The Ruined Cities of Zululand Part 18

cruise, Captain Hughes," replied the seaman, "and that I was bound for Quillimane."

"Perfectly, and that you would give me a pa.s.sage to England if I needed it," answered Hughes. "I shall be glad to accept it, if you can land me at Delagoa Bay, Port Natal, or the Cape; for we two have nothing save our knapsacks and rifles now."

"Avast there! Hear my tale first. It appears a special envoy has been sent out by the King of Portugal to report on this colony on the Zambesi. With his staff he has been for the last three months at Tete.

The 'Halcyon' has been taken up for his pa.s.sage home, and I am on my way to sign articles with Don Francisco di Maxara."

"But that does not account for my seeing Masheesh at your side in yonder boat?" remarked Hughes.

"The Governor of the fort yonder was at _Tete_ with his Excellency when the Matabele arrived, and told his tale. The Portuguese would not get under way without orders. Reaching Senna late last night, I heard of the affair, knew it must be you, and determined to send poor Mason on to sign articles, and guided by Masheesh to go to your help."

A cordial grasp of the hand followed this.

"Why, you are burning with fever, my lad, and more fit for the sick bay than the jungle," said Weber, looking into the soldier's face.

"Shove off; give way, my lads; his Excellency must wait a wee,"

continued the seaman, as the boat sheered down stream, and the men bending to their oars, the stout craft dashed down the Zambesi, heading for Senna.

Don Isidore Mujao, the commandant, met them at the landing place, greatly surprised at their speedy return, and still more so when he saw the use his Portuguese flag had been put to. About forty years of age; tall, dark complexioned, and sedate in manner, he welcomed the new comers, at the same time giving his orders to the men. Taking up the body of the late captain of the burned ship, six soldiers conveyed it to the little chapel, and during the pause, the new comers looked around them.

The fort was built of brick, and was in a very dilapidated condition.

Situated on the right bank of the Zambesi, the river rolled its waters under the walls, and seemed a large stream, dotted with reed-covered islands.

"Captain Weber, you can spare your men a toilsome row; his Excellency will arrive either this night or to-morrow from Tete _en route_ for Quillimane. Gentlemen," continued the Portuguese, "you are welcome; you will meet with scant hospitality here, but we will do our best."

Don Mujao took off his black broad-brimmed hat as he spoke, bowing low.

"Ay, ay, then I have not much time to lose. I say, Don," exclaimed the sailor, "this is the Senhor Wyzinski, a missionary, on the loose, and whom we found in a fair way to make a grill for Davy Jones; look at his singed hair and whiskers; and this is an old friend, Captain Hughes, 150th Regiment, who looks half dead with fever."

Again the formal Portuguese raised his hat, bowing first to one and then to the other.

"Roderigues," he said, beckoning to a soldier who stood near, "show the Senhors to the only room we can give them. Once more I ask your consideration for our shortcomings, Senhors."

"Come, make sail!" cried the skipper; "don't be all day backing and filling here."

The gate opened, then swung to again, as pa.s.sing the Governor, who stood with his hat raised from his head, and preceded by the very questionable individual who had been called Roderigues, Hughes and the missionary, literally worn out with fatigue and excitement, the one wounded in the shoulder, the other his face blistered with burns, and hardly able to walk from the effects of the tightly bound palmyra rope, took their way up a narrow, winding staircase, turning out of a landing into a large room, lighted by two barred windows looking over the Zambesi and the plain beyond.

Two rude stretcher beds placed at opposite sides of the room, two large horse buckets, evidently intended for washing purposes, a coil of palmyra rope, to haul up water from the river below, and a couple of rude chairs, formed the furniture. The roof of the chamber was vaulted, and the floor was of red brick. Such was the room into which the soldier ushered the two travel-worn men, and to them it seemed a palace.

Standing at attention as they pa.s.sed, the Portuguese spoke some words in his own tongue, then closed the door with a clang. Placing their rifles against the wall, and throwing down the knapsacks which had been recovered, the missionary's first act was to push the rude bolt, and offer up fervent thanks for the protection vouchsafed them during their late danger.

The water-buckets were put into use, the knapsacks rummaged, and then the two sat gazing in silence over the river.

"We must manage a pa.s.sage with our friend, Weber," said Wyzinski, at last.

