The League of the Leopard Part 24

Redmond chuckled dryly. The steamboat officials who ply along that coast have a good deal to ruffle them; and it is exasperating for the master of a steamer, attracted by flag or fire signal, to anchor off a dangerous beach expecting several boat-loads of cargo at least, and then discover that the shipper desires only a piece of ice or gratis liquor.

"Better wait for the old _Luala_. She's the canteen ship. Still, we'll sit up until we hear the _Kabunda_'s whistle. It sounds homelike," he said.

Gilby nodded approval, for the coast-hunting steamers were the only link connecting the two lonely men with civilization, and there were times when they acquired a childish fear of losing all touch with it.

Redmond sat smoking in silence, while Gilby listlessly turned over an old English newspaper, and huge brown c.o.c.kroaches crawled up and down the mildewed walls.

"Hallo!" Redmond exclaimed suddenly. "There's a man with boots on crossing the compound. Who, by all that's wonderful, can it be?"

"The Frenchman from Swamp Creek, looking for drinks," suggested Gilby.

"Guyot's dying of fever this time, sure, his n.i.g.g.e.r said. There's no other white man within marching distance; but whoever it is is coming up the stairs!"

Projected against the darkness outside, a strange, bedraggled figure stood in the door. The man's hair was wet and long, the half-closed eyes beneath it glittered feverishly, and the bones of the haggard face showed through the pallid skin. Thorn-rent rags barely decently covered the bony limbs beneath them, and the mire of many a league of swamp clung about him to the knees. Behind loomed the figure of a negro leaning on a rifle.

Moving unevenly, the stranger advanced into the room, and Redmond positively recoiled before him.

"Who in the name of perdition are you, and where do you come from?" he gasped.

The newcomer, instead of answering the question, caught at the table as he asked another:

"What day of the month is this, and have they changed the homeward mailboat's time bill?"

"The tenth, and the _Kabunda_ should pa.s.s to-night," said Gilby, staring blankly at him.

"Thank heaven!" was the response. "I am just in time! You ought to know me. I am Maxwell, and have been prospecting for Niven's gold beyond the Leopards' country."

"Good Lord!" broke from Redmond. "Stir round, Gilby, instead of gaping there! Fetch out some whisky, and kick up the steward boy! Can't you see there's a white man starving? Sit down before you fall over, Mr.

Maxwell."

Maxwell gulped down a draught of the spirit forced upon him, and sank into the chair his host dragged forward, while there was a crash and a howl on the veranda where Gilby fell over the sleeping steward boy.

"He means well, but can't help having been born clumsy," said the trader apologetically. "Lie right back there, and don't talk until you've eaten. Oh, I see--brought a n.i.g.g.e.r with you. Tell the cook to stuff the black man, Gilby."

When food was set before him, Maxwell ate ravenously; then leaning forward in his chair, he looked at his hosts.

"I must thank you for your kindness, and ask another favor," he said.

"It is of vital consequence that I should catch the _Kabunda_ to-night.

I will pay up to twenty pounds for a pa.s.sage off to her."

The pair stared at him, and there was a sceptical smile on Gilby's lips.

It was clear that he doubted the ragged adventurer's ability to redeem his promise.

"It can't be done," declared Redmond. "Our surf-boat has a plank badly split; and if she hadn't there's not a man on all this coast could run you off to-night."

"Nevertheless, if you will listen a few minutes, and treat what I tell you in strict confidence, I think one of you will," said Maxwell, determining to trust them in part.

As he told the story, the incredulous smile faded from the faces of his listeners.

"You can understand the necessity for my desperate hurry now," he concluded. "My partner is left alone, save for a handful of sickly n.i.g.g.e.rs, with the bushmen coming down, and his life may depend upon my catching that steamer. I will leave this packet of gold dust, which I had intended to use for traveling expenses, as the price of my pa.s.sage."

Redmond opened the leather bag tendered him, and Gilby dropped acid upon part of its contents. Then there was silence, until Redmond spoke with a naive directness which called up the faintest flicker of amus.e.m.e.nt into Maxwell's eyes.

"It is quite genuine, and we believe you. Rideau's a hard case, and we'd stake a good deal to get even with him after a certain game he played us; but our folks at home are so confoundedly particular, and you wouldn't find an agent on the coast willing to speculate in mines beyond Shaillu's country. You see, if you let us in, the auditors would set off the sum against our salary. Steady; I haven't quite finished yet. We're not fastidious, either of us, but we haven't come down to s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g money out of a countryman's necessity; so we're open to do the best we can for you. Now take back your gold, and be hanged to you!"

"My sentiments, too!" nodded Gilby. "Redmond can talk sensibly when he likes. It looks uncommonly like suicide, but as my place down under can't be much worse than this one, I'm open to chance drowning with you.

I'll go out, and fill my boat boys up with trade gin now. They're tolerably daring beggars, but they'd never face it sober."

