Soon they strolled down to the wood-cutting place, and the sombre, surrounding forest was ringing with the sound of axe and saw. The wretched slaves--for practically they were little or nothing else-- looked up with dull interest at the new arrivals, but their master, out of deference to Wyvern, omitted to kick or hammer any of them, and laid himself out to be extremely pleasant in his boisterous way, as he explained the arrangements while they strolled around.
"Hold hard, Wyvern. A snake"s bitten me."
The words--quick, sharp, replete with alarm--were Fleetwood"s. Wyvern, who was just in front of him, stopped dead in his tracks and turned, as with a mighty crash a nearly-cut through tree-trunk came to earth hardly more than a yard in front of him. His next step would have been his last.
"Blazes!" cried Bully Rawson, "but I never thought that log would have come down at all. I was just shoving against it to see how much more cutting through it wanted. What"s that about a snake, Joe?"
"No. It isn"t one," said that worthy, in a tranquil tone of voice as he looked down. "It"s only a thorn dug into my ankle. I was bitten once, and I suppose it"s made me nervous ever since. Which is lucky, or you"d have been squashed to pulp, Wyvern."
"By the Lord he would," cried Rawson. "Man alive, but you"ve had a narrow squeak! Well I"m blasted sorry if I"ve given you a shaking up-- and I can"t say more."
"Oh, that"ll be all right," said Wyvern, forgetting his own narrow escape in his intense relief. "But look here, Joe. Are you dead sure it wasn"t one?"
"Dead cert. Look. Here"s the thorn," picking one up.
"Haw-haw-haw!" bellowed Rawson. "Well, Wyvern, I suppose you and I are the only two cusses in the world who can say they"ve ever seen Joe Fleetwood in a funk. You were in one, weren"t you, Joe?"
"Rather," was the answer, drily given.
"Well, I am a clumsy fellow," said Rawson, in his breezy way. "Come along now, and I"ll show you my _amabele_ and mealie lands."
He led the way by a narrow game path in the bush and soon they came to a high hedge made of mimosa thorn boughs tightly interlaced. Beyond this some three acres of green crops were visible.
"That"s to keep out the bucks," said Rawson over his shoulder, for he was leading. "They"d scoff the lot in a night or two if there wasn"t something of the kind. Fond of hunting, Wyvern?"
"Yes."
"Well, if you come up here on a moonlight night you"ll get plenty of chances. There"s an odd koodoo or so comes sniffing around after that stuff, but the thorn fence humbugs them."
Wyvern was just thinking how even that inducement would not persuade him to see a moment more of his host than necessity obliged, so intense was the aversion the latter had inspired in him, when a sudden and violent push from behind, almost of the nature of a blow, sent him staggering and then sprawling, cannoning against and nearly upsetting his said host, who was some three or four yards ahead. Simultaneously the detonating roar of an explosion, seeming to come out of the ground itself, rent the air, and a perfect hail of missiles cut leaves and twigs from the bush, or ploughed up the ground a few yards to the right of the path they were pursuing.
"Hold up, man, hold up! Not hit, are you?" sung out Bully Rawson, with great concern. "No? That"s all right. Blast me if that wasn"t one of them spring-guns I"ve been settin" around this land for the bucks we"ve just been talking about Man, there was half a pound of loepers in it if there was one. You must have kicked the string. The wonder is I didn"t."
"Bit risky, isn"t it?" struck in Fleetwood, drily.
"Course. But I haven"t been seeing to them for some time. I swear I"d forgotten there were any left set at all."
"Well, I saw the string," rejoined Fleetwood, and his tone was decidedly short. "Wyvern was about to kick it, and so I sent him flying just in time. Legs blown off at the shins--no doctor--shock and loss of blood-- stone dead in three minutes. Seems to me your place is a bit dangerous, Bully."
"So it is. The wonder is I didn"t kick it myself. Well let"s chuck mouching about and get back to the store and have another drink. We deserve it after that. Well, I"ll hammer someone sweetly for leaving that thing there, that"s one consolation."
"It"s none," said Wyvern, also shortly. "Hammer yourself."
"Eh? What do you mean?" said the other, trying to suppress his rising fury. "Ah well. Let"s have a look at the gun."
There it was--a clumsy-looking, half-rusty iron tube like unto a young cannon, secreted in the bushes. To the peg which held up the hammer was attached a long string, its other end being made fast so that it came across the path. Any unwary animal which should collide with that string, would find all its worldly interests at an end there and then.
Again Rawson was profuse in his apologies.
But thereafter, the tone of conversation between the two and the third became somewhat strained, and their farewell was none too cordial. As they rode back to their outspan Fleetwood said:
"He"s beginning early."
"Do you think he meant to shove that tree down on me?"
"Of course he did. When that failed he remembered the spring-gun."
"Do you think that was a put up thing too?"
"I should rather say so. Look here, Wyvern. I saw him step _over_ the string. He knew it was there."
"The deuce you did."
"Well I did. I"ve got a rum sort of instinct, Wyvern, and it has saved more than one man"s life before to-day."
"And it has saved one man"s life twice to-day, old chap," answered Wyvern gravely.
