Charlotte stood watching her as she herself, when she had tried to read the letter, had been watched by Mrs. Ashby. The latter fumbled for her glasses, held them to her eyes, and bent still closer to the outspread page, in order, as it seemed, to avoid touching it. The light of the lamp fell directly on her old face, and Charlotte reflected what depths of the unknown may lurk under the clearest and most candid lineaments. She had never seen her mother-in-law’s features express any but simple and sound emotions—cordiality, amusement, a kindly sympathy; now and again a flash of wholesome anger. Now they seemed to wear a look of fear and hatred, of incredulous dismay and almost cringing defiance. It was as if the spirits warring within her had distorted her face to their own likeness. At length she raised her head. “I can’t—I can’t,” she said in a voice of childish distress.
“You can’t make it out either?”
She shook her head, and Charlotte saw two tears roll down her cheeks.
“Familiar as the writing is to you?” Charlotte insisted with twitching lips.
Mrs. Ashby did not take up the challenge. “I can make out nothing—nothing.”
“But you do know the writing?”
Mrs. Ashby lifted her head timidly; her anxious eyes stole with a glance of apprehension around the quiet familiar room. “How can I tell? I was startled at first…”
“Startled by the resemblance?”
“Well, I thought—”
“You’d better say it out, mother! You knew at once it was her writing?”
“Oh, wait, my dear—wait.”
“Wait for what?”
Mrs. Ashby looked up; her eyes, travelling slowly past Charlotte, were lifted to the blank wall behind her son’s writing table.
Charlotte, following the glance, burst into a shrill laugh of accusation. “I needn’t wait any longer! You’ve answered me now! You’re looking straight at the wall where her picture used to hang!”
Mrs. Ashby lifted her hand with a murmur of warning. “Sh-h.”
“Oh, you needn’t imagine that anything can ever frighten me again!” Charlotte cried.
Her mother-in-law still leaned against the table. Her lips moved plaintively. “But we’re going mad—we’re both going mad. We both know such things are impossible.”
Her daughter-in-law looked at her with a pitying stare. “I’ve known for a long time now that everything was possible.”
“Even this?”
“Yes, exactly this.”
“But this letter—after all, there’s nothing in this letter—”
“Perhaps there would be to him. How can I tell? I remember his saying to me once that if you were used to a handwriting the faintest stroke of it became legible. Now I see what he meant. He was used to it.”
“But the few strokes that I can make out are so pale. No one could possibly read that letter.”
Charlotte laughed again. “I suppose everything’s pale about a ghost,” she said stridently.
“Oh, my child—my child—don’t say it!”
“Why shouldn’t I say it, when even the bare walls cry it out? What difference does it make if her letters are illegible to you and me? If even you can see her face on that blank wall, why shouldn’t he read her writing on this blank paper? Don’t you see that she’s everywhere in this house, and the closer to him because to everyone else she’s become invisible?” Charlotte dropped into a chair and covered her face with her hands. A turmoil of sobbing shook her from head to foot. At length a touch on her shoulder made her look up, and she saw her mother-in-law bending over her. Mrs. Ashby’s face seemed to have grown still smaller and more wasted, but it had resumed its usual quiet look. Through all her tossing anguish, Charlotte felt the impact of that resolute spirit.
“Tomorrow—tomorrow. You’ll see. There’ll be some explanation tomorrow.”
Charlotte cut her short. “An explanation? Who’s going to give it, I wonder?”
Mrs. Ashby drew back and straightened herself heroically. “Kenneth himself will,” she cried out in a strong voice. Charlotte said nothing, and the old woman went on: “But meanwhile we must act; we must notify the police. Now, without a moment’s delay. We must do everything—everything.”
Charlotte stood up slowly and stiffly; her joints felt as cramped as an old woman’s. “Exactly as if we thought it could do any good to do anything?”
Resolutely Mrs. Ashby cried: “Yes!” and Charlotte went up to the telephone and unhooked the receiver.
Lukundoo
Edward Lucas White (1866-1934) was born in Bergen, New Jersey, but spent most of his life in Baltimore, attending Johns Hopkins University. He wrote poems and historical novels such as El Supremo and Andivius Hedulio, as well as fantasy and horror stories, which he said came to him in dreams.