"I don't know how it is, I don't feel any interest in anything,"

languidly replied Hughes. "These shivering fits upset me. The fever has its hold of me."

"I wonder whether they have any quinine? What a miserable, tumble-down set of wretched hovels these Portuguese have here. A town of thirty houses."

"The country looks fertile, and the colony should prosper," languidly returned Hughes, shivering heavily from head to foot, and his face flushing as he spoke. "Those are curiously-shaped sugar-loaf hills, the river flowing between us and them. The thick forest stretches beyond, and how beautiful the distant mountains seem."

"Those are the hills of the Morumbala range, but what interests me more is yonder boat, swinging to her anchor. She is of English build, has a small cabin, and pulls eight oars. I should like to drop down the Zambesi to-morrow. There must be traders at Quillimane, sailing to Natal or the Cape."

Here a prolonged, and painful shivering fit took possession of Hughes, gradually and rapidly increasing to such an extent, as soon to incapacitate him even from talking. That night the pulse was beating at a fearful pace, the temples throbbed nearly to bursting, and the terrible shivering fits shook his frame. The following day the brain was affected and the sufferer went once more through the scenes he had lately acted. The missionary dragged his cot to that of his sick comrade, and Captain Weber shared his watch, but the resources of the fort were very small, and but for his strong const.i.tution the chances were against recovery.

The morning of the third day, there was a great bustle within the walls of the ruined fort. Weber came to say good bye. The Portuguese envoy had arrived from Tete, the agreement had been made, and the captain of the merchantman was to drop down the river that morning to finish his preparations.

Hughes was wandering, and did not know him. "It shall go hard but that you shall have your pa.s.sage in the 'Halcyon,' if he can bear it," said the skipper, the tears standing in his eyes as he pressed the missionary's hand. "An hour of the fresh breeze of the Indian ocean would do more to cooper up yonder craft than all the rubbish in the world. He's on his beam ends now, that's sure; but may be he'll be all a-tanto soon."

A knock at the door, and Don Francisco Maxara entered; an elderly, grey-haired man, tall in stature, and stately in bearing.

"I cannot say it is a pleasure, Senhor," began the old n.o.ble, as he bowed to the missionary, and made room for the merchant captain to pa.s.s, "but at all events it is a duty to place myself and all I have at your command."

Boiling restlessly from side to side, his handsome features, bronzed by the sun, now flushed with fever, Hughes was unconscious of their presence. He was with his corps cheering on his men as he had cheered them on the plains of Chillianwallah, the day the gallant 10th Regiment melted away before the masked fire from the Sikh artillery, when gliding through the open door and pa.s.sing her arm through her father's, Dona Isabel de Maxara looked down on him.

Tall and graceful in figure, the girl's face, was of that beautiful clear brown tint, found only in the sunny south, but one of the peculiarities which distinguished her was the network of blue veins, tracing themselves under the transparent olive of the skin; the eyes were large and intensely brilliant, shaded now by the long black lashes, which, with the slightly arched and beautifully pencilled eyebrow, told of Moorish blood. The mouth was small and beautifully cut, the lips parted now and showing the white teeth; and if there was a fault in the features, it was that the forehead, with all its lace-work of blue veins glancing under the clear olive skin, was too high and ma.s.sive for a female face. The hair was brushed backwards, fastened behind by a large comb, tipped with gold, from which hung the long mantilla of Spain.

The sick man saw nothing of all this, he was busy among the guns at Chillianwallah.

"How long, Senhor," said the girl, looking up at the missionary, and the large eyes filling as she did so with tears, which rolled one by one unheeded down her cheeks,--"how long has your friend been ill?"

"This is the third day, mademoiselle," replied he, speaking in French, both father and daughter having used that language. "Have you any quinine, Senhor?" he continued, addressing the father.

"Yes, at your service; but not having had any before, what have you been using?" replied the n.o.ble, taking the sick man's hands, and feeling his pulse.

"A drink made out of the k.u.mbunga plant. It has cured me more than once."

"Wait," cried the girl, eager to be of use. "I will return in a moment," and she flew out of the room, showing as she moved the beautiful foot and ankle peculiar to the Portuguese.

The old n.o.ble shook his head as he let the arm he held fall on the bed-clothes.

