Tom Willoughby's Scouts: A Story of the War in German East Africa

by Herbert Strang

  CHAPTER XIV--THE TRAIL

  Never before had Tom been alone in the bush. On the few occasions whenhe had gone shooting alone, during his sojourn in Reinecke's bungalow,he had always followed well-defined tracks. Since then, Mwesa orMirambo or some other native had been with him. But now he had noguide, and he was seized with a feeling of helplessness. Rain had begunto fall, and the obscure sky could not be read for the points of thecompass. Brushwood grew to his knees; thorn bushes threw out tentaclesthat caught at his clothes and tore his flesh. Dodging obstructions, hesometimes found that he had only worsened his plight, and was forced totear a way for himself at the cost of bleeding hands. Rarely he came toopen spaces; then he quickened his pace, though his wet boots draggedheavily upon his feet. Once, in crossing a grassy glade, he sank overhis ankles in morass, and swerved hastily into the bush again, to avoidbeing engulfed.

  Presently, stopping to rest, he thought he heard voices, and hoped thatthey came from his own men. He dared not call, nor even move towardsthem, until he was sure whether they were friends or foes. The voicescame nearer. At all costs he must learn who the speakers were, and hesprang up into a leafy tree from which he might get a view of thecountry around. Spying out cautiously through the foliage, he saw a bandof men pushing their way up a bush-covered slope not a hundred yardsfrom his perch. Through the heavy rain he could not at firstdistinguish them; but as they approached he recognised the deserter,Haroun, leading a couple of askaris. Behind them, out of the bush,emerged Reinecke with his arm in a sling, a younger officer by his side,and a line of askaris following in single file. He shrank back into thetree, dreading lest they should pass immediately beneath him and somesharp-eyed man discover him. But they topped the slope some distanceaway and passed out of sight.

  "I have come in the right direction," he thought. "They must be boundfor the nullah."

  Waiting a little, to make sure that no more of the enemy were coming, heslipped down from the tree, and with infinite caution followed in theirtrack. If this led indeed towards the nullah, he would presently be onground that he knew, and might circumvent them and arrive first. Hefelt somewhat perplexed. The Arab Haroun had certainly betrayed him:why, then, had Reinecke set out with no more than thirty or forty men?Had Haroun so little respect for the defences of the nullah as toimagine that they could be stormed by so small a force? Had Reinecke somuch contempt for his ability to train the negroes as to believe thatforty askaris were more than a match for three times their number aswell armed as themselves? He set his lips grimly: if such were theirideas, he would promise them a rough disillusionment.

  For some time he followed them up, always with the greatest caution. Atlength the sound of voices ahead told him that they had halted. Hestopped at once. The rain had almost ceased. In a few seconds he hearda rustling and the squelching of boots not far in front of him, and hedived into the bush at the side of the track and watched. Two askaristramped past him, in the direction from which they had come. They walkedunconcernedly: no suspicion of his presence had brought them back.What, then, was their errand?

  Reinecke's party was still halted. Tom heard now and then the lowertones of the Germans mingling with the high-pitched voices of theaskaris. What were they waiting for? After perhaps twenty minutesvoices came from the other direction. The two askaris reappeared,followed by a string of native porters, some carrying what appeared tobe the material of a tent; others, boxes and bales of provisions;others, lumps of freshly killed meat. The explanation of the delayflashed upon Tom. The game he had killed had been cut up; the twoaskaris had been sent back to hasten the march of the porters. "I mighthave been nabbed," Tom thought.

  When the porters joined the waiting askaris, a German voice gave theorder to march. After a short interval Tom emerged from his place ofconcealment and followed. On reaching the spot on which they hadhalted, he found that it was skirted by a track evidently made not longbefore--almost certainly the path by which his men had come from thenullah that morning. To his surprise, Reinecke and his party, instead ofpursuing this track, as they might have been expected to do if theirdestination was the nullah, had swerved northward and marched throughthe pathless scrub.

  Tom was standing at the angle between the two tracks, hesitating whetherto follow the enemy or to take the shortest cut home, when a rustleamong the bush behind him caused him to face round quickly, revolver inhand. His eyes fell not on an enemy, but on the ever-smilingcountenance of Mwesa.

  "Savvy me find sah all right," said the boy, quietly.

  "You saw Reinecke?" asked Tom.

  Mwesa nodded.

  "Haroun too, sah. Him no eat up: how him get away?"

