'One of the boys always carries it,' insisted Spike turning to the bearers sprawled on the ground. 'Hey, you! W'ich one o' you 's got the green rock?' They looked at him blankly; then they looked at one another.
'No got,' said one. 'No bring.'
'Hell!' ejaculated Troll. 'You're a rare un, you are, aleavin' maybe a three million pun stone back there in the cannibal country!'
Chapter 14. Kidnaped
'TIRED?' ASKED WOOD. Gonfala shook her head. 'Not a bit.'
'You're doing pretty well for a girl who never had to do anything more strenuous than sit on a throne,' laughed van Eyk.
'You'd be surprised. I can probably out-run and out-last either of you. You see I used to hunt with the Kaji. Mafka insisted on it-lots of exercise. He was a great believer in exercise for every one but Mafka.'
'I'm glad,' said Wood, 'for we've got two long marches between this camp and railhead. I'll be glad when it's over. To tell you the truth, I'm fed up on Africa. I hope I never see it again.'
'I don't blame you, Stanlee; you came near staying here a long time.'
'Yes; eternity is rather a long time.' Wood grimaced. 'It's hard to realize, even now, that we escaped.'
'It's incredible,' agreed Gonfala. 'We're the first persons ever to escape from Mafka; and he'd been there, oh, no one knows how long-the Kaji said always. They believed that he created the world.'
The three were camped at the end of a day's march on their way out toward civilization. They had a dependable, well equipped safari furnished by Tarzan. The men planned on devoting one day to hunting, as they were in excellent game country; then they would cover the two long marches to railhead. The delay for hunting was Wood's concession to van Eyk, an indefatigable Nimrod, who had obtained permission from the Lord of the Jungle to take out a few trophies for his collection.
As night fell, the light of their beast fire cast dancing shadows through the camp and shone far out into the night, both attracting and repelling the great carnivores upon whose domain they trespassed; for this was lion country. It attracted also other eyes a mile or more to the north.
'I wonder what that might be,' said Spike.
'A fire,' growled Troll; 'what you think it was-a iceberg?'
'Funny, ain't you?'
'Not as funny as a bloke what runs off an leaves three million puns worth o' emerald with a bunch of cannibals.'
'Fer cripe's sake quit chewin' about that; I didn't leave it any more 'n you did. What I mean is, there must be men over by that fire; I wonders who they might be.'
'Natives, perhaps.'
'Or white hunters.'
'What difference does it make?' asked Troll.
'They might put us on the right trail.'
'An' tell that Clayton bloke where we are? You're balmy.'
'How do you know he's around here? Maybe they never even heard of him.'
'He's everywhere. Everybody's heard of him. He said he'd know it if we double-crossed Stanley. After I seen what he done in the Kaji country, I wouldn't put nothin' past him-he's omnivorous.'
'Whatever that means.'
'You're ignorant.'
'Well, just the same, I think we'd ourghter find out who made that fire. If they're one thing, we'd better light out of here; if they're the other, we can ask 'em to set us on the right trail.'
'Maybe you said something intelligent at last. It wouldn't do no harm to go have a look-see.'
'That fire may be a long ways off, and-'
'And what?'
'This is lion country.'
'You scared?'
'Sure I'm scared. So are you, unless you're a bigger fool than I think. Nobody but a fool wouldn't be scared in lion country at night without a gun.'
'We'll take a couple of the smokes with us. They say lions like dark meat.'
'All right; let's get goin'.'
Guided by the fire, the four men approached the Wood van Eyke camp; and after reconnoitering made their way to the concealment of a clump of bushes where they could see and not be seen.
'Cripes!' whispered Spike. 'Look who's there!'
'Gonfala!' breathed Troll.
'An' Wood an' van Eyk.'
'T'ell with them! If we only had the girl!'
'Wot do we want of her?'
'You get less brains every minute. Wot do we want of 'er! If we had her we could make the diamond do its stuff just like Mafka did-just like Clayton did. We'd be safe; nothin' nor nobody couldn't hurt us.'
'Well, we ain't got her.'
'Shut up! Listen to wot they're sayin'.'
The voices of the three whites by the campfire came clearly to Troll and Spike. Van Eyk was making plans for the morrow's hunt.
'I really think Gonfala ought to stay in camp and rest; but as long as she insists on coming along, you and she can go together. If there were three men, now, we could spread out farther and cover more ground.'
'I can do whatever a man can do,' insisted Gonfala. 'You can assume that you have three men.'
'But, Gonfala-'
'Don't be foolish, Stanlee. I am not as the women you have known in your civilized countries. From what you have told me, I shall be as helpless and afraid there as they would be here; but here I am not afraid. So I hunt tomorrow as the third man, and now I am going to bed. Good night, Stanlee. Good night, Bob.'
'Well, I guess that settles it,' remarked Wood, with a wry smile; 'but when I get you back in God's country you'll have to mind me. Good night.'
'Perhaps,' said Gonfala.
* * *
The chill of night still hung like a vapor below the new sun as the three hunters set out from their camp for the day's sport, and although the hunt had been van Eyk's idea primarily, each of the others was keen to bag a lion. Over their breakfast coffee they had laid wagers as to which would be the lucky one to bring down the first trophy, with the result that not a little friendly rivalry had been engendered. That each might, seemed entirely possible; as the night had been filled with the continual roaring of the great carnivores.
Shortly after leaving camp the three separated, van Eyk keeping straight ahead toward the east, Wood diverging toward the south, and Gonfala to the north; each was accompanied by a gunbearer; and some of the members of the safari followed along after van Eyk and Wood, either believing that one of the men would be more likely to get a lion than would the girl, or, perhaps, feeling safer behind the guns of the men.
From behind an outcropping of rock at the summit of a low hill northwest of the Wood-van Eyk camp Spike and Troll watched their departure; while below them, concealed from sight, the six men of their safari waited. The two whites watched Gonfala and her gunbearer approaching across the open plain. The direction that she was taking suggested that she would pass a little to the east of them, but that she would then still be in sight of van Eyk and possibly Wood also.
The latter was not at all happy about the arrangements for the day; he did not like the idea of Gonfala going out on her own after lion with only a gunbearer, but the girl had overridden his every objection. He had insisted, however, upon sending as gunbearer a man of known courage who was also a good shot; and him he had instructed to be always ready with the second rifle in the event that Gonfala got into a tight place and, regardless of custom,
