Pummelled, pushed, hustled, his hands and arms secured with innumerable knots of raw-hide; half suffocated, wholly nauseated by the greasy effluvium of the filthy blanket which still enveloped his head and shoulders, Dick Selmes was hurried down the hill by his captors. To his attempts at speech with them, in the hope that even one among them might understand English, the only reply was a savage growl in their own tongue, accompanied by a dig in the back with the butt end of a kerrie. Still, he did his best to keep his faculties of hearing undimmed, and, listening with all his might, it seemed as though the roar of the war-dance, instead of drawing nearer, became less marked. Whither were they taking him? All sorts of frontier stories of the old wars which he had heard came back to his mind: of the unsparing barbarities practised by these savages on any unfortunate white man who should fall into their hands; of soldiers, straggling from a column, cut off in the thick bush and slowly roasted to death with red-hot stones, or spread naked over a nest of black ants; of settlers, surprised by the suddenness of the outbreak, driven back to perish in the flaming ruins of their own homesteads. And now he himself was in the power of these very fiends! They were dragging him back to put him to some such end, to delight the whole location with the spectacle of his lingering torments. Shuddering with horror at the thought, the unfortunate fellow hardly noticed whither he was being hurried. Then he was suddenly and roughly flung to the ground, his legs tightly tied together at the ankles, by which he was now seized, and unceremoniously dragged through what he guessed to be the door of a hut.
Once within, a light was struck; the homely match of civilisation flaring feebly, but just enough to render more fiend-like still the fell, savage faces and forms decked with their wild war-trappings. This the prisoner was able to make out for a moment, for the blanket which covered his head and shoulders was removed. But only for a moment, for an effectual gag was forced into his mouth, and then the suffocating, nauseous covering was replaced. After a minute or two of muttered conversation, his captors withdrew.
And now for the unfortunate Dick Selmes followed a night of indescribable horror. To the certainty of being dragged forth at dawn to a death of unimaginable agony was added the torments of the present—the cramping pain of his bonds, the nauseous suffocation of the gag, and the bites of innumerable small pests of no account whatever to the savage, but calculated to drive a highly civilised and utterly helpless white man to the verge of insanity. Rescue! Of that there was no hope. The Police troop might hold its own on the defensive, but, after what he had seen last night, he could not believe it would stand a chance against these fierce warriors fighting on their own ground; besides, he himself would be murdered the first thing. And then he remembered how he of his own act had effectually cut off all trace as to his whereabouts. Even Harley Greenoak would fail to fathom the mystery of his disappearance—until too late. Again and again he bitterly cursed his own rashness.
Then, as the remaining hours of the night wore on, merciful Nature came to the relief of the sufferer, in that he sank into a state somewhat between sleep and unconsciousness, which at length took shape in a dream. The Police troop had come to his rescue. He could hear voices—those of the Inspector Chambers and Harley Greenoak, mingling with the deeper tones of his savage gaolers. He tried to call out, but could utter no sound. They were withdrawing; still he was perforce dumb. They had gone away. Ah, the agony of it! He strained at his bonds—nearly suffocated himself with the horrible gag. All of no avail.
Very different looked Vunisa’s location—now silent in slumber—as the Police rode up, to the weird and stirring scene it had presented throughout the best part of the night, but the yelping and barking of innumerable curs soon brought forth some of its denizens. These stood, open-mouthed with astonishment at the sight of the carbines and revolvers of the Police troopers.
“The chief,” said Harley Greenoak, decisively, “Vunisa, the chief. We have a ‘word’ to him.”
Scowling sullenly, the savages began to make the usual excuses. The chief was sick, and so on.
“A lie!” said Greenoak. “Bring him forth at once or we put the torch into every hut in this valley.”
By now all were astir. More than half the revellers had gone home, but there were yet an awkwardly large number left, even for nearly a hundred armed and mounted men. Still a hurried consultation went on, then, just as Greenoak was losing patience, the chief himself appeared.