The Hot Swamp Part 8

While our travellers were thus labouring and commenting on their work, unseen eyes were gazing at them with profound interest and curiosity.

A boy, or youth just emerging from the state of boyhood, lay low in a neighbouring thicket with his head just elevated sufficiently above the gra.s.s to enable his black eyes to peer over it. He was what we of the nineteenth century term a savage. That is to say, he was unkempt, unwashed, and almost naked--but not uneducated, though books had nothing to do with his training.

The prince chanced to look round, and saw the black eyes instantly, but being, as we have said, an adept in woodcraft--including savage warfare--he did not permit the slightest evidence of recognition to escape him. He continued his gaze in the same direction, allowing his eyes slowly to ascend, as if he were looking through the tree-tops at the sky. Then turning his head quietly round he resumed his work and whistled--for whistling had been invented even before that time.

"Comrades," he said, after a few minutes, "don't look up from your work, but listen. We are watched. You go on with your occupations as if all was right, and leave me to deal with the watcher."

His comrades took the hint at once and went quietly on with their labours, while the prince arose, stretched himself, as if weary of his work. After a few minutes of looking about him, as though undecided what to do next, he sauntered into the bush at the side of their encampment opposite to that where the watcher lay.

The moment he got out of range of the boy's eyes, however, his careless air vanished, and he sped through the underwood with the quietness and something of the gait of a panther--stooping low and avoiding to tread on dead twigs. Making a wide circle, he came round behind the spot where the watcher was hid. But, trained though he had been in the art of savage warfare, the boy was equal to him. From the first he had observed in Bladud's acting the absence of that "touch of nature which makes the whole world kin," and kept a bright look-out to his rear as well as in his front, so that when Bladud, despite his care, trod on a dry stick the boy heard it. Next moment he was off, and a moment after that he was seen bounding down the hill like a wild-cat.

The prince, knowing the danger of letting the boy escape and carry information to his friends, dashed after him at full speed--and the rate of his running may be estimated when it is remembered that many a time he had defeated men who had been victors at the Olympic games. But the young savage was nearly his match. Feeling, however, that he was being slowly yet surely overtaken, the boy doubled like a hare and made for a ridge that lay on his left. By that time the chase was in full view of the two men in camp, who rose and craned their necks in some excitement to watch it.

"He's after something," said the captain.

"A boy!" said Maikar.

"Ay, and running him down, hand over hand."

"There seems to be no one else in sight, so we don't need to go to his help."

"If he needs our help he'll come for it," returned the captain with a laugh, "and it will puzzle the swiftest runner in the land to beat his long legs. See, he's close on the lad now."

"True," responded the other, with a sigh of disappointment, "but we shan't see the end of it, for the boy will be over the ridge and out of sight before he is caught."

Maikar was right. Even while he spoke the youthful savage gained the summit, where his slim, agile figure was clearly depicted against the sky. Bladud was running at full speed, not a hundred yards behind him, yet, to the amazement of the spectators, the boy suddenly stopped, turned round, and waved his hand with a shout of defiance. Next moment he was over the ridge and gone. A few seconds later the prince was seen to halt at the same point, but instead of continuing the pursuit, he remained immovable for a few minutes gazing in front of him. Then he returned toward the encampment with a somewhat dejected air.

"No wonder you look surprised," he said, on arriving. "The other side of that ridge is a sheer precipice, down which I might have gone if I had possessed wings. There was no track visible anywhere, but of course there must have been a well-concealed one somewhere, for soon after I reached the top I saw the young wild-cat running over the plain far below. On coming to the edge of a long stretch of forest, he stopped and capered about like a monkey. I could see, even at that distance, that he was making faces at me by way of saying farewell. Then he entered the woods, and that was the end of him."

"I wish it was the end of him," observed the captain, with something like a growl--for his voice was very deep, and he had a tendency to mutter when disturbed in temper. "The monkey will be sure to run home and tell what he's seen, and so bring all his tribe about our ears."

"Ay, not only his tribe," remarked Maikar, "but his uncles, brothers, fathers, nephews, and all his kin to the latest walkable generation."

"Are your weapons ready?" asked Bladud, taking up his sword and putting on his helmet.

"All ready," answered the captain, beginning to collect things--"I have just finished two head-pieces out of the boar-hide for myself and Maikar, which will turn an arrow or a sword-cut, unless delivered by a strong arm. Don't you think them handsome?"

"They are suitable, at any rate," said Maikar, "for they are as ugly as our faces."

"Come, then, we must make haste, for wild men are not slow to act,"

rejoined Bladud. "By good fortune our way does not lie in the direction the boy took. We shall get as far away from them as possible, and travel during the night."

In a few minutes the little party--by that time fully equipped for the chase or war--were hurrying down the hillside in the direction of the setting sun. It was growing late in the evening, and as they reached the bottom, they had to cross a meadow which was rather swampy, so that their feet sank in some parts over the ankles.

