CHAPTER NINETEEN.
THE FOREST.
"And all this time we have been forgetting our picnic," reminded Vernamerrily.
They undid the saddle bags and spread out the contents. Nothing hadbeen forgotten, for had not she herself packed them?
"Why, this might be an up-the-river jaunt," said Denham, as theappetising daintiness of each article of food revealed itself. And thenthese two healthy people, realising perfectly that there is a time forthe material as well as for the romantic, fell-to with a will.
Not much was said as they took the homeward way; for one thing, it isdifficult to converse when you are riding single file, and to keep abright look out for projecting boughs or tangling trailers calculated tosweep you from your saddle in summary and unpleasant fashion at the sametime. Yet there was a glow of happiness in the hearts of both, thatcould do without words. Again, as on their way forth, Denham wascontemplating his guide with feelings of intense admiration and love;but now, superadded, the exultation of security. And yet--we have saidthat he was a singularly modest man, for one of his personal gifts andmaterial advantages--he still found himself wondering what a woman likethis could see in him.
"You're not conversational, Alaric," said Verna, over her shoulder."What's the subject of the meditation?"
"I ought to answer `you--and you only,' but it wouldn't be true. Thefact is, I have been obliged to divide contemplation of you with anenduring and superhuman effort to save myself from dangling--an executedcorpse--from any one of these confounded trailers."
She laughed--merrily, happily.
"Well, I can't spare you yet. Look! the stuff's thinning here. You cancome alongside again."
Hardly had he done so than both horses cocked their ears, snuffinguneasily.
"Why, what is it?" exclaimed Denham, rising in his stirrups to peerforward. "By Jove! It's a skeleton. Let's investigate."
He dismounted, and helped Verna from the saddle. They were careful tohitch up the horses, and then went forward.
As Denham had said, it was a skeleton, or rather what was left of one.The skull was separated from the trunk and the dry rib-bones were mostlyscattered, while those of the limbs still held together. But justbeside it was the unmistakable remnant of what had been a fire, and alarge one at that.
"What does it mean?" said Denham. "Some poor devil got lost, and diedof starvation beside his own fire?"
Verna shook her head. She was gazing down thoughtfully at the whitebones and their surroundings.
"That's not the reading of it," she said. "That's no white man's skull.Look at the teeth. Further, its owner's end was not starvation."
"How knowest thou that, O Sherlock Holmes up to date?" Denham hadpicked up the skull and was examining it with interest. "At any rate,he didn't die from a bang on the head."
"No; but he was killed, all the same, by others."
"Sherlock Holmes again. Go on."
"Well, no self-respecting native with the fear of _Inswelaboya_ andother horrors of the night before his eyes, that is to say, any native,would dream of coming in here alone for anything you could offer him."
"Wait a bit, Sherlock," laughed the other. "I think I've got you on onepoint. You said `horrors of the night.' How do you know it was night?"
"I deduce it from the size of the fire. Such a big one as it was wouldnever have been built in the daytime. There must have been several init; the ground is too dry for tracks to show, but for some reason orother this one has been killed by the rest."
"Verna, you are simply wonderful. Talk about woodcraft!"
She looked pleased.
"Well," she said, "I know the people and their ways. Not only that"--looking rather serious--"I hear and overhear things that you wouldn'tunderstand, or rather wouldn't be able to get behind even if you had afair amount of the language at your disposal, and you're not making abad progress under my poor tuition, Alaric."
"Delighted. Only it isn't `poor.'"
She made laughing rejoinder, and these two happy people talked onlightly, or half seriously by turns, rejoicing ill their newly-weldedhappiness. And the skull stared drearily up from the ground, sad relicof a fellow-creature done to death here in the forest gloom amid everycircumstance of torment and blood.
"Hallo! what's the matter with the gees?" said Denham suddenly. "Theyseem unhappy about something, and it can't be only about this oldskull."
For the horses were showing great uneasiness, snorting and snuffing andstriving to free themselves.
"They've seen or scented something," pronounced Verna.
"Well, we'd better investigate," said Denham, holding ready the smallbore, yet hard-hitting, rifle he had brought with him in view of"specimens," and advancing in the direction to which the horses' fearspointed. "Keep back, Verna. It may be a snake or a leopard."
Hardly were the words uttered than a serpentine head and neck of a dullyellow colour rose up out of the herbage, then subsided, with ahalf-startled hiss. Denham felt his sleeve plucked, as though to arresthis advance.
"Leave it, and come away," Verna whispered. "It's the _indhlondhlo_.They're frightfully dangerous."
"Leave it?" he whispered back. "Why, it's the very thing I've beenhoping to come upon all these weeks! Leave it? Not for anything."
"Not for me?"
"For you? Wait a bit, Verna, and follow my plan. You'll see somethingdirectly. Take the rifle"--handing it to her--"go a few yards back, andwhen I clench my open hand behind me, like this, shoot. Aim at thelowest part of the neck so as not to spoil the skin. But don't make any_sudden_ movement whatever you do."
His nerves were thrilling now with excitement suppressed but intense.All the "collector" was predominant; he only saw before him the"specimen," the rare "specimen," which he had coveted so long in vain.Dangerous! Well, many wild animals were that, but they were "collected"all the same.
"But I warn you it's deadly dangerous," she repeated; yet she carriedout his orders implicitly.
