CHAPTER XIII
THE HILL PEOPLE
Occasionally one passes a stranger on the street whose face bears theunmistakable imprint of recent pain, a patient line of mouth andhaunting glow of eyes that have looked close into the eternal shadows.Terry bore this look.
He unbuckled the Major's pack straps and relieving him of the load ledhim into the shack he occupied. It was a small hut, roofed and sidedwith grass woven into a bamboo lattice work; stilted six feet abovethe ground it trembled under the Major's heavy tread. A woven bamboopartition divided it into two small halves, and each room was baresave for a slatted cot that served as chair by day and couch by night.The breeze blew up through the strips of bamboo flooring.
Exhausted the Major sank down upon the hard cot but rose to sittingposture to study Terry with bloodshot eyes.
"Terry," he said, "you're looking a little--what the folks back homecall 'peaked'."
Terry's face was a little haggard, his body a little slimmer, thesteady gray eyes were deeper set.
"Oh, I'm all right." He seated himself on the ledge of the window nearthe Major. "You had a tight go of it last night. Did you hear thelittle agong ring?"
"Yes."
"The young Hillmen wanted to wipe you out. I had to work pretty hardwith Ohto--the old chief--to persuade him to let you come inunharmed." His face clouded. "I have been worried ever since youstarted into the Hills."
"How did you know that I was coming?"
"Major, that's why I have been so worried about not being able tostart back--I knew that you would come as soon as you heard."
The Major flushed in quick pleasure at the unconscious tribute to hisfriendship and his courage. He filled his pipe and smoked contentedly.It was the biggest hour that he had ever known. Terry unharmed, well;his own hazards surmounted; and the Hill Country penetrated atlast--the impossible again achieved by the Constabulary. He settledback comfortably, using his pack as a pillow.
"Tell me all about it," he said.
"There is not much to tell, Major. You must already know all about theway in which the Macabebes finished what Malabanan started, and ofSakay's leap into the pool--did Sears dynamite that pool?"
Horror shadowed the steady eyes till the Major assured him that thepool and its dweller were of the past.
"Major, that Sakay affair was pretty--bad: I keep wondering if Imissed him--I would hate to think that.... Well, I had not felt wellall day. I must have been exposed to that fever at Dalag and--"
"Yes, I guess you had! Merchant told me about that!"
Terry flushed and went on. "I started through the brush to get to thedoctor, but I must have been sicker than I thought, for I don'tremember anything after entering the woods. It's all a dream to me.Something pulled me up this way--I've always hoped to be the one toopen up the Hills--and I kept coming. I remember lying down at duskand being picked up and carried through the night. I must have beendelirious for about ten days, but had conscious periods every day.Every time I had a clear spell I swallowed several tablets of thequinine Sears gave me. I guess that quinine saved me--I would like tohave Sears know about it.
"Those ten days are rather confused, of course, but I remember thecare the women gave me and some of their rough remedies. I came out ofthe delirium two weeks ago but was pretty weak, so did not try to getup, but lay there listening to their talk. Their dialect is quite likethe Bogobo--I think they're just a tribe of Bogobos separated from theothers by those infernal woods. I soon learned that they had spared meand cared for me because they thought that I was daft. You know thatthese primitive tribes never molest lunatics--they think that they arepossessed of devils which, if disturbed, will enter the heads ofwhoever harms their present host. Probably I raved a good bit on theway up, when they were following me.
"When they realized that I was sane the tribe split into twofactions--one wanted to finish me but the other insisted that mycoming was a good augury. It was rather queer to lie here and listento the arguments pro and con--I pulled pretty hard for the negativecontenders! The question was finally decided by the old chief, Ohto,who announced that my fate would be determined when next the limoconssang. That settled the immediate question.
"The limocon is a big species of pigeon that nests in the Hills. Itseldom sings, and then only at nightfall. It is reverenced by thesepeople, who believe that it sings prophecies of good or evil, thecharacter of the omen being determined by the point of the compass inwhich it lights to offer its rare evening song. Direction is gaugedfrom where the Tribal Agong hangs--I will show you that after supper.It is a queer superstition, Major: they think that a song in the westmeans greatest harm--death by famine or disease or intra-tribal wars,from the north the omen is ill but to a lesser degree, south is good,but a song from the east augurs greatest happiness to their people."
The Major was pulling on a dead pipe, absorbed in Terry's story butbuilding into it all of the suffering and loneliness and suspensewhich the lad ignored in the telling.
"They say that the limocon has sung in the east but once since itheralded the birth of Ohto, who is the greatest chief they ever had.But it has sung in the west eight times--and each time it was followedby the death of one of Ohto's family. Now the old man is the last ofhis line. These things may have been mere coincidences but you can seewhy they believe implicitly in their feathered oracles.
"A week ago, while I was still kept prisoned in this hut, the birdsang in the south, an omen of sufficient favor to cause my release.Since then I have been free to wander about--and if it had not sung,my influence would have amounted to nothing when I pled for you. And Imight not have been here to plead.
"That's about all, Major, except as to what manner of folk theseHillmen are, and that you will learn better for yourself."
