preferred after the same method, that some of his possessions should be
restored to him. Then he would offer _lobola_ for Lindela, and----

"I accompany you farther, Nyonyoba, at the word of the Great Great One,
by whose light we live."

The voice of the _inceku_ who had ushered him forth broke in upon his
meditations. This man, instead of leaving him at the gate of the
_isigodhlo_, still kept at his side, and Laurence, manifesting no
curiosity, having picked up his weapons where he had left them,
accompanied his guide in silence.

They passed out of Imvungayo, and after walking nearly a mile came to a
large kraal, which Laurence recognized as that of Nondwana, the king's
brother. And now, for the first time, he felt a thrill of interest surge
through him. Nondwana's kraal! Had Tyisandhlu, divining his wishes,
indeed forestalled them? But this idea was as quickly dismissed as
formulated. The king had probably ordered that one or two of the
Ba-gcatya girls should be allotted to him--possibly chosen from those in
attendance upon the royal wives. His parting remark seemed to point that
way.

"Enter," said the _inceku_, halting before one of the huts. "Enter, and
good go with thee. I return to the king. Fare thee well!"

Laurence bent down and pushed back the wicker slab that formed the door
of the hut, and, having crawled through the low, beehive-like entrance,
stood upright within, and instinctively kicked the fire into a blaze.
And then, indeed, was amazement--wild, incredulous, bewildering
amazement--his dominant feeling, for by the light thus obtained he saw
that the hut was tenanted by two persons. No feminine voice, however,
was raised to bid him welcome in the soft tongue of the Ba-gcatya, but a
loud, full-flavoured, masculine English one:

"Stanninghame--by the great Lord Harry! Oh, kind Heavens, am I drunk or
dreaming?"

FOOTNOTES:

[3] Payment of cattle made to the father of a girl sought in marriage.

[4] "Lindela" means to "wait for"--in the sense of "to watch for," hence
the full significance of the parting remark.

CHAPTER XXIV.

AS FROM THE DEAD.

"There, there, Holmes. Do you quite intend to maim a chap for life, or
what?" exclaimed Laurence, liberating, with an effort, his hand from the
other's wringing grasp. "And Hazon, too? In truth, life is full of
surprises. How are you, Hazon?"

"So so," was the reply, as Hazon, who had been biding the evaporation of
his younger friend's effusiveness, now came forward. But his handshake
was characteristic of the man, for it was as though they had parted only
last week, and that but temporarily.

"And is it really you yourself, old chap?" rattled on Holmes. "It's for
all the world as if you had risen from the dead. Why, we never expected
to set eyes on you again in life--did we, Hazon?"

"Not much," assented that worthy laconically.

"Well, I can say the same as regards yourselves," rejoined Laurence.
"What in the world made them give you quarter?"

"Don't know," answered Hazon. "We managed to get together, back to back,
we two, and were fighting like cats. Holmes got a shot on the head with
a club that sent him down, and I got stuck full of assegais till I
couldn't see. The next thing I knew was that we were being carted along
in the middle of a big _impi_--Heaven knew where. One thing, we were
both alive--alive and kicking, too. As soon as we were able to walk they
assegaied our bearers, and--made us walk."

"Don't you swallow all that, Stanninghame," cut in Holmes. "He fought,
standing over me--fought like any devil, the Ba-gcatya say, although he
makes out now it was all playful fun."

"Well, for the matter of that, we had to fight," rejoined Hazon
tranquilly. "Where have you been all this time, Stanninghame?"

"Here, at Imvungayo. And you two?"

"Shot if I know. They kept us at some place away in the mountains. Only
brought us here a few days back."

"They won't let us out in the daytime," chimed in Holmes. "And it's
getting deadly monotonous. But tell us, old chap, how it is they didn't
stick you?"

This, however, Laurence, following out a vein of vague instinct, had
decided not to do, wherefore he invented some commonplace solution. And
it was with strange and mingled feelings he sat there listening to his
old confederates. For months he had not heard one word of the English
tongue, and now these two, risen, as it were, from the very grave,
seemed to bring back all the past, which, under novel and strange
conditions, had more and more been fading into the background. He was
even constrained to admit to himself that such feelings were not those
of unmingled joy. He had almost lost all inclination to escape from
among this people, and now these two, by the very associations which
their presence recalled, were likely to unsettle him again, possibly to
his own peril and undoing. Anyway, he resolved to say nothing as to the
incident of "The Sign of the Spider."

"Well, you seem to have got round them better than we did,
Stanninghame," said Hazon, with a glance at the Express rifle and
revolver wherewith the other was armed. "We have hardly been allowed so
much as a stick."

"So? Well, I've been teaching some of them to shoot. That may have had a
little to do with it. In fact, I've been laying myself out to make
thoroughly the best of the situation."

"That's sound sense everywhere," rejoined Hazon. "You can't get Holmes
here to see it, though. He's wearing out his soul-case wanting to break
away."

This was no more than the truth. Laurence, seated there, narrowly
watching his old comrades, was swift to notice that whereas these months
of captivity and suspense had left Hazon the same cool, saturnine,
philosophical being he had first known him, upon Holmes they had had
quite a different effect. There was a restless, eager nervousness about
the younger man; a sort of straining to break away even, as the more
seasoned adventurer had described it. The fact was, he was getting
desperately home-sick.

"I wish I had never had anything to do with this infernal business," he
now bursts forth petulantly. "I swear I'd give all we have made to be
back safe and snug in Johannesburg, with white faces around us,--even
though I were stony broke."

"Especially one 'white face,'" bantered Laurence. "Well, keep up your
form, Holmes. You may be back there yet, safe and sound, and not stony
broke either."

"No, no. There is a curse upon us, as I said all along. No good will
come to us through such gains. We shall never return--never."

And then Laurence looked across at Hazon, and the glance, done into
words, read: "What the mischief _is_ to be made of such a prize fool as
this?"

The night was spent in talking over past experiences, and making plans
for the future, as to which latter Hazon failed not to note, with faint
amusement, blended with complacency, that the disciple had, if anything,
surpassed his teacher. In other words, Laurence entered into such plans
with a luke-warmness which would have been astonishing to the
superficial judgment, but was not so to that of his listener.

Nondwana, the brother of the king, was seated among a group of his
followers in the gate as Laurence went forth the next morning to return
to his own quarters. This chief, though older than Tyisandhlu in years,
was not the son of the principal wife of their common father, wherefore
Tyisandhlu, who was, had, in accordance with native custom, succeeded.
There had been whisperings that Nondwana had attempted to oppose the
accession, and very nearly with success; but whether from motives of
policy or generosity, Tyisandhlu had foreborne to take his life. The
former motive may have counted, for Nondwana exercised a powerful
influence in the nation. In aspect, he was a tall, fine, handsome man,
with all the dignity of manner which characterized his royal brother,
yet there was a sinister expression ever lurking in his face--a cruel
droop in the corner of the mouth.

"Greeting, Nyonyoba. And is it good once more to behold a white face?"
said the chief, a veiled irony lurking beneath the outward geniality of
his tone.

"To behold the face of a friend once more is always good, Branch of a
Royal Tree," returned Laurence, sitting down among the group to take
snuff.

"Even when it is that of one risen from the dead?"

"But here it was not so, Ndabezita. My 'Spider' told me that these were
all the time alive," rejoined Laurence, with mendacity on a truly
generous scale.

"Ha! thy Spider? Yet thou art not of the People of the Spider."

"But I bear the sign," touching his breast. "There are many things made
clear to me, which may or may not be set forward in the light of all at
the fall of the second moon. Farewell now, Son of the Great."

The start of astonishment, the murmur which ran round the group, was not
lost upon him. It was all confirmatory of what he had heard. And then,
as he walked back to his tent in Silawayo's kraal, it occurred to
Laurence that he had probably made a false move. Nondwana, who, of
course, was not ignorant of his daughter's partiality, would almost
certainly decide that Lindela had betrayed the secret and sinister
intent to its unconscious object; and in that event, how would it fare
with her? He felt more than anxious. The king might take long in
deciding whether to restore his property or not, and etiquette forbade
him to refer to the matter again--at any rate for some time to come.
That Nondwana might demand too much _lobola_, or possibly refuse it
altogether as coming from him, was a contingency which, strange to say,
completely escaped Laurence's scheming mind.

"Greeting, Nyonyoba. Thy thoughts are deep--ever deep."

The voice, soft, rich, bantering, almost made him start as he raised his
eyes, to meet the glad laughing ones of the object of his thoughts at
that moment, the chief's daughter.

"What do you here, wandering alone, Lindela?" he said.

"Ha--ha! Now you did well to say my name like that--for--does it not
answer your question, 'to wait, to watch for'? And what is meant for two
ears is not meant for four or six. I have news, but it is not good."

They were standing in the dip of the path, where a little runlet coursed
along between high bush-fringed banks, and the tall, graceful form of
the girl stood out in splendid relief from its background of foliage.
Not only for love had she awaited him here, for her eyes were sad and
troubled as she narrated her discoveries, which amounted to this: It was
next to impossible for Laurence to escape the ordeal--whatever it might
be. All of weight and position in the nation were resolved upon it, and
none more thoroughly so than Nondwana. The king himself would be
powerless to save him, even if he wished, and, indeed, why should he run
counter to the desire of a whole nation, and that on behalf of a
stranger, some time an enemy?

Laurence, listening, felt his anxiety deepen. The net was closing in
around him, had indeed already closed, and from it there was no outlet.

"See now, Lindela," he said gravely, his eyes full upon the troubled
face of the girl, "if this thing has got to be, there is no help for it.
And, however it turns out, the world will go on just the same--and the
sun rise and set as before. Why grieve about it?"

"Because I love you--love you--do you hear? I know not how it is. We
girls of the Ba-gcatya do not love--not like this. We like to be married
to men who are great in the nation--powerful indunas--if not too
old,--or those who have much cattle, or who will name us for their
principal wife; but we know not how to love. Yet you have taught me,
Nyonyoba. Say now, is it through the magic of the white people you have
done it?"

"It may be so," replied Laurence, smiling queerly to himself, as he
thought how exactly, if unconsciously, this alluring child of nature had
described her civilized sisters. Then his face became alert and
watchful. He was listening intently.

"I, too, heard something," murmured Lindela, scarcely moving her lips.
"I fear lest we have been overlooked. Now, fare thee well, for I must
return. But my ears are ever open to what men say, and my father talks
much, and talks loud. It may be that I may learn yet more. But,
Nyonyoba, delay not in thy first purpose, lest it be too late; and
remember, Nondwana has a covetous hand. Fare thee well."

Left alone, Laurence thought he might just as well make sure that no
spy had been watching them. Yet though he examined the banks of the
stream for some little distance around, he could find no trace of any
human presence, no mark even, however faint, of human foot. Still, as he
gained his own quarters in Silawayo's kraal, a presentiment lay heavy
upon him--a weird, boding presentiment of evil to come--of evil far
nearer at hand than he had hitherto deemed.

Long and hard he slept, for he was weary with wakefulness and anxiety.
And when he awoke at dusk, intending to seek an interview with the king,
he beheld that which in no wise tended to allay his fears. For as he
drew nearer to Imvungayo there issued from its gate a crowd of
figures--of black, grotesque, horrible figures, and in the midst a man,
whom they were dragging along in grim silence, even as they had hauled
Lutali to his unknown doom, and as they disappeared into the gathering
darkness, Laurence knew only too well that here was another
victim--another hideous sacrifice to the grisly and mysterious
demon-god. No wonder his blood grew chill within him. Would he be the
next?

"And you would still become one of us, Nyonyoba?"

"I would, Great Great One; and to this end have I sent much ivory, and
many things the white people prize, including three new guns and much
ammunition, to Nondwana."

"Ha! Nondwana's hand is large, and opens wide," said the king, with a
hearty chuckle. "Yet Lindela is a sprig of a mighty tree. And I think,
Nyonyoba, you yourself are sprung from such a root."

"That is no lie, Ruler of the Wise. As a man's whole height is to the
length of half his leg, so is the length of my house to that of the
kings of the Ba-gcatya, or even to that of Senzangakona[5] himself."

"Ha! That may well be. Thou hast a look that way."

This conversation befell two days after the events just described. The
king had refused him an audience on that evening, and indeed since until
now. But in the meantime, by royal orders, a great portion of the
plunder taken from the slave-hunters' camp had been restored to him,
considerably more, indeed, than he had expected. And now he and
Tyisandhlu were seated once more together in the royal dwelling, this
time alone.

"But to be sprung from an ancient tree avails a man nothing in my
country if he is poor," went on Laurence. "Rather is it a disadvantage,
and he had better have been born among the meaner sort. That is why I
have found my way hither, Ndabezita."

"That is why? And you have gained the desired riches?" said the king,
eyeing him narrowly.

"I had--nearly, when the Ba-gcatya fell upon my camp, and killed my
people and my slaves. Now, having lost all, I care not to return to my
own land."

"But could you return rich you would care so to return?"

"That is so, Root of a Royal Tree. With large possessions it is indeed
a pleasant land to dwell in--with no possessions a man might often think
longingly of the restful sleep of death."

"That may well be," said Tyisandhlu thoughtfully. "The cold and the
gloom and the blackness, the fogs and the smoke--the mean and
horrible-looking people who go to make up the larger portion of its
inhabitants. _Whau_, Nyonyoba, I know more of your white people and
their country than anyone here dreams, and it is as you say. Without
that which should raise him above such horrors as this, a man might as
well be dead."

