CHAPTER XI.

When, a quarter of an hour previously, the first elephant had been seen to fall, and the second, bent on vengeance, had continued his work of uprooting the tree, MM. Périères and de Morin had imperatively ordered their companions to take to flight, and scatter themselves in the forest or the clearing. The Arab interpreter and the Dinka soldiers obeyed him; as for Joseph, he had anticipated his master's orders. M. Delange was desirous of remaining with his friends, but he had been made to understand that, as he was rather a bad shot, his rifle would be of more use in the hands of M. Périères or M. de Morin. In addition to this, if he refused to take himself off. Miss Beatrice Poles, who for the time being appeared inclined to exhibit a marked preference for him, would be loth to leave him, and it was necessary to get rid of her. This coquettish Englishwoman had, in order to make a startling impression on the colour-loving blacks, for some days past endued herself in a skirt of brilliant red, to which, by way of contrast, she had added the bluest of blue veils, and as the African elephant, like the bull of Spain, is driven wild with rage by garments of too vivid a hue, M. Delange, at the earnest request of his friends, and for the common safety, including that of the intrepid Miss Poles herself, withdrew with her to a convenient distance.

Madame de Guéran alone declined positively to seek safety in flight, and expressed her determination to share the fate of MM. de Morin and Périères. She maintained that she had no right to leave them in the hour of danger, and she affected to believe, with some show of reason, that they would defend themselves all the better if they had at the same time to protect her.

Consequently Madame de Guéran and her two friends, alone, were exposed to the elephant's attack. Notwithstanding his numerous wounds, the animal came impetuously on, and his strength did not appear to be failing him. As for his rage, it knew no bounds.

MM. de Morin and Périères, as we have already said, had fired away their last cartridge, and all they had to do now, as the time for flight was past and gone, was to await the onslaught of the elephant, as calmly as they could, trusting to their hunting knives to rid them of their assailant.

Laura de Guéran, whom they had placed between them, stood motionless and calm, her mouth half open, and her eyes fixed firmly on the advancing foe. She was marvellously lovely at that moment, and her two champions, in spite of the fact that death was staring them in the face, could not help looking at her with admiration. They seemed as if they were enjoying the prospect of dying by the side of her they loved, hand in hand, their eyes fixed on her's, joined to her in death.

The elephant rushed straight on, without wavering or deviating from his course, and already his three victims were flecked with the blood which he tossed into the air with his trunk, and which fell like rain drops in front of him. He no longer appeared to their affrighted eyes to belong to this world. He was some nameless monster, some supernatural mammoth, against whom mortals could not contend.

Suddenly the ground shook beneath them, as if struck by an enormous mass of rock which, loosened from a neighbouring mountain, had rolled impetuously down and buried itself at their feet.

The elephant, weakened by loss of blood, mortally wounded by the last shots fired at him, and, for some moments past, sustained merely by his angry rage, had fallen prone to the ground, at the very instant when his vengeance was on the point of being satisfied. For a moment Madame de Guéran, M. Périères, and M. de Morin remained almost in a state of stupefaction. Death had been so near to them that they doubted the fact of their own existence. It seemed impossible that they could have been saved so miraculously, and yet they were alive. And there, too, lay their enemy, so formidable, not a moment since, but now powerless, motionless, dead. His screams no longer filled the air, his tread no longer shook the ground, his life-blood was running in streams on the ground, and already formed an ensanguined pool around the Europeans.

And now, from all sides, there was a general rush to rejoin them and wish them joy of their deliverance, Miss Poles and M. Delange being the first to arrive. Notwithstanding the entreaties of MM. de Morin and Périères, they had not gone far away, but had halted in a neighbouring thicket, ready to die in their turn, if the elephant had sacrificed his first victims.

The fears she had entertained for her own safety and that of her companions, and her _tête-à-tête_ with M. Delange, at a time when their hearts were stirred with no ordinary emotion, had, as it were, softened Miss Poles. Her step was not so determined, her long neck had lost its stiffness, and her head was inclined towards the Doctor, ready to find a resting-place on his shoulder. Her very look, toned down by her blue spectacles, had in it somewhat of languor and indecision, as if she were regretting that she had once more returned to earth, instead of having taken to herself wings to fly with M. Delange to realms above.

The hunting party was once more complete, with the sole exception of Joseph, who had not answered to the summons to reassemble. Where had he hidden himself? That was a question which nobody could answer. He could not have taken refuge in the depths of the forest; he was too great a coward for that. Had he sought an asylum in some tree? That hypothesis was scouted at once, for his corpulence, and his absolute incapacity for anything approaching to agility, put any such gymnastic exercises out of the question.

For ten minutes he was shouted for in all directions, and real fears for his safety were making themselves felt, when he appeared, looking, for all the world, as if he were a victim to St. Vitus's dance, practising the most extraordinary contortions, raising his arms, only to let them fall again, and beating his shoulders, his chest, his legs, and even his too conspicuous stomach. Every now and then he gave himself a violent shake, just as a dog does when he comes out of the water. There was, nevertheless, no sign of damp about him; his white blouse looked perfectly dry; only it was dotted over with reddish blotches, which moved about and seemed alive. Not content with this gymnastic frenzy, he uttered a series of agonizing cries, not quite so terrible as those of the elephants, but far more shrill and discordant.

A general rush was made towards him, and it was then seen that he was being eaten alive by an army of red ants, the plague of Africa. They were swarming all over him, in knots or clusters, finding their way even into his beard and hair. They settled on his face, in his ears, crept down his neck and under his clothes, and, not satisfied with mere curiosity, were biting him viciously, tearing his flesh, and burying themselves in his skin.

When, an hour previously, he had run away, he did not know what direction to take. He was afraid of the forest because it was so dark, he dreaded the thickets on account of the thorns, and he shirked the long grass as not offering a refuge sufficiently sure. He was running here and there, having completely lost his head, when he caught sight of a hillock, about a yard high and three yards broad, near a tree. Towards this he plunged, head downwards, thinking, like the ostrich, that if he hid his head nobody would see him. Moreover, he thought he would be completely concealed behind the hillock, but, alas! as soon as he set foot on it it gave way, as if it were liquid, and in an instant Joseph disappeared from view.

He had, unfortunately, stumbled on one of those extensive ant hills which abound in the forests, in the midst of the high grass and always at the foot of a tree. All those who have travelled in equatorial Africa complain of these ants, of which there are some twenty species. Livingstone says that they do not know what fear is, and that they attack all animals, large and small, with equal fury. The Marquis de Compiégne, who died recently at Cairo, calls them _bashikouais_, and says that their nippers are like the hooks used in gudgeon fishing, and that they bite so viciously that, as a rule, their bodies alone can be pulled away; their heads remain in the wound.

Happily for Joseph the majority of the blacks are very partial to these termites. They fry or boil them, mixing them with grains of durra or eleusine, and eat them out of the palms of their hands with the greatest gusto. Consequently, the natives seized on Joseph with the double object of ridding him of his enemies and appeasing their own appetites. They carried their courtesy so far as to drag M. de Morin's valet behind a tree and strip him, first of all shaking out his clothes, and then reaping a second harvest from off his body. The spoil was then collected in a basket and reserved for the evening meal.

But night was coming on apace. It was absolutely necessary to gain the edge of the forest with all speed and seek a resting place for the night, and so the Europeans, preceded by their escort, set out on their return.