Chapter Thirty Five.
Rout.
Instinctively he put forth a hand. But—he was bound? Not so. He was bound no longer, which was one strange side of the new development to force itself upon his returning senses. What had happened? His strained ears had caught a sound as of something or somebody crawling along the ground, together with that of subdued breathing. That some beast of prey had crept in and had seized and slain his guards was his first thought, and now it was about to pounce upon him in the darkness; but the horror of this apprehension gave way to a feeling of reassurance as he remembered that no beast of prey, or any other animal, could, at the same time, have relieved him of his bonds.
Then he heard whispers, and someone touched him. He could not understand the burden of what was said, but that he was being pushed towards the door was unmistakable. In a moment he was outside, and the thrill of a great hope shot through him, with the thought that for some reason or other somebody was contriving his escape.
The black night air was heavy and still, but delicious after the foetid interior of the hut. The hand kept a firm grasp of his arm, and he yielded unquestioningly to its guidance. He would have given much to have understood the import of the whispered words, but that he was expected to do something was obvious.
In this strange way he moved onward through the darkness. He felt, rather than heard, that other presences were moving with him besides that of his unseen guide; then a nauseous taint upon the close air revealed, as in a flash, his whereabouts—they were close to the dreadful slaughter-yard.
What new horror was this? Was it some fresh act of devilry on the part of his tormentor that he should be brought to this ghastly place in the dead of night; and, when he should reach it—what then? To this thought, however, again succeeded reassurance. In that event he would not have been unbound. Then happened that which was more reassuring still. Something was thrust into his hand, something hard and cold. Great heavens! it was a revolver. He was armed now, and with the thought his broken spirits left him. He was armed, and free. But through what agency—and to whom the debt?
The guiding hand now had brought him to a standstill. Listening intently, his ears detected the very same sounds which had alarmed him in the darkness of the hut. Then, advancing once more, he stumbled over something, and almost fell. The trees had thinned out here, and now his eyes, accustomed to the gloom, discovered the nature of the obstruction. It was a human body, just slain, and hardly lifeless yet. Then, in a flash, something of the situation dawned upon him.
He saw now that he had arrived in front of the stockaded enclosure in which the captives had been secured. The guards had been surprised and silently slain, even as those who custodied him in the hut must have been, he decided. And—the stockade was now empty. All this he made out in the darkness; but to what end had he himself been released—released and armed? He was soon to know.
The first faint suspicion of dawn was lying upon the darkened world. Wagram made out that he was in the midst of quite a numerous band—a formidable one, too. These savages had not quite the stature and physique of his former enemies, and were less brutal-looking. They were armed in similar manner—with large spears, axes, and great crooked knives—and now by very graphic signs they proceeded to foreshow their intentions. This they did with surprising quickness and lucidity.
They were going to rush the town directly it was light enough, and put every living being within it to the spear. The white leader, especially, was to be slain, and to that end this other white man had been released and armed. The chances would be equal thus, or bettered, if anything; for they had the advantage slightly in numbers, in taking their enemies by surprise, and also in having a white man fighting on their side too. All this was explained to Wagram in less time than it has taken us to set it down, and then the whole force moved stealthily forward to take up its prearranged position.
While waiting for the signal to begin, the comic element of the situation came home to Wagram’s mind, and that comic element struck him suddenly as very comic indeed. Here was he—a man of peace if ever there was one—Wagram of Hilversea, a highly respectable country squire, whose main object in life had been effectively to steward his family possessions in such wise as to safeguard and ensure the happiness and welfare of those dependent on him—a man who had never seen a shot fired in anger nor, until he came here, a life taken—now to find himself with the honours of generalship thrust upon him without a moment’s warning—called upon to lead a pack of utterly merciless savages, of whose very numbers he had no actual idea, and not one word of whose speech he could understand—to lead them in the surprise and indiscriminate butchery of another pack of savages, if possible more bloodthirsty, and, incidentally, a fellow-countryman. Of a truth the complete topsy-turveydom of the eternal fitness of things involved by the arrangement struck him as positively Gilbertian. But there was no alternative, for, did he refuse, he knew that he himself would constitute the first victim; and he was tired of the rôle of victim; he had begun to realise that he had played it long enough. So he did not refuse; he asked, by signs, for more cartridges instead.
