Volume Three—Chapter Twelve.
Doctor Bolter’s Spirit.
Gold! What ideas that one word opens out—what magic it contains! But credit must be given to Doctor Bolter for the fact that it was no sordid love of the yellow metal that prompted him to search for gold.
He wanted it for no luxury; he had no wealthy man’s desires to quell; all he wished was to make that grand discovery that would prove the Malay Peninsula to have been the Ophir to which King Solomon’s ships came in search of treasure; and of this he wanted ample proof, such as he could lay before a committee of learned men. How was it to be obtained?
Doctor Bolter asked himself this question a dozen times over, but no answer came. He asked the question as he stood there up to his knees in water, examining his pannikins full of sand and gravel, which he took from the bottom of the little river, where it now displayed all the characteristics of a mountain stream.
He tried several pannikins full, scooping up the sand and gravel from likely places, and after picking out the larger stones, washing carefully till nothing remained after the water had been drained off but pure sand.
This he would examine in the full light of the sun, seeking in vain for little water-worn nuggets or specks and scales of gold; but for some time his efforts were unsuccessful; and they went on higher and higher, the shallowness, and the difficulties of the journey increasing at every stride, till, trying at a spot where the rapid stream swirled round the end of a great mass of stone, the doctor washed a pannikin of sand, and then uttered a grunt of satisfaction, for there at the bottom, glittering in the sunshine, were dozens of tiny specks of gold mingled with the grit.
“Plenty like that, master, the farther up the stream we go,” said the chief boatman. “It comes out of the mountains where the wicked spirits live.”
“Indeed,” said the doctor, sarcastically; “then we must go up and see the wicked spirits. Do you think they will be at home?”
“It is very dreadful, master, and we shall all be killed! They send down little specks of gold like that in the water; but if we went up to try and get the great pieces stuck in the mountain side, they would smite us, and our people would see us no more.”
“Well, we will risk that,” said the doctor. “Go on.”
The Malays sighed, and looked piteously at the doctor, whom they considered as dangerous as a spirit if not obeyed; for they knew he had strange medicines, and a lightning apparatus that sent sparks through them, and made their hands hold tightly by a couple of handles. Yes, he was a wonderful and dangerous man that doctor, whom nothing seemed to hurt, and they felt compelled to obey him.
They plied the paddles, then, sending the sampan through the sparkling water, till a few minutes after, when there was a loud grating noise, for they were aground.
The Malays sprang out, and wading and lifting the boat, they dragged it on into deeper water, jumped in and paddled on again, but only to get once more aground; and this occurred for a few times, after which the paddles had to be set aside, and the men waded and dragged the boat to a standstill.
The doctor had found gold in small quantities, and that proved gold to be there, but nothing more, and he rubbed his ear with a vexatious movement.
He knew that there was gold in the little streams that came down from the mountains, and probably there was a great deal more there in the mass. But that did not prove this to have been the place visited by Solomon’s ships, and he was as far off the goal as ever.
“One thing is very evident,” muttered the doctor, ill-humouredly, as he made a vicious blow at and missed a teasing fly, “Solomon’s ships never came up this river, and we can get no farther without walking. Here, drag the boat under the shelter of that rock, and let’s have a feed and a rest. The sun is unbearable!”
The men eagerly drew the boat over the stones, amidst which the pellucid water trickled and sparkled, placed it well in the shadow of a towering mass of rock, and then, in the comparative coolness, a good meal was made, after which first one and then the other dropped off to sleep.
The sun was setting when the doctor awoke from a dream of being somewhere undergoing a punishment for his sins by being buzzed at by flies that he could not knock off his face and ears.
He felt annoyed on seeing how the day was spent; but a little consideration told him that the men were almost knocked up by their exertions, and that they would be the better for the rest.
“Well,” said the doctor, “how are we to manage now? Will the stream grow deeper higher up?”
“No, master,” replied the Malay; “the boat can go no farther. We must walk.”
“Humph! and carry the provisions?” said the doctor.
“Yes, if the master wishes to go up to the mountains.”
“Why, you are afraid, Ismael!” said the doctor.
“Yes, master, we are both afraid; but if he says we must go, his servants will follow him right up where the spirits dwell. Look—see,” he whispered. “There is one waving its hands to us to tempt us. Don’t—no, don’t look, master, or you may die.”
