Long Odds Part 27

"The men won't have them in the forecastle."

"Ah," said Desmond a trifle sharply, "that's a thing I hadn't thought of, though, of course, it might have struck me. They're on deck still?

Bring me a lantern."

The man got one, and Desmond who went out with him held it up when they stood beside the little group of dusky men who sat huddled together upon the sloppy deck. A seaman stood not far away from them, and he turned to Desmond.

"We can't have them down forward with us, sir," he said.

There was a certain deference in his tone, but it was very resolute, and Desmond made a little gesture of comprehension as he glanced at the huddled negroes. Most of them were naked save for a strip of tattered waistcloth, and their thick lips, wooly hair, and heavy faces were revealed in the lantern light. He realized that there was something to be said for the seaman's att.i.tude. They had done what they could for these Africans, and had done it gallantly, but now they were afloat again they would not eat with them or sleep in their vicinity. Color is only skin-deep, a question of climate and surroundings, but Desmond, who admitted that, felt that, after all, there was a wide distinction between himself and the seamen and these aliens. It was one that could not be ignored. The theory of the brotherhood of humanity went so far, and then broke down.

"We have a few strips of pine scantling among the stores," he said, after a moment's thought. "You can screw one or two of them down on deck--but I can't have more than a couple of screws in each. Then if you ranged a ba.s.s warp in between it would keep them off the wet.

There's an old staysail they can have to sleep in. We could toss it overboard when they have done with it."

He turned away, and, soon after a meal was brought him, went to sleep while the _Palestrina_ sped on as fast as her engines could drive her towards the north. In due time she also crept into one of the many miry waterways which wind through the mangrove forests of Lower Nigeria, and Desmond sent a boat up it with a letter Ormsgill had given him to a certain white trader. An hour or two later a big gaunt man in white duck came back with the boat and drank a good deal of Desmond's wine. Then after asking the latter a few questions he looked at him with a twinkle in his eyes.

"Well," he said, "Ormsgill is rather a friend of mine, and what you have been telling me is certainly the kind of thing one would expect from him. It is by no means what I would do myself, but he always had--curious notions. Most of us have, for that matter, though, perhaps, it's fortunate they're not all the same. Well, I'll be glad to have the boys, especially as it's difficult to get Kroos enough from Liberia just now."

"I think there were certain conditions laid down in Ormsgill's letter," said Desmond reflectively.

The trader laughed. "There were," he said. "Well, I'm willing to admit that I have once or twice pitched a n.i.g.g.e.r who was a trifle impudent over the veranda rails. It's one of the things you have to do, and if you do it in one way they don't seem to mind. No doubt they understand it's only natural the climate and the fever should make you a trifle hasty. Still, I don't think a Kroo was ever done out of his earnings, or had things thrown at him when he didn't deserve it, in my factory."

Desmond fancied that this was probable, for he liked the man's face.

There was rough good-humor in it, and the twinkle in his eyes was rea.s.suring. As a matter of fact, he was, like most of those who followed his occupation in those swamps, one who lived a trifle hard and grimly held his own with a good deal against him. His code of ethics was, perhaps, slightly vague, but there were things he would not stoop to, and though now and then he might in a fit of exasperation hurl anything that was convenient as well as hard words at his boys, they knew that such action was not infrequently followed by a fit of inconsequent generosity. There are men of his kind in those factories whose boys will not leave them even when a rival offers them more gin cases and pieces of cloth for their services. In a moment or two Desmond made up his mind.

"Shall I send the boys ash.o.r.e with you?" he asked.

"No," said the trader reflectively. "After what you've told me it might be wiser if I ran them up river in the launch to our factory higher up after dark. You see, n.o.body would worry about where they came from there. In the meantime you had better go up and ask the Consul down to dinner. You needn't mention the boys to him, and it's fortunate that a yacht owner escapes most of the usual formalities.

I'll be back with the launch by sunset."

He kept his word, but while he was getting the boys on board his launch just after darkness closed down a little white steamer swept suddenly round a bend, and before the launch was clear two white officers stepped on board the _Palestrina_. A thick white mist rose from the river, but Desmond was a trifle anxious when one of the officers leaned over the yacht's rail looking down on the launch.

