 Chapter 27 of Shee by H. Ryder Haggard Chapter 27, we leap. We passed through the caves without trouble, but when we came to the slope of the inverted cone, two difficulties stared us in the face. The first of these was the laborious nature of the ascent, and the next the extreme difficulty of finding our way. Indeed, had it not been for the mental notes that I had fortunately taken of the shapes of various rocks, I am sure that we never should have managed it at all, but have never wondered about in the dreadful womb of the volcano, for I suppose it must once have been something of the sort, until we died of exhaustion and despair. As it was, we went wrong several times, and once nearly fell into a huge crack or crevasse. It was terrible work, creeping about in the dense gloom an awful stillness from boulder to boulder, and examining it by the feeble light of the lamps, to see if I could recognize its shape. We rarely spoke, our hearts were too heavy for speech, we simply stumbled about, falling sometimes and cutting ourselves in a rather dogged sort of way. The fact was that our spirits were utterly crushed, and we did not greatly care what happened to us. Only we felt bound to try and save our lives whilst we could, and indeed a natural instinct prompted us to it. So for some three or four hours, I should think, I cannot tell exactly how long, for we had no watch left that would go. We blundered on. During the last two hours we were completely lost, and I began to fear that we had gone into the funeral of some subsidiary cone, when at last I suddenly recognized a very large rock which we had passed in descending but a little way from the top. It is a marvel that I should have recognized it, and indeed we had already passed it going at right angles to the proper path, when something about it struck me, and I turned back and examined it in an idle sort of way, and as it happened this proved our salvation. After this we gained the rocky natural stare without much further trouble, and in due course found ourselves back in the little chamber where the benighted nude had lived and died. But now a fresh terror stared us in the face. It will be remembered that owing to job's fear and awkwardness, the plank upon which we had crossed from the huge spore to the rocking stone had been whirled off into the tremendous gulf below. How were we to cross without the plank? There was only one answer. We must try and jump it, or else stop there till we start. The distance in itself was not so very great, between 11 and 12 feet I should sing, and I have seen Leo jump over 20 when he was a young fellow at college, but then think of the conditions. Two weary, worn-out men, one of them on the wrong side of 40, a rocking stone to take off from a trembling point of rock, some few feet across the land upon, and a bottomless gulf to be cleared in a raging gale. It was bad enough, God knows, but when I pointed out these things to Leo he put the whole matter in a nutshell, by replaying that, merciless as the choice was, we must choose between the certainty of the lingering death in the chamber and the risk of a swift one in the air. Of course there was no arguing against this, but one thing was clear, we could not attempt that leap in the dark. The only thing to do was to wait for the ray of light, which pierced through the gulf at sunset. How near or how far from sunset we might be, neither of us had the faintest notion. All we did know was, that when at last the light came it would not endure more than a couple of minutes at the outside, so that we must be prepared to meet it. Accordingly we made up our minds to creep on to the top of the rocking stone and lie there in readiness. We were the more easily reconciled to this course by the fact that our lamps were once more nearly exhausted, indeed one had gone out bodily, and the other was jumping up and down as the flame of a lamp does when the oil is done. So by the aid of its dying light we hastened to crawl out of the little chamber and clamber up at the side of the great stone. As we did so the light went out. The difference in our position was a sufficiently remarkable one. Below in the little chamber we had only heard the roaring of the gale our head. Here, lying on our faces on the swinging stone, we were exposed to its full force and fury, as the great draught drew first from this direction and then from that, hauling against the mighty precipice and through the rocky cliffs like 10,000 despairing souls. We lay there hour after hour in terror and misery of mind so deep, that I will not attempt to describe it and listen to the wild storm voices of that tartarus as said to the deep undertone of the spore opposite against which the wind hummed like some awful harp, they called to each other from precipice to precipice. No nightmare, dreamed by man, no wild invention of the romance here can ever equal the living horror of that place and the weird crying of those voices of the night, as we clung like shipwrecked mariners to raft and tossed on the black unfathomed wilderness of air. Fortunately the temperature