Five Weeks in a Balloon

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVENTH.

Ter­rif­ic Heat.–Hal­lu­ci­na­tions.–The Last Drops of Wa­ter.–Nights of De­spair.–An At­tempt at Sui­cide.–The Simoom.–The Oa­sis.–The Li­on and Li­oness.

The doc­tor’s first care, on the mor­row, was to con­sult the barom­eter. He found that the mer­cury had scarce­ly un­der­gone any per­cep­ti­ble de­pres­sion.

“Noth­ing!” he mur­mured, “noth­ing!”

He got out of the car and scru­ti­nized the weath­er; there was on­ly the same heat, the same cloud­less sky, the same mer­ci­less drought.

“Must we, then, give up to de­spair?” he ex­claimed, in agony.

Joe did not open his lips. He was buried in his own thoughts, and plan­ning the ex­pe­di­tion he had pro­posed.

Kennedy got up, feel­ing very ill, and a prey to ner­vous ag­ita­tion. He was suf­fer­ing hor­ri­bly with thirst, and his swollen tongue and lips could hard­ly ar­tic­ulate a syl­la­ble.

There still re­mained a few drops of wa­ter. Each of them knew this, and each was think­ing of it, and felt him­self drawn to­ward them; but nei­ther of the three dared to take a step.

Those three men, friends and com­pan­ions as they were, fixed their hag­gard eyes up­on each oth­er with an in­stinct of fe­ro­cious long­ing, which was most plain­ly re­vealed in the hardy Scot, whose vig­or­ous con­sti­tu­tion yield­ed the soon­est to these un­nat­ural pri­va­tions.

Through­out the day he was deliri­ous, pac­ing up and down, ut­ter­ing hoarse cries, gnaw­ing his clinched fists, and ready to open his veins and drink his own hot blood.

“Ah!” he cried, “land of thirst! Well might you be called the land of de­spair!”

At length he sank down in ut­ter pros­tra­tion, and his friends heard no oth­er sound from him than the hiss­ing of his breath be­tween his parched and swollen lips.

To­ward evening, Joe had his turn of delir­ium. The vast ex­panse of sand ap­peared to him an im­mense pond, full of clear and limpid wa­ter; and, more than once, he dashed him­self up­on the scorch­ing waste to drink long draughts, and rose again with his mouth clogged with hot dust.

“Curs­es on it!” he yelled, in his mad­ness, “it’s noth­ing but salt wa­ter!”

Then, while Fer­gu­son and Kennedy lay there mo­tion­less, the re­sist­less long­ing came over him to drain the last few drops of wa­ter that had been kept in re­serve. The nat­ural in­stinct proved too strong. He dragged him­self to­ward the car, on his knees; he glared at the bot­tle con­tain­ing the pre­cious flu­id; he gave one wild, ea­ger glance, seized the trea­sured store, and bore it to his lips.

At that in­stant he heard a heart-​rend­ing cry close be­side him–“Wa­ter! wa­ter!”

It was Kennedy, who had crawled up close to him, and was beg­ging there, up­on his knees, and weep­ing piteous­ly.

Joe, him­self in tears, gave the poor wretch the bot­tle, and Kennedy drained the last drop with sav­age haste.

“Thanks!” he mur­mured hoarse­ly, but Joe did not hear him, for both alike had dropped faint­ing on the sand.

What took place dur­ing that fear­ful night nei­ther of them knew, but, on Tues­day morn­ing, un­der those show­ers of heat which the sun poured down up­on them, the un­for­tu­nate men felt their limbs grad­ual­ly dry­ing up, and when Joe at­tempt­ed to rise he found it im­pos­si­ble.

He looked around him. In the car, the doc­tor, com­plete­ly over­whelmed, sat with his arms fold­ed on his breast, gaz­ing with id­iot­ic fixed­ness up­on some imag­inary point in space. Kennedy was fright­ful to be­hold. He was rolling his head from right to left like a wild beast in a cage.

All at once, his eyes rest­ed on the butt of his ri­fle, which jut­ted above the rim of the car.

“Ah!” he screamed, rais­ing him­self with a su­per­hu­man ef­fort.

Des­per­ate, mad, he snatched at the weapon, and turned the bar­rel to­ward his mouth.

