07 Elephant Adventure (11 page)

But that was not all. This giant had more than muscle. He had skill - the skill to creep up silently upon the camp, gag and tie two guards, pick a lock and remove a boy from the chiefs house without allowing him to make a sound, steal cattle, and, most difficult of all, drive off two lumbering elephants without exciting them to a single squeal or rumble.

But Hal would not let anyone see his uneasiness. He said:

The fellow’s big boot-prints will just make it easier for us to track him. Time out for breakfast - then we hit the trail.’

Twenty minutes later they were on their way, following the big boot-prints and die even larger footprints of the two elephants. Joro and Toto insisted on coming along in spite of their hard night. Joro was Hal’s chief tracker, and with his help he was sure they could track the gang to its lair. Some of the men of the village wanted to go. but Chief Mumbo forbade it.

‘Would you bring destruction on us all?’ he said. ‘You will do that if you make the Thunder-man angry. With one hand he could crush this village. I too would like to go after Bo, for I am his father. But I am also chief and must think of the welfare of all of you.’

At first the tracking was very easy. Even if there had been no human footprints it would have been a simple matter to follow the deep, broad holes made by the two elephants.

Each forefoot of the big elephant made a round print two feet in diameter and about three inches deep. The print of each hind foot was not round, but oval, leaving a depression that looked like a big platter, three feet long and two wide.

No other animal in all the world could leave so big and so plain a record of his passing.

This is almost too easy,’ Roger laughed. ‘Those Arabs can’t be so smart after all. We’re bound to come up with them soon and then we’ll give them what’s what.’ Hal was studying the human prints. He asked Joro: ‘How many men do you think there were?’ ‘Perhaps twelve, perhaps fifteen.’

‘And we have thirty/ Roger said happily. ‘It will be no job at all to rub them out’

‘But they may have more men at their camp.’ Hal reminded him. ‘And they must have known they were leaving a plain trail. It won’t stay so plain, nor so Safe. Somewhere, they’ll try to trick us. Keep your eyes peeled.’

A forest of wild flowers rose high over their heads. The stems of the flowers were as big as tree trunks. Lobelias stood like gigantic candles twenty feet tall. The blooms at their tops were like flames.

The scene changed, and they were in a forest of bamboo. Far above, the ceiling of long pointed leaves was a delicate green against the dark sky. The constant mist made the leaves wet and from them fell drops of water like pearls to the always wet earth. The thick bamboo trunks were as straight as the columns in a cathedral.

‘Must take them a long time to grow so big,’ Roger said.

‘You’d be surprised,’ Hal said. ‘You see, it’s never dry here for one minute. They grow like mad. A hundred feet in two months. I’m not kidding.’ He grinned at the look of astonishment on Roger’s face. ‘Just think,’ he went on, ‘at home we have to wait twenty to fifty years for a tree to grow a hundred feet high, depending on what sort of tree it is. Of course, bamboos grow fast anywhere, but faster here than anywhere else.’

‘So all these big trees are only two months old? I can’t believe it.’

‘It’s true.’

‘Will they keep on going higher?’

‘No - a hundred feet is about the limit’

Then what happens?’

‘They bloom - just once. Then they die. The seeds that the flowers have dropped take root and make new trees.

There’s one now - just starting.’ The bamboo shoot, as thick as Roger’s leg, stood a foot

high. ‘It wasn’t there yesterday,’ Hal said. ‘It popped up

overnight.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Scientific expeditions have been through here. They took measurements. It’s all in the botany books - you can look it up for yourself. A shoot will grow almost two feet a day for the first few weeks. It slows down later. But a lot of them never get a chance to grow.’

‘Why not?’

They’re eaten by animals. Bamboo shoots are tender

and sweet’

‘I know. We’ve had them in Chinese restaurants.’

‘Right. The Watussi and the pygmies love them. And they’re the favourite food of gorillas. Look - the gorillas have been here.’

The footprints were plain. They had been made by bare feet, but certainly not the feet of any man. Compared with these huge impressions, the prints left by Hal’s safari men looked as if they had been made by children.

Otherwise they looked quite human. It was easy to see the marks left by the five toes.

‘But why are the prints so deep?’

