The Red Derelict

The other laughed harshly.

“That’s near enough,” he said. “Let me tell you this, then. You’re among the most devilish set of cannibal niggers this world ever produced. You’d have been eaten body and bones before this if – it hadn’t been for me.”

“In that case I cannot be too grateful for your interference; and, as a fellow-countryman, I am going to make further demands upon your kindness by entreating you to show me the way out, to facilitate my return to civilisation. And, I assure you, you will not find me ungrateful.”

These last words he pronounced with some diffidence. In the man’s very ferocity of roughness Wagram’s ear had not been slow to detect a refined accent of speech. Whatever the other might have come to he was certain that he was of gentle birth, and therefore hesitated to offer him material reward. The next words convinced him that he need have felt no such misgiving.

“What’ll you make it worth my while to land you – say at Sierra Leone, this day month?”

“Anything in reason. You shall name your own price.”

“Suppose I say ten thousand pounds, not a shilling less? How’s that?”

It was an enormous sum, remembering the resources probably at the stranger’s command; yet if Wagram hesitated momentarily it was less on that account than because a misgiving shot across his mind that if he agreed too readily this desperado, from whom he inwardly recoiled more and more, once he had reason to believe he was dealing with a rich man, would hold him captive until he had drained him to the bottom of even his resources; so he answered:

“It’s a stiff figure – very stiff; still, I think I might even promise that.”

“You think, do you? Well, come this way.”

He turned abruptly, Wagram following. As they passed between the palmetto huts the forbidding inhabitants raised their heads to stare for a moment, then dropped them stolidly again. They walked on in dead silence, for the stranger uttered no further word. They passed into the forest, still quite close on the outskirts of the town, and came suddenly upon a strong stockade. Before the gate of this several savages stood as though mounting guard. They were fully armed with large, wicked-looking spears, axes, and great curved-bladed knives.

“I don’t allow them any rotten gaspipe guns,” said the stranger grimly; “only things they know how to use. And they do know how to use these, by God! Look there.”

Wagram looked. They had reached the gate by this time. Within the enclosure were clustered a number of human beings chained together in couples by the leg. The place was in a state of indescribable filth, and the personal appearance of its occupants recalled to Wagram that of the wretched victim of yesterday.

“Prisoners?” he said.

The other nodded, then led the way on again. Soon a hum of voices greeted Wagram’s ears, and at the same time a horrible acrid odour assailed his nostrils.

“Takes a little getting used to, doesn’t it?” said his guide. “Look!”

Wagram looked, and then felt as if he must be sick. They had reached an open space; in it several men were at work – at work on the most congenial occupation of all to savages – that of butchery.

“This is their slaughter-house,” went on the stranger. “What’s the matter?”

For, with an exclamation of horror and disgust, Wagram had turned away, had turned his back upon what he had momentarily glimpsed. No mere glimpse of an ordinary slaughter-house had this been, repulsive and revolting as such a sight might be. In this case the victims were human.

“Good heavens!” he ejaculated, glaring at the other with loathing. “And you allow this – you – a white man?”

“I’m not going to interfere with the harmless little customs of my people – not likely,” was the reply, accompanied by a hideous laugh. “Well, if it’s too much for your weak nerves, come away. But – what do you say to my offer now?”

“I’ll take it. I don’t care how soon I leave this place; in fact, I’ll even increase the figure if you get me out at once.”

“I thought so. Well, it’ll be worth your while. You may take that from me – and the sooner the better. Shall we say fifteen thousand if you start to-morrow?”

“Yes; but you know you will have to trust me. I have no means of identification nearer than England.”

The other nodded.

“Seems strange, doesn’t it?” he said, “but I felt I could do that from the very first. I’ve had no fool of an experience in my time, you see, and I know one man from another when I see him. Now, I knew you weren’t a liar directly I clapped eyes on you; I knew, too, you were a coiny chap, never mind how – there’s something I can read these things by. See here, I don’t want to rush you through this business; think it over. I’ll look round at sundown, and then we’ll draw up our little agreement.”

