Chapter Twenty Seven.
The Dive of the Water Rat.
We stood there—we four—gazing into each other’s livid faces. Then the Major broke down. Sinking to the ground he covered his face with his hands and sobbed. I broke fiercely away. I could not stand for a moment doing nothing, so I set to work to go right round the pool and see if I could find any further trace. But the search was a vain one.
“The next thing is, what are we going to do?” said Falkner when we had rejoined them. “We don’t propose to spend the rest of the day staring at each other like stuck pigs, I take it?”
“We ought to drag the hole,” I said, “but we haven’t got the necessary appliances, nor even a draw net. Can any of you think of some expedient?”
“We might get a long pole, and splice a couple of meat-hooks to the end somehow,” said Falkner, “and probe about with that. Only, the cursed hole is about a mile too deep for the longest pole to get anywhere near the bottom in the middle.”
“Amakosi!”
We started at the interruption. So intent had we been that not one of us had been aware of the approach of a fifth—and he a native.
“Ha, Ivondwe!” I cried, recognising him. “What knowest thou of this, for I think thou couldst not have been far from this place at sundown yesterday?”
He answered in English.
“Do the Amakosi think the young missis has got into the water?”
“They do,” I said, still keeping to the vernacular. “Now, Water Rat, prove worthy of thy name. Dive down, explore yon water to its furthest depths for her we seek. Then shall thy reward be great.”
“That will I do, Iqalaqala,” he answered—greatly to my surprise I own, for I had been mocking him by reason of his name.
“And the snake?” I said. “The snake that dwells in the pool. Dost thou not fear it?”
I had been keenly watching his face, and the wonder that came into it looked genuine.
“Why as to that,” he answered, “and if there be a snake yet I fear it not. I will go.”
He stood looking down upon the water for a moment; he needed to lose no time in undressing, for save for his mútya he was unclad. Now he picked up two large stones and holding one in each hand, he poised himself at a point about ten feet above the surface. Then he dived.
Down he went—straight down—and the water closed over him. We stood staring at the widening circles, but could see nothing beneath the surface. Then it suddenly dawned upon us that he had been under water an abnormally long time.
“He’ll never come up again now,” declared Falkner. “No man living could stick under water all that time,” he went on after a wait that seemed like an hour to us. “The beast has either got hold of him, or he’s got stuck somehow and drowned. Oh good Lord!”
For a black head shot up on the further side of the hole, and a couple of strokes bringing it and its owner to the brink, he proceeded calmly to climb out, showing no sign of any undue strain upon his powers of endurance.
“Thou art indeed well named, Ivondwe,” I said. “We thought the snake had got thee.”
“Snake? I saw no snake,” he answered. “But I will go down again. There is still one part which I left unsearched.”
He sat for a moment, then picked up two stones as before. He walked round to an even higher point above the water, and this time dived obliquely.
“By Jove, he must have come to grief now,” said Falkner. “Why he’s been a much longer time down.”
As we waited and still Ivondwe did not reappear, the rest of us began to think that Falkner was right. It seemed incredible that any man could remain under so long unless artificially supplied with air. Then just as we had given him up Ivondwe rose to the surface as before.
This time he was panting somewhat, as well he might. “There is no one down there,” he began, as soon as he had recovered breath.
“No one?”
“No one. All round the bottom did I go—and there was no one. Au! it is fearsome down there in the gloom and the silence, and the great eels gliding about like snakes. But she whom you seek must be found elsewhere. Not under that water is she.”
Was he going on the native principle of telling you what you would most like to know? I wondered. Then Falkner began kicking off his boots.
“Here goes for a search on my own account,” he said. “Coming, Glanton? If there’s nothing to hurt him, there’s nothing to hurt us. We’ll try his dodge of holding a couple of stones. We’ll get down further that way.”
Ivondwe shook his head.
“You will not get down at all,” he said, in English.
“I’ll have a try at any rate. Come along, Glanton.”
I am at home in the water but not for any time under it. Half the time spent by Ivondwe down there would have been enough to drown me several times over. However I would make the attempt.
