The Fugitives: The Tyrant Queen of Madagascar by R. M. Ballantyne (top books to read txt) 📖

been continued, in ordinary circumstances, until the passers-by were beyond the range of hearing; but the appearance of the Englishmen induced the brown old gentleman on this occasion to beg the travellers to stop and accept his hospitality. This they declined to do, with many expressions of regret, on the ground that their business at the capital was urgent.

“It would have gratified me much,” said the old gentleman, “to have entertained you. But you are all well, I hope?”

“Yes, we are very well,” answered Laihova; “and how do you feel?”

“I feel as well as possible. And is it well with you?”

“It is well with us. But it does not seem to be well with the lady,” returned Laihova, glancing at the uncomfortable female with her head tied up.

“No, it is not well with her. She has toothache on the north side of her head. Farewell,” said the brown old gentleman, re-squatting on the fijerèna, as the travellers moved on; “may you live,” he shouted after them, when nearly out of ear-shot, “and reach old age.”

Great was the amusement of our travellers at all this, especially when Ravonino explained about the toothache. “You must know,” he said, “that almost all the houses in the central provinces of the island are built with their length running north and south, or nearly so, and the people use the points of the compass in describing the position of things. Thus, if they tell a slave to look for a thing in the house, they will say, Look in the north, south, east, or west corner, or side; and they apply this rule to the person also. I once heard the member of a mission from England told by his host that some rice was sticking to his moustache. The missionary wiped the wrong side. ‘No,’ said the host, ‘it is on the southern side of your moustache.’”

“Do you know,” said Mark Breezy, “that is not so strange to me as you might suppose; for I was once told by a friend who lived in the Scottish Highlands, that an old woman there actually said to her that she had toothache on the east side of her head!”

Further comment on this point was arrested by their coming suddenly in sight of the house where the guide’s friend dwelt.

“You had better stay here at the edge of this wood, while I go forward alone,” said the guide; “because although the man is kind, and has always professed to be my friend, I am not quite sure of him. It is well to be cautious. If I wave my hand to you, come up to the house, all will be well. If things don’t seem favourable I will return to you—but keep close; don’t show yourselves needlessly. You see, my friend is an officer of the palace. If friendly he can be very useful to us, if unfriendly he can be dangerous.”

“But why run risk by going near him at all?” asked Mark.

“We must run risk when life and death are in the balance,” replied the guide, shortly.

Concealed by the bushes, the travellers watched their companion as he went up to the house. Before he reached it a man opened the door and stepped out. Suddenly this man seemed to burst into a furious passion. He grasped Ravonino by the throat, almost threw him on his back, and, seizing a stick, began to belabour him violently, while two other men appeared at the door of the house, and, from their inordinate laughter, seemed fully to enjoy the scene.

“Hi!” exclaimed Ebony in shrill falsetto, as he jumped up in blazing wrath, intending to rush to the rescue, but Hockins grasped his woolly head and pulled him back.

“Obey orders, you black grampus! D’ee think he’s a babby as can’t take care of himself? Didn’t he tell us to keep close?”

Great as had been the surprise of the watchers at this sudden and unprovoked assault, it was as nothing compared with their astonishment when they saw their guide fairly turn tail and run towards them, closely followed by the furious man, who continued to thrash him all the time.

As Ravonino drew near, the angry man seemed to have exhausted himself, for he fell behind, and finally stopped. The guide ran on at full speed until he reached the wood, but did not even then slacken his speed. As he ran past his friends, however, he exclaimed in a sharp, stern voice—

“Follow me!”

Laihova obeyed with the unquestioning readiness of a faithful hound. The others followed suit with the open eyes of perplexity and amazement!

Reaching a sequestered dell in a few minutes, Ravonino suddenly stopped and turned round with a calm air of satisfaction.

“Well, dis am de most awrful supprise I’se had since my mudder give me my fust wollopin’.”

The expression on the negro’s face rendered the remark needless.

“It was well done,” said the guide, seating himself on the trunk of a fallen tree.

“A’most too well done!” returned Hockins, with a touch of sarcasm.

“Do you know,” continued the guide gravely, “I’ve had a narrow escape? The two men you saw laughing at the door are the very men we have been trying to avoid,—the Queen’s spies,—whom I have long known, and who would certainly have discovered me in spite of my shaved and stained face if we had come to talk to each other in the same room. Luckily my friend is smart as well as true. He knew my voice at once. To have talked with me, or warned me, or let me enter his house, would have been fatal. His only resource lay in thrashing me off his premises—as you have seen. How he will explain matters to the spies I know not, but I can trust him for that.”

“Das most awrful clebber!” exclaimed Ebony, his every feature broadening with delight at the success of the ruse.

“But what are we to do now?” asked Mark.

“Wait till he comes here. He told me to wait.”

“What! Told you?”

