CHAPTER XIII
A MIDNIGHT VISITOR
The porcupine dinner was good. In its ball of clay, Grenville brought it to the cave in the basket that he used for heavy burdens.
It was far too hot to be handled carelessly. And when he broke away the earthy covering and leaves, and arranged the steaming pieces on the platter Elaine had prepared, it was perfectly cooked, as tender as quail, and of a flavor surprisingly fine.
The banquet, however, would have been immeasurably improved by the commonest of bread and potatoes. To provide some palatable substitute for these essential commonplaces of civilization became another of Grenville's problems, which, he told himself, he must tackle—after the tiger.
Everything was after the tiger, or else over-fraught with danger. The thought of this made Grenville fret more than anything demanding his attention. That night, when Elaine had finally retired, he went to his fuses, broke off a length, and returned to light it at his fire. It was still too damp, from the juices of the plant, to burn efficiently. His bomb he, therefore, would not make until the following afternoon.
The fire about his potteries he was now permitting to die. It could not be altogether abandoned, since a too sudden cooling of the vessels would crack and ruin every one. Therefore, from time to time, he went to the furnace to regulate the heat. He had leveled a rock for a table, at the fireplace near his cave, and on this he finally spread the mysterious paper and parchment recovered from the tube.
They had been all day neglected. Grenville had thoroughly intended a daylight examination of the parchment, concerning the nature of which he was considerably in doubt.
A new supply of whittled wooden "tablets" on which to write lay ready to his hand. Scratching at his head with his pencil, he studied the hieroglyphics for an hour or more before he returned to the written sheet with the scrawl spelled out in cipher.
As a matter of fact, his mind refused the task on which he was endeavoring to focus his attention. Despite his utmost efforts, his thoughts would return to Elaine. He would have given almost his hope of eternity to secure her absolute comfort and freedom from anxiety. And, inasmuch as the tiger was responsible for much of her worry, his mind was made up that a trial should be made to slay the brute without another day's delay.... It is always so easy to plan!
He was finally staring straight into the fire, though his hand still rested on the parchment and the paper. The flames sank lower and lower, wavering finally like dull red spear-heads among the glowing embers.
At some fancied sound he turned sharply about, to peer through the darkness of the trail. All appeared as silent and calm as the grave. He wondered if, perhaps, Elaine had arisen to come to her door.
She was not to be seen at the indistinct entrance of her cave. He turned once more to stir his fire—then wheeled like one on a pivot.
His senses had not been deceived. Beyond, in the darkness, a few feet only from the cavern occupied by Elaine, two blazing coals had been fixed like twin stars by his movement.
A sudden recollection that he had failed to close the gap in the wall swept hotly and accusingly through him. Some beast of the jungle had passed the barrier, perhaps to enter the very cave that the wall had been built to protect!
With a note that broke the stillness abruptly, Grenville caught up a flaming branch of wood from the mass of embers in the fire, and sprang to the path to the cavern.
The prowling animal stood for a moment undecided, then started as if to spring before the oncoming man to the shelter of Elaine's rock retreat, doubtless to turn there in desperation for a mad encounter in the dark.
But, perhaps by a yard, the man was there before him. The brute, even then, refused to retreat towards the trail by which it had come. It leaped towards the place where Grenville made his bed—a shadowy form that he knew at last was not the arrogant tiger.
It turned for a moment in the mouth of the cave, as if aware this smaller retreat was too shallow for adequate shelter. But before the man could crack his fiery brand upon the creature's head, it leaped wildly past him, growling a savage protest, and reluctantly retreated towards the trail.
One more attempt it made, even then, to escape by Grenville's active form, and regain the larger cavern. But his fierce, hot rushes were not to be withstood. It finally turned with another sort of bellow, and cowered uncertainly upon the downward path.
After it no less desperately than before, Sidney plunged along the steep descent, his firebrand brightly glowing in the wind. A whine of fear escaped the jungle creature as he slunk at last through Grenville's gate to the outer precincts of the wall.
