“What to?” I asked. “The image has gone and the piece of it that ascended fell not upon the Bellower, as would have happened if the god had been angry with him, but on one of its own priests, whom it killed. Therefore, having been sacrificed by the god itself, he it is that should be eaten, not the Bellower, who merely did what his Spirit bade him.”
This ingenious argument seemed to produce some effect upon Marama, but to the priests it did not at all appeal.
“Eat them all!” these cried. “They are the enemies of Oro and have worked sacrilege!”
Moreover, to judge from their demeanour, the bulk of the people seemed to agree with them. Things began to look very ugly. The priests rushed forward, threatening us with their wooden weapons, and one of them even aimed a blow at Bickley, which only missed him by an inch or two.
“Look here, my friend,” called the doctor whose temper was rising, “you name me the Great Priest or Great Healer, do you not? Well, be careful, lest I should show you that I can kill as well as heal!”
Not in the least intimidated by this threat the man, a great bedizened fellow who literally was foaming at the mouth with rage, rushed forward again, his club raised, apparently with the object of dashing out Bickley’s brains.
Suddenly Bickley lifted his revolver and fired. The man, shot through the heart, sprang into the air and fell upon his face—stone dead. There was consternation, for these people had never seen us shoot anything before, and were quite unacquainted with the properties of firearms, which they supposed to be merely instruments for making a noise. They stared, they gasped in fear and astonishment, and then they fled, pursued by Tommy, barking, leaving us alone with the two dead men.
“It was time to teach them a lesson,” said Bickley as he replaced the empty cartridge, and, seizing the dead man, rolled him into the burning pit.
“Yes,” I answered; “but presently, when they have got over their fright, they will come back to teach us one.”
Bastin said nothing; he seemed too dazed at the turn events had taken.
“What do you suggest?” asked Bickley.
“Flight,” I answered.
“Where to—the ship? We might hold that.”
“No; that is what they expect. Look! They are cutting off our road there. To the island in the lake where they dare not follow us, for it is holy ground.”
“How are we going to live on the island?” asked Bickley.
“I don’t know,” I replied; “but I am quite certain that if we stay here we shall die.”
“Very well,” he said; “let us try it.”
While we were speaking I was cutting Bastin’s bonds. “Thank you,” he said. “It is a great relief to stretch one’s arms after they have been compressed with cords. But at the same time, I do not know that I am really grateful. The martyr’s crown was hanging above me, so to speak, and now it has vanished into the pit, like that man whom Bickley murdered.”
“Look here,” exclaimed the exasperated Bickley, “if you say much more, Bastin, I’ll chuck you into the pit too, to look for your martyr’s crown, for I think you have done enough mischief for one morning.”
“If you are trying to shift the responsibility for that unfortunate man’s destruction on to me—”
“Oh! shut it and trot,” broke in Bickley. “Those infernal savages are coming with your blessed converts leading the van.”
So we “trotted” at no mean pace. As we passed it, Bastin stooped down and picked up the head of the image of Oro, much as Atalanta in Academy pictures is represented as doing to the apples, and bore it away in triumph.
“I know it is scorched,” he ejaculated at intervals, “but they might trim it up and stick it on to a new body as the original false god. Now they can’t, for there’s nothing left.”
As a matter of fact, we were never in any real danger, for our pursuit was very halfhearted indeed. To begin with, now that their first rage was over, the Orofenans who were fond of us had no particular wish to do us to death, while the ardour of their sorcerers, who wished this very much, had been greatly cooled by the mysterious annihilation of their idol and the violent deaths of two of their companions, which they thought might be reduplicated in their own persons. So it came about that the chase, if noisy, was neither close nor eager.
We reached the edge of the lake where was the boathouse of which I have spoken already, travelling at little more than a walk. Here we made Bastin unfasten the better of the two canoes that by good luck was almost filled with offerings, which doubtless, according to custom, must be made upon the day of this feast to Oro, while we watched against surprise at the boathouse door. When he was ready we slipped in and took our seats, Tommy jumping in after us, and pushed the canoe, now very heavily laden, out into the lake.
Here, at a distance of about forty paces, which we judged to be beyond wooden spear-throw, we rested upon our paddles to see what would happen. All the crowd of islanders had rushed to the lake edge where they stood staring at us stupidly. Bastin, thinking the occasion opportune, lifted the hideous head of the idol which he had carefully washed, and began to preach on the downfall of “the god of the Grove.”
This action of his appeared to awake memories or forebodings in the minds of his congregation. Perhaps some ancient prophecy was concerned—I do not know.