was not a low one. Indeed the wind was warm or we should have perished. So we clung and listened and while we were stretched out upon the rock thing happened, which was so curious and suggestive in itself, though doubtless a mere coincidence, that if anything it added to, rather than deducted from, the burden on our nerves. It will be remembered that when Aisha was standing on the spore before we crossed to the stone, the wind tore her cloak from her and whirled it away into the darkness of the gulf we could not see with her. Well, I hardly like to tell the story, it is so strange. As we lay there upon the rocking stone this very cloak came floating out of the black space, like a memory from the dead, and fell on Leo, so that it covered him nearly from head to foot. We could not at first make out what it was, but soon discovered by its feel and then poor Leo for the first time gave away, and I heard him sobbing there upon the stone. Now doubt the cloak had been caught upon some pinnacle of the cliff, and was then blown hither by a chance gust, but still it was a most curious and touching incident. Shortly after this, suddenly, without the slightest previous warning, the great red knife of light came stabbing the darkness through and through, struck the swaying stone on which we were, and rested its sharp point upon the spore opposite. Now for it, said Leo, now or never. We rose and stretched ourselves, and looked at the cloud where it stained the color of blood, by the thread-ray, as they tore through the thickening depth beneath, and then at the empty space between the swaying stone and the quivering rock, and in our hearts despaired and prepared for death. Surely we could not clear it, desperate so we were. Who is to go first? said I. Do you, old fellow? answered Leo. I will sit upon the other side of the stone to study it. You must take as much run as you can and jump high, and God have mercy on us, say I. I acquiesced with a nod, and then I did a thing I had never done since Leo was a little boy. I turned and put my arm round him and kissed him on the forehead. It sound through the French, but as a fact I was taking my last farewell of a man whom I could not have loved more if he had been my own son twice or. Goodbye, my boy, I said. I hope that we shall meet again, wherever it is that we go to. The fact was I did not expect to live another two minutes. Next I retreated to the far side of the rock and waited till one of the chopping gusts of wind got behind me, and then I ran the length of the huge stone, some three or four and thirty feet, and sprang wildly out into the dizzy air. Oh, the sickening terrors that I felt as I launched myself at that little point of rock, and the horrible sense of despair that trots through my brain as I realized that I had jumped short. But so it was, my feet never touched the point, they went down into space. Suddenly my hands and body came into contact with it. I gripped at it with a yell, what one hand slipped, and I swung right round, holding by the other, so that I faced the stone from which I had sprung. Wildly I stretched up with my left hand, and this time managed to grasp a knob of rock, and there I hung in the fierce red light, with thousands of feet of empty air beneath me. My hands were holding to either side of the under part of the spur, so that its point was touching my head. Therefore, even if I could have found the strength, I could not pull myself up. The most that I could do would be to hang for about a minute, and then drop down, down into the bottomless pit. If any man can imagine a more hideous position, let him speak. All I know is that the torture of that half minute nearly turned my brain. I heard Leo grieve a cry, and then suddenly saw him in mid-air springing up and out like a chemo's. It was a splendid leap that he took under the influence of his terror and despair, clearing the horrible gulf as if it were nothing, and landing well on the rocky point. He threw himself upon his face to prevent his pitching off into the depths. I felt this poor above-me shake beneath the shock of his impact, and as it did so, I saw the huge rocking stone that had been violently depressed by him as he sprang. Fly back when relieved of its weight still for the first time during all these centuries, it got beyond its balance, fell with the most awful crash right into the rocky chamber, which had once served the philosopher Knut for a hermitage, and I have no doubt forever sealed the passage that leads to the place of life with some hundreds of tons of rock. All this happened in a second, and curiously enough, notwithstanding my terrible position, I noted it involuntarily, as it were. I even remember thinking that no human being would go down that dread path again. Next instant I felt Leo seize me by the right wrist with both hands, by lying flat on the point of rock he could just reach me. You must let go and swing yourself clear, he said in a calm and collected voice. And then I will try and pull you up, or we will both go together. Are you ready? By way of answer I let go, first with