In the grip of the Hawk: A story of the Maori wars

CHAPTER IX

JUST IN TIME

'A clever marksman,' thought George, as he snuggled behind his rock. 'If I hadn't been pulled down, I should have handed in my parole for good and all.'

He drew a deep breath. He had courage enough to admit that he had been scared.

Smack! Another bullet lodged close by; but this time there was an abrupt, dull thud, followed by a heavy groan, while a commotion further up the hill told all too plainly of a human form writhing in agony.

'Habet!' muttered George. 'Whatever is all the rumpus about? Some settlers, perhaps, have heard of our arrival and come out to stop us. What clever beggars these Maoris are at taking cover! I could not see a sign of one when I was up.' He twisted his head and stared down into the valley; but, seeing nothing for his pains, peered round the back of his sheltering rock.

In a moment the explosion roared in his ear; but there was no one to be seen in the valley. Only, almost simultaneously with the report of Winata's rifle, the gloom of the distant scrub was rent by a vivid flash, and George ducked again as the bullet came singing up to smash the stock of the Maori's gun and glance off up the hill.

'Na!' grunted the disgusted Winata Pakaro, and called softly to a comrade, who glided out of the bushes, not three feet from George, who, till then, had not the slightest idea that any one lay there. Winata explained his wants, and the other, whose business it was to keep in touch with the firing-line, crawled off as a fourth bullet grazed Pakaro's shoulder.

The hardy savage merely grunted, took another rifle from the hand of his comrade, and stretched himself out as before.

A crash, a groan, and, as the report of a fifth shot came from the valley, the powder-monkey, so to call him, fell upon his face, and lay still with a hole in his head. He had imitated George in peering over the rock, and now there he was—dead.

'I know only one man who can shoot like this,' thought George,' and he must be a good bit east of here.' Another bullet knocked fragments from the top of the rock. 'He has got our range to a nicety. I wish he would turn his polite attention to some other part of the hill. Ah! I thought so. It is getting too hot here.' For with the sound of the last shot Winata Pakaro glided away, giving a quick call to George to follow cautiously.

Ten minutes later a couple of Maoris stood as if by magic at his side, wound each an arm through his own, and, with their rifles at the trail, set off with him at a terrific pace down the hill.

Difficult as it was, George managed to snatch a fleeting glance or two as he tore along between his guards. On this side the Maoris were running at top speed, their objective being another hill, a natural fortress, which rose out of the valley a mile or so away. On that side, a mob of whites and friendly Maoris, far inferior in number to Te Karearea's force, were racing desperately towards the same hill, but wasting their breath in shouts and yells. But so far it was anybody's race.

'Let go!' panted George. 'I can run faster alone.'

'No tricks then, Hortoni,' growled one of the guards. 'Try to escape and we will brain you.'

Stimulated by the occasional shots which followed them, they swept along in fine style. As they neared the coveted hill, Te Karearea's Maoris converged upon it from all sides, and simply over-ran a score or so of whites who opposed them, braining one and wounding half a dozen others.

The hill gained, George flung himself upon his back, too blown to heed the bullets which whistled over him; but, as one of them passed uncomfortably close to his head, he crawled behind a rock to watch the progress of operations.

But the sharp excitement was over for the time, and the long day wore to an end with nothing but desultory fire upon either side, for the whites refused to cross a ravine, over which it would have been death to charge. The fine marksman of the morning was now conspicuous by his absence, and George wondered regretfully whether he was the man who had been carried feet first towards the camp of the whites after their one ineffectual charge upon the hill.

But towards evening the captain of the white force was startled by the sound of a Maori bugle in his rear, and, caught thus between two fires, resolved upon a desperate charge. He encountered no resistance as he led his men across the dangerous ravine; but, as he ran on, a stream of fire belched from the heart of a bush, and he had, literally, a close shave, for one of his whiskers was singed completely off. So he retired a sadder and less hirsute man, only to find that the astute Te Karearea had raided his camp and annexed his reserve of ammunition, along with all his horses, accoutrements, stores, and baggage.

This calamity finished the gallant officer, who retreated throughout the night over terrible country, with his weary and dispirited column at his heels, ammunitionless and supperless.

They were not pursued; for the Maoris themselves were tired and hungry, and preferred to set about the preparation of a well-earned meal. For even though a man fight in a bad cause, he yet gets up appetite enough to enjoy his dinner.

Wrath and disappointment at the result of the fight had made George unusually sullen, but when the pretty maid who had so deftly bandaged him, and whose musical name was Kawainga, or Star of the Dawn, brought him supper, his sufferings, less poignant than his appetite, did not compel him to refuse.

A hungry man is an angry man, and certainly when George had eaten all the good things set before him, and smoked a looted cigar—Te Karearea with generous irony had sent him a handful—his temporary irritation vanished, and his usual cool temper reasserted itself. He had plenty of common-sense, and recognising that there was nothing to be gained by quarrelling with the chief, presently accepted the latter's invitation to stroll round the camp and visit the pickets. For Te Karearea observed all proper military precautions, and maintained an iron discipline in camp and field.

'It would be no easy matter for a Pakeha to break through my lines, Hortoni,' he remarked, as they turned again towards the bivouac.

'If you are hinting at me, I have no intention of trying,' was George's reply to this suggestive remark. 'But why are you so anxious to detain me?'

