Rob Harlow's Adventures: A Story of the Grand Chaco

by George Manville Fenn

  CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

  A GAP IN THE RANKS.

  That which Shaddy pointed out was startling enough to cause Rob ashudder; for, plainly seen upon a broad leaf, trampled-down amongstothers that were dead and dry, were a few spots of blood.

  But after the momentary feeling of dread caused by the discovery therecame a reaction, and Rob exclaimed eagerly, "Some wild beasts have beenfighting;" and then as his companion shook his head, the boy uttered aforced laugh, and, to carry off the excitement, said:

  "I know what it is, Shaddy: two monkeys coming home from school have hada fight, and one made the other's nose bleed."

  "Wish I could laugh and joke about it like you do, squire," said Shaddysadly, as he peered about. "It's serious, my lad. Something verywrong, I'm afraid."

  "Don't say that, Shaddy," cried Rob huskily. "I only tried to turn itoff because I felt afraid and didn't want to show it. Do you reallythink there's something very serious?"

  "I do, my lad."

  "Not that Mr Brazier has been here?"

  "That's just what I do think, my lad; and I feel as if it was my faultfor sending him hunting and collecting by himself, instead of us waitingon him and watching him."

  "Shaddy, don't say anything has happened to him!" cried Rob in horror.

  "I don't say as there is," said Shaddy; "I don't say as there ain't, mylad: but you see that," he said, pointing down, "and you know that MrBrazier's a fine brave English gentleman, but, like all the naturalhistory people I ever see, so full of what he's doing that he forgetsall about himself and runs into all kinds of danger."

  "But what kind of danger could he have run into here?"

  "Don't know, my lad--don't know. All I do know is that he has been hereand got into trouble."

  "But you don't know that he has been here," cried Rob passionately.

  "What's this, then?" said Shaddy, holding out a piece of string, whichhe had picked up unnoticed by his companion. "Mr Brazier had got oneof his pockets stuffed full of bits o' spun yarn and band, like that aswe used to tie up his plants with, and it looks to me as if he'd droppedthis."

  "But couldn't--Oh no, of course not--it's impossible," cried Rob; "noone else could have been here?"

  "No, sir; no one else could have been here."

  "Yes, they could," cried Rob excitedly: "enemies!"

  Shaddy shook his head as he peered about, stooping and examining thetrampled-down growth.

  "Wish I could track like an Indian does, Mr Rob, sir. He has been heresure enough, but I can't make out which way he has gone. There's ourfootmarks pressing down the twigs and moss and stuff; and there's his, Ifancy."

  "And Indians?"

  "Can't see none, sir; but that means nothing: they tread so softly withtheir bare feet that a dozen may have been here and gone, and we notknow it."

  "Then you do think he has been attacked by Indians, Shaddy?" cried Robreproachfully.

  "Well, sir, I do, and I don't. There's no sign."

  "Then what could it have been,--a jaguar?"

  "Maybe, Mr Rob."

  "Or a puma!"

  "Maybe that, sir; or he may have come suddenly upon a deer as gave him adig with its horns. Here, let's get on back to camp as quickly as wecan."

  "But he may not be there," cried Rob excitedly, as he looked round amongthe densely packed trees. "Let's try and find some track by which hehas gone."

  "That's what I've been trying to do, and couldn't find one, sir. Ifhe's been wounded, somehow he'd nat'rally make back for the hut, so asto find us and get help. Come along."

  "Oh, Shaddy, we oughtn't to have left him. We ought to have kepttogether."

  "No good to tell me that, Mr Rob, sir; I feel it now, but I did it allfor the best. There, sir, it's of no use to stay here no longer. Comeon, and we may hit upon his backward trail."

  Rob gave another wild look round, and then joined Shaddy, who wascarefully studying the position of the sun, where a gleam came throughthe dense foliage high above their heads, and lightened the deep greentwilight.

  "That's about the course," he muttered, as he gave the iguana a hitchover to his right shoulder. "Now then, Mr Rob, sir, let's make a swiftpassage if we can, and hope for the best. Pah! Look at the fliesalready after the meat. No keeping anything long here."

  The remark struck Rob as being out of place at such a time, but he wasfain to recall how he had made speeches quite as incongruous, so hefollowed his companion in silence, trusting to him implicitly, andwondering at the confidence with which he pressed on in one direction,with apparently nothing to guide him. In fact, all looked so strangeand undisturbed that Rob at last could not contain himself.

  "Mr Brazier cannot have been anywhere here, Shaddy," he criedexcitedly. "Two wild beasts must have been fighting."

  "For that there bit o' string, sir?" said the man, drily. "What do youcall that, then, and that?"

  He pointed up to a bough about nine feet above him, where a cluster oforchids grew, for the most part of a sickly, pallid hue, save in onespot, where a shaft of sunlight came through the dense leafy canopy anddyed the strangely-formed petals of one bunch with orange, purple andgold, while the huge mossy tree trunk, half covered with parasiticcreepers, whose stems knotted it with their huge cordage, showed tracesof some one having climbed to reach the great horizontal bough.

  "That looks like Mr Brazier, his mark, sir, eh?"

  "Yes, yes," cried Rob eagerly.

  "Come on then, sir: we're right."

  "But did he make those marks coming or returning?"

  "Can't say, sir," said Shaddy, gruffly; and then, to himself, "Thatain't true, for he made 'em coming, or I'm a Dutchman."

