"Not in the least. I was born in England of a good family, and received a decent education from my father, who was a scholar, a gentleman, and something of a saint. For the rest I am nobody and nothing in particular, only a hunter with some skill at his trade, an observer, like you, of mankind in the rough, and one cursed with a curiosity and a desire to learn new things which, in the end, will no doubt put a stop to all my foolishness."
"Oh no, it won't," he answered cheerfully, "that is, not until the time appointed. I'll cast your horoscope for you, if you like—my father taught me the trick—and tell you when it will happen."
"No, you won't," I answered firmly.
At this moment Hans arrived with the coffee and informed me that Kaneke was anxious that we should march at sunrise, as here we were in danger.
Then followed anxious consultations. Arkle had a coat, or rather a Norfolk jacket, but no shirt; and one of my spares, a flannel garment that had cost me fifteen shillings at Durban and had never been used, must be provided for him. Luckily it was over–size, so he managed to drag it on to his great frame. Then a hat must be found, and so forth. Lastly it was necessary to provide him with one of the spare Winchester rifles and some cartridges.
Even before we were ready Kaneke arrived, not a little agitated, as I could see, and prayed us to hasten.
"Where to, Kaneke?" I asked.
"Up the side of the mountain and over its lip, Lord, that we may take shelter among my people the Dabanda. For be sure that after what happened yesterday, the Abanda will kill us if they can. If this white wanderer whom your servants call Red–Bull cannot march, he must be left behind."
Here Arkle, who it seemed understood and could speak Arabic perfectly, looked Kaneke up and down and replied that this was unnecessary, as he believed that he could get along.
So, having swallowed some food, presently off we went, guided by Kaneke up the steep mountain side.
"Did you call that man, Kaneke?" Arkle inquired when that worthy was out of earshot.
"Yes," I answered; "but why do you ask?"
"Oh, only because of late I have heard a good deal of a person named Kaneke from a native I know. But perhaps there are two Kanekes. The one he spoke of was a young fellow who committed a great crime."
Then rather abruptly he changed the subject, leaving me wondering.
Chapter XI
Arkle's Story
At first Arkle walked rather lamely, being troubled with stiffness and his sore heel, but soon these wore off for the time, and in the fresh air of the morning his vigour returned to him. Certainly he was a splendid–looking man, I reflected, as I marched at his side, a perfect specimen of the finest stamp of the Anglo–Saxon race.
While we went he continued his story.
"You were quite right in supposing that there were other reasons which induced me to come to Africa besides those I mentioned. I will tell them to you, if you care to hear them, for I may as well put my cards on the table. If not, please say so, for I do not wish to bore anybody with my affairs."
I replied that nothing would please me better, for to tell the truth my curiosity was much excited.
"Here goes, then," he said, "though I expect that the tale won't raise your opinion of me and my intelligence. As I have said, I am what is called a man with prospects or rather I was, for these seem far enough off today, and as such, having plenty of money to spend, I was exposed to many temptations. Mr. Quatermain, I cannot pretend that these were always resisted. I will pass over my follies, of which I am ashamed, with the remark that they were such as are common to impetuous young men.
"In short, I lived fast, so fast that my uncle and connections—my mother, by the way, died when I was young—being nonconformist of that puritanical stamp which often combines piety with a continual thirst for worldly advancement, were quite properly scandalized, and remonstrated. They said that I must change my mode of life, and as a first step, get married. This my uncle desired above all things, for there was no other heir, and as he often used to remark in a solemn voice, life is uncertain.
"At length I gave way and became engaged to a lady very well born indeed and very handsome, but without means, which, as I would have plenty, did not matter. To be honest, I did not greatly care for this lady, nor did she care for me, being, as I discovered afterwards, in love with somebody else. In fact the marriage would have been one of mutual convenience, nothing more. Now I am going to make you laugh.
"Although no one knew it and I scarcely expect you to believe it, I, a man who, as I have said, could and did plunge into dissipations, have another side to my nature. At times, Mr. Quatermain, I am a dreamer and what is called a mystic. I suppose I inherited it from my father, at any rate there it is."
"There is nothing wonderful in that," I remarked; "the old story of the flesh and the spirit, nothing more."
"Perhaps. At least I put faith in queer and unprovable things, for instance in what are called 'soul affinities', and even in the theory that we have lived before. Would you believe that the great lump of British flesh and blood which you see before you developed a 'soul affinity', if that is the right term, with someone I had never met?"
I looked at him doubtfully, reflecting that the hardships through which he had passed had probably touched his brain. He read my mind, for he went on:
"Sounds as though I were a bit cracked, doesn't it? So I thought myself, and should still think, were it not for the fact that I have found this affinity in Africa."
"Where?" I asked lightly. "At Lake Mone?"
"Yes," he replied, "at Lake Mone, where I always expected that I should find her."
I gasped, and felt as though I should like to sit down, which, owing to our hurry, was impossible. Evidently the poor man was rather mad.
"As I have begun it I had better go on with my story, taking things as they happened," he continued in a matter–of–fact voice. "I tell you that in the midst of my wild and rather unedifying career I began to be haunted by visions which came upon me at night."
"Dreams?" I suggested.
"No, always when I was awake and looking at the stars, and generally when I was in the open air. The first, I remember, developed in Trafalgar Square at three in the morning after I had been to a dance."
"The wine is not always very good at those dances, I have been told, or if it is, sometimes one drinks too much of it," I suggested again.
"Quite true, but as it happened this one was given by a relative of mine who is a strict teetotaller and never allows anything spirituous in her house. I had to go to meet my fiancée; it was a terrible affair. When it was over I went for a walk and came to Trafalgar Square, which at that hour was very quiet and lonely. There I stood staring at the Nelson Column, or rather at the stars above it, for it was frosty and they were beautiful that night. Then the thing came. I saw a desolate sheet of water lit up by the moon, an eerie kind of a place. Presently a form, that of a woman draped in white, appeared gliding over the water towards me, floating, not walking. It reached the shore and advanced to where I stood, and I saw that this woman was young and very beautiful, with large, tender eyes.
"She stopped opposite to me, considering me, and a change came over her face as though after long search she had found that which she sought. Looking at her, I too seemed to have found that which I sought. She held out her arms, she spoke to me; distinctly I heard her words, not with my ears but through some inner sense. What is more, I understood one or two of them, though they were in Arabic.
"I have always had a taste for studying out–of–the–way subjects, and it happened that in my medical reading I had become interested in the works of some of the old Arabian physicians, and in order to understand them had found it necessary to master something of the language in which they were written. This was some years before, and I had forgotten most of what I had learned, but not everything. So it came about that I caught the meaning of a sentence here and there—such as these: