Belgian and Arab
Lieutenant Albert Werper had only the prestige of the name he had dishonored to thank for his narrow escape from being cashiered.At first he had been humbly thankful, too, that they had sent him to this Godforsaken Congo post instead of court-martialing him, as he had so justly deserved;
but now six months of the monotony, the frightful isolation and the loneliness had wrought a change.The young man brooded continually over his fate.His days were filled with morbid self-pity, which eventually engendered in his weak and vacillating mind a hatred for those who had sent him here--
for the very men he had at first inwardly thanked for saving him from the ignominy of degradation.
He regretted the gay life of Brussels as he never had regretted the sins which had snatched him from that gayest of capitals, and as the days passed he came to center his resentment upon the representative in Congo land of the authority which had exiled him--his captain and immediate superior.
This officer was a cold, taciturn man, inspiring little love in those directly beneath him, yet respected and feared by the black soldiers of his little command.
Werper was accustomed to sit for hours glaring at his superior as the two sat upon the veranda of their common quarters, smoking their evening cigarets in a silence which neither seemed desirous of breaking.
The senseless hatred of the lieutenant grew at last into a form of mania.The captain's natural taciturnity he distorted into a studied attempt to insult him because of his past shortcomings.He imagined that his superior held him in contempt, and so he chafed and fumed inwardly until one evening his madness became suddenly homicidal.He fingered the butt of the revolver at his hip, his eyes narrowed and his brows contracted.At last he spoke.
"You have insulted me for the last time!" he cried, springing to his feet."I am an officer and a gentleman, and I shall put up with it no longer without an accounting from you, you pig."
The captain, an expression of surprise upon his features, turned toward his junior.He had seen men before with the jungle madness upon them--the madness of solitude and unrestrained brooding, and perhaps a touch of fever.
He rose and extended his hand to lay it upon the other's shoulder.Quiet words of counsel were upon his lips; but they were never spoken.Werper construed his superior's action into an attempt to close with him.
His revolver was on a level with the captain's heart, and the latter had taken but a step when Werper pulled the trigger.Without a moan the man sank to the rough planking of the veranda, and as he fell the mists that had clouded Werper's brain lifted, so that he saw himself and the deed that he had done in the same light that those who must judge him would see them.
He heard excited exclamations from the quarters of the soldiers and he heard men running in his direction.
They would seize him, and if they didn't kill him they would take him down the Congo to a point where a properly ordered military tribunal would do so just as effectively, though in a more regular manner.
Werper had no desire to die.Never before had he so yearned for life as in this moment that he had so effectively forfeited his right to live.The men were nearing him.What was he to do? He glanced about as though searching for the tangible form of a legitimate excuse for his crime; but he could find only the body of the man he had so causelessly shot down.
In despair, he turned and fled from the oncoming soldiery.Across the compound he ran, his revolver still clutched tightly in his hand.At the gates a sentry halted him.Werper did not pause to parley or to exert the influence of his commission--he merely raised his weapon and shot down the innocent black.A moment later the fugitive had torn open the gates and vanished into the blackness of the jungle, but not before he had transferred the rifle and ammunition belts of the dead sentry to his own person.
All that night Werper fled farther and farther into the heart of the wilderness.Now and again the voice of a lion brought him to a listening halt; but with cocked and ready rifle he pushed ahead again, more fearful of the human huntsmen in his rear than of the wild carnivora ahead.
Dawn came at last, but still the man plodded on.
All sense of hunger and fatigue were lost in the terrors of contemplated capture.He could think only of escape.
He dared not pause to rest or eat until there was no further danger from pursuit, and so he staggered on until at last he fell and could rise no more.How long he had fled he did not know, or try to know.When he could flee no longer the knowledge that he had reached his limit was hidden from him in the unconsciousness of utter exhaustion.
And thus it was that Achmet Zek, the Arab, found him.
Achmet's followers were for running a spear through the body of their hereditary enemy; but Achmet would have it otherwise.First he would question the Belgian.
It were easier to question a man first and kill him afterward, than kill him first and then question him.
So he had Lieutenant Albert Werper carried to his own tent, and there slaves administered wine and food in small quantities until at last the prisoner regained consciousness.As he opened his eyes he saw the faces of strange black men about him, and just outside the tent the figure of an Arab.Nowhere was the uniform of his soldiers to be seen.
The Arab turned and seeing the open eyes of the prisoner upon him, entered the tent.
"I am Achmet Zek," he announced."Who are you, and what were you doing in my country? Where are your soldiers?"