"Wherefore I prefer to live in the land of the Ba-gcatya rather than die
in my own. But whoever brought hither that description of our land told
a wonderfully true tale, Ruler of the Great."

Tyisandhlu made no reply, but reaching out his hand he took up a whistle
and blew a double note upon it. Immediately there entered an _inceku_.

"Let no man approach until this note shall again sound," said the king.
"Preserve clear a wide space around, lest the ear that opens too wide be
removed from its owner's head. Go."

The man saluted humbly and withdrew. And then for long did they sit
together and talk in a low tone, the barbarian monarch and the white
adventurer--and the subject of their talk seemed fraught with some
surprise to the latter, but with satisfaction to both.

"See now, Nyonyoba," concluded the king. "They have brought you here,
here whence no man ever returned; and you would become one of us. Well,
be it so. There is that about you I trust."

"Whence no man ever returned?" echoed Laurence.

"Surely. Ha! A white man found his way hither once, but--he was a
preacher--and I love not such. He never returned."

"But what of my two friends? You will not harm them, Ndabezita, because
they are my friends, and we have fought together many a long year,"
urged Laurence.

"I will spare them for that reason. They shall be led from the country
with their eyes covered, lest they find the way back again. But--if they
do--they likewise shall never depart from it. And now, Nyonyoba, all I
have told you is between ourselves alone. Breathe not a whisper of it or
anything about me even to your friends. For the present, farewell, and
good fortune be yours."

FOOTNOTE:

[5] Founder of the Zulu dynasty, and of course patriarchally greater
than the royal house of this Zulu-originated tribe.

CHAPTER XXV.

HIS LIFE FOR HIS FRIEND.

Now, if Laurence Stanninghame's prospects were brightening, and his
lines beginning to fall in pleasant places,--relatively speaking, that
is, for everything is relative in the conditions of life,--the same held
not good as regards the other twain of our trio of adventurers. Both
were kept prisoners in Nondwana's kraal, and, save that they were not
ill-treated, no especial consideration was shown them. They were allowed
to wander about the open space outside, but watchful eyes were ever upon
them, and did they venture beyond certain limits, they were speedily
made aware of the fact. No such distractions as joining in the hunting
parties, or coming and going at will such as their more fortunate
comrade enjoyed, were allowed them, and against the deadly monotony of
the life--in conjunction with a boding suspense as to their ultimate
fate--did Holmes' restless spirit mightily chafe; indeed, at times he
felt sore and resentful towards Laurence. At such times Hazon's
judicious counsel would step in.

"Shall we never make a philosopher of you, Holmes?" he would say. "Do
you think, for instance, that Stanninghame, faring no better than
ourselves, would improve our own lot any? No; rely upon it, his standing
in with the king and the rest of them is doing us no harm in the long
run."

"I suppose you're right, Hazon; and it's beastly selfish of one to look
upon it any other way," poor Holmes would reply wearily. "But, O Lord,
this is deadly work. Is there no way of getting away from here?"

"Not any at present. Yet you don't suppose I'm keeping my eyes or ears
shut, do you? We must watch our chances, and see and hear all we can. I
believe Tyisandhlu is a decent fellow all round, and mind, you do come
across plenty of pretty good fellows even among savages, whatever bosh
some men may talk to the contrary. But I don't care for Nondwana. I
believe he'd make short work of us if he dared. Possibly the king may be
watching his opportunity of smuggling us out of the country. At any
rate, I don't think he means us any harm, if only by reason of the
astonishing fancy he seems to have taken to Stanninghame!"

This, as we know, was very near the truth, though far more so than the
speakers guessed. For Laurence, moved both by inclination and
expediency, had rigidly adhered to his promise of secrecy. If it seemed
hard that he should be compelled to shut his companions out of his
entire confidence, he consoled himself with the certainty that their
admission into it, though it might encourage them mentally, could in no
wise benefit them materially--very much the reverse, indeed, for it
would probably bring about their destruction.

"Well, if anything is going to be done, it had better be soon or not at
all. It wouldn't take much to send me clean off my chump," said Holmes
dejectedly. "Every day I feel more inclined to break out--to run amuck
in a crowd, if only for the sake of a little excitement. Anything for a
little excitement!"

The two were strolling up and down outside Nondwana's kraal. It was a
still, hot morning; oppressive as though a storm were brooding. A filmy
haze lay upon the lower valley bottom, and the ground gave forth a
shimmer of heat. Even the amphitheatre of dazzling snow-peaks omitted to
look cool against the cloudless blue, while the coppery-terraced cliffs
seemed actually to glow as though red hot.

"I hate this," growled Holmes, looking around upon as magnificent a
scene of nature's grandeur as the earth could show, "positively hate it.
I shall never be able to stand the sight of a mountain again as long as
I live--once we are out of this. Oh, Heavens, look! What a brute!"

His accents of shuddering disgust were explained. Something was moving
among the stones in front--something with great, hairy, shoggling legs,
and a body the size of a thrush and much the same colour. A spider,
could it be, of such enormous size? Yet it was; and as truly repulsive
and horrible-looking a monster as ever made human flesh creep at
beholding.

Whack! The stone flung by Holmes struck the ground beside the creature;
struck it hard.

"Hold, you infernal fool," half snarled, half yelled Hazon. But before
he could arrest the other's arm, whack!--went a second stone. The aim
was true, the grisly beast, crushed and maimed, lay contracting and
unfolding its horrible legs in the muscular writhings of its death
throes.

"What's the row, eh?" grumbled Holmes, staring open-mouthed, under the
impression that his comrade had gone mad, and at first sight not without
reason, for Hazon's face had gone a swarthy white, and his eyes seemed
to glare forth from it like blazing coals.

"Row? You fool, you've signed our death-warrant, that's all. Here,
quick, pretend to be throwing stones on to it, as if we were playing at
some game. Don't you see? The name of this tribe--People of the Spider!
They venerate the beast. If we have been seen, nothing can save us."

"Oh, Heavens!" cried Holmes, aghast as the whole ugly truth dawned upon
him, setting to with a will to pile stones upon the remains of the slain
and shattered monster.

"Too late!" growled Hazon. "We have been seen! Look."

Several women were running stealthily and in alarm towards the gate, and
immediately a frightful uproar arose from within. Armed with sticks and
spears, the warriors came pouring forth, and in a moment had surrounded
the two--a howling, infuriated, threatening mob.

Although expecting nothing less than instant death, with the emergency
Hazon's coolness had returned. He stood in the midst of the appalling
uproar, apparently unmoved. Holmes, on the other hand, looked wildly
around, but less in fear than in desperation. He was calculating his
chances of being able to snatch a weapon from one of them, and to lay
about him in the last fierce battle for life. "Anything for a little
excitement!" he had said. In very truth his aspiration was realized.
There was excitement enough in the brandished spears and blazing
eyeballs, in the infuriated demoniacal faces, in the deafening, roaring
clamour.

"This is no matter for you," cried Hazon in firm, ringing tones. "Take
us to the king. We can explain. The affair was an accident."

At this the ferocious tumult redoubled. An accident! They had lifted
their hand against the great tutelary Spider that guarded Nondwana's
house! An accident!

"Hold! To the king let them be taken!" interposed a strong, deep voice.
And extending his hands, as though to arrest the uplifted weapons,
Nondwana himself stalked into the circle.

There was no gainsaying the mandate of one so great. Weapons were
lowered, but still vociferating horrible threats, the crowd, with the
two offenders in its midst, moved in the direction of Imvungayo.

But it seemed as though the wild, pealing shouts of rage and
consternation were a very tocsin; for now from every kraal, near and
far, the inhabitants came surging forth, streaming down the hillsides
over the face of the plain like swarming ants--and before they reached
Imvungayo the two whites seemed to move in the midst of a huge sea of
gibing, infuriated faces, as the dark crowd, gathering volume, poured
onward, rending the air with deafening shouts of execration and menace.
But the royal guards barred the gate, suffering no entrance save on the
part of the two white men, together with Nondwana and a few of the
greater among the people.

"This is the tightest place we have been in yet," murmured Hazon. "To
tread on the superstitions of any race is to thrust one's head into the
jaws of a starved lion."

"D---- their filthy superstition," said Holmes, savagely desperate.
"Well, I did the thing, so I suppose I shall be the one to suffer."

The other said nothing. He had a shrewd suspicion that more than one
life would be required in atonement. But he and death had stared each
other in the face so frequently that once more or less did not greatly
matter.

On learning the cause of the tumult, Tyisandhlu had come forth, and now
sat, as he frequently did, to administer justice at the head of the
great central space. When the shouts of "_bonga!_" which greeted his
presence had subsided, he ordered that the two whites should be brought
forward.

This was the first time the latter had seen the king, and now, as they
beheld his stately, commanding bearing, calm and judicial, both of them,
Holmes especially, began to hope. They would explain the matter, and
offer ample apologies. The owner of that fine, intellectual countenance,
savage though he might be called, he, surely, had a soul above the
debased superstitions of his subjects. Hitherto he had spared their
lives--surely now he would not sacrifice them to the clamour of a mob.
Yet, as Hazon had said, to tread on the superstitions of any race was
the most fatal thing on earth.

"What is this that has been done?" spoke the king, when he had heard all
that the accusers had to say. "Surely no such deed has been wrought
among us since the Ba-gcatya have been a nation."

There was a sternness, a menace even, in the full, deep voice, that
dispelled all hope in the minds of the two thus under judgment. They had
committed the one unpardonable sin. In vain Hazon elaborately explained
the whole affair, diplomatically setting forth that the act being
accidental, and done by strangers and white people, in ignorance, no
ill-luck need befall the nation, as might be the case were the symbol of
its veneration offended by its own people. The voice of the king was
more stern than before--almost jeering.

"Accidental!" he repeated. "Even though it be so, accidents often bring
greater evil in their results than the most deliberate wrong-doing--for
such is the rule of life."

"That is so!" buzzed the indunas grouped on either side of the king.
"_Au!_ hear the wisdom of the Burning North Wind!"

"Well, then, in this matter atonement must be made. It appears that one
only was concerned in it, and that one is Nomtyeketye."

This was the somewhat uncomplimentary nick-name by which Holmes was
known, bestowed upon him on account of his talkative tendencies as
contrasted with the laconic sententiousness of Hazon.

"I rule, therefore," went on the king, "that Nomtyeketye _be taken hence
to where atonement is offered_. The other may depart from among us to
his own land."

A shout of approval rose from the vast crowd without as the decision
became known. Some there were who clamoured for two victims--but the
king's decision was not lightly to be questioned. And before the shout
had died into a murmur the whole multitude of hideous black figures in
their weird disguise came bounding across the open space to seize their
victim. But before they could surround the latter an unlooked-for
interruption occurred.

"Hold!" cried a loud voice. "I have a favour to ask the king. I, who
bear the Sign!" And Laurence, who in the midst of one of the listening
groups had been unseen hitherto, now came forward, none hindering, and
stood before the king.

A deep silence was upon all. Every head was bent forward. The frightful
priesthood of the demon paused, with staring eyes, to wait on what new
turn events would take.

"Say on, Nyonyoba," said Tyisandhlu shortly, looking anything but
pleased at the interruption.

"It is this, O Burning Wind. Let Nomtyeketye return to his own people. I
will take his place."

"You?" exclaimed the king, as a gasp of amazement shivered through the
listeners.

"Yes, I. Hearken, Ndabezita. I it was who brought him hither. He is
young, and his life is all before him. Mine is all behind me, and has
been no great gain at that. I will proceed with these"--with a glance in
the direction of the blackly horrible group--"to where atonement is
offered. But let the two return together to their own land."

"Pause, Nyonyoba! Pause and think!" said the king, speaking in a deep
and solemn voice. "That which awaits you, if I grant your request, is
of no light order. Men have sought their own death rather than face it.
Pause, I say." Then rapidly, and speaking very low: "Even I cannot save
you there. It may be that the Sign itself cannot."

Now, what moved him to an act of heroic self-sacrifice, Laurence
Stanninghame hardly knew himself. It may have been that he did not
appreciate its magnitude. It may have been that he held more than a
lingering belief that the king would find some secret means for his
deliverance, whereas to his younger comrade no such way of escape lay
open. Or was it that at this moment certain words, spoken long ago in
warning, now stood forth clear and in flaming letters upon his brain:
"_Other men have gone up country with Hazon, but not one of them has
ever returned!_" He himself, abiding henceforward among the Ba-gcatya,
and Holmes consigned to the mysterious doom, would not those warning
words be carried out in all their fell fatality? But that after these
years of hardening in the lurid school of bloodshed and ruthlessness he
should be capable of sacrificing himself for another, through motives of
impulsive generosity, Laurence could not have brought himself to
believe. Indeed, he could not have defined his own motives.

"Give me your word, Great Great One, in the sight of the whole nation,"
he said in a loud voice, "that these two shall be suffered to depart
unharmed--now, at once--and I will take the place of Nomtyeketye."

"That will I readily do, Nyonyoba, for I have no need of strangers here
such as these," answered Tyisandhlu. Then, sadly, "And--you are
resolved?"

"I am."

"Then it must be. For ye two, go in peace;--enough shall be given you
for your journey."

