One Maid's Mischief

“What!”

“I say unless Murad has been playing the same game.”

“Don’t talk like that,” panted Hilton. “I don’t care a sou for the girl now; I wouldn’t marry her to save my life; I couldn’t after her base treatment. But Chum, old fellow, that idea of yours is like a lance thrust through me, for I did love her, and to come to that – Oh, Heaven help her! I could not bear that.”

“Oh, tush! tush!” said Chumbley, sitting up once more. “Don’t take any notice. An angry woman will say anything. It was only a fancy of mine. It can’t be true.”

“Chum,” said Hilton, in a low whisper, and his voice sounded very strange in the gathering darkness, “I beg your pardon for what I said. I was bitter and angry.”

“All right, old fellow. It’s all gone.”

“Then listen. Can we get away to-night?”

“No. Why?”

“I feel as if I couldn’t stop here after what you said. I tell you I hate Helen Perowne now devoutly, but I’d go through fire and water to save her from that black scoundrel. Why did you think such a thing?”

“I don’t know; it came into my head. It appeared possible. We were spirited off, and it seemed so easy for Murad to carry her off in the same way. I suppose what the Princess said set me thinking.”

“If she is in his power,” began Hilton – “Oh, it is not possible! She led him on so, too. That foolish love of admiration!”

“That’s the right term, Bertie. She never cared for you any more than she did for me.”

“No,” said Hilton, bitterly, “I believe you are right; but I was such a vain, conceited idiot, I thought myself far above you all. Chumbley, do you believe what you said?”

Chumbley looked across the little space between them towards his friend; but it was quite dark now, and the voices seemed to come out of a black void.

“No, old fellow, no,” he replied. “It was a passing fancy. Good-night.”

“Good-night.”

Then there was silence in the room, though neither of the men slept; Hilton lying in a state of feverish excitement, and Chumbley thinking over his words.

“What made me say that, I wonder?” he muttered. “Suppose it should be true, and that all this while the ruffian has been playing dark. By Jove! it is very likely; much more likely than for a couple of fellows to be carried off. Poor girl! No, it is impossible. I will not believe it. Let’s think of something else. Now then, how are we to get away from here?”

“Sleep, Chumbley?” said Hilton.

“If I answer and say no” thought Chumbley, “he will lie talking for hours. I’ll hold my tongue.”

“Fast asleep,” muttered Hilton to himself; “that fellow has no more soul than an ox,” and turning his head on the cushion that formed his pillow, he lay there in the feverish hot night, thinking of Helen Perowne, while the distant roar of some prowling tiger kept reaching his ear; and it was not until the thought of Grey Stuart’s soft eyes, looking truthfully at his, came like something soft and gentle to cool his heated imagination, that he finally dropped asleep, forgetting his troubles for the time.

Volume Three – Chapter Two.

A Search for Gold

If anyone else on the station had even talked of making an expedition up the river beneath the beams of that ardent sun Dr Bolter would have exclaimed:

“Ah, of course. Here am I, toiling from morn to night with hand and brain, to keep you people in decent health, and yet you propose such a piece of insanity as that! Why, sir, you must be mad!”

But then the doctor was mad upon his own particular subject, and neither heat nor storm would would have kept him back. The sun now had tremendous power, and even his Malay boatmen looked hot; but the doctor’s face only shone, and he sat back in the stern, gun in hand, carefully scanning the shore, ready to bring down the first attractive specimen he saw to add to his collection.

The boat was well supplied with necessaries, including a waterproof sheet, and a handy tent if he should camp ashore; but the boat was to be for the most part his camping-place; and, according to his preconceived plan, the doctor meant to force his way right up a branch or tributary of the main river – a stream that had never yet been, as far as he knew, explored; and here he was hopeful of making his way close up to the mountains, continuing the journey on foot when the river became too narrow and swift for navigation.

In this intent the boat was steadily propelled up-stream, and at the end of the second day the Inche Maida’s campong and home had been passed, and unseen they had placed some miles between them and the Princess’s people.

