"You see, I have donned this clothing to deceive them--the voiceless people who are searching for me. If they found me"--and he looked cautiously round--"they would drag me back to the river."
After another glance round the chamber, Hume and Sirayo withdrew, leaving Ferrara alone, and Hume, surrendering himself again to gloomy thoughts of his maimed face, sat on the outer coping of the wall, with his face resting on his hand.
Long he sat there thinking whether he, too, would not do well to lead the life of a hermit, rather than be an object of disgust to his friends, when he heard a hoa.r.s.e cry behind him, and, turning, saw Ferrara standing with his head turned, looking back along the pa.s.sage.
The strange being had stripped himself of his clothes. His huge form stood naked as that of a savage, his breast was heaving, the muscles of his arms rigid, and when he turned his face it was contorted with the pa.s.sion of terror and rage.
"What in Heaven"s name is it now?" cried Hume, springing to his feet.
Ferrara fixed his eyes on Hume; his lips moved, but without sound, and he seized his throat savagely. Then with a wild cry in Zulu of "They come! they come!" he sprang over the wall and fled towards the mountain, while Hume faced the pa.s.sage, expecting he knew not what. Presently he entered cautiously, until he came once again to the underground coil without meeting anyone; but while he stood peering down into the dark pit, he realised that Ferrara had in the stillness of that gloomy retreat fallen a victim to his dark fancies of the "voiceless people."
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN.
THE LAST OF THE ROCK.
Laura recovered from her prostration filled with an intense longing to get away from the savage surroundings, which had too surely left their mark upon her spirits. The whole enterprise had lost for her its zest, and under the reaction which had set in she wondered how she could have entered upon the expedition.
"Let us go," she said to Webster. "Take me away from this. It fills me with disgust."
"I do not wonder," he said gloomily, running his eyes over her frayed dress. "You look ill; won"t you rest?"
"It is not rest, but change--change from this fearful, this degrading life--that I need."
"Degrading?"
"Yes, degrading!" she replied pa.s.sionately. "Where is Mr Hume?"
"I do not know," he said.
"Find him, then."
He rose slowly, looked at her a moment dully, then heavily moved off towards the ruins, where after a long search he found Hume seated with his hands over his eyes. He waited for some time patiently, but as Frank showed no signs of his presence he touched him on the shoulder.
"Miss Anstrade asks for you. She wishes to return."
There was no reply.
"You must go back with her. She is weary of this life--sick of it and of me. I will remain here for a time. You hear me, don"t you, Frank?
besides, it is necessary your eyes should be looked to. Of course," he went on patiently, "I understand how you feel. I have seen that you have shunned me, but G.o.d knows, my lad, I would not have left you alone in the ruins if I could have helped it Frank, I tried to get back to you, but I was overcome by those cursed fumes. Do you believe it, Frank?"
"Ay, I believe it, Jim."
"Ah!" he said with a sigh of relief. "Now will you take her back, my lad? Take her away out of this, and when you are once again back among your fellows, forget that ever I had the impudence to make a pact about her. Forget it, and win her."
Hume withdrew his hand from his eyes, and, rising slowly, faced his friend, his worn face pale, his eyes burning from out that blackened mask.
"My G.o.d!" said Webster, drawing back. "But you can see," he muttered.
"I can see--yes," said Hume, in hollow tones. "See how you shrink from me. Do you ask me now to take her back?"
Webster said nothing, but a groan shook his frame, and he caught his friend"s hand and held it.
"You don"t speak?"
"The black will fade out. It is only powder."
"Yes, and my eyebrows will grow," he said with a bitter laugh, "and the red will disappear from my eyes; but before that she would have learnt to dread my presence. Do you still ask me to take her?"
"No, lad; you must not see her until you have recovered."
"Then, you must take her, and I will at once see Sirayo about your departure. By the way, he has our share of one part of the treasure already found, and it will be sufficient to pay your way to Cape Town and to take her pa.s.sage."
He related what had occurred in the underground chamber.
"You will come also, of course, keeping near by day, and sharing our camp by night?"
"You have forgotten the Golden Rock. I will remain here."
"Impossible! I could not leave you behind."
"I will stay."
"But what must I tell her?"
"Tell her that, as we came for the Golden Rock, it would be folly for the whole of us to return at the very time when the natives are friendly, and that I have remained behind in the interests of the party."
"She will want to hear that from your own lips."
"I will see Sirayo--tell him to make arrangements for your departure, and will leave for the rock. If she asks for me I will not be within call."
"It is a miserable ending," said Webster.
"Not for you," said Hume meaningly.
"Why?"
"You will have an opportunity to push your suit, and you may do so."
"Look here, Frank: I will take Miss Anstrade to Pretoria or Cape Town, and part with her as a friend--if she is willing to call me friend--and I will come back here to you. How long will it take for the double journey?"
"Three months."
"In three months, then, I will be back."
He went to the camp, and Miss Anstrade advanced quickly to meet him.
"Have you seen him?" she asked impatiently.