Chapter XX:
Lucretia's Rescue

ALPHA was very fatigued, as he had paddled all night, and had just felt safe to land. As soon as he drew near the landing and lifted Lucretia in his arms, Yanga and the women leaped upon him with loud screams. The women scratched and pommelled him while Yanga secured Lucretia and fled into the village. The fisherwomen threw their nets over his head, ducked him into the water and had the time of their lives, laughing at the half drowned figure with the mud bespattered gown clinging to his body.

Yanga sought the protection of the king's favorite wife whose good will she enjoyed.

Alpha soon decided that the town was too hot for his presence and resumed his journey on foot.

Eva and Zina wandered in their fruitless search until Eva was almost compelled to believe that Lucretia had really been sacrificed, still her mother's heart held hope and she continued her search.

They reached a village whose people received them kindly and she decided to rest a few days. In the meantime Alpha arrived at the same town on the next day. As soon as he heard of the white woman stranger in the town, he determined not to be foiled in his revenge.

So approaching the King, he said: "I was sent from a far country by the spirit of great Pompora (one of the great war ancestors) to bring to you the tidings that a woman of white skin, red hair, and eyes like the sky, would be sent to you to receive a message for him; that when she bears the message he will aid you in carrying war against your old enemy and make you victorious."

"You speak the truth, oh messenger of Pomopora. A woman as you described arrived at this town," was the reply.

Alpha left and saw that Eva was secured while he caught Zina and sold her to a passing caravan.

In a dark forest a dozen men squatted around a fire over which was a large earthen pot.

Two men standing were garbed in leopard hides, with wooden shoes upon their feet made in the shape of the leopard's claw.

In the right hand they held pronged knives in claw shape.

"We will have a new kind of messenger to-night. I wonder if this white skin woman can take the message to Pomopora in our language," one of the men said aloud in their tongue.

"Oh, don't bother about that; the priest says she must be the messenger."

"When the moon has gone we must be at the road to the spring," one of the leopard robed men replied.

Varnee happened to be passing through the woods when he saw the fire and men. He recognized he had come upon a meeting of the leopard branch of the Boreform society. He was so overcome with fright that he stood hidden behind a tree afraid to move.

He overheard the conversation referring to their prospective victim. He decided that it was Eva to whom they referred, so he made a quick retreat and ran to secure her rescue.

The leopard men paid no heed to the running footsteps, because they thought it was only a frightened antelope.

At midnight Eva was bound hand and foot and carried to the outskirts of the town and laid upon the ground at the beginning of the narrow pathway leading to the spring.

A priest marked a heart enclosed in a circle upon her forehead with a piece of charcoal. After a few weird antics and dancing the procession retired.

The two leopard men approached with loud growls after the party had disappeared. One of the men was leaping toward Eva with the raised leopard knife, when Varnee sent a bullet to his heart. As soon as the report sounded the other leopard man took to his heels, leaving his companion.

Varnee quickly cut away the cords from Eva. Lifting her up in his arms he said: "This be Varnee, no fear, try be strong heah, me go sabe you."

He reached a place in the woods where he had secured two large ostriches. He seated Eva upon the soft saddle and placed her feet in the stirrups he had hastily constructed and which nearly caused a fatal delay.

He instructed her how to hold on to a rope which he bound around his waist as he quickly seated himself upon the foremost bird and began their almost winged flight just as the inhabitants became aware of the escape.

The caravan which was purchased by Zina made an average of forty miles per day for fifteen days over a much traversed route leading S.S.W.

They finally reached the frontier of the Ashanti country after travelling a little over seven hundred miles.