This sounded well. If he were rough the man seemed not without a sense of fair dealing. Wagram was duly impressed; yet he need not have been, for the stranger’s real motive was a very different one. He had purposely taken Wagram to see one of “the sights” of the place which he knew would revolt and horrify him; now his object was to give him time to think about it; time and solitude could not fail to work the horror deeper into his system – so would his own terms meet with readier acceptation.

At the hut Wagram had occupied the stranger left him; and now, alone once more, the revulsion of feeling was well-nigh oppressive. He would soon be away from here, would soon be back in the home that he loved, and among those who loved him. This horrible experience – well, it, coming as the culminating point to his wanderings, had effected a certain sort of mental cure. Looking back, it seemed as if he had needed a mental shaking-up and – he had got it. Yes; he had been making an idol of “the pride of life,” and that pride had received a sudden, perhaps necessary, fall. What act of thanksgiving could he make for this unlooked-for deliverance? was his first thought as he found himself alone once more. The dank shades of the tropical forest, the repulsive picturesqueness of the savage town, the acrid odour of blood which still seemed to hang upon the air – all had faded now – had given way to the hawthorn hedges and running streams around Hilversea Court, as the splendid old pile arose against its background of embowering elms; the wholesome, clear English sunlight instead of the sickly tropical glare; the scent of innumerable wild flowers and the glad shout of the cuckoo, and, with it all, deeper and holier thoughts, enshrined amid the associations of the dearly-loved place; and then – he started wide awake.

“Here I am!” was saying the strong, harsh voice of the stranger. “Been asleep? Well, you’ll feel the better for it.”

“I believe I have,” said Wagram, sitting up. “Well, have you brought the draft of our agreement?”

“Ay, ay! here it is. Look through it and see if it’s all ship-shape.”

Wagram read the document carefully. It was short, even to conciseness, and set forward how the undersigned was to pay the bearer the sum of fifteen thousand pounds, within fifteen days of being landed at Sierra Leone, in consideration of having been landed there within one month from date.

“You have a code cable with your solicitors, of course?” said the stranger. “You can have the cash cabled there?”

“Yes; I have a code cable. But you say ‘the bearer.’ Why not have it paid in to your own name?”

“That’s my business,” was the answer. “For the rest, is it all ship-shape?”

“Certainly. But it’s only fair to warn you that I doubt if it’s particularly sound from a legal point of view. It isn’t witnessed, for one thing.”

“Legal point of view be damned. Didn’t I tell you you don’t look like a liar – and I know men? It’ll be good enough if you sign it.”

“Thanks,” said Wagram pleasantly. “You won’t find yourself far out in that deduction.”

“Got a wife perhaps, who’s anxious about you, eh?”

“No; I haven’t got a wife – not now.”

“Ah! had, then. Family you want to get back to?”

“Only one son – a boy at school. But he won’t have heard of the wreck, and if he did wouldn’t connect it with me fortunately. I took passage in the Baleka at the last moment, and didn’t even cable it home. By the way, some of these amiable people have relieved me of my pocket-book, and there were some notes in it. I don’t know whether they can be persuaded to disgorge.”

“Perhaps. But if we start from here to-morrow there’ll hardly be time.”

“No; I suppose not. Never mind, then,” was the easy answer, for the starting to-morrow had a soothing ring, beside which the loss was a mere trifle. But the speaker little thought how his listener had already made up his mind to have those notes in his own possession before the dawning of another day – incidentally, it might be, at the cost of a life or two.

The smoky rays of the sinking tropical sun shot in through the open doorway, illumining the gloomy interior. The stranger had brought a pen and ink with him – strange accessories of civilisation in that remote haunt of barbarous man-eaters. A wooden native stool did duty as a desk, and Wagram, squatted on the floor, proceeded to affix his signature: “Wagram Gerard Wagram.”

“Will that do?” he said, glancing up. Then he started in amazement, not undashed with alarm; for the other, who had been standing over him, emitted a sort of gasp. His face seemed to contract, then harden as he glared at the paper, then at the man who held it.

“That your name?” he said, and his voice took on a sort of growl.

“Yes; of course,” was the wondering answer.

“That’s your name – your real name?” repeated the stranger, and the growl in his voice and the stare of his eyes seemed full of menace and hate.