my left hand and then with the right, and as a consequence, weight out clear of the overshadowing rock, my weight hanging upon Leo's arms. It was a dreadful moment. He was a very powerful man, I knew, but will his strength be equal to lifting me up till I could get a hold on the top of the spore, when owing to his position he had so little purchase? For a few seconds I swung to and fro, while he gathered himself for the effort, and then I heard his sinews cracking above me, and felt myself lifted up as though I were a little child, till I got my left arm round the rock, and my chest was resting on it. The rest was easy. In two or three more seconds I was up, and we were lying panting side by side, trembling like leaves, and with the cold perspiration of terror pouring from our skins. And then as before the light went out like a lamp. For some half hour we lay thus without speaking a word, and then at length began to creep along the great spore, as best we might in the dense loom. As we drew towards the face of the cliff, however, from which a spore sprang out like a spike from a wall, the light increased, though only a very little, for it was night overhead. After that the gusts of wind decreased, and we got along rather better, and at last reached the mouth of the first cave or tunnel. But now a fresh trouble stared us in the face. Our oil was gone, and the lamps were, no doubt, crushed to powder beneath the fallen rocking stone. We were even without a drop of water to stay our thirst, for we had drunk the last in the chamber of nude. How were we to seek to make our way through this last boulder-strewn tunnel? Clearly all that we could do was to trust to our sense of feeling, and attempt the passage in the dark. So in we crept, fearing that if we delay to do so, our exhaustion would overcome us, and we should probably lie down and die where we were. Oh, the horrors of that last tunnel! The place was drawn with rocks, and we fell over them, and knocked ourselves up against them till we were bleeding from a score of wounds. Our only guide was the sight of the cavern, which we kept touching, and so bewildered did we grow in the darkness, that we were several times seized with the terrifying thought that we had turned and were travelling the wrong way. On we went, feebly and still more feebly, for hour after hour stopping every few minutes the rest, for our strength was spent. Once we fell asleep, and I think must have slept for some hours, for, when we woke, our limbs were quite stiff, and the blood from our blows and scratches had caked, and was hard and dry upon our skin. Then we dragged ourselves on again, till at last, when the spare was entering into our hearts, we once more saw the light of day, and found ourselves outside the tunnel in the rocky fold, on the outer surface of the cliff that, it will be remembered, led into it. It was early morning, that we could tell by the feel of the sweet air and the look of the blessed sky, which we had never hoped to see again. It was so near as we knew, an hour after sunset, when we entered the tunnel, so it followed, that it had taken us the entire night to crawl through that dreadful place. One more effort lay o'er, I gasped, and we shall reach the slope where Billy Ali is, if he hasn't gone. Come, don't give way, for he had cast himself upon his face. He rose, and, leaning on each other, we got down that fifty feet or so of cliff, somehow, I have not the least notioned how. I only remember, that we found ourselves lying in a heap at the button, and then once more began to drag ourselves along on our hands and knees, towards a grove where she had told Billy Ali to wait her arrival, for we could not walk another foot. We had not gone fifty yards in this fashion, when suddenly one of the mutes emerged from the trees on our left, through which, I presume, he had been taking a morning stroll, and came running up to see what sort of strange animals we were. He stared and stared, and then held up his hand in horror, and nearly fell to the ground. Next he started off as hard as he could, for the grove sum two hundred yards away. Now wonders that he was horrified at our appearance, for we must have been a shocking sight. To begin, Leo, with his golden curls turned as snowy white, his clothes nearly rent from his body, his worn face, and his hands a mass of bruises, cuts and blood and crusted filth, was a sufficiently alarming spectacle, as he painfully dragged himself along the ground, and I have no doubt that I was little better to look on. I know that two days afterwards, when I inspected my face in some water I scarcely recognized myself. I have never been famous for beauty, but there was something beside ugliness stamped upon my features, that I have never got rid of, until this day. Something resembling that wild look with which a startled person wakes from deep sleep, more than anything else that I can think of. And really, it is not to be wondered at. What I do wonder at, is that we escaped at all with our reason. Presently to my intense relief I saw all be lolly, hurrying towards us, and