第60章

"Where shall we look? God could not have been so cruel as to take my little girl away from me now.""We must arouse Esmeralda first," replied Clayton."She can tell us what has happened.Esmeralda!" he cried again, shaking the black woman roughly by the shoulder.

"O Gaberelle, I want to die!" cried the poor woman, but with eyes fast closed."Let me die, dear Lord, don't let me see that awful face again.""Come, come, Esmeralda," cried Clayton.

"The Lord isn't here; it's Mr.Clayton.Open your eyes."Esmeralda did as she was bade.

"O Gaberelle! Thank the Lord," she said.

"Where's Miss Porter? What happened?" questioned Clayton.

"Ain't Miss Jane here?" cried Esmeralda, sitting up with wonderful celerity for one of her bulk."Oh, Lord, now Iremember! It must have took her away," and the Negress commenced to sob, and wail her lamentations.

"What took her away?" cried Professor Porter.

"A great big giant all covered with hair.""A gorilla, Esmeralda?" questioned Mr.Philander, and the three men scarcely breathed as he voiced the horrible thought.

"I thought it was the devil; but I guess it must have been one of them gorilephants.Oh, my poor baby, my poor little honey," and again Esmeralda broke into uncontrollable sobbing.

Clayton immediately began to look about for tracks, but he could find nothing save a confusion of trampled grasses in the close vicinity, and his woodcraft was too meager for the translation of what he did see.

All the balance of the day they sought through the jungle;but as night drew on they were forced to give up in despair and hopelessness, for they did not even know in what direction the thing had borne Jane.

It was long after dark ere they reached the cabin, and a sad and grief-stricken party it was that sat silently within the little structure.

Professor Porter finally broke the silence.His tones were no longer those of the erudite pedant theorizing upon the abstract and the unknowable; but those of the man of action--determined, but tinged also by a note of indescribable hopelessness and grief which wrung an answering pang from Clayton's heart.

"I shall lie down now," said the old man, "and try to sleep.

Early to-morrow, as soon as it is light, I shall take what food I can carry and continue the search until I have found Jane.Iwill not return without her."

His companions did not reply at once.Each was immersed in his own sorrowful thoughts, and each knew, as did the old professor, what the last words meant--Professor Porter would never return from the jungle.

At length Clayton arose and laid his hand gently upon Professor Porter's bent old shoulder.

"I shall go with you, of course," he said.

"I knew that you would offer--that you would wish to go, Mr.Clayton; but you must not.Jane is beyond human assistance now.What was once my dear little girl shall not lie alone and friendless in the awful jungle.

"The same vines and leaves will cover us, the same rains beat upon us; and when the spirit of her mother is abroad, it will find us together in death, as it has always found us in life.

"No; it is I alone who may go, for she was my daughter--all that was left on earth for me to love.""I shall go with you," said Clayton simply.

The old man looked up, regarding the strong, handsome face of William Cecil Clayton intently.Perhaps he read there the love that lay in the heart beneath--the love for his daughter.

He had been too preoccupied with his own scholarly thoughts in the past to consider the little occurrences, the chance words, which would have indicated to a more practical man that these young people were being drawn more and more closely to one another.Now they came back to him, one by one.

"As you wish," he said.

"You may count on me, also," said Mr.Philander.

"No, my dear old friend," said Professor Porter."We may not all go.It would be cruelly wicked to leave poor Esmeralda here alone, and three of us would be no more successful than one.

"There be enough dead things in the cruel forest as it is.

Come--let us try to sleep a little."