'Why are you so anxious to leave me, my friend?' countered the Maori, and, as George burst out laughing, 'I have not treated you ill, Hortoni,' he added rather wistfully.

'True. Still, you talk as a fool. Home, friends, duty, inclination, all call me away from you. You are in arms against the men of my race. Is it any wonder that I fret in the toils?'

'Yet there are chiefs who have their Pakehas,' urged Te Karearea.

'That is not much to the credit of those Pakehas,' George said loftily; and to change the subject went on: 'Where is Paeroa?'

'Be wise in time, Hortoni,' the chief urged earnestly. 'You possess, though you do not realise it, a certain means of attaining greatness. Ascend the ladder which I am holding for you, and you will be great. Refuse, and you are doomed, even as your race is doomed. You ask for Paeroa. He is gone to carry the message of my coming.'

'And who will listen to it?' George asked dryly.

CHAPTER X

TOGETHER AGAIN

When the Maoris recovered from the shock of his rush, they faced George as he stood covering his friend's body with his own. There was no noise, no shouting; but the stern Roman faces looked very grim and determined. Then Winata Pakaro with oily tongue began an argument, in the midst of which was heard the click of the hammer of a gun drawn back to full cock.

But while Winata's smooth periods flowed on, there was a sudden rush, a scuffle, a shout of wrathful surprise, and there was George back again under the tree with the rifle in his hand. He had wrested it from the astonished warrior who had so stealthily—as he imagined—made ready to use it.

In another moment Terence's wrists and ankles were free and the rifle in his grasp, while George once more flourished his famous club, rightly judging that its moral effect would be considerable, while as to its physical possibilities there was no doubt whatever.

These things done in the space of a second or two, George began to harangue the Maoris, but Winata Pakaro cut into his first words with:

'Stand aside, Hortoni! We wish not to injure you; but this man must die.'

'Stand you back, O Winata Pakaro!' retorted George. 'This man is my brother in all but blood, and I say that he shall not die.'

There was a roar of incredulous laughter at what the chiefs took to be an expedient lie, and Winata muttered a hasty order over his shoulder.

'Look out!' cried George, suspecting his design. 'Fire as he jumps.'

But a long whistle shrilled from Winata's lips, and he flung himself flat on the ground as the Maoris made an ugly rush forward and Terence's rifle spoke.

Fortunately for the friends, the bullet merely startled an elderly chief into a most undignified caper as it hummed past his ear, and on the instant Winata leaped from the ground and hurled himself at Terence.

But the great fighter was handicapped by his fear of George, whose own weapon came more than once so dangerously near his head that he gave back in alarm; for there was no knowing when that magical piece of greenstone would spring out of its master's hand and begin a devil's dance upon its own account.

Still, it might have gone hardly with Terence, but that, as the Maoris surged about him, a deep voice cried angrily: 'Is the word of Te Karearea of no weight in this hapu? And you, Hortoni, why do you break faith with me?'

Where the chief had sprung from George had no idea, but he was uncommonly glad to see him, and, as the Maoris shrank back, he briefly explained who Terence was and what had taken place. Thereupon Te Karearea turned upon Winata Pakaro and rated him viciously, demanding how he had dared to take so much upon himself. To this verbal castigation Winata merely opposed a smile of cynical amusement as he walked away.

Then Te Karearea faced George once more and said graciously, 'I give you, O Hortoni, the life of the friend for whom you would have given your own. To-morrow you shall tell me the story of your friendship. But he must give up the rifle.'

At a nod from George, Terence surrendered the rifle, and Te Karearea then extended his hand, as if expecting to receive the greenstone club as well. But when this piece of impudent bluff—which was extremely well acted—met with the reception it deserved, he grinned good-humouredly and nodded to the pair to withdraw, which they did at once.

With his arm round Terence's shoulders, George piloted his chum towards the huge fallen tree, beneath which he designed to pass the night. 'You dear old fellow!' he said heartily, drawing Terence to him. 'Who would have thought of meeting here, and like this? What a mercy I came up in time!'

'Thank God you did!' replied Terence, unable to repress a shudder; for when a brave man has stared death in the face, and the grim Gatherer has passed on, leaving him untouched, he is not, as a rule, flippant about his experience.

'When I came rushing up, I hadn't the faintest idea that I was to meet you,' went on George. 'Indeed, I only recognised you when you screamed at me in that queer, cracked voice. In the first place, I had never seen you in uniform, and in the—— Hold up, old fellow!'

For Terence staggered and would have fallen, had not the strong arm around his shoulders slipped to his waist and supported him.

George laid him down and bent anxiously over him, seeing that he had fainted. The strain had been dreadful, and, brave though he was, his emotional nature had lent an added poignancy to the sufferings of that terrible half-hour.

In a few minutes he revived, and looking up at his friend with an apologetic smile, murmured: 'I'm all right now. I did not mean——'

'Lie still and don't talk, dear old fellow,' interrupted George; but Terence sat up with his back against the tree and drank a cup of water which George handed him. Then George, wishful to take his thoughts off his recent peril, began to chat about the sharpshooter of the early morning.

'What became of that crack shot of yours?' he inquired. 'He was wonderful. The Maoris lost two men, and I myself came within an ace of adding another bull's-eye to his score.'

At this Terence gasped in a queer way and collapsed flat upon his face; but when George, who thought that he had fainted again, was about to rise, he scrambled to his knees, and catching his friend in a bear's hug, exclaimed brokenly: 'Oh, thank God! O George, thank God I didn't hit you! Oh!'

He buried his face in his arms, while George patted his broad back, saying soothingly: 'So it was you after all! Curiously enough, I thought so at the time; but I did not see how such a thing could be. Cheer up, old fellow! There's no harm done.'

Terence wrung his friend's hand. There were traces of tears upon his cheeks, but he did not seem to mind. 'I took deliberate aim at you,' he said. 'We all thought that the white man on the hill must be one of those Pakeha-Maori rascals; so I let drive and——'

'Missed him! So that's all right,' finished George cheerfully. 'You must not let out to these people that you were the slayer of their comrades, or we shall hear a lot about a blood-feud and have endless trouble. By the way, was Te Karearea present at your court-martial?'

'I saw nothing of him until he stopped our little fight. Why?'

George did not explain. He had reason to know that the chief did not always choose to appear as the moving spirit in the programme of events. 'No matter,' he said. 'Now, I want to hear all your news. Are you hungry?'

'Oh no; your friends fed me well before turning me over to the hangman.'

'Don't call them my friends,' protested George. 'I would——'

'Oh! Then you are not a Pakeha-Maori?' put in Terence, with an air of great simplicity.

'You are yourself again, I see,' said George, laughing. 'Fill your pipe and let me hear your adventures.'

'I have had none until to-day,' began Terence. 'Colonel Cranstoun was very kind to me on board; but he and Horn kept me at it with never-ending drill. By the way, the colonel expressed his regret that he had packed you off in the tug.'

'No! Surely not?' George grinned.

'Yes. He pulled his long moustache, and observed: "I should have done better to keep the young scapegrace under my own eye."'

'You humbug!' laughed George. 'Go on.'

'He is a fine old fellow, George. On the third day out we met a Sydney-bound brig, which hove to, and the colonel sent a letter to your father. You saw it, no doubt.'

'No; but I am glad he wrote it. I started on your trail next morning.'

'What a fellow you are!' said Terence admiringly. 'I was sure that you would lose no time. But next morning!'

'Get on with your yarn,' ordered George.

'Right, sir! In due time we arrived at Auckland, where Colonel Cranstoun took me out of the ranks and made me useful as an orderly, or something of the kind. Since then I have been sent here, there, and everywhere. My last mission was to bring dispatches from our colonel in Wanganui to Major Biggs at Poverty Bay. There I found Biggs just starting after your beauties, so I got permission to join the expedition.'

'How did he hear of our arrival?' put in George.

'I can't say; and it is still a mystery to me how you come to be with these fellows at all. I am burning to hear your story. However, I will finish mine first. We have followed your trail for four days, and to-day, as you know, the fight began. I was sent back to Turanga for reinforcements; but as I heard on the way that Biggs was somewhere else, hurrying up the commissariat, I rode hither again. Of course I had not the least idea that the camp had meantime changed hands. That's my history, and a dull one it is. Now for yours.'

He listened, absorbed, to the recital of his chum's adventures. 'I do envy you,' he said, as George wound up his narrative. 'You certainly have not lacked incident. Let me see this wonderful—mere, do you call it?'

George handed over the club, which Terence examined with deep interest.

'It seems to me,' he said at last, 'that you will do well to take that old man's advice and hold fast to this club; for——'

'Oh, nonsense!' interjected George. 'How can there be any magic inherent in a piece of greenstone? The curious things which have occurred in connection with it are not inexplicable.'

'Explain, then, its return after your own eyes had seen it falling into the sea.'

'There must be an explanation,' said George doggedly.

'Say, rather, that, like all your unimaginative race, you refuse to believe in anything you cannot understand. If there is nothing exceptional about the club, why is Te Karearea so anxious to get it?'

'It is, of course, surrounded with traditions,' began George, and suddenly sprang up and darted round the tree in time to see a dark figure bounding away into the bush. Pursuit was useless, so George returned to their fire, expressing his conviction that the eavesdropper had been Te Karearea.

'As I said, he attaches importance to the club, if you don't,' was Terence's comment.

'More likely he came here to learn what he could about you,' George argued; 'for I don't believe in his protestation of ignorance of English.'

'All the same, you follow the old man's advice, and never let that club be far from you,' urged Terence.

'Well, it is a singular fact that the moment of my greatest peril was just after I had been deprived of the mere,' admitted George.

'Yet even that peril was averted.'

'Yes; and I do not understand why. From the moment of our meeting, Te Karearea has treated me with great consideration, and—though it may sound absurd—has sometimes seemed afraid of me. Not, of course, in a physical sense. There is something incomprehensible at work.'

'Perhaps he still hopes to convert you to his views.'

'He need not on that account fear me.'

'True. The great thing is the plain fact that association with the club has saved your life so far. I think——' He yawned widely.

'I think that you are more than half asleep,' finished George. 'Your bed is there, under the tree, and here is a blanket for you.'

Terence threw himself down at once, but almost immediately sprang up again. 'Give me your hand, George,' he said.

'What's the matter now?' asked George, obeying.

'Brute that I am, I have never even thanked you. But you know, old fellow—my dear old chum, you know——' He paused, blinking hard.

'I should think I did!' cried George, capering with the pain of that friendly squeeze. 'Brute! You are indeed. A grizzly isn't in it with you. Away with you to bed, and don't talk any more nonsense.'

