In Desert and Wilderness

XII

Stas did not start for Linde's camp the following day until noon, for he had to rest after the previous night's adventure. On the way, anticipating that the sick man might need fresh meat, he killed two guinea-fowl, which were really accepted with gratitude. Linde was very weak but fully conscious. Immediately after the greeting he inquired about Nell, after which he warned Stas that he should not regard quinine as an entirely sure cure for the fever and that he should guard the little one from the sun, from getting wet, from staying during the night in low and damp places, and finally from bad water. Afterwards Stas related to him, at his request, his own and Nell's history from the beginning to the arrival in Khartûm and the visit to the Mahdi; and afterwards from Fashoda to their liberation from Gebhr's hands, and their further wanderings. The Swiss gazed during the time of this narration with growing interest, often with evident admiration, and when the narrative reached an end he lit his pipe, surveyed Stas from head to foot, and said as if in a reverie:

"If in your country there are many boys like you, then they will not be able to manage you very easily."

And after a moment of silence he continued:

"The best proof of the truth of your words is this, that you are here, that you are standing before me. And believe what I tell you: your situation is terrible; the road, in any direction, is likewise terrible; who knows, however, whether such a boy as you will not save yourself and that child from this gulf."

"If Nell only will be well, then I shall do whatever I can," exclaimed Stas.

"But spare yourself, for the task which you have before you is beyond the strength of a mature person. Do you know where you are at present?"

"No, I remember that after our departure from Fashoda we crossed, near a great settlement called Deng, some kind of a river."

"Sobat," interrupted Linde.

"In Deng there were quite a number of dervishes and negroes. But beyond Sobat we entered into a region of jungles and proceeded whole weeks until we reached the ravine, in which you know what happened – "

"I know. Afterwards you went along the ravine until you reached this river. Now listen to me; it appears that after crossing the Sobat with the Sudânese you turned to the southeast, but more to the south. You are at present in a locality unknown to travelers and geographers. The river, near which we are at present, runs northwest, and in all probability falls into the Nile. I say in all probability, for I myself do not know and now cannot satisfy myself upon that point, though I turned from the Karamojo Mountains to investigate its source. After the battle, I heard from the dervish prisoners that it is called Ogeloguen, but even they were not certain, as they venture into this region only for slaves. The Shilluk tribe occupy this generally sparsely settled country, but at present the region is desolate, as the population partly died of smallpox, partly was swept away by the Mahdists, and partly sought refuge in the Karamojo Mountains. In Africa it often happens that a region thickly settled to-day becomes desolate to-morrow. According to my calculations you are a hundred and eighty-six miles, more or less, from Lado. You might escape to the south to Emin, but as Emin himself is in all probability besieged by the dervishes, that is not to be thought of."

"And to Abyssinia?" Stas asked.

"That is also about the same distance away. Yet you must bear in mind that the Mahdi is waging war against the whole world and, therefore, against Abyssinia. I know also from the prisoners that along the western and southern frontiers greater or smaller hordes of dervishes are prowling and you might therefore easily fall into their hands. Abyssinia indeed is a Christian empire, but the savage southern tribes are either pagan or profess Islam and for that reason secretly favor the Mahdi, – No, you will not get through that way."

"Well, what am I to do, and where shall I go with Nell?" Stas asked.

"I told you that your situation is extremely difficult," Linde said.

Saying this he put both hands to his head and for a long time lay in silence.

"The ocean," he finally said, "is over five hundred and sixty miles from here; you would have to cross mountains, go among savage peoples, and even pass over deserts, for it is probable that there are waterless localities. But the country nominally belongs to England. You might chance upon transports of ivory to Kismayu, to Lamu and Mombasa – perhaps upon missionary expeditions. Realizing that on account of the dervishes I would not be able to explore the course of this river because it turns to the Nile, I, too, wanted to go eastward to the ocean."

"Then we shall return together," Stas exclaimed.

"I shall never return. The wart-hog has so badly torn my muscles and veins that an infection of the blood must set in. Only a surgeon could save me by amputating my leg. Now everything has coagulated and become numb, but during the first days I bit my hands from pain – "

"You surely will get well."

