*CHAPTER VII.*
*THE RAIN OF MUD.*
It was about four o'clock in the morning. A new thing happened--astrange new thing, almost unparalleled in the world's history. Theeruption had been hitherto confined to the central peak of Tarawera,known among the Maori tribes as Ruawahia; but now with a mightyexplosion the south-west peak burst open, and flames came belchingforth, with torrents of liquid fire. The force of the earthquake whichaccompanied it cracked the bed of the fairy lake. The water rushedthrough the hole upon the subterranean fires, and returned in columns ofsteam, forcing upwards the immense accumulation of soft warm mud at thebottom of the lake. The whole of this was blown into the air, and forfifteen miles around the mountain fell like rain. The enormous amountof steam thus generated could not find half vent enough through thesingle hole by which the water had poured in, and blew off the crust ofthe earth above it.
Showers of rock, cinders, and dust succeeded the mud, lashing the laketo fury--a fury which baffled all imagination. The roar of the fallingwater through unseen depths beneath the lake, the screech of theescaping steam, the hissing cannonade of stones, created a volley ofsound for which no one could account, whilst the mud fell thick andfast, as the snow falls in a blizzard.
The geysers, catching the subterranean rage, shot their scalding sprayabove the trees. Mud-holes were boiling over and over, and new onesopening in unexpected places. Every ditch was steaming, every hill wasreeling. For the space of sixty miles the earth quivered and shook, anda horrid sulphurous smell uprose from the very ground; while aroundTarawera, mountain, lake, and forest were enveloped in one immense cloudof steam, infolding a throbbing heart of flame, and ascending to thealmost incredible height of twenty-two thousand feet. Beneath its awfulshadow the country lay in darkness--a darkness made still more appallingwhen the huge rock masses of fire clove their way upwards, to fall backinto the crater from which they had been hurled.
As Mr. Lee caught his horse by the forelock, the first heavy drops ofmud hissed on the frozen ground. In another moment they came peltingthick and fast, burning, blinding, burying everything in their path. Thehorse broke loose from his master's hand, and tore away to the shelterof the trees. The heavy cart lumbering at his heels alone kept Beautyfrom following his mate. Hal caught his rein, Edwin seized his head, asthe thick cloud of ashes and mud grew denser and blacker, until Edwincould scarcely see his hand before him.
"Get in! get in!" gasped the old rabbiter.
Edwin swung himself upon the horse's back, and rode postilion, holdinghim in with all his might.
"The sick man first," said Mr. Lee, almost choking with the suffocatingsmell which rose from the earth. He lifted the poor fellow in his arms,a comrade took him by the feet, and between them they got him into thecart. Hal had resigned the reins to Edwin, and taken his place, readyto pillow the unconscious head upon his knees.
"The Lord have mercy on us!" he groaned.
Mr. Lee groped round for Audrey. Her feet were blistering through herthin boots, as she sank ankle-deep in the steaming slime, which camepouring down without intermission. Her father caught her by the waistand swung her into the back of the cart. Another of the rabbiters got upon the front and took the reins from Edwin, who did not know the way.The other two, with Mr. Lee, caught hold of the back of the cart and ranuntil they came to their own camp. The tents lay flat; the howling dogshad fled; but their horse, which they had tethered for the night, hadnot yet broken loose.
Here they drew up, sorely against Mr. Lee's desire, for he could nolonger distinguish the glimmer of his charcoal fires, and his heart wasaching for his children--his innocents, his babies, as he fondly calledthem--in that moment of dread. As the rabbiters halted, he stooped tomeasure the depth of mud on the ground, alarmed lest the children shouldbe suffocated in their sleep; for they might have fallen asleep, theyhad been left so long.
"Not they," persisted Edwin. "They are not such duffers as to lie downin mud like this; and as for sleep in this unearthly storm--" he stoppedabruptly.
"Hark!" exclaimed his father, bending closer to the ground. "Surelythat was a 'coo,' in the distance."
Every ear was strained. Again it came, that recognized call for help nocolonist who reckons himself a man ever refuses to answer.
Faint as was the echo which reached them, it quivered with a passionateentreaty.
