CHAPTER XIII.—Preparation for the Crisis.
In the Enemy’s Land. The Weird Light on the Valley Wall. Mr. Vancouver. A Visit with Lentala. She Tells a Secret Which I Already Know.
I Would respect Beelo’s wish that she appear as a boy, and must keep hammering into my mind the words, Boy, Lad, Dear Little Brother. I must not for a moment think of her otherwise. “Boy, Lad, Dear Little Brother.”
“What are you dreaming, Choseph, and what are those words your lips are saying?” It was Beelo’s cheery voice.
He was sitting up; I was beside him looking down at the gliding water. I woke to the familiar raillery, and turned with a smile.
“Dear lad!” I joyfully responded.
“You had forgotten me,” he ruefully said. “And you, old Christopher! Don’t you see I’m dying of thirst?”
Christopher plucked two large leaves, fashioned them into a cup, and brought the water, which Beelo eagerly drank. He held out his hand, and I helped him up. He tried his legs.
“That’s better,” he said.
The perfect grace of movement, the exquisite feminine figure so artfully concealed,——
“Boy, Lad, Dear Little Brother.”
“Mooning again, and talking to yourself!” cried Beelo.
“It was a rough trip through the passage, boy. I’m a little shaken.”
“That’s past. Shake the other way.” He was pirouetting round a tree.
“But how are we going back, lad?”
“This way,” he carelessly answered, making wing-motions with his arms.
“There was an earthquake, Beelo.”
He stopped short, and his eyes lighted deep.
“Yes!” he softly but impressively exclaimed.
The old caution settled in his face; he peered and listened warily, and then came a look of assured repose.
“That is good,” he said,—“if—” a cloud drifted over his face—“if they felt it on the surface.”
“They did,” interposed Christopher.
“How do you know?” Beelo sharply demanded.
Christopher pointed to a large rock near us, to the path that it had freshly torn through the brush, and to a steep slope from which it had been dislodged.
“Good for Christopher!” said Beelo. He studied the sky, and dejectedly added, “But the storm is coming!” After a little reflection he remarked, as if to himself, “I don’t know whether that should change our plans or not.” He seated himself to think it out, and began arranging twigs on the ground. “No Senatras will be within miles of the passage,” he ruminated. “They fear it, for the earthquake is born here, and they have run away. So, we can make better time. Mr. Vancouver is safe today; we won’t go there.”
“Where, dear little brother?”
Pain crossed his face. “To the clearing opposite the Face. If only another earthquake would come, or this had come sooner!”
“Is one usually followed by another?”
“Often. Sometimes not. Come! The sun will be setting before long, and we have miles to go.”
We hid the battered raft and struck out. Our way led parallel to the stream, which tore foaming down a gorge of steeply sloping sides. It slipped into a pleasant valley, richly verdured. There we left it and began the ascent of a mountain on the west. Dusk was coming on. Beelo fearlessly pursued the trails in the darkening hours.
Occasionally we paused to rest. The valley which we had crossed lay a black-green sea below. Behind us the eastern sky was cut straight across by the level summit of our valley wall. Beelo was closely studying it.
“You see no sign of fire over there, do you?” he asked, pointing toward the clearing opposite the Face.
There was none, and Beelo was gratified. Our attention was diverted from that spot by a faint purplish flash, which slipped along the crest above the river passage, and was quickly gone. Beelo stood tense and still, and whispered:
“Did you see that?”
“Yes.”
We waited for its reappearance, but none came. Beelo said no more. The light had come from the subterranean lava-pot.
Beyond the wall was the blackest part of the sky. Under the horizon in that direction lightning was at play, as we judged from faint illuminations in the distant heavens, and the rumble of far thunder.
Night had nearly fallen when we reached the summit. The descent was rapid on the other side, for Beelo went with the sureness of familiarity. At last we stopped at an abandoned hut, hidden in the deep forest. Beelo paused on the door-step.