"You seem to have a crowd of boys with you, Brinsley," he said.

The trader stepped back on to the _Palestrina_'s ladder. "I could do with more. Those folks up river are loading me up with oil. Anyway, I'd like a talk with you about that gin duty your clerk has overcharged me."

Then he turned to a man in the launch below. "Go ahead," he said. "You can tell Nevin he must send me that oil down if he works all to-morrow night."

A negro shouted something back to him, and with engines clanking the launch swept away up the misty river, while it was with relief Desmond led Brinsley and his guests into the saloon where dinner was set out.

CHAPTER XXII

UNDER STRESS

When Desmond left him Ormsgill did not march directly east towards the interior, but headed northwards for several days. There were reasons which rendered the detour advisable, especially as he desired to avoid the few scattered villages as much as possible, but he had occasion to regret that he had made it. He pushed on as fast as possible until one hot afternoon when the boys wearied with the march since early morning lay down in the gra.s.s, and he wandered listlessly out of camp. Their presence was irksome, and he wanted to be alone just then.

There are times when an unpleasant dejection fastens upon the white man in that climate, and when he is in that state a very little is usually sufficient to exasperate him. The boys were muttering drowsily to one another, and Ormsgill felt he could not lie still and listen to them. He had also a tangible reason for the bitterness he was troubled with. Desmond had brought him no message from Ada Ratcliffe, and though she had as he knew no sympathy with what he was doing and had never shown him very much tenderness, it seemed to him that she might, at least, have sent him a cheering word. It was, in view of what it would cost him to keep faith with her, and that was a thing he resolutely meant to do, a little disconcerting to feel that she did not think of him at all.

In the meanwhile it was oppressively hot, and the air was very still.

His muscles seemed slack and powerless, his head ached, and the perspiration dripped from him, but he wandered on until he reached a spot where a little patch of jungle rose amidst a strip of tall gra.s.s in the mouth of a shallow ravine. Ormsgill stood still in its shadow and looked about him. Not a leaf shook, and there was not a movement in the stagnant air. In front of him the patch of jungle cut harshly green against the glaring blue of the sky, and beyond it there was sun-baked soil and sand on the slopes of the ravine.

Then there was a flash in the shadow and one of his legs gave away. He staggered and reeled crashing into a thicket, and when a minute later he strove to raise himself out of it one leg felt numb beneath the knee except for the spot where there was a stinging pain. Ormsgill also felt more than a little faint and dizzy, and for a few moments lay still again blinking about him. A wisp of blue smoke still hung about the leaves, and he could hear a low crackling that grew fainter as he listened. It was evident that the man who had shot him was bent on getting away, and he made shift to roll up his thin duck trousers, and looked down at his leg. There was a bluish mark in the middle of the big muscle with a little dark blood about it, and he took out his knife. He set his lips as he felt the point of it grate on something hard, and then closed the knife and sat still again with a little gasp of pain.

There was, he knew, a piece of the broken cooking pot the West African usually loads his flintlock gun with embedded in his leg. That, at least, was evident, but he did not know who had shot him, and, indeed, was never any wiser on that point. It was, perhaps, a negro who had supposed him to be a trader or official against whom he had some grievance, but, after all, that seemed scarcely likely, and Ormsgill fancied it was some dusky sportsman who had fired at a venture when he heard a movement, and had then gone away as fast as possible when he saw that he had hit a white man. This appeared the more probable because they were not very far from the coast, where men do not often attempt each other's life, and Ormsgill had only been struck by one piece of iron.

In any case, the faintness was leaving him by the time the startled boys came up and found him sitting in the shadow. It was evident that the wound was not very serious in itself, but he realized that a man could not expect to travel far in that climate with a piece of iron rankling in his leg. Somebody must cut it out for him, and he did not care to entrust any of his thick-headed carriers with the operation.