"They are cooing from the ford," cried one. But another contradicted.It was only when bending over the upturned roots of a fallen tree thatthe feeble sound could be detected, amidst all the fearsome noisesraging in the upper air.
The rabbiters felt about for their spades, and throwing out the mud fromthe cavity, knelt low in the loosened earth. They could hear it nowmore plainly.
Mr. Lee pressed his ear to the freshly-disturbed mould, and listenedattentively. The cry was a cry of distress, and the voice was the voiceof his friend.
The rabbiters looked at each other, aghast at the thought of returningto the thick of the storm. It was bad enough to flee before it; but toface the muddy rain which was beating them to the earth, to breathe inthe burning dust which came whirling through it, could any one do thatand reach the ford alive? Not one dare venture; yet they would notleave the spot.
At break of day they said, "We will go." They were glad of such shelteras the upheaved roots afforded. It was a moment's respite from theblistering, blinding rain. But whilst they argued thus, Mr. Lee wasstriding onwards to the seven black heaps, in the midst of which he hadleft his children.
The fires had long gone out; the blackness of darkness was around him.He called their names. He shouted. His voice was thick and hoarse fromthe choking atmosphere. He stumbled against a hillock. He sank in thedrift of mud by its side. A faint, low sob seemed near him; somethingwarm eluded his touch. His arms sought it in the darkness, sweepingbefore him into empty space. Two resolute small hands fought back hisown, and Cuthbert growled out fiercely, "Whoever you are, you shan'ttouch my Effie. Get along!"
"Not touch your Effie, my game chick!" retorted Mr. Lee, with the ghostof a smile in spite of his despair.
"Oh, it is father! it is father!" they exclaimed, springing into hisarms. "We thought you would never come back any more."
He thought they would never stop kissing him, but he got them at last,big children as they were, one under each arm, lifting, dragging,carrying by turns, till he made his way to the cart. Then he discoveredwhy poor Effie hung so helplessly upon him. Both hands had tightlyclinched in the shock of the explosion, and her feet dragged uselesslyalong the ground.
"She turned as cold as ice," said Cuthbert, "and I've cuddled her eversince. Then the mud came on us hot; wasn't that a queer thing?"
They snugged poor Effie in the blanket, and Audrey took her on her lap.
"I'm not afraid now," she whispered, "now we are all together. But I'velost the kitten."
"No," said Audrey; "I saw it after you were gone, scampering up a tree."
Mr. Lee was leaning against the side of the cart, speaking to old Hal.
They did not hear what he was saying, only the rabbiter's reply: "Trust'em to me. I'll find some place of shelter right away, down by the sea.Here, take my hand on it, and go. God helping, you may save 'em at theford. Maybe they are half buried alive. It is on my mind it will be adig-out when you get there. The nearer the mischief the worse it willbe. When our fellows see you have the pluck to venture, there'll besome of 'em will follow, sure and sartin."
"We are all chums here," said Mr. Lee, turning to the men. "Lend methat spade and I'm off to the ford. We must answer that coo somehow, mylads."
"We'll do what we can in the daylight," they answered.
"I am going to do what I can in the darkness," he returned, as heshouldered the spade and crossed over for a last look at his children.
Audrey laid her hand in his without speaking.
"You are not going alone, father, when I'm here
," urged Edwin, springingoff the horse. "Take me with you."
"No, Edwin; your post is here, to guard the others in myabsence.--Remember, my darlings, we are all in God's hands, and there Ileave you," said Mr. Lee.
He seized a broken branch, torn off by the wind, and using it as analpenstock, leaped from boulder to boulder across the stream, and was upthe other side of the valley without another word.
Cuthbert was crying; the dogs were whining; Audrey bent over Effie androcked her backwards and forwards.
The cart set off. The mud was up to the axle-tree. It was slow workgetting through it.
The rest of the party were busy dragging their tents out of the mire,and loading their own cart with their traps as fast as they could,fumbling in the dark, knee-deep in slush and mud.
As Beauty pulled his way through for an hour or more, the muddy raindiminished, the earth grew hard and dry. The children breathed morefreely as the fresh sea-breeze encountered the clouds of burning dust,which seemed now to predominate over the mud.
