CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
EQUATORIA.
As soon as our friends had paid the final honours to the mortal remainsof Muzi Zimba, they carefully warned the "People of the Stick" againstspreading the news of his decease in any shape or form, fearing that theignorant natives in the surrounding country might foolishly impute hissomewhat sudden and unexpected end, to the unauthorised presence of thelittle hand in his cavernous dwelling.
Hardly were the funeral obsequies over than Kenyon drew Grenville aside,and after a few moments of earnest conversation, the pair announcedtheir intention of investigating the secret stair through the mountain,of which the old hermit had spoken to them.
Taking Amaxosa along, and supplying themselves from Muzi Zimba's amplestores with torches made of fibre, the trio entered the indicated cave,shifted the black, basaltic-looking rock, and duly found themselves inthe entrance of the tunnel. The tortuous way was rough and very narrow,but it was, as the old man had said, fairly easy to traverse, and intwenty minutes' time our friends emerged into semi-daylight in thenarrow shaft of a dry and disused well, from whence--by means of a stoutbut roughly-constructed ladder of rope, which hung from its upperorifice--the old man had evidently obtained access at will into theslavers' town.
Withdrawing cautiously into the mountain again, in fear lest the smokeof their torches should be seen above the mouth of the well, our friendsentered into a somewhat heated argument.
Grenville was for entirely closing the narrow passage by blocking itonce for all with mighty rocks, which would effectually prevent Zerofrom discovering the secret of the way, and perhaps destroyingthemselves and their cavern by an explosion of gunpowder; but Kenyondeclared that, sooner than permit such a capital means of access toEquatoria to be destroyed, he would himself sit and watch it night andday. His specious arguments and professional instinct, at lengthprevailed over Grenville's caution, and the trio then resolved that tworeliable men should be kept constantly on the watch beneath the well,provided with a cord, the other end of which they would attach to thetrigger of a small pistol fixed in the cavern above, and should anyoneattempt to descend the well, the sentinels were to jerk the cord, firethe pistol as an anxious call for help, and forthwith retreatnoiselessly into the mountain burrow, where they would be met at thenarrowest part of the tortuous path by armed support.
During the whole of that day the party on the rock could descry in thefar distance large bands of the slaver fraternity patrolling thesouthern veldt, and carefully searching the borders of the easternforest, being evidently altogether at a loss to know what had become ofthe dangerous and hated foe, and yearning, no doubt, for theresuscitation of their slaughtered bloodhounds; whilst when night fell,the furthest limit of vision revealed, a hundred miles away, thefire-girt summit of the fierce volcano, its blazing peak hanging uponthe distant line of smoke-beclouded sky like a glittering star of thefirst magnitude.
The night was very dark and moonless when Kenyon and Amaxosa left theouter cave to relieve Leigh and Grenville, who were keeping watch belowthe well; but, pausing before he entered the narrow passage, theAmerican sent the Zulu forward, simply saying he would join himby-and-by, as he had yet some work to do, and so it came to pass thatthe two cousins returned to the cavern without having seen him, and thatAmaxosa, keeping his lonely vigil by torchlight, passed through the mostfearsome trial his courageous but untutored heart had ever known; forwhilst he watched and waited, patient as a statue carved in stone, thegreat Zulu heard a light footfall behind him, and, turning quickly,beheld, to his utter horror, the well-known figure of the ancient MuziZimba approaching through the gloom. The warrior's heart stood stillwith fear and his very blood froze in his veins--Muzi Zimba, whose deadbody he had that very day helped to consign to its grave, and upon whosebreast he had placed giant rocks to scare the beasts of prey; yet herehe stood, and there before him in the flesh stood Muzi Zimba. Nay, itcould not be flesh and blood, but a spook (spirit) of the mountain, andnot even a child of the Undi could fight with spooks. Coming swiftly tohim, the vision spoke quietly to him in broken Zulu. "Greeting," itsaid, "greeting, Lion of the Undi, what dost thou here by night in MuziZimba's secret way."
"Greeting, great Father of the Spooks," boldly answered the Zulu. "I dothis here, I watch thy dark and narrow stair, oh, Ancient One, by orderof the Great White Chief, my father, and if any enter to disturb thyrestful peace, he dies a swift and easy death on this my ready spear."
"Well done, Amaxosa," was the cool reply which the astonished chiefreceived from his ancient friend, the "Father of the Spooks," as thedread thing deftly removed its flowing wealth of beard and whiskers, andrevealed the clean-shaved countenance of Stanforth Kenyon, the Americandetective.
