Trapped by Malays Part 68

"You are trying to hide something, Archie," said Minnie earnestly. "You called me sister a few minutes ago."

"Well," he said sharply, "that's what you are to me."

"Then is it brotherly to keep something back?"

"Oh, all right, then," said the lad. "It was only because I didn't want to give you more troubles to think about."

"What is it, then? I know: Sir Charles is wounded, or perhaps--"

"No, no. He's been knocked about, like the rest of us. I was keeping it back that our men haven't got a cartridge among them left to fire.

Pegg and I were at the bungalow last night to smuggle out your uncle's double gun and the cartridges, and we had got in here to wait till night came again before we landed and tried to make our way back to the Residency."

"Say, Mister Archie, sir," grumbled Peter, as Minnie sat pressing her old companion's hand in token of her grat.i.tude for what he had said.

"What is it, Pete?"

"I can't understand what this chap says, but he made me shut up your knife, and has put away his own, so I think he means we have got as much green stuff as we can carry."

"Yes, that's it, Pete. Well, what?"

"Only this, sir. You see the moon there?"

"Of course I do."

"Well, is it a heclipse or an echo, or anything of that kind, over yonder?"

"Where? What do you mean?"

"This 'ere way, sir. You are looking t'other."

"Nonsense!"

"You are looking the wrong way, sir. Hold them branches back. Yes; it's getting wuss, sir. Blest if they ain't burning the Residency down!"

CHAPTER FORTY FOUR.

THE FISHERMAN'S PLAN.

Peter's conclusion was only a guess, but it soon became evident that a fire was raging somewhere in the direction of the station. But this did not seem to trouble the two Malays, who shifted the position of the boat by pushing it clear of the trees, to one of which they secured the sampan so that it swung in the stream, while they rearranged the greenery that had been collected, and worked hard in the bright moonlight so as to give it some semblance of a market-boat carrying down supplies from higher up the river.

This done to the satisfaction of the owner, whom Peter had been working hard to help, the lad uttered an apologetic cough.

"Look here, Pete," said Archie impatiently; "if you are going to say that we had better remain in hiding on account of the moonlight and the glare of that fire, you had better be silent, for we must trust to these people to do what they think best."

"I warn't a-going to say nothing of the sort, Mister Archie, sir,"

protested the lad.

"Then what were you going to say? I know that that cough or grunt of yours means that you are going to object to something."

"No, sir; it's not a object to anything unless you say I can't have it.

I was only going to ask if Miss Minnie didn't say something about having fruit aboard this 'ere craft."

"Yes, yes!" cried Minnie excitedly.

"Well, miss," said Peter, with a sigh of relief, "if you won't think it rude of me, I should just like to say that Mister Archie here ain't had a mossel of nothing to eat since the day before yesterday, and PP ain't much better."

"Oh Dula!" exclaimed Minnie; and she uttered a few words in the Malay tongue that sent the woman rustling past the cut boughs beneath the attap awning, to return directly and gladden the eyes of Peter with a basket containing a heap of bananas and a couple of native-made cakes.

"Ah!" sighed Peter. "Don't they look lovely in the moonlight! Tlat!"

he added, with a hearty smack of his lips.--"No, thank you, sir. No water, please," he continued, after a busy interval. "I never feel sure what you might be swallowing when you have a dip out of the river. It's all very well when the sun shines hot, but when it's the moon it don't make you thirsty--least it don't me."

It must have been a couple of hours later, during which the occupants of the boat had been watching the rising and falling of the fire as they swung slowly to and fro at the end of the rope, when Minnie, who had been speaking in a whisper to the boatman and his wife, turned to her companions and said:

"Pahan thinks that we may risk floating down the river now. The excitement of the fire will be pretty well over when we get abreast of the bungalow, and we have a long journey yet; and then if he makes the boat fast, as he says he can, at the foot of the garden, he thinks no one will notice it. But we shall have to lie hidden, and, if necessary, covered up with the boughs."

The covering over with boughs fell to the share of the two lads, the shelter of the attap mats and her Malay dress seeming likely to be sufficient for Minnie's protection if they neared any Malay boat, that most dreaded being the naga whose occupants had been put to flight-- though even if that were encountered, the sampan was now so transformed that it was not likely to be recognised; and once more the little party were in motion, floating down towards the station, the Malay poling the boat and keeping as near as possible to the farther sh.o.r.e.

CHAPTER FORTY FIVE.

"CLOSE UP!"

"Don't you think we might make a bigger peep-hole, Mister Archie?"

whispered Peter.

"No," was the abrupt reply.

"All right, sir; you know best; only it is precious smothery. I'm as hot as hot."

"Can't help it, Pete. We must bear it, and above all now that we are getting so near."

"Yes, we are near; aren't we, sir?"

"Very near, Pete."

"Can you make out anything more about what is burning?"

"Yes--the Residency."

"That's bad, sir. Thought we was to retreat to there when things got too hot at the orspittle."

Archie had been raising the boughs that concealed them as they drew nearer the upper landing-place, dropping very slowly along, their progress being checked by the manipulation of the boat's grapnel under Pahan's clever management, for he controlled the rate at which they were carried downward on the swift stream by using the rough little anchor as a drag.

As far as could be made out in the moonlight, the river was quite clear of boats, and, to their surprise, they glided on into utter silence, while not a moving figure could be made out.