‘Because the gorilla is so heavy. A big male gorilla can weigh 700 pounds - four times the weight of the average man.’

‘If they were right here why didn’t they chew up that bamboo shoot?’

They may have been here yesterday before it was out of the ground. Come on, pal - we’re being left behind.

If there are any of these hairy gentlemen around 1 don’t care to meet them alone.’

‘What do you mean, alone? You have me.’

Hal laughed. ‘Lot of help you’d be! A gorilla could knock you out with one little love pat.’ He looked around. ‘They’re probably watching us right now.’

‘Well, we don’t need to worry,’ Roger said comfortably. ‘If any of the big brutes had wanted to make trouble he would have attacked our men.’

‘Attack a gang of thirty men? Not likely. But two little babes in the woods like us - we’d be easy pickings.’

‘If they’re like most animals they won’t bother us unless we bother them.’

‘You got that out of story-books,’ Hal said. ‘And it’s true. All the same, it’s nonsense. Because you never know what is going to bother them.’

The boys hurried to overtake the others, who had disappeared down the trail. It was raining in earnest now and the black clouds made the forest dark and lonely. There were deep, low sounds all about which made the boys look now here and now there, expecting to see a gorilla pop out from behind any tree.

‘There’s a gorilla’s nest,’ Hal said.

It was a very rough structure made of branches and twigs so interlaced that they made a springy mattress raised about two feet from the ground.

‘I thought they lived in trees.’

‘They can climb trees - but they don’t want to. They’re so heavy, branches might break under them. The biggest of them never leave the ground.’

The muttering sounds of the forest increased and seemed to draw closer. Roger put on a brave front. No ‘monkey’ was going to make a monkey out of him. He pushed ahead and led the way. He was getting hungry. It was not long after breakfast but, like most boys, he had a hollow leg. In the gloom, he made out another bamboo shoot. If a gorilla could eat it, so could he. He slashed it off with his bush knife.

The darkness was pierced by a scream that made the skin crawl on Roger’s back. Within five feet of him was a blackness that he had thought to be a shadow. Now he saw it was an enormous gorilla as tall as a Watussi, and as broad as three or four of them, and all black except for gleaming white teeth. His deep-sunken eyes were black, his nostrils were like black rubber and his beard like a black brush.

He thrust out a black arm and grabbed the shoot from Roger’s hand. He flung it into the bushes where it was received by squeaking gorilla babies. Then he began hammering on his own huge chest, making a deep booming sound. This wasn’t enough for him, and he continued to scream.

It was a lesson Roger would never forget. You couldn’t tell what would bother an animal - and before you found out you might be dead. This big beast had gone into at rage merely because someone was stealing his family’s lunch.

With his heart thumping like an outboard motor, Roger started to back away. He couldn’t fight this thing. Neither he nor Hal carried a gun. They had only their bush knives, which would be about as useful as toothpicks against this monster.

Roger backed into Hal, who had not moved.

Hold your ground.’ Hal said. ‘Don’t give an inch. If he knows you’re afraid hell twist your head off.’

Hal edged forward until he stood beside Roger. The gorilla continued to scream and to pound his chest. His enormous arms were covered with hair eight inches long. His hands were as big as hams.-‘Let’s talk back in his own language,’ Hal said. He began beating on his own chest. He bared his teeth, twisted his usually pleasant face until it was almost as ugly as the gorilla’s, and screamed at the top of his lungs. Roger followed his example.

The bamboo forest rang with the combined racket of two lusty-throated humans and the beating and bellowing of the great ape. A chorus of other gorilla voices and drums sounded on all sides, and the birds above joined in the general excitement

Some of the safari men came running back to learn what had happened to their young masters. They stopped and stared at the strange spectacle - the hairy Hercules trying to scare two boys, while the boys, refusing to be scared, made most awful faces, whacked their own ribs, yelled to high heaven, and seemed ready to tussle with a monster that was twice as big as both of them put together.

Before the men could collect their wits they saw that the boys had already won the contest. The gorilla stepped back a few inches. The boys at once stepped forward. They brandished their arms as if about to tear the big fellow limb from limb.

The gorilla stopped his noise. His expression changed completely. Now there was fear in those deep eyes.

He turned to one side, dropped his hands to the ground and, doubling his fists so he could walk on the knuckles, as is the way of gorillas, shuffled off on all fours into the bush. He left a trail of footprints and knuckle prints and two boys, who only now began to realize that they had been badly frightened.’

‘My legs are like spaghetti,’ Roger complained.

Hal grinned. ‘You probably need some nourishment. Do have some bamboo shoots.’

‘I’d starve first,’ Roger said, looking round to see if any black eyes were watching. ‘So far as I’m concerned, from now on bamboo shoots are strictly for the apes.’

The boys rejoined the party. It was with a great feeling of relief that they came out of the dark shades of the bamboo forest on to an open savannah.

Ahead lay a lake - beautiful even in the pouring rain. Hal identified it on his map as Green Lake.

That was another odd thing about this mountain slope. It was a series of balconies, and on each balcony was a lake. Explorers had named them Green Lake, Black Lake, White Lake, and Grey Lake. Each was kept full by the daily rains and streams coming down from the glaciers. From every balcony waterfalls tumbled to the lower level. And across Green Lake beside the waterfalls towered posies that at home you would wear in your buttonhole and here stood twenty, thirty, forty feet high.

Joro was worrying.

‘The rain is washing out the footprints,’ he said. ‘If it keeps up like this we’re going to lose the trail.’

Suddenly Joro stopped. On the rim of a giant flower directly in front of his nose was one of the most frightful-looking creatures of the Mountains of the Moon. It was a chameleon with a fishy-looking skin, pop-eyes, and three horns sprouting from its ugly forehead.

‘It’s a bad sign/ Joro said. ‘When you see one of these things, you must turn back. We will only have bad luck if we go on.’

Hal, who never had much patience with native superstitions, said:

‘Well go on just the same. We’re not going to be stopped by one silly little animal.’

The other men had halted now and were staring with horror at the evil-looking reptile. Like Joro, they were all in favour of going back to camp.

‘Listen, men.’ Hal said. ‘You are brave. You face the greatest of beasts without fear. You wrestle with the elephant and the rhino and the lion. Don’t tell me you are afraid of a little animal that can neither sling nor bite.’

He held his finger close to the creature’s mouth. The men stared in frightened silence. The chameleon did not move. A fly lit on Hal’s finger. Immediately a long tongue like that of a snake darted out, took the fly, and carried it into the chameleon’s mouth.

‘Like an ant-eater,’ Hal said to Roger. ‘Its tongue is very long and very sticky and any insect it touches just has no chance.’

The eyes of the weird creature revolved on pivots. It could look at two different objects at the same time. One eye was fixed on Roger and the other on Hal. The eyes stood far out, and it was very odd indeed when one stared up and the other one down. This alone would be enough to make the Africans regard the creature with superstitious awe.

Another reason for thinking it must be bewitched was its ability to change colour. Just now it lay on a blue part of the flower and its skin was blue. Hal picked it up and placed it on the part of the flower which was orange. The colour of the skin turned to orange.

‘You see,’ Joro said. ‘It has magic.’

‘I’ll show you some more magic’ Hal said. He poked the little creature several times with his finger-nail, it swelled up like a balloon. The men shrank back muttering.

‘That’s its way of trying to scare anybody who annoys it,’ Hal said. ‘It blows itself up with air - just like certain fish. The puffer fish, the globe-fish, the porcupine fish. they can all swell up to make themselves look bigger than they really are and frighten their enemies. But surely you won’t let this little brat frighten you! How about Bo -the chiefs son - don’t you care what happens to him? And our elephants - are you going to stand by and let them take our elephants?’

‘It is bad luck,’ Joro repeated. ‘We go back to camp.’

Then well have to go on without you.’ Hal said.

He passed the chameleon and struck out down the trail. Roger caught up with him.

They had not gone half a mile before Joro came running up beside them. ‘You will not come back?’ he said. ‘No,’ Hal answered. ‘But you don’t need to come.’ ‘I will go with you.’ ‘But how about your bad luck?’ ‘If there is bad luck, we will have it together.’ Hal was deeply moved by the black man’s loyalty. He knew this was no small thing that Joro had done - daring to break a taboo hundreds of years old. To him, passing that chameleon was as serious a matter as it would be for Hal to throw himself in front of a moving train.