Harry Milvaine Part 33

For Harry was very low in spirits.

Whither did his thoughts revert? Home, of course. It was a pleasure to think of the dear ones far away, even although something seemed to whisper to him that he would never see them more.

Presently he fell into a kind of stupor. He had collected the withered gra.s.s in his immediate neighbourhood and formed it into a sort of pillow, and on this his head lay.

When he awoke--if he really had been asleep--the moon was shining very bright and clearly, the camp-fire had died to red shining embers, around it in various positions lay the Somali Indians, not far off was Mahmoud himself, while beside Harry's gra.s.s pillow, leaning on his rifle, stood the sentinel. This rifle had belonged to one of Harry's own men, so had the belt and well-filled pouch.

Harry raised himself on his elbow.

The sentinel never moved. There was a deep, death-like stillness over all the place, broken only now and then by the eldritch laugh of some prowling hyaena.

For a moment thoughts of escape came into Harry's mind. He was unfettered; he was, indeed, on a kind of parole. In so far only as this: the Arab Mahmoud had told him he should be free from fetters unless he attempted to escape; if he did so, he would either be shot down at once, or, if captured alive, manacled as a slave. Harry's answer had been bold enough.

"I accept parole," he had said, "on those conditions, and if I attempt to escape you may shoot me."

He sat up now and looked about him. The sentinel moved a few paces off and stood ready. But hearing his prisoner cough, and observing his perfect nonchalance, he stood at ease once more. Harry threw himself back. He shuddered a little, for dew was falling, and the night air was chill. Instead of sleeping it was his purpose now to think, but his thoughts soon resolved themselves into confused and ugly dreams, in which scenes on board ship were strangely mixed up and jumbled with those of his life at home and at school.

When he awoke again it was broad daylight, and all the camp was astir.

He ate his breakfast of boiled rice and dates in silence, and shortly after this a start was made.

Another long weary day.

Another weary night.

What the caravan suffered most from was the want of water. It was small in quant.i.ty and of such wretched quality, being thick, dark, and smelling, that Harry turned from his short allowance in loathing and disgust.

The route was ever inland, day after day. Knowing what he did of the country, Harry thought it strange they were following no direct road or caravan path. Sometimes they bore a little south, at other times almost directly north.

It was evident enough, however, that Mahmoud, their bold and stern leader, knew what he was about, and knew the country he was traversing, for he never failed to find water, without which a journey in this strange land is an impossibility.

The thought of escaping--the wish to escape--grew and grew in Harry's mind till it formed itself into a fixed resolve.

He would have carried it out at the earliest moment had he deemed it prudent, but there was the want of water to be considered. What good escaping, only to perish miserably in the wilderness? He would wait till the country became less barren.

The caravan in its route inland forded more than one broad stream. By the banks of these they sometimes journeyed for many miles, rested by day or camped at night.

Where, Harry often wondered, were his poor men? What fate was theirs, and what would his own fate be?

That he was to be sold into slavery, he had little, if any, doubt; and the truth was rendered more patent to him one evening by overhearing a conversation in Swahili between two of the Somalis. It referred to him, and mention was repeatedly made of the name of a great chief called 'Ngaloo, a name he had never heard before.

"Perhaps," thought Harry, "my men, too, are being driven to this king's country, though by a different route."

But this was improbable. Had he believed it at all likely he would have gone on patiently with his captors, and have shared the fortune of the poor fellows, whether that might be death or slavery.

No, he determined to escape.

His chance came sooner than he had antic.i.p.ated.

The caravan was encamped one night by the banks of a stream--a deep and ugly stream it was, its banks bordered by gigantic euphorbia trees or shrubs, so shapeless and ugly, that betwixt Harry and the moonlight they looked living uncanny things, and it needed but little imagination on his part to make them wave their arms and make motions that were both fantastic and fiend-like.

Harry was lying with his eyes half-shut looking at them when suddenly the sentinel bent down and gazed for a moment earnestly into his face.

Suspecting something, but not knowing what, he pretended to sleep, breathing heavily, with an occasional sob or sigh, but ready to spring in a moment if foul play were meant.

The sentinel now left his side and strode away on tiptoe--though with many a stealthy backward glance--around the sleeping caravan. He went so far as to touch several of the Somali Indians with his foot. But when a Somali does sleep it takes a deal to rouse him. Seemingly satisfied, he came back and had one other look at Harry, then walked straight away to the river's brink.

He was only going to quench his thirst after all, but well he knew that to have been found but five yards from his post would have cost him his life. No wonder he was careful. Harry's mind was made up in a moment, and more quickly than lightning's flash. How fast one must think on occasions like the present! He sprang lightly but silently to his feet the very moment he saw the Somali deposit his rifle and shot-belt on the bank and bend down towards a pool.

Next minute Harry, exerting all his young strength, had seized and flung him far into the stream.

A plash by night in an African river is but little likely to awake any one encamped by its banks. So far Harry was safe, but would the Indian give the alarm?

He did not wait to think, he only s.n.a.t.c.hed up the weapons and the shot-belt and darted away like a red deer swiftly along the riverside.

He wondered to hear no shout.

The truth is, the Somali sentinel feared to give it; to him it would have meant death, whatever it might be to Harry.

But looking round shortly, he was hardly surprised to find he was hotly pursued by the sentinel. He ran on for about two hundred yards farther, and, on looking round again, he noticed that the Somali was fast gaining on him. So Harry stopped.

His Highland blood was up.

"I won't run from one man," he said, "neither will I kill him; I'll give him a throw, though, if he likes, after the manner of Donald Dinnie."

So he stood and waited.

He had not long to wait. The Indian had divested himself of the linen jacket he wore, and next moment confronted him, panting, but with gleaming eyes and on murder intent. That is, murder if he could manage it quietly.

"Halt!" cried Harry, in Swahili, as he came to the charge. "No farther, or you die!"

The rest of his speech to the Somali he continued, partly in Swahili, partly in English, the former language being rather meagre in phraseology. But this is the gist of what he did say:

"I could kill you if I liked. It would be mean, however. Now take your time and get your breath, then if you like I'll give it to you English fashion."

He paused, and the Somali stood there glaring and foaming with fury.

After a minute--

"Time's up," said Harry, and, taking two or three paces to the rear, he threw rifle and shot-belt on the ground; then, pointing to them--

"Touch these, my friend, if you dare," he said.

No two biddings did the Somali require. He sprang towards the rifle as springs the jungle cat on its prey. Harry's blow was finely planted, and I am sure that Indian must have imagined, for the time being, that there were considerably more stars in the sky than ever he had seen before.

He rose and flew at Harry. He flew but to fall, and he rose and rose again, only to fall and fall again!

Harry could not help admiring his pluck.

He was conquered at last, though.