Denham began to whistle in a low, but exquisitely clear tone. This heraised gradually, but always continuous, and never sounding a falsenote. The effect was magical. The yellow head and neck shot up againabove the herbage, waved a moment, then remained perfectly still. Nohissing or hostile sign proceeded from the entranced reptile, forentranced it certainly was. Verna waiting, the rifle held ready, wasentranced too, and as those sweet, clear notes swelled by degrees higherand higher to sink in faultlessly harmonised modulation, then to riseagain, something of an eerie magnetism thrilled through her being asthough she shared the influence with the formidable and deadly reptilethus held in thrall. Moments seemed hours. Would he never give thesignal? A little more of this and even her nerves would be too muchstrung to reply to it.
The melody rose higher and higher, but always correspondingly clear.More of the reptile's length towered up now. Without taking her eyesoff it, Verna saw the hand behind Denham close. Her finger pressed thetrigger. The yellow neck flung back with a quick, whip-like movement,and there was a rustling among the herbage which told its own tale.
"Did you hit?" whispered Denham, without turning his head.
"Oh yes; you can never make any mistake about that when you're behind arifle. But--"
She broke off in amazement. The other had gone quite white, or at anyrate as white as his bronze sunburn would allow. He seemed aware of ithimself.
"You did it magnificently," he said, passing a hand over his eyes asthough to clear them. "You know," he went on, half in apology, half inexplanation, "that sort of thing takes it out of one. It isn't only themusical part of it. A certain amount of magnetism, of expenditure offorce, comes in. But let's inspect the quarry."
"Careful, dearest. We'd better make sure it's quite dead. They arefrightfully venomous."
"Wherefore you want to take the lead," flinging a restraining arm aroundher. "That won't do at all."
But all danger was over. Verna's bullet had severed the spinal
cord.The reptile was dead, but the muscular vitality kept its coils writhingin a manner suggestive of lingering life. All the collector again wasuppermost in Denham as he contemplated the writhing booty. He saw italready carefully and naturally set up in his museum.
"Can't be less than seven feet," he said, turning it about gingerly witha stick. "But, darling, what a dead shot you are! All my bestspecimens _you_ obtain for me."
"But I shouldn't have obtained this one if you hadn't kept it still inthe first instance. Alaric, you never told me you added snake-charmingto your other accomplishments. Do you know, though, if it had beenanybody else I should have thought it decidedly uncanny. Have you donemuch of it?"
"Only tried it once before in my life. Then it came to me as a suddenidea. I thought I'd experimentalise again in this instance. I happento be able to whistle rather above the average, so I was always carefulto keep the note clear. I had a sort of feeling that the least breakwould destroy the spell at once. By the way, think there's anotheranywhere about?--they say snakes go in couples."
"No, no, no!" she answered, instinctively slipping a restraining handbeneath his arm. "Be content with this one. Besides, we have got toget it home."
"So we have, by Jove!" with a glance up at the sun. "Now let me thinkof the best way to work. The horses won't stick it near them, I'mafraid. But this is worth having, and no mistake. They grow largerthan this, though, don't they, Verna?"
"Yes," she answered, with a touch of anxiety. "But they are very rareand very dangerous. A snake isn't like a lion or anything of that sort.He's about ten times as quick, and offers no mark for a bullet, and ifyou use shot you spoil the skin. No; be content with this one."
"Why, you sworn big-game huntress, you talk with weighty wisdom. Now Iam still debating the difficult problem of how to get this specimenhome."
"_Nkose! Nkosazana_!"
Both started. In their preoccupation they had been totally unaware ofthe presence of any third person. They looked up to become aware of thepresence of such, in the person of a tall Zulu, and he Mandevu. Theappearance of the latter caused Denham some vague uneasiness. It seemedas though this man were dogging him. The next words were not calculatedto allay the feeling.
"That was a great snake," he said, "and well killed. _Whau_! when lastI saw a snake bewitched like that it was not so well killed, it was cutnearly in half. _Nkose_ must be _isanusi_ to have the power of keepinga snake--two snakes--still in such wise."
Verna translated this for Denham's benefit, and translated it well, wordfor word. Inwardly it puzzled her a little, for it seemed to conveysome hidden meaning. But to her companion the words were disquieting,to say the least of it, and more than ever confirmed the idea that theZulu was following him from place to place with a purpose.
"Tell him, Verna," he said, "that I want this taken home. If he has anyboys he can fetch them along, and they shall be well paid, nor will Iforget himself."
This was put. Mandevu thought he could find the boys--there was a kraala little way off. He would see. This Verna knew to be absolutelyuntrue, but Denham was delighted. He presented Mandevu with ahalf-sovereign, intimating that there was more where that came from whenthe service required should be accomplished. That worthy strode offinto the forest on the spot.
Verna was rather silent as they sat and waited. That curiousinstinctive consciousness of being watched or followed was upon her.She did not believe that Mandevu had come upon them by mere chance orthat he was alone. She remembered their meeting with him nearSapazani's kraal, and also that Denham had run against him twice atEzulwini. Now if they, or either of them, were being watched, to whatend? And here she owned herself puzzled.
Presently Mandevu reappeared with two boys. Meanwhile Denham had beendoctoring his prize with some subtle chemical substance by way ofpreservative. He did not notice that none of them looked in thedirection of the skeleton, plainly visible from there. He was toointent upon his new find. But Verna did. However, as she had said, sheknew the people, so forbore to remark upon it. Yet a mutteredexclamation on the part of one of the two did not escape her.
"_Whau_! The snake of Sebela! It, too, is dead."
And hearing it, a good deal of the mystery of the skeleton was solved.For she had known Sebela--alive. The forest had its secrets. Itsshades witnessed scenes intensely human--dark as well as golden.