PAGE 10
The Penalty
by
He discovered that he was lying in what appeared to be a huge amphitheatre of sand, surrounded by high cliffs, ragged and barren, and strewn with boulders. Two great fires burned at several yards’ distance, and about these, a number of savages were congregated. From somewhere behind came the trickle of water, and the sound goaded him to something that was very nearly approaching madness. He dragged himself up on to his knees. His thirst was suddenly unendurable.
But the next instant he was flat on his face in the sand, struck down by a blow on the back of the neck that momentarily stunned him. For a while he lay prone, gritting the sand in his teeth; then again with the strength of frenzy he struggled upwards.
He had a glimpse of his guard standing over him, and recognized the savage who had nearly strangled him, before a second crashing blow brought him down. He lay still then, overwhelmed in darkness for a long, long time.
He scarcely knew when he was lifted at last and borne forward into the great circle of light cast by one of the fires. He felt the glare upon his eyeballs, but it conveyed nothing to him. Over by the farther fire some festivity seemed to be in progress. He had a vague vision of leaping, naked bodies, and the flash of knives. There was a good deal of shouting also, and now and then a nightmare shriek. And then came the torment of the fire, great heat enveloping him, thirst that was anguish.
He turned upon his captors, but his mouth was too dry for speech. He could only glare dumbly into their evil faces, and they glared back at him in fiendish triumph. Nearer to the red glow they came, nearer yet. He could hear the crackle of the licking flames. They danced giddily before his eyes.
Suddenly the arms that bore him swung back. He knew instinctively that they were preparing to hurl him into the heart of the fire, and the instinct of self-preservation rushed upon him, stabbing him to vivid consciousness. With a gigantic effort he writhed himself free from their hold.
He fell headlong, but the strength of madness had entered into him. He fought like a man possessed, straining at his bonds till they cracked and burst, forcing from his parched throat sounds which in saner moments he would not have recognized as human, struggling, tearing, raging, in furious self-defence.
He was hopelessly outmatched. The odds were such as no man in his senses could have hoped to combat with anything approaching success. Almost before his bonds began to loosen, his enemies were upon him again. They hoisted him up, fighting like a maniac. They tightened his bonds unconcernedly, and prepared for a second attempt.
But, before it could be made, a fierce yell rang suddenly from the cliffs above them, echoing weirdly through the savage pandemonium, arresting, authoritative, piercingly insistent.
What it portended Herne had not the vaguest notion, but its effect upon the two Wandis who held him was instant and astounding. They dropped him like a stone, and fled as if pursued by furies.
As for Herne, he wriggled and writhed from the vicinity of the fire, still working at his bonds, his one idea to reach the water that he knew was running within a stone’s throw of him. It was an agonizing progress, but he felt no pain but that awful, consuming thirst, knew no fear but a ghastly dread that he might fail to reach his goal. For a single mouthful of water at that moment he would have bartered his very soul.
His breathing came in great gasps. The sweat was running down his face. His heart beat thickly, spasmodically. His senses were tottering. But he clung tenaciously to the one idea. He could not die with his thirst unquenched. If he crawled every inch of the way upon his stomach, he would somehow reach the haven of his desire.