“See,” he said, pointing to a glow a mile or less away, down the valley. “That is the main settlement of the Senatras. The king’s palace, where Lentala and I live, is there. We will visit it tonight,—if Lentala agrees. You will rest here awhile and have something to eat. After the visit to the palace you will sleep here.”
He showed us within, closed the door, blew a flame from smothered embers on the hearth, and lighted a nut-oil lamp. He had been very sober and quiet all the way, but now his eyes began to dance.
“This is your mansion!” he exclaimed.
The place had been made clean and sweet, good beds of leaves were on the earth floor, and fresh water stood in calabashes. Beelo dragged forward a copper vessel, and took from it a generous food supply.
“Isn’t she pretty good—for a girl?” he casually asked.
“Who?”
“Lentala. She did these things.”
Ever since the scene at the end of the passage, sadness had sat upon me, and I was in no mood to enjoy Beelo’s pleasantries,—this, too, while I was deeply touched by the labor and gentle thoughtfulness with which everything had been done for our comfort. Still, something precious was gone from my life; my heart hungered for the lad. But he was here! In a swirl of perversity I seized Beelo’s hands, and held him before me.
“Dear lad,” I said, “I am walking in the dark. Believe me, little brother, I am grateful—more grateful than any words could say—for the skill and the kindness that we have seen from you. But my heart is sore, and you are laughing at me.”
Something between suspicion and embarrassment had been rapidly growing in Beelo’s face. Of a sudden he closed my mouth with his hand and made a brave rally of Beelo’s old flippancies.
“Christopher,” he said, “did you ever see such a goose? Such an old goose?”
I gently removed his hand.
“I am serious, boy.”
“Hush!” commanded Beelo in a whisper.
His hunt down into me was ruthless, but the hurt there helped me to steady my gaze. “When I fainted——” he began, and stopped, having found my face expressionless. He turned to Christopher, who, giving no attention to us, was setting out the supper on a mat. Beelo’s sharp eyes came back to me.
“Dear little brother,——”
“No, no! Not a word!” he broke in. “I haven’t time, and you are hungry. Come, Choseph!”
He turned me to the supper and forced me to sit on the ground opposite Christopher. It was pleasant to be man-handled by Beelo. His abuse of me was always smoothed by affection. I had no appetite, but who could resist Beelo? He played that I was an invalid and unable to help myself. He patted my cheek, put food into my mouth, chattered nonsense as though I were a baby, and petted me with outrageous condescension. There was nothing to do but melt under his dear absurdities; and when he found me re-established, he kissed me on the forehead and dashed out, calling that he would be back before long.
When he returned he was brilliantly alive. There seemed no end to his vitality.
“It’s glorious!” he cried, seizing Christopher and sending his bulk in a twirl across the hut. “It’s splendid!” he went on, smashing my dignity with boy’s play. “It’s just——” But his breath was gone, and he tumbled in a panting heap on the ground.
“What news, Beelo?” I inquired.
He sat up, but as yet had meager breath for speech.
“Mr. Vancouver—is safe. Doesn’t look very—happy. Hasn’t seen—the king. Oh, no! Lentala,—who is an Angel—and Sweet—and Kind—and Beautiful,—is just dying—to see you. And——”
“Rest a minute,” I interrupted.
He flung a little pout at me, and then archly demanded, “Aren’t you good-natured yet, Choseph?”
I shook my head.
“You will be when you see Lentala,” he said with mock melancholy. “Don’t you like girls?” he suddenly fired at me.
“Y—es,” I stammered consciously.
“You like Annabel!” with a spitfire touch on his tongue.
“I once liked, very much, a dear lad named Beelo more than any girl.”
“Once liked Beelo!” His shining eyes were lances.
“I like him just as much yet—when he is Beelo.”
I knew by his start that the thin ice on which I walked was cracking.
“And what is he when he isn’t Beelo?”
“A little devil.”