'I won't,' said Terence seriously; 'but I will do at last what I ought to have done at first.' Without a word more he dropped upon his knees and buried his face in his hands. A few minutes later he rose quietly, and with a nod at George, lay down upon his fern-bed and prepared to sleep.

CHAPTER XI

ONE MYSTERY THE LESS

'The réveillé!' laughed Terence, as he awoke next morning to the cheerful notes of a bugle. 'For a moment I thought that I was back with the old regiment.'

'Oh, the soldier fashion in which we do things here would not disgrace the "old regiment," as you call it,' said George, smiling. 'Your own red coat, by the way, has a suspicious newness about it. Did you sleep well?'

'Never better. Ah, George, old fellow, I owe——'

'Here's breakfast,' broke in George hastily, giving him a mighty smack on the back, to the great delight of Kawainga, Star of the Dawn, who appeared with two satellites, bearing the materials for a substantial breakfast.

Soon they were again upon the march, and Te Karearea, who had taken every precaution against a surprise, jogged peacefully along, smoking a looted cigar, and listening with interest to the story of the youthful adventures of George and Terence, whom he addressed as Mura, or The Blazing One. The name had much the sound of Moore, but it was the appearance of the Irishman, with his red coat and flaming head of hair, which had really suggested the title.

'It is good to hear of such friendship,' the chief said, beaming upon the pair during a pause in their narration. 'Surely Mura will not wish to leave us now that he has found you, Hortoni. Persuade him to stay, my friend.'

George looked him in the eyes and laughed quietly. He translated to Terence, but made no reply to the chief, who did not pursue the subject.

'What did he mean by that remark, George?' inquired Terence as they lay in the shade during the midday halt.

'I can't say exactly, for one never knows what the crafty beggar is up to.' He looked cautiously round, but as no one was near, went on: 'He may even wish you to try and escape, in order to—to——'

'To find an excuse for knocking me on the head,' supplied Terence. 'Then he'll be disappointed, for I'll not leave you—unless escape meant a good chance of helping you out of the trap. In that case I'd go this minute.'

'I am sure you would, dear old fellow!' said George affectionately; 'but we will stick together as long as possible. Only, if the chief does not parole you, then——' He broke off short, staring up at Te Karearea, who had, as usual, approached unobserved.

'It looks as if the rascal possesses the power to render himself invisible at will,' said George disgustedly, when the chief had withdrawn after informing them that the march was about to be resumed. 'We shall have to go warily, Terence; for there is no knowing how much he may have heard.'

'Much good may it do him,' remarked Terence airily. 'And if it comes to knocking on the head——' He bent his arm. The great biceps contracted, bulging out the red sleeve. Let that enormous mass of muscle be extended with the weight of the body behind it, and the fist in front of it would surely trouble somebody's weak nerves.

George smiled. 'Oh, I know what you can do; but a couple of hundred to one is long odds. Meantime, you must not run the risk of offending him; for, remember, he is utterly unscrupulous. In some mysterious way I appear to be necessary to him; but were it otherwise, he would kill me without the slightest compunction. Of that I feel sure. Come! it is time we joined him.'

Four days later, towards sunset, they debouched from the forest through which for the last sixty hours they had toiled wearily along a narrow, difficult track. It had been a terrible journey for the Maoris, but far more so for the white men, and all alike rejoiced when at last the dreadful bush lay behind them, and they beheld the river which alone divided them from the pah which was their goal.

As was usual with the Maori fortresses, the position was one of immense strength. The island plain, at the back of which rose a considerable hill, was a swampy area overgrown with flax, and extended for nearly a mile on every side of the eminence but one, being itself enclosed by a forked ravine, at the bottom of which the river roared and swirled among giant boulders. No doubt, at some far-off day this roughly level plain had itself been covered with forest; but dead and gone generations of Maoris had cleared away the offending wood, so that no one could now approach the pah unobserved. The single side of the hill unflanked by the plain was simply a vast, precipitous rock-face, having for its vis-à-vis the equally precipitous opposing wall of the ravine, into whose depths it dropped a sheer two hundred feet, the twin cliffs forming a cañon through which the river raced on its way to unite again with the main stream.

The place was, indeed, almost inaccessible when once the only approach from the forest was barred. This was merely a rough bridge across the river on the side furthest from the hill, and when the tree-trunks forming this were withdrawn, a handful of men could easily hold the island against an army.

But even were the bridge to be rushed, the ascent of the hill was made difficult by carefully laid trenches and rifle-pits, and, finally, the pah was encircled by a double row of palisades of great height and immense strength, the chinks between the massive logs being filled with hard-baked mud and clay. The palisades were loopholed above, and a rude platform ran along the inner side of each row, where men might lie, secure themselves, and fire upon an advancing foe.

It would indeed be a desperate and determined foe who would venture to attack, much more succeed in taking, the Pah O Te Mate—the Pah of the Slain, the Fortress of Death.

As it happened, the weary travellers were not destined to enter the pah just yet; for as the vanguard swung out of the forest and prepared to cross the hundred yards or so of cleared ground between them and the bridge, they saw a sight which halted them as effectually as though some sudden stroke had robbed their limbs of all power.

But they could not stand still, for those in the rear pressed them on, and presently the little clearing became almost blocked with armed men vainly striving to preserve their customary proud and resolute bearing, and with trembling women who did not attempt to hide their extreme terror.