"No, my brave lad, I surely will die and you will cover me well with stones, so that the hyenas cannot dig me out. To the dead it may be all the same, but during life it is unpleasant to think of it. It is hard to die so far away from your own – "

Here his eyes were dimmed as though with a mist, after which he continued thus:

"But I already have become resigned to the idea – so let us speak about you, not about me. I will give you this advice. There remains for you only the road to the east, to the ocean. But take a good rest before starting and gain strength, otherwise your little companion will die in the course of a few weeks. Postpone the journey until the end of the rainy season, and even longer. The first summer months, when the rain ceases to fall and the water still covers the marshes, are the healthiest. Here, where we are, is a plateau lying about twenty-two hundred and eighty-nine feet above the sea. At the height of forty-two hundred and fifty feet the fever does not exist and when brought from the lower places its course is weaker. Take the little English girl up into the mountains."

Talking apparently fatigued him very much, so he again broke off and for some time impatiently brushed away the big blue flies; the same kind as those which Stas saw among the burnt débris of Fashoda.

After this he continued thus:

"Pay close attention to what I tell you. About a day's journey towards the south there is an isolated mountain, not higher than twenty-six hundred and twenty feet; it looks like a pan turned upside down. Its sides are steep, and the only way of reaching it is by a rocky ridge so narrow that in some places two horses can barely proceed on it side by side. On its flat top, which is about thirty-five hundred feet wide, there was a negro village, but the Mahdists slaughtered and carried away the residents. It may be that this was done by that same Smain whom I defeated, but those slaves I did not capture because he had previously despatched them under an escort to the Nile. Settle on that mountain. There is a spring of excellent water, a few manioc fields, and a multitude of bananas. In the huts you will find a great many human bones, but do not fear infection from the corpses, as after the dervishes there were ants there, which drove us from the place. And now, not a living creature! Remain in that village a month or two. At such a height there is no fever. Nights are cool. There your little one will recover her health, and you will gain new strength."

"And what am I to do afterwards, and where shall I go?"

"After that it will be as God disposes. Try to get through to Abyssinia in places situated farther than where the dervishes have reached, or ride to the east – I heard that the coast Arabs are reaching some kind of lake in their search for ivory which they purchase from the Samburu and Wahima tribes."

"Wahima? Kali comes from the Wahima tribe."

Here Stas began to narrate to Linde the manner in which he inherited Kali after Gebhr's death and that Kali had told him that he was the son of the ruler of all the Wahimas.

But Linde received this information more indifferently than Stas expected.

"So much the better," he said, "as he may be helpful to you. Among the blacks there are honest souls, though as a rule you cannot depend upon their gratitude; they are children who forget what happened the day before."

"Kali will not forget that I rescued him from Gebhr's hands, I am sure of that."

"Perhaps," Linde said, and pointing at Nasibu added: "He also is a good child; take him with you after my death."

"Do not speak of death, sir."

"My dear boy," answered the Swiss, "I desire it – if it would only come without great agony; consider that now I am completely unarmed, and if any one of the Mahdists whom I routed should accidentally stray to this hollow, alone he could stab me like a sheep."

Here he pointed to the sleeping negroes.

"They will not wake any more, or rather – I speak incorrectly – all of them awake for a short time before their death and in their mental aberration fly to the jungle, from which they never more return. Of two hundred men, sixty remained to me. Many ran away, many died of smallpox, and some fell asleep in other ravines."

Stas with pity and awe began to gaze at the sleepers. Their bodies were ashen-hued, which in negroes indicates paleness. Some had their eyes closed, others half open; but these latter slept deeply, for their eyeballs were not susceptible to the light. The knees of some were swollen. All were frightfully thin, so that their ribs could be counted through their skins. Their hands and feet quivered without cessation very rapidly. The big blue flies swarmed thickly on their eyes and lips.

"Is there no help for them?" Stas asked.

"There is none. On Victoria Nyanza this disease depopulates whole villages. Sometimes more severely, sometimes less. It most frequently takes hold of the people of the villages situated in the underwood on the banks."

The sun had passed to the western sky, but still before night Linde had related to Stas his history. He was a son of a merchant of Zurich. His family came from Karlsruhe, but from the year 1848 had resided in Switzerland. His father amassed a great fortune in the silk trade. He educated his son for an engineer, but young Henry was attracted from early youth by travel. After completing his studies in a polytechnical school, having inherited his father's entire fortune, he undertook his first journey to Egypt. It was before the Mahdi's time, so he reached as far as Khartûm, and hunted with Dongolese in the Sudân. After that he devoted himself to the geography of Africa and acquired such an expert knowledge of it that many geographical societies enrolled him among their members. This last journey, which was to end so disastrously for him, began in Zanzibar. He had reached as far as the Great Lakes and intended to penetrate into Abyssinia along the Karamojo Mountains, which up to that time were unknown, and from there to proceed to the ocean coast. But the natives of Zanzibar refused to go any farther. Fortunately, or unfortunately, there was a war between the kings of Uganda and Unyoro. Linde rendered important services to the king of Uganda, who in exchange for them presented him with over two hundred bodyguards. This greatly facilitated the journey and the visit to the Karamojo Mountains, but afterwards smallpox appeared in the ranks, after that the dreadful sleeping sickness, and finally the wreck of the caravan.

Linde possessed considerable supplies of various kinds of preserved food, but from fear of the scurvy he hunted every day for fresh meat. He was an excellent shot but not a sufficiently careful sportsman, and it happened that when a few days before he thoughtlessly drew near a wild boar which had fallen from his shot, the beast started up and tore his legs frightfully, and afterwards trampled upon his loins. This happened near the camp and in the sight of Nasibu, who, tearing his shirt and making bandages of it, was able to check the flow of blood and lead the wounded man to the tent. In the foot, however, coagulum was formed from the internal flow of blood and gangrene threatened the patient.

Stas insisted upon dressing his wounds and announced that he would come daily, or, so as not to leave Nell only under the care of the two blacks, he proposed to convey him to "Cracow," on saddle-cloth, stretched between two horses.

Linde agreed to the dressing of the wounds, but would not agree to the removal.

"I know," he said, pointing at the negroes, "that those men must die, but until they die, I cannot doom them to be torn to pieces alive by hyenas, which during the night-time are held back by the fire."

And he began to repeat feverishly:

"I cannot! I cannot! I cannot!"

But he became calm immediately, and continued in a strange voice:

"Come here to-morrow morning – I have a request to make of you, and if you can perform it, God may lead you out of this African gulf, and grant me an easy death. I wished to postpone this request until to-morrow, but as I may be unconscious to-morrow I make it to-day. Take water in some utensil, stop before each one of those poor sleeping fellows, sprinkle water over him, and say these words: 'I baptize thee, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost!'"

Here emotion checked his speech and he became silent.

"I reproach myself," he said after a while, "that I did not take leave in that manner of those who died of small-pox and of those who fell into their final slumber. But now death is hovering over me, and I desire to go together with even that remnant of my caravan upon the last great journey."

Saying this he pointed with his hand at the ruddy sky, and two tears coursed slowly over his cheeks.

Stas wept like a beaver.

XIII

The next morning's sun illuminated a strange spectacle. Stas walked along the rocky walls, stopped before each negro, moistened his forehead with water, and pronounced over him the sacramental words. And they slept with quivering hands and limbs, with heads drooping on their breasts or tilted upwards, still alive but already resembling corpses. And thus took place this baptism of the sleepers – in the morning stillness, in the luster of the sun, in the desert gloom. The sky that day was cloudless, a grayish blue, and as though sad.

Linde was still conscious, but grew weaker and weaker. After the wounds were dressed, he handed to Stas papers enclosed in a tin case, entrusted them to his care, and said nothing more. He could not eat, but thirst tormented him terribly. Before sunset he became delirious. He shouted at some imaginary children not to sail too far away on some unknown lake, and afterwards fell into chills, and clasped his head with both hands.

On the following day he did not recognize Stas at all, and at noon, three days later, he died without recovering consciousness. Stas mourned for him sincerely, and afterwards with Kali carried him to a neighboring narrow cave, the opening of which they closed with thorns and stones.

Stas took little Nasibu to "Cracow," while Kali was ordered to watch the supplies at the camp and keep a big fire burning near the sleepers. Stas bustled continually between the two ravines, conveying luggage and particularly the rifle cartridges, from which he extracted powder and made a mine for the purpose of blasting the rock which imprisoned the King. Happily Nell's health improved considerably after daily doses of quinine, and the greater variety of food increased her strength. Stas left her reluctantly and with fear, and on riding away would not permit her to leave the tree and closed the opening with thorny acacia boughs. Owing to the pressure of work which devolved upon him, he had to leave her, however, to the care of Mea, Nasibu, and Saba, upon whom after all he depended the most. Rather than to leave her alone for any length of time, he preferred to ride a score of times each day to Linde's camp for the luggage. He also overworked himself terribly, but his iron constitution endured all toil. Nevertheless, not until the tenth day were all the packs distributed; those of less value were hidden in caves, and those of more importance were brought to "Cracow"; the horses, too, were led onto the promontory and a considerable number of Remington rifles were carried by them, which rifles were to be borne later by the King.