An hour later Maxwell and the two traders stood upon the roaring beach amidst a crowd of black men. Steamy spray whirled about them, and veiled half the palm-crowned bluff from whose summit a crimson flame leaped up; and each time the white haze thinned, two lights reeled wildly through the blackness out at sea. Between these and the beach a succession of great rollers reared their crests of phosph.o.r.escent flame, and the hoot of the steamer's whistle was but faintly audible through the roar they made. A picked crew of brawny negroes chattered about the big surf-boat they held upright on rollers just clear of the surges which raced up the sand.

"It does not look nice. In fact, I've seldom seen it worse, but we'll take our chances when those big ones have run in," said Gilby. "Get into the boat Maxwell, and take care when the rest of us follow in a hurry that we don't fall over you. Hyah you Krooboy, all be fit and ready!"

Huge breakers usually run in series, and when the last of the larger ones had crumbled with a thunderous roar, burying the half-mile sweep of sand in foam from end to end, there was a heaving of muscular shoulders, and clamorous black men floundered waist-deep through the backwash dragging at the boat. She was large and heavy, but thirty pairs of strong hands made light work, and when a dozen amphibious Kroos had swung themselves on board the rest toiled almost shoulder-deep in hissing froth while the sand streamed seaward under them. The craft's stern alone stuck fast, and Redmond shouted himself breathless as he braced his shoulders beneath her quarter, knowing that unless they could drive her clear boat and crew would be rolled over together when the next sea came in.

"Shove, you black imps, shove before them sharks go chop you!" he cried.

They made a last effort, the boat slid clear. Twelve three-tongued paddles smote the water together, and Redmond watched the craft rise almost upright with bows buried in froth and seafire as another majestic breaker came rolling in. Then he turned and raced sh.o.r.eward for his life, with an acre of foam close behind him. When he halted again the surf-boat had vanished into the hollow of the sea, but the howling of those who paddled her, and the helmsman's sulphurous encouragement, rising above the roar of waters, betokened her safety.

"Gilby's no fool in a surf-boat, anyway," he mused, as he went back dripping to the factory.

Another hour had pa.s.sed when the boat was flung upon the beach with a crash which rent her damaged plank from end to end; and the soaked white man who sprang out of her hurried to the factory with his proud display of two bottles of claret, and one, partly-empty, of liqueur, besides a piece of ice in flannel, and a cigar box.

"The time was too short, or I might have done better," he explained.

"Had only a few minutes to tax the skipper and mates in, while the old man wasn't over-pleased about stopping for one pa.s.senger. Boat was half-full when we got alongside, and Maxwell too weak to climb the ladder. They hove him on board with the crane, wrong side uppermost, and half-dazed apparently. The boat was plunging wildly, and Sorrowful Tom too drunk to fix the sling. Taking things all around, it's a mercy we didn't drown him."

"You're a good man in a boat," Redmond conceded. "Still, you have very little sense. Fancy making a run of that kind and coming ash.o.r.e with--claret!"

While Dane and Maxwell fought the plague in Africa, Lilian Chatterton and the young clergyman in charge of that parish walked side by side down the street of a village in North Britain one afternoon. The village was neither picturesque nor prosperous just then, for there was a scarcity of work at the quarries, and for weeks together hard frost had rendered all stone-cutting impossible. A bitter wind sighed about the low stone houses which rose dripping in unlovely simplicity from the muddy street, while an air of stolid, uncomplaining poverty was stamped upon the faces of the men who lounged idly where they could find a shelter in the lee of a building. Miss Chatterton had not enjoyed good health that winter, and the surroundings depressed her. Neither did she find the vista of bleak hillside, snow-streaked moor, and lowering sky much more cheerful, and she was glad when her companion broke the silence.

"It is not exhilarating weather, and this has been a hard winter for the poor," he said. "Unfortunately, we have had rather more of them than usual with us of late, and the sick would have suffered considerably if it had not been for your kindness."

"I have done little," Lilian replied; "but they are somewhat hard to help."

The Reverend Andrew Rae laughed.

"That is the simple truth. We are not an effusive race, and it sometimes hurts us to receive a favor. Still, though they would rather perish than express it, I fancy most of them would on opportunity prove their grat.i.tude. I have been wondering if the worthy Robert Johnstone's opinions have been too much for you, having noticed that his house, or rather, his son's house, is the only one in the village you have not entered. It surprised me, since his daughter used to sew for you, and has been ailing lately."

"It is some time since Mary Johnstone did any work for me," said Lilian, and the clergyman wondered at the coldness of her tone.

"She is a very hard-working girl, and as she has been lying helpless for several weeks, would it not appear unkind if you made her the one exception? I want you to come in with me now."

Drawing the girl's arm lightly through his own, he marched her up to the doorway before she quite grasped his intentions, and halted in front of the man who lounged there regarding them with undisguised hostility. He was not an attractive person, and did not look like an abstainer from alcoholic liquor, but just then he was evidently in the more aggressive humor because, for the time being, he was wholly sober.

"We are coming in for a few minutes to see your daughter," announced Rae.

The man did not move an inch, and his person barred the entrance.