The People of the Mist by H. Rider Haggard (christmas read aloud .txt) 📗
- Author: H. Rider Haggard
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“Now, Shepherdess, take your choice. As you know well, I have loved you from a babe and I love you yet, though you have scorned me for this man’s sake. Take your choice, I say; cling to me and trust me, giving the Deliverer to the priests, and I will save you. Cling to him, and I will bring shame and death upon you all, for my love shall turn to hate.”
At this juncture Leonard quietly drew his revolver, though at the time nobody noticed it except Francisco. Indeed by now Juanna was almost as angry as Soa herself.
“How dare you speak to me thus?” she said, stamping her foot, “you whom from a child I have thought good and have trusted. What do you say? That I must give him who saved me from death over to death, in order that I may buy back your love and protect myself. You evil woman, I tell you that first I will die as I would have died yonder in the slave camp,” and she ceased, for her indignation was too great to allow her to say more.
“So be it, Shepherdess,” said Soa solemnly, “I hear you. It was to be expected that you would prefer him whom you love to her who loves you. Yet, Shepherdess, was it not I after all who saved you yonder in the slave camp? Doubtless I dream, but it seems to me that when those men who are dead deserted you, running this way and that in their fear—and, Shepherdess, it is for this that I am glad they are dead, and lifted no hand to save them—I followed you alone. It seems to me that, having followed you far till I could walk no more for hunger and weariness, I used my wit and bribed a certain white man, of the sort who would sell their sisters and blaspheme their mothers for a reward, to attempt your rescue.
“I bribed him with a gem of great price—had there been ten of them, that gem would have bought them all—and with the gem I told him the secret of the treasure which is here. He took the bribe, and being brave and desperate, he drew you out of the clutches of the Yellow Devil, though in that matter also I had some part; and then you loved him. Ah! could I have foreseen it, Shepherdess, I had left you to die in the slave camp, for then you had died loving me who now hate me and cast me off for the sake of this white thief.”
Leonard could bear it no longer, and in the interests of their common safety he came to a desperate resolve. With an exclamation, he lifted the pistol and covered Soa. Both Francisco and Juanna saw the act and sprang to him, the latter exclaiming, “Oh! what are you going to do?”
“I propose to kill this woman before she kills us, that is all,” he answered coldly.
“No! no!” cried Juanna, “she has been faithful to me for many years. I cannot see her shot.”
“Let the butcher do his work,” mocked Soa; “it shall avail him little. Doubtless he is angry because I have spoken the truth about him,” and she folded her arms upon her breast, awaiting the bullet.
“What is to be done?” said Leonard desperately. “If I do not shoot her, she will certainly betray us.”
“Then let her betray,” said Francisco; “it is written that you shall do no murder.”
“If you fear to shoot a woman, send for your black dog, White Man,” mocked Soa. “He would have killed my father, and doubtless this task also will be to his liking.”
“I can’t do it. Get a rope and tie her up, Francisco,” said Leonard. “We must watch her day and night; it will be a pleasant addition to our occupations. After all it is only one more risk, which is no great matter among so many. I fancy the game is about played out, anyhow.”
Francisco went for the rope and presently returned accompanied by Otter. A month of furious dissipation had left its mark even on the dwarf’s iron frame. His bright black eyes were bloodshot and unsteady, his hand shook, and he did not walk altogether straight.
“You have been drinking again, you sot,” said Leonard. “Go back to your drink; we are in sorrow here and want no drunkards in our company. Now then, Francisco, give me that rope.”
“Yes, Baas, I have been drinking,” answered the dwarf humbly; “it is well to drink before one dies, since we may not drink afterwards and I think that the hour of death is at hand. Oh! Shepherdess of the heavens, they said down yonder at the Settlement that you were a great rain-maker: now if you can make the rain to fall, can you not make the sun to shine? Wind and water are all very well, but we have too much of them here.”
“Hearken,” said Leonard, “while you revelled, the last of Mavoom’s men vanished, and these are left in their place,” and he pointed to the knives.
“Is it so, Baas?” answered Otter with a hiccough. “Well, they were a poor lot, and we shall not miss them. And yet I wish I were a man again and had my hands on the throat of that wizard Nam. Wow! but I would squeeze it.”
“It is your throat that will be squeezed soon, Otter,” said Leonard. “Look here, god or no god, get you sober or I will beat you.”
“I am sober, Baas, I am indeed. Last night I was drunk, to-day nothing is left but a pain here,” and he tapped his great head. “Why are you tying up that old cow Soa, Baas?”
“Because she threatens to use her horns, Otter. She says that she will betray us all.”
“Indeed, Baas! Well, it is in my mind that she has betrayed us already. Why do you not kill her and have done?”
“Because the Shepherdess here will have none of it,” answered Leonard; “also I do not like the task.”
“I will kill her if you wish, Baas,” said Otter with another hiccough. “She is wicked, let her die.”
“I have told you that the Shepherdess will have none of it. Listen: we must watch this woman; we will guard her to-day and you must take your turn to-night—it will keep you from your drink.”
