Author: Henryk Sienkiewicz
Category: Nonfiction
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for Nell! For I could not free herotherwise; but if it is a sin, punish me, but let her regain herhealth."
On the way he met Kali, who had gone to see whether the wicked Mzimuate the meat offered to him the previous night. The young negro, lovingthe little "bibi," prayed also for her, but he prayed in an entirelydifferent fashion. He particularly told the wicked Mzimu that if the"bibi" recovered her health he would bring him a piece of meat everyday, but if she died, though he feared him and though he mightafterwards perish, he would first so flay his hide that the wickedMzimu would remember it for ages. He felt greatly encouraged when themeat deposited the previous night disappeared. It might indeed havebeen carried away by some jackal, but the Mzimu might assume the shapeof a jackal.
Kali informed Stas of this propitious incident; the latter, however,stared at him as if he did not understand him at all and went onfurther. Passing a clump of shrubs in which he did not find anyguinea-fowl, he drew nearer the river. Its banks were overgrown withtall trees from which were suspended like long stockings the nests oftitmice, beautiful little yellow birds with black wings, and alsowasps' nests resembling big roses, but colored like grayblotting-paper. In one place the river formed an expansion a few scorepaces wide, overgrown in part by papyrus. On this expansion aquaticbirds always swarmed. There were storks just like our European storks,and storks with thick bills ending with a hook, and birds black asvelvet, with legs red as blood, and flamingoes and ibises, and whitespoon-bills with bills like spoons, and cranes with crowns on theirheads, and a multitude of curlews, variegated and gray as mice, flyingquickly back and forth as if they were tiny sylvan sprites on long,thin, snipe-like legs.
Stas killed two large ducks, beautiful, cinnamon colored, and treadingupon dead butterflies, of which thousands strewed the bank, he firstlooked around carefully to see whether there were any crocodiles in theshallows, after which he waded into the water and lifted his quarry.The shots had dispersed the birds; there remained only two marabous,standing between ten and twenty paces away and plunged in reverie. Theywere like two old men with bald heads pressed between the shoulders.They did not move at all. The boy gazed for a while at the loathsomefleshy pouches hanging from their breasts, and afterwards, observingthat the wasps were beginning to circle around him more and morefrequently, he returned to the camping place.
Nell still slept; so handing the ducks to Mea, he flung himself upon asaddle-cloth and fell into a sound sleep. They did not wake until theafternoon--he first and Nell later. The little girl felt somewhatstronger and the strong broth revived her strength still more; she roseand left the tree, desiring to look at the King and at the sun.
But only now in the daylight could be seen what havoc that one night'sfever had wrought in her. Her complexion was yellow and transparent;her lips were black; there were circles furrowed under her eyes, andher face was as though it had aged. Even the pupils of her eyesappeared paler than usual. It appeared also, despite her assurances toStas that she felt quite strong and notwithstanding the large cup ofbroth which she drank immediately after awakening, that she couldbarely reach the ravine unaided. Stas thought with despair of thesecond attack and that he had neither medicine nor any remedy by whichhe could prevent it.
In the meantime the rain poured a dozen or more times a day, increasingthe humidity of the air.
X
Days of suspense, heavy and full of fear, began. The second attack didnot come until a week after and was not so strong as the first, butafter it Nell felt still weaker. She wasted and grew so thin that sheno longer was a little girl, but the shadow of a little girl. The flameof her life flickered so faintly that it appeared sufficient to blow atit to extinguish it. Stas understood that death did not have to waitfor a third attack to take her and he expected it any day or any hour.
He himself became emaciated and black, for misfortune exceeded hisstrength and his reason. So, gazing on her waxen countenance, he saidto himself each day: "For this I guarded her like the eye in the head;in order to bury her here in the jungle." And he did not understand whyit should be so. At times he reproached himself that he had not guardedher enough, that he had not been sufficiently kind to her, and at suchmoments such sorrow seized his heart that he wanted to gnaw his ownfingers. Clearly there was too much of woe.