Holmes, who understood the language very imperfectly, had no clear
notion, even then, of what had taken place. But when he saw the gigantic
forms in their black disguise bounding forward to surround Laurence, he,
being otherwise unarmed, instinctively threw himself into a boxing
attitude, which was, under the circumstances, ridiculous, if natural.

"Keep cool, you young idiot," snarled Hazon. "We're out of this mess
better than we deserve."

"Why, what's happened?"

"Stanninghame is acting substitute for you, and we are to be fired out
of the country, which is good news to you, I take it."

"But I can't allow it!" cried Holmes bewilderedly, as the truth began to
dawn upon him. "No, hang it, I can't,--tell the king, I----"

"No good! Keep your hair on! and remember, too, it's more than probable
he won't come to any harm. He stands in with them too well."

Holmes, more than half reassured, suffered himself to be
persuaded--especially as he was powerless to do anything at all. But
whether Hazon believed or not in what he had just advanced must remain
forever locked up as a mystery in the breast of that inscrutable
individual. One thing, however, he did not believe in, and that was in
he himself suffering for the foolishness of other people.

Meanwhile Laurence, in the midst of his disguised executioners, was
pursued by the howling and execrations of the crowds, which parted
eagerly to make way for their passage. Outside on the open plain a vast
mob of women had collected, yelling shrilly at him--and even pelting him
with earth and sticks. One of the latter, thrown at close quarters,
hurling over the heads of his guards, struck him on the shoulder,
painfully and hard. He looked up. It had been hurled by the hand of
Lindela; and as he met her eyes full, the face which he had last looked
upon softening and glowing with the wondrous light of love, was now
wreathed into a horrible grin of hate and savagery.

"_Yau!_ The Spider is hungry! Fare thee well, Umtagati,"[6] jeered the
chief's daughter shrilly.

FOOTNOTE:

[6] Doer of witchcraft.

CHAPTER XXVI.

THE PLACE OF THE HORROR.

Was he awake--asleep and dreaming--or--dead?

All these questions did Laurence Stanninghame ask himself by turn as he
recovered his confused and scattered senses; and there was abundant
scope for such conjecture for, in truth, the place wherein he found
himself was a strange one.

A wall of rock arose on either side of him--one straight, perpendicular,
the other overhanging, arching out above the first. As he lay there in
the semi-gloom, his first thought was that he was in a cave; a further
glance, however, convinced him that the place was a gigantic fissure or
rift. But how had he come there?

With an effort, for he still felt strangely languid and confused, he
sent his mind back to the events of the previous day. Stay, though--was
it the previous day? Somehow it seemed much longer ago. He remembered
the long hurried march into the heart of the mountains with his gruesome
escort. He remembered partaking of a plentiful meal and some excellent
corn-beer; this he had done with a view to keeping up his strength,
which he might need to the full. Then he remembered no more. The liquor
had been drugged, he decided.

But to what end? To what end, indeed, was he there? How had he been
brought there? He raised himself on his elbow and looked around.

He started. A large bundle lay beside him--something rolled up in a
native blanket. Speedily undoing this, he discovered several grass
baskets with lids. These contained pounded corn, such as is eaten with
_amati_, or curdled milk--and, indeed, a large calabash of the latter,
tightly stoppered, was among the stores. Well, whatever was to become of
him, he was not to starve, anyhow. But was he only being fattened for a
worse fate?

Then a thought struck him, which set all his pulses tingling into
renewed life. He, too, had been sent out of the country, and these
stores were to last him for, at any rate, part of his journey. True, the
prospect was anything but an exhilarating one, seeing that he was
unarmed, and had but the vaguest idea which way to turn; that the
Ba-gcatya country was surrounded by ferocious and hostile races. But
then, everything is relative in this world, and to a man who has spent
hours of a long day journeying towards a mysterious, horrible, and
certain death, the discovery of release and life, even with such slender
chances, was joy after the boding dread which those long hours had held
for him. Yes, that was it, of course. Tyisandhlu had not been faithless
to the friendship between them. While openly consenting to his
sacrifice, for even the king dare not, in such a matter, run counter to
the feelings of the nation, Tyisandhlu had given secret orders that he
should be smuggled out of the country.

Having arrived at this conclusion, it occurred to Laurence that he
might as well explore a little. He would leave his stores here for the
present; for a glance served to show that the rift or fissure ended
there, so taking only a handful of the pounded corn, to eat as he
walked, he started at once.

But there was a something, a cold creepiness in the air perhaps, that
quelled much of his new-born hope. The rift seemed to form a kind of
circle, for he walked on and on, ever trending to the right, never able
to see more than a short distance in front; never able to behold the
sky. There was something silently, horribly eloquent in the grim
sameness of those tomblike walls. Just then, to his relief, the
semi-gloom widened into light. The cliffs no longer overhung each other.
A narrow strip of sky became visible, and, in front, the open daylight.

But with the joy of the discovery another sight met his gaze, a sight
which sent the blood tingling through his veins. Yet, at first glance,
it was not a particularly moving one. On the ground, at his feet, lay
two unobtrusive-looking pebbles of a bluish gray. But as the next moment
he held them in his hands, Laurence knew that he held in a moment what
he had gone through years of privation and ruthless bloodshed to
obtain--wealth, to wit. For these two unobtrusive pebbles were, in fact,
splendid diamonds!

More of them? Of course there were. The exploration could wait a little
longer. An accident might cut him off from this spot--might cut him off
from such a chance forever. The hands of the seasoned adventurer
trembled like those of a palsied old woman as he turned over the loose
soil with his foot, for instrument of any kind he had none; and indeed,
his agitation was not surprising, for in less than an hour Laurence was
in possession of eight more splendid stones as large as the first,
besides a number of small ones. He knew that he held that which should
enable him to pass the remainder of his life in wealth and ease, could
he once get safe away.

Could he? Ah, there came in the dead weight--the fulfilling of that
strange irony of fate which well-nigh invariably wills that the good of
life comes to us a trifle too late. For his search had brought him quite
into the open day once more. Before him lay a valley--or rather
hollow--of no great size, and--it was shut in--completely walled in by
an amphitheatre of lofty cliffs.

Cliffs on all sides--at some points smooth and perpendicular, at others
actually overhanging, at others, again, craggy and broken into terraces;
but, even with the proper appliances, probably unscalable; that detail
his practised eye could take in at a glance. How, then, should he hope
to scale them, absolutely devoid, as he was, of so much as a stick--let
alone a cord.

A cord? How had he been brought there? Had he been let down by a
cord--or brought in by some secret entrance? the latter appeared more
probable; and that entrance he would find,--would find and traverse, be
its risks, be its terrors what they might. He had that upon him now
which rendered life worth any struggle to preserve.

He stepped forth. The sky was over his head once more, clear and blue.
That was something. By the slant of the sunrays he judged it must be
about the middle of afternoon. The floor of the hollow was bumpy and
uneven. Sparse and half-dry grass bents sprung from the soil, but no
larger vegetation--no trees, no brush. Stranger still, there was no sign
of life--even of bird or insect life. An evil, haunted silence seemed to
brood over the great, crater-like hollow.

The silence became weighty, oppressive. Laurence, in spite of himself,
felt it steal upon his nerves, and began to whistle a lively tune--as he
walked slowly around, examining the cliffs, and every crack and cranny,
with critical eye. The echoing notes reverberated weirdly among the
brooding rocks. Suddenly his foot struck something--something hard. He
looked down, and could not repress a start. There at his feet, grinning
up at him, lay a human skull--nay, more, a well-nigh complete skeleton.

It was a gruesome find under the circumstances. Laurence, his nerves
unstrung by the effects of the drug, and recent alternations of
exultation and what was akin to despair, felt his flesh creep. What did
it mean? Why, that no way of escape did this valley of death afford.
This former victim--had he been placed there in the same way as himself,
and, all means of exit failing, had succumbed to starvation when his
provisions were exhausted? It looked that way. Bending down, he examined
this sorry relic of humanity--examined it long and carefully. No bone
was broken, the skeleton was almost complete; where it was not, the
joints had fallen asunder without wrench, and the smooth round cranium
showed not the slightest sign of abrasion or blow.

With sinking heart he pursued his search; yet somehow his attention now
was given but languidly to potential means of exit which the faces of
the cliffs might afford. Something seemed irresistibly to draw it to the
ground. Ha! that was it. Again that horrid gleam of whitened bones.
Another skeleton lay before him--and look, another, and another, at
short distances apart. All these, like the first, were unshattered,
uninjured; but--the whole area here was strewn with skulls, yellow and
brown with age,--was strewn with bones also, mossy, mahogany-hued, and
which crackled under his tread.

No one could be more ruthless, more callous; no man could view scenes of
cruelty and bloodshed more unmoved than Laurence Stanninghame,--as we
have shown,--or bear his part more coolly and effectively in the
fiercest conflict; yet there was something in these silent human relics
lying there bloodless; in the unnatural, haunted silence of this
dreadful death-valley that caused his flesh to creep. Then he noticed
that all were lying along the slope of a ridge which ran right across
the hollow, dividing the floor of the same into two sections. He must
needs go over that ridge to complete his explorations, yet now he shrank
from it with awe and repugnance which in any other man he would have
defined as little short of terror. What would await him on the other
side?

Well, he must go through with it. Probably he would find more of such
ghastly relics--that was all. But as he stood upon the apex of the
ridge, with pulses somewhat quickened, no whitening bones met his
gaze--fixed, dilated as that gaze was. The cliff in front--he thought
to descry some faint chance of escape there, for its face was terraced
and sloping backward somewhat. Moreover, it was rent by crannies and
crevices, which, to a desperate and determined man, might afford hand
and foothold.

And now for the first time it flashed upon Laurence that the mystery of
"The Spider" stood explained. This horrible hole whence there was no
escape--where men were thrust to die by inches as all of these had died
before him--the repulsive and blood-sucking insect was in truth a
fitting name allegorically for such a place, which swallowed up the
lives of men. Besides, for all he knew, the configuration of the crater
might, from above, resemble the tutelary insect of the Ba-gcatya. Yes;
he had solved the mystery, as to that he was confident--the next thing
to do was to find some way out, to break through the fatality of the
place.

For the first time now his shoulder began to feel stiff and sore, where
the stick hurled by Lindela had struck him. That was a bad preparation
for the most perilous kind of cliff-climbing. Then the incident recalled
to mind Lindela herself. Her sudden change of front was just such an
oddity as any of the half-ironical incidents which go to make up the sum
of life's experiences. Well, savage or civilized, human nature was
singularly alike. A touch of superstition and the god of yesterday
became the demon of to-day.

Thus musing, he came, suddenly and unexpectedly, upon another skeleton.
But the effect of the discovery of this was even more disconcerting than
that of the first. For, around, lay rotting rags of clothing, and a
gold ornament or two. These remains he recognized at a glance. They were
those of Lutali.

Yes, here was a broad bracelet of gold, curiously worked with the text
of the Koran, which he had seen last on the Arab's sinewy wrist. Now
that wrist was but a grisly bone. There, too, were parchment strips,
also inscribed with Koran passages, and worn in a pouch as amulets. The
identity of these remains was established beyond a doubt.

But the discovery inspired within him a renewed chill of despair. If
Lutali had been unable to find means of escape, how should he? The Arab
was a man of great readiness of resource, of indomitable courage, and
powerfully built. If such a one had succumbed, why should he, Laurence,
fare any better? He sat down once more, and, gazing upon the sorry
remnant of his late confederate, began to think.

What a strange, vast, practical joke was that thing called life. Here
was he at the end of it, and the very means of ending it for him had, at
the same time, put him into possession of that which rendered it worth
having at all. He felt the stones lying hard and angular in his pockets,
he even took out one of them and turned it over sadly in his hands. He
would gladly give a portion of these to be standing on the summit of
yonder cliff instead of at the base; not yet had he come to feel he
would gladly give them all. It was only of a continuance with what life
had brought him that he should be there at all. He had sacrificed
himself for another. The sublimity of the act even yet did not strike
him. He regarded it as half-humorous, half-idiotic,--the first because
his cynical creed was bolstered up by the consciousness that Holmes
would never more than half appreciate it; the last, because--well--all
unselfishness, all consideration, was idiotic.

Then it occurred to him that it would be time enough to sit down and
dream when he had exhausted all expedients, and he had not explored that
side of the hollow at all yet. To this end he moved forward. A very
brief scrutiny, however, of the face of the cliff sufficed to show that
for climbing purposes the cracks and crannies were useless.

Ha! What was this? A cave or a rift? Right in front of him the cliff
yawned in just such a rift as the one in which he had awakened to find
himself, only not on anything like such a large scale. Eagerly Laurence
plunged into this. Here might be a way to the outer world--to safety.

He pressed onward in the semi-gloom. The rocks darkened overhead,
forming, in effect, a cave. And now it seemed that he could hear a
strange, soft, scraping, a kind of sighing noise. A puff-adder was his
first thought, looking around for the reptile. But no such reptile lay
in his path, and he had no means of striking a light. With a dull
shrinking, his flesh creeping with a strange foreboding, as with the
consciousness of some fearful prescience, he decided to push on, being
careful, however, to tread warily. This was no time for sticking at
trifles.

But as he advanced the air became foetid with a strange, pungent,
nauseous odour. There were lateral clefts branching off the main
gallery, but of no depth, and to these he had given but small notice.
Now, however, something occurred of so appalling a nature that he stood
as one turned to stone.

