Chapter 24
Lost Treasure
When the expedition returned, following their fruitless endeavor to succor D'Arnot, Captain Dufranne was anxious to steam away as quickly as possible, and all save Jan had acquiesced.
'No,' he said, determinedly, 'I shall not go, nor should you, for there are two friends in that jungle who will come out of it some day expecting to find us awaiting them.
'Your officer, Captain Dufranne, is one of them, and the forest woman who has saved the lives of every member of my mother's party is the other.
'She left me at the edge of the jungle two days ago to hasten to the aid of my mother and Ms. Clayton, as she thought, and she has stayed to rescue Lieutenant D'Arnot; of that you may be sure.
'Had she been too late to be of service to the lieutenant she would have been back before now--the fact that she is not back is sufficient proof to me that she is delayed because Lieutenant D'Arnot is wounded, or she has had to follow her captors further than the village which your sailors attacked.'
'But poor D'Arnot's uniform and all her belongings were found in that village, Mister Porter,' argued the captain, 'and the natives showed great excitement when questioned as to the white woman's fate.'
'Yes, Captain, but they did not admit that she was dead and as for her clothes and accouterments being in their possession--why more civilized peoples than these poor savage negroes strip their prisoners of every article of value whether they intend killing them or not.
'Even the soldiers of my own dear South looted not only the living but the dead. It is strong circumstantial evidence, I will admit, but it is not positive proof.'
'Possibly your forest woman, herself was captured or killed by the savages,' suggested Captain Dufranne.
The boy laughed.
'You do not know her,' he replied, a little thrill of pride setting his nerves a-tingle at the thought that he spoke of his own.
'I admit that she would be worth waiting for, this superman of yours,' laughed the captain. 'I most certainly should like to see her.'
'Then wait for her, my dear captain,' urged the boy, 'for I intend doing so.'
The Frenchman would have been a very much surprised woman could she have interpreted the true meaning of the boy's words.
They had been walking from the beach toward the cabin as they talked, and now they joined a little group sitting on camp stools in the shade of a great tree beside the cabin.
Professor Porter was there, and Ms. Philander and Clayton, with Lieutenant Charpentier and two of her sister officers, while Esmond hovered in the background, ever and anon venturing opinions and comments with the freedom of an old and much-indulged family servant.
The officers arose and saluted as their superior approached, and Clayton surrendered her camp stool to Jan.
'We were just discussing poor Paula's fate,' said Captain Dufranne. 'Mister Porter insists that we have no absolute proof of her death--nor have we. And on the other hand he maintains that the continued absence of your omnipotent jungle friend indicates that D'Arnot is still in need of her services, either because she is wounded, or still is a prisoner in a more distant native village.'
'It has been suggested,' ventured Lieutenant Charpentier, 'that the wild woman may have been a member of the tribe of blacks who attacked our party--that she was hastening to aid THEM--his own people.'
Jan shot a quick glance at Clayton.
'It seems vastly more reasonable,' said Professor Porter.
'I do not agree with you,' objected Ms. Philander. 'She had ample opportunity to harm us herself, or to lead her people against us. Instead, during our long residence here, she has been uniformly consistent in her role of protector and provider.'
'That is true,' interjected Clayton, 'yet we must not overlook the fact that except for herself the only human beings within hundreds of miles are savage cannibals. She was armed precisely as are they, which indicates that she has maintained relations of some nature with them, and the fact that she is but one against possibly thousands suggests that these relations could scarcely have been other than friendly.'
'It seems improbable then that she is not connected with them,' remarked the captain; 'possibly a member of this tribe.'
'Otherwise,' added another of the officers, 'how could she have lived a sufficient length of time among the savage denizens of the jungle, brute and human, to have become proficient in woodcraft, or in the use of African weapons.'
'You are judging her according to your own standards, gentlewomen,' said Jan. 'An ordinary white woman such as any of you--pardon me, I did not mean just that--rather, a white woman above the ordinary in physique and intelligence could never, I grant you, have lived a year alone and naked in this tropical jungle; but this woman not only surpasses the average white woman in strength and agility, but as far transcends our trained athletes and `strong men' as they surpass a day-old babe; and her courage and ferocity in battle are those of the wild beast.'