even then I could scarcely help smiling, at the expression of consternation on his dignified countenance. Oh, my baboon, my baboon, he cried, my dear son! Is it indeed thee and the lion? Why, his mane that was ripe as corn is white like the snow? Whence come ye? And where is the pig, and where too? She, who must be obeyed? Dead, both dead, I answered, but ask no questions help us, and give us food and water, or we too shall die before thine eyes. Seized, though not, that our tongues are black for want of water. Hell, then, can we talk? Dead, he gasped, impossible, she, who never dies, dead, how can it be? And then, perceiving I think that his face was being bratched by the mutes, who had come running up, he checked himself, and motioned to them to carry us to the camp, which they did. Fortunately, when we arrived, some broth was boiling on the fire, and with this Bilali fed us, for we were too weak to feed ourselves. Thereby, I firmly believe saving us from death by exhaustion. Then he bade the mutes, where the blood and grime from us with that cloth, and after that we were laid down upon piles of aromatic grass, and instantly fell into the dead sleep of absolute exhaustion of mind and body. Chapter 28 Over the Mountain The next thing I recollect is a feeling of the most dreadful stiffness, and a sort of vague idea passing through my half-awaken brain, that I was a carpet that had just been beaten. I opened my eyes, and the first thing they fell on was the venerable countenance of my old friend Bilali, who was seated by the side of the improvised bed upon which I was sleeping, and thoughtfully stroking his long beard. The sight of him at once brought back to my mind a recollection of all that we had recently passed through, which was accentuated by the vision of poor Leo, lying opposite to me. His face knocked almost to a jelly, and his beautiful crowd of curls turned from yellow to white. Curiously enough, Leo's hair has lately been to some extent regaining its color. That is to say, it's no a yellowish gray, and I am not without hopes that it will in time come quite right. End of the note. And I shut my eyes again and ground. Zuchast slept long, my baboon, said old Bilali. How long, my father, I asked. Around of the sun and around of the moon, a day and a night has Zuchast slept, and the lion also. See, he sleepeth yet. Blest is sleep, I answered, for it swallows a recollection. Tell me, he said, what hath befallen you, and what is this strange story of the death of her who dies not? Be think, thee, my son, if this be true, then is thy danger and the danger of the lion very great? Nay, almost is the pot red, where with thee shall be potted, and the stomachs of those who shall eat thee are already hungry for the feast. Knowest thou not that these Amahaga, my children, these dwellers in the caves, hate thee? They hate thee, strangers, they hate thee more because of their brethren, whom she put to the torment for your sake. Assuredly, if once they learn that there is not to fear from Hiyah, from the terrible one who must be obeyed, they will slay ye by the pot. But let me hear thy tale, my poor baboon. This adored I said to work untold him, not everything indeed, for I did not think it desirable to do so, but sufficient for my purpose, which was to make him understand that she was really no more, having fallen into some fire, and, as I put it, for the real thing would have been incomprehensible to him, being burned up. I also told him some of the horrors we had undergone in effecting our escape, and this produced a great impression on him. But I clearly saw that he did not believe in the report of Aisha's death. He believed indeed that we thought that she was dead, but his explanation was that it had suited her to disappear for a while. Once he said, in his father's time she had done so for twelve years, and there was a tradition in the country that many centuries back no one had seen her for a whole generation, when she suddenly reappeared, and destroyed a woman who had assumed the position of queen. I said nothing to this, but only shook my head sadly. Alas, I knew too well that Aisha would appear no more, or at any rate that Bilali would never see her again. And now concluded Bilali, what would so do, my baboon? Nay, I said, I know not, my father, can we not escape from this country? He shook his head. It's very difficult, but a cover we cannot pass, for you would be seen, and as soon as these fierce ones found that ye were alone well, and he smiled significantly, and made a movement as though he were placing a head on his head. But there is a way over the cliff where off I once spake to thee, where they drive the cattle out of pasture. Then beyond the pastures are three days' journey through the marshes, and after that I know not, but I have heard that seven days' journey from thence is a mighty river, which flows to the black water. If you could come scither, perchance ye might escape, but how can ye come scither? Bilali, I said, once, though knowest, I did save thy life, now pay back the debts, my father, and save me mine and