The Inche Maida was very friendly, but the knowledge that she would perhaps be down before many hours were over at the station, made the doctor fix his time for passing in the dusk of the evening, for he did not wish his movements to reach his wife’s ears sooner than he could help, nor yet to be canvassed by his friends.

Hence, then, he slept that night with his boat secured to the trunk of a large cocoa-palm, well covered in from the night dew, and with a bit of quinine on the tip of his tongue when he lay down to keep off the fever.

Neither he nor his men troubled themselves about the weird noises of the jungle, nor the rushings and splashings that disturbed the river. There were dangerous reptiles and other creatures around, but they did not disturb them; and when the loud roar of a tiger was heard not many yards away, amidst the dense bushes of the shore, the doctor merely turned over and uttered a low grunt, muttering in his sleep about Mrs Bolter breathing so hard.

The next morning before the white mist had risen from the river, the Malays were busy with their paddles, and they had gone on about five or six miles when one of the men ceased rowing, and held up his hand to command silence.

“A big boat coming down the river pulled by many oars, master,” said the man, “a fighting prahu, I think. Shall we hide?”

“Hide? no,” exclaimed the doctor. “Why?”

“It may be an enemy who will make us prisoners, perhaps kill us,” said the Malay, softly. “We are thy servants, and we will go on if you say go.”

“Perhaps I had better not,” said the doctor, thoughtfully. “It would spoil the expedition. Hah! yes, I can hear the oars now. But where could we hide?”

“If the master bids us, we will place the boat so that no one passing shall see, and we can see all,” replied the Malay.

Doctor Bolter did not like hiding, but thinking that in this case discretion might be the better part of valour, he replaced his shot cartridge with ball, as he gave the signal to the man, who turned the sampan in shore; and cleverly guiding it in amongst the overhanging vegetation, this dropped behind them and they were in a verdant tunnel, the branches and leaves just touching their heads, and though themselves completely concealed, able to see everything that passed or repassed upon the river.

They had occupied their place of hiding so long, that, had he not still heard the regular beat-beat of the large boat’s oars, the doctor would have concluded that it had passed. Still it seemed wonderful how the water bore the sound, for it was what seemed to be a considerable time before they saw the prow of a long prahu come round a bend of the river with its long banks of oars making the calm surface of the rapid river foam, as the long vessel glided on, coming in very close to them, so as to cut off a good deal of the next bend.

They were so close that Doctor Bolter could note the expression upon the countenances of the men, and it seemed almost impossible that the little boat and its crew could remain unseen; but the prahu passed on, and round the next bend, the doctor waiting till the beat of the paddles was growing faint before he gave the word for them to proceed.

“Are those friends or enemies?” he said to one of the boatmen.

The Malay smiled.

“Who knows?” he said. “To-day they may be friends, to-morrow enemies. The prahu is Rajah Murad’s, and the crew his men.”

The doctor did not pay much heed to the rather oracular words of the Malay, though he recalled it all afterwards, his attention now being taken up by some choice specimens of the sunbird family, hovering about the blossoms on the banks.

Ten miles or so farther up, and the boatmen pointed to the overgrown mouth of the little river of which they were in search.

Anyone unacquainted with the place would have passed it unseen, but it had been noted down by the doctor during one of his expeditions, as a place to be explored at some future time.

The men turned the head of the sampan towards the tangled mass of bushes and overhanging trees, and then, as they drew near, one of them rose in the prow, and drew the long heavy parang he wore, a sword-like knife much used by the poorer Malays for cutting back the thorns and canes that a few days’ rapid growth led across their path; but the next moment he had lowered the weapon, and rested the point upon the edge of the boat.

“Someone has been here, master,” he said; “a big boat has broken its way through.”

“All the better for us,” said the doctor, and instead of having to cut and hack right and left, the sampan passed easily along the tangled channel, the masses of huge water-lilies giving way before the boat, while, as they got farther on past the grown-up mouth, the river seemed to widen, and the route of the vessel that had passed before could be plainly seen in a narrow channel of leaf-sprinkled water.

“That prahu must have been along here, master,” said the elder of the two Malays, thoughtfully. “No small sampan could have broken a way like this.”