The men"s eyes gleamed with excitement. Stealthily as panthers they crept down the dry gully after their leader. They did not know that behind them, at the wall, Barney, having abruptly dismissed the children, was watching with a very wistful look. The good fellow wished that he were with them.
Down they went, as rapidly as the rough ground permitted, scarcely making a sound. At length Jack halted. He turned and gave one quick glance over the eager faces; there was no falterer among his band.
Then he scrambled over the brink of the gully. Lepoko was first after him, Makoko was second; the rest of the men stood upon no order of going, but made each for the easiest point of ascent. And there Mboyo and Samba joined them. Standing on gently sloping ground Jack looked eagerly ahead. Had his movement been detected? There, two hundred yards away, was the camp within its light stockade. Not a man was to be seen. The midday sun beat fiercely down; doubtless the garrison were enjoying a siesta. No sentry was posted, or, if posted, he had forgotten his duty. The gate of Ilombekabasi on the northern face was far away; what simple negro would suppose that the enemy was approaching silently from the nearer end?
In compact and orderly ranks Jack"s men were sprinting noiselessly after him, holding their weapons so that no clash or click should disturb the silent camp. They were within a few yards of the stockade when suddenly there was a cry. All were black men in the camp save one. At that moment he, in the intolerable heat, was about to leave his tent and bathe in a clear stream that ran through the enclosure.
He saw the running band; he cried to his men, and, flinging away his towel, sprang back to his hut to get his rifle. He was too late.
Jack, getting a "shove up" from one of his men, was on and over the stockade in a few seconds; his men were leaping all around him. And now their tongues were loosened. Yells and rifle shots aroused the lethargic garrison, some from sleep within their huts, some from drowsy lolling in shady quarters by the stockade. For most of them one glance was enough. Here was Lokolobolo, the Inglesa, and with him a crowd of men among whom they recognized some they had beaten in Ilola with the whip. With frantic yells of alarm they ran for dear life across the compound to the gate on the further side, out into the open, never pausing until they had gained the forest fringe, with half a mile between them and the men they feared.
But not all; the white man had seized his rifle and collected a small band about him. Mboyo, near Jack, gave a cry; among the negroes around the white man he saw Boloko, his renegade brother. Taking cover where they could, they began to fire at the invaders, hastily, frantically.
But Jack had his men in hand. Bidding them also take cover, he sent those who had fireb.a.l.l.s to creep round the camp and set light to the huts. Soon volumes of dense suffocating smoke bellied across the camp, screening attackers from defenders. Then Jack gave the order to close in upon the few who resisted. With triumphant yells his men swept forward through the smoke--a few shots were fired; one or two men fell; then the white man, with Boloko and the rest of his band at his heels, made a dash for the gate. Two men dropped ere they could pa.s.s through; but the white man and Boloko and half a dozen others were more fortunate. Out in the open they ran like hunted deer; and Elobela"s burning camp was left in the hands of Lokolobolo.
Jack lost no time. The stockade and the huts on the windward side were ablaze; soon the whole place must be in flames. The sound of the shots, the sight of the smoke, would bring back Elbel and all his force. Shouting to his men to collect all the arms and ammunition they could carry and then rush back to the fort, Jack went outside the stockade beyond the cloud of smoke to keep watch. The flames were roaring and crackling behind him; but even at this distance, nearly two miles from the place where Elbel was at work, he fancied he heard the shouts of the amazed and angry enemy. Then suddenly the deep resonant note of Imbono"s drum struck his ear. Barney must be warning him! He turned and called to his men to delay no longer. Back to the fort!
Meanwhile Barney had followed the movements of the gallant band. He heard the shots and yells, and saw the first spiral of smoke; then he hastened to the northwest blockhouse, calling to all the riflemen left with him to line the wall overlooking the gully. In a few minutes he saw the negroes above dashing helter-skelter down the slope. And yes!
there was Elbel at their head, a figure in white, running as though he were running for a prize. Barney smiled with satisfaction.
"Begorra! They"re forgetting me!" he murmured pleasantly, as he saw that the enemy, in their frantic haste, were making for the shortest path along the further edge of the gully, within easy range of the camp. Barney determined to wait until they were well abreast of him, and then give them a volley. But the impatience of a negro forced his hand. In the excitement of the moment one of the riflemen, free from Jack"s restraining presence, fired his piece. The shot brought Elbel to his senses. He suddenly remembered the danger into which he was running. Turning sharp to the right, he sprinted straight to the cover of the copse. Some of his men followed him; others ran heedlessly on.
