The Secret Mountain

Pilescu and Ra

“Well, the way in may be by means of a moving rock,” said Ra

They were all sitting down at the foot of the tree, eating a meal, for they were hungry and tired. It was hot in the valley, even in the shade of the trees. The calls of the birds, the hum of insects and the chattering of monkeys sounded all the time. The sun was sinking low, and Pilescu made up his mind that they must all camp where they were for the night, He glanced up at the enormous branches of the tree they were under, and wondered if, by spreading out the rugs in a big fork halfway up, the children could sleep there safely.

“I don’t like letting the children sleep on the ground tonight,” he said to Ra

Ra

“Oh, we can easily prevent that,” said Pilescu. “We can tie them on with those creeper-ropes.”

The two men had been talking to one another in their own language, and only Paul understood. He listened with delight.

“We’re going to sleep up in a tree!” he told the others, who listened in astonishment. “We daren’t light a fire tonight, you see.”

“Golly! How exciting!” said Mike. “I really don’t think anyone could have had such a lot of thrills in a short time as we’ve had this week!”

Pilescu made the children climb the tree whilst it was still daylight. Halfway up the branches forked widely, spreading out almost straight, and there was a kind of rough platform. Pilescu stuffed the spaces between the branches with creepers, twigs and some enormous leaves that he pulled from another tree. Then he spread out half the rugs, and told the children to settle down.

They spread themselves on the rugs, joyful to think they were to spend a whole night in a tree. Some monkeys, who had been watching from the next tree, set up a great chattering when they saw the children settling down.

“They think you are their cousins from a far-off land,” said Pilescu with a broad grin. “They’re not far wrong, either. Now lie still whilst I cover you with these other rugs, and then I’m going to tie you firmly to the branches.”

“Oh, Pilescu — we’re too hot to be covered!” cried Paul, pushing away the rug.

“It will be very chilly in the early morning,” said Pilescu. “Very well — leave the rug half off now, and pull it on again later.”

Pilescu and Ra

But her eyes were very heavy, and although she listened for a while to the enormously loud voices of some giant frogs in the nearby marsh, and the curious call of a bird that seemed to say, “Do do it, do do it,” over and over again, she was soon as fast asleep as the others.

As usual, Ra

Pilescu was very wide awake. He sat with his gun in his hand watching for any movement or sound nearby that might mean an enemy of some kind. He, too, heard the frogs, and the bird crying “Do do it, do do it.” He heard the trumpeting of far-off elephants, the roar of some big forest cat, maybe a leopard, and the stir of the wind in the branches of the trees.

And then, towards dawn, he heard something and saw something that was not bird or animal. Something or someone was creeping between the bushes, very slowly, very carefully. Pilescu stiffened, and took hold of his gun firmly. Could it be any of the Folk of the Secret Mountain?

The Something came nearer, and Pilescu put out a hand and shook Ra

“There’s something strange over there,” whispered Pilescu. “I can only see a shadow moving. Do you suppose it’s a scout sent out by the Mountain Folk?”

Ra

“I’ll slip behind that bush and pounce on whatever it is,” whispered Ra

So big Ra

He pounced on it — and there came a terrified yell, and a shrill voice that cried out something that sounded like “Yakka, longa, yakka, longa!”

Ra

“Mafumu!”

Yes — it was Mafumu. Poor Mafumu, crawling painfully along the bushes, searching for the friends he had left the day before.

“Mafumu! What has happened?” asked Ra

“I went back a long way with my uncle, but he was unkind to me, and he told me he would give me to the first crocodile he saw in a river. So I ran away from him to come back to my new friends. And a big thorn went into my foot — see — so I could not walk, I could only crawl.”

The poor little boy was so tired, and in such pain that tears fell out of his eyes. As dawn came stealing over the countryside, big Ra

But comfortable though he was in Ra

So up the tree he climbed, and was soon snuggled down beside Jack, who did not even wake when the boy lay almost on top of him.

“Mafumu may be helpful to us,” said Pilescu to Ra

In the morning, what loud cries of amazement came from the tree above, when the children awoke and found Mafumu with them!

“Mafumu!”

“How did you get here, Mafumu?”

“Mafumu, get off me, I can’t move!”

“Mafumu, what have you done to your foot?”

Mafumu sat up on Jack’s legs and gri

“Me back,” he said, proud that he could say some English words with the right meaning. “Me back.” Then he went off into his usual gibberish.

“Hallo, goodnight, shutup, what’s the matter!”

Everyone laughed. Jack punched him on the back in a friendly ma

And Jack was right, as we shall soon see!