The League of the Leopard

"Tolerably bad, was I not?" asked Dane; and the surgeon answered frankly.

"You were. In fact, on two occasions, I concluded you were going to beat me. Wouldn't even take a draught from – me, and one might compliment you on your determined obstinacy."

"I'm much obliged," Dane said slowly. "That's not quite all I mean, but it's the best I'm capable of just now. I don't know who you are, or why you did so much for me."

The surgeon laughed good-humoredly.

"If you must have a reason, you were an interesting case. I'm Dennis Ormond, of the Gold Coast service, and Dom Pedro asked me to look at you. I obliged him, and at first you were not a very encouraging spectacle. Of course, I did my little, but I may say that my medicine was not the only thing responsible for your cure. The señorita assisted me very ably, and – for a man must sleep sometimes – without her help it is quite probable we should have attended the expected funeral."

Ormond said this with an indifference which Dane, because he did not then know how much his little had been, or that his was an eminent name on the fever coast, thought hardly civil; but there was a warning gravity in his tone as he continued:

"It was, of course, my business; but not the señorita's; and you might have changed the pronouns in your last sentence advantageously."

Dane was ashamed of several things he said and did that day, and his answer among them; but few white men are quite accountable for their actions when recovering from fever, and there was that in the surgeon's glance which aroused his indignation.

"Are you not taking an unfair advantage – considering how much I owe you!" he asked.

"Perhaps so!" said Ormond. "In this land one takes an advantage when and how one can. I dare say I'm a meddlesome idiot; but I conceived a certain respect for you, if only because of the spirited manner in which you resisted my attempts to cure you; and more for the señorita. Now, I don't think Miss Castro, curious combination of ministering angel, child, and – well, the angel's antithesis, as she evidently is, would have done so much for everybody!"

Dane answered nothing. One cannot rebuke the man one owes one's life to. Ormond, however, had not finished with the subject.

"You crawled off your cot in delirium one night, and I found you groping among some papers scattered from your pocket-book about the floor," he said. "It required the assistance of two Krooboys to induce you to lie down again, and Miss Castro helped me to pick up the papers. I, however, found this among them first, and considered it well to take charge of it in the meantime. Miss Castro, you have heard, made an excellent nurse."

Dane felt that the surgeon noticed the way his fingers tightened on the little photograph handed him; but the man went on, with a smile:

"Your sister, presumably, for one could not help glancing at the picture. Still, I can't flatter you by saying that I recognize a family likeness. Therefore – I kept it aside."

Dane thanked him, and Ormond answered lightly:

"The rest of the papers Miss Castro returned to the pocket-book. All you have to do now is to lie still and recover."

"I will try," Dane said. "When can I start again?"

Ormond pointed out through the window toward the sea.

"In a week, if you are prudent – in fact, the sooner you start in that direction the wiser you will be. This country is not healthy for full-blooded Englishmen of your description. If you march inland again, cable anybody interested to double your life insurance."

Dane made a negatory gesture, but Ormond anticipated his answer.

"Of course, I hardly expected you would take good advice, but it was my duty to give it. Just now I'll leave you to your own resources, because Dom Pedro is waiting with the chessmen below. Most gentlemanly old rascal, and you are indebted to him; but I wouldn't tell him too much respecting the supposititious treasure you rambled about if I were you. Henceforward you will have to get better in your own way, because word has just been sent me that my niggers are dying by dozens."

He went out, and left Dane staring at the photograph in his hand. Although not improved by long exposure to tropic heat, or the dampness of the African climate, it had been a good portrait of Lilian Chatterton, and the eyes that looked out from the faded paper seemed to challenge the man. On inspecting the dim picture later he decided it must have been because he remembered them so well. They were clear and searching, honest above all things, but, as it were, demanding equal sincerity from whoever looked into them; and though perhaps this was due to the observer's fancy, the whole face seemed to possess a spiritual beauty. Dane, however, was certainly a little light-headed still, for as he gazed the face grew scornful.

To most Europeans in that country there comes a time of mental weakness and black dejection, and Dane's courage had melted before the fever which left him unstable as water, and fanciful as a child. Thus it was that, in a sudden access of bitterness, he slipped the picture back into its case. Lilian, he decided, had cruelly misjudged him, and now doubtless enjoyed the sunny side of life in the cool British air, careless of the fact that for her sake he risked life and reason in the pestilential steam of Africa.

There was a rustle of draperies, and Bonita Castro swept into the room with the grace of movement and carriage which characterizes her mother's race. There was, however, nothing spiritual about Miss Castro's beauty, which was of the flesh and of the glowing south, appealing to the senses, delighting the eye; and Dane's pulse throbbed a little faster as she came toward him with a low cry of pleasure. It was the first time he had risen from his trestle cot in the adjoining room. Stooping, she held toward him a great cluster of the spotless African lilies – which, scented ambrosially, spring up wherever decay is rankest – then sank with lithe gracefulness into a chair near his side.

"It is very good to see you better, Don Ilton," she said.

"It is the result of your kindness, señorita. Unfortunately, I don't know how to thank you – "

"Then you will not try." Miss Castro raised a restraining hand. "We do not leave the sick to die. Even if it had been another, there is always enjoined on us the charity."

Dane had lost his sense of humor, and just then Bonita Castro looked all ministering angel, and his attitude expressed rather reverential respect than personal admiration, which, it is possible, did not please the lady so well.

"But you have done so much for one who is almost a stranger," he persisted.

Miss Castro's mood changed swiftly, and spreading out her hands with a gesture of amusement, and a smile which Dane fancied most men would have given much to win, she was again all a woman, and a very alluring one.

"It is true that you English have not the graceful speech. Are we, then, the mere stranger, Don Ilton? Carramba! One takes pride in what one save from the fever, and it was on my lips to call you cariño."

Dane had acquired sufficient knowledge of Castilian in South America to appreciate the possible significance of the substantive; and he afterward remembered that he was not wholly displeased with it.

"You make me a vain man, señorita," he said lightly.

Miss Castro laughed again, and Dane lay silent for a while.

"I am the more indebted to your care because every day is precious, and I must rejoin my comrade as soon as possible," he said at last.

The damask warmth deepened just a trifle in his companion's cheek.

"You two still go on into the forest – why?" she asked.

"Because I am a poor man, and, as you have guessed, my comrade believes there is treasure waiting up yonder."

Bonita Castro smiled scornfully, and answered him with the assurance of one stating a definite fact.

"The Señor Maxwell will never bring gold out of the Leopards' country. Two white men have try already and, both of them, they die. You must not go back there, Don Ilton, nor let your comrade go, though I know he is a very clever and fearless man."

"How do you know that?"

Dane found it hard to conceal his astonishment at her tranquil answer:

"I try if he is fearless on board the steamer. I can use the pistol well."

"It is fortunate you did not test my courage in the same fashion. But was there not a third man?"

Miss Castro's fingers closed viciously, and the questioner experienced an instinctive shrinking as he saw the hatred in her deep black eyes.

"The third was not a white man, though he call himself so," she said, with a quietness that was ominous. "Maldito sea el perro! To-day again he infect this factory."

Dane could not help feeling that, unless the gentleman were prudent, he might have cause to regret his visit to the factory. He was inclined to admire high-spirited women, but Miss Castro looked more than dangerous just then; though Dane learned afterward that her hatred was justifiable.

Following her glance, he saw a short and very sallow-faced gentleman, neatly dressed in spotless duck, cross the compound below and disappear into the salt shed, evidently in search of Dom Pedro. There was nothing particularly noticeable about him; but another taller figure, draped in blue and white cotton and wearing a crimson turban, followed, and squatted in the hot dust outside the shed. This man was an African, but lighter in color than the seaboard tribes, and his movements reminded Dane of those of the midnight assassin. He decided, however, that the resemblance was fanciful.

"Is that the person you mentioned?" he asked. "It is evident that you dislike him. May I ask why?"