Growling at the man who had spoilt his scheme, Barney gave the order to fire, and half a dozen of the enemy fell. But Elbel had escaped; and the rest of his men took warning and diverged from the direct course as he had done. Barney saw that further efforts would be wasted; so, ordering his men to cease fire, he returned to the other end of the fort to see how Jack was faring.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Jack rushes Elbel"s camp]
Here they come! Makoko is leading, staggering up the gully under the weight of half a dozen rifles. Behind him is Lombola, poising a load of ammunition on his head. There is Lingombela, with a bundle of cartridge pouches roped to his back. So one after another they file up the gully. Barney opens the little gate in the wall; willing helpers within haul the loads through. No man enters until all the rifles and ammunition have been handed in; then they scramble through, laughing and jesting; and Jack comes last of all.
"Well done, sorr!" said Barney heartily.
"Well done, Barney!" returned Jack, gripping his hand. "By Jove!
What"s that?"
A loud explosion set the air trembling, and a hundred echoes flying from the rocks around. A dense volume of flame and smoke rose from the site of Elbel"s camp.
"There goes the last of their ammunition!" said Jack with a laugh.
"We"ve got best part of it here."
"Bedad, sorr, now"s the chance for me meself. Give me leave, sorr, and I"ll go at them wid the men and wipe them clean off the face uv the earth."
"Stop, stop, Barney! We mustn"t be impatient. They"ve no more ammunition in reserve, but every man who was with Elbel will have a good many rounds with him. We can"t risk a pitched battle against two hundred rifles."
"Ochone, sorr! Will I niver get a chance at all?"
"Cheer up! Your chance will come, and you"ve done splendidly as it is.
It was a fine idea of yours to sound that drum when you saw them running down. And it was your idea to set something going here to occupy the attention of the outpost. By the by, I haven"t had time to ask Samba yet how they dealt with those fellows."
He called up the boy. His story was very simple. Mboyo and he had crawled round under cover of the rocks and bushes, and came upon the unsuspecting sentries from the rear. They had their knives; the men died without a sound. Jack shuddered. It was not an Englishman"s way of dealing with an enemy; it was the negro"s way. But his feeling of compunction was somewhat diminished when Samba added that one of the men was Bomolo, the brutal forest guard who had been the terror of Imbono"s people. For how many maimings and murders had this man been responsible? Surely in this quick death he had met with far less than his deserts!
Jack had every reason to be satisfied with the success of his sortie.
To have burned the enemy"s camp; captured more than half his reserve ammunition, and destroyed the rest, was no mean feat. And as for the people of Ilombekabasi, they were frantic with delight. So quietly had Jack made his preparations that the majority of the people knew nothing of what was happening until they heard the first shot. Then they crowded to the wall and watched eagerly. The camp itself was hidden from them by the contour of the hill, but they saw the smoke rising above the bushes and hailed it with loud shouts. When they understood the meaning of the great noise that followed Lokolobolo"s return they were almost beside themselves with joy. And in the cool of the evening Jack allowed them to hold a great feast, after which Imbono reeled off a long oration in praise of Lokolobolo, and the village bard composed and chanted a new song in numerous stanzas, the whole populace roaring the chorus:--
O kelaki na?
Bomong"ilombe, Bosak"owa w.a.n.ga,[2]
Lokolobolo!
For several days after the sortie Jack was left undisturbed. He guessed how Elbel was occupied, and his conjecture was confirmed by Samba, who at once resumed his scouting work. Elbel was constructing another camp a good distance east of his former position. And he was spending more time and labour on it; the stockade was more than usually high and thick, and was flanked with bastions after the model of the blockhouses at Ilombekabasi.
Samba also discovered that on the day after the burning of the camp one of the white men with twenty paddlers had gone down the river. Jack had no doubt that he had been despatched to the headquarters of his Company for more ammunition. Clearly Elbel was rendered only the more determined by his successive rebuffs.
"And I don"t wonder at it," remarked Jack, talking the situation over with Barney. "We are making hay of the rubber collection in this district, and Elbel"s Company will be pretty mad with him. I understand why he hasn"t got help before this from the State forces.
