“Quick! quick! It’s the devils—the devils!”
It needed no urging from me—or from him either—to induce everyone concerned to quicken his pace. On a sudden the forest where, a moment back, had reigned the silence of the grave, was now alive with shouts and noises. People were shrieking. What sounded like drums were being banged. Guns were being fired. The Great Joss’ absence was discovered. Possibly the absence of a good deal of valuable property had been discovered too. The alarm was being given. The priests—those pious souls who had burned the girl’s mother alive as a reward for having borne the Great Joss a child!—were warning the country far and wide of what had happened. In a few minutes the whole countryside would be upon us.
I don’t fancy the fighting instinct was very hot in any of us just then. There was something ominous about that din. We were few. The proceedings on which we were engaged might appear odd regarded from a certain point of view. Fortunately, we were near the boat.
As luck would have it, when he was within a dozen paces of the water’s edge, Luke, tripping over a bush, or something, dropped on to his knee. The palanquin, torn from Isaac’s shoulders, descended to the ground with a crash. What were Mr. Batters’ feelings I am unable to say. I expected to see him shot through the roof, like a jack-in-the-box. But he wasn’t. So far as I could tell in the haste and confusion he was silent. Which was ominous. The girl sank down beside the fallen palanquin with the evident intention of offering words of comfort to her revered, though maltreated, parent.
Before she had a chance of saying a word Luke had righted himself. Rudd had regained possession of the end which he had lost. Mr. Batters inside might be dead. That was a matter of comparative indifference. No inquiries were made. Somehow the palanquin was being borne towards the boat. Of exactly what took place during the next few minutes I have only vague impressions. I know that the palanquin was got into the boat somehow, with the Great Joss, or what was left of him, still inside. The men, disposing of their burdens anywhere or anyhow, began to get out their oars. I dropped my loot somewhere aft. The boat was got afloat. The girl—who had all at once got as frightened of the sea as a two-year-old child—I lifted in my arms, carried through three feet of water, and put aboard. I followed.
A wild-looking figure came tearing after us down the slope. There were others, but he was in front, and I noticed him particularly. He was a tall, thin old party, dressed in yellow, with a bald head, and a face that looked like a corpse’s in the moonlight. It was yellow, like his dress. As wicked a physiognomy as ever I set eyes upon. He was in a towering rage. When he got down to the shore we were in deep water, perhaps twenty yards away. He seemed so anxious to get at us I expected to see him start swimming after us. Not a bit of it. I rather imagine that the people just thereabouts were not fond of water in any form. He refused to allow the sea to damp so much as the tips of his toes. He screamed at us instead—to my surprise, in English—not bad English either.
“The Joss! The Great Joss! Give us back our Joss!”
“Wouldn’t you like it?” I returned.
I wasn’t over civil, not liking his looks. I wondered if he had had a hand in burning the girl’s mother. He looked that sort of man.
He raised his hands above his head and cursed us. He looked a quaint figure, standing there in the moon’s white rays. And ugly too. Dangerous if he had a chance. His voice was not a loud one, but he had a trick of getting it to travel.