Trudging along steadily, Larry just keeping in sight of me, so as to hold touch with the column, I came, a little way farther on, upon a most beautiful grove of camphor and juniper-trees, that seemed cut out of a gorge in the Kilima-Njaro mountains.
The smell was so overpoweringly sweet and delicious, after the toil of our long march and the arid wastes through which we had drearily toiled, knee-deep in hot sand that had burnt the soles of our feet through our boots, that I really could not help halting for a moment to inhale the soft perfumed air, which seemed to me like a breath from the portals of Paradise!
Leaning against one of the trees, a fine juniper it was, I had just taken off my cap to wipe the perspiration that was rolling down my face like rain, it having been a stiff climb upwards from the undulating country below, besides having to battle, too, with the brushwood most of the way, and the creepers that hung down from the branches, making some of the places through which we pa.s.sed perfect jungles of ma.s.sed vegetation, when, all of a sudden, a big hairy hand clutched me round the throat and I felt myself drawn up into the tree.
CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.
A REGULAR SCRIMMAGE!
I believe the delicious perfume that permeated the air had almost lulled me to sleep for the moment, when I was rudely roused up by feeling the grip on my throat. "Belay that, Larry," cried I, fancying that my practical-joking friend had stolen a march on me, thinking to catch me napping, speaking without even taking the trouble to open my eyes. "A lark"s a lark, old chap: but you needn"t squeeze my throat so beastly hard, Larry!"
The pressure of his fingers, as I thought, continuing and absolutely causing me considerable pain, as well as throttling me, while I felt myself drawn up, as I have stated, into the lower branches of the tree against which I had been leaning, I quickly opened my eyes.
Heavens, I was horrified!
The hand that I fancied was the hand of Larry and which he had clasped round my neck in joke, was one of the great hairy paws of a huge baboon, who, with his grinning face shoved close to mine, was trying his best to choke me in grim earnest; while, getting a purchase with the other paw on to a projecting limb of the juniper-tree, he was slowly hoisting me aloft.
His grip was so strong that I felt powerless in his grasp; but, all the same, I was not going to give in to a brute of a monkey without making a fight for it!
So, feeling for the lanyard of my knife, I drew this out of its sheath and gave Jocko"s elder brother a slash across his wrist that must have tickled him up a bit, the blood from the beast"s paw shooting over my face in a stream, while he let go his hold of me.
Hardly had I reached the ground, however, touching mother earth again with a jerk that nearly dislocated my ankles, besides making me fall sideways all a-sprawl, than the baboon, giving vent to a vicious snarl, caught hold of my left leg with both his paws, just as a dog might seize a bone, and bit me savagely with his tusk-like teeth.
Fortunately, all of us were in full marching rig with gaiters on, and this protection prevented the baboon"s teeth from penetrating far into my flesh, though he made his mark on my unfortunate calf.
Then, on my prodding him in one of his hind legs, which I clutched in my turn, thinking such a procedure only fair play, the beast dropped the gaiter he was busy gnawing up, and made at me with a howl, endeavouring to clutch me again in his hairy hug.
But, dropping on one knee, I gave him an upper cut with my doubled fist right under the brute"s chin, which prevented this movement; and the next moment, falling back, when I jumped on top of him, he and I were rolling over and over, locked together, the baboon and I, in each other"s arms, and engaged in one of the biggest rough-and-tumble fights I ever had the pleasure of partic.i.p.ating in!
The big brute, though, was so strong and muscular that he got the better of me after a bit, tearing all the clothes off me with the long nails he had at the ends of his toes and human-like fingers, besides biting me in the most savage fashion wherever he saw an opening.
I thought my last hour had come.
But, help was at hand.
As I gasped and struggled frantically with the ferocious monster, feeling my strength ebbing away so fast that I had hardly power enough to protect my face from the brute"s cruel claws, I heard a hoa.r.s.e shout and a rapid footstep near me crunching on the ground.
Then.
"Bang!" came, the report of a rifle close to my ear, and the baboon"s b.l.o.o.d.y body fell back on top of me, the beast having been shot as dead as a herring.
"Lor", Tom," exclaimed Larrikins, hauling away the carca.s.s of the baboon, which I subsequently learnt was a species of the mandrill, common in the north-eastern and central parts of Africa, "I wer" only in the nick o" time! Why didn"t yer call out, chummy?"
"How could I, Larry?" said I, after he had put his water-bottle to my mouth and brought me round a bit, so that I was able to sit up and speak. "The beast had me round the neck and I couldn"t have shouted or even whispered to save my life."
"Well, ye wouldn"t "a saved it, me joker, if I hadn"t missed yer all of a sudd.i.n.k," replied Larrikins, grinning; for I believe he could not have helped laughing, his disposition was so humorous, if a fellow had told him his father was dead! "I wer" a-wondering where yer wer", Tom, when I see"d a troop of big black monkeys makin" fur this very grove where we is. Wonderin" if they was them beasts that Swahili chap told us on, I follered "em up; and then, all at onst, I see"d ye, Tom, a-strugglin"
with that beast theer, and I comes up at the double and puts my rifle inter his ear and blows his bloomin" brains out, jest as ye was well- nigh spent, me joker."
"Thank you, Larry," said I; "you"ve saved my life."
"All right," he replied jokingly, pulling me up and rubbing me down, helping to arrange my tattered jumper and trousers, which that devil of a baboon had nearly torn to pieces; his bites, luckily for me, not being as bad as they had seemed, now that the blood was rubbed off. "I hopes, Tom, ye"ll remember me in yer will when ye"re dead, me joker!"
