Noah was our godfather, and he pitched and caulked a ship
'With stable-room for two of each and fodder for the trip,
Lest when the Flood made sea of earth the animals should die;
And two by two he stalled us till the wrath of God was by.
But who in the name of the Pentateuch can the paleface people be
Who ha' done on the plains of Africa more than he did at sea?
A million hoofs once drummed the dust (Kongoni led the way!)
From river-pool to desert-lick we thundered in array
Until the dark-skin people came with tube and smoke and shot,
Hunting and driving and killing, and leaving the meat to rot.
And we didn't know who the hunters were, but we saw the herds grow thin
That used to drum the dust-clouds up with thousand-footed din.
We were few when the paleface people came--scattered and few and afraid.
Fewer were they, but they brought the law, and the dark-skin men obeyed.
The paleface people drew a line that none by dark or day
Might cross with fell intent to hunt--capture or drive or slay.
But who can the paleface people be with red-meat appetites
Who ruled anew what Noah knew--that animals have rights?
And now in the Athi Game Reserve--in a million-acre park
A million creatures graze who went by twos into the Ark.
We sleep o' nights without alarm (Kongoni, prick your ear!)
And barring the leopard and lion to watch, and ticks, we've nought
to fear,
Zebra, giraffe and waterbuck, rhino and ostrich too--
But who can the paleface people be who know what Noah knew?
The lions awoke us a little before dawn as the proprietor had promised.
They seemed to have had bad hunting, for their boastfulness was gone.
They came in twos and threes, snarling, only roaring intermittently--in
a hurry because the hated daylight would presently reverse conditions
and put them at disadvantage.
I grew restless and got up. The air being chilly, I put my clothes on
and sat for a while by the window. So it happened I caught sight of
Hassan, very much afraid of lions, but obviously more afraid of being
seen from the hotel windows. He was sneaking along as close to the
house as he could squeeze, his head just visible above the veranda rail.
For no better reason than that I was curious and unoccupied, I slipped
out of the house and followed him.
Once clear of the hotel he seemed to imagine himself safe, for without
another glance backward he ran up-street in the direction of the
bazaar. I followed him down the bazaar--a short street of corrugated
iron buildings--and out the other end. Being fat, he could not run
fast, although his wind held out surprisingly. If he saw me at all he
must have mistaken me for a settler or one of the Nairobi officials,
for he seemed perfectly sure of himself and took no pains whatever now
to throw pursuers off the track.
It soon became evident that he was making for an imposing group of
tents on the outskirts of the town. As he drew nearer he approached
more slowly.
It now became my turn to take precautions. There was no chance of
concealment where I was--nothing but open level ground between me and
the tents. But now that I knew Hassan's destination, I could afford to
let him out of sight for a minute; so I turned my back on him, walked
to where a sort of fold in the ground enabled me to get down unseen
into a shallow nullah, and went along that at right angles to Hassan's
course until I reached the edge of some open jungle, about half a mile
from the tents. I noticed that it came to an end at a spot about three
hundred yards to the rear of the tents, so I worked my way along its
outer edge, and so approached the encampment from behind.
I had brought a rifle with me, not that I expected to shoot anything,
but because the lion incident of the previous afternoon had taught me
caution. It had not entered my head that in that country a strange
white man without a rifle might have been regarded as a member of the
mean white class; nor that anybody would question my right to carry a
rifle, for that matter.
The camp was awake now. There were ten tents, all facing one way. Two
of them contained stores. The central round tent with an awning in
front was obviously a white man's. One tent housed a mule, and the
rest were for native servants and porters. The camp was tidy and
clean--obviously belonging to some one of importance. Fires were
alight. Breakfast was being cooked, and smelled most uncommonly
appetizing in that chill morning air. Boys were already cleaning
boots, and a saddle, and other things. There was an air of discipline
and trained activity, and from the central tent came the sound of
voices.
I don't know why, but I certainly did not expect to hear English. So
the sound of English spoken with a foreign accent brought me to a
standstill. I listened to a few words, and made no further bones about
eavesdropping. Circumstances favored me. The boys had seen I was
carrying a rifle and was therefore a white man of importance, so they
did not question my right to approach. The tent with the mule in it
and the two store tents were on the right, pitched in a triangle. I
passed between them up to the very pegs of the central tent from which
the voices came, and discovered I was invisible, unless some one should
happen to come around a corner. I decided to take my chance of that.
