Part 13

A second beating of tom-toms thundered through the barrio. The bride was coming. Down an avenue made for her by hostile looking women, crept a tiny, terrified figure. It was draped in the softest Eastern stuffs; jeweled anklets and bangles tinkled merrily. A gauzy veil of wondrous workmanship swathed the figure, but through it all Piang recognized his beloved Papita. Slowly she approached the altar; fearfully she raised her eyes to the man who awaited her there. Her little feet faltered, and the priestess supported her. Papita leaned heavily against the woman. Three soft notes of a mina-bird floated over the barrio, and Papita became suddenly alive. Again the notes stole through the jungle. The bride threw back her veil.

"The unwilling maid seems to have forgot her woe," said one scornful woman to another. "Now that she is about to become our chief's first wife, she does not weep and cry to be taken home."

The priestess commenced the ceremony that was to last all night. Chants, prayers, admonitions, all, Papita responded to with renewed vigor, and her eyes furtively glanced toward a spot near the curve of the creek where a slender reed swayed unceasingly. After many hours the priestess led the way to the water and Ynoch placed Papita in her gala vinta and pushed her out into the stream. He got into another, and the two boats nosed each other while the crowd showered them with oils and perfumes. When the command came to part, each boat shot off in an opposite direction. A maiden and a bridegroom are each supposed to meditate for the last time on the advisability of the union before the final ceremony; so reads the Dyak marriage laws.

As indifferently as a queen, Papita plied her paddle, paying no heed to the unfriendly eyes and mutterings of the Dyaks; she seemed in no haste and managed her vinta with amazing skill for one so small. Only once she seemed to lose control; her vinta cut deep into the tall rushes near the bend of the creek. Had the Dyaks been less intent on exhibiting their scorn, they might have noticed that when the boat drew back from the rushes it rode deeper in the water, and the little figure labored harder at the paddle as the vinta turned the bend and passed from sight.

"Piang! is it you?"

As Papita spoke, the form lying in the bottom of the vinta slowly unfolded like a huge jack-knife. The merry eyes twinkled, the youthful, firm mouth curved at the corners, and Piang, the adventurer, smiled up at the astonished girl.

"But yes, Chiquita, did you think that Piang would suffer the outcast Sicto to kidnap his little playmate?" Piang took up the paddle and the vinta shot forward. Silently the two bent to the task, every moment increasing the distance between them and their enemies.

"Will they catch us, Piang?"

"Of course not, my Papita. Piang, the charm boy comes to rescue you." The proud head went up with arrogant superiority.

"But there are many hidden cut-offs and creeks between us and the river, Piang; Sicto will surely trap us." The terrified expression in the girl's soft eyes touched Piang's heart.

"Have no fear, Papita. Let Sicto overtake us and he will be sorry. Put your ear to the baskets."

As the girl bent over the two baskets, lying in the bottom of the vinta, a frown puckered her brow. A dull hum, like a caged wind protesting in faint whispers, rose from them. Gradually a smile broke over her face, and she laughed softly.

"Yes; Sicto will be sorry if he overtakes us," she whispered.

Through the deepening night, a roar came to the fugitives. A deep, cruel howl; tom-toms beat a ragged and violent alarm; savage war-cries rent the air, bounding back from one echo to another. Papita's hand wavered at her paddle. Piang's stroke grew swifter, surer. The outraged bridegroom had returned from his meditations to find himself brideless.

"How will they come, Piang?" Papita's voice trembled.

"Some by water, some by land. Work, Papita."

And so the deadly tropic night closed about them. The little nut-shell sped down the river, past snags, skulking crocodiles, and many unseen dangers. The jungle came far out over the water, dangling her treacherous plant-life above them, ready to drag them from the vinta: it crept beneath them, shooting up in massive trees that obstructed their passage—trees loaded down with parasites, intertwined, interlaced in hopeless confusion, each trying to crush and climb over the other in the fight for supremacy.

Where the creek empties into the Cotabato River, Piang paused; there were suspicious-looking shadows close to the bank, and he reached for his precious baskets.

"Work slowly, Papita," he whispered, and the trembling girl kept the vinta just moving. From its ominous silence, the jungle crashed into chaos.

"Le le le le iiiiiio!" shrieked the echoes.

Piang was ready.

"Le le le le iiiiiio!" he tauntingly replied.

Kneeling in the bow of the vinta, he hastily lighted a green resinous torch and stuck it upright. It gave forth the pungent, heavy perfume of the jungle pitch. Waiting until his enemies were almost upon him, Piang raised one basket above his head and opened the trap. A sudden buzz and whirl filled the air; Piang reached for the second basket and held it in the smoke of the torch, ready to open. For a few moments, nothing happened, but the enemy slackened their pace, and the war cries were silenced. Finally yells of rage and pain broke from them:

"Badjanji!" they screamed. The little insects, infuriated at the treatment they had received, fairly pounced upon the defenseless Dyaks. No jungle pest is so dreaded as the enraged honey-bee. Its envenomed stings are poisonous, deadly, and often cause more painful wounds than bolos. The men fought desperately. Tauntingly Piang laughed, swiftly he and Papita paddled, and the smoke from the torch enveloped them in its protecting waves. Coming abreast of the war-prau, Piang loosed the other basket of bees.

On sped the vinta, and ever nearer came the great estuary that gave upon the Celebes Sea. The sounds of the sufferers grew fainter, and finally Papita and Piang were again alone in the great night.

"They will return and assemble the war fleet, Papita; they will pursue us into the ocean. If the water is rough, we cannot cross the bay to Parang-Parang in this vinta. We must hide near the coast and make our way homeward on foot."

