A Frontier Mystery Part 37

"What if Tom should take into his head to come here again?" I asked.

"He will not, _Nkose_, I have tied him up so that he can neither move nor speak."

"Good," I said.

The night seemed very dark as we set forth, for the moon had not yet risen, and the starlight was insufficient to render our march easy, as we followed the elastic stride of our silent guide. Our excitement was intense, as we threaded the thickness of some bushy kloof by narrow game paths known to our guide and lit upon in the darkness with the unerring instinct of the savage. Every now and then a rustle and patter, as something scurried away, and once some large animal, alarmed, started away with a sudden and tremendous crash which it seemed must have been heard for miles. Not one of us dared break the Xosa's enjoinment to strict silence, and thus we proceeded. How long this lasted we could only guess, but it seemed that we were hours traversing the interminable tortuousness of bushy ravines, or scaling the side of a slope with such care as not to disturb a single stone. At last Jan Boom came to a halt, and stood, listening intently.

In the gloom we could make out nothing distinct. We were facing a dark ma.s.s of thick bush, with a rugged boulder here and there breaking through, as if it had fallen from a stunted krantz which crowned the slope not very much higher above. It took some straining of the eyes to grasp these details. When we looked again our guide had disappeared.

"What does it mean, Glanton?" whispered Falkner. "What if this is another trap and we are going to be the next to disappear? Well, we sha'n't do it so quietly, that's one thing."

Then through the silence came Jan Boom's voice, and--it seemed to come from right beneath our feet.

"Down here, _Amakosi_. Iqalaqala first."

"Down here?" Yes--but where? Then I saw what was a hole or cavity, seeming to pierce the blackness of a dense wall of bush. Without a moment's hesitation I obeyed, and finding Jan Boom's outstretched hand I dropped into what was curiously like a sort of deep furrow. The others followed, and lo--something closed behind us. We were in pitch darkness, and a moist and earthy smell gave out a most uncomfortable suggestion of being buried alive.

"Now walk," whispered the Xosa. "Let each keep hold of the one in front of him. But--before all--silence!"

In this way we advanced, Jan Boom leading, I keeping a hand on his shoulder, Kendrew doing ditto as to mine, while Falkner brought up the rear. The place was not a cave, for every now and again we could see a star or two glimmering high above. It seemed like a deep fissure or creva.s.se seaming the ground, but what on earth it was like above I had no idea.

We walked lightly and on our toes in order to ensure silent progress. A few minutes of this and the Xosa halted. The fissure had widened out, and now a puff of fresh air bore token that we were getting into the light of day, or rather of night, once more. Nor were we sorry, for our subterranean progress was suggestive of snakes and all kinds of horrors.

I, for one, knew by a certain feel in the air that we were approaching water.

A little further and again we halted. A patch of stars overhead, and against it the black loom of what was probably a krantz or at any rate a high bluff. The murmur of running water, also sounding from overhead, at the same time smote upon our ears.

It was getting lighter. The moon was rising at last, and as we strained our gaze through the thick bushy screen behind which we had halted, this is what we saw.

We were looking down upon a circular pool whose surface reflected the twinkling of the stars. On three sides of it ran an amphitheatre of rock, varying from six to twenty feet in height. At the upper end where the water fell into it in a thin stream, the rock dipped to the form of a letter "V." All this we could make out in the dim light of the stars, for as yet the face of the rock was in dark shadow. And yet, and yet-- as I gazed I could descry a striking resemblance to our own waterhole except that this was more shut in.

"Remember," whispered the Xosa, impressively. "There is to be no shooting. They are to be taken alive."

We promised, wondering the while where "they" were. A tension of excitement, and eagerness for the coming struggle was upon all three of us. For me I rebelled against the agreement which should deter me from battering the life out of the black villains who had brought my darling to this horrible place. What terrors must she not have endured? What ghastly rites of devil worship were enacted here?

Foot by foot the light crept downwards, revealing the face of the rock as the moon rose higher and higher. Then a violent nudge from Falkner, at my side--but I had already seen.

The water was pouring down upon the head of what had once been a human being. Now it was a dreadful, glistening slimy thing, half worn away by the action of the running water. It was fixed in a crucified att.i.tude, facing outwards, bound by the wrists to a thick pole which was stretched across horizontally from side to side of the pool, the feet resting upon a rock ledge beneath. It needed not the agonised stare upon that awful upturned face--or rather what once had been a face--to tell in what unspeakable torture this wretched being had died. To my mind and to Falkner's came the recollection of our gruesome find that grey afternoon in the northern wilds of Zululand.

Two more bodies, one little better than a skeleton, were bound similarly on each side of the central one. As we gazed, spellbound with horror, we saw that which pointed to one of these being the body of a white man.