In the midst of the confusion the voice of Te Karearea was heard angrily demanding the cause of the block, but no sooner had the chief forced his way to the front than he, too, stopped as if compelled, all signs of anger faded from his face, and he stood meek and inoffensive, his hands crossed upon his broad chest, his plumed head bowed low.

And what was the cause of all this fear and commotion? Standing alone at the bridge-head was one old man. His figure was bent, his snow-white hair fell, a tangle of locks, below his shoulders, and the hand which grasped the staff upon which he leaned, trembled as it clutched the crook. Yet there was fire in his rolling eyes, and a hint of mastery, if not of menace, in the gesture with which he flung up his free hand, forbidding the advance; and his voice, far from piping in the thin treble of extreme old age, rang stern and sonorous, as the liquid Maori speech gushed from his venerable lips.

He was Kapua Mangu—the Black Cloud—the Tohunga, and most notable of all the Maori wizards.

At the old man's bidding, Te Karearea advanced and listened respectfully to some words spoken for his ear alone. Then, turning, he rapidly issued an order which sent the warriors tumbling back into the forest, while side by side with the great magician, the chief set off across the plain in the direction of the pah.

'So we are not to enter the fortress to-night,' George explained to Terence as they followed the Maoris. 'According to the old gentleman, a particularly malignant demon has taken up his quarters on the hill, and any attempt to pass him would be fraught with dire peril. To-morrow we are to make a kind of state entry.'

'Which means that the ancient rogue has reasons for keeping us off the hill to-night.'

'Very likely; but it won't hurt us, fortunately. What do you say to supper and early bed?'

'I'm with you there,' agreed Terence, 'for I'm dog tired.'

So they hunted about until they found pretty Miss Kawainga, who soon provided them with an excellent meal, after which they selected a comfortable spot for their bivouac, spread their blankets on the fern, and were quickly asleep.

An hour before midnight something awakened George, and he sat up and looked in all directions for the cause. Everything was profoundly still, and presently he made out that the camp was deserted, not a single Maori being visible anywhere. Wondering sleepily what the chief was about, he noticed that their fire had dwindled a good deal, and, knowing that the early hours of morning would be cold, crept out of his blanket-bag and rose, yawning, to replenish it. Hither and thither he moved, gathering sticks and fern, when suddenly the wood dropped through his hands, he turned cold, and his heart throbbed heavily under his creeping flesh. He drew in a deep breath, and his strong will and high courage fought desperately against the unnerving sensations of the moment. For once again the quiet night was rent by those weird, awful sounds which had so unmanned him during that dreary midnight hour aboard the brig a week ago.

'Hau-hau! Hau-hau! Pai marire, hau-hau! Hau-hau!'

From afar the horrid noises screamed through the shivering forest, mixed now and again with a singular gabble of words which somehow had the sound of English, though the distance made it difficult to judge.

George made a fierce effort to collect himself. Terence had suffered enough already, and for his sake he must not give way. But to his intense surprise he saw the object of his concern sitting up and listening with an expression of deep interest on his face.

'Queer row, isn't it?' said Terence. 'Do you see those lights on the hill behind there? That is where they are. Perhaps this explains the mysterious confab between the chief and the wizard. I vote we go and have a look at them; we may never get another chance.'

George could scarcely believe his ears. The noise which now, as before, so shocked him, was accepted by Terence as something merely interesting. Still, the sight of his friend's unconcern did much to steady his own jumping nerves.

Receiving no answer, Terence looked up. The dying fire added to the ghastliness of George's face. 'Hullo! What is it, old fellow?' he cried, rolling out of his bag. 'Are you ill?'

'I plead guilty to a bad fit of the horrors,' answered George, 'though your coolness is rapidly convincing me that my bogy is not so awful as I imagined it to be. I never was so frightened in my life as when I first heard those terrible sounds at dead of night aboard the brig. I did not speak of it to you when we met, because it had nothing to do with my story. If you know what the noise means, for heaven's sake tell me at once.'

'I thought you knew all about it,' replied Terence. 'The row is horrid, but simple enough in its origin. It is a part of the religious service, or incantation, perhaps I should say, of the Hau-haus.'

'Oh! And who may the Hau-haus be? Men or devils?'

'Men, distinctly; but with a strong dash of the devil in them, too.'

'Are they Maoris?'

'Very much so. The same among whom you have been adventuring this month past. Let us steal back to that hill and lay your ghost for once and all. I'll tell you what I know as we go.'

'I'm with you,' agreed George. 'I'm thankful to have fathomed this uncanny mystery. Hark! They are at it again.' Once more the unholy clamour swelled upon the quiet air.

Even the sentinels had left the camp and gone, presumably, to the hill, where, as they advanced, the friends could see great fires blazing and vomiting clouds of smoke into the blackness of the night. As they went, Terence discoursed in low tones of the rise and progress of the Hau-hau religion, and its effect upon those Maoris who had embraced it.

'I learned what I have told you from a friendly Arawa chief,' he said, as they drew near the ravine which formed the approach to the hill. 'He spun the yarn one night around the camp-fire, and by way of illustration gathered a few of his men and surprised us a little later with a very creditable imitation of the howling which so disturbed you. I must own that, until I knew what it was, I felt far from comfortable.'