They could hear the second cart rumbling behind them. The poor fellowwho had been struck by the lightning began to speak, entreating hiscomrades to lay him somewhere quiet. "My head, my head!" he moaned."Stop this shaking."
By-and-by they reached a hut. They were entering one of the greatsheep-runs, where the rabbiters had been recently at work. Here thecarts drew up, and roused its solitary inmate. One of the rabbiterscame round and told Hal they had best part company.
"There are plenty of bold young fellows among Feltham's shepherds. Weare off to the great house to tell him, and we'll give the alarm as wego. He'll send a party off to the hills as soon as ever he hears ofthis awful business. A lot of us may force a way. We'll take this sideof the run: you go the other till you find somewhere safe to leave thesechildren. Wake up the shepherds in every hut you pass, and send them onto meet us at Feltham's. If we are back by daylight we shall do," theyargued.
"Agreed," said the old man. "We can't better that. Dilworth and thetraps had best wait here. He will sleep this off," he added, lookingcompassionately at his stricken comrade.
Out came the shepherd, a tall, gentlemanly young fellow, who had passedhis "little-go" at Trinity, got himself "ploughed" like Ottley, and sowent in for the southern hemisphere and the shepherd's crook.
Pale and livid with the horror of the lone night-watch in his solitaryhermitage, he caught the full import of the direful tidings at a word.His bed and his rations were alike at their service. He whistled up hishorse and dog, and rode off at a breakneck gallop, to volunteer for therelief-party, and send the ill news a little faster to his master'sdoor, for his fresh horse soon outstripped the rabbiters' cart.Meanwhile old Hal drove onward towards the sea. A shepherd met him andjoined company, breathless for his explanation of all the terrors whichhad driven him from his bed. He blamed Mr. Lee for his foolhardiness inventuring on alone into such danger.
Freed at last from the clayey slime, Beauty rattled on apace. Cuthbertwas fast asleep, and Edwin was nodding, but Audrey was wide awake. Shegathered from the conversation of the men fresh food for fear. The "run"they were crossing was a large one. She thought they called itFeltham's. It extended for some miles along the sea-shore, and Audreyfelt sure they must have journeyed ten or fifteen miles at least sincethey entered it. Thirteen thousand sheep on run needed no small companyof shepherds. Many of them lived at the great house with Mr. Feltham;others were scattered here and there all over the wide domain, each inhis little shanty. Yet most of them were the sons of gentlemen, certainto respond to the rabbiters' call. Again the cart drew up, and aglimmer of firelight showed her the low thatched roof of another shanty.Hal called loudly to a friend inside.
"Up and help us, man! There is an awful eruption. Tarawera is pouringout fire and smoke. Half the country round will be destroyed before themorning!"
Down sprang the shepherd. "We are off to Feltham's; but we must haveyou with us, Hal, for a guide. We don't know where we are wanted."
Edwin was wide awake in a moment. The men were talking eagerly. Thenthey came round, lifted the girls out of the cart, told them all to goinside the hut and get a sleep, and they would soon send somebody to seeafter them.
Hal laid his hand on Edwin's shoulder. "Remember your father's charge,lad," he said, "and just keep here, so that I know where to find you."
It was still so dark they could scarcely see each other's faces; but asEdwin gave his promise, Audrey sighed a startled sigh of fear. Werethey going to leave them alone?
"Must," returned all three of the men, with a decision that admitted ofno question.
"Afraid?" asked the shepherd, in a tone which made Edwin retort, "Not abit."
But Audrey could not echo her brother's words. She stood beside him thepicture of dismay, thinking of her father. Hal's friend Oscott pickedup a piece of wood and threw it on the dying lire; it blazed upcheerily.
"My dear," said Hal, in an expostulating tone, "would you have us leaveyour father single-handed? We have brought you safe out of the danger.There are numbers more higher up in the hills; we must go back."
"Yes, yes," she answered, desperately. "Pray don't think about us. Go;do go!"
Oscott brought out his horse. The shepherd smiled pityingly at thechildren. "We'll tell the boundary-rider to look you up. He will bringthe dog his breakfast, and I have no doubt Mrs. Feltham will send himwith yours."
With a cheery good-night, crossed by the shepherd with a cheeriergood-morning, intended to keep their spirits up, the men departed.