my friend's reliance. It shall be a pleasant thing for thee to think of when Zion hour comes, and something to set in the scale against the evil doing of thy days, if perchance thou hast done any evil. Also, if thou be right, and if she does but hide herself, surely when she comes again she shall reward thee. My son the baboon, answered the old man, think not that I have an ungrateful heart. Well, do I remember how thou didst rescue me, when those dogs stood by to see me drown? Measure for measure will I give thee, and if thou canst be saved, surely I will save thee. Listen, by dawn tomorrow be prepared, for later shall be here to bear ye away across the mountains and through the marshes beyond. This will I do, saying that it is the word of she that it be done, and he who obeyeth not the word of she, food is he for the hyenas. Then, when ye have crossed the marshes, ye must strike with your own hands, so that perchance, if good fortune go with you, ye may live to come to that black water whereof ye told me. And now, see, the lion wakes, and ye must eat the food I have made ready for you. Leo's condition, when once he was fairly aroused, proved not to be so bad as might have been expected from his appearance. And we both of us managed to eat a hearty meal, which indeed we needed sadly enough. After this we limped down to the spring and bathed, and then came back and slept again till evening, when we once more ate enough for five. Bilali was away all that day, no doubt making arrangements about litters and birers, for we were awakened in the middle of the night by the arrival of a considerable number of men in the little camp. At dawn the old man himself appeared, and told us that he had, by using she's dreadful name, though with some difficulty, succeeded in getting the necessary men and two guides to conduct us across the swamps, and that he urged us to start at once, at the same time announcing his intention of accompanying us, so as to protect us against treachery. I was much touched by this act of kindness on the part of that bilally old barbarian, towards two utterly defenseless strangers. A three, or in his case, for he would have to return, six days' journey through those deadly swamps, was no light undertaking for a man of his age, but he consented to do it cheerfully, in order to promote our safety. It shows that even among those dreadful Amahaga, who are certainly with their gloom and their devilish and ferocious rites, by far the most terrible savages that I ever heard of, there are people with kindly hearts. Of course, self-interest may have had something to do with it. He may have thought that she would suddenly reappear, and demand an account of us at his hands. But still, allowing for all deductions, it was a great deal more than we could expect, under the circumstances, and I can only say that I shall, for as long as I live, cherish a most affectionate remembrance, of my nominal parent, old Bilali. Accordingly, after swallowing some food, we started in the litters, feeling so far as our bodies went wonderfully, like our old selves, after our long rest and sleep. I must leave the condition of our minds to the imagination. Then came a terrible pull up the cliff. Sometimes the ascent was more natural, more often with us a zig-zag roadway cut, no-doped in the first instance by the old inhabitants of Kaffir. The Amahagir say they drive their spare cattle over at once a year to pasture outside. All I know is that those cattle must be uncommonly active on their feet. Of course, the litters were useless here, and we had to walk. By midday, however, we reached the great flat top of that mighty wall of rock, and grand enough the view was from it, with a plain of Kaffir, in the center of which we could clearly make out the peeler drawings of the Temple of Truth to the one side, and the boundless and melancholy marsh on the other. This wall of rock, which had no-doped ones formed the lip of the crater, was about a mile and a half thick, and still covered with clinker. Nothing grew there, and the only thing to relieve our eyes were occasional pools of rainwater, for rain had lately fallen, wherever there was a little hollow. Over the flat crest of this mighty rampart, we went, and then came the descent, which, if not so difficult a matter as the getting up, was still sufficiently breakneck, and took a still sunset. That night, however, we camped in safety upon the mighty slopes that rode away to the marsh beneath. On the following morning about eleven o'clock began our dreary journey across those awful seas or swamps, which I have already described. For three whole days, through stench and mire, and the all-prevailing flavor of fear, did our beavers struggle along, till at length we came to open rolling-ground, quite uncultivated, at mostly treeless, but covered with game of all sorts, which lies beyond that most desolate, and without guides utterly impracticable, district. And here on the following morning we bade farewell, not without some regret, to old Bilali, who strolled his white beard and solemnly blessed us. Farewell, my