These, after some difficulty, were found him. The revolver was a large and thoroughly business-like weapon, but very rusty. He hoped it was in working order; and even then the worst of it was he had not had much experience of revolvers, and would have greatly preferred a double-barrelled shot gun. Then he insisted, by signs, in being further armed with one of their axes and a large knife.
He was under no hesitation as to his course. He would fight, and fight his uttermost, for the freedom which Heaven had restored to him, and, incidentally, on behalf of those who, all unconsciously, had been Heaven’s instruments in such restoration. His captivity, and the revolting circumstances and sights almost daily attendant on it, had changed him in some way—had certainly hardened him. These people, for whom and with whom he was to fight, had a cause, for as it grew lighter he recognised among them several of the captives he had seen fastened up within the stockade, while all were of the type of the man he himself had freed from the slaughter-block at the imminent risk of his own life; whereas, on the other hand, these cannibal murderers were a type of humanity of which the earth might well be rid. And the white man—his fellow-countryman, his arch-tormentor—what of him? Well, him, too, he would kill without hesitation if they met in fight; for he was far worse than the black fiends over whom he exercised ascendency. If ever a murderer deserved death it was this white renegade, who boasted that the lives which he himself had seen him take were as nothing beside those which he had taken, and that under every circumstance of more than barbarian atrocity. Yes; he would kill him in self-defence if they met.
At this tense, psychological moment this man of refinement and philanthropic instincts found time to marvel at his own complete reversion to first principles. Here, surrounded by savages, he seemed to have gone back to the savage too in the longing and eagerness for battle which had come upon him. How much more of the experience which had been his of late would suffice to turn him into as complete a savage as the renegade yonder?
Then of what followed his mind grasped but the smallest conception. A series of ear-splitting whistles, a roar and a rush, and he was within the town, borne onward with the rest. The attack was made absolutely without method or order, and no pretence to generalship. It was the onslaught of a wild animal—a surprise and a spring. He saw the black, naked, spiky-headed forms surge from the huts, to be received upon the broad spears of the assailants. In this way quite half the inhabitants were destroyed before they had time to realise that they had been attacked.
So eager and engrossed were the said assailants with slaughter that they seemed hardly to remember his presence. The vibration of whoops and yells was deafening, stunning, in the pearly dawn. But the scenes of butchery and bloodshed oppressed Wagram’s senses no longer. For now he was in the thick of the fight, and every nerve was strained to take care of himself. What if his “followers” ruthlessly slaughtered every living thing that showed?—here was he, with a cloud of spiky-headed fiends driving at him with their broad-headed spears. Down they went, three of them, one after another, for in the heat of battle the coolness of discernment had come upon him, and he was consistently holding his weapon straight and aiming low. Then he whirled round just in time to down a large and nimble cannibal who was within an ace of transfixing him between the shoulders with a broad spear. But still they closed up—and yet, and yet, could not quite. There was a look on this man’s face now which reminded them of him up there, and before it—and his pistol—they at heart quailed.
Still reserving his last fire, knowing he would have no time to reload, he uttered a loud shout, and with axe uplifted he charged forward to cut his way through the opposing horde. It was death—to all appearance; but here again the very hopelessness of it saved the situation, for the moral effect of the terrific appearance of this man of peace forced into action, his tall stature and irresistible Berserk rage, was too much. They gave way before it, before him and the whirling weapon, but—in giving way one more fell.
He had reached his allies now, not before some of them, taking him in the heat of the turmoil for the white renegade, had narrowly missed spearing him. Upon the latter’s quarters was the main attack now directed.
It had been a singularly silent conflict, silent because, except for the few shots he had discharged, the crash of firearms was absent. Of whooping and whistling, of the death shriek, and yelling appeals to the slayers there had been plenty, and now the assailed in a mad rush had fallen back upon the white man’s quarters. There, if anywhere, would safety lie, reasoned the doomed wretches, quite two-thirds of whose numbers had been slain. Upon them, pressing them hard, came their ruthless and avenging foes, encouraged, invigorated by the utter absence of any sign of the terrible white man. And they were now almost upon his house. Could it be that he was away? Already they gloated in imagination upon the rich spoils they would find there. His slaves they would massacre as some sort of revenge for his repeated and ruthless raids upon them, when—what was this?
“Pop-pop-pop! Pop-pop-pop!”