The second Malay threw himself flat in the bottom of the boat, and covered his face with his hands.
“Well, I’ve seen worse things than that,” said the doctor, grimly. “Why, it’s a woman; and she’s coming this way.”
“The spirits come in all shapes from the mountains to tempt people,” said the trembling Malay. “Now, they are tigers, now they are crocodiles, and sometimes women and men.”
“Ah, the women are the worst kind of spirits,” said the doctor—“especially,” he added to himself, “if they are middle-aged and jealous of their husbands. Here, get up, sir; don’t lie there; you’re crushing my specimens. That’s only a Malay woman.”
The figure was struggling slowly along, the rugged, rock-strewn bank of the stream making her passage very arduous, for the little river was running now in the bottom of a ravine like a huge rift in the mountain side. The rocks towered up at a swift angle, and a traveller would have found the best road to be decidedly in the bed of the stream.
The woman ashore, however, evidently preferred the dry land, and kept on picking her way toilsomely from rock to rock, now descending into some rift, and anon climbing forth once more into sight, and more than once she seemed to fall.
She was quite a couple of hundred yards away still, and the doctor watched her approach with growing interest, feeling no little compassion for her, as he saw that she was evidently footsore, and struggled towards them in a weary, halting manner, that grew pitiable as she advanced.
At last the piled-up rocks grew evidently so difficult that the woman toiled slowly down to the bed of the stream, where the doctor saw her stoop and scoop up the sweet, cool water with her hand, evidently to drink with avidity. After this she made an effort to continue her course, but she seemed to totter and sink down upon a stone at the side of the stream, waving her brown hand once more as if for help.
“Poor thing!” said the doctor, stepping out of the boat into the shallow water, but only to be seized by the two Malays.
“No, no, master,” they cried together; “you must not go. It is a spirit, and it will kill you!”
“Let go, you silly, superstitious fellows!” cried the doctor, wrenching himself free. “Women are very dangerous creatures, but I think I shall get back safe.”
Then, to the horror of his two men, he waded up the stream to where the native woman sat back, half reclining against the rock, with her feet washed by the running water.
As it is well known, when once the sun is below the horizon, the twilight is extremely short in the tropics; and the fast-coming darkness was deepened by the depth of the rocky ravine, so that as the doctor waded carefully on to avoid a nasty fall, the figure of the woman in her gay plaid sarong was beginning to look filmy and indistinct enough to make anyone of superstitious tendencies doubtful of the reality of that upon which he gazed.
But the doctor was made of too stern stuff to be troubled in this way, even after the promptings of his companions; and wading on, with the water feeling deliciously cool as it plashed musically about his feet, he noted that the brown face looked fixed and strange, the lips parted, revealing the black, filed teeth, and such an air of exhaustion displayed in the eyes, that he hurried his steps.
“What is the matter?” he said, in the Malay tongue; but the woman did not reply, only raised one hand feebly and let it drop.
Black, brown, or white, it was the same to Dr Bolter. Here was a patient asking help in her mute way; and taking her hand, he quickly felt her pulse.
“No fever. Exhaustion,” he muttered, softly, laying her farther back, so that after dipping some of the cold water in the cup of his spirit-flask, and adding a few drops of some essence, he could trickle it gently between the sufferer’s lips.
She made an effort to swallow, and did so, uttering a low moan the next minute, followed by a piteous sigh.
“Drink a little more,” he said, in the Malay tongue; and she obeyed mechanically, as he held the silver cup to her lips. “Poor girl,” he continued, to himself, “her feet are cut and bleeding, and she has hurt herself with falling—Here! hoi! Ismael! Ali!”
The rocks echoed his cry, and the two men approached tremblingly.
“Come along, you stupid fellows!” he cried. “It is nothing to be afraid of;” and after a few more angry admonitions the two boatmen came up and helped to carry the insensible girl down to the boat, when, a snug place close by in the rocks having been picked out, the sufferer was placed upon a roughly-prepared couch formed of the doctor’s overcoat and his waterproof sheet; then a macintosh was laid over her, and she seemed to fall off into a heavy sleep.
“That keeps us here for the night,” said the doctor; and being hungry, a fire was lit, and a capital little dinner of preserved game and fish prepared, of which all partook, and then made preparations for passing the night.