He laughed. “You aren’t quite dead,” he said, and a briskness sprang into his manner. “We must go. Most of the Senatras have already gone to sleep. Come.”
He rapidly led us into the valley, meanwhile instructing us how to respond if greeted. The natives were not garrulous nor inquisitive, and we passed unnoticed, until the outskirts of the settlement were reached. There, in a dimly lighted hut, Mr. Vancouver was resting under guard, Beelo informed us. A barely visible figure challenged Beelo. The prompt response made the shape sink from view.
“We haven’t time to see Mr. Vancouver now,” said the lad to us.
A turn in a lane lined with huts brought us into a beautiful highway, broad and white, and picketed with odorous trees which arched overhead. The darkness would have been profound but for a diffused light which glowed ahead upon something white. We went rapidly toward it, and found it to be a high stone wall; the light was from two lamps on posts where the highway swung to the left and ran at the foot of the wall.
Instead of following the main road Beelo turned into a narrow way to the right. The overhead growth was so dense that the light from the lamps was soon lost, but Beelo knew the way. At last he stopped, and slipped a key into a lock. The heavy wooden door, plated and strapped with iron, suggested a postern in an archaic fortress. He led us within and secured the door.
The nearer approach of the storm brought lightning, which increased Beelo’s caution while revealing glimpses of our environment. In the region behind the wall the verdure was less dense and more orderly than in the park through which we had come. The lightning made the open spaces embarrassing to our guide, who hurried us across them to the shadows. Finely kept paths wound and intersected, but Beelo knew shorter routes. A rising wind assisted the stealth of our progress.
He brought us under the shadow of a low arcade, open on one side, and closed on the other with a long stone house. The pillars were massed in vines. Here the darkness was intense. The stone floor gave no sound under our tread.
Beelo stopped us, advanced a few paces, and rapped on a door. It was cautiously opened, but we could not see within as Beelo entered. A very faint light barely made him visible.
“Lentala!” he whispered, “they are here.”
A voice fuller and mellower than Beelo’s yet much like his, answered, “Yes? I had given you up, and was undressing for bed.”
“You’ll dress?” Beelo spoke nervously.
“Yes. Tell them to wait a little while. They are safe out there. Beelo, the king is furious because you ran away tonight. He is waiting for you. Go at once. It is something about the man from the colony.” I resented her domineering manner toward Beelo.
“Very well. I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he answered sweetly.
Coming back to us, he began to explain, but I told him we had heard. A reassuring hand was given to each of us, and he was hurrying across the garden fronting the arcade. He halted and came back.
“Don’t stay with Lentala longer than ten minutes,” he earnestly said. “The king may detain me. If I don’t come, can you find your way back?”
I assured him that we could, and that even should he come, we would not let him conduct: us to the hut.
He gave my hand a grateful little squeeze as he slipped the gate-key into it, and darted away, saying:
“Wait at Lentala’s door till she opens it.”
Presently she bade us enter. Instead of her barbarous but highly becoming dress at the feast, with neat jacket and short skirt blazing with gold embroidery, she now wore a plain, loose garment. It was partly redeemed by a low cut in the neck, a splendid girdle consisting of a heavy and elaborately linked chain of gold, and a necklace of wonderful diamonds.
I could not have explained why this dazzling woman, who had filled so wide a space in my fancy, now looked a negligible quantity, an intrusion. There was little of the sparkle that I had expected. The childlike coquetries, the careless abandon, the subtleties that had flitted so unconsciously through the conduct of the Lentala I remembered,—these and a thousand other graces were absent from the sedater young woman smiling upon us and composedly seating us.
She had greeted us with a warning finger on her lips.
“My servants,” she explained in a low, rich voice, “are all in bed and asleep. But they are not far away, and we must be careful.” There was a curious reminder of Annabel’s preciseness in this new Lentala.
She must have felt my discomfort, for she let some of her consciousness slip away, and a dash of her native wildness gradually returned.