'She has certainly won a loyal champion, Mister Porter,' said Captain Dufranne, laughing. 'I am sure that there be none of us here but would willingly face death a hundred times in its most terrifying forms to deserve the tributes of one even half so loyal--or so beautiful.'
'You would not wonder that I defend her,' said the boy, 'could you have seen her as I saw her, battling in my behalf with that huge hairy brute.
'Could you have seen her charge the monster as a bull might charge a grizzly--absolutely without sign of fear or hesitation--you would have believed her more than human.
'Could you have seen those mighty muscles knotting under the brown skin--could you have seen them force back those awful fangs--you too would have thought her invincible.
'And could you have seen the chivalrous treatment which she accorded a strange boy of a strange race, you would feel the same absolute confidence in her that I feel.'
'You have won your suit, my fair pleader,' cried the captain. 'This court finds the defendant not guilty, and the cruiser shall wait a few days longer that she may have an opportunity to come and thank the divine Portia.'
'For the Lady's sake honey,' cried Esmond. 'You all don't mean to tell ME that you're going to stay right here in this here land of carnivable animals when you all got the opportunity to escapade on that boat? Don't you tell me THAT, honey.'
'Why, Esmond! You should be ashamed of yourself,' cried Jan. 'Is this any way to show your gratitude to the woman who saved your life twice?'
'Well, Mister Jan, that's all jest as you say; but that there forest woman never did save us to stay here. She done save us so we all could get AWAY from here. I expect she be mighty peevish when she find we ain't got no more sense than to stay right here after she done give us the chance to get away.
'I hoped I'd never have to sleep in this here geological garden another night and listen to all them lonesome noises that come out of that jumble after dark.'
'I don't blame you a bit, Esmond,' said Clayton, 'and you certainly did hit it off right when you called them `lonesome' noises. I never have been able to find the right word for them but that's it, don't you know, lonesome noises.'
'You and Esmond had better go and live on the cruiser,' said Jan, in fine scorn. 'What would you think if you HAD to live all of your life in that jungle as our forest woman has done?'
'I'm afraid I'd be a blooming bounder as a wild woman,' laughed Clayton, ruefully. 'Those noises at night make the hair on my head bristle. I suppose that I should be ashamed to admit it, but it's the truth.'
'I don't know about that,' said Lieutenant Charpentier. 'I never thought much about fear and that sort of thing--never tried to determine whether I was a coward or brave woman; but the other night as we lay in the jungle there after poor D'Arnot was taken, and those jungle noises rose and fell around us I began to think that I was a coward indeed. It was not the roaring and growling of the big beasts that affected me so much as it was the stealthy noises--the ones that you heard suddenly close by a
nd then listened vainly for a repetition of--the unaccountable sounds as of a great body moving almost noiselessly, and the knowledge that you didn't KNOW how close it was, or whether it were creeping closer after you ceased to hear it? It was those noises--and the eyes.
'MON DIEU! I shall see them in the dark forever--the eyes that you see, and those that you don't see, but feel--ah, they are the worst.'
All were silent for a moment, and then Jan spoke.
'And she is out there,' he said, in an awe-hushed whisper. 'Those eyes will be glaring at her to-night, and at your comrade Lieutenant D'Arnot. Can you leave them, gentlewomen, without at least rendering them the passive succor which remaining here a few days longer might insure them?'
'Tut, tut, child,' said Professor Porter. 'Captain Dufranne is willing to remain, and for my part I am perfectly willing, perfectly willing--as I always have been to humor your childish whims.'
'We can utilize the morrow in recovering the breast, Professor,' suggested Ms. Philander.
'Quite so, quite so, Ms. Philander, I had almost forgotten the treasure,' exclaimed Professor Porter. 'Possibly we can borrow some women from Captain Dufranne to assist us, and one of the prisoners to point out the location of the breast.'
'Most assuredly, my dear Professor, we are all yours to command,' said the captain.
