"Sorry I can't oblige you. The boy is in my service: he has been wounded--perhaps you know how; nothing but an order from the Free State courts will compel me to give him up. And even then I won't, knowing what I know. That's flat, Mr. Elbel. You stop me at your risk. Go ahead, Nando."

The negroes dug their paddles into the water, and the canoe darted past the side of the launch. Monsieur Elbel bit his moustache and savagely tugged its ends; then, completely losing control of his temper, he shouted--

"You hear; I varn you. You act illegal; you come to seek for gold; dat is your business: it is not your business to meddle yourself viz de natif. I report you!"

The launch snorted away up stream, the canoe continued its journey at a moderate pace, and each was soon out of sight of the other.

For some minutes Mr. Martindale seemed preoccupied.

"What is it, uncle?" asked Jack after a time.

"I was thinking over what that fellow Elbel said. He knows more about our business here than I quite like. Of course they all know we're after minerals, but Barnard's find is not the dead secret he thought it was. Or say, Jack, d'you think we are being watched?"

"Perhaps he was fishing?"

"I don't think so, for he didn't wait for an answer. However, we needn't meet our difficulties half-way. Anyhow, 'twill do Mr. Elbel no harm to know that we don't care a red cent for him or any other Congo man. I suppose he's in charge of this section. But what on earth did the fellow want with the boy?"

Nando, without ceasing to ply his paddle, turned his head and spoke over his shoulder to Samba, now wide awake.

"Samba say him uncle dah, sah: uncle Boloko, plenty bad man."

"A wicked uncle, eh?"

"He berrah angry, sah, 'cos Samba him fader hab got plenty more wives, sah; must be chief some day. Boloko he want to be chief: berrah well: Banonga men all say 'Lako! lako!'[3] plenty loud. Boloko berrah much angry: go to white men: tell berrah bad fings 'bout Banonga men. Samba say Banonga men lib for cut off Boloko his head if catch him."

"Wigs on the green, Jack. Then I guess this Boloko fellow wanted to get in first. Well, it doesn't raise my opinion of Mr. Elbel; you know a man by the company he keeps, eh?"

"And the Company by him, uncle."

[1] Immediately.

[2] Exclamation of surprise.

[3] Exclamation of refusal.

CHAPTER IV

Night Alarms

In the course of an hour or two Mr. Martindale's canoe reached the camp, on a piece of rising ground immediately above the river. Here he found the rest of his party--some fifty strong West African natives--the three canoes in which they had come up stream lying nose to stern along the low bank, only the first being moored, the others roped to it.

The party had reached the spot three days before, and were resting after the fatigues of their journey. These had been by no means slight, for the men had had to haul the canoes through the rapids, and sometimes to make portages for a considerable distance. Fortunately the canoes were not heavily laden. They contained merely a good stock of food, and a few simple mining tools. This was only a prospecting trip, as Mr. Martindale was careful to explain before leaving Boma.

His friend Barnard's instructions had been clear enough. The discovery had been accidental. Coming one day, in the course of his wanderings, to the village of Ilola, he happened to learn that the chief's son was down with fever. The villagers had been somewhat unfriendly, and Barnard was not loth to purchase their goodwill by doing what he could for the boy. He cured the fever. The chief, like most of the negroes of Central Africa, had strong family affections, and was eager to give some practical token of his grat.i.tude for his son's recovery. When taking the boy's pulse, Barnard had timed the beats by means of his gold repeater. The chief looked on in wonderment, believing that the mysterious sounds he heard from the watch were part of the stranger's magic. When the cure was complete, he asked Barnard to present him with the magic box; but the American made him understand by signs that he could not give it away; besides, it was useful only to the white man. Whereupon the chief had a happy thought. If the yellow metal was valuable, his friend and benefactor would like to obtain more of it.

There was plenty to be found within a short distance of the village.

The chief would tell him where it was, but him alone, conditionally.

