The Blue Raider Part 8

Haan grunted, and changed the subject by suggesting that they should take turns in watching through the remaining hours of the night. They were not near a village, he thought, but it was as well to adopt precautions in a land where enemies might lurk in every bush. Trentham proposed that the seamen, having loads to carry, should be let off, and it was in fact arranged that the guard should be shared by Hoole, Haan, and himself. Each would have about an hour's duty.

They were not disturbed. As soon as dawn streaked the sky they were afoot. Haan, after a preliminary scanning of the sea and as much of the coastline as was visible, plunged among the trees, followed in single file by the rest. Birds chattered with shrill cries from tree and bush, and in the half light shadowy forms darted up the trunks. Under foot all was damp; moisture dripped from every leaf, and the air was full of the odour of rotting vegetation.

'Hadn't we better stick to the cliff?' asked Trentham, dismayed at the prospect of hours of toilsome march in such an atmosphere and with twining plants clogging their steps.

'De coast winds--we save miles and miles,' said Haan briefly.

Trentham could only defer to his guide's judgment, but he felt anxious, ill at ease. He took little heed of the strange scenes through which he was pa.s.sing--the graceful palms, the fantastic screw pines, trees propped on aerial roots, trees surrounded by natural b.u.t.tresses springing from the trunk twenty feet above the ground. He had no eye for the orchids festooned from tree to tree, or the gorgeous blooms that hung from branches high above his head. Many-hued parrots, white c.o.c.katoos, birds of paradise, tree kangaroos, all were barely noticed, so much preoccupied was he with troublous thought. How could Haan find his way through the trackless forest? What defence had they against the natives whom they were sure to meet sooner or later? Could they survive a week's travelling and camping in an atmosphere so fetid and unhealthy?

But he kept his thoughts to himself, and even gave a rea.s.suring nod to Grinson, when the boatswain murmured that he saw no sign of food.

'Mr. Haan told us he had been in these parts before,' he said. 'We must trust him.'

As they penetrated deeper into the forest the undergrowth became more and more dense, and the order of their going was sometimes altered, each seeking his own path. It usually happened that Haan a.s.sumed his place as leader very quickly; but once, when Trentham and Hoole together had forced their way through a ma.s.s of tangled vegetation, they found that they had lost touch with him. To their surprise, they had emerged into a comparatively clear s.p.a.ce, beyond which they caught sight of the sea, a dark motionless plain under a leaden sky. The beach was hidden from them, but in front and to the left stretched the rugged contours of the cliffs, while to the right, behind the trees, rose the tops of lofty hills.

They were about to call for Haan, when Hoole's eye was arrested by a cloud of smoke rising from beyond the edge of the cliff.

'By gum, Trentham!' he exclaimed. 'Is there a steamer below there?

Let's have a look!'

They went a few paces forward, and had just caught sight of a number of dark figures moving up and down what appeared to be a steep slope, perhaps a mile away, near the cloud, when Haan came panting up behind them, and unceremoniously pulled them back.

'Shust in time!' he said in a husky whisper, rapidly, with every sign of agitation. 'Vy--vy--vy did you leave me? You vill ruin every zing!'

'Sorry!' said Trentham, as the man continued to draw them back. 'What's the matter?'

'Shust in time!' repeated the Dutchman, as if to himself; then, aloud, and with his former slow, careful utterance: 'Dere, between us and dat place, is de village of dose n.i.g.g.e.rs what capture me.'

'That accounts for the smoke,' remarked Hoole. 'We 've escaped making a bad bloomer, seemingly.'

'My word, shust in time!' said Haan. 'If I had not come! Dose n.i.g.g.e.rs--you saw dem--wild men, noding can tame dem, cannibals, ferocious--if dey had seen us, dere would soon be noding of us but our bones. Never, never leave me again!'

'It was quite accidental, Mr. Haan,' said Trentham. 'The bush was so thick----'

'Yes, yes,' said the man impatiently, 'but we gain no time going separate. I lead, you follow--remember dat!'

Trentham was inclined to resent a certain peremptoriness in the Dutchman's tone, but, catching Hoole's eye, he held his peace.

