The Haunting of Low Fennel Part 8

She re-entered the tent, lighting the lamp.

The Valley of the Just! What irony, that her husband should have selected that spot to camp in! She sat deep in thought, when presently Ramsa Lal entered with coffee. He had just set down the tray when the sound of a distant cry brought him rigidly upright. He stood listening intently. The sound was repeated--nearer it seemed--a sort of hoa.r.s.e scream, terrible to hear--impossible to describe.

Moreen rose to her feet and followed the man out of the tent. Some one--some one who kept crying out--was plunging heavily through the jungle towards the camp.

The men about the fire were on their feet now. Obviously they would have fled, but the prospect of flight into the haunted darkness was one more terrible than that of remaining where they were.

It ceased, that strange cry; but whoever was approaching could be heard alternately groaning and laughing madly.

Then out from the thicket on the west, into the red light of the fire, burst a fearful figure. It was that of Major Fayne, wild eyed, and with face which seemed to be of a dull grey. He staggered and almost fell, but kept on for a few more paces and then collapsed in a heap almost at Moreen's feet, amid the clatter of the strange loot wherewith he was laden.

This consisted in a number of golden vessels heavily encrusted with gems, a huge golden salver, and a dozen or more ropes of gigantic rubies!

Amid these treasures, the ransom of a Sultan, the price of a throne, he lay writhing convulsively.

Ramsa Lal was the first to recover himself. He leapt forward, seized the prostrate man by the shoulders and dragged him into the tent, past Moreen. Having effected this he raised his eyes in a mute question.

She nodded, and whilst Ramsa Lal seized the Major's shoulders, Moreen grasped his ankles, and together they lifted him up on to the bed.

He lay there, rolling from side to side. His eyes were wide open, gla.s.sy and unseeing; a slight froth was upon his lips, his fists rose and fell in regular, mechanical beats, corresponding with the convulsive movements of his knees.

Moreen dropped down beside him.

"Ramsa Lal! Ramsa Lal! What shall I do? What has happened to him?"

Ramsa Lal ripped the collar from Major Fayne's neck in order to aid his respiration. Then, quietly signing to Moreen to hold the lamp, he began to search the entire exposed surface of the Major's skin. Evidently he failed to find that for which he was looking. He glanced down at the ankles, but the Major wore thick putties and Ramsa Lal shook his head in a puzzled way.

"It is like the bite of a hamadryad," he said softly, "but there is no mark."

"What shall I do!" moaned Moreen--"what shall I do!"

There was a frightened murmur from the entrance, where the native servants stood in a group, peering in. Moreen stood up.

"Hot water, Ramsa Lal!" she said. "We must give him brandy."

"But it is useless, Mem Sahib; he has not been bitten--there is no mark; it may be a fever from the jungle."

Moreen beat her hands together helplessly.

"We must do _something_!" she said; "we must do _something_."

A sudden change took place in Major Fayne. The convulsive movements ceased and he lay quiet, and breathing quite regularly. The gla.s.sy look began to fade from his eyes, and with every appearance of being in full possession of his senses, he stared at Moreen and spoke:

"You shall repent of your words, Harringay," he said in a quiet voice.

"You have deliberately accused me of faking the cards. I care nothing for any of you. Why should I attempt such a thing? I could buy and sell you all!..."

Moreen dropped slowly back upon her knees again, white to the lips, watching her husband. With the same appearance of perfect sanity, but now addressing the empty air, he continued:

"In my tent--my wife will tell you it is true--my wife, Harringay, do you hear?--I have jewelled cups and strings of rubies, enough to buy up Mandalay! I blundered on to them in that old ruined temple back in the jungle, not five hundred yards from your bungalow. Harringay--think of it--a treasure-room like that within sight of your verandah! There are snakes there, snakes, you understand, in hundreds; but it is worth risking for a big fortune like mine."

"He mixes time and place," murmured Ramsa Lal. "He talks to the Commissioner Sahib in Mandalay of what is here in the Valley of the Just."

Moreen nodded, catching her breath hysterically.

"You see," continued the delirious man, "I am as rich as Midas. Why should _I_ want to cheat you! Don't talk to me of what you would do for my wife's sake! Keep your favours, curse you!"

With a contemptuous smile, Major Fayne threw his head back upon the pallet. Then came another change; the look of stark horror which Moreen had seen once before crept into the grey face; and her husband raised himself in bed, glaring wildly into the shadows beyond the lamp.

"You are a spirit!" The words came in a thrilling, eerie whisper. "Oh G.o.d! I understand. Yes! I came away from Harringay's bungalow. My wife was asleep and I sat drinking until I had emptied the whisky decanter."

He bent forward as if listening.

"Yes, I went back. I went back to reason with him. No! as G.o.d is my witness I did not plan it! I went back to reason with him."

Again the uncanny att.i.tude was resumed. Then:

"I stepped in through the verandah, and there he sat with Moreen's photograph in his hand. Listen to me--_Listen!_" There was an agony of entreaty in his voice; it rose to a thin scream--"My wife's photograph!

Do you hear me? Do you understand? _Moreen's_ photograph--and as I stood behind him, he raised it to his lips--he----"

Major Fayne stopped abruptly, as if checked by a spoken word; and with wildly beating heart Moreen found herself listening for the phantom voice. She could hear the breathing of the natives cl.u.s.tered behind her; but no other sound save a distant howling in the jungle was audible, until her husband began again:

"I struck him down--from behind, yes, from behind. His blood poured over the picture. You understand I was mad. If you are just--and is not this called the Valley of the Just?--you cannot condemn me. Why did I fly?

I was not in my right mind; I had--been drinking, as I told you; I was mad. If I was not mad I should never have fled, never have drawn suspicion--on myself."

He fell back as if exhausted, then once more struggled upright and began to peer about him. When he spoke again, his voice, though weak, was more like his own.

"Moreen!" he said--"where the devil are you? why can't you give me a drink?"

Suddenly, he seemed to perceive her, and he drew his brows together in the old, ugly frown.

"Curse you!" he said. "I have found you out! I am a rich man now, and when I have gone to England, see what Jack Harringay will do for you. I will paint London red! I have looted the old temple, and they are after me, they----"

The words merged into a frightful scream. Major Fayne threw up his hands and fell back insensible upon the bed.

"Mem Sahib! Mem Sahib, you must be brave!" It was Ramsa Lal who spoke; he supported Moreen with his arm. "There is a spell upon this place. No medicine, nothing, can save him. There is only one thing----"

Moreen controlled herself by one of those giant efforts of which she was capable.

"Tell me," she whispered--"what must we do?"

Ramsa Lal removed his arm, saw that she could stand unsupported, and bent forward over the unconscious man. Following a rapid examination, he signed to her to leave the tent. They came out into the white blaze of the moonlight--and there at their feet lay the glittering loot of the haunted temple, a dazzlement of rainbow sparks.

"Only for such a thing as this," said Ramsa Lal, "dare I go, but not one of us will see another dawn if we do not go." He pointed to the heap of treasure. "Mem Sahib must come also."

"But--my husband----"

"He must remain," he said. "It is of his own choosing."

V