Edwin put his arm round Audrey. "Are you really afraid? I would notshow a white feather after all he said. Come inside."
The hut was very similar to the one at the entrance of the gorge, withthe customary bed of fern leaves and thick striped blanket. The men hadlaid Effie down upon it, and Cuthbert was kneeling beside her rubbingher hands.
"I'll tell you a secret," he whispered. "Our Audrey has gone over tothe groaners."
"No, she has not," retorted Edwin. "But once I heard that Cuthbert waswith the criers."
"Where are we?" asked Effie piteously.
"Safe in the house that Jack built," said her brother, wishing to get upa laugh; but it would not do.
Audrey turned her head away. "Let us try to sleep and forgetourselves."
Edwin found a horse-rug in the hut, and went out to throw it overBeauty's back, for the wind was blowing hard. There was plenty ofdrift-wood strewing the shore, and he carefully built up the fire.Having had some recent experience during the charcoal-burning, he builtit up remarkably well, hoping the ruddy blaze would comfort Audrey--atleast it would help them to dry their muddy clothes. The sound of thetrampling surf and the roar of the angry sea seemed as nothing in thegray-eyed dawn which followed that night of fear.
He found, as he thought, his sisters sleeping; and sinking down in thenest of leaves which Cuthbert had been building for him, he soonfollowed their example. But he was mistaken: Audrey only closed hereyes to avoid speaking. She dared not tell him of their father's perilfor fear he should rush off with the men, urged on by a desperate desireto share it. "I know now," she thought, "why father charged him toremain with us."
Her distress of mind drowned all consciousness of their strangesurroundings. What was the rising of the gale, the trampling of thesurf upon the sand, or the dashing of the tumultuous waves, after thefire and smoke of Tarawera?
But Cuthbert started in his dreams, and Edwin woke with a cry. Shakinghimself from the clinging leaves, now dry as winter hay, he ran out withthe impression some one had called him. It was but the scream of thesea-gull and the moan of the storm. It should have been daylight by thistime, but no wintry sun could penetrate the pall-like cloud of bluevolcanic dust which loaded the atmosphere even there.
It seemed to him as if the sea, by some mysterious sympathy, respondedto the wild convulsions of the quaking earth. The billows were rollingin towards him mountains high. He turned from the angry wa
ves torebuild his fire.
Did Oscott keep it as a beacon through the night on the ledge of rockwhich sheltered his hut from the ocean breezes? From its position Edwinwas inclined to think he did, although the men in the hurry of theirdeparture had not exactly said so. By the light of this fire he couldnow distinguish the outline of a tiny bay--so frequent on the westerncoast of the island--a stretch of sandy shore, and beyond the haven overwhich the rock on which he stood seemed sentinel, a sheet of boilingfoam.
And what was that? A coasting steamer, with its screw half out of thewater, tearing round and round, whilst the big seas, leaping after eachother, seemed washing over the little craft from stem to stern.
He flung fresh drift-wood on his beacon-fire until it blazed aloft, apyramid of flame. "Audrey dear, Audrey," he ran back shouting, "get up,get up!"
She appeared at the door, a wan, drooping figure, shrinking from theteeth of the gale. "Is it father?" she asked.
"Father! impossible, Audrey. We left him miles away. It is a ship--aship, Audrey--going down in the storm," he vociferated.
She clasped her hands together in hopeless despair.
Cuthbert pulled her back. "You will be blown into the sea," he cried."Let me go. Boys like me, we just love wild weather. I shan't hurt.What is it brings the downie fit?" he asked. "Tell old Cuth."
"It is father, dear--it is father," she murmured, as his arms went roundher coaxingly.
"I know," he answered. "I cried because I could not help it; but Edwinsays crying is no good."
"Praying is better," she whispered, buttoning up his coat a littlecloser. But what was he wearing?
"Oh, I got into somebody's clothes," he said, "and Edwin helped me."
"It is father's short gray coat," she ejaculated, stroking it lovinglydown his chest, as if it were all she ever expected to see of her fatherany more.
"So much the better," he answered, undaunted. "I want to be fatherto-night."
"Night!" repeated Edwin, catching up the word, "How can you stand theretalking when there is a ship going down before our eyes?"
