The Pursuit Part 2

Echo supplied no answer.

CHAPTER II

AT THE TENT CLUB

Aylmer tightened the reins, touched the rowels against the mare's flank, and lifted her out of her easy amble into something like a canter. He called to his companion and pointed up the slope at a gleam of white set in the dun green of the cork woods.

"The camp!" he said, and gave a little sigh of relief. Through the fifteen miles which separate Tangier from Awara the two had halted no longer than sufficed to tighten a girth or light a cigarette. The horses were white with lather, the men stained with dust.

Commandant Rattier looked, nodded, and smiled. For a sailor, people were apt to consider him taciturn--at first; but they soon discovered that his was a taciturnity which spoke. His brown eyes could gleam with many lights which were whimsically expressive. A little sidelong jerk of his neatly trimmed beard told more than many elaborated sentences.

Reputations had tottered and scandals had been abashed before a single gesture of his neatly gloved hands. For the moment his nod suggested content, antic.i.p.ation, and unruffled good humor.

A minute later surprise overcame his reticence. Half a dozen dull, half-m.u.f.fled explosions throbbed in the distant jungle of broom and wild olive. The commandant's eyebrows rose in arcs of amazement.

"Do they then shoot the boar as well as impale it?" he asked.

Aylmer smiled.

"The beaters," he explained. "They are driving towards the plain behind the marsh. They are firing blank charges."

The Frenchman gave a little laugh.

"In all these matters you must remember that I am of an ignorance the most profound. And my impudence, also, must appear to you colossal. I am to allow myself to charge with a spear--I, who, till to-day, have never seen a wild pig save, perhaps, as bacon!"

Aylmer dropped the reins upon the mare's neck, lifted his hand, and wiped his forehead.

"All things must have a beginning, my friend," he said. "You have the sailor's eye and, no doubt, the sailor's steady hand. And, above all, you ride--as sailors do not always ride. I have every reason to believe that I shall be proud of you before the day is out."

Rattier lifted his shoulders with a little shrug. He did not speak, but he left the impression that he deprecated this point of view, found the arguments futile, and disposed of the question finally. The attention of the riders was suddenly drawn elsewhere.

A couple of men emerged into view from behind a clump of argans. They held two horses by the bridles. One of them signalled with outstretched hand.

As Aylmer reined in the mare almost upon her haunches the man dropped his hand, relinquished the horse he held into the care of his companion, and approached. He made a dignified gesture of welcome and pointed to a basket on the ground.

"Sid' Anstruther sends breakfast, Sidi. They drive the bush beyond the hill and the marsh. If you will refresh yourselves here you will avoid climbing the hill to the camp. You can then take these horses and join the spears who wait at the tongue of the jungle in the plain."

Aylmer slid to the ground.

"It is well thought of, Absalaam," he said, and turned to explain matters to his companion. The Moor beckoned forward his underling, who quickly tethered the fresh horses to a broom stump and then led away the other two in the direction of the tents which gleamed white upon the slope a mile or so above them. Absalaam, meanwhile, was deftly setting out the meal in the shadow of the argan branches.

The two began to eat and drink with appreciation but quickly. They did not exchange much conversation; their attention, indeed, seemed concentrated on matters outside sight but within hearing. For the m.u.f.fled explosions continued and to them was added the sound of chorussed and intermittent yells. But these last had not risen to any great pitch of excitement; no pig, or, at any rate, no boar, had as yet been sighted or had broken cover.

Absalaam flitted to and fro handing dishes, changing plates, expressing by the vigilance of his att.i.tude and actions the fact that he, too, appreciated the need for haste. His dark eyes beamed a sort of intensity of vigor; the pose of his head seemed to indicate that his ears were critically alert to the purport of those distant shouts. But he offered no comment till Aylmer pushed aside his plate and rose to his feet.

"Your station, oh Sidis, will be at the far side of the point of jungle, between the marsh and the forest."

Aylmer nodded, explained to Rattier, and swung himself into the saddle.

"How many spears?" he asked laconically. The Moor held up the open fingers of one hand.

"Four," he answered, "and a lady, who rides but does not carry a spear.

It will be difficult with so few, but the Sidis will find the horses of good mettle and capable. Have I now your leave to go, oh Sidis? It is desirable that I join the beaters."

Aylmer made a curt motion of consent and looked round, with a tinge of impatience, for his companion. Rattier was daintily flicking a crumb or two from his khaki tunic and flapping his handkerchief at the dust on his overalls. He mounted, at last, with a self-satisfied little shrug.