For one thing he has got to rehabilitate himself with his Company, who"ll certainly cashier him if he doesn"t find a way out of the mess he has got into. For another thing, if he brings the State forces on the scene, he"ll most likely lose all chance of collaring uncle"s gold, and I believe that"s at the bottom of it right through. But things can"t last much longer as they are. The State must intervene soon, whether Elbel likes it or not."
"And what then, sorr?"
"Then it will be all up with us, I"m afraid. But we won"t look forward to that. I only wish I could find some means of sending word to England of what goes on here, and what we"re doing."
"What would be the good uv it, sorr? Sorrow a bit."
"Why do you say that?"
"Why! Because in England they"re all too busy making money to attend to such things--making money, sorr, or fighting tooth and nail about education, or dreaming about football. Now if Ireland had Home Rule----"
"No politics, Barney! I don"t agree with you. I"m as sure as I"m alive that if the people at home really knew how abominably the natives are treated--knew about the floggings and maimings and murders, they"d make such an outcry that either King Leopold would be forced to change his policy, or some one would step in and manage things for him. If only England and America would join hands!"
When Elbel had completed his new camp, he resumed the work far up the hill which the sortie had interrupted. Jack was still at a loss to understand what the Belgian"s scheme was, and he was prevented from finding out, by the fact that every night a strong body was left on guard, as he knew by the many camp fires at the top of the ridge.
One afternoon, however, the secret was explained. One of the men placed on the look-out at the north-eastern blockhouse reported that he saw a stream of water rushing down the hill. Jack hastened to the spot with his field-gla.s.s, and was somewhat alarmed to see that the man"s information was correct; water was certainly streaming down over the rocky ground, making a course that seemingly would bring it right against the fort wall.
"He"s going to flood us out!" thought Jack. "He must have built an embankment across the new course of the river."
This was a manoeuvre which he had not foreseen, and one which it seemed impossible to counter. The water, gathering impetus as it flowed down the hill, would almost infallibly undermine the wall, even if it had not force enough to wash it away altogether. But as he watched, for the moment so much taken aback that he could not think of anything to be done, his consternation was changed to amus.e.m.e.nt, for about two hundred yards up the hill the water made a swerve to his right, and flowed with increasing rapidity in that direction. The slope was such that, instead of coming straight down as Elbel had evidently expected, the stream, finding the easiest course, took at this point a trend to the south-east. After all it would only wash the blockhouse on which Jack stood.
Jack instantly saw what he ought to do. Running down to the base of the stockade, he summoned a large body of workers, and set some of them to dismantle the blockhouse, the remainder to pull down the wall and build it up again several feet behind its former position, and in such a way that instead of forming the angle of a square it lay across, making a line parallel with the course of the stream.
They had hardly got to work before the full body of water was upon them. But so many men were employed, and they moved so rapidly, that only one or two logs were carried away by the current, the solidly built blockhouse serving as a dam and protecting the workers behind.
The main stream fell with a roar over the steep slope on the edge of which the blockhouse stood--a slope only less precipitous than that of the cataract, now a thing of the past, at the opposite corner of the fort.
Only a few minutes later a tremendous outcry was heard from the direction of Elbel"s new camp. For a moment it startled Jack. Had the enemy taken advantage of the sudden flood to organize an attack in force? But the thought had hardly crossed his mind when he burst into laughter, causing his workers to pause and look round in astonishment.
"A magnificent idea!" he said to Barney. "D"you see what has happened?
The silly fellow is flooding his own camp!"
"Bedad, sorr, that"s what comes uv being too clever by half."
"It comes of playing with things he knows nothing about. He"s tried an engineer"s job without experience and without surveying instruments.
It"s ticklish work interfering with the course of nature, and you never know what will happen if you set water on the run. Look at them, Barney! "Pon my soul, it"s the funniest thing I"ve ever seen. There"s Elbel himself, do you see? scampering down the hill like a madman."
"Like a mad gorilla, sorr."
"And all his men after him! By Jove! can"t they yell! He"ll have to shift his quarters again, Barney."
"And sure I hope all his food is soaked and all his clothes in the wash-tub. A bath will do those greasy n.i.g.g.e.rs no harm."