CHAPTER XXIV
THE SHADOW OF DEATH
The firing from the bank had ceased, and John, who still kept his
head, being a rather phlegmatic specimen of the Anglo-Saxon race, knew
that, for the moment at any rate, all danger from this source was
ended. Jess lay perfectly still in his arms, her head upon his breast.
A horrible idea struck him that she might be shot, perhaps already
dead!
"Jess, Jess," he shouted, through the turmoil of the storm, "are you
hit?"
She lifted her head an inch or two--"I think not," she said. "What is
going on?"
"God only knows, I don't. Sit still, it will be all right."
But in his heart he knew it was not "all right," and that they stood
in imminent danger of death by drowning. They were whirling down a
raging river in a cart. In a few moments it was probable that the cart
would upset, and then----
Presently the wheel bumped against something, the cart gave a great
lurch, and scraped along a little.
"Now for it," thought John, for the water was pouring over the
flooring. Then came a check, and the cart leant still farther to one
side.
/Crack!/ The pole had gone, and the cart swung round bows, or rather
box, on to the stream. What had happened was this: they had drifted
across a rock that projected from the bed of the river, the force of
the current having washed the dead horses to the one side of it and
the cart to the other. Consequently they were anchored to the rock, as
it were, the anchor being the dead horses, and the cable the stout
traces of untanned leather. So long as these traces and the rest of
the harness held, they were safe from drowning; but of course they did
not know this.
Indeed, they knew nothing. Above them rolled the storm; about them the
river seethed and the rain hissed. They knew nothing except that they
were helpless living atoms tossing between the wild waters and the
wilder night, with imminent death staring them in the face, around,
above, and below. To and fro they rocked, locked fast in each other's
arms, and as they swung came that awful flash that, though they
guessed it not, sent two of the murderers to their account, and for an
instant, even through the sheet of rain, illumined the space of
boiling water and the long lines of the banks on either side. It
showed the point of rock to which they were fixed, it glared upon the
head of one of the poor horses tossed up by the driving current as
though it were still trying to escape its watery doom, and revealed
the form of the dead Zulu, Mouti, lying on his face, one arm hanging
over the edge of the cart and dabbling in the water that ran level
with it, in ghastly similarity to some idle passenger in a pleasure
boat, who lets his fingers slip softly through the stream.
In a second it was gone, and once more they were in darkness. Then by
degrees the storm passed off and the moon began to shine, feebly
indeed, for the sky was not clear washed of clouds, which still
trailed along in the tracks of the tempest, sucked after it by its
mighty draught. Still it was lighter and the rain thinned gradually
till at last it stopped. The storm had rolled in majesty down the ways
of night, and there was no sound round them save the sound of rushing
water.
"John," said Jess presently, "can we do anything?"
"Nothing, dear."
"Shall we escape, John?"
He hesitated. "It is in God's hands, dear. We are in great danger. If
the cart upsets we shall be drowned. Can you swim?"
"No, John."
"If we can hang on here till daylight we may get ashore, if those
devils are not there to shoot us. I do not think that our chance is a
good one."
"John, are you afraid to die?"
He hesitated. "I don't know, dear. I hope to meet it like a man."
"Tell me what you truly think. Is there any hope for us at all?"
Once more he paused, reflecting whether or no he should speak the
truth. Finally he decided to do so.
"I can see none, Jess. If we are not drowned we are sure to be shot.
They will wait about the bank till morning, and for their own sakes
they will not dare to let us live."
He did not know that all which was left of two of them would indeed
wait for many a long year, while the third had fled aghast.
"Jess, dear," he went on, "it is of no good to tell lies. Our lives
may end any minute. Humanly speaking, they must end before the sun is
up."
The words were awful enough--if the reader can by an effort of
imagination throw himself for a moment into the position of these two,
he will understand how awful.
It is a dreadful thing, when in the flow of health and youth, suddenly
to be placed face to face with the certainty of violent death, and to
know that in a few more minutes your course will have been run, and
that you will have commenced to explore a future, which may prove to
be even worse, because more enduring, than the life you are now
quitting in agony. It is a dreadful thing, as any who have ever stood
in such a peril can testify, and John felt his heart sink within him
at the thought of it--for Death is very strong. But there is one thing
stronger, a woman's perfect love, against which Death himself cannot
prevail. And so it came to pass that now as he fixed his cold gaze
upon Jess's eyes they answered him with a strange unearthly light. She
feared not Death, so that she might meet him with her beloved. Death
was her hope and opportunity. Here she had nothing; there she might
have all. The fetters had fallen from her, struck off by an
overmastering hand. Her duty was satisfied, her trust fulfilled, and
she was free--free to die with her beloved. Ay! her love was indeed a
love deeper than the grave; and now it rose in eager strength,
standing expectant upon the earth, ready, when dissolution had lent it
wings, to soar to its own predestined star.