"I say, guide," observed Maikar, who, like his nautical commander, had small respect for rank, and addressed the prince by what he deemed an appropriate t.i.tle, "it has just come into my head that we are leaving a tremendous trail behind us. We seafaring men are not used to trouble our heads on that score, for our s.h.i.+ps leave no track on the waves, but it is not so on the land. Won't these naked fellows follow us up and kill us, mayhap, when we're asleep?"

"Doubtless they will try," answered Bladud, "but we land-faring men are in the habit of troubling our heads on that score, and guarding against it. Do you see yonder stream, or, rather, the line of bushes that mark its course?"

"Ay, plainly."

"Well, when we reach that, you shall see and understand without explanation."

On reaching the stream referred to, they found that it was a small, shallow one, with a sluggish current, for the plain through which it flowed was almost flat.

"You see," said Bladud, pausing on the brink, "that it flows towards the sea in the direction we have come from. Now step into the water and follow me down stream."

"Down?" exclaimed the captain in surprise, and with some hesitation.

"We don't want to return to the sea whence we have just come, do we?"

"Captain Arkal," returned Bladud, sternly, "when you give orders on board s.h.i.+p, do you expect to have them questioned, or obeyed?"

"Lead on, guide," returned the captain, stepping promptly into the water.

For about a quarter of a mile the prince led his followers in silence and with much care, for it was growing very dark. Presently they came to a place where the banks were swampy and the stream deep. Here their guide landed and continued to walk a short distance down the bank, ordering his followers to conceal their track as much as possible, by closing the long gra.s.s over each footprint. The result, even to the unpractised eyes of the seamen, did not seem satisfactory, but their leader made no comment. After proceeding about fifty yards further, he re-entered the stream and continued the descent for about a mile. Then he stopped abruptly, and, turning round, said, "Now, comrades, we will land for a moment, then re-enter the stream and ascend."

The astonishment of Captain Arkal was so great, that he was again on the point of asking an explanation, for it seemed to him that wandering down the bed of a stream for the mere purpose of turning and wandering up it, when haste was urgent, could only be accounted for on the supposition that the prince had gone mad. Remembering his previous rebuff, however, he kept silence.

On reaching the swampy part of the bank their leader did not land, but held straight on, though the water reached nearly to their armpits.

They were somewhat cooled, but not disagreeably so, for the night was warm.

In course of time they reached the spot where they had first entered the stream. Pa.s.sing it, without landing, they held on their course for a considerable distance, until they came to a place where the stream was not more than ankle-deep. Here Bladud paused a few moments and turned to his companions.

"Now, captain," he said, with a smile that may be said to have been almost audible though not visible, "do you understand my proceedings?"

"Not quite, though, to say truth, I begin to think you are not just so mad as you seemed at first."

"Don't you see," continued the prince, "that when we first came to the stream, I entered it so that our footprints on the bank would show clearly that we had gone downwards. This will show our pursuers, when they arrive here, that, though we are wise enough to take to the water because it leaves no footprints, we are not experienced enough to be careful as to concealing the direction we have taken. When they reach the swampy bank and deep water, they will be led to think we did not like getting wet, and the effort made to cover our footprints, will make them think that we are very ignorant woodsmen. Then, with much confidence, they will continue to follow down stream, looking on the banks now and then for our footprints, until they begin to wonder whether we intend to make a highroad of the river all the way to the sea. After that they will become perplexed, astonished, suspicious as to our stupidity, and will scurry round in all directions, or hold a council, and, finally they will try up stream; but it will be too late, for by that time we shall be far away on our road towards the setting sun."

"Good!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Maikar, when this explanation was finished.

"Good!" echoed the captain, with an approving nod. "You understand your business, I see. Shove out your oars. We follow."

Without further remark Bladud continued his progress up stream. It was necessarily slow at first, but as night advanced the moon rose, in her first quarter, and shed a feeble but sufficient light on their watery path.

At last they came to a place where the leader's sharp eye observed signs of the presence of man. Stopping short and listening intently, they heard subdued voices not far from the spot where they stood.

"Stay where you are," whispered Bladud. "Don't move. I'll return immediately."

He entered the bushes cautiously and disappeared. Standing there without moving, and in profound silence, under the dark shadow of an overhanging bush, it is no wonder that the captain and his comrade began to think the time very long, yet it was only a few minutes after he had left them that their guide returned.

"Only a single family," he whispered--"three men, two women, and four children. We have nothing to fear, but we must pa.s.s on in silence."

The discovery of those natives obliged them to continue the march up the bed of the stream much longer than they had intended, and the night was far advanced before they thought it prudent to leave the water and pursue the journey on dry land.

Fortunately the country was open and comparatively free from underwood, so that they made progress much more rapidly; nevertheless, it was not thought safe to take rest until they had placed many a mile between them and the natives, who, it was thought probable, would be started in pursuit of them by the youth to whom Bladud had given chase.

Much wearied, and almost falling asleep while they advanced, the travellers halted at last in a dense thicket, and there, lying down without food or fire, they were soon buried in profound repose.

CHAPTER NINE.