him that this man is a fake,’ muttered Blake. ‘That he can’t do any of these things he claims.’
The guide muttered something harshly to the Chief, who immediately turned on Caltro.
‘He’s telling him to prove his words,’ said Nayland quietly, translating. ‘This is what I’ve been afraid of all the time.’
In the centre of the clearing. Caltro drew a wide circle with a stick, tracing out the intricate pentagrams and heptagrams. Then he stood in the middle of them, holding his arms upraised, his face lifted towards the sky.
His lips were moving, uttering a string of gibberish that even Nayland couldn’t understand. For a long moment, Caltro stood there as the darkness began to creep swiftly over the jungle. He snapped his fingers sharply several times.
The fire in the middle of the clearing, between the thatched huts suddenly sprang into life, the flames licking up into the heavens. There was a mutter from the natives. Overhead, the clouds were gathering swiftly, building up into a mass of darkness that blotted out the last rays of the setting sun.
Seconds later, there came a distant rumble of thunder, followed by another, louder and nearer. Lightning split the dark heavens, flashing high against the sky. There came another mutter from the gathering of superstitious natives.
Nayland could see that the old Chief was almost convinced. This was something he had never come up against before. Here was black magic such as he had never dreamed of.
So everything was lost, just when it seemed that they had defeated him, utterly and completely. So this was why Caltro hadn’t bothered to make his move on the boat. He preferred to prove his power was far greater than theirs.
For a long minute there was silence in the clearing, a clinging silence such as Nayland had never known before. Deep inside, he had the impression that something was going to happen, something unforeseen.
Then, almost before he was aware of it, he saw the dark shadow materialise in the shelter of one of the huts. The face, as the native came out into the open, was covered with paint and for a moment Nayland thought it was Shabaka standing there, staring at them across the clearing, his right arm raised, the firelight shining redly on the tip of the upraised spear.
Nayland felt the muscles of his throat constrict. It was as if he had seen all of this enacted somewhere before, but he couldn’t remember where. Then the memory came flooding back to him as he stood, rooted to the spot, unable to move.
That nightmarish dream he had had on board ship. Every detail here was almost the same as he had dreamed it that night. The fire blazing fiercely in the middle of the clearing. The natives huddled around it and the tall, grossly fat figure of Caltro standing in the middle of them all, picking up the mask and the headdress, holding them high above his head in an attitude of triumph.
But it was a triumph that was short-lived. The dark figure leapt into the clearing, face contorted. Caltro turned, seemed to catch a brief glimpse of the hate-distorted face that towered above his. Then the spear struck, knocking him to the ground.
The silence was shattered by a scream that shrilled up and down a raw-edged scale, shrieking at their ears. A tremor ran along Nayland’s limbs. Gradually, the shrieking sound died away into a gurgling that was even more horrible to hear.
When they went forward, there was only the crumpled figure of Caltro lying in the middle of the circle, his face upturned towards the sky so that the red glow from the fire fell full on it.
‘God, what an expression,’ muttered Merrivale. He turned away.
Caltro’s eyes, wide and distended, looked as though they had seen something not fit for human eyes to witness.
The witchdoctor lowered his spear and, without a word, took the mask and headdress from the chief. Approaching the altar, he placed the relics carefully on the smooth stone and stepped back.
Raising his arms, he muttered something that Nayland couldn’t understand. The next second there came a brilliant flash like a bolt of lightning from the heavens. When they could see clearly again the relics were gone — the shrine was empty!
‘It’s finished,’ Nayland said in a low voice.
‘But Caltro?’ Merrivale put in. ‘If it hadn’t been for that spear in his chest, I’d swear he died of fright.’
Nayland nodded. ‘My guess
is that he did. When he saw the witchdoctor he was convinced it was Shabaka come to avenge himself on any who sought to defile his mask.’
*
THE END
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Table of Contents
Chapter One – Journey into Evil
Chapter Two – The Mask of Darkness
Chapter Three – Something Evil
Chapter Four – Against the Darkness
Chapter Five – The Messenger!
Chapter Six – The Voodoo Curse
Chapter Seven – Terror by Day
Chapter Eight – The Transposition
Chapter Nine – The Thing That Kills
Chapter Ten – The Dark Ones
Chapter Eleven – The Devil Incarnate
Chapter Twelve – Lycanthrope!
Chapter Thirteen – Death in the Jungle