There shot out from one of these lateral recesses two enormous
tentacles--black, wavy as serpents, covered with hair, armed at the
extremity with a strong double claw. They reached forth noiselessly to
within a couple of yards of where he stood, then two more followed with
a quick, wavy jerk. And now behind these, a head, as large as that of a
man, black, hairy, bearing a strange resemblance to the most awful and
cruel human face ever stamped with the devil's image--whose dull, goggle
eyes, fixed on the appalled ones of its discoverer, seemed to glow and
burn with a truly diabolical glare.

Laurence stood--staring into the countenance of this awful thing--his
blood curdled to ice within him, his hair literally standing up. Was it
the Fiend himself who had taken such unknown and fearful shape to appear
before him here in the gloom of this foul and loathsome cavern? Then, as
his eyes grew more and more used to the dim shades, he made out a huge
body crouched back in the recess, half hidden by a quivering mass of
black, hairy tentacles.

For a few moments thus he stood--then with a cry of horror he threw out
his hand as though instinctively to ward off an attack. The four
tentacles already protruded were quickly withdrawn, and the fearful
creature, whatever it was, seemed to shrink back into the cranny. One
last look upon the hairy heap of moving, writhing horror--upon those
dreadful demon eyes, and this man, who had faced death again and again
without shrinking, now felt it all he could do to resist an impulse to
turn and flee like a hunted hare. He did, however, resist it--yet it was
with flesh shuddering and knees trembling beneath him that he withdrew,
step by step, backwards, until he stood once more in the full light of
day.

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE HORROR.

Vampire--insect--devil--what _was_ the thing? From the length and
thickness of those frightful tentacle-like legs, stretching forth from
the cranny--Laurence--who had not halted until he had gained the ridge
dividing the hollow--estimated that the creature when spread out must be
eight or ten feet in diameter.

He looked back. It had not followed him from the cave. Why had it not?
Was it waiting for night--to steal upon him in the darkness, to wreath
around him those terrible tentacles, and to drain his life-blood?

Now, indeed, all stood clear. "The Spider" was no allegorical term, but
literal fact. That frightful monster with which he had just come face to
face was indeed the demon-god of the Ba-gcatya! It was actually fed with
living men, in accordance with some dark and mysterious superstition
held by that otherwise fine race. Now the fate of those whose skeletons
lay around stood accounted for. They had been devoured by this
unimaginable horror. Alive? It was almost certain--possibly when
weakened by starvation. Yet a gruesome thought entered his mind. Why had
an abundance of food been lowered with him into this hell-pit? Did not
the circumstance make as though it was in their full vigour that the
monster was designed to seize its victims--and in that event, with what
an extent of strength and fell ferocity must it not be endowed?

But what _was_ this thing? Laurence had seen spiders of every variety,
huge and venomous, and of grisly size, yet nothing like this. Why, the
creature was as large as a bear nearly! It must be some beast hitherto
unknown to natural history; yet those awful tentacles--joints, hair,
everything--could not but belong to an insect--were, in fact, precisely
as the legs of a huge tarantula, magnified five hundred-fold. What
ghastly and blood-curdling freak of nature could have produced such a
monstrosity as this? Why, the very sight of the awful thing huddled up,
black, within the gloom of the cranny, the horrid tentacles--a
hundred-fold more repulsive, more blood-curdling than though they
actually were so many serpents--moving and writhing in a great
quivering, hairy, intertwined mass--was in itself a sight to haunt his
dreams until his dying day, did he live another fifty years. What must
it mean, then, to realize that he was actually shut in--escape
impossible--with the deliberate purpose of being devoured by this
vampire, this demon, even as all these others had been devoured before
him?

At this juncture of his meditations his mind became alive to two
discoveries--one, that he had gained the farther end of the ridge than
that by which he had crossed; the other, that immediately before and
beneath him, just over the slope of the ridge, lay the body of a man.

Yes--the body of a man, not the skeleton of one. That it was that of a
dead man he could see at a glance--also that it was one of the
Ba-gcatya. With a shudder he remembered the luckless wretch he had seen
dragged away but a day or two before his own seizure--whether for
evil-doing or as a customary sacrifice he had been condemned to this,
Laurence had not inquired at the time. Casting one more look at the
cave, and satisfying himself that the monster had not emerged, Laurence
went down to examine the body.

It was that of a man in the prime of life--and wearing the head-ring. It
was lying on its back, the throat upturned and protruding. And then
Laurence shudderingly noticed two round gaping orifices at the base of
the throat, clearly where the great nippers of the monster had
punctured. The limbs, too, were scratched and scored as though with
claws; and upon the dead face was such an awful expression of the very
extremity of horror and dread as the spectator, accustomed as he was to
such sights, had never beheld stamped on the human countenance before.
And beholding it now, Laurence Stanninghame felt that the perspiration
was oozing upon him at every pore, for he realized that he was looking
upon a foresight of his own fate; for was he not that most perfectly and
completely helpless of all God's creatures--an unarmed man!

He had not so much as a stick or a pocket-knife to resist the onslaught
of this blood-drinking monster--no, not even a boot, for it flashed
across his mind at that moment that a good iron-shod heel might be
better than nothing. He was wearing only a low-soled pair of ordinary
_velschoenen_--hide shoes, to wit. There were not even stones lying
about the ground, save very small ones, and he had no means of loosening
rock slabs large enough to serve as weapons. There was no place of
refuge to climb into afforded by ledges or pinnacles of rock, and even
were there, why, the thing could surely come up after him as easily as
the common tarantula could run up a wall. Nothing is more completely
demoralizing than the helplessness of an unarmed man. With his
Express--or his six-shooter--this one would have regarded the situation
in the light of a wholly new and adventurous excitement--with even a
large strong-bladed knife he would have been willing to take his
chances. But he was totally unarmed. It seemed to Laurence that in that
brief while he had lived a lifetime of mortal fear.

Then with a mighty effort he pulled himself together. He would return to
where he had left his stores ere commencing the exploration. Nobody ever
yet improved a situation of peril by starving himself. Yet as he wended
his way up the long chasm wherein he had first awakened to life, it was
with a feeling of shuddering repulsion. The place bore such a close
resemblance now to that other cave; yet here, at any rate, he knew there
was nothing.

He opened the corn baskets and the calabash of _amasi_, and made a
fairly good meal. Then, by the glooming shades of the overhanging rock,
he judged that daylight was waning. Out into the open once more--the
open air might render such a life-and-death struggle with the monster a
trifle less horrible than here, shut in by these tomb-like rock walls.

The gray of the brief twilight was upon the faces of the surrounding
cliffs, which soon faded into misty gloom. Only the stars, leaping into
the misty gloom--only the stars, leaping forth into the inky sky, shed
an indistinct light into this vault of horror and of death. He was shut
in here--and shut in with this awful thing which should find him out
during the hours of darkness. And, marvellous to tell, a sudden
drowsiness came upon him--and whether the effects of the drug still
lingered about him, or was it the reaction from an overstrained mind? he
actually slept--slept hard and dreamlessly.

Suddenly he awoke--awoke with the weight of an indefinable terror upon
him. A broad moon in its third quarter was sailing aloft in the heavens,
flooding the hollow with its ghostly light. Instinctively he sprang to
his feet. As he did so there came upon him a resistless and shuddering
fear akin to that which had paralyzed him in the cave. What was it? The
magnetic proximity of the awful thing stealthily stalking him? No. The
reason now lay clear.

In the moonlight he could make out, shadowy and indistinct, the corpse
he had found during the afternoon. But, as he gazed, a change seemed to
have come over it. It had increased in size--had more than doubled its
bulk. Heavens! the dark mass began to move--to heave--and then he
thought the very acme of horror was reached. Not one body was there, but
two. Spread out over the human body was that of the monster. Now he
could make out almost every detail of its hideous shape, the convulsive
working of the frightful tentacles as it devoured its lifeless prey. He
could stand it no longer. His brain was bursting; he must do something.
Raising his voice he shouted--shouted as assuredly he had never shouted
in his life. There was a maniacal ring in his voice. He felt as though
he must rush right at this thing of fear. Was he really going mad? Well,
it began to look like it.

But the effect was prompt. The awful vampire, gathering its horrible
legs under it, sprang clear of the carcass. It stood for a moment in
rigid immobility, then ere the maniacal echoes of that shout had
quavered into silence among the cliffs, it shoggled over the ridge and
was lost to view.

The night wore through somehow, and if ever mortal eyes were rejoiced by
the light of dawn, assuredly they were those of Laurence Stanninghame,
as once more he found himself the sole living tenant of that ghastly
place of death. Yet, to what end? One more dreary day in his rock
prison, another night of horror--and--the same brooding fate awaiting!
He could not remain awake forever. Even though the sound of his voice
thus unexpectedly lifted up had alarmed the vampire, it would not always
do so. Still, with the light of the new-born day after the night of
terror came some medium of relief.

Once more he drew upon his provision stores. While repacking them his
gaze rested on the native blanket with the wild idea of manufacturing
therefrom a cord. But to do this he needed a knife. The stuff was of
material too stout for tearing.

A knife! Ha! With the thought came another. It was not worth much, but
it was something,--and with that came a hard, fierce, desperate hope.
The broad gold bracelet which still encircled Lutali's skeleton
wrist--could not that be banged and flattened into something sharp and
serviceable? It was hard metal, anyway.

Still the grim horror lurked within its cave--still it came not forth.
It was waiting until another night should embolden it to seize its
defenceless human prey. He glanced upwards. There were still from two to
three hours of daylight. In a very few moments he had reached the
skeleton of the Arab, and, snapping off the bony wrist without
hesitation, the bracelet was within his grasp.

But as he looked around for some means of flattening it, there flashed
in upon him another idea--a perfectly heaven-sent idea, grisly under
ordinary circumstances, as it might be. The bracelet was large and
massive, and for it a new use suggested itself. Critically examining the
skeletons, he selected two with the largest and strongest leg-bones.
These he soon wrenched off, and, running one through the gold bracelet,
he jammed the latter fast against the thicker end--binding it as tightly
as he could to the bulging joint with a strip torn from his clothing.
With a thrill of unutterable joy he realized that he was no longer
unarmed. He had manufactured a tolerably effective mace. He swung it
through the air two or three times with all his force. Such a blow would
strike a human enemy dead;--was this thing so heavily armour-plated as
to be proof against a similar stroke?

With one idea came another. These bones might be further utilized, they
might be splintered and sharpened into daggers. No sooner thought of
than carried out. And now the skeletons underwent the most ruthless
desecration. Several were wrenched asunder ere he had selected half a
dozen of the most serviceable--and these he hammered to the required
size with his newly constructed mace--sharpening them on the rough face
of the rock. And then, as with a glow of satisfaction he sat down to
rest and contemplate his handiwork--he almost laughed over the grim
whimsicality of it. Did ever mortal man go into close conflict armed in
such fashion--he wondered--with club and dagger manufactured out of the
bones of men?

Should he take the bull by the horns, and advance boldly to attack the
monster in its own den? He shrank from this. The gloom of the cavern
invested the thing with an additional element of terror, besides the
more practical consideration that a confined space might hinder him in
the use of his _bizarre_ and impromptu weapons. He would need all the
freedom of hand and eye. Once more he took out the metal box, and fed
his eyes long and earnestly upon its contents. The Sign of the Spider!
Was there indeed an influence about this trinket--or rather, the love
which had hallowed it--which was potent to stand between him and peril
in the direst extremity, even as it had stepped between him and certain
death at the spears of the victorious Ba-gcatya? Slightly improved as
was his helpless condition, yet he could not hope. Even if he succeeded
in slaying the monster, how should he escape from this death-trap, this
rock-prison? The second day closed.

How many hours of darkness should precede moonrise he could but feebly
guess. Grasping his strangely fashioned club in his right hand, and the
strongest and sharpest of his bone daggers in the left--he stood, his
back to the rock wall, so as not to be taken in the rear; never relaxing
for a moment in vigilance, his ears strained to their utmost tension,
his eyeballs striving to pierce the black gloom. More than once a sound
as of stealthy, ghostly scrapings caused his heart to beat like a
hammer; and he seemed to see the horrible eyes of the monster flaming
luridly out of the darkness; but still the silent hours went by,
unbroken by any disturbance.

Ha! The gloom of the hollow was lightening--and soon the rim of the
great moon peeped over the cliff behind him. But his attention was
rivetted now upon something before him--a something, huge and black and
shadowy--which moved. The horror was coming over the ridge.

It came,--running stealthily a few yards,--then halting,--then running
again. It passed the body of its last victim, and came running on.
Laurence stood transfixed, spellbound, with loathing and repulsion, as
he gazed upon the huge hairy legs, listening to the scraping patter of
the claw-armed extremities. But he had no doubt now as to its
intentions; it was coming straight for him.

It stopped--within a bare forty yards, and now as for the first time, he
got a clear view of it in the bright moonlight, Laurence felt his heart
fail him for the very hideousness of the beast. It had the head of a
devil, the body and legs of a spider, and the black hairy coat of a
bear; and, indeed, it was nearly as large as a fair-sized specimen of
the latter. No, it was no ordinary thing, this fearsome monster.

It advanced a little nearer,--stopped again,--then rushed straight at
him.

Laurence stepped aside just in time to avoid the open jaws, but too late
entirely to escape the great flail-like tentacle, which swept him from
his feet, right under the horror, pinioning for a moment his arms. Then,
by a tremendous effort, he threw himself partly upwards. The horrible
nippers descended--but missing his throat--descended to his chest, and
met there, with a metallic, crunching sound.