'He 's a bit unstrung,' whispered Hoole, as they returned to the spot where Haan had left the seamen, 'and I don't wonder. He doesn't want to fall into their clutches a second time.'

Haan quickly recovered his equanimity, and for nearly two hours they plodded on through the forest, keeping, apparently, the coast behind them. Then suddenly, through a break in the trees, the expected landmark loomed up on their left hand.

'Dat is Mushroom Hill,' said Haan. 'We now go quicker. We go round de hill on de north side, and go quicker still--and safer. De n.i.g.g.e.rs on de oder side are not so fierce; dey do not eat men. Why? Dey are nearer Friedrich Wilhelmshafen, and dey have felt de weight of de German hand.'

'Poor devils!' said Trentham involuntarily, and surprised a strange look that gleamed for an instant in the Dutchman's eyes.

'Say, how far away is that hill of yours, Mr. Haan?' asked Hoole.

'Forty miles. We take dree days.'

'Well, I guess we 'll take a little food first. We shall have to rely on our biscuits; we haven't happened on any orchards yet.'

'Plenty bread-fruit yonder,' said Haan, waving his arm towards the hill, 'and coco-palms, and pawpaws. Yes, we eat our lunch and rest. De sun is bursting drough; it will be very hot. Last night we sleep little. A nap--forty vinks you call it--will refresh us, den we go stronger.'

'A capital idea!' said Trentham. 'I say, Mr. Haan, it was lucky you found us when you did.'

'Yes,' said Haan drily. 'But we must still be on guard. We must not all sleep togeder.'

'Of course not. We 'll take turns again--we three. Let the men off.

They have the hardest job, though their loads will be lighter when we start again. I 'll take first watch, then you, Hoole. Mr. Haan must be more tired than we two.'

'It is no matter,' remarked Haan, 'and I am used to a hard life. I can stand fatigue better than you two young gentlemen. But certainly I can sleep wid pleasure. Two hours--dat will give forty minutes each. Yes; and I haf no watch; de n.i.g.g.e.rs strip off my coat. You wake me, Mr.

Hoole, and lend me your watch, so I wake you; and I give you no more dan forty minutes--not one second.'

He laughed in a clumsily roguish way. They cleared a s.p.a.ce and sat down to their meal of biscuits and water. Haan was the first to throw himself on his back, his bald head shaded by the spreading candelabra-like branches of a screw pine. The rest were not slaw to follow his example, except Trentham, who sat on the keg, and lit a cigarette to keep himself awake.

Eighty minutes later Hoole, having completed his spell of watching, touched Haan lightly on the shoulder. The man did not stir. He tickled his ear with a spray of some feathery plant; Haan slept on.

'I 'll give him another five minutes,' thought Hoole, yawning.

At the end of that time, by dint of poking Haan in the ribs and pinching his nose, he succeeded in waking the Dutchman.

'Awfully sorry!' he said, 'but I can scarcely keep my eyes open. Here 's my watch; be sure and not let me oversleep.'

Haan got up. His movements were slow and clumsy, but his eyes were keen and alert.

'Forty minutes, Mr. Hoole,' he said with a smile. 'Not a second more.'

He did not sit on the keg as Hoole and Trentham had done, but posted himself a few paces from the rest of the party, at a spot where the ground rose slightly. Hoole, just before he closed his eyes, saw the stout figure pacing slowly up and down.

Rather more than two hours afterwards Meek, in his sleep, threw out his left leg, and dealt Grinson, who lay at his side, a smart kick on the s.h.i.+n.

'Belay, there!' shouted Grinson, starting up. 'What swab--what dirty lubber----'

''Twas a nightmare, Mr. Grinson,' said Meek penitently. 'I dreamt as a kangaroo was a-coming to peck me, and----'

'Peck you! A goose might----'

He paused and looked around. Hoole and Trentham were a few yards away, fast asleep. Haan was not in sight.

'Whose watch is this, Ephraim?' asked Grinson.

'I can't rightly say, but seeing as the two gentlemen be asleep, I can't help thinking 'tis the Dutchman's.'

Grinson got up.

'If so be he was a landsman,' he said, 'he might be doing a beat like a bobby; but a seaman ought to know better.'