  He made another careful calculation of their position, and was about tostart again, when he caught sight of something about Rob, or rather itsabsence, and exclaimed,--

  "Why, where's them mushrooms?"

  "Mushrooms, Shaddy! I--I don't know."

  "But, Master Rob!"

  "Oh, who's to think about eating at a time like this? Go on, pray; Ishall not feel happy till I see Mr Brazier again."

  Shaddy uttered a low grunt, gazed up at the shaft of light which shoneupon the cluster of flowers, and then shifted the iguana again, andtramped on sturdily for about an hour, till there was a broad glare oflight before them, and he suddenly stepped out from the greenishtwilight into sunshine and day.

  "Not so bad, Mr Rob, sir, without a compass!" he said, with a smile oftriumph.

  But Rob, as he stepped out, was already looking round for theirfellow-prisoner in the forest, but looking in vain. There was no signof human being in the solitude; and a chilly feeling of despair ranthrough the lad as he forgot his weariness and made a move for the hut,about a hundred yards away.

  It was hard work to get through the low tangled growth out there in thesunlight; and before he was half-way there he stumbled and nearly fell,but gathered himself up with a faint cry of fear, for there was a lowgrowl and a rush, as something bounded out, and he just caught a glimpseof the long lithe tawny body of a puma as it sprang into a fresh tangleof bush and reed, while Rob stood fast, and then turned to look atShaddy.

  The man's face was wrinkled up, and for the moment he evidently sharedthe boy's thoughts. Stepping close to him, he began to peer aboutamongst the thick growth from which the animal had sprung, while Robfelt sick as his imagination figured in the puma's lair the torn andbleeding body of his friend; and as Shaddy suddenly exclaimed, "Here'sthe place, sir!" he dared not look, but stood with averted eyes, tillthe man exclaimed:

  "Had his nest here, sir, and he was asleep. Bah! I ought to haveknown. I never heard of a puma meddling with a man."

  "Then Mr Brazier is not there?" said Rob faintly.

  "Why, of course he ain't," replied the man sourly. "Come along, sir,and let's see if he's in the hut."

  They rushed to their newly thatched-in shelter, and Rob seized the sideand peered in, where all was black darkness to him, coming as he didfrom the br
illiant sunshine.

  "Mr Brazier," he cried huskily; but there was no reply. "Mr Brazier,"he shouted, "why don't you answer?"

  "'Cause he ain't there, my lad," said Shaddy gruffly. "Here, wait tillI've doctored this iguana thing and hung it up. No, I'll cover it withgrass here in the cool, and then we must make back tracks and find MrBrazier before night."

  "Oh, Shaddy!" cried Rob in an anguished tone, "then he has been horriblyhurt--perhaps killed!"

  The man made no reply, but hurriedly cut open and cleaned the lizard atsome distance from the hut, then buried it beneath quite a pile ofgrass, dead leaves and twigs, before stepping back to his companion inmisfortune.

  "Oh, why did you stop to do that," cried Rob, "when Mr Brazier may belying dying somewhere in the forest?"

  "Because when we find him, we must have food to eat, lad, and somethingfor him too. That thing may save all our lives. Don't you think Idon't want to get to him, because I do. Now then, sir, we've got to gostraight back the way we came, and find him."

  "You'll go right back to where the spots--I mean, where we found thepiece of string?" whispered Rob, whose feeling of weariness seemed todisappear at once.

  "Yes, sir, straight back as an arrow, and it's of no use to hide facts;you must take your place as a man now, and act like one, having the hardwith the soft, so I shall speak plainly."

  "You need not, Shaddy," said Rob sadly. "You are afraid he has beenbadly hurt and carried off by Indians--perhaps killed."

  "Nay, my lad; that's making worse of it than I thought. My ideas wasbad enough, but not so bad as yours, and I think mine's right."

  "Then what do you think?" said Rob, as after a sharp glance round theymade for the spot where they had re-entered the clearing from theforest.

  "Tell you what I _don't_ think first, my lad," replied Shaddy: "I don'tthink it's Indians, because I haven't seen a sign of 'em, and if I had Ifancy they'd be peaceable, stupid sort of folk. No: he's got intotrouble with some beast or another."

  "Killed?"

  "Nay, nay; that's the very worst of all. There's hundreds of ways inwhich he might be hurt; and what I think is, that he has started to comeback, and turned faint and laid down, and perhaps gone to sleep, so thatwe passed him; or perhaps he has lost his way."

  "Lost his way?" cried Rob, with a shiver of dread.

  "Yes, my lad. It's of no use to hide facts now."

  "Then we shall never find him again, and he will wander about till helies down and dies."

  "Ah! now you're making the worst of it again, sir. He might find theway out again by himself, but we've got to help him. Maybe we shall beable to follow his tracks; you and me has got to try that: an Indian ora dog would do it easily. Well, you and me ought to have more stuff inus than Indians or dogs, and if we make up our minds to do it, why, weshall. So, come along, and let's see if we can't muster up plenty ofBritish pluck, say a bit of a prayer like men, and with God's help we'llfind him before we've done."

  He held out his hand to Rob, who made a snatch at it and caught itbetween his, to cling to it tightly as he gazed in the rough,sun-blackened face before him, too much oppressed by emotions to utter aword.

  But words were not needed in the solemn silence of that grand forest.Their prayer for help rose in the midst of Nature's grandest cathedral,with its arching roof of boughs, through which in one spot came a ray ofbrilliant light, that seemed to penetrate to Rob's heart and lighten himwith hope; and then once more they swung round and plunged into theforest depths.