‘It stands to reason,’ said Twombly, ‘that a man must accept the evidence of his own eyes, and when eyes and ears agree, there can be no doubt. He has to believe what he has both seen and heard.’
‘Not always,’ put in Singleton, softly.
Every man turned towards Singleton. Twombly was standing on the hearthrug, his back to the grate, his legs spread out, with his habitual air of dominating the room. Singleton, as usual, was as much as possible effaced in a corner. But when Singleton spoke he said something. We faced him in that flattering spontaneity of expectant silence which invites utterance.
‘I was thinking,’ he said, after an interval, ‘of something I both saw and heard in Africa.’
Now, if there was one thing we had found impossible, it had been to elicit from Singleton anything definite about his African experiences. As with the Alpinist in the story, who could tell only that he went up and came down. the sum of Singleton’s revelations had been that he went there and came away. His words now riveted our attention at once. Twombly faded from the hearthrug, but not one of us could ever recall having seen him go. The room readjusted itself, focused on Singleton, and there was some hasty and furtive lighting of fresh cigars. Singleton lit one also, but it went out immediately, and he never relit it.
I
We were in the Great Forest, exploring for pigmies. Van Rieten had a theory that the dwarfs found by Stanley and others were a mere cross-breed between ordinary negroes and the real pigmies. He hoped to discover a race of men three feet tall at most, or shorter. We had found no trace of any such beings.
Natives were few, game scarce; food, except game, there was none; and the deepest, dankest, drippingest forest all about. We were the only novelty in the country, no native we met had even seen a white man before, most had never heard of white men. All of a sudden, late one afternoon, there came into our camp an Englishman, and pretty well used up he was, too. We had heard no rumour of him; he had not only heard of us but had made an amazing five-day march to reach us. His guide and two bearers were nearly as done up as he. Even though he was in tatters and had five days’ beard on, you could see he was naturally dapper and neat and the sort of man to shave daily. He was small, but wiry. His face was the sort of British face from which emotion has been so carefully banished that a foreigner is apt to think the wearer of the face incapable of any sort of feeling; the kind of face which, if it has any expression at all, expresses principally the resolution to go through the world decorously, without intruding upon or annoying anyone.
His name was Etcham. He introduced himself modestly, and ate with us so deliberately that we should never have suspected, if our bearers had not had it from his bearers, that he had had but three meals in the five days, and those small. After we had lit up he told us why he had come.
‘My chief is ve’y seedy,’ he said between puffs. ‘He is bound to go out if he keeps this way. I thought perhaps . . .’
He spoke quietly in a soft, even tone, but I could see little beads of sweat oozing out on his upper lip under his stubby moustache, and there was a tingle of repressed emotion in his tone, a veiled eagerness in his eye, a palpitating inward solicitude in his demeanour that moved me at once. Van Rieten had
no sentiment in him; if he was moved he did not show it. But he listened. I was surprised at that. He was just the man to refuse at once. But he listened to Etcham’s halting, difficult hints. He even asked questions.
‘Who is your chief?’
‘Stone,’ Etcham lisped.
That electrified both of us.
‘Ralph Stone?’ we ejaculated together. Etcham nodded.
For some minutes Van Rieten and I were silent. Van Rieten had never seen him, but I had been a classmate of Stone’s, and Van Rieten and I had discussed him over many a campfire. We had heard of him two years before, south of Luebo in the Balunda country, which had been ringing with his theatrical strife against a Balunda witch-doctor, ending in the sorcerer’s complete discomfiture and the abasement of his tribe before Stone. They had even broken the fetish-man’s whistle and given Stone the pieces. It had been like the triumph of Elijah over the prophets of Baal, only more real to the Balunda.
We had thought of Stone as far off, if still in Africa at all, and here he turned up ahead of us and probably forestalling our quest.
II
Etcham’s naming of Stone brought back to us all his tantalizing story, his fascinating parents, their tragic death; the brilliance of his college days; the dazzle of his millions; the promise of his young manhood; his wide notoriety, so nearly real fame; his romantic elopement with the meteoric authoress whose sudden cascade of fiction had made her so great a name so young, whose beauty and charm were so much heralded; the frightful scandal of the breach-of-promise suit that followed; his bride’s devotion through it all; their sudden quarrel after it was all over; their divorce; the too much advertised announcement of his approaching marriage to the plaintiff in the breach-of-promise suit; his precipitate remarriage to his divorced bride; their second quarrel and second divorce; his departure from his native land; his advent in the dark continent. The sense of all this rushed over me and I believe Van Rieten felt it, too, as he sat silent.
Then he asked:
‘Where is Werner?’
‘Dead,’ said Etcham. ‘He died before I joined Stone.’
‘You were not with Stone above Luebo?’
‘No,’ said Etcham, ‘I joined him at Stanley Falls.’
‘Who is with him?’ Van Rieten asked.
‘Only his Zanzibar servants and the bearers,’ Etcham replied.
‘What sort of bearers?’ Van Rieten demanded.
‘Mang-Battu men,’ Etcham responded simply.
Now that impressed both Van Rieten and myself greatly. It bore out Stone’s reputation as a notable leader of men. For up to that time no one had been able to use Mang-Battu as bearers outside of their own country, or to hold them for long or difficult expeditions.
‘Were you long among the Mang-Battu?’ was Van Rieten’s next question.
‘Some weeks,’ said Etcham. ‘Stone was interested in them and made up a fair-sized vocabulary of their words and phrases. He had a theory that they are an offshoot of the Balunda and he found much confirmation in their customs.’
‘What do you live on?’ Van Rieten inquired.
‘Game, mostly,’ Etcham lisped.
‘How long has Stone been laid up?’ Van Rieten next asked.
‘More than a month,’ Etcham answered.
‘And you have been hunting for the camp?’ Van Rieten exclaimed.
Etcham’s face, burnt and flayed as it was, showed a flush.
‘I missed some easy shots,’ he admitted ruefully. ‘I’ve not felt ve’y fit myself.’
‘What’s the matter with your chief?’ Van Rieten inquired.
‘Something like carbuncles,’ Etcham replied.
‘He ought to get over a carbuncle or two,’ Van Rieten declared.
‘They are not carbuncles,’ Etcham explained. ‘Nor one or two. He has had dozens, sometimes five at once. Ifthey had been carbuncles he would have been dead long ago. But in some ways they are not so bad, though in others they are worse.’
‘How do you mean?’ Van Rieten queried.
‘Well,’ Etcham hesitated, ‘they do not seem to inflame so deep nor so wide as carbuncles, nor to be so painful, nor to cause so much fever. But then they seem to be part of a disease that affects his mind. He let me help him dress the first, but the others he has hidden most carefully, from me and from the men. He keeps his tent when they puff up, and will not let me change the dressings or be with him at all.’
‘Have you plenty of dressings?’ Van Rieten asked.
‘We have some,’ said Etcham doubtfully. ‘But he won’t use them; he washes out the dressings and uses them over and over.’
‘How is he treating the swellings?’ Van Rieten inquired.
‘He slices them off clear down to flesh level, with his razor.’
‘What?’ Van Rieten shouted.
Etcham made no answer but looked him steadily in the eyes.
‘I beg your pardon,’ Van Rieten hastened to say. ‘You startled me. They can’t be carbuncles. He’d have been dead long ago.’
‘I thought I had said they are not carbuncles,’ Etcham lisped.
‘But the man must be crazy!’ Van Rieten exclaimed.
‘Just so,’ said Etcham. ‘He is beyond my advice or control.’
‘How many has he treated that way?’ Van Rieten demanded.
‘Two, to my knowledge,’ Etcham said.
‘Two?’ Van Rieten queried.
Etcham flushed again.
‘I saw him,’ he confessed, ‘through a crack in the hut. I felt impelled to keep him a watch on him, as if he was not responsible.’
‘I should think not,’ Van Rieten agreed. ‘And you saw him do that twice?’
‘I conjecture,’ said Etcham, ‘that he did the like with all the rest.’
‘How many has he had?’ Van Rieten asked.
‘Dozens,’ Etcham lisped.
‘Does he eat?’ Van Rieten inquired.
‘Like a wolf,’ said Etcham. ‘More than any two bearers.’
‘Can he walk?’ Van Rieten asked.
