One Maid's Mischief

by George Manville Fenn

This idea suggested the loathsome monsters that she knew would haunt the hot, steamy jungle close to the river side; and with starting eyes, when some low rustle was heard amongst the leaves, she tried to pierce the darkness, believing over and over again that she saw some lithe, undulating reptile gradually approaching her; and at such times it required all her strength of mind to determine that it was but a mere fancy, and as unreal as the images of fierce creatures that she more than once believed that she saw coming out of the jungle.

Then her busy brain reminded her of other and more real perils of her position—the more dangerous from their insidious nature and approach. Depressed in spirit as she was, she could not help recalling the accounts she had heard of the deadly fevers, and the certainty of their attacking anyone who passed the night upon the bare earth.

Still, it would only mean death at the worst, she thought, in a weary, despondent way; and her misery was so great now that she felt ready to give up her very life sooner than fall again into Murad’s hands.

Then her thoughts flew to Harley, with whom she seemed to associate any hope that she might have of the future; and for a time she would brighten up, and contrast her present position with that of some few hours back. She was a prisoner then, and in terrible peril; now she was free, and the chances were, she hopefully told herself, that she might fall in with some party sent in search of her, for she would not believe Murad’s version of her disappearance to be true.

It seemed to her as if the morning would never come, and the first herald of its approach was a dank, chilling breath that came to her laden with the mist of the river; and as she sat and shivered she felt that her clothes were saturated with the heavy dew, and longed now for the coming of the sun with its warm, inspiring beams and hopeful light.

Her teeth chattered, and her limbs ached as the day broke. She had been awake for quite a couple of hours; and the weariness and oppression that troubled her was now supplemented by a throbbing headache, which was at times almost more than she could bear.

As the sun sent his beams glancing through the jungle, Helen rose painfully to her feet, gladly seizing the bough of a tree to cling to and support herself till the giddy sensation that oppressed her wore off.

And now, in place of the chill from which she had suffered, she began to burn; hands, cheeks, temples seemed as if they were on fire; there was a misty unreality in the waving branches of the tree as it overhung the river; and as she stood there, trying to master the giddiness that oppressed her, she felt as if this were only the continuance of one of the disturbed dreams that had haunted her during the darkness.

Then the fit passed away almost as suddenly as it had come; and trying to shake off the wearisome lassitude that oppressed her, she began to move forward along the slightly-beaten track that ran onward a few yards from the edge of the river, one evidently made by the wild creatures that from time to time came down to drink, or made the banks of the river their home.

It was an arduous journey, for she had constantly to stoop down to enable her to pass beneath the interlacing boughs and parasites that crossed the path in all directions; but still she progressed, sometimes strong, and hopeful, more often wearied by lassitude, and at times compelled to cling to the branches as she struggled on, her head reeling, her eyes blinded by pain, and the feeling of unreality coming on more strongly with each attack; till at last she went on, forcing her way through the jungle in a state of wild delirium, muttering incoherently as she staggered on.