He must promise that if he came for it, or sent any one for it, the people of Ilola should not be injured; for every month brought news from afar of the terrible things that were done by the white men in their hunt for rubber. Perhaps the same might happen if white men came to look for gold.

Barnard gave the chief the desired a.s.surance, undertaking that no harm should come to him or his people if he showed where the gold was to be found. The American was then led across a vast stretch of swampy ground to a rugged hill some three or four miles from Ilola. Through a deep fissure in the hillside brawled a rapid stream, and in its sandy bed the traveller discerned clear traces of the precious metal.

Barnard explained to Mr. Martindale that Ilola was several days'

journey above the rapids on the Lemba, a sub-tributary of the Congo, and provided him with a rough map on which he had traced the course of the streams he would have to navigate to reach it. But even without the map it might be found without much difficulty: its name was well known among the natives along the upper reaches of the river, the chief being lord of several villages.

So far Mr. Martindale's journey had been without a hitch, and he was now within three or four days of his destination. It was the custom of the party to stay at night in or near a native village. There a hut could usually be got for the white men, and Barnard had told them that a hut was for many reasons preferable to a tent. Sudden storms were not infrequent in these lat.i.tudes, especially at night--a tent might be blown or washed away almost without warning, while a well-built native hut would stand fast. Moreover, a tent is at the best uncomfortably hot and close; a hut is more roomy, and the c.h.i.n.ks in the matting of which its sides commonly consist allow a freer pa.s.sage of air. The floor too is dry and hard, often raised above the ground outside; and the roof, made of bamboo and thatched with palm leaves and coa.r.s.e gra.s.ses, is rain-tight.

Up to the present Mr. Martindale had met with nothing but friendliness from the natives, and a hut had always been at his disposal. But he had now reached a part of the river where the people knew white men only by hearsay, and could not distinguish between inoffensive travellers and the grasping agents whose cruelty rumour was spreading through the land. The people of the village where he wished to put up for this night were surly and suspicious, and he decided for once to sleep in his tent on the river bank instead of in a hut.

The party had barely finished their evening meal when the sun sank, and in a few minutes all was dark. Samba had been handed over to Barney, whose hospital experience enabled him to tend the boy's wound with no little dexterity, and the boy went happily to sleep in Barney's tent, his arm round Pat's neck. Jack shared his uncle's tent. He had been somewhat excited by the scenes and events of the day, and did not fall asleep the moment he lay down, as he usually did. The tent was very warm and stuffy; the mosquitoes found weak spots in his curtains and sought diligently for unexplored regions of his skin, until he found the conditions intolerable. He got up, envying his uncle, who was sound asleep, his snores vying with the distant roars of hippopotami in the river. Taking care not to disturb him, Jack stepped out of the hut, and understood at once why the air was so oppressive. A storm was brewing. Everything was still, as if weighed down by some monstrous incubus. Ever and anon the indigo sky was cut across by steel-blue flashes of forked lightning, and thunder rumbled far away.

Jack sauntered on, past Barney's tent, towards the river bank, listening to noises rarely heard by day--the grunt of hippopotami, the constant rasping croak of frogs, the lesser noises of birds and insects among the reeds. The boatmen and other natives of the party were a hundred yards away, beyond the tents he had just left. Sometimes they would chatter till the small hours, but to-night they were silent, sleeping heavily after their toil.

He came to a little eminence, from which he could look down towards the stream. Everything was black and indistinguishable. But suddenly, as a jagged flash of lightning momentarily lit the scene, he fancied he caught a glimpse of a figure moving below, about the spot where the nearest of the canoes was moored. Was it a wild beast, he wondered, prowling for food? Or perhaps his eyes had deceived him? He moved a little forward; carefully, for the blackness of night seemed deeper than ever. Another flash! He had not been mistaken; it was a figure, moving on one of the canoes--a human form, a man, stooping, with a knife in his hand! What was he doing? Once more for an instant the lightning lit up the river, and as by a flash Jack guessed the man's purpose: he was about to cut the mooring rope!