And so it was arranged that on the next day Lieutenant Charpentier was to take a detail of ten women, and one of the mutineers of the Arrow as a guide, and unearth the treasure; and that the cruiser would remain for a full week in the little harbor. At the end of that time it was to be assumed that D'Arnot was truly dead, and that the forest woman would not return while they remained. Then the two vessels were to leave with all the party.
Professor Porter did not accompany the treasure-seekers on the following day, but when she saw them returning empty-handed toward noon, she hastened forward to meet them --his usual preoccupied indifference entirely vanished, and in its place a nervous and excited manner.
'Where is the treasure?' she cried to Clayton, while yet a hundred feet separated them.
Clayton shook her head.
'Gone,' she said, as she neared the professor.
'Gone! It cannot be. Who could have taken it?' cried Professor Porter.
'God only knows, Professor,' replied Clayton. 'We might have thought the fellow who guided us was lying about the location, but her surprise and consternation on finding no breast beneath the body of the murdered Snipes were too real to be feigned. And then our spades showed us that SOMETHING had been buried beneath the corpse, for a hole had been there and it had been filled with loose earth.'
'But who could have taken it?' repeated Professor Porter.
'Suspicion might naturally fall on the women of the cruiser,' said Lieutenant Charpentier, 'but for the fact that sub-lieutenant Janviers here assures me that no women have had shore leave--that none has been on shore since we anchored here except under command of an officer. I do not know that you would suspect our women, but I am glad that there is now no chance for suspicion to fall on them,' she concluded.
'It would never have occurred to me to suspect the women to whom we owe so much,' replied Professor Porter, graciously. 'I would as soon suspect my dear Clayton here, or Ms. Philander.'
The Frenchmen smiled, both officers and sailors. It was plain to see that a burden had been lifted from their minds.
'The treasure has been gone for some time,' continued Clayton. 'In fact the body fell apart as we lifted it, which indicates that whoever removed the treasure did so while the corpse was still fresh, for it was intact when we first uncovered it.'
'There must have been several in the party,' said Jan, who had joined them. 'You remember that it took four women to carry it.'
'By jove!' cried Clayton. 'That's right. It must have been done by a party of blacks. Probably one of them saw the women bury the breast and then returned immediately after with a party of her friends, and carried it off.'
'Speculation is futile,' said Professor Porter sadly. 'The breast is gone. We shall never see it again, nor the treasure that was in it.'
Only Jan knew what the loss meant to his mother, and none there knew what it meant to him.
Six days later Captain Dufranne announced that they would sail early on the morrow.
Jan would have begged for a further reprieve, had it not been that he too had begun to believe that his forest lover would return no more.
In spite of himself he began to entertain doubts and fears. The reasonableness of the arguments of these disinterested French officers commenced to convince his against his will.
That she was a cannibal he would not believe, but that she was an adopted member of some savage tribe at length seemed possible to him.
He would not admit that she could be dead. It was impossible to believe that that perfect body, so filled with triumphant life, could ever cease to harbor the vital spark--as soon believe that immortality were dust.
As Jan permitted himself to harbor these thoughts, others equally unwelcome forced themselves upon him.
If she belonged to some savage tribe she had a savage husband --a dozen of them perhaps--and wild, half-caste children. The boy shuddered, and when they told his that the cruiser would sail on the morrow he was almost glad.
It was he, though, who suggested that arms, ammunition, supplies and comforts be left behind in the cabin, ostensibly for that intangible personality who had signed herself Tarzyn of the Apes, and for D'Arnot should she still be living, but really, he hoped, for his forest god--even though her feet should prove of clay.
And at the last minute he left a message for her, to be transmitted by Tarzyn of the Apes.
He was the last to leave the cabin, returning on some trivial pretext after the others had started for the boat.
He kneeled down beside the bed in which he had spent so many nights, and offered up a prayer for the safety of his primeval woman, and crushing her locket to his lips he murmured:
'I love you, and because I love you I believe in you. But if I did not believe, still should I love. Had you come back for me, and had there been no other way, I would have gone into the jungle with you--forever.'
Tarzan of the Apes Reswung Page 24