'I don't blame you,' said George with a shudder. 'And there have been many converts to Hau-hauism, you say.'

'Plenty; and to-day the Hau-haus are the fiercest and most implacable of our foes. They have some very unpleasant customs, and that nasty yowling, with its blasphemous invocation of the Holy Trinity, is not the least atrocious of them.'

Their cautious march ceased now, and they began to crawl quietly up the side of the ravine, from the plateau above which came the hum of many voices.

'Te Karearea must have joined this sect before he was packed off to Chatham Island,' said George. 'I remember that he said something one day about being a priest among his own people.'

'Hush!' warned Terence. 'I hear them moving just above us.'

They flattened themselves against the side of the ravine and waited their opportunity. Suddenly a succession of yells burst from three hundred lusty throats, and the ground shook to the trampling of the mob as they hurled themselves this way and that in their fierce ecstasy.

'Now is our chance,' whispered Terence, and under cover of the tumult they dragged themselves up the bank and lay flat among the fern at the top.

What a sight met their astonished eyes!

CHAPTER XII

VANISHED

From where the friends lay they looked across a rude plateau, dotted with ti-tree, koromiko, and other bushes, and upon this, at intervals of a dozen yards, three huge fires blazed and roared and crackled under frequent additions of fuel. The ground swarmed with Maoris, many of whom Te Karearea had recruited on his march, and most of them were naked, save for their katikas, or short kilts of flax. As their bodies were splashed and streaked with red and white paint, it required but little imagination to conceive them an array of petticoated skeletons, gouted with blood, dancing round the wild fires of a witches' sabbath.

Between two of the fires there had been set up a long pole, upon whose spiked summit, pitiful to see, was a human head, wonderfully preserved after the Maori fashion. It was the head of a white man, too, as was plainly shown by the fair hair and whiskers which still covered the dried, stretched skin of scalp and cheeks.

'All that is left of poor Lloyd,' whispered Terence. 'Te Karearea must have sent for it. Look, here he comes with Winata Pakaro and another. Where is the old wizard?'

With stately tread the three chiefs approached, the Maoris forming in two long lines on opposite sides of the great fires, while every eye was bent upon the dignified figure of their commander.

For some moments Te Karearea stood still, gazing up at the impaled head. Then suddenly he began to dance. Slowly he moved at first; but with each succeeding minute his steps grew quicker, his gestures more frantic, his gyrations more wild. Round and round, up and down, from side to side he sprang and whirled and bounded, until it seemed a marvel how he kept his balance. All at once, after a figure of extraordinary swiftness and duration, he stopped.

With arms outstretched and head thrown back, so that his eyes stared up at that poor head upon the pole, he stood an instant, and then from his open mouth there issued a piercing voice, which screamed and gabbled the most appalling mixture of frenzied prayer and blasphemous incantation.

And the voice which possessed Te Karearea was so unlike his own, so compact of yell and howl and bark and screech and frenzied raving, that George, shuddering where he lay, muttered to Terence: 'This man hath a devil.'

The awful voice ceased, and Te Karearea, falling headlong, writhed in a convulsion. As if at a signal, the whole crowd, men and women, broke ranks and rushed to form a circle round the niu, or sacred pole.

And then began a dance indeed. No one there but was pourewarewa—half-mad—with religious ecstasy, and wholly consumed with hatred of the detested Pakeha. So round and round they circled, hands joined, at an ever increasing speed, till the lighter of them, dragged off their feet by their stronger, swifter comrades, seemed to fly like witches and warlocks through the air.

And all the time the infernal din went on—the barking scream of Hau-hau! Hau-hau! the blasphemous invocation, the senseless jumble of word and phrase.

It was a revolting scene, but so wildly exciting, that the watchers forgot their fatigue and, more, the danger they ran from discovery.

Slowly the mad orgies came to an end, and as one by one the dancers gave way under the tremendous physical and mental strain, they fell to the ground. And where they fell they lay, to be pounded and bruised under the naked feet of those who still leapt and whirled around the pole.

'We had better make off,' whispered George,' for, if they find us here, we shall neither of us see to-morrow.'

'Right!' With the word Terence half-turned to begin the descent. But at that very moment he became aware of an ominous sound, unheard before in the hideous din—the soft pad-pad of scores of naked feet, running swiftly through the forest.

In a flash George grabbed him by the wrist. 'Lie close! We are cut off. A number of them are coming up the hill.'

Still as mice they lay, while the noise of the onrush grew louder, and at last Te Karearea, raising himself wearily, shouted hoarsely, 'Awake, fools! Awake, and stand to your arms, unless ye desire to be slain as ye lie. Ha! Awake!'

Instantly a deep voice shouted from the ravine, 'All is well, O Far-darting Hawk! We come from afar to do thy will. Forward, brothers, to salute your chief!'

A loud yell responded to this exhortation, and the men coming up the hillside charged forward at a tremendous rate, while George and Terence, feeling that now, indeed, their lives were the sport of fate, threw themselves flat upon the ground and awaited the issue.

George's belt had worked round, so that his greenstone club was in front, the hard handle pressing painfully against his breast-bone. As he had no time to adjust the belt, he cautiously raised himself on his hands and knees, drew out the weapon, and laid it among the fern in front of him. Before he could sink to earth again, the vanguard of the new company crashed up the side of the ravine and broke, a wildly-rushing wave, on all sides of him.