"There, use that at once," said the breathless girl, as she returned with a small bottle filled with quinine. "And as soon as you can, get away from this terrible place."

"We will leave now, my daughter; we are but in the way. Later on we may be useful. Command me, Senhor," added the Portuguese; "whatever I have is at your service. I pray you do not spare me or mine."

With a stately wave of the hand, as though he were quitting a palace, instead of a poor barrack-room in a dilapidated fort, the n.o.bleman pa.s.sed on.

"You will let me know," said Isabel, pausing before she joined her father, and raising the large black eyes to the missionary's face--"you will let me know how your poor friend is." And with one more glance round the room, and at the wretched bed, she pa.s.sed out.

Wyzinski stood looking at her. It seemed like a dream; but then there was the stoppered bottle of white powder in his hand to prove the reality. All that day, all that night, the missionary watched by the bedside. Towards midnight a heavy thunderstorm pa.s.sed over the plains watered by the Zambesi. The air seemed blue with the forked lightning; the thunder rattled and roared over the fort, but the morning dawned calm and beautiful, and a cool breeze blew in at the open windows, bringing with it the sweet breath of the tamarind flowers. The quinine, too, had done its work; and the crisis which in the dreadful tertian fever of the Zambesi always occurs on the third day, had pa.s.sed over favourably. These storms are of frequent occurrence in the land through which the Zambesi rolls its waters, and scarcely a week goes by without the thunder making itself heard round the dilapidated walls of Senna.

Another of these periodical storms had just occurred, sweeping over the land, accompanied by torrents of rain, cooling the air, and refreshing the parched-up plains on the banks of the Zambesi. The river was high in consequence, rolling down branches and trees and quant.i.ties of driftwood past the brick walls of the crumbling fort. It has already been said that several small islands intersect the course of the river; and near one of these, not a stone's throw from the water-gate, two boats were moored, swinging to the stream. The one a large European-looking pinnace--though really built on the Zambesi after an English model--possessed a covered cabin aft, and was capable of holding some twenty people. The other was of smaller and lighter mould. From the island came the sounds of laughter and conversation.

Under the trellised creepers, through which the rays of the afternoon sun were shining, sat a party of Europeans. The water was bubbling up in a stone basin; the purple grapes were hanging in rich cl.u.s.ters from the vines; and there, doing the honours of the table with a gentle grace which showed a practised ease and knowledge of the world, sat Dona Isabel Maxara. Near her, half sitting, half reclining on some cushions, Captain Hughes seemed lost in contemplation of the fair girl. Still very weak, and much pulled down by the short but sharp attack of the deadly tertian, he had got it into his head that the quinine had saved his life; and perhaps it was not a very unpleasant thing to be beholden for life to so fair a physician. And so he gazed on the tall, graceful, and beautifully-turned figure, the head carried with that dignified swan-like movement peculiar to Spain and Portugal, the long black lace veil now thrown back and floating behind. The clear olive complexion was well set off by the crimson lips of the well-cut mouth, and the large coal black eyes, with their long lashes, well matched by the luxuriant tresses of jetty hair. As she rose to carry the small cup of coffee to the invalid, he certainly thought the life it pleased him to consider she had saved, could not have a better use than devotion to her; and when the fair Isabel stooped over the young soldier, and one long tress, of the raven hair touched his hand, raised to receive the cap, the rosy flush flew up into a cheek once browned by exposure, but paled now by illness.

At a table close by, the Portuguese envoy, Dom Francisco Maxara, sat playing at chess with the Commandant of Senna; the two, wholly absorbed in their game, exchanging a word only at intervals. The missionary was unpacking, showing, and repacking, the various skins and small animals he had managed to secure. The birds were singing in the bushes round about, and above all came the buzz of insect life, and the ceaseless roll of the broad Zambesi.

The soldier lay back on the cushions sipping his coffee, his eyes half shut, a pleasant feeling of indolence enervating his frame, as he gazed.

"She is very lovely," he muttered; "and here am I, a captain of a marching regiment, allowing myself to fall in love with the daughter of a Portuguese grandee, whom I shall probably never see again."

"And this," continued Wyzinski, who seemed to have monopolised the conversation, "is it not a beautiful skin? Do you remember, Hughes, shooting this wild cat in the tree the morning of that terrible day among the Amatongas?"