Jack's first impulse was to shout; but in a moment he saw that a sudden alarm might cause the natives of his party to stampede. The intruder was alone, and a negro; Why not try to capture him? Jack was ready with his hands: his muscles were in good order; he could wrestle and box, and, as became a boy of Tom Brown's school, fight. True, the man had a knife; but with the advantage of surprise on his side Jack felt that the odds were fairly equal. He stole down the slope to the waterside, hoping that the darkness would remain unbroken until he had stalked his man. A solitary bush at the very brink gave him cover; standing behind it, almost touching the sleeping sentry who should have been guarding the canoes, Jack could just see the dark form moving from the first canoe to the second.

He waited until the man bent over to cut the connecting rope; then with three long silent leaps he gained the side of the foremost canoe, which was almost resting on the bank in just sufficient water to float her.

The man had already made two or three slashes at the rope when he heard Jack's splash in the shallow water. With a dexterous twist of his body he eluded Jack's clutch, and swinging round aimed with his knife a savage blow at his a.s.sailant. Jack felt a stinging pain in the fleshy part of the thigh, and, hot with rage, turned to grapple with the negro. His fingers touched a greasy skin; the man drew back, wriggled round, and prepared to leap overboard. At the moment when he made his spring Jack flung out his hands to catch him. He was just an instant too late; the negro had splashed into the shallow water on the far side of the canoe, and disappeared into the inky blackness beyond, leaving in Jack's hands a broken string, with a small round object dangling from the end. At the same moment there was a heavy thwack against the side of the canoe; and Jack, mindful of crocodiles, bolted up the bank.

He turned after a few yards, shuddering to think that the man had perhaps escaped him only to fall a victim to this most dreaded scourge of African rivers. But if he was indeed in the jaws of a crocodile he was beyond human help. He listened for a time, but could detect no sound betraying the man's presence. Pursuit, he knew, was useless.

Except when the lightning flashed he could scarcely see a yard beyond him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A midnight encounter]

Jack did not care to disturb his uncle. He went round the camp, found Nando with some difficulty in the darkness, and ordered him to send ten of the crew to occupy the canoes for the rest of the night. Then he went back to his tent, bound up his wound, and stretched himself on his mattress. He lay awake for a time, wondering what motive the intruder could have for damaging the expedition. At last, from sheer weariness, he dropped off into a troubled sleep in which he was conscious of a deluge of rain that descended upon the camp.

The morning however broke clear. Jack told his uncle what had occurred.

"Humph!" grunted Mr. Martindale. "What's the meaning of it, I wonder?"

"Do you think it was a move of that Belgian fellow, uncle?"

"Mr. Elbel? No, I don't. He has no reason for interfering with us.

I've bought the rights from his company, and as they'll get royalties on all the gold I find, he's not such a fool as to hinder us."

"But Samba, uncle?"

"Bah! He was egged on to demand the boy by that villainous-looking n.i.g.g.e.r, and his dignity being a trifle upset, he thought he'd try it on with us. No, I don't think he was at the bottom of it. I've always heard that these n.i.g.g.e.rs are arrant thieves; the villagers were unfriendly, you remember, and most likely 'twas one of them who took a fancy to our canoes. Glad you frightened him off, anyway. What about your wound?"

"It's nothing to speak of--a slight flesh wound. I washed it with alum solution, and don't think it will give me any bother."

"Lucky it's no worse. We'll set a careful watch every night after this. And take my advice: if you can't sleep, don't go prowling about; it isn't safe in these parts. Try my dodge; shut your eyes and imagine you see forty thousand sheep jumping a patent boundary fence in single file; or if that don't work, say to yourself: 'How much wood would a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck would chuck wood?'--and keep on saying it. I've never known it fail."

"Perhaps it's a good job I didn't know it last night," replied Jack, laughing. "We should have been minus four canoes."

"And all our stores. But don't do it again, there's a good fellow.