CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE.

HOW BOB AND TOM BAGGED STRANGE GAME.

The young midshipman saw at a glance what had happened, and the sight of the deadly struggle going on roused him from the stupor that had a.s.sailed him.

It was evident that Ali had been holding by one hand to the branch of a tree, and was leaning over just such a pool as that which had caught the attention of Bob, when a crocodile, taking advantage of his unguarded approach, had seized him by the leg just above the knee.

Ali had at once dropped his gun, seized the branch with the other hand, and clung for life as he uttered the cry for help, while the reptile tugged viciously, and shook him violently, to make him loose his hold.

Had the creature succeeded, the young Malay chief's fate had been sealed, for in another moment he would have been drawn down into the deep pool, with a few bubbles ascending through the agitated water to show where he lay.

The time seemed long to the brave young fellow as he held on for dear life; and it seemed long to Bob Roberts before he could act; but it was but a matter of moments before he had reached Ali's side, with his gun c.o.c.ked; and placing the piece close to the reptile's eye as it glared savagely at him, and seemed about to leave one victim to seize another, he fired both barrels in rapid succession.

There was a tremendous splash as the smoke hung before him for a few moments, then as it rose the young middy saw nothing but the troubled water before him, and Ali lying panting, and with his eyes starting, close by his side.

By this time Tom Long and the two Malays had come up, eager with questions, to which Ali answered faintly, and gladly partook of a little spirits from the young ensign's flask.

"I ought to have known better," he said, "but I did not think of the danger. It will be a warning for you both. These rivers swarm with the brutes."

"But your leg?" cried Bob, kneeling down.

"A little torn; that's all," said the young Malay, stoically. "My sarong and the trousers have saved it, I think."

All the same, though, it was bleeding freely, and with a rough kind of surgery Bob's handkerchief was used to bind it up.

"I'm not much hurt," said Ali then; and to prove his words he rose, limped a step or two forward, and picked up his gun, while Bob proceeded to slip a couple more cartridges in his own, gazing once more eagerly into the pool, but seeing nothing but a little blood-stained water.

He turned sharply round, for something touched him, and there stood Ali, looking at him in a peculiar manner, and holding out one hand, which Bob took, thinking the other felt faint.

"I can't talk now," said Ali, hoa.r.s.ely; "but you saved my life. I shall never forget it."

"Oh, nonsense, old fellow," cried Bob. "But, I say; what a brute! He must have been twenty feet long."

"Oh, no," said Ali, smiling faintly, "not ten. The small ones are the most vicious and dangerous. Let us go."

"But can you walk?" said Bob. "Have a cigar."

"Yes; I will smoke," said the young Malay, as he walked bravely on, though evidently in pain; and lighting a cigar, he talked in the most unconcerned way about the creature's sudden attack.

"Such things are very common," he said. "Down by the big river they seize the women who go for water, and carry off the girls who bathe.

There are monsters, ten, twenty, and twenty-five feet long; but we are so used to them that it does not occur to us to take care."

They were now walking over the ground they had that morning traversed, Ali seeming so much at ease, and smiling so nonchalantly, that his companions ceased to trouble him with advice and proposals that he should be carried.

At last they came to a spot where a fresh track turned off, and Ali paused.

"You will not think me rude," he said, speaking with all the ease of a polished gentleman, "if I leave you here? Ismael will take you the nearest way down to the island. Yusuf will go with me. My leg is bad."

"Then let us carry you," cried Bob. "Here, we'll soon cut down some bamboos and make a frame."

"No, no, it is not so bad as that," cried the young man, firmly; "and I would rather walk. This is a nearer way, and you will do as I ask, please."

The two youths hesitated, but Ali was so firm, and his utterances so decided, that although unwillingly, they felt constrained to obey his wishes.

"No, no," exclaimed Bob, "let me go with you, old fellow. Let us both come."

"Do you wish to serve me more than you have already done?" said Ali, quietly.

"Yes, I do, 'pon my word," replied Bob.

"Then please say 'good-bye.' I am very nearly at home."

There was nothing more to be said, so the young Englishmen shook hands and parted from their companion, after he had promised to send word by Yusuf the next day how he was.

"I don't half feel satisfied," said Bob, trudging along behind the Malay who was their guide. "I think we ought to have gone with him, Tom."

"I feel so too," was the reply, "but what could we do? Perhaps he was not so very much hurt after all."

They were tired now, and the heat of the afternoon seemed greater than ever, so that they longed to get out of the stifling forest to the open banks of the river. But they were as yet far away, and their guide made a cut along the side of a patch of marshy ground, looking back from time to time to see if they followed.

"Snipe, by all that's wonderful!" cried Bob, firing two barrels almost as he spoke, and bringing down four birds out of a flock that bore some resemblance to, but were double the size of, snipes.

Tom raised his piece for a shot, but he was too late; and Yusuf smiled and showed his teeth as he ran and picked up the birds, tied their legs together with some gra.s.s, and added them to the jungle-fowl he was carrying.

"Well, they won't be able to laugh at us," said Bob. "We shan't go back empty. Hallo! what the d.i.c.kens now?"

For a couple of scantily clad Malay girls, their sarongs torn and ragged with forcing their way through the bushes, came panting up, uttering loud cries, and, flinging themselves down at the astonished youths'

feet, clung to their legs, while Yusuf began to abuse them angrily, and kicking one, was about to thrust away the other with his foot.

"You leave them alone, will you?" said Bob, giving him a rap on the head with his gun-barrel. "I wish to goodness I knew what was the Malay for _cowardly beast_, and you should have it, young fellow."

The Malay's hand flew to his kris as he threw down the birds, and it flashed in the sunshine directly.

"Ah! would you bite?" cried Bob, presenting his gun at the other's breast, when the man shrank away, with his eyes half-closed, and a peculiarly tigerish aspect about him as he drew his lips from his white teeth, but kept at a respectful distance, knowing as he did how ably the young sailor could use his gun.

Just then the girls renewed their cries and lamentations, clinging wildly to the youths as if for protection, as half-a-dozen Malays, armed with krises and the long limbings, or spears, that they can use with such deadly force, came running up, and made as if to seize upon the two girls.

"Keep off, will you! Confound your impudence, what do you mean?" roared Bob, slewing round his gun to face the newcomers. "I say, Tom, what fools we do seem not to be able to speak this stupid lingo! What are they jabbering about?"

"Hang me, if I know," said Tom, whose face was flushed with heat and excitement. "All I can make out is that they want these two Malay ladies who have come to us to protect them."

"Then, as my old nurse used to say, 'want will be their master,'" said Bob, angrily; "for they're not going to have them."

The leader of the Malay party volubly said something to the two English, and then said some angry words to the two girls, who clung more tightly to their protectors, as he caught each by her shoulder.

Bob brought the barrel of his gun down heavily on the Malay's head, in the same fashion as he had served Yusuf, who was now missing, having suddenly glided away.

The Malay leaped back, tore out his kris, and made at his a.s.sailant; but the presented barrels of the two guns kept him back, as they did his companions, who had presented their limbings as their leader drew his kris, while now the girls leaped bravely up, and interposed their bodies between the two youths and the threatened danger.