第33章

This is a digression at a critical point but it is not too long for the occasion itself was very long.With the exception of the periodical passing of the vase, and the movement necessary to throw fuel on to the fire, nothing happened for the best part of a whole hour.Nobody spoke a word.There we all sat in perfect silence, staring at the glare and glow of the large fire, and at the shadows thrown by the flickering earthenware lamps (which, by the way, were not ancient).On the open space between us and the fire lay a large wooden tray, with four short handles to it, exactly like a butcher's tray, only not hollowed out.By the side of the tray was a great pair of long-handled iron pincers, and on the other side of the fire was a similar pair.Somehow I did not at all like the appearance of this tray and the accompanying pincers.There I sat and stared at them and at the silent circle of the fierce, moody faces of the men, and reflected that it was all very awful, and that we were absolutely in the power of this alarming people, who, to me at any rate, were all the more formidable because their true character was still very much of a mystery to us.They might be better than I thought them, or they might be worse.I feared that they were worse, and I was not wrong.It was a curious sort of a feast, I reflected, in appearance, indeed, an entertainment of the Barmecide stamp, for there was absolutely nothing to eat.

At last, just as I was beginning to feel as though Iwere being mesmerized, a move was made.Without the slightest warning, a man from the other side of the circle called out in a loud voice, "Where is the flesh that we shall eat?"Thereon everybody in the circle answered in a deep, measured tone, and stretching out the right arm towards the fire as he spoke"The flesh will come."

"Is it a goat?" said the same man.

"It is a goat without horns, and more than a goat, and we shall slay it," they answered, with one voice, and turning half round they one and all grasped the handles of their spears with the right hand, and then simultaneously let them go.

"Is it an ox?" said the man again.

"It is an ox without horns, and more than an ox, and we shall slay it," was the answer, and again the spears were grasped, and again let go.

Then came a pause, and I noticed, with horror and a rising of the hair, that the woman next to Mahomed began to fondle him, patting his cheeks, and calling him by names of endearment, while her fierce eyes played up and down his trembling form.I do not know why the sight frightened me so, but it did frighten us all dreadfully, especially Leo.The caressing was so snakelike, and so evidently a part of some ghastly formula that had to be gone through.I saw Mahomed turn white under his brown skin, sickly white with fear.

"Is the meat ready to be cooked?" asked the voice, more rapidly.

"It is ready; it is ready."

"Is the pot hot to cook it?" it continued, in a sort of scream that echoed painfully down the great recesses of the cave.

"It is hot; it is hot."

"Great heavens!" roared Leo, "remember the writing, 'The people who place pots upon the heads of strangers.'"As he said the words, before we could stir, or even take the matter in, two great ruffians jumped up, and, seizing the long pincers, plunged them into the heart of the fire, and the woman who had been caressing Mahomed suddenly produced a fibre noose from under her girdle or moocha, and, slipping it over his shoulders, ran it tight, while the men next him seized him by the legs.The two men with the pincers gave a heave, and, scattering the fire this way and that upon the rocky floor, lifted from it a large earthenware pot, heated to a white heat.In an instant, almost with a single movement, they had reached the spot where Mahomed was struggling.He fought like a fiend, shrieking in the abandonment of his despair, and, notwithstanding the noose round him, and the efforts of the men who held his legs, the advancing wretches were for the moment unable to accomplish their purpose, which, horrible and incredible as it seems, was to put the red-hot pot upon his head.

I sprang to my feet with a yell of horror, and drawing my revolver fired it by a sort of instinct straight at the diabolical woman who had been caressing Mahomed, and was now gripping him in her arms.The bullet struck her in the back and killed her, and to this day I am glad that it did, for, as it afterwards transpired, she had availed herself of the anthropophagous customs of the Amahagger to organize the whole thing in revenge of the slight put upon her by Job.She sank down dead, and as she did so, to my terror and dismay, Mahomed, by a superhuman effort, burst from his tormentors, and, springing high into the air, fell dying upon her corpse.The heavy bullet from my pistol had driven through the bodies of both, at once striking down the murderess, and saving her victim from a death a hundred times more horrible.It was an awful and yet a most merciful accident.

For a moment there was a silence of astonishment.The Amahagger had never heard the report of a firearm before, and its effects dismayed them.But the next a man close to us recovered himself, and seized his spear preparatory to making a lunge with it at Leo, who was the nearest to him.