"I will do better than that," said I, as we both moved off to join some of the other bluejackets scouting away behind us, who had come up during the stoppage of our march through the wild country. "I will remember you, Larry, as long as I live!"
The surgeon accompanying our column presently came up to me and neatly strapped up the cuts which the baboon had inflicted on me with his teeth. He wanted me to retire to the rear and stop with the baggage guard; but, I would have none of that, no, not I!
"I would rather go on, sir, if you will allow me," said I. "Now that I have rested and you have put that stuff on the wounds, I feel all right again, sir; and I don"t want to be left out of the fighting and lose the chance of paying out those Arab beggars for a few scratches like these.
Why, sir, chaps that don"t know me would say that I was a coward!"
"Very good, my lad," said the surgeon good-humouredly, for he was a rare good fellow, and a prime favourite with all on board the _Mermaid_; "you can go on with the column if you like. We want such men as you in the battle front; and, I think, we generally have them, too!" I therefore resumed my place in the ranks, though let off scouting duty, as was Larry, the two of us being now relieved by fresh hands from amongst the bluejackets; and so, I now marched along with the column, which pursued its way onward steadily inland, steering the same west south-west course, until we had travelled some fifteen miles away from our base.
We halted for the night on a beautiful gra.s.sy plain, covered with red and white clover, with thistles and dog-roses and dandelions intermixed, such as one might see on the outskirts of many an English wood in the south; while, there we were in the heart of Africa, so to speak!
Shortly after we encamped here, a runner brought news from the admiral to our captain, telling him that the other column had reached the position a.s.signed to it in the original plan of operations and that they were now within good striking distance of the Arabs, who, the chief wrote word, were ma.s.sed in the vicinity of Arabuku, which after executing our long detour we also were near.
All our preparations being thus complete, "old Hankey Pankey" arranged for us to break camp at four o"clock the next morning, and move off to where the Somalis and their allies were said by the natives to be intrenched in strong force, so as to take them in the rear while the admiral made a front attack.
No bugle, though, sounded to rouse us when day broke in the African forest and the rosy light of dawn came peeping through the trees, brightening the green sheen of their leaves and making the dewdrops glisten on the clover, the scene reminding me more of home than anything I had seen since I left Spithead.
But, neither I nor any one else had much time for such reflections that morning as we silently paraded before "old Hankey Pankey" and the other officers; and, after a careful inspection of our arms, we started in a bee-line for Arabuku, the men ma.s.sed four deep, with the guns in the centre of our column and flanking parties on the right and left, "old Hankey Pankey," of course, let him alone for that, leading the van.
At five o"clock, just as the old sun appeared in full splendour above the tops of the hills on our left, a halt was ordered by the captain, the word being pa.s.sed quietly along the ranks from front to rear.
I was on the right flank, close to "old Hankey Pankey" as he brought us up in this sudden fashion, so I heard every word he said to Mr Gresham, who marched by his side; though, for that matter, I almost guessed what was coming, from the captain wheeling round abruptly and stopping the sort of half trot at which he had been going along, the poor gentleman never having quite recovered the use of his legs after the matchlock ball had ventilated them.
"I think this was about the spot, Gresham, eh?" said he to the first lieutenant. "The admiral said we were to proceed four miles due south from our encampment at Kilili, or whatever else that place was called by our Swahili guide."
"Yes, sir," replied Mr Gresham. "I think we have about covered that distance by now; and our course has been true by compa.s.s, I know."
"Yes, yes," said "old Hankey Pankey," as if thinking over the matter--"yes. Got the rockets ready, Mr--ahem--Shrapnell?"
"Aye, aye, sir," replied "Gunnery Jack," who had come up from his guns, on the halt being cried, to see whether the captain might not have any special orders for him. "They"re close at hand, sir."
"The signal rockets, I mean."
"Yes, sir, I"m speaking of the signal rockets," replied Mr Shrapnell, with never a movement on his face, but looking grave as a judge. "I thought you"d want them, sir, so I brought them along with me. Adams here, sir, has them in his charge. The other rockets with the tube for firing them are with the guns in the centre of the main column."
"That"s right, Mr Shrapnell; tell Adams to get one of the signals ready for sending up at once, for I expect to see the admiral"s every minute,"
said "old Hankey Pankey"; adding, as "Gunnery Jack" stepped back to prepare the signal rocket with Adams, "That chap thinks himself very smart with his rocket and tube, as if I didn"t know the real difference between the two! It"s just like those gunnery fellows. They think n.o.body can be as sharp as themselves; but Mr Shrapnell will find himself too sharp for himself as well as for me some day, if he doesn"t look out!"
Almost as he said this, we could hear the "whis-s-ish" of a rocket going up in the distance, the sound seeming to come from a point in the bush about a mile or so ahead of us; and then, the bright blue and red globules of fire that followed the burst of the warning signal were seen the very next moment, high in the air above the trees in front, slowly sinking as their light died away out of sight.
"Stand by there!" shouted "old Hankey Pankey" to Adams, who had our return signal rocket all ready, slung on to a handspike for a stick.
"Here"s my cigar, set fire to it with that."
He handed him as he thus spoke the manilla which he had been smoking throughout our march, as if he were going to some picnic and probably feeling quite as jovial as if he had been; and, Adams at once setting light to the end of the rocket, it soared aloft like its compeer the moment before, with a whish and a rush that must have scared all the stray baboons within earshot of its flight.