Chapter XX: “As we’ve sown so we must reap.”

Mail day was the great event of the month at Tuata, Northern Nigeria, one of the most isolated of British outposts. The district was a vast tract of dense forest with no means of communication beyond the trails leading from one village to another.

It was so peaceable that Mellors, the commissioner, occasionally found it in his heart to wish for a little more excitement. In fact, it was so law-abiding, in a part where uprisings were frequent, that Captain Lindsay Fletcher had come to Tuata to pursue his investigations in the tangled, almost unexplored forest that comprised most of the district; to find out if those hundreds of miles of dense wilderness held any clue to the Hyena’s headquarters.

At that moment under consideration the Government representatives were stretched out on cane lounges on the veranda of Mellors’ bungalow, deep in the contents of the newly arrived mail.

Captain Fletcher was lost in an epistle signed “Leslie Graham.”

Nearly a year had passed since he had last seen the writer, and during the period letters from that source had come to him regularly at the rate of about one a month, all of which he had kept and treasured.

The broiling midday sun poured down on the cleared hill where the tiny town was situated. No sound broke the hot silence except the sleepy drone of insects and the rustle of paper, as Fletcher, Mellors, and a young subaltern went through the monthly mail.

All at once, a sudden order to halt, issued by the _Hausa_ sentry on duty at the top of the balcony steps, made the three Englishmen look up.

A tattered, blood-stained figure was ascending the stairs--a negro assistant at a trading factory, to judge from his garments. His left arm was tied up in an unskilful manner in a caked and gory cloth, and there was a wild, hunted look in his eyes as he stood, swaying with fatigue, at the top of the steps.

This apparition brought the Englishmen to their feet.

“Hello, my friend, what has happened?” Mellors asked, going quickly towards the wounded negro.

“They all dead, all dead,” the man gasped. “Massa Barton, Massa Joe, Congo Sam, Brass Boys. All dead. All but me. I see um die. Killed all dead. And dem wild mans laugh! Laugh, all time. Laugh like de debil.”

Barton’s was one of the few trading stations scattered throughout the district; it was a store situated near a big village about twenty miles away, and run by two brothers of that name.

“Good Lord!” Mellors ejaculated. “It means the whole factory has been wiped out.”

“I expect it has,” Fletcher replied. “From what this fellow says it sounds like some of the Hyena’s work.”

“Then we’re in for a lively time if he’s taken it into his head to prowl round my district,” Mellors said.

Fletcher turned to the negro.

“Tell me all you know,” he said quietly.

Between breathless gasps the story came out--a short one--and the tactics Fletcher knew very well.

Just before midnight of the preceding day the store had been set on suddenly by a score of fiends who had risen, so it seemed, from the earth with howls of mad laughter. He, the speaker, had been cut down as he fired the alarm, trampled on, and left for dead as the marauders swept on towards his masters’ sleeping quarters.

Before they returned he had managed to crawl away and hide himself in the forest. The two Englishmen and their assistants had fought till the greater force had overpowered them. Then the raiders had set fire to the factory.

“My aunt! To think that was all going on within twenty miles of us. And I was playing patience last night because I’d nothing better to do,” the subaltern said, sorrowfully.

“Well, my son, you’ll have something else to do this evening,” Mellors rejoined grimly. “You can go along with Fletcher and help him to clean up the mess at Barton’s place.”

In less than an hour Fletcher and the youngster, with a detachment of _Hausas_, were en route for Barton’s factory.

It was early afternoon when the expedition left Tuata. For the first twelve miles they went along a narrow path in the silent forest, which twisted, like an endless snake, between immense towering trees all festooned and matted together by a mass of parasitic growths. There were patches of swamp on the route, rudely bridged by half-submerged trunks of trees, covered again with small boughs and rushes to make a safe passage across the quaking bog that lay, black and green-patched, stretching away beneath a low arch of twining vegetation.

Twilight gathered early in the green shade of this dense forest, bringing with it the usual thick miasma. The last glimmer of daylight vanished by the time the journey was rather more than half completed. Fletcher called a halt for rest and refreshments, before pushing on into the thick blackness.

The journey was started again, the party proceeding in single file, the captain leading. It was a dark night, with a saturating mist; no glimmer of starlight could penetrate the matted growth; and there would be no moon before the small hours of the morning; even then, no matter how brilliant the flood of light, only the merest ray would pierce through into the tangled depths. All around lay the sleeping forest, its silence broken by the rustle of their movements, the distant howls of a prowling leopard or the booming of some night-bird.

For nearly half-an-hour they went along, until the most intricate part of the trail was reached; a tangle so thick and overgrown that even in single file they had great difficulty in pushing through.

Then, suddenly, without the least warning, a blaze of fire was opened on them, lighting up the mist and night with its flare. It was followed by a screech of hideous mirth, a roar of devil’s laughter, the snarl of a hundred maddened beasts.

Fletcher knew that sound only too well.

A brief, grim, death-struggle began. Shadows fought with shadows in a shadowy mist. Shrieks and yells, groans and hoarse commands, dull yellow flashes and the clang of steel, came from every side. It was a nightmare of blackness and blood, fog, fire and ghastly yells.