The result was even as I expected. With all the will in the world I had not the power, and so far from getting to the bottom, I was forced to return to the surface almost immediately. Falkner fared not much better.
“It must be an awful depth,” he said. “I couldn’t even touch bottom, and I’m no slouch in the diving line.”
“Where ought we to search, Ivondwe?” I said in the vernacular, “for so far there is no more trace than that left by a bird in the air? It will mean large reward to any who should help to find her—yes, many cattle.”
“Would that I might win such,” he answered. Then pointing with his stick, “Lo, the Amapolise.”
Our horses began to snort and neigh, as the police patrol rode up. I recognised my former acquaintance, Sergeant Simcox, but the inspector in command of the troop was along.
“I’ve just come from your house, Major Sewin,” he said after a few words of sympathy, “and I left a couple of men there, so you need be under no apprehension by reason of your ladies being alone. Now have you lighted upon any fresh clue?”
“Eh? What? Clue?” echoed the old man dazedly. “No.”
So I took up the parable, telling how I had found spoor leading to the waterhole and that here it had stopped. I pointed out where the ground had been smoothed over as though to erase the traces of a struggle.
“Now,” I concluded, “if you will come a little apart with me, I’ll tell you something that seems to bolster up my theory with a vengeance.”
He looked at me somewhat strangely, I thought. But he agreed, and I put him in possession of the facts about Ukozi in his relations with Major Sewin, and how Aïda had consulted me about them during my absence in Zululand, bringing the story down to that last startling scene here on this very spot three nights ago.
“Well you ought to know something about native superstitions, Mr Glanton,” he said. “Yet this seems a strange one, and utterly without motive to boot.”
“I know enough about native superstitions to know that I know nothing,” I answered. “I know this, that those exist which are not so much as suspected by white men, and produce actions which, as you say, seem utterly without motive.”
“If we could only lay claw on this witch doctor,” he said, thoughtfully.
“Yes indeed. But he’ll take uncommonly good care that we can’t.”
“Meanwhile I propose to arrest this boy on suspicion, for I find that he couldn’t have been very far from where Miss Sewin was last seen, at the time.”
“Ivondwe?”
“That’s his name. It may only be a coincidence mind—but you remember old Hensley’s disappearance?”
“Rather.”
“Well this Ivondwe was temporarily doing some cattle herding for Hensley at the time, filling another man’s place. It certainly is a coincidence that another mysterious disappearance should take place, and he right at hand again.”
“It certainly is,” I agreed. “But Ivondwe has been here for months, and I’ve known him for years. There isn’t a native I’ve a higher opinion of.”
“For all that I’m going to arrest him. It can do no harm and may do a great deal of good. But first I’ll ask him a few questions.”
Inspector Manvers was colonial born and could speak the native language fluently. I warned him of Ivondwe’s acquaintance with English in case he should say anything in an aside to me.
To every question, Ivondwe answered without hesitation. He had been looking after the cattle, yonder, over the rise, at the time, much too far off to have heard or seen anything. Had he been near, the dog would have kept him off. The dog was always unfriendly towards him.
“Where is Ukozi?” asked the inspector. The question was met by a deprecatory laugh.
“Where is the bird that flew over our heads a few hours ago?” asked Ivondwe. “I would remind the chief of the Amapolise that the one question is as easy to answer as the other. A great isanusi such as Ukozi does not send men before him crying aloud his movements.”
“That we shall see,” said the inspector. “Meanwhile Ivondwe, you are arrested and must go with us.”
“Have I not searched the depths of yonder pool?” was Ivondwe’s unconcerned remark. “Ask these.”
“Well, you are a prisoner, and if you make any attempt to escape you will be shot without challenge.” Then turning to me. “Now I think we had better continue our search down to the river bank. I need hardly tell you, Mr Glanton, how I sympathise with you, but we must not lose hope yet. People do strange and unaccountable things at times—generally the last people in the world who would be likely to do them. We shall find Miss Sewin yet.”