Without being much of a physiologist he knew that there are arteries in one's leg which it is highly undesirable to sever. He also recognized that while the thing was, perhaps, possible to one with nerve enough, he could not get it out himself, which was, however, rather more than one could reasonably have expected of a man born and brought up in a state of civilization, for there are a few points on which the primitive peoples excel us. Still, the life he had led had made him hard, and when he had quieted the boys he bound up the wound, and filling his pipe with hands that were tolerably steady, lay still awhile to consider.

He could not push on towards the interior as he was, and there were, he believed, one or two doctors in the city, which was not very far away. He was aware that he was liable to be arrested there, but it seemed possible that he might enter it un.o.bserved at night and purchase secrecy from any one who took him in. In such a case he would be the safer because it was about the last spot in which those interested in his capture would expect to come across him, and in a few more minutes he had made up his mind. Though the hammock is not so frequently used as a means of conveyance in that country where the trek-ox is generally available as it is in most other parts of Western Africa, he had provided himself with one.

"Get the hammock slung," he said. "We will go on towards the west when you are ready."

Half an hour later the bearers hove the pole to their woolly crowns, and plodded on again. They were not men of any great intelligence, and were usually content to do what they were told without asking questions, which was a custom that had its advantages. They had also an unreasoning and half-instinctive confidence in the man who led them, and in due time they plodded into sight of the town one night when the muggy land breeze was blowing. Like other West African towns, the place straggles up and back from the seaboard bluff, with wide s.p.a.ces between the houses, and n.o.body seemed stirring when Ormsgill's boys marched into the outskirts of it. Remembering what the priest of San Thome had told him of the man whose wife he had sent the girl Anita to, he presently bade them stop outside the building which stood well apart from the rest. Some of them were roofed with corrugated iron, and some with picturesque tiles, but the top of this one was flat, which Ormsgill was pleased to see. He recognized that it was built in the older Iberian style which is not uncommon in Western Africa and ensures the inmates privacy. There are no outbuildings where this plan is adopted. The house stands four-square and self-contained, presenting an almost unbroken wall to the outer world, though there is usually an open patio in the midst of it. One of the boys rapped upon a door, and when it was opened by a negro his comrades unceremoniously marched down an arched pa.s.sage under the building until they reached the enclosed patio. Ormsgill had impressed them with the fact that the most important thing was to get in.

Then lights appeared at one or two windows, and when a little, olive-faced gentleman in white linen with a broad sash about his waist came down the stairway from a veranda Ormsgill raised himself in the lowered hammock.

"You will forgive this intrusion, Senor," he said.

The other man made him a little formal salutation. "I," he said dryly, "await an explanation."

Ormsgill offered him one, and the little gentleman looked at him thoughtfully for a moment or two.

"I have heard of you--from the fathers up yonder who are friends of mine," he said. "Perhaps it is my duty to inform the Authorities that you are here, but in the meanwhile that is a point on which I am not quite certain. You can, at least, consider this house as yours until we talk the matter over. The boys may sleep in the patio to-night, but they will first carry you in."

They did it at Ormsgill's bidding, and left him sitting in a basket chair in a big, cool room, after which his host brought in a few cigars and a flask of wine.

"They are at your service, senor," he said. "I would suggest that you give me a little more information. I am one who can, at least, now and then respect a confidence."

Ormsgill looked at him steadily, and made up his mind. It was clear that if his host meant to hand him over to the Authorities there was nothing to prevent him doing so, and reticence did not appear likely to serve any purpose, since he was wholly in his hands. He spoke for a few minutes, and the other nodded.

"I think it was wise of you to tell me this," he said. "There are, I may mention, others besides myself who desire to see certain changes made in our administration, and they would, I think, sympathize with you. Some of them are gentlemen of influence, but we have confidence in Dom Clemente and another man of greater importance--and we are waiting. To proceed, I think it would not be difficult to keep you here awhile without anyone we would not wish to know becoming aware of it. The thing is made easier by the fact that my wife and the girl Anita are away, and my sister, who is very deaf and does not like society, rules the household. Now if it is permissible I will examine your leg."

