CHAPTER XXI. RIVALS FOR THE HONOURS OF DEATH.
A night of dread foreboding, of weary watching for the day that seemed as if it would never come. With what tantalising slowness did the snail-like stars crawl across the black vault of the heavens! And when day came, what then?
Hunger and thirst, danger and despair, and the certainty of death! But no need to await the dawn for these; already they were here. Comfortable bed-fellows, truly, and for a bed the bare, unyielding rock.
Jack lay with his head pillowed upon the coil of rope. Not that he found it a comfortable resting-place. The knowledge of what the rope could not do for them made it a pillow of thorns. He could not rest. The last thread of hope had broken, plunging him into the abyss of despair. Besides, his arm had become extremely painful within the last hour; he was restless, feverish. Fever goads the brain. Jack's brain was just then busier, perhaps, than it had ever been before. He felt none of the sharp gnawings of hunger, none of the insatiable cravings of thirst, though, as a matter of fact, these were even then conspiring with his wound to fever his blood and keep him awake, and make him think, think, think with: never an instant's pause. When thought is goaded like this, it speedily verges on delirium.
To give way to despondency was not at all like Jack; and as he tossed from side to side and thought upon the “whine” (that was what he called it, in his own mind) in which he had indulged a little while ago when the utter desperateness of the situation first burst upon him—when he thought of this, he felt heartily ashamed of himself. He was a coward, a rank, out-and-out coward. He hated himself for his faint-hearted, babyish lack of spirit. But he would redeem his reputation yet. He would show them—meaning Don and the blacks—that he was no coward, anyhow!
The blacks, as they crossed and recrossed each other on their noiseless beat, thought little and said less. They were desperately hungry, and hunger is the one fellow-feeling that does not make us wondrous kind. Every now and then they tightened their waist-cloths a little, but beyond this gave no outward sign or token of what they thought or felt.
So the night wore on, and still Jack thought in restless silence. There was a deeper flush on his cheek, but it was no longer the flush of shame. The fever in his blood, the delirium in his brain, were rising. So was his resolution. He flung himself about restlessly, muttering. He would show them he was no coward, anyhow!
So the night wore on, until by-and-by, as Don turned for the hundredth time upon his uneasy couch—for he, too, was unable to rest—his hand came into accidental contact with that of his chum. He started; Jack's hand was fiery hot.
Housed by his companion's touch and movement, Jack sat bolt upright, and gazed about him in an excited, feverish fashion, muttering incoherently. His breath came and went in short, hurried catches, and in his eyes shone an unnatural wildness that struck terror to Don's heart. Knowing nothing of his chum's resolve, he thought him simply delirious.