“Yes; that’s my name, and there it is,” answered Wagram firmly, yet not without a dire foreboding over the extraordinary effect it seemed to produce.

“Yes – of course. Ho-ho! That’s your name – Wagram Gerard Wagram! Of course it is – of course. Ho-ho!” And, snatching up the paper, the other went out of the hut, leaving behind him the echo of his mocking tones and savage, sneering laughter.

Chapter Thirty Three.

The Closed Door

The stranger walked slowly across to his own quarters in a frame of mind very unwonted with him. Something had moved him – moved him powerfully. A new vista opened before him, and what a promise of the good things of life did he behold. The past, too, came before him, but it he put aside with sneering and bitterness.

Two female slaves greeted him with subservient smiles. They were not of this race, but had been brought from much farther inland. They were much lighter in colour, physically fine symmetrical specimens, and not without good looks. Their smiles he returned with a frown that made them cower.

“No more of these,” he muttered in English, staring at them. “White – red and white – white and gold – golden hair – volumes of it – every kind. Aha! No more of this soot.”

They cowered still more before his stare, wondering which of their recent or further back delinquencies had come to his knowledge or what their fate would be. But now he ordered them to begone, and, while trying not to show their relief, they lost no time in obeying.

He got out a bottle of rum and poured out a strong, stiff measure. This he tossed off like water. The beginning of a debauch? Oh no. This man knew better than that. He was never seen intoxicated – he valued his influence too much – and were he once seen in a state of incapacity he knew full well that his influence would be gone; further, that it would not be long before his life followed. There were times, however, when he had taken enough liquor to have sent two ordinary hard-headed men to the ground, and at such times the black savages among whom he dwelt were careful to give this white savage a very wide berth indeed. That was all.

His private quarters were in no way ringed off from the rest of the town, in which was reason. No combination could thus be formed against him, or any hostile plan unknown to himself be carried out, as might be the case were he more shut away. But his huts were better and more spacious than the rest, that mostly occupied by himself attaining almost to the dignity of a bungalow – and, indeed, in such dread was this place held that his possessions were as sacred as though guarded by iron safes. For the acquisitive savage had found it unhealthy to pilfer from this his white brother. At first he had tried it. One attempt had been met by a wholly unlooked-for shot, killing the offender. On another occasion a large and heavy knife had fallen unexpectedly from nowhere, penetrating the brain of the would-be thief, with similar result. This was the more singular in that at the time of both attempts he whom they would have plundered was about fifty miles away, so that it needed not many recurrences of further disaster – in each case mysterious, and taking a varying form – to render this man’s goods absolutely safe.

The secret of the extraordinary ascendency of this white savage over the black, apart from the fact that he never interfered in the slightest degree with their manners and customs, especially when he had led them personally in some sanguinary and victorious raid, may have lain in the fact that he tolerated no opposition. If he considered his subordinate devils had a real grievance he would listen to it and redress it, and of this we have seen at least one gruesome instance. Otherwise he simply rose up and killed the offender – killed him with his own hand.

Now he went outside his house, called a name, and issued an order. In the result, about three quarters of an hour saw him in possession of Wagram’s pocket-book. This he proceeded to investigate with quite unwonted hurry. A few visiting cards and the notes Wagram had mentioned were all it contained. The latter he put aside. Cash was always – cash.

For Wagram himself another long, trying, well-nigh sleepless night was in store – a night of wearing suspense, and the certainty of a most dreadful disappointment. For he could not disguise from himself the consciousness that something had gone suddenly wrong – that the train of the negotiation had, at a certain point, left the rails – for what otherwise could be the meaning of the sudden change of tone and manner on the part of the stranger directly the agreement was completed? Had he merely been fooling him with promises of escape until he had put his name to a document binding him to pay down a very large sum? At first blush it looked like this, but further reflection served to show that, failing his own co-operation, the document was useless for the purpose of obtaining one single shilling – in a word, was utterly unnegotiable. Could it be that the man was touched in the brain, and subject to sudden and dangerous impulses – hence his unlooked-for change of manner – or was he a renegade, who had, perhaps, undergone the penalty of former crime and hated those of his own blood and colour in consequence? Anyway the whole affair was a mystery, which the morning might solve; and that it would solve it in a way that was speedily favourable to himself he devoutly hoped and prayed.