He did so, and looked a trifle grave after it. "I know a little of these matters, and it is advisable that this should be seen to," he said. "Now the Portuguese doctor is not exactly a friend of mine, and might ask questions as to how you got hurt and where you came from, but there is a half-breed who I think is clever, and he would probably refrain from mentioning anything that appeared unusual if he is remunerated sufficiently. It is"--and he made a little expressive gesture, "a thing he is accustomed to doing."

Ormsgill suggested that the man should be sent for early next morning, and went to sleep an hour later in greater comfort than he had enjoyed for a considerable time. He did not, however, sleep soundly, and was awake when the half-breed doctor came into his room next morning. The latter set to work and managed to extract the piece of iron, but before nightfall the fever which had left him alone of late had Ormsgill in its grip. It shook him severely during several days, and then, as sometimes happens, left him suddenly, limp and nerveless in mind and body. He was content to lie still and wait almost unconcernedly. Nothing seemed to matter, and he felt that effort of any kind was futile.

He lay one morning in this frame of mind when there were footsteps on the veranda outside his door, and he heard a voice that sounded curiously familiar. Then the door opened, and Benicia Figuera who came into the room started when she saw him. Ormsgill, however, betrayed no astonishment. He was too languid, and he lay still gravely watching her. The sunlight that streamed in through the open door fell full upon her, gleaming on her trailing white draperies and forcing up bronze lights in her dusky hair. He did not see the faint tinge of color that crept into the ivory of her cheek, but he vaguely noticed the pity shining in her eyes. She seemed to him refreshingly cool and reposeful.

He did not remember exactly what she said, though he fancied she mentioned that she had some business with his host's sister, and he had no recollection of his own observations, but he sank into tranquil sleep when she went away and awoke refreshed, to wonder when she would come back again. As it happened, she came next day, bringing him choice fruits and wine, and it was by her instructions he was carried out on the veranda above the patio where she sat and talked to him.

Her voice was low and tranquil, her mere presence soothing, and she did not seem to mind when he grew drowsy. Once or twice again, when she was not aware that he was watching her, he saw compa.s.sion in her eyes. Afterwards, though this was not quite in accordance with Iberian customs, she came for an hour or two frequently, and Ormsgill grew curiously restless when she stayed away. Sometimes his host sat with them and discoursed on politics, but more often he left his deaf sister, who would wander away to superintend the dusky servants' lax activities.

The house, like others of the same type, might have been built for a fortress, and afforded those within it all the seclusion any one could desire. One arched entrance pierced the tall white walls, which had a few little windows with heavy green lattices set high in them. Within, the building rose, tinted a faint pink and terraced with verandas supported by tottering wooden pillars, about a quadrangular patio, and it was characteristic that it was more or less ruinous. When the outer windows were open the sea breeze blew through it, and sitting in cool shadow one could hear the drowsy murmur of the surf. Ormsgill found the latter inexpressibly soothing when Benicia sat near him, and he would lie still contentedly listening to her and watching the shadow creep across the patio. Weak as he was in body, with his mind relaxed, he allowed no misgivings to trouble him. He was vaguely grateful for her presence as a boon that had been sent him without his request, and whether Benicia understood his att.i.tude, or what she thought of it, did not appear.

That was at first, however, and by degrees he took himself to task as his strength came back, until in the hot darkness of one sleepless night he realized towards what all this was leading him. As it happened, Benicia did not appear the next day, and he had nerved himself for an effort by the one that followed. He had an interview with his host and the half-breed doctor, who both protested, and then lay waiting for the girl in a state of tense expectancy. He recognized now what it was most fitting that he should do, but that, after all, is a good deal less than half the battle. It was late in the afternoon when she came, and the first glance showed her that there was a change in Ormsgill.

He lay in a canvas lounge smiling gravely, but he had dressed himself more precisely than usual, and there was a suggestion of resolution in his haggard face which had not been there before. There was also something in his eyes which conveyed the impression that the resolution had cost him an effort, and Benicia laid a certain restraint upon herself, for she knew what had happened. The days in which he had leaned upon her and permitted her unquestioningly to minister to his comfort had, undoubtedly been pleasant, but, after all, she had not expected them to continue.