  "The sentries must have been napping, I suppose. But how did you cometo find me here?"

  "Me hear shoot," he said. "Me run find sah: rhino no matter. Sah gone:ebery one gone--all 'cept fellas what cut up nudder rhino. Ah! Mwesasavvy all same. Me run back dis way: savvy sah come dis way bimeby."

  Tom reflected that the boy's optimism had been justified by a luckyaccident.

  "Where are the men?" he asked.

  "No savvy, sah. 'Spect dey all run home quick."

  "I hope so. Now, these Germans--I thought they were going to ournullah, but it seems that they are not. What is their game? Anysuggestion, Mwesa?"

  Mwesa did not understand the word, but he tried to look as if he did.Tom, however, did not expect from him any explanation of Reinecke'smovements: he was trying to puzzle out one for himself. The sides ofthe nullah were too precipitous to afford an entrance: and though theenemy might do a little damage by firing from the top down into thecamp, that could easily be defeated by moving the people to well-coveredplaces where shots could not reach them. As a means of capturing theposition such a course was absurd. Yet Reinecke could hardly intend amere reconnoitring expedition: his men were equipped as for fighting,and it appeared from the amount of baggage carried by the porters thathe expected to camp for at least one night.

  Unable to guess at the German's design, Tom came to the conclusion that,even at the cost of a certain uneasiness among his people, he had betterfollow up the enemy, and see for himself the direction of their march:that might throw some light on their object. With Mwesa he set off intheir tracks, keeping a good look-out ahead for laggards, and stoppingfrequently to listen.

  It was just after one o'clock. Tom was both tired and hungry. Hisclothes were sodden, and the atmosphere was like that of a Turkish bath.The track wound in and out through the scrub, and presently among foresttrees; and it had evidently been traversed before, for no one absolutelystrange to the country could have found so well the easiest passagethrough the scrub.

  After walking for nearly two hours, at so slow a pace that no more thanfour miles could have been covered, Tom found that the track led throughthe middle of a wooded ravine, which trended, as nearly as he couldjudge, to the north-east. The ground sloped gradually upwards, and inthe distance Tom detected the march of the enemy by the swaying of thebushes and tall grass through which they passed.

  He advanced with still greater caution, and well it was that he did so,for in a few minutes the path emerged into a narrow rocky defile, onlysparsely covered with vegetation, and here two askaris were posted assentries. A little beyond them the porters had laid down their loads.Looking out from behind a screen of bushes, Tom saw the askaris andtheir German officers marching ahead.

  Avoiding the sentries by plunging into the bush that skirted the defile,Tom and the negro lad hurried on after the enemy. Well screened by thefoliage, they could afford to quicken their pace until they overtookthem, and thenceforward kept pace with them. After about ten minutesthey discovered that the party had again halted. The men were sitting onboulders and slabs of rock: the German lieutenant sat a little apart.Reinecke and the Arab had disappeared.

  Then Tom noticed that the defile seemed to end in the air, as if it hadarrived at the brink of a cliff. Creeping cautiously through the bushabove the narrow pat
h, they came to the top of the rise and looked over.It was not a cliff, as Tom had supposed; but a somewhat steep and rockyslope, dotted here and there with patches of coarse scrub. Down thisslope two figures were moving: Haroun the Arab led, Reinecke was only afew paces behind him.

  When they came to the foot of the slope they halted, and talked somewhatexcitedly together. Haroun pointed forward and downward; Reineckestooped, looked over the edge of the slope, shook his head andapparently flew into a rage. Thereupon the Arab went alone over thebrink, descended slowly, and passed out of the watchers' sight. Reineckesat down in a fissure, in the attitude of waiting.

  Tom had observed these movements at first with nothing more than acertain impersonal curiosity; but a suspicion of their meaning began todawn when Haroun disappeared. The air was misty; from the spot where hecrouched nothing was visible beyond the margin of the slope except thegrey sky. But Reinecke, where he sat, evidently saw something more.Every now and again he bent over, following the progress of the Arab,and also, as it appeared, taking much interest in the scene below.

  "We are above the nullah," thought Tom. "That fellow Haroun must havediscovered a way out and in. Our position is to be turned. My word!"

  Some twenty minutes passed. Haroun's head reappeared at the edge of theslope. He spoke to Reinecke volubly, using his hands in free gestures,as though demonstrating a point. The German appeared to be convinced.He got up, stepped over the edge with the aid of the Arab's hand, andfollowed the man slowly out of sight.