The first thing that puzzled me was why a German (for it was a
perfectly unmistakable German accent) should need to talk English to a
native who was certainly familiar with both Arabic and Kiswahili. When
I heard the German addressed as Bwana Schillingschen I wondered still
more, for from all accounts that individual could speak more native
tongues than most people knew existed. It did not occur to me at the
time that if he wished not to be understood by his own crowd of boys he
must either speak German or English, and that Hassan would almost
certainly know no German.
"A good thing you came to me!" I heard. The accent was clumsy for a
man so well versed in tongues. "Yes, I will give you money at the
right time. Tell me no lies now! There will be letters coming from
people you never saw, and I shall know whether or not you lie to me!
You say there are three of the fools?"
"Yes, bwana. There were four, but one going home--big lord gentleman,
him having black m'stache, gone home."
There was no mistaking Hassan's voice. No doubt he could speak his
mother tongue softly enough, but in common with a host of other people
he seemed to imagine that to make himself understood in English he must
shout.
"Why did he go home?"
"I don't know, bwana."
"Did they quarrel?"
"Sijui."* [* Sijui, I don't know: the most aggravating word In
Africa, except perhaps bado kidogo, which means "presently," "bye and
bye," "in a little while."
"Don't you dare say 'sijui' to me!"
"Maybe they quarrel, maybe not. They all quarreling with Lady
Saffunwardo--staying in same hotel, Tippoo Tib one time his house--she
wanting maybe go with him to London. He saying no. Others saying no.
All very angry each with other an' throwing bwana masikini, Greek man,
down hotel stairs."
"What had he to do with it?"
"Two Greek man an' one Goa all after ivory, too. She--Lady Saffunwardo
afterwards promising pay them three if they come along an' do what she
tell 'em. They agreeing quick! Byumby Tippoo Tib hearing bazaar talk
an' sending me along too. She refuse to take me, all because German
consul man knowing me formerly and not making good report, but Greek
bwana he not caring and say to me to come along. Greek people very
bad! No food--no money--nothing but swear an' kick an' call bad
names--an' drunk nearly all the time!"
"What makes you think these three men know where the ivory is?" said
the German voice. It was the voice of a man very used to questioning
natives--self-assertive but calm--going straight each time to the point.
"They having map. Map having marks on it."
"How do you know?"
"She--Lady Saffunwardo go in their bedroom, stealing it last night."
"Did you see her take it?"
"Yes, bwana."
"Did you see the marks on it?"
"No, bwana."
"Then how do you know the marks were on it? Now, remember, don't lie
to me!"
"Coutlass, him Greek man, standing on stairs keeping watch. Them three
men you call fools all sitting in dining-room waiting because they
thinking she come presently. She send maid to their room. Maid, fool
woman, upset everything, finding nothing. 'No,' she say, 'no map--no
money--no anything in here.' An' Lady Saffunwardo she very angry an'
say, 'Come out o' there! Let me look!' And Lady Saffunwardo going in,
but maid not coming out, an' they both search. Then Lady Saffanwardo
saying all at once, 'Here it is. Didn't you see this?' An' the maid
answering, 'Oh, that! That nothing but just ordinary pocket map! That
not it!' But Lady Saffunwardo she opening the map, an' make little
scream, an' say, 'Idiot! This is it! Look! See! See the marks!'
So, bwana, I then knowing must be marks on map!"
"Good. What did she do with it?"
"Sujui."
"I told you not to dare say 'sijui' to me!"
"How should I know, bwana, what she doing with it?"
"Could you steal it?"
"No, bwana!"
"Why not?"
"You not knowing that woman! No man daring steal from her! She very
terrible!"
"If I offered you a hundred rupees could you steal it?"
"Sujui, bwana."
"I told you not to use that word!"
"Bwana, I--"
"Could you steal it?"
"Maybe."
"That is no answer!"
"Say that again about hundred rupees!"
"I will give you a hundred rupees if you bring me that map and it
proves to be what you say."
"I go. I see. I try. Hundred rupees very little money!"
"It's all you'll get, you black rascal! And you know what you'll get
if you fail! You know me, don't you? You understand my way? Steal
that map and bring it here, and I shall give you a hundred rupees.
Fail, and you shall have a hundred lashes, and what Ahmed and Abdullah
and Seydi got in addition! The hundred lashes first, and the ant-hill
afterward! You're not fool enough to think you can escape me, I
suppose?"