"You are sure, John?" she asked again.
"Yes, dear, yes. Why do you force me to repeat it? I can see no hope."
Her arms were round his neck, her soft curls rested on his cheek, and
the breath from her lips played upon his brow. Indeed it was only by
speaking into each other's ears that conversation was possible, owing
to the rushing sound of the waters.
"Because I have something to tell you which I cannot tell unless we
are going to die. You know it, but I want to say it with my own lips
before I die. I love you, John, /I love you, I love you/; and I am
glad to die because I can die with you, and go away with you."
He heard, and such was the power of her love, that his, which had been
put out of mind in the terror of that hour, reawoke and took the
colour of her own. He too forgot the imminence of death in the warm
presence of his down-trodden passion. She was in his arms as he had
taken her during the firing, and he bent his head to look at her. The
moonlight played upon her pallid, quivering face, and showed that in
her eyes which no man could look upon and turn away. Once more--yes,
even then--there came over him that feeling of utter surrender to the
sweet mastery of her will which had possessed him in the sitting-room
of "The Palatial." Only all earthly considerations having faded into
nothingness now, he no longer hesitated, but pressed his lips to hers
and kissed her again and yet again. It was perhaps as wild and
pathetic a love scene as ever the old moon above has witnessed. There
they clung, those two, in the actual shadow of death experiencing the
fullest and acutest joy that our life has to offer. Nay, death was
present with them, for, beneath their very feet, half-hidden by the
water, lay the stiffening corpse of the Zulu.
To and fro swung the cart in the rush of the swollen river, up and
down beside them the carcases of the horses rose and fell with the
surge of the water, on whose surface the broken moonbeams played and
quivered. Overhead was the blue star-sown depth through which they
were waiting presently to pass, and to the right and left the long
broken outlines of the banks stretched away till at last they appeared
to grow together in the gloom.
But they heeded none of these things; they remembered nothing except
that they had found each other's hearts, and were happy with a wild
joy it is not often given to us to feel. The past was forgotten, the
future loomed at hand, and between the one and the other was spanned a
bridge of passion made perfect and sanctified by its approaching
earthly end. Bessie was forgotten, all things were forgotten, for they
were alone with Love and Death.
Let those who would blame them pause awhile. Why not? They had kept
the faith. They had denied themselves and run straightly down the path
of duty. But the compacts of life end with life. No man may bargain
for the beyond; even the marriage service shrinks from it. And now
that hope had gone and life was at its extremest ebb, why should they
not take their joy before they passed to the land where, perchance,
such things will be forgotten? So it seemed to them; if indeed they
were any longer capable of reason.
He looked into her eyes and she laid her head upon his heart in that
mute abandonment of worship which is sometimes to be met with in the
world, and is redeemed from vulgar passion by an indefinable quality
of its own. He looked into her eyes and was glad to have lived, ay,
even to have reached this hour of death. And she, lost in the abyss of
her deep nature, sobbed out her love-laden heart upon his breast, and
called him her own, her own, her very own!
Thus the long hours passed unheeded, till at last a new-born freshness
in the air told them that they were not far from dawn. The death they
were awaiting had not found them. It must now be very near at hand.
"John," she whispered in his ear, "do you think that they will shoot
us?"
"Yes," he answered hoarsely; "they must for their own sakes."
"I wish it were over," she said.
Suddenly she started back from his arms with a little cry, causing the
cart to rock violently.
"I forgot," she said; "you can swim, though I cannot. Why should you
not swim to the bank, and escape under cover of the darkness? It is
only fifty yards, and the current is not so very swift."
The idea of flight without Jess had never occurred to John, and now
that she suggested it, it struck him as so absurd that he broke into
the ghost of a laugh.
"Don't be foolish, Jess," he said.
"Yes, yes, I will. Go! You /must/ go! It does not matter about me now.
I know that you love me, and I can die happy. I will wait for you. Oh,
John! wherever I am, if I have any individual life and any remembrance
I will wait for you. Never forget that all your days. However far I
may seem away, if I live at all, I shall be waiting for you. And now
go; you /shall/ go, I say. No, I will not be disobeyed. If you will
not go I will throw myself into the water. Oh, the cart is turning
over!"
"Hold on, for God's sake!" shouted John. "The traces have broken."
He was right; the tough leather was at length worn through by constant
rubbing against the rock, and the strain and sway of the dead horses
on the one side, and of the cart upon the other. Round it spun,
broadside on to the current, and immediately began to heave over, till
at last the angle was so sharp that the dead body of poor Mouti slid
out with a splash and vanished into the darkness. This relieved the
cart, and it righted for a moment, but now being no longer held up by
the bodies of the horses or by the sustaining power of the wind it
began to fill and sink, and at the same time to revolve swiftly. John
understood that all was finished, and that to stop in the cart would
only mean certain death, because they would be held under water by the
canvas tent. So with a devout aspiration for assistance he seized Jess
round the waist with one arm and sprang off into the river. As he
leapt the cart filled and sank.