A rapid, knocking sound. Half-a-dozen of their foremost went down. Again that ugly knocking. Down went more. The terror-stricken barbarians halted, dazed. Glaring up at the stockade they could just discern something flash as it moved to and fro, could see a little jet of smoke with each knocking detonation; but what they could not see was the terrible face behind the Maxim as its owner worked his deadly means of defence, grinning in cold and devilish glee. They could not see this, but they could see their own numbers falling like grass before the scythe with every deadly “pop-pop-pop” of this awful unseen power. Their exultation had turned into blind panic now, and with yells of dismay they broke and fled.
He within laughed. Then, not leaving his weapon, he called to his own followers to start in pursuit, and to bring in as many as they could capture alive.
But before this order could be carried out dense volumes of smoke came rolling across the open, together with the roar and crackle of flames. By some means or other the town had been fired; and, indeed, therein lay safety for the panic-stricken runaways. But for the delay thus caused not one would have escaped.
Their flight was now simply headlong, and for anybody but himself not one of them had a thought. As during the fight there had been no system, nothing organised, so now there was no attempt at rally, nobody to give any order. Owing to the same lack of system Wagram had not been able to make his way to the forefront of the attack, and well, indeed, for him that he had not. Now, seeing his “followers” whirl by in a wild, headlong panic, he quickly decided that it was time to go too. He might stand some chance that way, but by remaining here he was doomed. So, taking advantage of the rolling smoke clouds, he, though not without difficulty, at length gained the adjoining forest in the direction taken by his late allies.
But of them there was no sign. He looked around eagerly, wildly almost, but bootlessly. There was no sound save that of the recent turmoil, growing fainter and fainter behind as he continued his flight—no sign of any human presence. He was in an utterly unknown and trackless wilderness—alone.
Alone, without food or water, and no knowledge how or where to procure either, no knowledge, even, of what direction to take; in truth, the fugitive was in pitiable case.
The one redeeming feature of the situation lay in the fact that he was no longer unarmed. He had a revolver and several cartridges, a large knife and an axe, the bloodstains on which latter proved that he had well known how to use it, and woe-betide whoever should attempt his recapture. He would sell his life, if necessary, and die fighting.
But in the silent gloom of the trees no sign of human enemy reached eye or ear. The real enemy was likely to prove hunger or thirst—and against such weapons were powerless. Instinct moved him to continue his flight as far as possible from the scene of his recent trials; and further, on no account to lose his head and wander wildly, as so many have been known to do when the full sense of being lost, and the full weight of the awful solitude, is borne in upon them. When he could see it he pitched his course by the sun, and travelled due west; too often, however, he could not see it, for the tall tree tops met overhead, and trailing masses of undergrowth shut out everything.
And, indeed, there was everything in the situation to render it appalling, particularly to an imaginative man. The silence and the semi-gloom, the very tree trunks and boughs taking on weird and fantastic shapes, the sense of being shut in, the sudden quiver of a network of close foliage, as though some beast of prey or colossal serpent were about to rush upon him from behind it. At such times, too, he would recall the devil-sacrifice he had witnessed within the fetish enclosure, when the victim had been drawn by an irresistible fascination to his doom, and would start back in horror, as though to avoid the mysterious weapon flashing forth to transfix him.
Night would soon be here. All the long day he had travelled on, and now thirst had more than begun to assert itself—hunger had not troubled him much. He sank to the ground exhausted—only to spring up again. The ground was alive with black ants of a peculiarly vicious kind. No rest even there—and the incident reminded him as to his possible fate in the event of succumbing to exhaustion. He stood a good chance of being devoured alive by clouds of venomous and voracious insects.
And yet, and yet—he could not stagger on for ever.
Suddenly an instinct of danger started him on the alert, causing him to forget his exhaustion for a time. Something—somebody—was following him.
There was no doubt about it. Turning quickly, a dark shadow glided, then disappeared behind a tree trunk.
Facing this he thought, and thought hard. He was certain that it was the figure of a man—that probably meant danger. On the other hand, the native might prove friendly; and certain it was that unless he fell in with somebody who could show him where to obtain the barest necessaries of life, and that within the next few hours, his own doom was sealed. Accordingly he called out, making vehement signs of peace by ostentatiously laying down his weapons on the ground in front, though holding himself in readiness to snatch them up again if necessary. It answered. The unknown stepped from his place of concealment and advanced with something like a grin on his face. He began talking volubly, then drew a hand across his throat, at the same time pointing back over his shoulder; and Wagram stared, then stared again. Yes; he was certain now. He had thought to recognise the other somewhat, and now he was sure. It was the man he had rescued from the block in the cannibal slaughter-yard.