Yet he was unharmed. Even in that unspeakably awful moment--crushed in
the wreathings of the huge tentacles--the frightful head and devilish
eyes of the vampire within two feet of his own--he realized what had
happened. Instead of penetrating his body, the nippers of the monster
had struck upon the metal box. The thought nerved him. Wrenching his arm
partly free beneath the horror, he sought a joint in the horny armour,
and drove the bone dagger into its body--drove it into the very butt.

Throwing up its head convulsively, the fearful creature began to spin
round and round, and its would-be victim realized somewhat of its
enormous muscular strength, for wiry and in hard training as he was, he
was dragged with it, rolled over and over in the wreathings of the
black, hairy tentacles. Was he being dragged off to its den? The very
terror of the thought nerved him once more--revived his fast-failing
strength. Drawing forth another of his bone daggers, he plunged it, too,
deep into the body of the beast.

For a moment the sinewy, struggling tentacles relaxed, and just that
moment the man was able to seize, or he had been lost. With a violent
effort he flung himself free, and, having once more gained his
feet,--his breath coming in hard, panting gasps,--stood awaiting the
next attack.

Thus they stood, a strange group indeed, in the brilliant moonlight: The
man, his rudely constructed mace uplifted, his head bent forward, a
lurid glow in his eyes--the glow of the fell fury of desperation; the
hideous spider-devil--swaying itself on its horrible tentacles as though
for another spring upon its intended victim. Ha! it was coming!

The man stood ready, a tightening of the muscles of the arm that held
the club, a lowering of the brows. On the part of the demon, a spasmodic
contraction. Again it came at him.

Half rearing itself from the ground, its feelers waving in the air on a
level with his face, propelling itself slowly forward, as though to make
sure of its final rush, emitting the while a kind of soft breathing
hiss. The aspect of the creature was so truly fearful, that the man,
gazing upon it, was conscious of a kind of blasting influence stealing
over him, beginning to paralyze nerve and effort alike--a feeling that
it was useless to continue the struggle. The metal box could not save
him twice. Yet, through all, was the certainty that to lose nerve for
one moment was to lose life.

His will-power triumphed. He knew that did he once again get within grip
of those ghastly tentacles he would never emerge alive. He swung up his
improvised mace; the creature was now within twelve yards of him. He
hurled the club; with terrific force it cleft the air, the massive band
of gold which constituted its head lighting full upon one of the demon's
eyes. For one moment the horror contracted into a heaving, writhing
heap, frightful to behold, then, throwing out its grisly tentacles, it
spun round and round as it had done before. The man's heart was beating
as though it would burst. Was the thing slain, or in its vampire
tenacity of life would it renew the combat? Ha!--was it coming again?
Was it? One moment of the most unutterable suspense, and then--and
then--the fearful thing drew back, turned round, and shoggled away in
the direction whence it had come. It was worsted.

Save for a few scratches, Laurence was unhurt. He had almost
miraculously escaped the creature's nippers. Yet now that he had won his
hard-fought victory, a sort of rage took possession of him, an impulse
to follow it up, to destroy this fell horror utterly. Growling a savage
curse, he started in pursuit of the retreating monster, but hardly had
he taken two steps forward than there floated to his ear a sound--a
voice which seemed to fall from the sky itself. He stopped short in his
tracks and stood immovable, statuesque, listening.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

"ONLY A SAVAGE!"

"Nyonyoba!"

Clear, distinct, the name sounded, floating down from above.

"What the devil is that?" was the characteristic exclamation that burst
from Laurence--and there was something of a quaver in the tone. For his
nerves were quite overstrung, and no manifestation of things unknown
would have surprised him now.

"Nyonyoba! Ho, Nyonyoba!" again called the voice in soft, rich Zulu
tones, low but penetrating. "Move now some thirty paces to where the
cliff juts. There is that by which you may return to earth again--and
the Spider may go hungry."

"The Spider has got enough to fill him up for some long time," answered
Laurence, with excusable pride. "But who speaks?--The voice is like that
of Lindela."

"It is that of Lindela," came the soft-toned reply. "Climb now, and
tarry not. I see the Spider. Climb before it is too late."

With all his elation, now that the first flush of victory was over,
Laurence could not recall without a shiver the grasp of those horrible
tentacles, the fiend-like glare of that dreadful face. He vastly
preferred flight to renewed fight, now.

Following the voice, he came to the point indicated. A rope of twisted
raw-hide thong lay against the rock. His heart leaped within him. Soon
he would be free from this fearful place. The cliff here formed a
projecting angle, all jagged like the teeth of a saw. He remembered
noticing this, remembered balancing its capabilities of forming a
natural ladder. He had even climbed a few steps, and then had been
forced to own that it was impracticable. Now, however, with the aid of
the raw-hide rope, the thing could be done--done with comparative ease.

As a preliminary he stepped back, and, gazing upwards, went over the
climb in his mind, carefully noting every step, every handhold. The
cliff was terrace here, and the nearest resting-place, whence, indeed,
the rope hung, he estimated to be about sixty feet. Without this aid,
however, it might as well have been sixty hundred.

Seizing the rope he began his ascent, the mace and the remainder of his
bone daggers still slung around him. The task was more difficult than it
looked. Contact, often sudden and violent, with the rock face bruised
his knuckles, inflicting excruciating pain, once indeed so as to turn
him sick and faint. But a glance down into the grisly hollow, as he hung
thus suspended by a thread--the glint of the white skeletons in the
moonlight, and, above all, the vague, shadowy outline, black and
frightful, of the horror, which still lingered outside its den, as
though meditating return--nerved him once more. What if he were to fall,
maimed, battered, helpless--would not the frightful thing hold him
entirely at its mercy, and return and drain his life-blood at its
pleasure? Summoning all his will-power, all his strength, he resumed his
climb, and soon a firm, resolute hand, grasping his, drew him up for the
time being into safety; for they were on a ledge.

"Rest now, beloved," said the chief's daughter softly, as she turned to
draw up the rope. "I have saved thee so far."

"But--to what end, Lindela? Did you not fling a stick at me, and strike
me hard? See, I am bruised with it yet. It has even hindered my climbing
powers. That is a strange way of showing love."

"But is this a stranger way?" said the girl sadly, displaying the rope
she had just drawn up. "See now. They suspected me, as it was. Had I not
shown myself the first and the fiercest to turn against you, should I
have been here now? But come, we are not yet in safety. When we are it
will be time enough for talk, and for--love."

She led the way to a steep, narrow cranny. Up this they climbed some
fifty feet without difficulty, emerging upon another terrace. Here
another rope hung from the cliff above, about the same height.

"Go first, Nyonyoba, while I hold the rope to steady it," said the girl.
"Then, too, if your strength should give way, perhaps I may catch you
and break your fall. I am as strong as any of the women of the
Ba-gcatya--and that is saying much."

For answer, Laurence uttered a derisive laugh. But there must have been
that in its tone which pleased the chief's daughter, for she repeated
the request, more softly, more entreatingly.

"See now, Lindela," he answered, placing a hand on each of the shapely
shoulders, which glistened light bronze in the moonlight. "You don't
know me yet if you think I will leave the post of danger to you. Obey me
instantly. Go first up that rope, or I return and do combat once more
with the Spider."

"Once more? Have you then--actually fought with that--with that which is
down there?" And her eyes were round with amazement.

"I have, and the thing has two of these sticking in it to their full
length," showing the bone daggers. "I have a recollection, too, of
smiting hard with this noble knob-stick, but it was like smiting the
hardest kind of tortoise shell. Not yet, however, is the time to talk.
Go first, Lindela--go first."

She obeyed him now without further demur, and soon he had joined her,
for this climb was neither so long nor so difficult as the first.

Laurence now saw that they were high up on a mountain top. Great peaks,
some snow-capped, towered aloft--and far away beneath stretched a
billowy expanse of country, dim, misty in the moonlight. The air was
keen and chill, and with something of a shiver Lindela resumed her light
upper covering, which she had laid aside in order to give full freedom
to body and limbs.

"And you have met and fought with that," she began, pointing downwards,
"and are still alive? Why, Nyonyoba, you have done that which no man has
ever done before. How did you do it? With the bones of dead men? Ha! you
are indeed great, Nyonyoba, great indeed. Yet--what a thought!"

"A good thought truly. Still, had it occurred to those who went before
me they might have done the same. Yet not--for there was another force
that saved me which they lacked."

"Ha! another force?"

"Yes, the Sign of the Spider. The Spider itself was powerless against
that."

He drew forth the metal box, and for the first time examined it. By the
light of the moon he could discern two slight dents; one upon the border
of the quaint sprawling initials, where the nippers of the monster had
struck. For the moment he forgot Lindela, forgot the surroundings,
forgot where he was, remembering only Lilith. Three times had Lilith's
love interposed between him and certain death--three times most
unequivocally. And this third time, from what unutterably horrible form
of death! Those poisoned fangs. The very thought made him shudder.

"You are cold, beloved. See, here are coverings. I have thought of
everything."

The voice, the touch upon his arm, recalled him to himself. If the love
of the one woman had stood between him and death--no less had that of
the other borne its part. And this other now stood before him,
soft-eyed, pleading; grand in her statuesque and perfect proportions, in
her splendid strength and courage--that strength and courage which had
nerved her to set aside the most awesome traditions of her race, to
brave its gloomy superstitions, to venture alone and unaided into the
haunt of mysterious terror, for love of this stranger and alien. This,
too, was the sublimity of love in all of its indomitable
quenchlessness. And she who gave so freely, who gave all, indeed, of
this rich, this inestimable gift was--only a savage!

Only a savage! It is probable that some of the most golden-lined,
well-nigh divine phases of mind that ever had dawned upon him in his
life were shed over Laurence Stanninghame then, as he stood upon that
lofty mountain top at midnight in the flooding light of the moon, his
gaze meeting the sweet responsive one from the wide opened eyes of
this--savage.

"Say, Nyonyoba!" and the voice was full and rich,--"say, Nyonyoba, what
will you give me if I show you that which will delight your eyes? Will
you love me very much--very much?" and the soft musical Zulu word
_Ka-kúlu_ thus repeated was as a caress in itself. "Well then, come."

She led the way a few yards, then halted. A bundle lay upon the ground,
and this Lindela proceeded to undo. It consisted of a couple of strong
native blankets, inclosing several round baskets of woven grass similar
to those which had contained the food which had been let down in cruel
mercy into the place of the horror by the mysterious hands which had
lowered himself. But that upon which Laurence's eyes rested, upon which
he almost pounced, was a short carbine and a well-stocked
cartridge-belt. It was a vastly inferior weapon to his own trusty
"Express," but still it was a firearm.

"That is not all," cried the girl, laughing gleefully. "See this."

She thrust another bundle into his hands. Almost trembling he opened
it. A revolver--his own; also another of smaller calibre. And with both
was a quantity of ammunition. As he seized these, he realized that he
would have given half his diamonds, up till then well-nigh forgotten,
for just such an armoury. Now he felt equal to anything, to anybody. He
was once more the dominant animal, an armed man--nay, more--a well-armed
man.

"Ha!--now you are once more as you ought to be," cried Lindela,
gleefully clapping her hands together. "You who are stronger than--that
which is down there," falling into the Zulu custom of refraining
directly to mention that which is held in awe. "Without weapons. What
are you now with them? Great--great! To defeat the Spider--armed only
with the bones of men. _Whau!_ That was great indeed--magnificent!"

"Yet I think I will silence forever that horror," said Laurence,
stepping to the brink of the cliff and peering down into the awful
hollow. "Yes, there the beast is; I will risk a long shot," and he
sighted the carbine.

But in a moment Lindela's arms were around him, pinioning his to his
sides.

"Not so, beloved," she whispered earnestly. "Not so; the Black Ones who
wait on the Spider frequently come to look down into his haunt, even
when they do not bring offerings of men. If they find him slain they
will know you have escaped, and will pursue; for which reason it is
well--well, indeed, that you did not quite slay him with those
marvellous weapons, the bones of men. Further, they might hear the
sound of the fire-weapon, and know where to find us. Come, we have far
to travel."

This was unanswerable. Laurence stood for a few moments gazing down into
the fearsome place which held this shuddering mystery. Was it real? Was
he dreaming? Were those hours of terror and despair spent down there but
some gigantic nightmare? He passed his hand over his eyes--then looked
again. The thing was real. But now he could no longer see the horrid
shape--black and grisly. The creature must have withdrawn into its
ghastly den--to die. The wounds which he had inflicted upon it were
surely too deep, too strongly dealt, to be aught but mortal. The Spider
would no more drink the blood--feed on the flesh of men. Then he turned
to follow Lindela.

The latter had already loaded herself with the bundle of wraps and
provisions. To his suggestion that they should, at any rate, halve the
load, Lindela laughed in scorn.

"A man's work is to carry his weapons, and, when needed, use them," she
answered. "To bear loads--and this is a light one indeed--is woman's
work--not work for one who has proved too great even for the Spider."

Then, as they travelled down the mountain side in the fresh cool night
air, she told him of all that had befallen since he had been hauled to
his mysterious and awful doom. The thoughtless act of Holmes had
necessitated the destruction of Nondwana's kraal there and then; and,
indeed, the king's brother was more than dissatisfied with the clemency
extended to the other two white men. But the word of Tyisandhlu, once
given, stood. They had been sent out of the country under a strong armed
escort, which was under orders to conduct them to the great town of an
Arab chief, with whom El Khanac had blood brotherhood.