Not daring to move, he held perfectly still, while the reinforcements poured by, the tramp and clatter of their bare feet upon dead wood and fern sounding a jarring undernote to their yell and song. The hindmost of them passed swiftly, avoiding almost miraculously the crouching figures in the fern, and George and Terence, half-suffocated, breathed again.

'Safe!' muttered George, hallooing, like many another, before he was out of the wood; for, ere he could move, two more Maoris, the whippers-in, perhaps, came racing up. The first sprang clear over Terence, who still lay flat, but the second was neatly 'rabbited' over George's broad, arched back and sent flying upon his face a dozen feet ahead.

In an instant the Maori was up and back with a panther-like bound at the spot at which the accident had occurred. He knew that his fall had been caused by a man, and his fears, actively working, assured him that the man must be an enemy.

With a loud, snorting 'Ha!' the Maori brought down his heavy wooden club with deadly accuracy of aim, and Terence, who had scrambled up, involuntarily closed his eyes, and would fain have closed his ears, too. But instead of the dull scrunch which his quivering nerves were expecting, he heard a sharp, rattling smack, an exclamation of wild surprise, and, as he looked again, saw the wooden mere sailing through the air, to be caught, as it descended, by the outstretched hand of the active Maori.

For a moment Terence was stupefied, and then enlightenment came. The greenstone club, which George had held in his upraised hands, had once more come between him and death, intercepting the murderous blow, and disarming his assailant.

The Maori still held George at a disadvantage, but made no effort to follow up his attack. Bending down until his lips were close to the Englishman's ear, he muttered in agitated tones, 'Hortoni! Master! Forgive! I knew thee not, and have brought danger upon thee. Fly swiftly. I will hold them back.'

The case was not one for argument, and as George and Terence raced down the hill, Paeroa—for it was indeed he—sprang out of the bushes with a yell and bounded after his comrade.

The latter, of course, had heard the commotion, and was coming back to inquire into its cause; but Paeroa met him with the frightful announcement, 'It was a lizard! A taipo! I have slain him.' Then screeching 'Taipo! Taipo!' at the top of his voice, he sped towards Te Karearea, closely followed by his friend, who had no desire to investigate further. For the mere mention of a lizard is horrible to a Maori, so ingrained is the superstition that evil spirits of most malignant type invariably assume this shape.

But Paeroa had reckoned without his over-lord. Te Karearea was by no means free from superstition, but he was a man of keen intelligence, and he instantly perceived that Paeroa's story did not square with the noise of fast-retreating footsteps. So he rapidly issued orders which sent a score of the newly-arrived Maoris hastening upon the track of the fugitives, while Paeroa, who attempted to lead them with a view of helping the Pakehas, was sternly ordered to remain where he was.

The Maoris, uncertain whether they were chasing men or demons, made a lusty noise to scare the latter and keep up their own courage, and with the roar of the pursuit thundering in their ears, George and Terence dashed down the hill at what was very nearly breakneck speed. For a fall among the boulders or a headlong crash against the trunk of a tree might easily serve to smash a skull or snap a spinal column.

But, fortunately for them, the nature of the ground soon became such as no man could pass through at a run.

Had they struck the rough path which Te Karearea's axe-men had hewn while they slept, or chanced on one of the numerous tracks which pierced the forest for miles around for the convenience of hunters, all would have been well; for all these roads led to the river or to the bivouac. Once there, ahead of the Hau-haus, they might have defied detection, since no one but Paeroa could certainly have said who were the intruders upon their grim rites.

But in the first mad rush of their flight they had plunged deeply into the maze of the forest, where, dark as it was, for the half-moon was low, they were almost at the mercy of the thorns, which rent their clothes and tore their bodies, and of the thousand-armed, clinging kawakawa, the supplejack, whose tough, all-embracing tendrils held them back with the power of ropes.

'We are trapped,' panted Terence. 'Let us turn and make a fight of it.'

For behind, alongside, and even ahead of them pealed the vengeful shouts of the Hau-haus.

'Range up alongside me,' George answered over his shoulder. 'I have a better plan than that.' His temper seemed to cool and his brain to grow clearer the greater the emergency.

'All right! Wait until I catch up to you,' said Terence. 'Then I will—Ah-h-h——'

Before he could finish what he was about to say, there broke from him that strange, solitary note of alarm, sharp at first, then long drawn and dying away in a curiously muffled shriek. Then silence, save for the occasional yell of a pursuer, and a faint rustling near by, as of branches coming gradually to rest after a puff of wind. But there was no wind.

'Terence!' George called softly. 'Terence! Where are you?' But he got no answer, and, full of terror, began to grope his way to the spot whence his comrade's voice had seemed to come.

'Terence!' he called again loudly, careless of his own safety, if only he might bring help to his friend. 'Terence! Speak to me. Oh, what has happened? Where can he be? There was no sound of a blow or—Ah-h-h——'

Just as with Terence, that one sharp, quavering cry—and then George's voice, too, died away, and a terrible silence fell upon the dark bush.

CHAPTER XIII

DOWN AMONG THE DEAD MEN

Crash! George's heavy body broke through the tangle upon which he had stepped, and down he went through impenetrable darkness to the bottom of the hole into which he had fallen.

Breathless and bruised he picked himself up, relieved to find his bones unbroken. The mystery was dispelled now, for Terence must have preceded him; but a spasm of fear gripped his heart as his foot struck against the body of his friend.

