Page:Richard Marsh--The joss, a reversion.djvu/271

Rh we had left behind. Actual peril there appeared to be none. No one seemed cognisant of what was going on, or seemed to care. If the temple itself had been portable, we might have carried it away entire; the result apparently would have been the same.

Thinking such thoughts I watched Luke and Rudd go swinging down the slope in the moonlight. I almost suspected them of intentional awkwardness; they treated that palanquin to such a continuous shaking. Its occupant must have been gripping the sides with his huge hands, or surely he would have been dislodged and shot on to the ground. With a stream of adjectives he enlivened the proceedings.

“Small blame to him,” said I to myself. “If jolting’s good for the liver, as I’ve heard, he’ll have had a good dose of the medicine before he’s through. If swearing ’ll make it easier, for the Lord’s sake let him swear.”

And he swore. And right in the middle of about as full flavoured a string of observations as I had ever heard there arose a wild cry from the forest behind us. In a second the Joss’ head appeared between the curtains.

“Quick! quick! It’s the devils—the devils!”

It needed no urging from me—or from him either—to induce everyone concerned to quicken his pace. On a sudden the forest where, a moment back, had reigned the silence of the grave, was now alive with shouts and noises. People were shrieking. What sounded like drums were being banged. Guns were being fired. The Great Joss’ absence was discovered. Possibly the absence of a good deal of valuable property had been discovered too. The alarm was being given. The priests—those pious souls who had burned the girl’s mother alive as a reward for having borne the Great Joss a child!—were warning the country far and wide of what had happened. In a few minutes the whole countryside would be upon us.