"The second time! That was a good rifle, and fired by one of our own men," he said. "Take this nigger, Hilton, crawl in on him, and, disregarding anything which may happen, get that man—alive if you can. He is worth all the rest of the expedition."
Crouching low, crawling on hands and knees, and slipping from trunk to trunk, the pair worked backward in a semicircle, though, instead of following, it was the negro who led the white man. It seemed to Dane that he was making noise enough to waken the dead, but his dusky companion had probably owed his life to his powers of silent motion, and his progress was as noiseless as that of a serpent. Still, a clamor which broke out at the rear of the camp drowned the sound of Dane's passage, and presently a fire commenced to crackle behind the serried trunks. Rising partly upright, he could see naked figures outlined against it flitting with burdens on their heads into the swamp. Nevertheless, Maxwell's instructions were explicit, and, when the negro beckoned, he sank down again.
The fire tossed higher, and Dane surmised that somebody had lighted the dried grass to divert attention from the deserters or a fresh attack. Its purport, however, was in the meantime a side issue, for, as the radiance came flickering athwart the trunks, it revealed something dim and shadowy crouching among the roots of a neighboring cottonwood. The blurred shape might have escaped notice had not the line of steel before it glimmered once or twice. With infinite caution Dane covered a few more yards, and stooped behind a screen of trailers, with every nerve quivering, and a heavy pistol clenched in his right hand. What had become of the negro he did not know. Once the assassin raised his weapon, and Dane laid the short pistol barrel upon his raised forearm, hoping that the stiffness of the trigger might not spoil his aim; but he lowered it again, for, evidently attracted by the increasing glare, the man he stalked rose partly upright, glancing over his shoulder. His caution betrayed him, for, hurling himself crashing through the creepers, Dane fell upon him, driving the heavy pistol into the center of the dusky face with his full weight behind it. The two went down, the colored man undermost, clawing with greasy hands at his adversary's throat. Their grip was feeble, for the first blow had got home; but time was precious, and Dane, heaving his right shoulder clear, brought the steel-bound butt down again.
There was a hollow groan; several men who came running up fell heavily over the pair, and while one dragged the half-dazed white man clear, the others lashed the prisoner fast with creeper ropes. Rising shakily, Dane sent up a breathless shout.
"Stand fast and see that nobody gets in your way if you have him safe!" cried Maxwell. "Don't trouble about the grass! It is damp among the cottonwoods, and will soon burn out."
Dane waited ten long minutes, feeling thankful, meanwhile, that the one spot where the ridge could be reached on that side through the quaggy swamp was lighted by the fire. Then Maxwell joined him, and, trusting to their subordinates' vigilance, they made the round of the knoll together. A dozen carriers were missing; and their assailants had vanished as mysteriously as they came.
"We shall miss the boys, but it might be fatal to try to follow them; and at least we know whom we can trust," said Maxwell. "A treacherous servant is worse to deal with than an open enemy. Our assailants were evidently mere bush thieves, and not regular fighting men, or they would probably have got in. Whether they expected help from the deserters, or what share the man you seized had in the plot, I can't decide now; and, in the meantime, it is of no great importance. We shall discover it to-morrow."
Nobody in camp slept during the rest of the night, which was one of the longest in Dane's recollection. Most of it he spent huddled among the roots of a cottonwood while the heavy dew of the tropics splashed upon him, straining ears and eyes alike for any sign of the enemy. There was, however, no sound but the wailing of some night bird from all the tangled grass; and except when now and then a murmur of negro voices rose up, a deep impressive silence brooded over the camp. Dane could hear his watch ticking, and there were times when he found it difficult to master an impulse to cry aloud, or to commit any extravagance which would break the tormenting stillness.
At last, however, the temperature fell a little. A faint chill air shook the dew from the tangled creepers flung from mighty branch to branch, and the darkness became less dense. The steam of the swamps grew thicker, a streak of radiance broadened in the east, and suddenly as night had fallen, the red sun leaped up. It was once more burning day, and neither the dew-drenched white men, who stiffly straightened their aching limbs, nor the stolid Africans, who rolled over in their lairs among the undergrowth, were sorry to greet the light again. They were a pitiful handful of travel-worn and somewhat dejected men, alone on a contracted islet of dry soil in a limitless sea of mist whose white waves were doubtless filled with unseen perils.
"Another day to be endured," said Maxwell, yawning as he spoke. "Another, and another, until the long weeks swell into months, and then, if nobody poisons or shoots us prematurely, we shall go back to England and fancy we have been dreaming. Has it occurred to you yet, Hilton, that the men who gain fortunes in Africa don't win but earn them hardly? One might wonder why a beneficent Creator made this country."