son the baboon, he said, and farewell to thee, too, our lion. I can do no more to help you, but if ever ye come to your country, be advised, and venture no more into lands that ye know not, lest ye come back no more, but leave your white bones to mark the limit of your journey. Farewell, once more, often shall I think of you, nor wilt so forget me, my baboon, for though thy face is ugly, thy heart is true. And then he turned and went, and with him went the tall and sudden-looking beavers, and that was the last that we saw of the Amahaga. We watched them winding away with the empty liters like a procession, bearing dead men from a battle, till the mists from the marsh gathered round them and hid them, and then, left utterly desolate in the vast wilderness, we turned and gazed round us and at each other. Three weeks or so before, four men had entered the marshes of Skafer, and now two of us were dead, and the other two had gone through adventures, and experience is so strange and terrible, that death himself has not a more fearful countenance. Three weeks, and only three weeks, truly time should be measured by events and not by the lapse of hours. It seemed like thirty years since we saw the last of our whale boat. We must strike out for the Zambezi, Leo, I said, but God knows if we shall ever get there. Leo nodded. He had become very silent of late, and we started with nothing but the clothes we stood in, a compass, our revolvers and express rifles, and about 200 rounds of ammunition, and so ended the history of our visit to the ancient ruins of mighty and imperial Kafer. As for the adventures that subsequently befell us, strange and varied as they were, I have, after deliberation, determined not to record them here. In these pages I have only tried to give a short and clear account of an occurrence which I believe to be unprecedented. And this I have done, nervous of you to immediate publication, but merely to put on paper, while there are yet fresh in our memories the details of our journey and its result, which will, I believe, prove interesting to the world if ever we determine to make them public. This, as at present advised, we do not intend to be done during our joint lives. For the rest, it is of no public interest resembling as it does the experience of more than one central African traveler. Suffice it to say that we did, after incredible hardships and privations, reach the Zambezi, which proved to be about 170 miles south of where Bilali left us. There we were, for six months, imprisoned by a savage tribe who believed us to be supernatural beings, chiefly on account of Leo's useful face and snow-white hair. From these people we ultimately escaped, and, crossing the Zambezi, wandered off southwards, where, when on the point of starvation we were sufficiently fortunate to fall in with a half-caste Portuguese elephant hunter, who had followed a troop of elephants further inland that he had ever been before. This man treated us most hospitably, and ultimately, through his assistance, we, after innumerable sufferings and adventures, reached Dalagohe Bay, more than 18 months from the time when we emerged from the marshes of Kefir, and the very next day managed to catch one of the steamboats that ran round the cape to England. Our journey home was a prosperous one, and we set our foot on the quay at Southampton exactly two years, from the date of our departure upon our wild and seemingly ridiculous quest. And I now write these last words with Leo, leaning over my shoulder in my old room in my college, the very same into which some two and twenty years ago, my poor friend Wincy, came stumbling on the memorable night of his death, bearing the iron chest with him. And that is the end of this history, so far as it concerns science and the outside world. What its end will be as regards Leo and myself is more than I can guess at, but we feel that it is not reached yet, a story that began more than two thousand years ago, my stretch a long way into the dim and distant future. Is Leo really an reincarnation of the ancient calicurates, of whom the inscription tells? Or was I should be deceived by some strange hereditary resemblance? The reader must form his own opinion on this as on many other matters. I have mine, which is that she made no such mistake. Often I sit alone at night, staring with the eyes of the mind into the blackness of unborn time, and wondering in what shape and form the great drama will be finally developed, and where the scene of its next act will be laid. And when that final development ultimately accures, as I have no doubt it must and will occur, in obedience to a faith that never swerves and a purpose that cannot be altered, what will be the part played therein by that beautiful Egyptian Amenartas, the princess of the royal race of the pharaohs, for the love of whom the priest calicrates broke his woes to Isis, and pursued by the inexorable vengeance of the outraged goddess, fled down the coast of Libya to meet his doom at Kaffir. End of Chapter 28 Over the Mountain And The End of the Book She by H. Ryder Haggard