“Have you found Hensley yet?” I said bitterly.
He looked grave. The cases were too startlingly akin.
“The old gentleman had better be persuaded to go home,” he said, with a pitying glance at the Major, who was sitting in a state of utter collapse. Kendrew volunteered to effect this. He could join us afterwards, he said.
For the remaining hours of daylight we searched, leaving not a square yard of ground uninvestigated for a radius of miles. But—we found nothing—not even the remotest trace or clue.
I suppose, if I lived to be a thousand I should never forget the agony of that day. Mile after mile of our patient and exhaustive search, and still—nothing. The sickening blank as we returned, obliged to give it up for that day, only to renew our efforts with the first glimmer of returning light!
The moon rose, flooding down over the dim veldt. I recalled that last time when we two had wandered so happily over this very same ground. No presentiment had we then, no warning of mysterious danger hanging over us. How happy we had been—how secure in each other’s love—and now! Oh God! it was too much.
“Look here,” I burst forth roughly. “What’s the good of you people? Yes, what the devil’s the good of you? What do you draw your pay for anyway? If you had unearthed the secret of Hensley’s disappearance this one would never have come about. Your whole force isn’t worth a tinker’s twopenny damn and the sooner it’s disbanded and sent about its silly business the better.”
The police inspector was a thoroughly good fellow, and a gentleman. He didn’t take any offence at this, for he knew and respected the agony I was undergoing. We were riding a little ahead of the patrol, and therefore were alone together.
“Look here, Glanton,” he said. “Abuse us as much as ever you like and welcome if only it’ll relieve your feelings. I don’t resent it. You may be, in a measure, right as to Hensley. We all thought—and you thought yourself if you remember—that the old chap had got off the rails somehow, in an ordinarily natural if mysterious way. But now I’m certain there’s some devilish foul play going on, and the thing is to get to the bottom of it. Now let’s keep our heads, above all things, and get to the bottom of it. This is my idea. While we go on with our search to-morrow, you go and find Tyingoza and enlist his aid. He’s a very influential chief, and has a good reputation, moreover you’re on first-rate terms with him. I believe he could help us if anybody could. What do you think?”
“I have thought of that already,” I answered gloomily. “But an isanusi of Ukozi’s repute is more powerful than the most powerful chief—at any rate on this side of the river. Still it’s a stone not to be left unturned. I’ll ride up the first thing in the morning. No, I’ll go before. I’ll start to-night.”
But I was not destined to do so. On returning to the house I found that both the Major and his wife were in a state of complete prostration. They seemed to cling to the idea of my presence. It was of no use for me to point out to them that the police patrol was camped, so to say, right under their very windows, not to mention Falkner and Kendrew in the house itself. They would not hear of my leaving that night. Edith, too, begged me to fall in with their wishes. A refusal might be dangerous to her father, she put it. Utterly exasperated and amazed at the selfishness, as I deemed it, of the old people, I seemed to have run my head against a blank wall.
“Look here, Edith,” I said. “They are simply sacrificing Aïda by throwing obstacles in my way like this. What am I to do?”
“This,” she answered. “Fall in with their wishes, till they are asleep. They will sleep, if only through sheer exhaustion, and if they don’t I’ll take care that they do, through another agency. Then, carry out your own plan and God bless you in it.”
“God bless you, for the brave resourceful girl you are,” I rejoined. “Manvers and I have been knocking together a scheme, and nothing on God’s earth is going to interfere with it. Well, we’ll make believe—but, at midnight I’m off, no matter what happens.”
“That’s right, Glanton,” said Kendrew, who had entered with an opportuneness that under other and less interested circumstances I should have regarded as suspicious. “Edith and I will take care of the old birds, never fear.”
Utterly heartsick, and though unconsciously so, physically weary by reason of the awful strain of the last twelve hours, I only sought to be alone. I went into the room I always occupied and shut myself in. Sleep? Yes, I would welcome it, if only as a respite. I don’t know whether it came or not.