“Kennedy!” shout­ed Joe, throw­ing him­self up­on his friend.

“Let go! hands off!” moaned the Scot, in a hoarse, grat­ing voice–and then the two strug­gled des­per­ate­ly for the ri­fle.

“Let go, or I’ll kill you!” re­peat­ed Kennedy. But Joe clung to him on­ly the more fierce­ly, and they had been con­tend­ing thus with­out the doc­tor see­ing them for many sec­onds, when, sud­den­ly the ri­fle went off. At the sound of its dis­charge, the doc­tor rose up erect, like a spec­tre, and glared around him.

But all at once his glance grew more an­imat­ed; he ex­tend­ed his hand to­ward the hori­zon, and in a voice no longer hu­man shrieked:

“There! there–off there!”

There was such fear­ful force in the cry that Kennedy and Joe re­leased each oth­er, and both looked where the doc­tor point­ed.

The plain was ag­itat­ed like the sea shak­en by the fury of a tem­pest; bil­lows of sand went toss­ing over each oth­er amid blind­ing clouds of dust; an im­mense pil­lar was seen whirling to­ward them through the air from the south­east, with ter­rif­ic ve­loc­ity; the sun was dis­ap­pear­ing be­hind an opaque veil of cloud whose enor­mous bar­ri­er ex­tend­ed clear to the hori­zon, while the grains of fine sand went glid­ing to­geth­er with all the sup­ple ease of liq­uid par­ti­cles, and the ris­ing dust-​tide gained more and more with ev­ery sec­ond.

Fer­gu­son’s eyes gleamed with a ray of en­er­get­ic hope.

“The simoom!” he ex­claimed.

“The simoom!” re­peat­ed Joe, with­out ex­act­ly know­ing what it meant.

“So much the bet­ter!” said Kennedy, with the bit­ter­ness of de­spair. “So much the bet­ter–we shall die!”

“So much the bet­ter!” echoed the doc­tor, “for we shall live!” and, so say­ing, he be­gan rapid­ly to throw out the sand that en­cum­bered the car.

At length his com­pan­ions un­der­stood him, and took their places at his side.

“And now, Joe,” said the doc­tor, “throw out some fifty pounds of your ore, there!”

Joe no longer hes­itat­ed, al­though he still felt a fleet­ing pang of re­gret. The bal­loon at once be­gan to as­cend.

“It was high time!” said the doc­tor.

The simoom, in fact, came rush­ing on like a thun­der­bolt, and a mo­ment lat­er the bal­loon would have been crushed, torn to atoms, an­ni­hi­lat­ed. The aw­ful whirl­wind was al­most up­on it, and it was al­ready pelt­ed with show­ers of sand driv­en like hail by the storm.

“Out with more bal­last!” shout­ed the doc­tor.

“There!” re­spond­ed Joe, toss­ing over a huge frag­ment of quartz.

With this, the Vic­to­ria rose swift­ly above the range of the whirling col­umn, but, caught in the vast dis­place­ment of the at­mo­sphere there­by oc­ca­sioned, it was borne along with in­cal­cu­la­ble ra­pid­ity away above this foam­ing sea.

The three trav­ellers did not speak. They gazed, and hoped, and even felt re­freshed by the breath of the tem­pest.

About three o’clock, the whirl­wind ceased; the sand, falling again up­on the desert, formed num­ber­less lit­tle hillocks, and the sky re­sumed its for­mer tran­quil­li­ty.

The bal­loon, which had again lost its mo­men­tum, was float­ing in sight of an oa­sis, a sort of islet stud­ded with green trees, thrown up up­on the sur­face of this sandy ocean.

“Wa­ter! we’ll find wa­ter there!” said the doc­tor.

And, in­stant­ly, open­ing the up­per valve, he let some hy­dro­gen es­cape, and slow­ly de­scend­ed, tak­ing the ground at about two hun­dred feet from the edge of the oa­sis.

In four hours the trav­ellers had swept over a dis­tance of two hun­dred and forty miles!

The car was at once bal­last­ed, and Kennedy, close­ly fol­lowed by Joe, leaped out.

“Take your guns with you!” said the doc­tor; “take your guns, and be care­ful!”

