The Land of Mystery

  CHAPTER XI.

  A MYSTIFIED SENTINEL.

  Jared Long, the New Englander, and Quincal, the native helper, were thesentinels on duty in the immediate vicinity of the camp.

  The professor was wearied from a hard day's work, and, feeling thateverything possible had been done for the safety of all, stretched outupon his blanket on the soft ground and was soon asleep.

  He expected to assume his duty as guardsman in the course of a fewhours, and needed all the rest he could get before that time.

  Bippo and Pedros were so disturbed by what they had witnessed, that,though they lay down at the same time, it was a good while before theyclosed their eyes in slumber. Their homes were near the mouth of theXingu, and, even at that remote point, they had heard so many fearfulaccounts of the ferocious savages that infested the upper portions ofthe river, that they never would have dared to help in an attempt toexplore the region but for the liberal pay promised, and theirunbounded faith in the white men and their firearms.

  The poor fellows would have given all they had, or expected to have, tobe transported down the Xingu and out of the reach of the terriblenatives who used their poisoned arrows and javelins with such effect;but, behold! the explorers, undaunted by what had taken place, had nothought of turning back, but were resolved to push on for an unknowndistance, and Bippo and his friends had no choice but to go with them,for to run away would insure certain death at the hands of these peoplewho seemed to be all around them.

  Jared Long had so little faith in the usefulness of the servant Quincalas sentinel, that he arranged to place the least dependence possible onhim. With no supposition that any danger was likely to come from thewoods behind them, he sent the fellow a short distance back,instructing him to keep his ears and eyes open, since if he failed todo so, some wild animal was likely to devour him.

  In crossing the Xingu below the falls, the rapid current had swept thecanoe downward, so that it lay against the bank at a point fully twohundred yards below. It was here that the American stationed himself,standing, like Fred Ashman, just far enough from the water to beshrouded in the slight but increasing shadow made as the moon slowlyworked over and beyond the zenith.

  Looking across to the other shore, he could discern nothing upon whichto hang a suspicion; but the first thing, perhaps trifling in itself,which attracted notice, was the unusual quantity of driftwood whichappeared to be coming through the rapids and floating past.

  As has been stated, in such a wooded country as the Matto Grasso therewas always more or less of this, and Long had taken a critical surveyof the rapids and noted the stuff which went plunging and dancingthrough them. Now, however, he was sure there was an increase, and agood deal of it consisted of large trees and logs, which must have beenbrought down by some cause more than ordinary.

  Had there been anything else to occupy his attention, the fact wouldhave escaped him, but the sentinel who is alive to his duty, noteslittle things, even when they seem to have no bearing on the greatsubject which engages all his energies.

  It was a long way from the camp to the source of the Xingu, and in sucha vast country as Brazil, there might have been a violent storm ragingat that moment above and below them without the least evidence, so faras they could see, around them. Like all countries, that portion ofempire is ravaged at times by fierce hurricanes and cyclones, whichmight have uprooted scores of trees and flung them into the waterswhich were now bearing them toward the Amazon and the broad Atlantic.

  The sentinel naturally gave his chief attention to the other side ofthe Xingu, where so many stirring scenes had taken place that afternoonand evening. The camp-fire, which had been left burning, hadsmouldered so low that none of the embers were discernible, and only athin column of smoke crept slowly upward marking where it had been.But this vapor was so clearly seen in the wonderful moonlight that itwas easy to fix the precise point where the trail entered thewilderness.

  It was just there, as Long believed, that the savages would debouchinto sight, and renew the warfare which thus far had been only oneseries of disasters to them.

  He was not mistaken, when, shortly after he had noticed the increasingnumber of logs and driftwood, he fancied he detected something going onat the very point on which his gaze was fixed.

  As was the case with Fred Ashman, it was some time before he could somuch as conjecture its nature. The glimpses were so faint andmomentary that nothing tangible resulted, though he was positive thatsome of their enemies were there.

  At the moment he uttered an exclamation of impatience, he made outthree figures of the natives, who advanced far enough from the wood forhim to identify them.

  Not only that, but they walked stealthily to the edge of the river andstood several minutes, as if looking across at the canoe.

  Long was confident that he could drop one of them at least, and he wastempted to do so. The most effective way of keeping the savages offwas by nipping their schemes in the bud, and filling them withadditional terror of the white strangers.

  But he decided to wait a while, suspecting, as he did, that some schemewhose nature he could not guess was under way, and that if theprojectors were undisturbed, it would soon be revealed.

  Jared Long, we say, was convinced that the natives were scrutinizingthe canoe and seeking to learn something about the occupants, whom theyhad doubtless watched as they made their way from the water to theshelter of the wood. Such was his belief, and yet he was altogethermistaken.

  It struck him as odd that the savages acted as they did, when it wouldseem that they could see just as well from the edge of the wood, wherethey were not exposed to the fire of their enemies; but he reflectedthat there was precious little about the conduct of the natives fromthe first that could be explained on the line of common sense andconsistency.

  The trio stood in view less than five minutes, when they darted back tocover, as if afraid of being seen by the whites, a theory altogetheruntenable under the circumstances.

  The natural supposition of the sentinel was that a large number of thesavages had gathered under the bank and were making ready for somedemonstration, which would soon take place.

  It was not yet time to awaken the Professor and the natives. In fact,the plucky New Englander half believed that with his repeating rifle hewould be able to beat off any approach from the other shore.

  At this moment, he was amazed to see one of the savages do anextraordinary thing.

  Darting out from the wood behind him, he ran to the smoulderingcamp-fire seized a brand that was covered with ashes, and circled it soswiftly about his head that it was fanned into a roaring blaze.

  While doing this, he stood apparently with one foot in the margin ofthe Xingu, and evidently with not the slightest fear of the whitestrangers within gun-shot. He not only swung the brand forward severaltimes, but reversed and spun it in the other direction, with a velocitythat made it look like a solid ring of fire.

  Suddenly the truth flashed upon the bewildered sentinel: _the savagewas signaling to some friend or friends on the other bank_! That beingthe case, it followed that the friend or friends were mostuncomfortably close to the camp of the white men.

  And still Long failed to attach any importance to the unusual quantityof logs and driftwood that was sweeping down the Xingu in front of him.