Miss Castro appeared to consider, and then answered frankly:

"Why should I not tell you? You are muy caballero, and I think, good friend of me. He was partner with my father, this Victor Rideau. They once go inland to trade with an Emir, who at that time gather much plunder of ivory, and perhaps they give their carrier boy the good rifle and cartridge, for the Emir is treacherous. He is very bad man, and —pobre padre mio!– when Rideau is go away he put pressure on Dom Pedro, and demand all his rifle and black carrier boy. What would you? My father he is not desire his throat cut, and he agree. The Emir write safe conduct and agreement, and sent him back with ivory, but this Rideau he guard the scroll in Arabic, and now always demand the silver from my father for fear he denounce him to the authority. One must not sell the black boy, and there is heavy penalty for giving the negro the arm of precision."

Dane grasped the situation, surmising that the Emir in question was one who had, for a time, successfully defied both British and French. He also surmised that the Gallic authorities would deal stringently with whoever had supplied the Moslem soldier with modern weapons at a time when it appeared quite possible he would even march upon the coast. Still, he was not sure that very much pressure had been required to convince Dom Pedro.

Returning to her almost caressing manner, Miss Castro touched his arm:

"Why you need that gold?"

"Gold is generally useful, isn't it?" smiled Dane. "It would help me to earn a little more than my bread when I go back to England."

Bonita Castro laughed, and then grew serious. There was a light in her dark eyes, and her voice grew deeper; and it was only because it appeared necessary that Dane afterward told his comrade part of what followed. Indeed, there was little to relate, but much to be imagined.

"Is there no other place than England, when all the world is good?" she said. "Is not this much better than your mud and snow, and the sight of the men with anxious faces groping through the fog? Vaya! You men of the English cities, you not know how to live."

The speaker pointed out through the open window, and most men would have agreed with her in a measure. If the beauty of the fever coast is that of a whited sepulcher, it is a sufficiently alluring region, and Dom Pedro's factory stood high and healthily upon the summit of a bluff. Tall palms swaying about it before the sea breeze tossed their emerald traceries against transparent blue. In the cottonwoods' shadow beyond them tall white lilies grew, and the rollers of the southern ocean, flaming dazzlingly, dissolved into spouts of incandescence upon a crescent of silver sand below. The whole scene was flooded with light and color, and permeated by the languorous spell of the tropics, which it is not good for white men to linger under.

"It is all very beautiful," he said; "but I have my bread to win."

"You are very modest, Don Ilton. Is there no place for such as you in Africa? Now I know one who would give much – even a share in the profits of several factories – for the help of two men he could trust. There will be more gold to win than you will ever find in the Leopards' country; and there will be the excitement you hunger for. The man who needs the assistance has a cunning enemy. Will you not listen when again he speaks to you?"

Miss Castro leaned slightly forward.

"It is the life you English long for. There would be adventure; much profit, I think, too, and – for that you like also – an enemy. He is bad enemy of – me. This England of yours is far off, and the wise man he – is it not so? – takes gratefully what the good saints send him. Is it not enough, Don Ilton?"

Dane was not a vain man, but there was a subtle inflection in the woman's voice which suggested an amplification of the meaning of her last words. England certainly seemed very far away, Maxwell's project a mad one; and Dane remembered that the woman for whose sake he had joined in it had been ready to think ill of him. His companion was very alluring, he was weak in mind and body, very grateful to one who had saved his life for him, and loath to resume the burden which was part of his birthright as a civilized Englishman. A word, even a gesture, would, it seemed, smooth out many difficulties, and, shaking off responsibility, he might henceforward live for the day only; but though intoxicated by the spell of the tropics and the eyes of his companion, Dane had a memory, and he realized that he stood on the brink of a declivity. He had seen the end of other Britons who, selling their birthright for a few years' indulgence, sank beyond the level of the beasts. The face of a countrywoman, no longer cold and disdainful, but innocent and gentle, rose up before him; and the struggle ended.

"It is so much that I do not deserve it," he said humbly, answering her question. "I must accomplish the purpose which brought me here, and then go back to England. Nothing would turn back my comrade."

Miss Castro did not speak for a few moments, but Dane felt that she understood more than he had said. Then she looked at him steadily.