How had she found out the mystery of the Spider? Was it known to all the
nation? It was known to very few, she explained. The Black ones who
waited upon the Spider were a mysterious order--so mysterious, indeed,
that none knew exactly who were members of it and who were not. Nor
could she tell how the strange and gruesome cult first originated, save
that it was dimly whispered that the Ba-gcatya had taken it over from
the nation they had driven out, and that in accordance with an ancient
prophecy uttered by a famous magician at the time of their flight from
Zululand. But as she told of her resolve to rescue him at all risks,
even so long ago as when, by overhearing her father's talk, she learned
that this doom was to be his in any case, Laurence felt himself grow
strangely soft towards her. Savage or not, Nondwana's daughter was a
splendid character in the whole-hearted devotion of her love; heroic was
hardly the word for it. And as she went on to tell how she had devoted
herself entirely to finding out the locality of the dreaded spot,
learning the way to it by stealthily following on the footsteps of that
grim order when it was actually engaged in conveying thither another
human victim, risking her life at every step,--and not her life merely,
but incurring the certainty of the same fearful doom in the event of
discovery,--telling it, too, in the most simple way, and as though the
act were the most natural thing in the world, Laurence realized that he
might have done worse than throw in his lot with this loftily descended
daughter of a splendid race of kingly barbarians, had circumstances been
ordered otherwise.

But even while thus listening, while thus thinking, another vein of
thought was running parallel in his mind. Those insignificant-looking
stones, which he had picked up down there, represented wealth--ample
wealth; and with it had come a feverish longing to enjoy the comforts,
the pleasures, the delights which civilization afforded to those who
possessed it. Yet, his entering upon such enjoyment, if it were ever
effected,--as at that moment it seemed in a fair way to be,--he owed to
Lindela. What was to become of her, for she could never return to her
nation? She had thrown away everything, this high-born daughter of a
race of kings; had risked her life daily, to save the life of a
stranger--and that for love. Yes, that was love indeed! he thought. She
was a brown-skinned savage, but she was a splendid woman--with mind and
character as noble as her own magnificent physique. She would be a
delightful, a perfect companion during those wild, free forest
marches--day after day, night after night, fraught with peril and
hardship at every step, but--how would civilization affect her? Would it
not ruin that grand character, even as it had ruined really noble
natures before her,--for there is such a thing as the "noble savage,"
although we grant the product to be a scarce one. And with all this was
entwined the thought of Lilith Ormskirk.

Well, sufficient for the day is the evil thereof, had always been his
guiding maxim, and for the present, as he took his way down the mountain
side--the great crags rising higher and higher to the moon, the black
billowy roll of the forest country drawing nearer and nearer, the voices
of the wild creatures of the waste, raised weird and ravening on the
night, the thunderous boom of the voice of the forest king ever and anon
dominating all others--Laurence felt conscious of a wild, exhilarating
sense of freedom. There was music in these sounds after the ghastly,
awed silence of the horrible place from which he had been delivered.
And, was it due on his part to the frame of mind of the hardened
adventurer, trained to take things as they come, the good with the
ill--but never, during the days and weeks that followed, did the
daughter of the line of the Ba-gcatya kings feel moved to any qualm of
regret over the sacrifice of name and home and country which she had
made for this man's sake.

CHAPTER XXIX.

"A DEEP--A SOLITARY GRAVE."

They were now on the other slope of the great mountain chain which shut
in the Ba-gcatya country on that side, and, judging by the landmarks, it
seemed to Laurence that the surroundings wore an aspect not absolutely
unfamiliar, and that they could not be far out of the way by which he
had been brought in a captive. There was the same broad belt of desolate
land which took many days to traverse--a land of gloomy forest and
sluggish river, reed-fringed, crocodile-haunted; and night after night
they would build their camp-fire, resting secure in the red circle of
its cheery flame--while the howling of ravening beasts kept up dismal
chorus in the outer darkness beyond. It was a primeval idyll, the
wandering of these two--the man, the product of the highest
_fin-de-siècle_ civilization; the woman, the daughter of a savage race.
Yet in such wandering, savage and civilized were curiously near akin.
They were free as air--untrammelled by any conventionality or artificial
needs. The land furnished ample subsistence, animal and vegetable. The
wild game which supplied them with food could not have been more free.

"Would you rather have been rescued some other way, Nyonyoba?" said the
girl one evening, as they were sitting by the camp-fire.

"No. There is no other way I should have preferred. See now, Lindela.
What if we were to return to your people? Surely they would believe now
in the Sign of the Spider--and that the conqueror is greater than the
conquered?"

"Not so," she answered, and her eyes, which had brightened at the first
words of his reply, became clouded and sad. "They would put us to death
now--both of us. But were it otherwise--would you really desire to
return?"

"One might do worse. I don't know that the blessings of civilization are
such blessings after all, which to you is a riddle."

He relapsed into silence and thought. There were times when, with the
riches upon him, he was consumed with a perfectly feverish longing to
return to civilization. There were other times, again, when he looked
back with more than a lingering regret to the pleasant land of the
Ba-gcatya. Furthermore, Lindela had entwined herself around his heart
more than he knew. Not an atom of the intrepidity of devotion she had
displayed in order to compass his final rescue was thrown away upon
him--any more than her deportment since. Through the toilsomeness and
peril of their journeying no word of complaint or despondency escaped
her. She was always sunny-natured, cheerful, self-sacrificing,
resourceful--in short, a delightful companion. Yet--she was a savage, he
thought, with a curl of the lip, as before his mind's eye arose the
contrast between her and her civilized sisters, with their artificiality
and moods and caprices, and petty spites and fictitious ailments, and
general contentiousness all around. It was by no means certain he would
not have returned to dwell with her among her own people, had that
course been open--but it was not. Only the return to civilization lay
before him; and what to do with Lindela--for he had not the slightest
desire to part with her.

Meanwhile they had reached the perilous phase of their wanderings. Ruins
of multitudinous villages lay in their path at every turn, but, what was
worse, signs of human occupation began to show once more, and human
occupation meant hostile occupation. It was fortunate that the land had
been doubly raided--by the slave-hunters and the Ba-gcatya--because in
its depopulation lay their safety. But those who had escaped would not
be likely to view with any friendly glance a representative of each
despoiling factor, as exemplified in these two. So they avoided
villages, which was easy enough by careful observation ahead. What was
less easy, however, was to avoid wandering parties.

Nor was it always practicable. Once they came right into such a
horde--near enough, that is, for their presence to be discovered, and
for a whole day were they stealthily followed, their pursuers only
drawing off owing to nightfall and the proximity of other tribes hostile
to themselves. Another time they nearly walked into the midst of an
encampment while a cannibal feast was in progress. At sight of the human
limbs hung up, the filed teeth and tattooed faces of these savages
tearing at their horrible repast, Lindela shuddered with repulsion and
anger.

"See there, Nyonyoba," she said, when they had withdrawn beyond
hearing, "do not the Ba-gcatya act rightly in stamping out these foul
_Izíma_--who devour the flesh of their own kindred, like wild dogs?"

"I think so. And we, who capture them to sell them, do we not send them
to a better fate, where they can no more indulge in such repellent
appetites?" And this she did not attempt to gainsay.

For months they journeyed on thus, peril their companion at every step,
the more so as they gained the more inhabited tracts. Once they fell in
with a petty Arab chief and his following. This man was known to
Laurence, and treated them well and hospitably while they remained at
his camp. But before they departed he said:

"What sum will purchase this girl, my friend, for by now thou must have
had enough of her? She would fetch large money at Khartoum, whither I
can forward her, and I will deal with thee fairly. Yes, Allah is great.
I will only make my profit on her. The price shall be liberal."

Then Laurence Stanninghame, the renegade, the man who had thrown all
considerations of duty and feeling to the winds as so much lumber, so
much meaningless conventionality, felt as shocked and disgusted as ever
he could have done in his most foolish days, what time illusions were as
vivid, as golden as ever. But, remembering himself, he replied in an
even tone:

"No sum will purchase her, Rahman ben Zuhdi. Were I dying at this
moment, and large wealth could bring me fifty years more of life, I
would not sell her. All that the world contains could not purchase her,
for she has restored me to life at the peril of her own, again and
again,--nay, more, has restored me to that which alone renders life a
possession of any value. I have dealt in slaves, but this is a daughter
of a race of kings.

"The People of the Spider," said the Arab thoughtfully, flashing a
curious glance at Lindela, who stood some little way apart. "They grow
their women fine if they are all as this one. Well, I did but make thee
the offer, my brother; but if a man values anything above gold, all the
gold in the world will not induce him to part therewith. Fare thee well.
We part friends."

"As friends indeed do we part, O Rahman," replied Laurence. And they
resumed their respective ways.

As time went on, Lindela's manner seemed to undergo a change--her
spirits to flag. Was it the fearful malarial heat of the low-lying
forest country, often swampy, which was affecting her? thought Laurence
with concern. He himself was inured to it, but this daughter of a
healthy upland race, accustomed to the breezy, equable climate of her
mountain home--on her the steaming heat of the rotting vegetation and
marshy soil might conceivably be beginning to tell.

They were resting one day during the noontide heat. No burning rays from
the outside sun could scorch here, for the place was dim with thick
foliage and creepers trailing from the limbs of great forest trees. Both
had fallen asleep.

Suddenly Lindela started up. A sharp wringing pain, seeming to begin on
the left shoulder, went through her frame. It spread--down her
arm--then through to the other shoulder--down the other arm. What was
it? A cramp caught from the treacherous chill of the humid soil?
Perhaps. Well, it would soon pass. Then Laurence began to stir in his
sleep. The sight made her forget her pain. He must not awaken; he needed
rest. Noiselessly plucking a leafy branch she went over to him and began
softly to fan him. This was effective. His even, regular breathing told
that he slumbered peacefully, restfully, once more.

Soon she became aware that her powers were failing her. Her arm seemed
to become cramped, paralyzed, and a mist floated before her eyes. What
did it mean? Her lips opened to call aloud--then closed, uttering no
sound. Why should he be disturbed because she was suffering a little
pain? thought this savage--this daughter of a race of savage kings.

But the mist deepened before her failing vision. She swayed where she
sat, then fell heavily forward--upon him--the branch wherewith she had
been fanning him striking him sharply across the face.

Laurence sprang to his feet, unconsciously throwing her from him. His
first impression was that he had been surprised in his sleep by an
enemy.

"Lindela! What is it?" he cried, raising her up and supporting her. And
then his dark face turned a livid ashen white--for with the dull stupor
which lay heavy in the usually bright eyes, his own had rested upon
something else. The shapely shoulder was swollen to an abnormal size,
and at the back of it were two small round punctures.

"She has been bitten. A snake, of course," he muttered. "And it is too
late."

"Yes, it is too late, Nyonyoba," she murmured. "Yet I do not think I
have been bitten--not by a snake, or I should have known it."

"But you have been. When was this? Why did you not awaken me?" And his
voice startled even himself, so fierce was it in its grief.

"Why should I awaken you, beloved, you who needed rest?" she murmured,
groping for his hand. "Yes, it is too late. It was some time ago. I
thought it was a cramp, but I must have been bitten."

Laurence was thinking--and thinking hard. What remedy was there? None.
It was even as she had said--too late. The poison had penetrated her
whole system.

"I am dying, beloved--and shall soon go into the Dark Unknown----" she
murmured, more drowsily than before. "Yet it matters nothing, for those
of our nation do not fear death. And listen. I heard the Arab's proposal
to you, and your answer thereto--yet, when you returned to your people,
what would have become of me?"

[Illustration: "I AM DYING, BELOVED--AND SHALL SOON GO INTO THE DARK
UNKNOWN."]

She was but voicing his own thoughts of many and many a time before. Yet
now Laurence felt almost startled. Was it the clear intuition which
rightly or wrongly is believed to accompany the hour of dissolution?
Then he remembered she could have learned much about civilized peoples
through the talk of Tyisandhlu and her father.

"I die, beloved, but I welcome death," she went on,--"for I have
lived--ah, yes, I have lived. I feel no pain now, and I die in your
arms. Surely my _itongo_[7] will not weep mournfully on the voices of
the night as others do; surely it will laugh for very joy, for very
love, because of this my end, until time shall die--will it not,
Nyonyoba, my beloved? Say--will it not?"

But Laurence could not say anything, for, lo--a marvel. This man,
deadened for long years to feeling or ruth; this coldly pitiless
trafficker in the sufferings of human beings; in whose cynical creed now
such a love as that of this savage girl held no place--felt now as
though a hand were gripping him by the throat, choking all power of
reply. And the call of birds, high among the tree-tops, alone broke the
silence, in the semi-gloom of the forest aisles.

Lindela's voice had sunk until it was well-nigh inaudible, and Laurence
was constrained to bend his head to hers in order to catch her every
word. Then--a flash of gladness seemed momentarily to light up the
drowsy eyes, and she spoke no more. Her eyelids closed, her breathing
grew fainter and fainter, and soon Laurence knew that that which lay
heavy within his arms was no longer a living woman. Lindela had passed.