Dick grasped his ri­fle, and Joe took one of the fowl­ing-​pieces. They then rapid­ly made for the trees, and dis­ap­peared un­der the fresh ver­dure, which an­nounced the pres­ence of abun­dant springs. As they hur­ried on, they had not tak­en no­tice of cer­tain large foot­prints and fresh tracks of some liv­ing crea­ture marked here and there in the damp soil.

Sud­den­ly, a dull roar was heard not twen­ty paces from them.

“The roar of a li­on!” said Joe.

“Good for that!” said the ex­cit­ed hunter; “we’ll fight him. A man feels strong when on­ly a fight’s in ques­tion.”

“But be care­ful, Mr. Kennedy; be care­ful! The lives of all de­pend up­on the life of one.”

But Kennedy no longer heard him; he was push­ing on, his eye blaz­ing; his ri­fle cocked; fear­ful to be­hold in his dar­ing rash­ness. There, un­der a palm-​tree, stood an enor­mous black-​maned li­on, crouch­ing for a spring on his an­tag­onist. Scarce­ly had he caught a glimpse of the hunter, when he bound­ed through the air; but he had not touched the ground ere a bul­let pierced his heart, and he fell to the earth dead.

“Hur­rah! hur­rah!” shout­ed Joe, with wild ex­ul­ta­tion.

Kennedy rushed to­ward the well, slid down the damp­ened steps, and flung him­self at full length by the side of a fresh spring, in which he plunged his parched lips. Joe fol­lowed suit, and for some min­utes noth­ing was heard but the sound they made with their mouths, drink­ing more like mad­dened beasts than men.

“Take care, Mr. Kennedy,” said Joe at last; “let us not over­do the thing!” and he pant­ed for breath.

But Kennedy, with­out a word, drank on. He even plunged his hands, and then his head, in­to the de­li­cious tide–he fair­ly rev­elled in its cool­ness.

“But the doc­tor?” said Joe; “our friend, Dr. Fer­gu­son?”

That one word re­called Kennedy to him­self, and, hasti­ly fill­ing a flask that he had brought with him, he start­ed on a run up the steps of the well.

But what was his amaze­ment when he saw an opaque body of enor­mous di­men­sions block­ing up the pas­sage! Joe, who was close up­on Kennedy’s heels, re­coiled with him.

“We are blocked in–en­trapped!”

“Im­pos­si­ble! What does that mean?–“

Dick had no time to fin­ish; a ter­rif­ic roar made him on­ly too quick­ly aware what foe con­front­ed him.

“An­oth­er li­on!” ex­claimed Joe.

“A li­oness, rather,” said Kennedy. “Ah! fe­ro­cious brute!” he added, “I’ll set­tle you in a mo­ment more!” and swift­ly reload­ed his ri­fle.

In an­oth­er in­stant he fired, but the an­imal had dis­ap­peared.

“On­ward!” shout­ed Kennedy.

“No!” in­ter­posed the oth­er, “that shot did not kill her; her body would have rolled down the steps; she’s up there, ready to spring up­on the first of us who ap­pears, and he would be a lost man!”

“But what are we to do? We must get out of this, and the doc­tor is ex­pect­ing us.”

“Let us de­coy the an­imal. Take my piece, and give me your ri­fle.”

“What is your plan?”

“You’ll see.”

And Joe, tak­ing off his linen jack­et, hung it on the end of the ri­fle, and thrust it above the top of the steps. The li­oness flung her­self fu­ri­ous­ly up­on it. Kennedy was on the alert for her, and his bul­let broke her shoul­der. The li­oness, with a fright­ful howl of agony, rolled down the steps, over­turn­ing Joe in her fall. The poor fel­low imag­ined that he could al­ready feel the enor­mous paws of the sav­age beast in his flesh, when a sec­ond det­ona­tion re­sound­ed in the nar­row pas­sage, and Dr. Fer­gu­son ap­peared at the open­ing above with his gun in hand, and still smok­ing from the dis­charge.

Joe leaped to his feet, clam­bered over the body of the dead li­oness, and hand­ed up the flask full of sparkling wa­ter to his mas­ter.

To car­ry it to his lips, and to half emp­ty it at a draught, was the work of an in­stant, and the three trav­ellers of­fered up thanks from the depths of their hearts to that Prov­idence who had so mirac­ulous­ly saved them.