The Major rose and stepped to the door where they could survey thevillage, unseen by the brown people who now swarmed the hard-packedclearing. They were a squat race. The men, G-stringed, displayed thesame powerful physique that had marked the warrior who had conductedthe Major, the women were clad in a single width of homespun cottonwhich draped from waist to knee and passed up over breast and back toknot at the right shoulder. Men, women and children were all longhaired, and marked alike with broad, high cheek-boned faces flattenedacross the bridge of the nose. Their slightly thickened lips andwidened nostrils were offset by large, intelligent eyes. They weregrouped about the fires which burned in the center of the village, thewomen tending the pots which steamed over the coals. The fresh hide ofa buck lay in the center of the ring of fires amid heaps of yams andunthreshed rice.
"Community cooking," explained Terry. "The young men hunt, the olderones farm, the girls weave and the old women cook. The scheme worksout well in such a simple manner of living. Such government as theyhave is a blending of a little democracy with strong patriarchism. Theold chief, Ohto, lets them have their own way about the littlethings, but when he speaks it is the law."
"How numerous are they?"
"Six or eight thousand. This is the largest of nine villages scatteredaround the crown of the mountain. Ohto rules them all."
He pointed to a wide lane leading through the fringe of woods intoanother and smaller clearing a few hundred feet south.
"That is where Ohto lives. No one approaches his house unless sentfor. You--we--are to have an audience with him to-night. He set thetime at moonrise."
"A husky lot," commented the Major. "They're bigger than the Bogobos,and lighter skinned--but they sure don't get much chance to tan inthese woods!"
"They're a wild lot, Major, but you'll like them."
They saw a woman leave the circle of fires and approach their hutbearing two crude dishes. She hesitated near the door, nervouslysearching the newcomer with timid black eyes, but reassured by Terry'slow word she climbed the bamboo steps and laid before them a supper ofvenison, yams and boiled rice, then scampered out with a twinkle ofbrown legs.
While they ate the Major outlined the news of Davao. Terry, tired ofthe monotonous f
are, finished quickly and sat on the threshold,looking out upon the savages who squatted at supper about the fires.
"Major," he said, "we arrived here at a strange time. These people areall worked up over the question as to who shall succeed Ohto as chiefof the tribe. You remember I told you that he has no relatives, thatthey have all died off. His last grandson died three years ago. He wasto have married--"
He broke off and turned to face the Major. "You may remember myreporting a Bogobo tale to the effect that a Spanish baby had beenabducted?"
"Yes, we looked it up, Terry. It was true."
"It's true all right. She is here! A wonderful girl, Major, beautiful,wildly reared but--well, you may see her to-night for yourself. Shewas stolen by these people when she was an infant and Ohto's grandsonwas three years old, stolen to become his bride when both came of age.That is the way they keep their chieftain strain fresh--by stealingchildren from outside tribes and mating them when they grow up.Ahma--that is her name--is the only white child they ever abducted.
"But Ohto's grandson died a year before the marrying age. She hasgrown up in Ohto's household, has been taught their beliefs, dresseslike them except that as his adopted daughter she is entitled to finerthings. She is one of them except for the whiteness of her skin. Oneof them, yet ... different."
His voice trailed off into a silence in which the subdued murmuringsof the Hill People sounded loud.
The Major stirred where he lay stretched on the hard couch: "Who willsucceed this Ohto, then?"
Terry roused himself. "The tribe is wrought up over this problem, aswell as the problem of our presence here. They gather every night anddiscuss the matter. Some want to select a new chief among the youngmen and train him so that he will be ready when Ohto dies, othersinsist that Ahma--this girl--shall select a husband from among themand thus raise him automatically to chieftainship. But she laughs atthem all, though there are plenty of aspirants for the honor. The oldchief has said nothing--he just sits and thinks.
"He loves Ahma with all of the wild love of a savage for the young hehas cared for since infancy. He seems to consider her happiness evenabove the wishes and welfare of the tribe."
"Terry, you said this girl is 'different.' How different?"
Terry shrugged his shoulders, rose and secured their hats beforeanswering.
"You will probably see her to-night, Major. Come, I want to show youthe Tribal Agong."
Leaving the shack they threaded through the tiers of huts and crossedthrough the fringe of trees that surrounded the village, coming out atthe foot of the cone. The huge monolith rose some eight hundred feetabove the tableland on which the village was built. Its symmetricalslopes were smooth and steep. A goat could not have found footinganywhere upon its precipitous sides.
A winding shelf had been cut out of the rock to serve as a trail. Itwound round the cone a dozen times in an ascent of several hundredfeet where it terminated, high above where they stood, in a nichetwenty feet square. Niche and trail had been chipped out of solid rockand were worn smooth by the rains of many years. Here and there thesmooth surface was checkered with fissures, marks of erosion andearthquake.
The Major, head bent far back, breathed deeply:
"Sus-marie-hosep!" he exclaimed.
High above the spot where they stood a granite arm had been carvedover the rock platform in which the winding trail ended, and from thisarm a mammoth bronze agong hung suspended over them.
"Why, I always thought those stories of the Giant Agong werejust--why, how in thunder did they get it up there? And how did theycast it? Why--Sus-marie-hosep!"