He fell into an uneasy sleep; and it seemed he had hardly done so when he was aroused by a touch. He opened his eyes, to meet those of a savage who was standing over him, and a shudder of loathing ran through him; and this not entirely due to the strong musky odour wherewith the new-comer seemed to be poisoning the air – the fact being that, since the scene he had yesterday witnessed, these were no longer human beings in his eyes but so many horrible ghouls. This one, however, beckoned him to get up and go with him.

Wagram obeyed. He had no immediate fears for his personal safety, in view of the presence of a fellow white man in that nest of demons; and as he followed his repulsive guide he glanced around upon the life of the place – the morose, evil-looking inhabitants, fiend-like with their long spikes of plaited wool sticking up from their heads, and their round, black progeny tumbling about like so many sooty imps. There was no trace of the light-hearted, careless good humour of the negro among these. He had never seen one of them laugh, for instance; and their grin had something malevolent about it – something that was more than half a snarl. Could it be that their awful unnatural appetite affected them mentally too, and that by feeding on the bodies of their fellow-demons the spirit of the latter entered into theirs? But his speculation on this head was cut short. He and his guide had arrived at a much larger hut than the others, and there, seated on a native stool in front of it, was the strange white man.

“Well, I’ve got back that pocket-book of yours,” began the latter unceremoniously. “Here it is; only I’m sorry to say the notes are no longer in it. Rum thing that these devils should have any idea of the value of money, especially paper money.”

He broke off, and emitted a shrill whistle. A slave girl appeared. A monosyllabic order, and she reappeared, bearing a bottle and two glasses.

“Have a tot,” he said. “You don’t look over-bobbish, and it’ll pick you up. None of your poisonous trade rum this, but real old Jamaica.”

“Thanks; it may. I’ve had another sleepless night, and can do with a little picking up.”

In fact, he felt the better for it. And what he was about to witness required some stimulating, for now the other uttered a loud, peremptory call.

It was answered with amazing and startling celerity. A number of spiky-haired blacks came crowding up in front of the place. Wagram, watching his strange host, saw the latter draw himself up to his full stature as, with a scowl that was perfectly demoniacal, he harangued them for some minutes, working himself up to a perfect paroxysm of fury. His eyes glared, and his deep tones took on the thunderous roar of an angry mastiff. Immediately a man was thrust to the forefront of the group. The white man walked down off his verandah and stood confronting this fellow, whose brutal face blenched and lowered before the scathing, stare. Then he seized a great spear from one of the lookers-on, and, half hurling, half stabbing, he drove the blade clean through the body of the ugly, cowering savage, who sank to the earth, pouring forth his life-blood in torrents.

Wagram felt himself growing pale. The slayer, not content with his swift and sudden vengeance, had withdrawn the formidable weapon, and, his eyes rolling and bloodshot, was brandishing it over the staring black crowd, literally foaming at the mouth as he roared forth his deep-toned imprecations. The assembly seemed turned to stone as those fierce eyes swept over it, lighting first on one and then on the other, while the great spear twirled and quivered in that sinewy grip. Each thought that he might be the next victim; and, indeed, it seemed so, for that towering form looked as though endowed with the strength and malevolence of a fiend. Then with a last fierce and frenzied shout he bade them begone, and they, for their part, did not wait to be told twice.

“What was it all about?” said Wagram, hardly able to conceal the disgust and horror which he felt.

The other turned on him his restless, bloodshot eyes. “Your lost pocket-book. It ought to have been brought to me, and wasn’t. See?”

“Good God! And you killed a man for that!” The tones of disgust and reproach seemed to sting the other.

“Killed a man for that!” he repeated with a beast-like growl. – “Rather! And I’ve killed a dozen men for far less – if you call these cannibal swine men. And I’ll do it again. No; you know, all these sickening old canting ideas you were raised in don’t count with me – not a straw. I’m God here, you understand – and I mean to be.”