For long he sat thus. Then a faint rustling sound in the dry wood of an
immense fallen tree-trunk caught his ear. Ha!--the snake which had been
the cause of her death! It, at any rate, should die. Gently he laid her
down, then snatching up a stick which had been used to carry one of the
loads he advanced towards the sound.

Something was struggling among the dry bark; with the stick he broke
this away. There fell out an enormous spider.

He started back in horror and loathing. The hairy monster brought back
too gruesome a reminiscence. Then he noticed that it looked as if it had
received injury through crushing, two or three of the hideous tentacles
being partially or wholly broken off.

Then, as he gazed with loathing upon the sprawling thing, it seemed that
the missing link was supplied. Lindela, in her sleep, must have moved
over on to this horror, though not heavily enough to crush it. It had
buried its venomous nippers in her shoulder, prior to crawling away to
die.

A shiver ran through his frame as he beat to death the great noisome
insect--and his blood seemed to chill with a superstitious fear. It
seemed too strange, too marvellous to be a mere coincidence. Lindela had
defied the traditions of her race, and now she had met her death through
the agency of the very embodiment of those traditions. She, a daughter
of the Kings of the People of the Spider, had met her death through the
Spider's bite. It was horrifying in its sinister appropriateness. Was it
really a thing of witchcraft? Did the Fiend have actual bodily power
here, in "the dark places of the earth"? Had this demoniacal influence
followed her to wreak its vengeance here, at such a distance from the
home and country to which she would return no more?

When Laurence Stanninghame resumed his journey the next day he left
behind him a grave--a deep, secure grave--a solitary grave in the heart
of the untrodden forest. His journeyings henceforth must be alone; but
ofttimes his thoughts would go back to that nameless grave, and to her
who rested forever therein. Only a savage! Only a heathen! Yes--but if
brave, devoted, self-sacrificing love is of any account at all in the
scheme of Christian virtues, where would this savage, this heathen, come
in at the day of awards? Where indeed, among the multitude of
gold-worshipping, form-adoring Pharisees? Truth to tell, Laurence
believed but dimly in the day of awards. Yet did it exist, he thought he
knew the answer to his own question.

FOOTNOTE:

[7] Tutelary spirit.

CHAPTER XXX.

"GOOD-BYE--MY IDEAL!"

Johannesburg once more. The great, restless gold-town had passed through
many changes, many booms and rumours of booms--the latter for the most
part--since that quiet _trek_ now four years ago. Many of those who then
were among its busiest inhabitants had departed, some to a land whence
there is no return, others to the land of their respective births. Many,
who then had been on the verge of millionaires, "buzzing" their rapidly
acquired gains with a lavish magnificence which they imagined to be
"princely"--were now uncertificated bankrupts, or had blown their brains
out, or had come within the meshes of the law and the walls of a convict
prison; while others, who at that time lived upon hope and the "whiff of
an oiled rag," now fared sumptuously every day, and would do so unto
their lives' end. But for those who had held on to the place through
good and evil report, since the time we last pioneered our reader
through its dust-swept streets and arid surroundings, something of a
surprise was in store. For the old order of things was reversed. Instead
of Hazon returning without his travelling companions, the latter had
returned without Hazon.

"Bless my soul, Stanninghame, is that you?" cried Rankin, running right
into Laurence one morning just outside the new Exchange. "And Holmes
too? Why, you're looking uncommonly well, both of you. What have you
done with the pirate, eh?"

"Oh, he's coming on!" replied Laurence, which in substance was correct,
though it might be weeks before he came on; for, as a matter of fact,
Hazon had remained behind at a certain point to collect and reduce to
cash such gains as were being custodied for him--and the joint
undertaking--by sundry of his blood-brethren the Arab chiefs.

"Coming on, is he? Well, well! I think we've been libelling the pirate
after all, eh Rainsford?" as that worthy just joined them. "Here's
Hazon's _trek_ come back without Hazon, instead of the other way about."

Laurence thought how nearly it had been a case of the other way about.
Had he not offered himself instead of Holmes, it would have been, for he
would have remained with the Ba-gcatya, and Hazon would have returned
alone. Of the fate of Holmes--well--he knew what that would have been.
Holmes, however, did not, for the simple reason that Laurence had
refrained from communicating a word relating to that horrible episode to
either of his associates--when, shortly after parting with Rahman ben
Zuhdi, and the death of Lindela, he had found the two, safe and well, at
the principal town of a prominent Arab chief. And Holmes, possibly
through ignorance of its nature or magnitude, never did fully appreciate
the sacrifice which the other had made for him.

"What do you think?" went on Rankin, when the requisite amount of
greeting and chaff had been exchanged, "this fellow Rainsford has gone
and got married; has started out in the nursery department for all he's
worth."

Laurence laughed.

"Why, Rainsford, you were as stony broke as the rest of us when I left.
Things looking up, eh?"

"Of course. I told you it was a case of 'down to-day, up
to-morrow'--told you at the time. And it's my belief you'd have done
better to have remained here." Then lowering his voice; "Where's the
pirate?"

"Coming on."

Rainsford whistled, and looked knowing.

"What do you say?" cut in Rankin, "a drop of gin and soda wouldn't hurt
us, eh?" Then while they moved round to the Exchange bar, he went on;
"I've got a thing that would suit you to a hair, Stanninghame. I'd take
it up myself if I could, but I'm only an agent in the matter."

"Shares, eh?"

"Yes--Skinner and Sacks."

"Dead off. See here, Rankin--you must off-load them on somebody else. If
I were next door to certain of making half a million out of it, even
then I wouldn't touch any sort of investment connected with this place.
No, not to save my immortal soul--if I've got one, which at times seems
doubtful." And there was something in Laurence's laugh--evoked by old
time recollections--which convinced the other that no business was to be
done in this quarter at any rate.

There was method in the way in which Laurence had sought to dawdle away
the morning. He had arrived late the night before, and as yet had made
no inquiries. How strange it all seemed! Surely it was but yesterday
that he was here last. Surely he had slept, and had dreamed the
portentous events which had intervened. They could not have been real.
But the stones--the great diamonds--they were real enough; the metal box
too--the "Sign of the Spider."

How was he thus transformed? Later in the day, as he stood on the
_stoep_ knocking at the door of Mrs. Falkner's house, he was conscious
that his heart hardly beat quicker, that his pulses were as firm and
even as ever. Four years of a hard, stern schooling had done it.

Yes, Mrs. Falkner was at home. He was ushered into the drawing room,
which was empty. There was the same ever-clinging scent of roses, the
same knick-knacks, the same lounge on which they had sat together that
night. Even the battery stamps across the kloof seemed to hammer out the
same refrain.

The door opened. Was it Lilith herself? No, only Lilith's aunt.

"Why, Mr. Stanninghame, I am glad to see you. But--how you have
changed!"

"Well, yes, Mrs. Falkner. Time has knocked me about some. I can't say
the same as regards yourself, though. You haven't changed an atom."

She laughed. "That can't be true. I'm sure I feel more and more of an
old woman every day. But sit down, do, and tell me about your
adventures. Have you had a successful trip?"

"Pretty well. It has proved a more paying concern, at any rate, than
the exhilarating occupation known as 'waiting for the boom.'"

"I am very glad to hear that. And your friends--have you all returned
safe and sound?"

Laurence replied that they had. But for all his outward equability, his
impatience was amounting to torment. Even while he talked his ears were
strained to catch the sound of a light step without. How would Lilith
look? he wondered. Would these four years have left their mark upon her?

"And how is your niece, Miss Ormskirk?" he went on.

"Lilith? Oh, but--by the way, she is not 'Miss Ormskirk' now. She is
married."

"Oh, is she? I hadn't heard. After all, one forgets how time slips by."

That was all. It was a shock--possibly a hard one; but of late Laurence
Stanninghame had been undergoing a steady training for meeting such.
Mrs. Falkner--who had made the communication not without some qualm, for
she had been put very much up to the former state of things, both by her
nephew, George, and certain "signs of the times," not altogether to be
dissimulated, however bravely Lilith had borne herself after that
parting now so far back--felt relieved and in a measure a trifle
disappointed, for, womanlike, she dearly loved romance. But the man
before her had not turned a hair, had not even changed colour at the
intelligence. It could not really matter, she decided--which was as well
for him, but for herself disappointing.

"Yes--she married her cousin George, my nephew. You remember him," she
went on. "I was against it for a long time; but, after all, I believe it
was the saving of him, poor fellow, he was so wildly in love with her.
He was simply going to the dogs. Yes, it was the saving of him."

"That's satisfactory, anyway," said Laurence, as though he were
discussing the fortunes of any two people whose names he had just heard
for the first time. But meanwhile his mind was inwardly avenging itself
upon its outward self-control. For vividly, and as though spoken into
his ears, there seemed to float fragments of those farewell words
uttered there in that room: "_You have drawn my very heart and soul into
yours.... Oh, it is too bitter! Laurence, my darling--my love, my life,
my ideal, good-bye--and good-bye!_"

Well, the foolish dream had been a pleasant one while it lasted. Nay,
more,--in all seriousness it had borne momentous fruit,--for no less
than three times had that episode--yes, now it seemed a mere
episode--intervened between him and death.

"Lilith will be so glad to see you when you are passing through; for of
course you will be returning home again. They have taken a bungalow at
Kalk Bay for the summer. I'll find you the address."

They talked on a little longer, and then Laurence took his departure.

As he gained the outer air once more there was that about the shimmer of
the sunlight, the hum of the battery stamp, the familiarity of the
surroundings, which reminded him of that former time when he had thus
stepped forth, having bidden a good-bye which was not a good-bye. Yet
the same pain did not grip around his heart now--not in its former
acuteness--rather was it now a sense of the falling away of all things.
By a freak of psychology his mind reverted to poor Lindela, dying in his
arms in the steamy gloom of the equatorial forest: dying slowly, by
inches, in pain; yet uttering no cry, no complaint, lest she should rob
him of a few minutes more or less of sleep. That was indeed love. Still,
even while making it, his sense of philosophy told him the comparison
was not a fair one.

Well, that was over--another chapter in his life to shut down. Now to
make the best of life. Now, with the means to taste its pleasures, with
hard, firm health to enjoy them; after all, what was a mere sentimental
grievance? Perhaps it counted for something, for all he told himself to
the contrary. Perhaps deep down there gnawed a restless craving, stifle
it as he would. Who can tell?

"The R. M. S. _Alnwick Castle_ leaves for England at 4 P. M."

Such was the notice which, posted up in shipping office, or in the short
paragraph column of the Cape Town newspapers, met the public eye.

It was the middle of the morning. Laurence Stanninghame, striving to
kill the few hours remaining to him on African soil, was strolling
listlessly along Adderley Street. A shop window, adorned with
photographic views of local scenery and types of natives,--mostly
store-boys rigged up with shield and assegai to look warlike for the
occasion,--attracted his attention, and for a while he stood, idly
gazing at these. His survey ended, he backed away from the window in a
perfectly irrational and British manner on a busy thoroughfare,
and--trod hard on somebody's toes. A little cry of mingled pain and
resentment, then he stood--profusely apologizing.

But with the first tones of his voice, she whom he had so awkwardly, if
unintentionally damaged, seemed to lose sight of her injuries. Her face
blanched, but not with physical pain, her lips parted in a sort of gasp,
and the sweet eyes, wide and dilated, sought his in wonder--almost in
fear.

"Laurence!"

The name was hardly audible, but he heard it. And if his steely
philosophy had stood him in good stead before, assuredly at this moment
his guard was down; as he recognized that he had last beheld this serene
vision of loveliness, arrayed as now in cool white, strained to him in
farewell embrace alone in the solemn night, those parted lips pressed to
his in heart-wrung pain, those sweet eyes, starry, humid with love,
gazing full into his own. And now they met again, four years later--by
chance--in a busy thoroughfare.

"Pray excuse my inexcusable awkwardness; I must have hurt you," he said,
as they clasped hands, and the tone was even almost formal, for he
remembered they were in public.

"You--you--have changed. I should hardly have known you but for your
voice," she said unsteadily--for he had turned to walk up the street
with her. "But--when did you return? I--had not heard."

"Had you not? I called on your aunt in Johannesburg on the way through.
She was telling me all about you."

Something of relief seemed to manifest itself in Lilith's tone as she
rejoined:

"But you--are you staying here?"

"Well, no. I have been trying to kill time until this afternoon. I am
leaving by the _Alnwick Castle_."

"Oh! By the _Alnwick Castle_?" she repeated again--and in the catch in
her voice, and the quickness of utterance, he knew she was talking at
random, for the sake of saying something, in fact.

"Do you care to hear a little of what has befallen me since I went?" he
said. "Then let us turn in here," as she made a mute but eager gesture
of assent.

They had gained the entrance to the oak avenue at the back of Government
House. Strolling up this, they turned into the beautiful Botanical
Gardens. Nobody was about, save a gardener or two busied with their
work.

"What I am going to tell you is so marvellous that you will probably
refuse to believe it," he said, after narrating the incident of the sign
upon the metal box which had arrested the uplifted weapons of the
unsparing Ba-gcatya, and, of course, editing out all that might have
revealed the real nature of the expedition. "I have never breathed one
word of it to any living being--not even to those who were with me. I
would rather you did not either, Lilith, because it is too strange for
anybody to believe, and--for other reasons."

She gave the required promise, and he drew forth the box. At sight of
this relic of the past, that sweet, entrancing, if profitless
past--Lilith could no longer quite keep herself in hand. The tears
welled forth, falling upon the metal box itself--hallowing, as it were,
the sweet charm of its saving power.

