The Three Mulla-mulgars Part 23

And suddenly a loud, hoa.r.s.e voice broke out: "Nod ho, Nod ho! Ulla ulla!

Nod ho!" Nod started back.

"Oh, Midden, Midden!" he said, "it is my brother, Mulla Thumma, calling me. Give me my Wonderstone; I must go at once."

But the Midden was now rocking and floating on the shadowy water, her bright hair sleeking the stream behind her. Her face was all small mischief. "Let me make magic but once," said she, "and I will return it.

Stop, Prince Ummanodda Nizzanares Eengeneela!"

"I cannot wait, not wait. Have pity on me, most beautiful Midden. I did but put it into your hands for friendship's sake. Return it to me now.

Tishnar listens."

"Ummanodda! Ahoh, ahoh, ahoh!" bawled Thumb's harsh voice, coming nearer.

"Oh, harsh and angry voice," cried the Midden, "it frightens me--it frightens me. To-morrow, in the night-time, Mulla-mulgar, come again. I will guard and keep your Wonderstone. Call me, call me. I will come."

There was a sudden pale and golden swirl of water. A light as of amber floated an instant on the dark, gliding clearness of the torrent. Nod stood up dazed and trembling. The Water-midden was gone. His eyes glanced to and fro. Desolate and strange rose Tishnar's peak. He felt small and afraid in the silence of the mountains. And again broke out, hollow and mournful, Thumb's voice calling him. Nod hobbled and hid himself behind a tree. Then from tree to tree he scurried in, hiding under great ropes of Cullum and Samarak, until at last, as if he had been wandering in the forest, he came out from behind Thumb.

"What is it, my brother?" he asked softly. "Why do you call me? Here is Nod."

Thumb's eyes gladdened, but his face looked black and louring. "Why do you play such Munza tricks," he said--"hiding from us in the night? How am I to know what small pieces you may not have been dashed into on this slippery Arakkaboa? What beasts may not have chosen Mulla-skeeto for supper? Come back, foolish baby, and have no more of this creeping and hiding!"

Nod burned with shame and rage at his jeers, but he felt too miserable to answer him. He followed slowly after his brother, his small, lean, hungry hand thrust deep into his empty pocket. "O Midden, Midden!" he kept saying to himself; "why were you false to me? What evil did I do to you that you should have stolen my Wonderstone?"

A thick grey curtain hung over the night, though daybreak must be near.

A few heavy hailstones scattered down through the still branches. And athwart Moot and Mulgarmeerez a distant thunder rolled. "Follow quick, Walk-by-night," said Thumb; "a storm is brewing."

The men of the Mountains were all awake, squatting like gra.s.shoppers, and gossiping together close about their watch-fire. Wind swept from the mountain-snows, swirling sparks into the air, and streamed moaning into the ravines. And soon lightning glimmered blue and wan across the roaring clouds of hail, and lit the enormous hills with glimpses of their everlasting snows. The travellers sheltered themselves as best they could, crouched close to the ground. Nod threw himself down and drew his sheep-skin over his head. His heart was beating thick and fast.

He could think of nothing but his stolen Wonderstone and the dark eyes of the yellow-haired Water-midden. "Tishnar is angry--Tishnar is angry,"

he kept whispering, beneath the roar of the hail. "She has forsaken me, Noddle of Pork that Nod is."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER XXII

When at last day streamed in silver across the peaks, the storm had spent itself. But Nod did not stir, nor draw near to the fire to drink of the hot pepper-water the travellers had brewed against the cold.

Thumb came at last and stooped over him. "Get up now, Ummanodda, little brother, and do not mope and sulk any more. I was angry because I was afraid. How should we have gone a day in safety without the Nizza-neela and his Wonderstone? Come nearer to the fire, and dry your sodden sheep's-coat."

Nod crept forlornly to the fire, and sat there shivering. He could not eat. He crouched low on his heels, nor paid any heed to what was said or done around him. And presently he fell into a cold, uneasy sleep, full of dreadful dreams and voices. When he awoke, he peered sullenly out of his jacket, and saw Ghibba with three of the five Moona-mulgars that he had taken with him sitting hunched up round the fire. They had come back bruised and bedraggled, and torn with thorns. One of them, stumbling in the gloom on the green rocks, had fallen headlong into the cataract, and had not been seen again; and one had been pounced on and carried off by some unknown beast while they were hobbling back in the torchless darkness towards the beacon above the cataract. There was no way beyond the ravine. All was dense low forest, rocks and thorns, and pouring waterways. And the travellers knew not what to be doing.

Nod could not bear to look at them nor listen to their lisping, mournful voices. He covered up his face again, weary of the journey and of the dream of Tishnar's Valleys, weary of his brothers, of the very daylight, but weariest of himself.

After long palaver, Ghibba came shuffling over to him, and sat down beside him.

"Is the Mulla-mulgar ill, that he sits alone, hiding his eyes?" he said.

Nod shook his head. "I am in my second sleep, Mountain-mulgar. A little frost has cankered my bones. It is the Harp Nod hears, not Zevvera's zoots."

Ghibba sat with a very solemn look on his grey scarred face. "The Mulla-mulgars say there can be no turning back, Nizza-neela. And, by the way I have come, it is certain that there is no going onward. Then, say they, being Mulgars-of-a-race, we must float with the mountain-water into the great cavern, and trust our hearts to the fishes. Maybe it will carry us to where every shadow comes at last; maybe these are the waters of the Fountains of a.s.sasimmon."

