The People of the Mist. H. Rider Haggard
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of adventures which every one of us must dare. He who meets them thus and holds his heart pure and his hands clean will lay himself down to sleep without a sigh or a regret when mountain, swamp, river, and forest all are travelled, and the unknown innumerable treasure, buried from the olden time far out of reach of man’s sight and knowledge, at last is opened to his gaze.
So Leonard started, and his hopes were high notwithstanding the desperate nature of their undertaking. For here it must be confessed that the undesirable element of superstition still held fast upon his mind, and now with some slight cause. Had not his brother spoken of wealth that he should win by the aid of a woman? And had not a woman come to him, bearing in her hand a jewel which, if real, was in itself worth a moderate fortune; promising also, with the help of another woman, to lead him to a land where many such might be found? Yes, these things were so, and it may be pardoned to Leonard if, setting aside the theory of coincidence, he began to believe that the end would be as the beginning had been, that the great adventure would be achieved and the wealth be won.
We shall not need to follow the footsteps of Leonard Outram and his companions day by day. For a week they travelled on, journeying mostly by night as they had proposed. They climbed mountains, they struggled through swamps and forests, they swam rivers. Indeed one of these was in flood, and they never could have crossed it had it not been for Otter’s powers of natation. Six times did the dwarf face the torrent, bearing their goods and guns held above the water with one hand. On the seventh journey he was still more heavily weighted, for, with some assistance from Leonard, he must carry the woman Soa, who could swim but little. But he did it, and without any great fatigue. It was not until Otter was seen stemming a heavy current that his vast strength could be measured. Here, indeed, his stunted stature was a positive advantage, for it offered the less surface for the water to act upon.
So they travelled forward, sometimes hungry, sometimes full of meat, and even of what were better, of milk and corn. For the country was not entirely deserted; occasionally they came to scattered kraals, and were able to obtain provisions from their peaceful inhabitants in return for some such trifle as an empty cartridge of brass. At first Leonard was afraid lest Soa should tire, but notwithstanding her years and the hardships and sufferings which she had undergone, she showed wonderful endurance—endurance so wonderful that he came to the conclusion that it was her spirit which supported the frailty of her body, and the ever-present desire to rescue one whom she loved as a surly dog sometimes loves its master. However this might be, she pushed forward with the rest, rarely speaking except to urge them onwards.
On the eighth night of their journey they halted upon the crest of a high mountain. The moon had set, and it was impossible to go further; moreover, they were weary with long marching. Wrapping themselves up in their blankets—for here the air was piercingly cold—they lay down beneath the shelter of some bushes to sleep till dawn. It was Otter who woke them. “Look, Baas,” he said to Leonard, “we have marched straight. There below us is the big river, and there far to the right is the sea.”
They looked. Some miles from them, across the great plain of bush that merged gradually into swamp, lay that branch of the Zambesi which they would reach. They could not see it, indeed, for its face was hid by a dense cloak of soft white mist that covered it like a cloud. But there it was, won at last, and there away to the eastward shone the wide glitter of the sea, flecked with faint lines of broken billows whence the sun rose in glory.
“See, Baas,” said Otter, when they had satisfied themselves with the beautiful sight, “yonder, some five hours’ march from here, the mountains curve down to the edge of the river. Thither we must go, for it is on the further side of those hills that the great swamp lies where the Yellow Devil has his place. I know the spot well; I have passed it twice.”
They rested till noonday; but that night, before the moon rose, they stood on the curve of the mountain, close down to the water’s edge. At length she came up, and showed them a wonderful scene of desolation. Beyond the curve of hills the mountains trended out again to the south, gradually growing lower till at last they melted into the skyline. In the vast semicircle thus formed ran the river, spotted with green islands, while between it and the high ground, over a space which varied from one mile at the narrowest to twenty miles in width at the broadest of the curve, was spread a huge and dismal swamp, marked by patches of stagnant water, clothed with reeds which grew to the height of small trees, and exhaling a stench as of the rottenness of ages.
The loneliness of the place was dreadful, its waste and desolation were appalling. And yet it lived with a life of its own. Wild fowl flew in wedges from the sea to feed in its recesses, alligators and hippopotami splashed in the waters, bitterns boomed among the rushes, and from every pool and quagmire came the croaking of a thousand frogs.
“Yonder runs the slave road, or yonder it once ran,” said Otter, pointing to the foot of a hill.
“Let us go and see,” answered Leonard; “we can follow it for a while and camp.”
They climbed down the hill. At its foot Otter cast backwards and forwards among the bushes like a hound. Then he held up his hand and whistled.
“I thought so,” he said, as the others drew near; “the path is still the same. Look, Baas.”
As he spoke he broke down the branches of a creeping bush with his strong foot. Among them lay the mouldering skeleton of a woman, and by her side that of a child.
“Not long dead,” said Otter phlegmatically, “perhaps two weeks. Ah! the Yellow Devil leaves a spoor that all may follow.”
Soa bent over the bones and examined them. “One of Mavoom’s people,” she said; “I know the fashion of the anklets.”
Then they marched on for two hours or more, till at length they came to a spot where the trail ran to the edge of the water and stopped.
“What now, Otter?” said Leonard.
“Here the slaves are put on boats, Baas,” the dwarf answered. “The boats should be hidden yonder,” and he pointed to some thick reeds. “There too they ‘weed the corn,’ killing out the weakly ones, that they may not be burdened with them. Let us go and look.”
They went, Otter leading the way. Presently he halted. “The boats are gone,” he said, “all except one canoe; but the ‘weeds’ lie in a heap as of old.”
He was right. Piled in a little open space lay the bodies of some thirty men, women, and children recently dead. In other spaces close by were similar heaps, but these were of bleached bones on which the moonlight shone brightly—mementoes of former sacrifices. Quite close to the first pile of dead was a mooring-place where at least a dozen flat-bottomed boats had been secured, for their impress could yet be seen in the sand. Now they were gone with the exception of the canoe, which was kept there, evidently to facilitate the loading and launching of the large boats.
Nobody made any comment. The sight was beyond comment, but a fierce desire rose in Leonard’s heart to come face to face with this “Yellow Devil” who fattened on the blood and agony of helpless human beings, and to avenge them if he might.
“The light is going, we must camp here till the morning,” he said after a while.
And there they camped in this Golgotha, this place of bones, every one of which cried to heaven for vengeance.
The night wind swept over them whispering in the giant reeds, fashioning the mists into fantastic shapes that threw strange shadows on the inky surface of the water as it crept slowly to the sea. From time to time the frogs broke into a sudden chorus of croaking, then grew silent again; the heron cried from afar as some alligator or river-horse disturbed its rest, and from high in air came the sound of the wings of wild-fowl that travelled to the ocean. But to Leonard’s fancy all these various voices of nature were as one voice that spoke from the piles of skeletons gleaming faintly in the uncertain starlight and cried, “Oh! God, how long shall iniquity have power on the earth? Oh! God, how long shall thy Hand be stayed?”
The darkness passed, the sun shone out merrily, and the travellers arose, brushed the night-dew from their hair, and ate a