And Nell now slept almost continuously and it may be that this kept heralive. Stas woke her a few times a day to give her nourishment. Then,as often as it did not rain, she begged him to carry her into the openair for now she could not stand on her own feet. It happened, moreover,that she fell asleep in his arms. She knew now that she was very sickand might at any moment die. In moments of greater animation she spokeof this to Stas, and always with tears, for she feared death.
Once she said: "I shall not now return to papa, but tell him that I wasvery, very sorry--and beg him to come to me."
"You will return," Stas answered.
And he could not say anything more as he wanted to wail.
And Nell continued in a scarcely audible, dreamy voice:
"And papa will come and you will come sometime, will you not?"
At this thought a smile brightened the little wan face, but after awhile she said in a still lower tone:
"But I am so sorry!"
Saying this she rested her little head upon his shoulder and began toweep. He mastered his pain, pressed her to his bosom, and replied withanimation:
"Nell, I will not return without you--and I do not at all know what Iwould do in this world without you."
Silence followed, during which Nell again fell asleep.
Stas carried her to the tree, but he had barely gone outside when fromthe summit of the promontory Kali came running and waving his hands; hebegan to shout, with an agitated and frightened face:
"Great master! Great master!"
"What do you want?" Stas asked.
And the negro, stretching out his hand and pointing to the south, said:
"Smoke!"
Stas shaded his eyes with his palm and straining his sight in thedirection indicated really saw in the ruddy luster of the sun, whichnow stood low, a streak of smoke rising far in the jungle, amid the topof two still more distant hills which were quite high.
Kali trembled all over, for he well remembered his horrible slaverywith the dervishes; he was certain that this was their camping place.To Stas, also, it seemed that this could not be any one else thanSmain, and at first he too became terribly frightened. Only this waswanting! Besides Nell's fatal disease, the dervishes! And againslavery, and again a return to Fashoda or to Khartum, under the hand ofthe Mahdi or the lash of Abdullahi. If they caught them Nell would dieat once, while he would remain a slave the rest of the days of hislife; and if he did escape of what use was liberty to him without Nell?How could he look into the eyes of his father or Mr. Rawlinson, if thedervishes after her death should fling her to the hyenas. He himselfwould not even be able to say where her grave was.
Such thoughts flitted through his head like lightning. Suddenly he feltan insurmountable desire to look at Nell, and directed his stepstowards the tree. On the way he instructed Kali to extinguish the fireand not to dare to light it during the night, after which he enteredthe tree.
Nell was not sleeping and felt better. She at once communicated thisnews to Stas. Saba lay close to her and warmed her with his huge body,while she stroked his head lightly, smiling when he caught with hisjaws the subtile dust of the decayed wood floating in the streak oflight which the last rays of the setting sun formed in the tree. Sheapparently was in a better frame of mind, as after a while sheaddressed Stas with quite a lively mien.
"And perhaps I may not die."
"You surely will not die," Stas replied; "since after the second attackyou feel stronger, the third will not come at all."
But she began to blink with her eyelids as if she were meditating oversomething and said:
"If I had bitter powders like that which made me feel so well after thenight with the lions--do you remember?--then I would not think t
heleast bit of dying not even so much!"
And she indicated upon her little finger just how little in that caseshe would be prepared to die.
"Ah!" Stas declared, "I do not know what I would not give for a pinchof quinine."
And he thought that if he had enough of it, he would at once treat Nellwith two powders, even, and then he would wrap her in plaids, seat herbefore him on a horse, and start immediately in a direction opposite tothe one in which the camp of the dervishes was located.
In the meantime the sun set and the jungle was suddenly plunged indarkness.
The little girl chattered yet for half an hour, after which she fellasleep and Stas meditated further about the dervishes and quinine. Hisdistressed but resourceful mind began to labor and form plans, each onebolder and more audacious than the other. First he began to ponder overwhether that smoke in the southern direction necessarily came fromSmain's camp. It might