The Argus Pheasant Part 47

Peter Gross looked at her in astonishment. "I laughed at you?" he exclaimed.

"Yes, on the beach. When I told you you must go. You laughed. Do not deny it, you laughed!" The fierce intensity of her tone betrayed her feeling.

Peter Gross shook his head while his gaze met hers frankly. "I do not recollect," he said. "I surely did not laugh at you--I do not know what it was--" A light broke upon him. "Ay, to be sure, I remember, now. It was a Dyak boy with a mountain goat. He was drinking milk from the teats. Don't you recall?"

"You are trying to deceive me," Koyala cried angrily. "You laughed because--because--"

"As G.o.d lives, it is the truth!"

Koyala placed the point of her dagger over Peter Gross's heart.

"_Orang blanda_," she said, "I have sworn to kill you if you lie to me in any single particular to-day. I did not see that whereof you speak.

There was no boy, no goat. Quick now, the truth, if you would save your life."

Peter Gross met her glance fearlessly.

"I have told you why I laughed, Koyala," he replied. "I can tell you nothing different."

The point of the dagger p.r.i.c.ked the resident's skin.

"Then you would rather die?"

Peter Gross merely stared at her. Koyala drew a deep breath and drew back the blade.

"First we shall talk of other things," she said.

At that moment the rattle of rifle-fire reached Peter Gross's ears.

"What is that?" he cried.

Koyala laughed, a low laugh of exultation. "That, _mynheer_, is the children of Bulungan driving the white peccaries from Borneo."

"Ah Sing has attacked?" Peter Gross could not help, in his excitement, letting a note of his dismay sound in his voice.

"Ah Sing and his pirates," Koyala cried triumphantly. "Wobanguli and the warriors of Bulungan. Lkath and his Sadong Dyaks. The Malays from the coast towns. All Bulungan except the hill people. They are all there, as many as the sands of the seash.o.r.e, and they have the _orang blanda_ from Holland, and the Javanese, and the loud-voiced _orang blanda_ that you brought with you, penned in Van Slyck's kampong. None will escape."

"Thank G.o.d Carver's in the fort," Peter Gross e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed.

"But they cannot escape," Koyala insisted fiercely.

"We shall see," Peter Gross replied. Great as were the odds, he felt confident of Carver's ability to hold out a few days anyway. He had yet to learn of the artillery Ah Sing commanded.

"Not one shall escape," Koyala reiterated, the tigerish light glowing in her eyes. "Ah Sing has pledged it to me, Wobanguli has pledged it to me, the last _orang blanda_ shall be driven from Bulungan." She clutched the hilt of her dagger fiercely--.

Amazed at her vehemence, Peter Gross watched the shifting display of emotion on her face.

"Koyala," he said, suddenly, "why do you hate us whites so?"

He shrank before the fierce glance she cast at him.

"Is there any need to ask?" she cried violently. "Did I not tell you the first day we met, when I told you I asked no favors of you, and would accept none? What have you and your race brought to my people and to me but misery, and more misery? You came with fair promises, how have you fulfilled them? In the _orang blanda_ way, falsehood upon falsehood, taking all, giving none. Why don't I kill you now, when I have you in my power, when I have only to drop my hand thus--" she flashed the dagger at Peter Gross's breast--"and I will be revenged? Why? Because I was a fool, white man, because I listened to your lies and believed when all my days I have sworn I would not. So I have let you live, unless--" She did not finish the thought, but stood in rigid attention, listening to the increasing volume of rifle-fire.

"They are wiping it out in blood there," she said softly to herself, "the wrongs of Bulungan, what my unhappy country has suffered from the _orang blanda_."

Peter Gross's head was bowed humbly.

"I have wronged you," he said humbly. "But, before G.o.d, I did it in ignorance. I thought you understood--I thought you worked with me for Bulungan and Bulungan only, with no thought of self. So I worked. Yet somehow, my plans went wrong. The people did not trust me. I tried to relieve them of unjust taxes. They would not let me take the census. I tried to end raiding. There were always disorders and I could not find the guilty. I found a murderer for Lkath, among his own people, yet he drove me away. I cannot understand it."

"Do you know why?" Koyala exclaimed exultingly. "Do you know why you failed? It was I--I--I, who worked against you. The _orang kayas_ sent their runners to me and said: 'Shall we give the _controlleur_ the count of our people?' and I said: 'No, Djath forbids.' To the Rajahs and Gustis I said: 'Let there be wars, we must keep the ancient valor of our people lest they become like the Javanese, a nation of slaves.' You almost tricked Lkath into taking the oath. But in the night I went to him and said: 'Shall the vulture rest in the eagle's nest?' and he drove you away."

Peter Gross stared at her with eyes that saw not. The house of his faith was crumbling into ruins, yet he scarcely realized it himself, the revelation of her perfidy had come so suddenly. He groped blindly for salvage from the wreck, crying:

"But you saved my life--three times!"

She saw his suffering and smiled. So she had been made to suffer, not once, but a thousand times.

"That was because I had sworn the revenge should be mine, not Ah Sing's or any one else's, _orang blanda_."

Peter Gross lowered his face in the shadow. He did not care to have her see how great had been his disillusionment, how deep was his pain.

"You may do with me as you will, _juffrouw_," he said.

Koyala looked at him strangely a moment, then rose silently and left the hut. Peter Gross never knew the reason. It was because at that moment, when she revealed her Dyak treachery and uprooted his faith, he spoke to her as he would to a white woman--"_juffrouw_."

"They are holding out yet," Peter Gross said to himself cheerfully some time later as the sound of scattered volleys was wafted over the hills.

Presently he heard the dull boom of the first sh.e.l.l. His face paled.

"That is artillery!" he exclaimed. "Can it be--?" He remembered the heavy guns on the proas and his face became whiter still. He began tugging at his bonds, but they were too firmly bound. His Dyak guard looked in and grinned, and he desisted. As time pa.s.sed and the explosions continued uninterruptedly, his face became haggard and more haggard. It was because of his folly, he told himself, that men were dying there--brave Carver, so much abler and more foresighted than he, the ever-cheerful Paddy, all those he had brought with him, good men and true. He choked.

Presently the sh.e.l.l-fire ceased. Peter Gross knew what it meant, in imagination he saw the columns of natives forming, column upon column, all that vast horde of savages and worse than savages let loose on a tiny square of whites.

A figure stood in the doorway. It was Koyala. Cho Seng stood beside her.

"The walls are down," she cried triumphantly. "There is only a handful of them left. The people of Bulungan are now forming for the charge. In a few minutes you will be the only white man left in Bulungan."

"I and Captain Van Slyck," Peter Gross said scornfully.

"He is dead," Koyala replied. "Ah Sing killed him. He was of no further use to us, why should he live?"

Peter Gross's lips tightened grimly. The traitor, at least, had met the death he merited.

Cho Seng edged nearer. Peter Gross noticed the dagger hilt protruding from his blouse.

"Has my time come, too?" he asked calmly.

The Chinaman leaped on him. "Ah Sing sends you this," he cried hoa.r.s.ely--the dagger flashed.

Quick as he was, quick as a tiger striking its prey, the Argus Pheasant was quicker. As the dagger descended, Koyala caught him by the wrist. He struck her with his free hand and tried to tear the blade away. Then his legs doubled under him, for Peter Gross, although his wrists were bound, could use his arms. Cho Seng fell on the point of the dagger, that buried itself to the hilt in the fleshy part of his breast. With a low groan he rolled over. His eyeb.a.l.l.s rolled gla.s.sily upward, thick, choked sounds came from his throat--