"Wow, Inkoos!" said the astonished Zulu. "Wow! the thing was indeedwell done; and I, even I, the son of the witch-doctor, Isanusi, wouldhave let thee pass and leave me for a spook. Yet, did it seem strangeto me, my father, thou shouldst speak to thy son with the tongue of hisown people, for ever I heard that the Ancient One who has gone from us,knew not to speak as speak the children of the Zulu."
Briefly explaining his intentions to the chief, Kenyon carefullyreadjusted his disguise, and, nimbly mounting the ladder of rope,scrambled out of the mouth of the well, and at once found himself in aclump of bushes, and close to the outskirts of the slavers' town,towards which he fearlessly directed his now seemingly feeble steps.
Well was it for Stanforth Kenyon that years of rigid training in his ownpeculiar walk of life enabled him to support to perfection the somewhatdifficult, because exquisitely simple, character, which his supremeaudacity had undertaken. The extreme darkness of the night was,however, favourable to his enterprise, as there were but few peopleabout, and the detective found himself in the very centre of Equatoriawithout being accosted by anyone. The town, to his surprise, proved tobe very compactly built, and consisted of perhaps five hundred houses,mostly composed of wood and roofed with iron, the only exceptions tothis rule being what were evidently the public offices of the place,which were built of a mixture of sand and gravel, a composition goingamongst the natives by the name of "swish," and which presented, so faras he could see by the light of the oil-lamps hung round the buildings,an extremely handsome appearance.
Just as Kenyon was about to move forward after carefully taking stock ofthe place, a young girl started out from a side street, and laid agently detaining hand upon his arm.
"Father," she said, "I have looked and longed for thee every night, andfeared that thou wert ill. Come and see my boy, I beseech thee, goodfather, for he dies--he dies before my face, and here is none to helpbut thee."
With a sign of brief assent, the detective turned and halted slowlyalong, despite the manifest impatience of the young and anxious mother.
Turning into a small house some little way along the street, she led himthrough a comfortably but roughly furnished parlour, into a bed-room atthe rear, where lay a baby boy not more than eighteen months old, andwhom his medical experience soon assured him was suffering from a slightattack of that most malignant disease, diphtheria.
Knowing, through Grenville, that the old hermit had acted in thecapacity of physician and surgeon to both slavers and natives, Kenyon,before he left the cavern, had provided himself with several articles,including a small case of phials, likely to be of use in supporting hisassumption of the character of a medical practitioner; and, brieflydirecting the young mother to keep the child quiet and supply him withcooling drinks, he carefully painted the tonsils with perchloride ofiron, and left her instructions to continue this treatment.
As Kenyon, however, was moving away, the grateful mother again stoppedhim. "Father," she said, "I call thee such by permission; canst thou donaught for yon poor woman whom these cruel, heartless Mormons havecondemned to death by fire, because she will not change her faith and`marry' one of their own creatures. Thou knowest my history, my father;how I was stolen away when but a girl, and wedded to a man I used tohate, and that my happiest
hour was when he died in battle. Yet do Ilove my little son, and could I but give freedom to this woman I wouldfly the country with her, and take refuge with the brave men of my ownrace who have escaped hence, and who now hold Zero at defiance."
"Where lies this woman, my daughter?" said the false hermit, aftermaking a show of thinking carefully for some little time.
"Still in the same strong place, my father--the great hall of the commonprison-house; and at noon, next day but one, she suffers at the stake.Save her, if thou canst, my father; and if it be indeed beyond thypower, then give her, in mercy, a draught of swift and deadly poison, ifthou hast such, and earn a double blessing from her ere she dies."
With a promise that he would endeavour on the following night to see thecondemned one referred to, our adventurer at length got away from theimportunate woman, and effected, undiscovered, his retreat to the well,and thence into the depths of the mountain, where he, of course, foundthe Zulu on guard, the pair being soon after this relieved by Umbulanziand the young Scotsman, Ewan, of whom all had formed a high opinion,both as to shrewdness and bravery.
Arrived in the cave above, Kenyon communicated to his astonished andadmiring friends his experiment and the result of it, and all then fellto eagerly discussing ways and means for the rescue of the poorcondemned woman from her villainous judges and would-be executioners;and, ere the party lay down to sleep, it was decided that Kenyon shouldmake an attempt to see her the following night in his character of apriest, and learn what suggestions the captive could herself make, withregard to a plan to save her life and give her back her liberty.