"No, bwana."
"Then go and get the map!"
"But afterward, what then? She very gali* woman." [*Gali, same as
Hindustani kali--cruel, hard, fierce, terrible.]
"Nonsense! Steal the map and bring it here to me. Then I've other
work for you. Are you a renegade Muhammedan?"
"No, bwana! No, no! Never! I'm good Moslem."
"Very well. Back to your old business with you! Preach Islam up and
down the country. Go and tell all the tribes in British territory that
the Germans are coming soon to establish an empire of Islam in Africa!
Good pay and easy living! Does that suit you?"
"Yes, bwana. How much pay?"
"I'll tell you when you bring the map. Now be going!"
Hassan went, after a deal of polite salaaming. Then boys began
bringing the German's breakfast, and unless I chose to confess myself
an eavesdropper it became my business to be in the tent ahead of them.
So I strode forward as if just arrived and purposely tripped over a
tent-rope, stumbling under the awning with a laugh and an apology.
"Who are you?" demanded the German without rising. He had the splay
shovel beard described to us in Zanzibar--big dark man, sitting in the
doorway of a tent all hung with guns, skins and antlers. He was in
night-shirt and trousers--bare feet--but with a helmet on the back of
his head.
"A visitor," I answered, "staying at the hotel--out for a morning shot
at something--had no luck--got nothing--saw your tents in the distance,
and came out of curiosity to find out who you are."
"My name is Professor Schillingschen," he answered, still without
getting up. There was no other chair near the awning, so I had to
remain standing. I told him my name, hoping that Hassan had either not
done so already, or else that he might have so bungled the
pronunciation as to make it unrecognizable. I detected no sign of
recognition on Schillingschen's face.
The boys reached the tent with his breakfast, and one of them dragged a
chair from inside the tent for me. I sat down on it without waiting
for the professor to invite me.
"I'm tired," I said, untruthfully, minded to refuse an invitation to
eat, but interested to see whether he would invite me or not.
"Have you any friends at the hotel?" he asked, looking up at me darkly
under the bushiest eyebrows I ever saw.
"I've got friends wherever I go," I answered. "I make friends."
"Are you going far?" he demanded, holding out a foot for his boy to
pull a stocking on.
"That depends," I said.
"On what?"
"On whether I get employment."
I said that at random, without pausing to think what impression I might
create. He pulled the night-shirt off over his head, throwing the
helmet to the ground, and sat like a great hairy gorilla for the boy to
hang day-clothes on him. He had the hairiest breast and arms I ever
saw, hung with lumpy muscles that heightened his resemblance to an ape.
"I might give you work," he said presently, beginning to eat before the
boy had finished dressing him.
"I want to travel" I said. "If I could find a job that would take me
up and down the length and breadth of this land, that would suit me
finely."
"That is the kind of a man I want," he said, eying me keenly. "I have
a German, but I need an Englishman. Do you speak native languages?"
"Scarcely a word."
To my surprise he nodded approval at that answer.
"I have parties of natives traveling all over the country gathering
folk lore, and ethnographical particulars, but they get into a village
and sit down for whole weeks at a time, drawing pay for doing nothing.
I need an Englishman to go with them and keep them moving."
"All well and good," I said, "but I understand the government is not in
favor of white men traveling about at random."
"But I am known to the government," he answered. "I have been accorded
facilities because of my professional standing. Have you references
you can give me?"
"No," I said. "No references."
I thought that would stump him, but on the contrary he looked rather
pleased.
"That is good. References are too frequently evidence of back-stairs
influence."
All this while he kept eying me between mouthfuls. Whenever I seemed
to look away his eyes fairly burned holes in me. Whenever food got in
his beard (which was frequently) be used the napkin more as a shield
behind which to take stock of me than as a means of getting clean
again. By the time his breakfast was finished his beard was a beastly
mess, but he probably had my features from every angle fixed indelibly
in his memory. The sensation was that I had been analyzed and card
indexed.
"I pay good wages," he remarked, and then stuck his face, beard and
all, into the basin of warm water his boy had brought. "Where did you
get that rifle?" he demanded, spluttering, and combing the beard out
with his fingers.
It was on the tip of my tongue to say "At Zanzibar," but, as that might
have started him on a string of questions as to how I came to that
place and whom I knew there, I temporized.
"Oh, I bought it from a man."