Cuthbert ran up the rocky headland after his brother, scarcely able tokeep his footing in the increasing gale. There, by the bright stream oflight flung fitfully across the boiling waves, he too could see thelittle vessel tossing among the breakers. An Egyptian darkness layaround them--a darkness that might be felt, a darkness which theruddiest glow of their beacon could scarcely penetrate.
"You talk of night," Edwin went on, as the brothers clung together, "butit is my belief it has long since been morning. I tell you what it is,Cuth: the sun itself is veiled in sackcloth and ashes; it can't breakthrough this awful cloud."
Young as they were, they felt the importance of keeping up the fire towarn the steamer off the rocks, and again they set to work gatheringfuel. The men had said but little about the fire, because they knew itwas close on morning when they departed, and now--yes, the morning hadcome, but without the daylight.
Old roots and broken branches drifted in to shore were strewing thebeach. But as the boys were soon obliged to take a wider circle tocollect them, Edwin was so much afraid of losing his little brother hedare not let go his hand. Then he found a piece of rope in the pocketof "father's coat," and tied their arms together. So they went aboutlike dogs in leash, as he told Cuthbert. If dogs did their hunting incouples, why should not they?
Meanwhile Audrey, whose heart was in the hills, was watching landwardsfrom the little window at the back of the hut. Edwin's pyramid of fireshot fitful gleams above the roof and beyond the black shadow of theshanty wall. Beauty, who had never known the luxury of a stable untilhe came into the hands of his new masters, was well used to looking outfor himself. He had made his way round to the back of the hut, and nowstood cowering under the broad eaves, seeking shelter from the ragingblast.
Where the firelight fell Audrey could faintly distinguish a line ofroad, probably the one leading to the mansion. To the left, thewavering shadows cast upon the ground told her of the near neighbourhoodof a grassy embankment, surmounted by a swinging fence of wire, thefavourite defence of the sheep-run, so constructed that if the half-wildanimals rush against it the wire swings in their faces and drives themback. She heard the mournful howling of a dog at no great distance.Suddenly it changed to a clamorous bark, and Audrey detected a faint butfar-away echo, like the trampling of approaching horsemen.
She pushed the window to its widest and listened. Her long fair hair,which had been loosely braided for the night, was soon shaken free bythe raging-winds, and streamed about her shoulders as she leaned out asfar as she could in the fond hope that some one was coming.
The knitted shawl she had snatched up and drawn over her head when shejumped into her father's arms was now rolled up as a pillow for Effie.She shivered in the wintry blast, yet courted it, as it blew back fromher the heated clouds of whirling ashes. Faint moving shadows, as oftrees or men, began to fleck the pathway, and then a band of horsemen,galloping their hardest, dashed across the open.
Audrey's pale face and streaming hair, framed in the blackness of theshadowing roof, could not fail to be seen by the riders. With oneaccord they shook the spades they carried in the air to tell theirerrand, and a score of manly voices rang out the old-world ballad,--
"What lads e'er did our lads will do; Were I a lad I'd follow him too. He's owre the hills that I lo'e weel."
Audrey waved her "God-speed" in reply. With their heads still turnedtowards her, without a moment's pause, they vanished in the darkness.Only the roll of the chorus thrown back to cheer her, as they tore theground beneath their horses' hoofs, rose and fell with the rage of thestorm--
"He's owre the hills we daurna name, He's owre the hills ayont Dumblane, Wha soon will get his welcome hame. My father's gone to fecht for him, My brithers winna bide at hame, My mither greets and prays for them, And 'deed she thinks they're no to blame. He's owre the hills," etc.
The last faint echo which reached her listening ears renewed thepromise--
"What lads e'er did our lads will do; Were I a lad I'd follow him too. He's owre the hills, he's owre the hills."
The voices were lost at last in the howl of the wind and the dash of thewaves on the angry rocks. But the music of their song was ringing stillin Audrey's heart, rousing her to a courage which was not in her nature.
She closed the window, and knelt beside the sleeping Effie with aquestion on her lips--that question of questions for each one of us, beour emergency what it may--"Lord, what wouldest thou have me to do?"She was not long in finding its answer.
Doing and Daring: A New Zealand Story Page 7