“Beelo has told me everything,” she said; “I’ll not trouble you with questions. And we are not to discuss any plans tonight.”
The beauty and richness of the room came forth, faint in the light of suspended lamps, which, clouded in thin fabrics, cast no shadows and softened all contours. A rich massing of hammered gold and silver, of exquisite bronzes and ivories, of hangings and rugs, was softened to grace by their perfect arrangement, and over that in turn was a fine breath of daintiness. My astonishment grew as the significance of it came over me. Did this girl, all seeming innocence, gentleness, and kindness, feel none of the crime and blood with which these treasures were drenched? Yet only the sweetest of spirits could have cast upon this charnel-house loot the cleansing that held its grisly suggestion back.
She had been moving about and gently chatting, and I had made empty responses. At last I discovered that she was growing nervous. A heavy crash of thunder brought out the cause. She looked anxious, and said: “The storm is near. You must go before it breaks. Beela”—I noted her odd pronunciation of the final syllable—“said that if he didn’t return in ten minutes you must go without him, but I can’t think of that. He has been gone much longer.”
I tried to assure her that we could go alone, but still she was uneasy. Christopher and I rose. She came and laid a hand on my arm.
“Wait a little while.” She hesitated over the next words. “Do you like Beela—Beelo?”
“Very much,” I answered dully.
A liquid softness entered her beautiful eyes, and with it a sparkle of the old Lentala—and of Beelo too.
“I am going to tell you a secret,” she went on. “You will keep it?—and you, Christopher? And you’ll not let Beelo know?”
We pledged ourselves. She removed her hand, looked down, and while busying herself with a readjustment of her girdle, said, very low:
“Beelo isn’t a boy.”
Her fingers stopped in her acute tension. I stood silent. With an effort she raised her eyes to mine, and hers betrayed a keen suspense.
“Beelo is a girl,” she added, as though I had not heard. “Her name is Beela.” She found my look coolly meeting hers.
“You liked Beelo the boy,” she groped on; “don’t you like Beela the girl?”
“I—I’m not acquainted with her,” I fumbled.
For a moment the Lentala of the feast returned in a look of mischievous amusement, followed by one of pretended sorrow. I was enjoying the fine play in her face..
“But don’t you see,” she asked, “that in knowing and liking the boy, you knew and liked the girl?”
It would have been impossible for me to make her understand that I was not nimble in violent readjustments; so I held my peace.
“She was Beela the girl all the time,” Lentala insisted. “It couldn’t have been anything but the girl in her that you cared for.” She did not know in the least that she was talking to the wind.
“Of course,” agreed I, very uncomfortable.
My tone made her turn impatiently away. With much spirit she went on as with ease and softness she paced the floor:
“After all she has done, too! I don’t see———”
“Lentala!” I interrupted; “don’t misunderstand. I do like——”
“No, you don’t!” Her voice was growing unsteady. “My poor little Beela! I know she’s a madcap, but she is good, she is kind. She had to be a boy. I made her be one. She couldn’t have done what she did——”
“Lentala, please——”
“——-unless she was a boy. And now she is shamed and humiliated! Don’t let my sweet sister ever know that. It would break her heart. Poor little Beela!”
“This is all wrong. I——”
“Even for my sake you might be generous. It is——”
Three strides brought me to her, and I was unconscious of the power in my angry grip on her wrist, but her tongue went silent. She raised her eyes under the compulsion of mine.
“That is enough,” I said.
There was a moment’s matching of our forces. A ripple of mischievous and innocent surprise animated her, and she laughed with the glee of a gentle child. She was very much like her sister then.
A deepening thunder-crash came.
“You must go—now! I’m going with you. I won’t let you——”
“You shall not go,” I firmly said.
“I must. I want to. I’ll get a——”
“No, Lentala. Good-night.”
As I was turning away, I saw the second time in her face the look of one whose road has stopped at a wall. When I smiled and bowed to her as Christopher and I were passing out, she was standing where I left her, looking blankly at me.