"Lie still, for Heaven's sake!" he shouted, when they rose to the
surface.
In the dim light of the dawn which was now creeping over the earth he
could discover the line of the left bank of the Vaal, the same from
which they had been driven into the river on the previous night. It
appeared to be about forty yards away, but the current was running
quite six knots, and he saw that, burdened as he was, it would be
quite impracticable for him to reach it. The only thing to do was to
keep afloat. Luckily the water was warm and he was a strong swimmer.
In a minute or so he saw that about fifty paces ahead some rocks
jutted out twenty yards into the bed of the stream. Then catching Jess
by the hair with his left hand he made his effort, and a desperate one
it was. The broken water boiled furiously round the rocks. Presently
he was in it, and, better still, his feet touched the ground. Next
second he was swept off them and rolled over and over at the bottom of
the river, to be sadly knocked about against the boulders. Somehow he
struggled to his legs, still retaining his hold of Jess. Twice he
fell, and twice he struggled up again. One more effort--so. The water
was only up to his thighs now, and he was obliged to half carry his
companion.
As he lifted her he felt a deadly sickness come over him, but still he
staggered on, till at last they both fell of a heap upon a big flat
rock, and for a while he remembered no more.
When he came to himself again it was to see Jess, who had recovered
sooner than he had, standing over him and chafing his hands. Indeed,
as the sun was up he guessed that he must have lost his senses for
some time. He rose with difficulty and shook himself. Except for some
bruises he was sound enough.
"Are you hurt?" he asked of Jess, who, pale, faint and bruised, her
hat gone, her dress torn by bullets and the rocks, and dripping water
at every step, looked an exceedingly forlorn object.
"No," she said feebly, "not very much."
He sat down on the rock in the sun, for they were both shivering with
cold. "What is to be done?" he asked.
"Die," she said fiercely; "I meant to die--why did you not let me die?
Ours is a position that only death can set straight."
"Don't be alarmed," he said, "your desire will soon be gratified:
those murderous villains will hunt us up presently."
The bed and banks of the river were clothed with thin layers of mist,
but as the sun gathered power these lifted. The spot at which they had
climbed ashore was about three hundred yards below that where the two
Boers and their horses had been destroyed by the lightning on the
previous night. Seeing the mist thin, John insisted upon Jess
crouching with him behind a rock so that they could look up and down
the river without being seen themselves. Presently he made out the
forms of two horses grazing about a hundred yards away.
"Ah," he said, "I thought so; the devils have off-saddled there. Thank
Heaven I have still got my revolver, and the cartridges are
watertight. I mean to sell our lives as dearly as I can."
"Why, John," cried Jess, following the line of his out-stretched hand,
"those are not the Boers' horses, they are our two leaders that broke
loose in the water. Look, their collars are still on."
"By Jove! so they are. Now if only we can catch them without being
caught ourselves we have a chance of getting out of this."
"Well, there is no cover about, and I can't see any signs of Boers.
They must have been sure of having killed us, and gone away," Jess
answered.
John looked round, and for the first time a sense of hope began to
creep into his heart. Perhaps they would survive after all.
"Let's go up and look. It is no good stopping here; we must get food
somewhere, or we shall faint."
She rose without a word, and taking his hand they advanced together
along the bank. They had not gone twenty yards before John uttered an
exclamation of joy and rushed at something white that had lodged in
the reeds. It was the basket of food which was given to them by the
innkeeper's wife at Heidelberg that had been washed out of the cart,
and as the lid was fastened nothing was lost out of it. He undid it.
There was the bottle of three-star brandy untouched, also most of the
eggs, meat, and bread, the last, of course, sodden and worthless. It
did not take long to draw the cork, and then John filled a broken
wineglass there was in the basket half full of water and half of
brandy, and made Jess drink it, with the result that she began to look
a little less like a corpse. Next, he repeated the process twice on
his own account, and instantly felt as though new life were flowing
into him. Then they went on cautiously.
The horses allowed themselves to be caught without trouble, and did
not appear to be any the worse for the adventure, although the flank
of one was grazed by a bullet.
"There is a tree yonder where the bank shelves over; we had better tie
the horses up, dress, and eat some breakfast," said John, almost
cheerfully; and accordingly they proceeded towards it. Suddenly John,
who was ahead, started back with an exclamation of fear, and the
horses began to snort, for there, stark and stiff in death, already
swollen and discoloured by decomposition--as is sometimes the case
with people killed by lightning--the rifles in their hands twisted and
fused, their clothes cut and blown from their bandoliers--lay the two
Boer murderers. It was a terrifying sight, and, taken in conjunction
with their own remarkable escape, one to make the most careless and
sceptical reflect.
"And yet there are people who say that there is no God, and no
punishment for wickedness," said John aloud.
