Chapter Twenty Nine.
The Secret of the Lebombo.
All in a second Wyvern’s hopes were dashed to the ground. From a state of elation he was cast once more into blank despair. Not so easily had his enemies abandoned the pursuit. They had tracked him through the night with the persistency of sleuth-hounds, and now had, literally, run him to earth at last.
That the owner of the head had seen him was beyond all doubt for the head itself had been instantaneously withdrawn, with a smothered exclamation. And he himself was unarmed. In a frenzy of desperation he gazed around. No. The cave contained nothing, not even a loose stone.
It is in such moments of desperation that readiness of resource will come to a man or it will not Wyvern at that moment felt something move beneath his foot. Looking down he saw that his said foot was resting on an upturned blade of stone, which, if he had noticed at all he would have taken for a mere projection of the solid rock. Now an idea occurred to him. Bending down, he quickly loosened it. The piece came away in his hand. It was about two feet long, and shaped like a thick and clumsy sword blade. In a trice he had found himself armed with a most formidable weapon.
Gripping this he stood listening intently, his breath coming quick in the tensity of his excitement. The first of his enemies to enter he would infallibly brain, then the next, and so on, while his strength lasted. They should not again take him alive. Still, not a sound without.
What were they planning? Could it be that they had some devilish scheme of forcing him out by fire or smoke, knowing that he had no firearms? He had read of such a situation, and his heart sank as he realised how easily it could be carried out in his case. Ha!
The silence was broken at last. Without he could just catch the sound of a deep-toned, murmuring whisper in the Zulu tongue.
“Go away and leave me in peace,” he called out, in the best Zulu he could muster. “The first to enter shall surely have his head cleft in twain, and then the next. I am not unarmed.”
“Whou!”
It would be hard to convey the tone of wonder contained in that brief exclamation, and then at the tone of another voice the hunted and desperate man could hardly trust his own sense of hearing.
“Wyvern, old chap, come on out. It’s only me and Hlabulana.”
The next moment he and Joe Fleetwood were gripping hands. Hlabulana the while began to uncork his snuff-horn.
“This is awfully funny,” went on Fleetwood. “We had suspicions that it was Bully Rawson in there, and were concocting some scheme for getting him out—you know the brute’s quite capable of shooting the pair of us on sight. But how did you get away?”
“Mtezani cut me loose in the scrimmage, but they chevied me a good way I can tell you.” Then he narrated what had subsequently happened. “Got any scoff, Joe?” he concluded. “I’m starving.”
“Only some pounded mealies, which Hlabulana managed to raise from Heaven knows where. Here—fall on.”
While Wyvern was satisfying his cravings with this plain fare, Fleetwood narrated his own escape, which had been effected by Hlabulana under exactly similar circumstances, except that it had not been discovered, and therefore he had not been pursued.
“He told me that Mtezani was taking care of you,” he concluded, “so I came away easy in mind, feeling sure we should come together again when, things were quiet, and we have.”
“By Jove we have! And to think of you having taken me for Bully Rawson. I don’t feel flattered, Joe.”
The other broke into a laugh.
“Tell you what, old man. We both look all fired ruffians enough just now to be taken even for him. At least, I feel it, and can truthfully assure you you look it. And now what are we going to do next? I’ve got a bull-dog six-shooter here that the idiots forgot to bag when they trussed us up.”
“I haven’t even got that,” laughed Wyvern. “I was going to brain the pair of you with a most murderous stone club which I tore up out of the ground. It’s sharp as a sword on one side.”
Something in the words seemed to strike Fleetwood.
“Sharp as a sword?” he echoed.
“Why yes. What’s there in particular about that?”
“Why only that it’ll do to dig with.”
“To dig with? Are we in a position to do our fossicking now?”
“Rather. Now we’re here—bang on the very spot we should be record idiots if we didn’t do something towards discovering what we’ve come for.”
“I’m with you there,” rejoined Wyvern. “But here we are, with one six-shooter between us, no rifles or even a shot-gun. How are we going to get scoff?”
“Oh, Hlabulana will take care of that. He has some remarkably efficient assegais.”
“Well upon my word, the adventure was wild enough before but it has about reached the March hare stage now,” pronounced Wyvern with a laugh. “However our luck, if varied, has turned right last time, and we’ll try it again.”
It was indeed as he had said, a mad adventure. Here were these two, in the heart of a wild and dangerous region, inadequately armed even, and trusting to chance for the bare means of subsistence; and yet instead of making their way back to civilisation as soon as possible—especially after their recent perilous experience and hairbreadth escape—they elected to remain and prosecute their search, yet it is of such that your real adventurer is made.
“We’ll have to keep a bright look-out for Bully Rawson,” said Fleetwood, as they entered the cave. “I know he got clear, and if he has any suspicions that we did, it won’t be long before we see or hear from him.”
“There’s no doubt about the place, I suppose?” said Wyvern, for him, rather excitedly. “Look. Here’s where I found the opal.”
“Not a shadow of doubt Hlabulana has been going over all the situation with me while you were snoozing inside—Lord! and I not knowing it.”
Then, somehow, a silence fell between the two men as they stood looking at each other in the semi-gloom. Were they really going to unearth the rich secret which this savage mountain range had held buried within its lone and desolate heart for so many years, the secret which should make the rest of their lives a time of ease and possession, which should bring to one, at any rate, that which would make life almost too good to live?