The Major gazed up till the muscles at the back of his neck ached:"Why, it must be fifteen feet in diameter--that striking knob is--why,the thing must weigh six or seven tons!"
With this last thought the Major moved uneasily to one side. Terrygrinned at him.
"I felt that same way when I first stood under it, but I've been upthere. That flimsy-looking arm on which it hangs is two feet thick andchiseled out of solid granite to form a bracket. I think you are rightabout its size--the striking knob in the center is about six incheswide."
The Major shook his head, still bewildered: "Terry, I feel as if thisis all a dream--being up here on Apo, this cold air, the smell of thepines, and now this thing here--Sus-marie-hosep!"
"The old Bogobo woman who told me of hearing the Agong insisted thatshe would live to hear it rung again. It is never rung except at themarriage of a chieftain or the birth of his heir. These Hillmenfairly worship it. They have the most absurd legends as to how it wascast and hung up there, and of the reasons for the wonderful tone theysay it sounds. They believe that the souls of all the dead limoconslive on in it forever and that when it is sounded they all burst forthin song."
The sun exhausted its last white rays and sank below the low hillsbeneath them. Terry moved forward into the narrow trail and indicatedto the Major that he should follow. They ascended slowly, the shelfnarrowing so that by the time they had mounted twice about the base ofthe crag they were forced to advance by careful side steps, theirbacks against the cliff. Terry stopped at the fourth spiral, his handsgripping the jagged projections, his back tight against the cliff, andwhen the Major reached his side he nodded significantly toward thehorizon.
The Major slowly withdrew his eyes from the dizzying abruptness of thefall beneath them, and followed Terry's rapt gaze. The great panoramaof the Gulf lay unfolded beneath their aerie.
The sun, glowing pink against the crag, cast its huge shadow over thenow tiny huts beneath them. Dusk was already falling over the greatsloping forest that stretched from beneath their feet far into theMindanao fastnesses and ended in a dim horizon where pink-blue of skymelted into the misted billows of distant hills. Far southward theCelebes was faintly outlined, a frosted mirror framed by primevalverdure, and to the east the slopes extended down mile upon mile,flattened, then leveled to edge the great sweep of the gulf.
They stood tight against the clear crest while the swift shadowsgathered the Gulf into its fold. The little valleys faded, andblackened, and the lower hills disappeared. The gulf narrowed,shortened, and dissolved into the night. The dark crept swiftly up theslopes as if envious of the ruby crown set on Apo's forehead by theabdicating sun.
A steady wind, cool and fragrant with the odorous pines, streamedagainst them, forced their bodies hard against the crag. The Major,enraptured of the vast grandeur, voiced his exaltation.
"Jiminy!" he said. "The top of the world! An empire!--an empire ofhemp! And our flag covers it all!"
Receiving no answer, he carefully pivoted his head so as to faceTerry, and was humbled by what he saw. Terry's face, white in the fastfading light, was exalted, glowed like that of an esthetic of theMiddle Ages, his eyes shone with a vision wider than that disclosedfrom the mountain top.
"Terry, what do you see--in all this?" the Major asked.
The wind whipped his words into space. He repeated, louder.
Terry stirred slightly, answered vaguely, his gaze still fixed uponthe tremendous shadowed expanse below them: "I was thinking of a ...dozen words ... spoken upon another mountain, words that seem veryreal ... and make one feel very small ... in such a place as this."
The Major puzzled, gave it up. He was on the point of askingexplanation when Terry spoke.
"We had best get down from here, Major. It is getting darker."
It took them but a few minutes to work their way down, but the cragreared black against ten thousand stars when they reached the base. Inthe regions near the equator the sun courses in hot hurry.
Returned to the hut, the Major sat on the window ledge and Terry atthe threshold. The night was chill with the clear crispness ofaltitude. The Major sniffed the pine-laden breeze gratefully.
"We have found a new Baguio," he said.
Terry assented, absentmindedly.
The Major nursed his empty pipe, studying the savages who groupedaround the fires to warm their almost naked bodies. Occasionally oneor two
would detach themselves from the groups and approach near wherethe two white men sat illumined by the flames, staring at thesestrangers in frank curiosity, silent, inscrutable, unafraid. Noticingthe glint of fire upon a nearby row of long-shafted spears whichreared their vicious barbs eight feet above the ground into which theyhad been thrust, the Major spoke to Terry.
"Your pistol?"
Terry motioned toward his room; "In there. They never bothered meabout it--probably don't know what a pistol is."
The Major, thinking of the sensation the opening of the Hill Countrywould create, of the Governor's joy when he should hear the news, ofthe added prestige for his Service, turned to Terry to expresssomething of his thoughts. But he desisted when he saw by Terry'sflame-illumined countenance that he had forgotten his presence, forthere was something about the lean wistful face that made hisdetachment inviolable.
Soon the moon rose above the level of the plateau and flooded thevillage with a filtered glow. Terry rose.
"Ohto ordered me to bring you at moonrise." He waited until the Majorhad secured the gifts he had packed up, then led the way through thelane into the smaller clearing.