"Your love had power to save one life, you see," he went on in a cold,
even voice, intended to strengthen him against himself. "But look,
now--see those marks on the lid, just discernible? Now--listen."

And Lilith did listen; and at the description of the awful rock prison,
with its skeleton bones, the long hours of helpless suspense and
despair--and the final struggle in the ghastly moonlight; the struggle
for life with the appalling monster that tenanted it, her eyes dilated
with horror, and with pallid face and gasping lips she begged him not to
go on, so great a hold did the incident take upon her imagination, even
there, in the blaze of the broad midday sunlight.

"I have done now," he said. "Well, Lilith--you see what that token of
your love has rescued me from. It was given as an amulet or charm, and
right well has it fulfilled its purpose. But--to what end?"

"Did you--did you come back with what you went for," she broke forth at
last, as with an effort.

"Yes. Therein, too, you proved yourself a true prophet. And now tell me
something about yourself."

"Were you--angry with me when you heard what I had done, Laurence?" she
said, raising her eyes full to his.

"Angry? No. Why should I be? Your life is your own, though, as a rule,
sacrificing ones' self to save somebody else, as your aunt rather gave
me to understand was the case here, is lamentably apt to turn out a case
of throwing away one's life with both hands. It is too much like cutting
one's own throat to save somebody else from being hanged."

"And is that your way of wishing me well, Laurence?" she said
reproachfully.

"No. I wish you nothing but well. It would be futile to say 'happiness,'
I suppose."

"The happiness of doing one's duty is a hard kind of happiness, after
all," she said, with a sad little smile.

"Yes. An excellent copybook maxim, but for all purposes of real
life--bosh. Am I not in my own person a living instance to that effect?
As soon as I pitched 'duty' to the dogs, why then, and only then, did I
begin to travel in the contrary direction to those sagacious animals
myself--which, of course, is simply appalling morality, but--it's life.
Well, child, make the best of your life, and prove a shining exception
to the dismal rule."

"Do you remember our talk on board the dear old _Persian_? Yes, we had
so many, you were going to say; but I mean our first one, the first
serious one--that night, leaning over the side, I asked you: 'Shall I
make a success of life?' Do you remember your answer?"

"As well as though it were yesterday. I replied that the chances were
pretty even, inclining, if anything, to the negative. Well, and was I
right?"

Lilith turned away her head. He could see that the tears were not far
away. Her lips were quivering.

"I likewise told you you were groping after an ideal," he went on.

"And I found it. Perhaps I had already found it when I asked the
question. Oh, Laurence, life is all wrong, all horribly wrong and out of
joint," she burst forth, with a passionate catch in her voice, as she
turned and faced him once more.

"Yes, I know it is. I came to that conclusion a goodish while ago, and
have never seen any reason since to doubt its absolute accuracy."

"All out of joint!" she repeated hopelessly. "It is as if our lives had
been placed opposite each other on parallel lines, and then one of the
lines had been moved. Then our lives lay apart forever."

"That's about it."

She was not deceived. His tone was hard; to all appearances indifferent.
Yet not to her ear did it so ring. She knew the immensity of effort that
kept it--and what lay behind it--under control. Then she broke down
entirely.

"Laurence, my love--my doubly lost love!" she uttered through a choking
whirlwind of sobs. "Teach me some of your strength--some of your
hardness. Then, perhaps, I can bear things better."

"A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, remember, and perhaps you
have shown me the weak link here--that of my 'hardness.' Child, I would
not teach you an iota of it, if I could. It is good for me, but no
woman was ever the better for it yet. But keep yourself in hand now. We
are in a public place, although a comparatively secluded one. For your
own sake, do not give way. And for the very reason that I feared to stir
up old memories, I had intended to go through without attempting to see
you once more. Tell me one thing--would it have been better had I done
so?"

"Better had you done so? No--no. A thousand times no--Laurence, my
darling. I shall treasure up this last hour we have spent
together--shall treasure it as the sweetest of memories as long as life
shall last."

"And I shall treasure up that reply. Listen! Twice has your love stood
between me and death, as I have told you. Yet of the third time I have
never told you. It was the day I decided to go up-country. I had done
with life. The pistol was pressed hard against my forehead. I was
gradually trying how much more pressure the trigger would bear. A hair's
breadth would have done it. Then it seemed that your voice was in my
ear. Your form stood before me. I tell you, Lilith, you saved me that
day as surely as though you had actually been within the room. I put the
pistol down."

"I did this?" wonderingly. "Why, that must have been the day I had that
awful dream."

"It was. Hazon came in just after, and we made our plans for the
expedition. I remember telling you of it that same afternoon."

"Why, then, if this is so, it must have been with some great purpose,"
she cried, brightening up, a strange, wistful smile illumining her
face. "Oh, how glad I am you have told me this, for now I can see
comfort--strength. In some mysterious way it seems as if our two lives
were intertwined, that it would ever be in my power in some dim way to
watch over yours. My darling, my darling--until this moment I had not
the strength to part with you--now I have. Let me do so before it leaves
me, for we have been here a very long time. I would have seen you off on
board, but that I dare not. I simply lack the strength of will to bear
that, Laurence, my dear one. We had better say good-bye here--not in the
crowded street. Then I will go--alone."

Both had risen, and were holding each other's hands, were gazing into
each other's eyes. Thus they stood for a moment. Nobody was in sight.
Lilith lifted her lips, and they moved in a barely audible murmur.

"Good-bye, my ideal!"

One long, close, farewell kiss, and she was gone. And the man, as he
flung himself back on the garden seat, with his eyes fixed dreamily on
the jutting end of the massive rock wall of Table Mountain towering on
high to the cloudless blue, realized at that moment no elation such as
one might feel who had found considerable wealth, and was returning full
of hard, firm health to enjoy the same. More than ever at that moment
did life seem to him all out of joint--more than ever, if possible; for
his had been one of those lives which, from the cradle to the grave,
never seems to be anything else.

CHAPTER XXXI.

CONCLUSION.

"Well, Fay, I think that's about enough for one lesson. Down you get."

"Just once more round the park, father," was the pleading rejoinder.
"I'm quite beginning to feel at home on Tricksie now."

Laurence gave way, and Tricksie darted off, perhaps a trifle too
vivaciously for a learner of the noble art of horsemanship. But the girl
kept her seat bravely, and the conceded scamper being brought to a
close, she came round to where Laurence awaited, and slid from her
saddle.

"Father, I won't have you call it 'lessons' any more," she cried. "I can
ride now; _can_ ride--do you hear!"

"Oh, can you?" laughed Laurence, thinking what a pretty picture she made
standing there with the full light of the setting sun tinting the golden
waves of her hair, playing upon the great dark eyes. Indeed, he owned
inwardly to a weakness, a soft place as strange as it was unwonted, for
this child of his. Yet she was something more than a child now, quite a
tall slip of a girl at the angular age; but there was nothing awkward or
angular even then about Fay Stanninghame.

"Well, hitch up the pony to the rail there," he went on. "Those two
scamps can take him in when they are tired of careering around and
whooping like Sioux on the war-path."

The two boys, also happy in the possession of a pony apiece, had lost no
time either in learning to ride it.

"There's no part of a fool about either of those chaps," said Laurence,
more to himself than to the girl, as he watched the two circling at full
gallop in and out among the trees, absolutely devoid of fear. "Let's
stroll a little, Fay; or would you rather go in?"

"Of course, I wouldn't," linking her arm in his. "Father, are we very
rich now?"

"Oh, pretty warm. Think it fun, eh, child?"

"Fun? Why it's heavenly. This lovely place! Oh, sometimes I dream that
this _is_ all a dream, and then--to wake up and find it real!"

"Well, dear, be as happy as you like now--all day and every day. You
have had enough of the other thing to last you a precious long time."

They strolled on through the sweet May evening--on beneath a great beech
hanger, where cushats cooed softly among the green mast, and the air was
musical with the sweet piping of thrushes and the caw of homing rooks.
Here and there a gap in the hawthorn hedge disclosed a glimpse of
red-tiled roof and farm stack--and nestling among the trees of the park
the chimneys of the Hall.

Laurence Stanninghame had found this place by a mere chance. He might
have purchased it for a third of its value, but he preferred not.
Possibly he distrusted the wandering blood within him, possibly he did
not lose sight of the fact that where he had found the great diamonds he
had certainly left behind many more, to be found or not at some future
time. So he rented the house and park, and extensive shooting and
fishing rights. No more pinching and scraping now. To the children this
change was, as Fay had said, "heavenly."

"How do people get rich in Africa, father?" said the latter, as they
turned homeward.

"In various ways. They find gold mines with no gold in them, and then
sell shares in them to a pack of idiots for a great deal of money. Or
they perhaps find a few diamonds themselves. Or they trade in all sorts
of things--ivory, and so forth."

He had stopped to light a pipe; Fay, intently watching his face through
the clouds of smoke he was puffing forth, detected a lurking quizzical
expression in his eyes, which roused her scepticism.

"I never quite know whether you are serious or not, father," she said.
"But you never tell us any stories about Africa."

"I've got out of practice for story-telling, little one."

"But Colonel Hewett tells us plenty,"--naming a neighbour,--"and yet he
hasn't been so much in Africa as you have."

"Ah, he'll never get out of practice in that line," returned Laurence,
with the same quizzical laugh.

"What a lot of adventures you must have had, father," went on Fay
wistfully; for this was a sore subject both with herself and her
brothers. They had expected tale upon tale of hair-raising peril--of
lions and crocodiles and snakes and fighting Zulus. But woeful
disappointment awaited. The last topic the returned wanderer seemed to
care to talk upon was that of his wanderings.

Before they regained the house they were joined by the two boys, happy
and healthy with their recent gallop, and full of the trout they were
going to catch on the morrow under the tuition of the keeper. Laurence,
dismissing them for a while, entered quietly by a back way. The post had
come in, and with it an African mail letter. This he carried into his
private sanctum. It was from Holmes.

"I hope the fellow isn't going to make trouble," he said to himself with
a slight clouding of the brow. "He's idiot enough to turn
pious--repentant, I suppose, they would call it--and give the whole
thing away. 'Nothing but a curse can come of it,--the curse of blood,'
the young fool said, or words to that effect. I wonder what sort of a
'curse' it is that puts one in possession of all this," looking out upon
the soft, peaceful English landscape, hayfield and wooded hill,
slumbering in the gathering dusk. "As if there could be a greater curse
anyhow than being condemned to go through life that most pitiable
object--a pauper with sixteen quarterings. No--no!"

He tore open the envelope, and in the fading light ran rapidly over its
contents. Hazon had returned to Johannesburg, and had wound up all their
affairs, and each of them was in possession of more than a small
fortune. There was nothing, however, of the remorseful or the morbid
about the writer now, and, turning over the page, Laurence broke into a
short half laugh, for there followed the announcement of Holmes'
engagement to Mabel Falkner of the blue eyes, and the usual transports
and rhapsodies attendant upon such a communication. Skipping the bulk of
this, Laurence returned the missive to his pocket with another sneering
laugh.

"We shall hear no more about a 'curse' on our good fortune now, friend
Holmes," he said to himself, "for you are entering upon an institution
calculated to knock out all such Quixotic niceties. Ha, ha! I shouldn't
be in the least surprised if in a little while you didn't hanker to
start up-country again upon another 'ivory' trade."

But Holmes' letter had, as it were, let in a waft of the dark cloud of
the Past upon the fair and smiling peacefulness of the Present, and he
fell to thinking on what strange experiences had been his--of the
consistent and unswerving irony of life as he had known it. Every
conventionality violated--every rule of morality, each set aside, had
brought him nothing but good--had brought nothing but good to him and
his. Had he grovelled on in humdrum poverty-stricken respectability,
what would have befallen him--and them? For him the stereotyped
"temporary insanity" verdict of a coroner's jury--for them, well, Heaven
only knew. Whereas now?

At this stage an impulse moved him, and opening a locked cabinet he took
forth something, and as he examined it the associations of the thing,
and the fast darkening room, brought back the vision of glooming rock
walls and a perfectly defenceless man weighed down with horror and
dread.

"May I come in, father? But you are in the dark."

It was Fay's voice. He half started, so rapt was he in his meditations.

"That's soon remedied," he said, striking a light. "Yes, come in, little
one. You were asking about this thing once. Look at it--queer sort of
weapon, isn't it?"

"It is, indeed," she answered. "Is it a Zulu war club? Why, the head is
made of brass, or is it gold? And look, there is some strange writing on
it."

"And the handle is a bone. Yes, the head is gold, and I put the thing
together when I had no other weapon--ay--and used it, too, in the
ghastliest kind of fight I ever was in. Come, now, we will put it away
again."

"Not yet, father. Show me some more queer things," she pleaded, nestling
to his side.

Then he got out other trophies and curios, and Fay spent a good hour of
unalloyed delight turning them wonderingly over, and drinking in the
incident, more or less stirring, which related to each.

But there was one thing he did not show her; one thing upon which no eye
save his own might ever again rest; one thing he treasured up in the
greatest security under lock and key, which was enshrined within his
mind as a hallowed "charm," and that was the metal box and its
contents--the "charm" which twice had stood between him and death--death
violent and horrible--The Sign of the Spider.

End of Project Gutenberg's The Sign of the Spider, by Bertram Mitford