"That"s nothing as between you and me," rejoined the other. "When I remember that day on the Hlobane--"
"Oh d.a.m.n the Hlobane," cut in Wyvern. "Now do you think this unhung scoundrel has any inkling of our errand?"
"No, but for some reason or other he"d rather have our room than our company, and the best road towards that is to get rid of us. I had my eye on him from the very beginning, luckily. I saw him start shoving at that tree, and the only way to stop you dead short was to invent that snake-bite lie, just as the only way to make you clear the spring-gun string was to give you the shove I did. You let it off, but the sudden pitch forward just cleared the charge."
"Well, if he gets up to anything of that sort openly I shall shoot,"
said Wyvern decisively.
"So shall I," said Fleetwood, with equal decision.
The while the subject of these remarks, having solaced his feelings by thrashing one of his dependents, and getting considerably drunk, was arriving at the conclusion that the process of "taking care of" Wyvern was not going to prove as easy as it looked, and that he himself had begun upon it very badly indeed.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.
THE OPAL.
An amphitheatre of bush and krantzes, the latter fringed on the sides and brink with the feathery droop of forest trees: dark, lateral kloofs running steeply up into the face of the heights: beyond the silence of a great wilderness, but enhanced by the varying bird voices upon the heat of the still atmosphere, or the hum of insects and the chirrup of crickets; and, over all, the deep blue arch of an unclouded sky.
Wyvern wiped his wet face with his wet handkerchief and gasped. He realised that he was getting limp--the enervating limpness produced by the torrid, up-country, steamy heat, and, proportionately, was getting depressed. So far they seemed no nearer their goal. They had searched, always with the greatest caution, but without success, or even a clue; and Hlabulana, their guide, seemed not nearly so confident now they had reached the locality as he had seemed when he made his statement to Fleetwood. In brief he was puzzled but would not own to it--only put them off in his vague native way. Added to which Joe Fleetwood had been more than once down with rather a bad attack of old up-country fever; in fact he was lying in camp at that moment not able to get about. But Wyvern, leaving him in the care of Hlabulana and Mtezani, the young Zulu to whom they had afforded asylum when the Usutus had pursued him right into their camp--and that under strict orders not to lose sight of him until his own return--had started forth, in his wearied impatience, to see if he could get no nearer the difficulty of solving matters.
Bully Rawson had troubled them no further. In fact they had seen but little of that worthy, who when they suggested trekking on had heartily approved of the idea. Now they were about thirty miles distant from him, allowing for the roundabout roughness of the road. It seemed as though he intended to trouble them no longer, and their precautions, though not exactly suspended, were very much less rigid as time went by.
Wyvern eyed the expanse of savage wilderness--forest and cliff and height--with a sombre hatred. What if this discovery they had come up here to make should elude them after all? What if these recesses, practically labyrinthine in their vastness, should hold that which he had come to seek, that upon which he had pinned his future; should hold it there at his very feet while he walked over it unconscious? The thought was maddening. His depression deepened.
Then arose before him more strongly than ever--for it was ever before him--the vision of Lalante; of Lalante, wide-eyed, smiling, ever hopeful--of Lalante, a tower of strength in her sweetness and confidence, unique in his experience; his complement, his other half-- than whom the whole world could not contain another similar. How, in that far wilderness, he longed and yearned for her presence, her soothing comforting words, the love thrill in the sweetness of her voice, his all--all his--his alone! It was so long since he had been able to receive even the words written by her, to realise that the paper on which they were traced had been pressed by her hand, warm and strong with the pulses of love. When would he again? If this scheme failed, the failure would be irretrievable, abject. And she? Could she go on for ever hoping in him? Would not the surroundings of her life ultimately prove too strong for her? She was young, much younger than himself: could she continue to believe in a man who was an utter and consistent failure all along the line? In the solitude of the great wilderness he was brought more face to face with his knowledge of life-- of life and its experiences--and the retrospect was like iron entering into his soul. Her presence was no longer with him: would it ever be again--for of such was life?
All the old time came back: the sweet time at Seven Kloofs when they had been together, sometimes for days at a time, either there or at her own home, especially that blissful day they had spent alone and free from all interruption, the last of its kind before the rupture came; and it seemed as though he had not appreciated it enough then--seemed so now, though in actual fact it would have been impossible for him to have done so more. He could almost find it in his heart to have cursed Le Sage for setting up that barrier between them during those last weeks, what time they could have made the most of the sad sweetness of impending parting; could have set up a rich barrier of love against the blank and separation that was to come. And with it all there came over him a wave of longing--a craving, a yearning--that was perfectly irresistible, but for the accidents of time and distance, to behold Lalante once more, to hold her once more to him, to hear the full, love-fraught tones of her voice, to look into her eyes, let what might happen afterward. This undertaking had ended in the clouds, and all the buoyant hope which had sustained him had ebbed.
Thus musing he wandered on mechanically, hardly noting whether game he had come out to shoot was to be found or not. Then something caught his gaze. He stood and stared--shading his eyes, and then took a few quick strides. Something shone: shone but dully--but still shone. It was only a steel b.u.t.ton.