‘He crawls a bit, groaning,’ said Etcham simply.
‘Little fever, you say,’ Van Rieten ruminated.
‘Enough and too much,’ Etcham declared.
‘Has he been delirious?’ Van Rieten asked.
‘Only twice,’ Etcham replied; ‘once when the first swelling broke, and once later. He would not let anyone come near him then. But we could hear him talking, talking steadily, and it scared the natives.’
‘Was he talking their patter in delirium?’ Van Rieten demanded.
‘No,’ said Etcham, ‘but he was talking some similar lingo. Hamed Burghash said he was talking Balunda. I know too little Balunda. I do not learn languages readily. Stone learned more Mang-Battu in a week than I could have learned in a year. But I seemed to hear words like Mang-Battu words. Anyhow, the Mang-Battu bearers were scared.’
‘Scared?’ Van Rieten repeated, questioningly.
‘So were the Zanzibar men, even Hamed Burghash, and so was I,’ said Etcham, ‘only for a different reason. He talked in two voices.’
‘In two voices,’ Van Rieten reflected.
‘Yes,’ said Etcham, more excitedly than he had yet spoken. ‘In two voices, like a conversation. One was his own, one a small, thin, bleaty voice like nothing I ever heard. I seemed to make out, among the sounds the deep voice made, something like Mang-battu words I knew, as nedru, metababa, and nedo, their terms for “head,’’ “shoulder,” “thigh,” and perhaps kudra and nekere (“speak” and “whistle”); and among the noises of the shrill voice matomipa, angunzi, and kamomami (“kill,” “death,” and “hate”). Hamed Burghash said he also heard those words. He knew Mang-Battu far better than I.’
‘What did the bearers say?’ Van Rieten asked.
‘They said, “Lukundoo, Lukundoo!” ’ Etcham replied. ‘I did not know that word; Hamed Burghash said it was Mang-Battu for “leopard.” ‘
‘It’s Mang-Battu for “witchcraft,” ’ sai
d Van Rieten.
‘I don’t wonder they thought so,’ said Etcham. ‘It was enough to make one believe in sorcery to listen to those two voices.’
‘One voice answering the other?’ Van Rieten asked perfunctorily.
Etcham’s face went grey under his tan.
‘Sometimes both at once,’ he answered huskily.
‘Both at once!’ Van Rieten ejaculated.
‘It sounded that way to the men, too,’ said Etcham. ‘And that was not all.’
He stopped and looked helplessly at us for a moment.
‘Could a man talk and whistle at the same time?’ he asked.
‘How do you mean?’ Van Rieten queried.
‘We could hear Stone talking away, his big, deep-chested baritone rumbling along, and through it all we could hear a high, shrill whistle, the oddest, wheezy sound. You know, no matter how shrilly a grown man may whistle, the note has a different quality from the whistle of a boy or a woman or a little girl. They sound more treble, somehow. Well, if you can imagine the smallest girl who could whistle keeping it up tunelessly right along, that whistle was like that, only even more piercing, and it sounded right through Stone’s bass tones.’
‘And you didn’t go to him?’ Van Rieten cried.
‘He is not given to threats,’ Etcham disclaimed. ‘But he had threatened, not volubly, nor like a sick man, but quietly and firmly, that if any man of us (he lumped me in with the men) came near him while he was in his trouble, that man should die. And it was not so much his words as his manner. It was like a monarch commanding respected privacy for a deathbed. One simply could not transgress.’
‘I see,’ said Van Rieten shortly.
‘He’s ve’y seedy,’ Etcham repeated helplessly. ‘I thought perhaps . . .’
His absorbing affection for Stone, his real love for him, shone out through his envelope of conventional training. Worship of Stone was plainly his master passion.
Like many competent men, Van Rieten had a streak of hard selfishness in him. It came to the surface then. He said we carried our lives in our hands from day to day just as genuinely as Stone; that he did not forget the ties of blood in imperilling one party for a very problematical benefit to a man probably beyond any help; that it was enough of a task to hunt for one party; that if two were united, providing food would be more than doubly difficult; that the risk of starvation was too great. Deflecting our march seven full days’ journey (he complimented Etcham on his marching powers) might ruin our expedition entirely.
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