“Ay—you don’t suppose he let his tongue lie idle while he was using his stick. Of course I was myself taken aback at first when he seized me by the throat, but two or three muttered words in the midst of his anger opened my eyes, and I ran at once. All the way as he ran after and belaboured me he was giving me important information in furious tones! The spies are only staying with him for a short rest. When they are gone he will come and find us here.”

“He’s a born actor,” said Hockins.

“True—and he acted some of his blows heavier than I could have wished, in his anxiety to impress his information on me!” said the guide.

“What is his name?” asked Mark.

“Fisatra. He is named after a great chief who lived in this district not long ago.—But here he comes to speak for himself.”

At that moment a tall, fine-looking man, of very dark complexion, and clad in the ample folds of a beautiful lamba, approached them. His whole countenance was wrinkled with the lines of fun, and his brilliant teeth glistened as he smilingly held out his hand to the Englishmen, and asked them to accept his hospitality.

As they passed into the house they saw two slave-girls pounding rice in a large wooden mortar, with two enormous wooden pestles, while the savoury steam that arose from some invisible kitchen served to put a finer edge on their already sharpened appetites.

When the mats were spread, and the feast was being enjoyed, Ravonino asked the host how he had got rid of the spies, and how he managed to explain his conduct without raising their suspicions.

“Nothing easier,” said Fisatra, while his broad shoulders heaved with an inward chuckle. “You know that I used to be feared in the palace in days gone bye because of my violent nature, and the way in which I used to knock about the furniture and make the household slaves—sometimes the household troops—scurry when I was in a rage. Yet I’m sure you know very well, (he looked sheepishly innocent here), that I never was an angry man—at least not a cruel one. But that’s all changed. I am one of your set now, though no one suspects it. Since I met Mr Ellis—”

“Is Mr Ellis here just now?” interrupted Ravonino, anxiously.

“Not now,” answered Fisatra; “he departed some weeks ago, but I believe has not yet left the coast. And now there is no check on the Queen’s violence. Well, as I was about to say, I took to the old habit in pretence, as you have seen, and when I returned from thrashing you I went storming through the house, kicking about the pots and pans, and foaming at the mouth in such a way that I not only stopped the spies laughing, but put them in fear of their lives.”

Again the fun-wrinkles corrugated the visage of Fisatra, and his mighty shoulders heaved with internal explosions.

“After I had calmed down a bit,” he continued, “the spies ventured to ask timidly if that was a great enemy that I had beaten. This set me into, a worse passion than ever. ‘Enemy?’ I shouted ‘no—no—not an enemy—he—he’s a—a—’ but I got no further than that, for I didn’t know what to say, and I wouldn’t lie, so I took to foaming and stamping again! At last I said, ‘Don’t speak to me about him—excuse me, my friends; I can’t stand it—and—and the rice is nearly ready. You must be hungry!’ I said this with a look and tone as if another fit was coming on. They excused themselves. ‘No,’ they said, ‘we are not hungry, and we have yet far to go this day before the sun descends. The Queen’s orders will not wait.’ And off they went, glad to get out of my way. Truly, if it is sinful to get in a rage, it is useful sometimes to act it! So now, my friends, eat—eat—while you have the chance, and fear not the return of the spies!”

“Tell me,” said the guide, anxiously, “are you sure that Rafaravavy is still safe?”

“She is still safe—but no one knows how long that may be, for she is fearless, and utters the forbidden prayers even in the presence of the Queen. If it had not been for the love that Ranavalona bears her, she would have been tossed from the ‘rock of hurling’ long ago.”

“Faithful, even unto death,” said the guide, with a look and tone in which pathos and triumph were strangely blended.

“She has not yet been tried to that extent, but if she is, God will enable her to stand firm,” said Fisatra, whose grave child-like sincerity, when talking of religious subjects, was not less impulsively honest and natural than were the outbursts of his fun when another humour stirred his feelings.

The “rock” to which he alluded was a frightful precipice at one side of the city from which criminals were usually hurled—a spot which is hallowed by the blood of many Christian martyrs who perished there during the long reign of that tyrant queen Ranavalona.

“Has then the queen forbidden the Christians to pray?” asked Ravonino.

“Have you not heard?—but of course you have not, being an outlaw and having only just returned. Recently a very bad fit has come over the Queen. You know that for some years past there have been a few French people living in Antananarivo, who by their knowledge and skill in mechanics and mercantile matters have made themselves useful to our government. These men lately tried to dethrone the Queen, on pretence of delivering the country from her cruelties, and establishing a ‘French Protectorate.’ They gained over some of our chief men, collected in one of their houses a large quantity of weapons and ammunition, and had even fixed the night when the palace was to be invaded, the Queen seized, and the Protectorate set up. Fortunately the plot came to my knowledge. I say fortunately, because a bad queen is better than a