"You are a strange people, but, go when you will, God go with you, Don Ilton. Now, at least from my hands, you will take the medicine."

Dane's hand trembled as he held it out for the glass, for the struggle had left its mark on him; but he felt inclined to resent this climax, which appeared grotesquely ludicrous. Nevertheless, he duly swallowed the medicine, and resisted an inexplicable impulse which prompted him to smash the glass. Then, with a wondrous unfolding of filmy draperies, his companion rose languidly, and, it seemed to Dane, melted out of the room. Almost simultaneously the crouching figure in the dusty compound rose and vanished too.

Dane decided that it would be well to gather strength with all possible celerity, and leave the factory as soon as he was fit to travel in a hammock. Accordingly, in spite of the protests of Dom Pedro, who, after repeating in definite form the offer made by his daughter, found him supplies and carriers, he presently took his leave, and shook hands with Miss Castro beside the waiting hammock at the compound gate. Her manner had been a shade more reserved of late, but she spoke with friendly earnestness when she laid in his hand a tiny object wrought in silver and ivory.

"You will take this for what you call a keep-a-sake, Don Ilton," she said. "There is always peril in the bush country, and it was given my mother by a holy man. It has the virtue. If you meet Rideau in the forest, remember he is my enemy and beware of him. And now, señor, the good saints keep you."

Dane bent over the little olive-tinted fingers, then Amadu helped him into the hammock, and presently Dom Pedro's factory had faded to a white blur against the sparkling sea.

As he journeyed northward Dane had much to ponder over. He regretted that he had been unable to secure a closer view of Rideau or his dusky follower. He fancied he once heard the Frenchman's voice raised angrily in an altercation with Dom Pedro; but he could learn nothing about the tall negro, who had vanished mysteriously. When the journey was almost accomplished, and he was recovering strength again, there was added another subject for consideration. Searching for the map Maxwell had given him, he failed to find it; but, after the first shock of dismay had passed, he was almost thankful that time and distance prevented his returning to the factory in search of it. Dane, remembering the surgeon's narrative, felt himself unequal to the task of asking Miss Castro what she had done with it. He pushed on, hoping for the best, and that Maxwell might not ask too many questions.

Maxwell, when he heard the news, sat silent for several minutes.

"We are not beginning well," he then said gravely, "but that is perhaps not material. It seems to me that the future of the mine will be settled when we meet Monsieur Rideau and his lieutenant, as I think we will. Of course it is no use asking where you lost the map."

Dane recognized the significance of the last sentence, and answered accordingly.

"If I had possessed that knowledge I should have returned and found it. I have reasons for believing it was in my pocket-book when I left the factory."

Maxwell glanced at him keenly and smiled.

"After what you told me, I suppose one could expect nothing else from you," said he.

CHAPTER X

RIDEAU'S BARGAIN

Some time after Dane's departure, a smartly uniformed hammock train approached Dom Pedro's factory. That worthy ceased his leisurely pacing up and down the veranda, and watched the bearers wind out from the steamy shadow with ill-concealed anxiety, hoping that he might be mistaken. Then as they came on at a steady trot with the poles of the lurching hammock upon their woolly crowns, he stamped on the flooring; and even a sleepy Krooboy started at his vivid maledictions. There was no longer room for doubt that he was about to be honored by a visit from his former partner, Monsieur Victor Rideau, and it was very evident that Dom Pedro was not pleased to see him. His sister, a portly lady, of doubtful age, sat in a shady corner of the veranda, but she passed much of her time in Africa in peaceful slumber, and was now asleep as usual – or appeared so.

"It is too hot for anger, father," a voice said; and Dom Pedro, turning, saw his daughter leaning languidly over the balustrade. She, too, was watching the hammock with a curious expression.

"There is good cause!" Dom Pedro answered, cutting short his flow of expletives. "This Rideau comes another time to torment me. Why is it that when so many honest men die up yonder this one should always come back safely?"

"He will not always do so. Some day he, too, will be lost in the forest," said Bonita quietly; and the man glanced at her with hope in his eyes, for several of his daughter's predictions had curiously been fulfilled. This may have been due to coincidence, or a shrewd calculation of probabilities; but Dom Pedro, having lived long in a land where occult influences are believed in, was not free from superstition.

"I would send half, or at least a third, of all I have, to the hospital in Lisboa if that were so," he declared. "Niña, you speak as though you knew."

Bonita laughed a little, though there was anxiety in her face.

"Padre, one might doubt the efficacy of such a bribe. Perhaps I do. It is money he wants, as usual?"

"Yes." There was a certain hesitation in the man's answer which did not escape his daughter. "It is, of course, the silver, and I have not much to give him. You have no regard for this Rideau, niña?"

Bonita's face was a study. Anger, loathing, and the faintest trace of fear were stamped upon it.

"Regard! I have only hatred for el perro!"

The emphasis on the last word was significant: while it means simply dog, and is used on occasion to designate a person jestingly, the Castilian can, by change of inflection, make it imply a rabid cur of the lowest degree; and Bonita used the epithet in that manner.

Dom Pedro raised his shoulders, and drew in his breath. He was slightly afraid of his daughter; but, unfortunately for them both, he was more afraid of Rideau, and he did not look at her when he spoke again.

"It is strange the Señor Dane did not return for the book he left, since it shows the path through the forests of Shaillu's country, and he cannot find his way without it."

Bonita smiled upon him pityingly.

"You do not know those men as I do. They plan all from the beginning and leave nothing to chance. The Señor Maxwell is a man of system, and he will have safe in his memory all the book could tell him."

"They are a curious people," observed Dom Pedro dryly. "One of those two, however, was surely a trifle blind."

A faint trace of color crept into Bonita's face.

"It is time for you to receive your guest," she said.

Dom Pedro did so with the utmost cordiality, his hat in his hand, and the two men – one of whom despised the other, who feared and hated him – expressed their mutual delight at the meeting with great effusiveness. Bonita Castro watched them meanwhile from a green latticed window, and shivered a little, though the day was as hot as it usually is at that season in West Africa. She slipped her fingers under the laces at her breast, and her face was not attractive when they touched a little piece of wrought silver. It was not a mere adornment, for there was a slender blade of steel attached to it. Again she said, with an intensity of detestation: "El perro!"

Dom Pedro played chess and discoursed upon the shortcomings of their rulers with his guest all afternoon, and the five o'clock comida had been eaten before either hinted that Rideau could have any possible motive for his visit beyond the pleasure of seeing his former partner. Time has no great value to men of Latin extraction in the tropics; and it is possible that one of them found pleasure in prolonging the other's anxiety. At last, when they sat out on the veranda, the visitor, lighting a maize husk cigarette, thrust his wineglass away.

"It is always a gratification to see my old friend Dom Pedro, and I have traveled a long way to give myself that pleasure," he observed; and his host, knowing how much this was worth, braced himself to meet what should follow. "Being here, there is, however, a little affair we can discuss together. I have an opportunity for a small investment to lay before you."

"I am honored, but trade is very bad, and silver scanty," Dom Pedro said hastily. "I have received no profits yet on the last venture."

Rideau spread out his palms deprecatingly.

"They are very dishonest men up yonder in the bush, as you, my friend, should know, and have robbed me shamefully; while it was but an hour since I rejoiced at your prosperity. I saw the cloth and gin sheds empty – and they were full not long ago."

Dom Pedro groaned inwardly, but attempted a show of resolution.

"I repeat that trade is bad. It is, I fear, impossible to oblige even you."

Rideau laughed a little, but his merriment was akin to mockery.

"I can only hope you are mistaken, and this time there will be a profit. There is also another affair I would discuss with you. I am a man with a conscience, and something we are concerned in up in the bush country troubles me. It is told me that these troublesome English make protest with the Administration that when the Emir invaded their dominions his men carried good rifles which could only have been obtained from this colony. The Captain Oger stated publicly that it is a stain on the national honor, and there will be strict inquiry. I am a good friend of Dom Pedro, but first of all patriotic Frenchman, me."