Almost immediately followed a frightful din of growls and wauling. There were certain deep gutturals and mouthings that Grenville was sure his tiger only could produce. There were sounds of a conflict, fierce and bloody, retreating down the trail. Like a battle of cats, enormously exaggerated, with screams and roars intermingled, the disturbance rose on the air. But Grenville had blocked his gate with logs and bowlders, and calmly returned to his place.
Elaine was crouching by the fire when he came once more to the terrace. She had called him in vain, and was visibly trembling as his form appeared within the glow.
"What was it?" she cried. "What has happened?"
"Why—it sounds like a couple of jungle politicians engaged in a tariff argument."
"You weren't down there?"
"I strolled to the wall, to make sure it was closed for the night."
"There was nothing—up here? I dreamed there was something—fighting with you—some terrible creature—like that."
She waved her hand towards the hideous sounds, retreating swiftly in the darkness.
"Can't understand such a dream," he said. "We've had no corned beef and cabbage. You'd better go back and try again."
He started at once for his pottery fire, in his brusque, indifferent manner.
Elaine stood there, watching his figure, retreating in the darkness, and made no move to retire. Like a dim silhouette of Vulcan, projected against the reddened glare of his furnace, he presently appeared, from the place where she eagerly kept him in her vision. She felt she could not bear to creep away until he should return.
She saw him stand for a little time observing his waning heaps of embers before he faced about to return once more to his seat. Then, slowly, as she heard his footsteps approaching, she glided silently back to her shelter, and so at length within the door. Even then she lingered eagerly, to make certain he was not far away. Until he sat down, and stirred up the flames, she did not return to her couch.
"To be so perfectly fearless!" she murmured, half aloud, and so crept away to her dark, uncomfortable cave.
Grenville pocketed the documents, still lying face up on his rock. He finally slept beside the fire, to finish his plans in dreams.
These plans, which were vague enough that night, matured fairly early in the morning. He had resolved to try for the tiger at the spring.
Fully expecting to encounter abundant signs of the animal conflict of the midnight hours, he descended the trail before Elaine had appeared, intent upon removing such evidence of trouble as might be found disturbingly near their tower.
There was nothing at all along the trail to show that a fight had taken place. Where the grass and shrubbery began in the clearing below the walls, there was one mere tuft of hair upon a twig. But a rod removed from this there was at least a hint as to what might have caused the engagement.
This was a trampled and slightly reddened ring where something had been eaten—some quarry doubtless captured by the smaller of the prowlers, who had found himself suddenly attacked and driven from the feast by the master hunter of the jungle, on whose sacred preserves he had probably dared to poach.
Grenville proceeded to the spring, not only to fetch a fresh supply of water, but as well to indulge in a vigorous washing of his hands and face, and to make some observations.
He found that by breaking several limbs a none too comfortable seat in the branches of a rubber tree might be prepared, provided he could climb to the perch. With a very long fuse attached to his bomb he might be enabled to execute a coup upon the tiger, under cover of the night. Could he only slay some animal—another wild hog, for instance—and place it here as a lure, his chances of securing the tiger's attendance would be infinitely increased.
A number of things were essential to his plan. The first, a rope ladder, was the simplest of the lot. That he could fashion with ease. His greatest problem was the fire with which to ignite his fuse, should he wish to explode his bomb. The wood he had found, that so amazingly retained its glow, might answer his needs for, perhaps, two hours, as he sat high up in the tree. It was all he possessed, and upon it he must needs rely. But how he should manage to discern his beast, in the darkness, when the prowler came at last to drink, was more than he could determine.
"A dead-fall might do for the brute," he soliloquized aloud, as the business revolved in his mind. "But I couldn't get one ready by to-night."
For several reasons a dead-fall was impracticable. The thought was, therefore, abandoned, while the details of loading and placing the bomb were elaborately planned. So vivid was Grenville's imagination that already he pictured himself high in the tree, heard the tiger come to lap the water, lighted his fuse—and ended that trouble forever.