He was prepared to meet the world's criticism, or this, at any rate, was the implication his shoulders conveyed.

With an air that was deferential without being obsequious the Moor handed each rider a long "under-arm" spear. The next instant they had disappeared down the ragged track through the mimosa at a gallop.

As they emerged into the open plain beyond the stretch of forest land, the yells in the jungle combined into a stentorian chorus. The hidden men shrieked, hollaed, rattled their staves, and in one or two instances performed excited fantasias with empty sardine tins. Up on the slope a furlong or two above Aylmer and his companion, a woman came suddenly into view, riding a dappled gray, and waving a handkerchief.

They turned towards her as another rider, as yet unseen, cantered round a thicket of broom in the same direction.

The handkerchief was waved excitedly and the canter became a gallop.

The mimosa crashed; the sun-dried lop of wild olive was splintered.

Something dark, unwieldy, menacing, burst out of the undergrowth with a speed which seemed preposterously out of proportion to its bulk. It fled across the interval of sand which lay between the strip of forest behind it and the one from which Aylmer and Rattier had just emerged. Emotion perforated the latter's imperturbability. Speech escaped him.

"But this is a monster!" he exclaimed. "The near relation of a hippopotamus!"

The boar may have heard and certainly seemed to resent the criticism. He jinked, wheeled from the direction which would have taken him slantingly towards the other rider, and charged the commandant. Nothing daunted, the latter lowered his spear and galloped steadily forward.

He did not attempt to lessen his speed to receive the shock. Had his skill, indeed, been equal to his spirit, the result would never have been in doubt. But he held his spear at a "dropping" angle, which discounted the force of speed behind it. The point, instead of meeting the boar's chest in a line almost parallel with the ground, grazed his jaw, brushed past his shoulder, and cut a shallow groove in his quarter.

It turned the charge, but not far enough. The wicked eight-inch tusks flashed out in pa.s.sing and gashed the horse's pastern. The gallop slowed into a canter, blundered into a trot, and became a halting limp.

The boar jinked again and Aylmer spurred in pursuit, hearing the hoofs of his rival's horse thundering jealously behind. He increased his speed, diminished the distance yard by yard, lowered his spear, thrust, and was nearly spilled from the saddle. With incredible quickness the huge body had wheeled again as if on a pivot.

The pursuers made a chorus of their vexation. Their impetuosity carried them a full forty yards past the line of the boar's retreat. They reined in jerkily, and turned to see their quarry in full retreat up the hill.

By good horsemans.h.i.+p Aylmer maintained and increased his lead, but without much hope of overhauling the chase before the thicket gave it shelter. The mimosa covert was a bare two furlongs distant. The only chance lay in the boar being headed, and all the spears were, apparently, behind it. There remained nothing to do but to ride and ride hard.

His horse responded bravely to the touch of the spur but the sand was loose and deep. He decreased very slightly the distance between pursuer and pursued, faltered once or twice, and began to show distress in his breathing. Aylmer told himself that, for the moment, the game was up.

And then, with a whirl of flying drapery and gesticulating arms, a new rider shot into view on the brow of the slope. Absalaam, calling down innumerable maledictions upon the ancestry of all jungle pigs, galloped a tent pony between the boar and his refuge.

His tactics were successful, but not in the direction which he had desired. The brute wheeled, not down-hill towards the other riders, but slanting back and still upwards in the direction of Awara and the camp.

As Aylmer swerved to follow, a cry startled him. He was suddenly aware that the lady in white was riding slightly behind, but almost abreast of him. She was swathed in a sand veil, but her eyes were uncovered and the expression in them was arresting. She was staring up the hill. Her glance told of anxiety, or even horror.

He followed the direction of her gaze.

Two figures appeared, both exactly in the line of the hunt. One, also white clad, and running with uncertain feet, was evidently a child--a boy of six or seven years. He had distanced his pursuer, a fat and middle-aged Moor, who was menacing him with gesticulations of wrath and at the same time emitting supplicating cries. The youngster answered him with triumphant little jeers, and continued his escape. At the same moment both of them saw the approaching danger.

The child halted, hesitated, and seemed to debate upon his action. Not so the Moor. With a howl of dismay he fled towards the undergrowth, his yellow slippers twinkling against the dun background of the sand. And he continued to yell with whole-hearted despair; he woke the echoes with his shrieks.