Fletcher’s little force fought with the madness of cornered creatures; but they were surrounded, split up, outnumbered easily three to one.

All at once a red-hot something seemed to sear Fletcher’s brain, and in its train came an all-prevailing silence.

There followed a vista of pain and heat and thirst. When consciousness returned he was being jogged along in a litter; all was darkness, yet the twitter of birds and other daylight sounds reached him. He tried to move his right arm, but it appeared to be fixed to his side. Any attempt to raise the left resulted in excruciating agony.

Slowly events came back to him, bringing in their wake a suppressed shudder; for he realized he had fallen into the hands of the Hyena!

He lay wondering how long it was since the ambush, and why, instead of killing him, his captor had nursed him back to life. A sudden chill swept away the feverish heat enveloping him as the fate of other white officers who had fallen alive into the hands of the Hyena rushed back to his mind.

A halt roused him. The cloth screening his eyes was removed, his uninjured arm loosened. Weakly he raised himself and inspected his surroundings. The interior of a native hut met his gaze, the door guarded by a trio of savages. By his side lay the subaltern, moaning and gazing round with fevered blue eyes.

A glance told Fletcher the boy was past saying anything. Swaying with weakness, he struggled to his feet and, aided by the walls, tottered to the door, his first instinct to get an idea of his surroundings. The three on guard there quickly gave him to understand he was not to go outside. He sat down again, too weak and dazed to argue the matter.

As he sat, limp and sagging on a packing case, brooding on the situation, a movement of the guard roused him. His gaze went to a figure just entering. And remained there.

The man was one he had grown to know very well during the voyage out on the _Batava_, as spotless and immaculate now, in well-cut white drill and broad, sombrero hat, as he had been when he strolled up and down the deck, alone and aloof; or stood talking in a half-bored, half-amused manner, to the girl whose voice could stop his stealthy, caged-lion march, whose presence banished the habitual expression of contempt his face wore when she was not about.

Lebrassa crossed the hut, and, ignoring Fletcher completely, knelt by the side of the moaning boy. He dressed the lad’s wounds and readjusted the bandages with a care and gentleness that left Fletcher marveling.

The mulatto seemed to feel his prisoner’s fixed gaze. Presently he looked round, the cruel lines about his mouth deepening.

“You notice I’ve a liking for blue eyes, Captain Fletcher,” he said. “If your ravings are to be believed, it’s a weakness we share in common.”

The Englishman knew quite well what Lebrassa was hinting at, and he ignored the remarks.

Presently Lebrassa got up and came to his side.

“With your permission I’ll dress your shoulder too,” he said suavely. “Dr. Hillman, my surgeon, has just started for Europe on a very important mission, so his duties fall to my lot. I’m afraid my men mauled you about pretty severely and I’ve a reason for wanting you whole. However, as it happened, it made no difference, except that you’ve missed three days’ appreciation of my scheme of exchange and barter.”

Fletcher still ignored his captor.

“I’ve been impatiently awaiting your return to reason,” Lebrassa continued, “so that I can tell you, among other things, that Barton’s factory was _not_ raided by me. I merely wanted you to go that way because the path offered the best ambush in the district of Tuata. My messenger played his part well, and you very kindly walked into my trap. I’ve been most anxious to meet you. I thought you might be able to give me Miss Graham’s address. I don’t suppose you’ll tell me freely. But you’re sufficiently versed in my methods to know I can use ways of extracting information perhaps not recognized by the British Army.”

Much as Lebrassa tried, he could not keep a note of savage hate from leaking into the suave, friendly tone he had adopted.

“You black devil!” Fletcher cried. “You may torture me till Doomsday, but I won’t tell you where she is.”

The mulatto laughed, low and fierce, and with intense satisfaction.

“I admire your sentiments,” he said. “However, the circumstances are now beyond you. Mental tortures, I know from personal experience, exceed any amount of physical pain. This, I think, will explain what I mean.”

From his pocket Lebrassa drew a packet of bloodstained letters and dropped them on Fletcher’s knee. They had on them Portuguese stamps, and the writing was Leslie’s.

Blankly Fletcher stared at the package.

“I came across these when I searched your unconscious body,” Lebrassa continued. “They told me all I wanted to know. I may add that as soon as I learnt Miss Graham’s address I sent Dr. Hillman as special envoy to her, offering your life in exchange for herself.”

Fletcher was beyond speech. One hand went across his brow as he gazed at the letters on his knee. Letters he had treasured and always carried about with him. Letters that would put Leslie again into the Hyena’s hands!

As the meaning of it all penetrated his dazed brain, a sudden desire to do murder seized him. Everything passed from him--the knowledge of his own wounds and weakness, the giant strength of his captor. A red cloud surrounded him, and out of it a dark face looked with savage hatred and mocking triumph.

He staggered to his feet and made a dash at the other’s brown, muscular throat, heedless of the excruciating agony of his shoulder. For his effort tore the wound open and brought the blood pouring down his arm.

A push from Lebrassa sent him reeling backwards. Sick with pain and the sense of his own helplessness, he sank back weakly onto the packing case, and with a stifled groan buried his face in his hands.