Morning fairly burst upon them. Twilight in the tropics is a name only, for the sun rises and disappears abruptly, and it is day or night in a few moments. The early light showed the ocean in the distance, and at the same moment sounds behind made Piang listen anxiously.

"They are coming, Papita; we must hide."

As Piang headed for the bank, he noticed a thin stream of smoke trembling above Bongao. He paused and trained his eye on the blur. Suddenly he dug his paddle into the water.

"Papita, quick! The Sabah is coming!"

Again the vinta shot forward, down through the shifting, treacherous delta, out into the ocean. Louder grew the beating of paddles against the Dyak war-praus, and Piang could hear the war chant. He knew that Sicto cared little for ships; he had evaded too many of them. Only the Sabah, Sicto feared, but he would probably take a chance on this being the Chino mail boat or a Spanish tramp. That the Dyaks would take the chance and follow, Piang was sure.

The sea was choppy and fretful. The little bride boat danced and careened about recklessly. Between the Sabah and Piang lay Bongao, and straight for Bongao he headed, skilfully keeping the vinta steady. A white mist rose, as if to hide the vinta from the pursuers, but when the fleet reached the river's mouth a yell announced that they had been discovered. The race was for life, for more than life, and the boy seemed possessed of a supernatural strength. Nearer came the smoke, and finally around the point of Bongao, burst the little gunboat. At first the Dyaks did not heed the stranger, so used were they to hurling contempt at island visitors, but when in answer to Papita's signal, as she stood up waving her disheveled wedding veil, there came a shrill whistle, they paused in dismay.

In a very short time Papita and Piang were raised over the side of the Sabah, and General Beech and Governor Findy were questioning them.

"You say that Dato Ynoch is pursuing you?"

"Yes, yes, that is him in the first prau," excitedly replied Piang.

"Well, Piang, it is Ynoch that brings the Sabah here to-day. We thank you, my boy, for tempting him into the open."

When the Moro boy disclosed Ynoch's identity, a grim smile settled over Governor Findy's face.

"Man the guns, Captain!" commanded General Beech in his dignified, quiet way.

The Dyaks were scattering in the wildest confusion, making their way back to the river with all speed, but the Sabah relentlessly pursued. A sudden darkening shadow startled the captain of the Sabah, and he pointed toward the mountains.

"Something queer hatchin' over there, General."

A dense mist hid the hills; only old Ganassi Peak stood out, dignified and stern. Like a dirty piece of canvas, one cloud balanced itself on Ganassi's shoulder and rapidly spread itself around the peak. It seemed to sap the very life from Ganassi, as it enveloped it in a chilling embrace. Slowly the cloud loosed its hold and bounced along on the lower hills. In its center it seemed to bear a restless, struggling mass, and the passengers on the Sabah watched it nervously. Strange things happen very suddenly in the sunny Celebes. Fascinated, they watched the odd cloud lumbering toward them, dipping and lifting its burden. It sailed over the mountains, flitted past the jungle and reached the ocean, where it hovered and waved as if undecided which way to go. At times, like canvas, it would belly down in the middle, almost burst, right itself, and come sailing on. Again and again the heavy contents pulled the cloud to earth, but valiantly struggling with its burden, it resisted. The cloud brought with it a death-like mist, damp and choking, and the sunshine was abruptly put out. The thing hesitated over the Sabah, dipping and sucking itself back, as if made of elastic; it wandered about aimlessly and paused over the fleeing Dyaks. Finally as if discouraged and strained beyond its endurance, it gave up.

With shrieks and cries the Dyaks watched it. Tons and tons of water burst from the cloud, striking the sea with a hiss that sent the spray high in the air.

"Waterspout!" yelled the captain and ordered the Sabah's engines stopped. In horror they beheld the crazy column careen about, obeying its master, the capricious wind, and following any stray current; around and around the spiral, grinding mass of water veered and circled aimlessly. It danced and capered about the ocean like some malignant monster loosed from torment, and finally, as if by direct intent, started for the river's mouth. The Dyaks saw it coming, and in their puny efforts to escape, looked like ants before an elephant. The five streams, flowing through the delta of the Cotabato River, seemed to draw the vicious waterspout toward them, and on it went, directly in the wake of the doomed Dyaks. Tensely the Sabah's passengers followed the course of the spout. The whirling Nemesis descended upon the pirates; their cries of anguish came faintly through the roar and hiss of water; crude Dyak prayers, shrieked by terrified worshipers, smote upon their ears, and finally, like a whirlwind, the waterspout pounced upon its victims. It caught at them with a thousand arms; it tossed them up, bore them down, tore them from the light eggshell praus, crushing them to bits.

Through the entire fleet stalked the monster, dealing out death and destruction to all, and, when there remained naught to vent its wrath upon, like an insatiate giant, it turned toward the jungle. Straight up the river it marched, rooting up trees, tearing down banks, and gradually vanished in the distance, leaving wreckage and disaster in its path.

Silenced by the terrible spectacle, the Americans seemed to huddle closer together for protection, or comfort. But two figures stood out alone on the Sabah's deck.

Papita's eyes were fastened on Piang, on the charm that dangled from his necklace of crocodile teeth; Piang was lost in Ganassi Peak. His eyes were filled with a divine awe as he silently faced his beloved peak, where dwelt his wonder man, the Hermit Ganassi. Every element of his being, his very attitude, proclaimed that his spirit was pouring out a thanksgiving to his patron, whose prayers to Allah, the Merciful, had sent the waterspout to destroy his enemies. The Christians, boasting a greater God, were put to shame by this artless exhibition of a faith that they could never feel, and their eyes were filled with admiration as they looked upon this Moro boy, transfigured in his faith, as he muttered softly:

"There is no God but Allah!"

THE END

NOTES

Bichara means meeting and corresponds to the East Indian word, durbar.