“Yes, Baas, I will watch, though it would be better to kill her at once, for thus we should be spared trouble.”
Then they bound Soa securely and set her in a corner of the throne chamber, and all that day Leonard and Francisco mounted guard over her alternately. She made no resistance and said nothing; indeed it seemed as if a certain lassitude had followed her outbreak of rage, for she leaned her head back and slept, or made pretence to sleep.
The day passed uneventfully. Olfan visited them as usual, and told them that the excitement grew in the city. Indeed the unprecedented prolongation of the cold weather was driving the people into a state of superstitious fury that must soon express itself in violence of one form or another, and the priests were doing everything in their power to foment the trouble. No immediate danger was to be apprehended, however.
After sundown Leonard and Francisco went out into the courtyard to inspect the weather according to their custom. There was no sign of a change; the wind blew as bitterly as ever from the mountains, the sky was ashen, and the stars seemed far off and cold.
“Will it never break?” said Leonard with a sigh, and re-entered the palace, followed by Francisco.
Then, having solemnly cautioned Otter to keep a strict guard over Soa, they wrapped themselves up in their blankets in order to get some rest, which both of them needed sadly. Juanna had retired already, laying herself to sleep immediately on the other side of the curtain, for she feared to be alone; indeed they could see the tips of her fingers appearing beneath the bottom of the curtain.
Very soon they were asleep, for even terror must yield at last to the necessities of rest, and a dense silence reigned over the palace, broken only by the tramp of the sentries without.
Once Leonard opened his eyes, hearing something move, and instantly stretched out his hand to assure himself of Juanna’s safety. She was there, for in her sleep her fingers closed instinctively upon his own. Then he turned round and saw what had disturbed him. In the doorway of the chamber stood the bride of the Snake, Saga, a lighted torch in one hand and a gourd in the other, and very picturesque that handsome young woman looked with her noble figure illumined by the glare of the torchlight.
“What is the matter?” said Leonard.
“It is all right, Baas,” answered Otter; “the old woman here is as safe as a stone statue yonder and quite as quiet. Saga brings me some water, that is all. I bade her do so because of the fire that rages inside me and the pain in my head. Fear not, Baas, I do not drink beer when I am on guard.”
“Beer or water, I wish you would keep your wife at a distance,” answered Leonard; “come, tell her to be off.”
Then he looked at his watch, the hands of which he could just distinguish by the distant glare of the torch, and went to sleep again. This took place at ten minutes past eleven. When he awoke again dawn was breaking and Otter was calling to him in a loud, hoarse voice.
“Baas,” he said, “come here, Baas.”
Leonard jumped up and ran to him, to find the dwarf on his feet and staring vacantly at the wall against which Soa had been sitting. She was gone, but there on the floor lay the ropes with which she had been tied.
Leonard sprang at Otter and seized him by the shoulders.
“Wretched man!” he cried, “you have been sleeping, and now she has escaped and we are lost.”
“Yes, Baas, I have been sleeping. Kill me if you wish, for I deserve it. And yet, Baas, never was I more wide-awake in my life until I drank that water. I am not wont to sleep on guard, Baas.”
“Otter,” said Leonard, “that wife of yours has drugged you.”
“It may be so, Baas. At least the woman has gone, and, say, whither has she gone?”
“To Nam, her father,” answered Leonard.
FATHER AND DAUGHTER
While Leonard and Otter spoke thus in their amazement, had they but known it, a still more interesting conversation was being carried on some three hundred yards away. Its scene was a secret chamber hollowed in the thickness of the temple wall, and the dramatis personae consisted of Nam, the high priest, Soa, Juanna’s servant, and Saga, wife of the Snake.
Nam was an early riser, perhaps because his conscience would not allow him to sleep, or because on this occasion he had business of importance to attend to. At any rate, on the morning in question, long before the break of dawn, he was seated in his little room alone, musing; and indeed his thoughts gave him much food for reflection. As has been said, he was a very aged man, and whatever may have been his faults, at least he was earnestly desirous of carrying on the worship of the gods according to the strict letter of the customs which had descended to him from his forefathers, and which he himself had followed all his life. In truth, from long consideration of them, their attributes, and the traditions concerning them, Nam had come to believe in the actual existence of these gods, although the belief was a qualified one and somewhat half-hearted. Or, to put it less strongly, he had never allowed his mind to entertain active doubt of the spiritual beings whose earthly worship was so powerful a factor in his own material rule and prosperity, and in that of his class. In its issues this half-faith of his had been sufficiently real to induce him to accept Otter and Juanna when they arrived mysteriously in the land.
It had been prophesied that they should arrive thus—that was a fact; and their outward appearance exactly fitted every detail of the prophecy—that was another fact; and these two facts together seemed to point to a conclusion so irresistible that, shrewd and experienced as he was, Nam was unable to set it down to mere coincidence. Therefore in the first rush of his religious enthusiasm he had accorded a hearty welcome to the
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