“Steady. Don’t be blasphemous,” said Wagram. “Oh, it’s you who are going to give me orders, is it!” said the other, not loudly, but in a tone of deadly, quiet resentment. “Well, we shall see; and, by way of beginning, I may as well tell you I’ve changed my mind since yesterday. In a word, I’d like the pleasure of your company here a little longer.”

“But – our agreement?”

“Our agreement? Oh, here it is. That for it!” tearing in several fragments the paper he had just produced. “I don’t get the advantage of the improving society of such a good and holy man as you every day, and now I’ve got it I mean to profit by it – for a time. See?”

Wagram was simply nonplussed. What did it all mean? Was this a madman? It seemed like it. The document under which he stood to obtain a really splendid sum he had torn up in a fit of gusty rage. But the fearful look on the man’s face as he stood glaring down on him was something to reckon with – and the jeering tones. He began to conceive for him an even greater repulsion than for the black, cannibal savages themselves.

“We can easily rewrite it,” he said in a conciliatory tone. “Think again. It will be to both our interests; and if there is any service I can render you I will willingly do so.”

“Service be damned!” said the other roughly. “I rather think the boot’s on the other foot, since it entirely depends upon me, Wagram Gerard Wagram, whether you ever see home again, or furnish beefsteaks for the noble image of God you see around here. Upon me, do you hear? Upon me only.”

“Well, of course, it does,” answered Wagram, realising that the man was going through a sort of paroxysm of blind, well-nigh delirious rage. “But I should think you would hardly hand over a fellow-countryman to the mercy of a lot of cannibal savages. I have a better opinion of you than that.”

“Have you? Then keep your damned opinion for where it’s wanted. Now, come with me.”

Thinking it best to humour him Wagram did not hesitate. The other led the way through the outskirts of the town. One thing struck Wagram during their progress. The inhabitants hardly noticed them. All seemed to be hurrying towards one point. Soon the same acrid, horrible odour fell upon his nostrils as that which had sickened him on arriving at the human shambles. He stopped.

“I won’t go any further, thanks,” he said. “I don’t want to see that place again.”

“But you must,” replied the other in a tone that was perfectly fiendish in its menace. “You’ve no choice. I’m God here, remember.”

What could he do? He was unarmed; therefore, to that extent, at everybody’s mercy. He had others to think of beside himself – one other especially. So he steeled himself.

The dreadful place of slaughter was thronged, it seemed, with the whole population of the town. Through these a word from his guide cleared a prompt way. Several wooden blocks were let into the ground, and upon one of these a victim was being bound down in such wise that the body, turned face upwards, formed an arc, the head being fixed so as to draw the upturned throat to the fullest tension. And the horrified, blood-chilled spectator observed that the victim was a large stalwart black very much akin in aspect to the one he had seen struck down by the mysterious blow in that eerie temple of devil-worship within the heart of the forest.

“I’ve let them have a little compensation for killing one of themselves just now,” broke in his companion’s voice with hideous callousness. “It was a biggish man among them – as far as I allow any of them to be big. So I’ve stood them a feed. These belong to another breed, and they like them, and I can get plenty more. See?”

“But, you’ll never allow this?” cried Wagram. “Stop it, do you hear? Stop it, man – devil – or whatever you are. Stop it, or I will.”

Without waiting for any reply he sprang forward. A tall black fiend armed with a great curved knife had stepped to the side of the victim, whose agonised, livid, terror-stricken face was sufficient to haunt Wagram to his dying day. It was done in a moment. Quick as thought Wagram had snatched the murderous implement from the grasp of the savage, at the same time dealing him a straight-out blow behind the ear which sent him staggering, and had cut through the bonds which held the wretched victim, who rolled heavily to the ground. A howl, as of a pack of famished wolves balked of its prey, arose from the crowd. A rush was made. But somehow the sight of this man – who had never shed human blood in his life – standing there at bay, a new and entirely whole-hearted Berserk rage blazing from his eyes as he rolled them around, holding the formidable weapon ready, seemed to tell, and they hesitated, still mouthing and yelling like hell let loose. Then great, heavy-hafted spears were raised, ready for casting. But a word from the other white man checked the decisive throw, though still unwillingly. They growled and muttered like dogs, looking from one to the other.