'Is that you, George? What a good fellow you are. I thought you wouldn't be long after me,' came from the ground, and in the fullness of his relief George laughed out.

'What a joker it is!' he said. 'One would have thought that a fall like this would have taken the sprightliness out of you, Terence.'

'I fell on my head,' the Irishman answered simply, 'and that, no doubt, saved my life. Strike a match and let us see where we are.' Then, as George obeyed, 'Why, you are covered with blood. Are you hurt, dear old fellow?'

'I fell upon my nose,' replied George dryly, 'and, as it is not so hard as your head, you see the result. But, thank God, we are no worse. We seem to be in a kind of tunnel. If the Maoris know of the place——'

'We shall be in a hole, indeed,' put in the irrepressible Terence.

But it was no tunnel into which they had fallen, but a vast, underground forest—a wonder of God's own working. Here and there in New Zealand these dead worlds exist, in which, when once you have found your way thither, you must believe yourself to be within the veritable home of the gnomes and elementals. The tops of dead trees, fixed in the earth above and cemented by the decay of ages, form the roof of your new world, while their great trunks, not so much decayed as changed by mineral deposit, stand like tall sentinels guarding the long gone past, the very emblems of the grandeur of repose.

Such a space as this may extend for miles, or may show as a comparatively small chamber, owing to subsidence from above; while from some such hole as that down which the friends had fallen, or from cracks in the upper earth, 'a dim, religious light' struggles through, which faintly illumines, while it does not dispel, the weird gloom of the subterranean forest.

Of course all this did not become clear in a moment to our adventurers; but one discovery George did make as he struck his third match, and he raised something from the ground as it flickered out.

'This looks as if the place was known and used,' he said, endeavouring to ignite the thing he had picked up. It was a torch, and a bundle of them lay at his feet. For some time he was unsuccessful, but at last the end caught, and the torch burned with a feeble light.

'These were not made yesterday,' went on George, lighting another from the one he held and handing it to Terence. 'Pick up a few and let us explore a bit.'

It was soon evident that they could not get out by the way they had come in, at least, not without the aid of a rope, and from this, and the condition of the torches, they argued that the place, though known at one time, had long ago fallen into disuse. But Terence was by no means disheartened, and was eager to go forward.

'Come on!' he cried. 'Our way lies in this direction as far as we know.'

'But, if we go forward among the mazes of these dead trees, we may discover no other outlet and be unable to find our way back to this one,' argued George.

'Never mind; let us chance it,' insisted Terence. 'There must be another entrance or outlet or these torches would not be here.'

George yielded against his better judgment, and for half an hour they wandered through what they now realised to be a dead forest, but no way out did they find. Suddenly the Irishman pulled up.

'Why, in all this new excitement I had quite forgotten that marvellous occurrence upon the hill,' he said. 'Of course I jumped to the conclusion that the Maori was Paeroa, of whom you told me; but what I want to know is—How came you to drag out your own club and hold it over your head just in time to guard his stroke?'

'My belt had got screwed round and the club was hurting my chest; so I took it out and laid it on the fern in front of me when first we "grassed" ourselves. But, if you will believe me, I have not the slightest recollection of picking it up again when I rolled over on my back as Paeroa struck at me.'

'Then you expected to be struck,' said Terence.

'I can hardly say. I know that I was mightily surprised when my mere broke the shock of the wooden club, for I did not see it in my hands as I stared up at Paeroa.'

'But you must have felt it,' persisted Terence.

'I did not,' returned George with equal earnestness. 'It seems to me that I had no knowledge of it whatever until Paeroa struck his blow.'

Terence rumpled his fiery curls. 'It is all very odd and uncanny. How do you account for it?' he asked.

'I can't account for it,' George answered. 'Perhaps the mystery, if there is one, will explain itself some day. Meantime, where are we?'

'One thing is certain,' said Terence, ignoring the change of subject. 'That greenstone club always seems to be interposed, or to interpose itself, between you and danger—if not death—in the nick of time. Well, it's no use speculating. Where are we? In goblin-land, I should say. The very place for them.'

They walked on for the best part of an hour and then found themselves at the bottom of a shallow gully, in the opposite steep of which gaped a large rent, which looked as if it might be the mouth of a cave.

The impulsive Terence dashed into the black opening, followed more sedately by George, and the cave turned out to be a short tunnel with a sloping floor, which descended to the level and then quickly sloped again upwards. Small rills of water trickled from the walls or splashed musically upon the floor, where, as from the roof, stalactites and stalagmites had formed during the slow march of centuries.

'I believe we have passed under the river,' said George, 'and that tunnel was made by the hand of man—though how long ago it is impossible to guess. Ah! Here is a poser.'

'Had we not passed through that tunnel, I should think that we had been walking in a circle all this time,' remarked Terence, rather hopelessly; for the scene upon which they issued was the counterpart of that which they had left behind them on the other side of the passage.

Still they walked on, always ascending now, as it seemed to them, and at last, just as they came to the base of a slope, between which and the opposite ridge a wide, shallow gully extended, Terence halted suddenly and gripped George's wrist with a warning 'Hush!'

He pointed to the left, where a number of Maoris sat in a circle; but none of them turned round or took the least notice of the intruders.

'Let us go nearer,' whispered Terence. 'You can speak to them if they seem inclined to be nasty.'