“Come on. Let’s get to work,” said Fleetwood. “Where’s this weapon of yours? We can’t have very far to dig, because from what Hlabulana says they can’t have had time to bury the stuff very deep.”
“Here it is. Look. There’s the hole I pulled it up from—Hallo!”
Wyvern had gone down on his knees, and was experimentally fitting the stone into its former position. With the above exclamation he placed it aside and began hurriedly clawing at the earth where it had lain, with his bare fingers.
“Here’s a box,” he said quickly, shovelling out handfuls of earth; “An unmistakable box.”
Fleetwood bent over.
“Sure?” he asked, as excited as Wyvern himself.
“Dead cert. Here, lend a hand. We’ll soon have it out.”
And they did have it out. A few minutes more of eager digging, and the whole top of a metal bound wooden chest was visible. But it required a good deal more exertion before it was clear of earth all round. Then they hauled it up, and although not more than a foot square by half that depth, it required some hauling, for it might have been made of solid lead.
“That’s the bar gold,” pronounced Fleetwood as, heated and panting, they sat down for a rest. “No ‘stones’ would weigh anything like that. Well the stones can’t be far off. Let’s get to work again.”
They resumed their digging, systematically, with knives now, first around the excavation first made, then beneath it. Here, in a few minutes, Wyvern hauled out something—something round and moist. It was a small leather bag.
“Let’s investigate,” he said, and there was a tremble in his voice.
The leather was half rotten with age and damp, and the fastenings gave way when touched. Fleetwood put down his hat, and punching in the crown, poured the contents of the bag into the cavity thus formed. Then the two men looked up and sat staring at each other.
For in the said cavity was a heap of gems, which glittered and sparkled as the light from without struck upon them—rubies and emeralds and opals, many of considerable size, and obviously, even to these two unversed in such matters, of great value. This alone would have been worth all they had gone through for.
Replacing the stones in the bag they continued their excavation now with a tremble of the hands. And small wonder that it should be so. They had just found that which was enough to set them up comfortably for the rest of their lives, and there was even more to find. Any kind of search more fraught with every element of excitement it would be hard to conceive.
And, in fact, less than half-an-hour’s search had placed them in possession of three more bags similar to the first, but two of which contained stones far more valuable, than even the first; one nothing but diamonds, and fine ones at that. These, after investigation, were placed aside, and operations resumed.
But further excavation all round and under, brought nothing to light.
“That’ll be the lot, I’m thinking,” said Fleetwood. “It about corresponds with what Hlabulana said they’d got.”
“Joe,” said Wyvern gravely. “Do me the favour to pinch my leg, and pinch it hard, just to show that I’m not dreaming, you know. The whole thing seems too good. Seems as if one would wake up in a minute.”
“It does, doesn’t it,” answered the other, equally serious. And again they lapsed into silence, each full of his own thoughts.
“Now for what’s to be done,” went on Fleetwood. “I don’t like these diamonds. There I’m in my element, for, as you know, I was a digger in the early Dutoitspan days—not that they ain’t devilish good ones. But they’re awkward things to hawk around anywhere in South Africa—the I.D.B. law, you know. Suppose by any chance it got round that one had a bag of diamonds like that in one’s possession, they’d have one watched day and night to find out how one got hold of it. Then it’d be bound to give away the rest of the show. We don’t want that.”
“Not much. Look here, Joe. I’ve an idea which may be a good one or may not. We can’t possibly carry away that box. Let’s bury it again and call for it some time later when things are quiet again. As for the diamonds, we’ll plant them in some other place just to make sure that Hlabulana doesn’t show them to someone else, and pick them up at the same time as the bar gold. How does it pan out?”
“First rate. Only, old chap, I don’t think it’ll be much a case of us calling for them. I’m pretty sure I shall have to undertake it for both, for with a recollection of the portrait in your room in Ulundi Square you’ll be in no hurry to repeat this expedition.”
They set to work to bury the box again. It mattered little enough if here were marks of fresh digging, for who in the world would ever dream of treasure lying buried in this particular cave—one among many—without some due? Hardly had they done so than the entrance darkened, and Hlabulana stood within. In the excitement of their discovery they had forgotten his very existence. Quickly Fleetwood explained to him what they had found, showing him the bags.
“That is right, U’ Joe,” said the Zulu, turning them over in his hands. “There were but four. Whau! I like not this dark hole. It savours of tagati.”
“But you will like all the cattle and new wives your share of this will bring you, son of Musi,” said Fleetwood with a laugh. “If it is tagati it is pretty good tagati for us three, this time anyhow. Well, the sun will soon be down, and I think we had better take a short rest and travel by moonlight. It will be safer.”
This was agreed to, and as the red moon raised her great disc above the lone mountain range, flooding forest and valley and rock with her chastened brilliance, two ragged, unkempt white men stepped forth on their return journey, and upon them was wealth surpassing their highest expectations.
“Hang it all, I can’t believe it yet,” said Wyvern, for the twentieth time, with the twentieth grip on the bags of gems disposed about his clothing.
“I can hardly believe it myself,” rejoined Fleetwood, going through precisely the same performance.
But Hlabulana, the Zulu, said nothing. He only took snuff as calmly as if nothing had happened.