"I see no boat," yapped Nod scornfully. "The only boat my brothers ever floated in was an old Gunga's Oomgar-nugga's bobberie that now is a nest in Obea-Munza for Coccadrilloes' eggs."

"Already my people are gathering branches," said Ghibba, "to make floating mats or rafts, such as I saw one of the Fishing-mulgars squatting on while he dangled his tail for fish-bait. Comfort your weary bones, then, Eengenares. Tishnar, who guards you, Tishnar, whose Prince you are, Tishnar, who feasted even Utts like me on fruits of sleeping-time, will not forsake us now."

Nod turned cold, and trembling, as if to tell this solemn Man of the Mountains that his Wonderstone was gone. But he swallowed his spittle, and was ashamed. So he rose up and listlessly hobbled after him to where the rest of the travellers were toiling to gather branches for their rafts.

The storm had snapped and stripped off many branches from the trees.

These the travellers dragged down to the water. Others they hauled down with Cullum ropes, and some smaller saplings they charred through with fire at the root. When they had heaped together a big pile of boughs and Samarak, Cullum and all kinds of greenery, Ghibba and Thumb bound them clumsily one by one together, letting them float out on to the water, until the raft was large and buoyant enough to bear two or three Mulgars with their bags. For one great raft that would have carried them all in safety would have been too unwieldy to enter the mouth of the cavern, besides being harder for these ignorant sailors to navigate. The torrent flowed swiftly into the cavern. And if but two or three sailed in together, Fortune might drown or lose many in the dark windings of the mountain-water, but one or two at least might escape.

They toiled on till evening, by which time four strong green rafts bobbed side by side at their mooring-ropes on the water. Then, tired out, sore and blistered with their day's labours, the travellers heaped up a great watch-fire once more, and supped merrily together, since it might be for many of them for the last time. Nor did the mountain-mulgars raise their drone for their kinsfolk beneath the cataract, wishing to keep a brave heart for the dangers before them.

Only Nod sat gloomy and downcast, waiting impatiently till all should be lying fast asleep. One by one the outwearied travellers laid themselves down, with the palms of their feet towards the fire. Nod heard the calling of the beasts in the ravine, and ever and again from far up the mountain-side broke out the long hungry howl of the little wolves. Only Nod and the Mountain-mulgar whose turn it was to keep watch were now awake. He was a queer old Mulgar, blind of one eye, but he could stand wide awake for hours mumbling in his mouth a shaving of their blue cheese-rind. And when he had turned his back for a moment on the fire, Nod wriggled softly away, and, hobbling off into the forest, soon reached the water-side.

He crept forward under the gigantic dragon-tree, and down the steep bank to the little creek where he had first heard the singing of the Water-midden. All was shadowy and still. Only the dark water murmured in its stony channel, and the faint night-wind rustled in the sedge. Nod leaned on his belly over the water, and, gazing into it, called as softly and clearly as his harsh voice could: "Water-midden, Water-midden, here am I, Ummanodda, come as you bade me."

No one answered. He stooped lower, and called again. "It is me, the Mulla-mulgar, child of Tishnar, who trusted to you his Wonderstone, beautiful Midden. Nod, who believed in you, calls--your friend, the sorrowful Nod!"

"Sing, Mulla-mulgar!" croaked a scornful sedge-bird. "The Princess loves sweet music."

A lean fish of the changing colours of a cherry swam softly to the glimmering surface and stared at Nod.

"Tell me, Jacket-of-Loveliness," whispered Nod, "where is thy mistress that she does not answer me?"

The fish stared solemnly on wavering fin.

"Hsst, brother," said Nod, and let fall a bunch of Soota-berries into the stream. The fish leapt in the water, and caught the little fruit in its thin, curved teeth, and nibbled greedily till all was gone.

Whereupon, staring solemnly at Nod once more, he let the leaves and stalk float onward with the stream, then with a flash and flicker of tail dived down, down, and was gone. All again was silent. Only the blazing stars and the shadowy phantoms of the distant firelight moved on the water.

"O Tishnar," muttered the little Mulgar to himself, "help once this wretched Nod!"

Suddenly, as he watched, as if it were the amber or ivory beam of a lantern in the water, he saw a pale brightness ascending. And all in a moment the Water-midden was there rocking on the dark green water beneath the arching sedge. But her hands, when Nod looked to see, were empty, floating like rose-leaves open on the water. But he spoke gently, for he could not look into her beautiful wild face, and her eyes, that were like the forest for darkness and the moonlit mountains of Tishnar for loveliness, and still be angry, nor even sad.

"Tell me, O Water-midden, where is my Wonderstone?" he said.

The Water-midden smoothed slowly back her gold locks. "You told me false, Mulla-mulgar," she answered. "All day long have I been sitting rubbing, rubbing with my small tired thumb, but no magic has answered.

It is but a common water-pebble roughened into the beasts' shapes. It means nothing, and I am weary."

And Nod guessed she had been rubbing the Wonderstone craft to cudgel, and not as the magic went, sama-weeza--right to left.

"If it is but a water-pebble, give it back to me, then, Midden, for it was my mother who gave it me."

But the Midden smiled with her red lips. "You did deceive me, then, Mulla-mulgar, so that you might seem strange and wonderful, and far above the other hoa.r.s.e-voiced travellers, the beloved of Tishnar? You may deceive me again, perhaps. I think I will not give you back your stone. Perhaps, too," she said, throwing back her tiny chin, so that her face lay like a flower in leaves of gold--"perhaps I rubbed not wisely.

You shall tell me how."

"Show me, then, my Wonderstone. I am tired out for want of sleep, and long no more for Tishnar's fountains."