Now a dark figure appeared on the brink above the central victim, appeared so silently and suddenly as to lend further horror to this demon haunted spot. We watched it in curdling horror as it stooped, then reached down and cut the thongs which held first one wrist then the other. The body thus released toppled heavily into the pool with a dull splash that echoed among the overhanging rocks. Then it disappeared.

The figure, straightened up now, stood watching the troubled surface for a moment. Standing there full in the moonlight I thought to recognise the face. It was that of one of Tyingoza's people whom I knew by sight, but could not fit with a name. Then he turned to clamber back, crooning as he did so, a strange weird song. It was not very intelligible, but was full of _sibongo_ to the Water Spirit, who should now delight in a fresh victim, a rare victim, one by the side of which all former sacrifices were but poor. Then would the land have rain again--would drink all the rain it needed.

Now the blood seemed to rush to my brain as though to burst it. A red mist came before my eyes, and my heart seemed to hammer within me as though it would betray our place of concealment without fail. For I realised who this new victim--this rare victim--was to be, the victim who was to take the place of the ghastly shapeless horror which we had seen disappear beneath that awful surface. A warning touch from Jan Boom brought me back to recollection and sanity again.

Through our concealing screen we saw the man who had released the corpse drop down the rock. Another had joined him, and now the two crouched down in the shadow with an air of eager expectancy as though waiting for something or somebody. One held in his hand a coiled thong. Then we heard voices, one a full, sonorous, male tone talking in the Zulu; and another, rich, musical, feminine--and it I recognised with a tightening of the heart. Both were approaching, in such wise as would bring the speakers almost within touch of us.

And the two fiends, the one with the coiled thong, and the other, crouched--waiting.

CHAPTER THIRTY.

THE LATEST VICTIM.

There she stood--Aida, my love. I could see every line of the sweet pale face, turned full towards me in the moonlight, but it wore a half-dazed look as that of one who walks and talks in her sleep. But it bore no sign of fear.

"This is the third night, _Inkosikazi_, and it is time to restore you to your own people," Ukozi was saying. "You will tell them that we have not harmed you, but that your presence was necessary for three nights, to render perfect our _muti_."

She looked as if she but half understood him, and nodded her head. They were but a few paces from us, and where they had emerged from we could not make out. Their backs were toward the horrid remains, and also toward the two crouching figures.

"So now we are ready. Come."

This was clearly a signal, for the two crouching figures sprang up and forward to seize her. The first went down like a felled bullock, under a judiciously planted whack from Jan Boom's k.n.o.bkerrie as we leapt from our concealment. Falkner had grappled with the witch doctor, but Ukozi was a muscular and powerful savage, and it taxed all his younger foeman's athletic resources to hold him. He writhed and struggled, and the two were rolling over and over on the ground. Then Jan Boom seizing his chance, let out again with his formidable k.n.o.bkerrie, bringing it down bang in the middle of Ukozi's skull. He, too, flattened out. The third, held at the point of Kendrew's pistol, had already surrendered.

"Better tie them up sharp before they come to," said Falkner. "Here goes for Mr Witch Doctor anyhow."

All this had happened in a moment. In it I had borne no active part, my first care and attention had been given to Aida. It was remarkable that she showed but little surprise at the sight of me.

"Is that you, dear? And you have come to take me home? I am rather relieved, for I was beginning to get a little frightened I believe.

But--what is it all about? These people have done me no harm."

"No--thank the Lord and we four," said Falkner grimly. "Not yet, but we were only in the nick of time. There--you evil beast. You can come to now, as soon as you like."

This to the fellow whom Jan Boom had first stunned and whom he had just finished tying up in the most masterly manner. The Xosa had effected the same process with the third, under cover of Kendrew's pistol.

"Don't look round, Aida," I said. "There's a sight it'll be as well for you not to see. In fact I'll take you away as soon as Jan Boom is ready to show us the way out."

But Jan Boom was apparently not ready. He stood glaring down upon the prostrate and unconscious witch doctor with an expression of vindictive hatred upon his countenance that was positively devilish.

"Not killed," he muttered in his own tongue. "No--no--not killed. That were too sweet and easy for him."

"Ha-ha, Jan," guffawed Falkner. "You were so keen on capturing the brute alive, and now you've killed him yourself."

"He not dead," answered the Xosa in English. "Zulu n.i.g.g.a's skull d.a.m.n hard. He come to directly."

"Well it wasn't much of a sc.r.a.p anyway," grumbled Falkner. "Are there any more of them?"

"Only two women up there at the huts," said Aida. "But I don't understand. They've done me no harm."

"No, exactly. You don't understand, but we do," answered Falkner grimly. "And, now, by the way, where are the said huts?"

"Up above there. You go by the way you saw me come in. Through that pa.s.sage."

Now we saw a narrow pa.s.sage similar to the one we had entered by. It seemed to lead upward.

"Quite sure it's all there are?" he said.