_ CHAPTER FORTY FOUR. "YOU DAH?"
Murray's movements were cautious in the extreme, and as he crept almost inch by inch he grew more confident of his power to do so without being heard, for the movements made by whoever it was that was drawing near were loud enough to cover his own.
To remain away from his companion during the long night was a thing not to be dreamed of, with the possibility of the companionship of reptiles such as he had seen; and the opportunity of creeping back unseen as well as unheard grew more and more promising as the minutes glided by, and he listened now so that he might be in no danger of losing his way. But at the same time there was the risk of this being an enemy.
How he completed his short journey he could hardly tell, for he had to battle with nervous excitement as well as with the darkness that now began to fall rapidly in the deep shades of the forest, and at the last he was attacked by a fresh trouble which was as startling as the first, and showed him beyond doubt that some one was making for the hut. He had more than once nearly convinced himself that he who approached was the huge black, who had startled him with a false alarm of danger; but somehow, when this idea was still hanging in the balance and he felt doubtful of the wisdom of making his presence known to one who might after all prove an enemy, he grasped suddenly at a fresh development, for when at last the movements to which he listened had drawn very near, he felt his heart sink with something approaching dread on his fellow sufferer's behalf, for certainly now it could not be the huge black he had seen, for two people, evidently well accustomed to thread a way through the forest, were converging upon his hiding-place, and rapidly now.
"If it were only morning!" he said to himself, as, unable to keep down his hard breathing, he covered the last few yards which lay between him and his brother midshipman, and then, cutlass in hand, turned at bay.
The lad's experience had already been giving him lessons in wood-craft, and so it was that in his last movements he had hardly made a sound; but he had evidently been heard, for the duplex movement amongst the trees ceased at once, and a silence ensued which seemed terrible. So well was it sustained that as the lad crouched there, cutlass in hand, bending over his comrade, upon whose breast he had laid one hand, it seemed to him that his own breathing and that of Roberts was all that could possibly be heard. In fact, there were moments when the lad felt ready to believe that he had been a victim to imagination, and that he had been for some time fancying the presence of a snake. Yes, those were the heavy pulsations of his own breast--of that there could be no doubt; and those others which sounded like the echoes of his own heart were as certainly the result of the beating which kept on heavily in the breast of his wounded companion. It could not be--it was impossible that any one else was near. If there had been pursuers at hand, Murray felt that they must have gone by. And as he leaned forward, staring hard above where his comrade lay insensible, and trying to pierce the darkness, he at last found himself faintly able to make out a little opening which meant feeble light that was almost darkness; and this he now recognised as being the opening he had made with the cutlass by removing a portion of the leafy roof.
"We are alone," thought Murray, "and this is all half-maddening fancy."
The effort to retain silence had at last become greater than he could sustain, and even at the risk of bringing down danger upon their heads, Murray felt that he must speak--if only a word or two. If matters should come to the worst he was ready with his cutlass--ready to strike, and his blow would send the enemy, if enemy it was, or even enemies, scuffling rapidly away through the forest. At any rate the lad determined that he could retain silence no longer, and drawing a long, slow, deep breath, he was about to ask who was there in some form or another, and fend off at the same time any blow that might be struck at them, when the silence was broken from close at hand, and in a low deep whisper, with the words--
"Massa--massa! You dah?"
And now, suffering from the strange whirl of excitement which seemed to choke all utterance, Frank Murray felt that it was impossible to reply. _