"That is no answer!" he retorted.
If I had been possessed of much inclination to play deep games and
match wits with big rascals I suppose I would have answered him civilly
and there and then learned more of his purpose. But I was not
prepossessed by his charms or respectful of his claim to superiority.
The German type super-education never did impress me as compatible with
good breeding or good sense, and it annoyed me to have to lie to him.
"It's all the answer you'll get!" I said.
"Where is your license for it?" he growled.
The game began to amuse me.
"None of your business!" I answered.
"How long have you been in the country!"
"Since I came," I said.
"And you have no license! You have been out shooting. A lucky thing
you came to my camp and not to some other man's! The game laws are
very strict!"
He spoke then to a boy who was standing behind me, giving him very
careful directions in a language of which I did not know one word. The
boy went away.
"The last man who went shooting near Nairobi without a license," he
said, "tried to excuse himself before the magistrate by claiming
ignorance of the law. He was fined a thousand rupees and sentenced to
six months in jail!"
"Very severe!" I said.
"They are altogether too severe," he answered. "I hope you have killed
nothing. It is good you came first to me. You would better stand that
rifle over here in the corner of my tent. To walk back to the hotel
with it over your shoulder would be dangerous."
"I've taken bigger chances than that," said I.
"If you have shot nothing, then it is not so serious," he said,
disappearing behind a curtain into the recesses of his tent.
He stayed in there for about ten minutes. I had about made up my mind
to walk away when four of his boys approached the tent from behind, and
one of them cried "Hodi!" The boy to whom he had given directions
across my shoulder was not among them.
They threw the buck down near my feet, and he came out from the gloomy
interior and stared at it. He asked them questions rapidly in the
native tongue, and they answered, pointing at me.
"They say you shot it," he told me, stroking his great beard
alternately with either hand.
"Then they lie!" I answered.
"Let me see that rifle!" he said, reaching out an enormous freckled
fist to take it.
I saw through his game at last. It would have been the easiest thing
in the world to extract a cartridge from the clip in the magazine and
claim afterward that I had fired it away. Evidently he proposed to get
me in his power, though for just what reason he was so determined to
make use of me rather than any one else was not so clear.
"So I shot the buck, did I?" I asked.
"Those four natives say they saw you shoot it."
"Then it's mine?"
He nodded.
"It's heavy," I said, "but I expect I can carry it."
I took the buck by the hind legs and swung myself under it. It weighed
more than a hundred pounds, but the African climate had not had time
enough to sap my strength or destroy sheer pleasure in muscular effort.
"What's mine's my own!" I laughed. "You gave me something to eat after
all! Good day, and good riddance!"
The boys tried to prevent my carrying the buck away.
"Come back!" growled the professor. "I will take responsibility for
that buck and save you from punishment. Bring it back! Lay it down!"
But I continued to walk away, so he ordered his boys to take the
carcass from me. I laid it down and threatened them with my butt end.
He brought his own rifle out and threatened me with that. I laughed at
him, bade him shoot if he dared, offered him three shots for a penny,
and ended by shouldering the buck again and walking off.
Meat was cheap in Nairobi in those days, so the owner of the hotel was
not so delighted as I expected. He reprimanded me for being late for
breakfast, and told me I was lucky to get any. Fred and Will had
waited for me, and while we ate alone and I told them the story of my
morning's adventure a police officer in khaki uniform tied up his mule
outside and clattered in.
"Whose buck is that hanging outside the kitchen?" he demanded.
"There's some doubt about it," I said. "I've been accused of being the
owner."
"Then you're the man I want. The court sits at nine. You'd better be
there, or you'll be fetched!"
He placed in my hand what proved to be a summons to appear before the
district court that morning on the charge of carrying an unregistered
rifle and shooting game without a license. Two native policemen he had
with him took down the buck from the hook outside the kitchen door and
carried it off as evidence.
We finished our breakfast in great contentment, and strode off
arm-in-arm to find the court-house, feeling as if we were going to a
play--perhaps a mite indignant, as if the subject of the play were one
we did not quite approve, but perfectly certain of a good time.
The court was crowded. The bearded professor, his four boys, and two
other natives were there, as well as several English officials, all
apparently on very good terms indeed with Schillingschen.
As we entered the court under the eyes of a hostile crowd I heard one
official say to the man standing next him:
"I hope he'll make an example of this case. If he doesn't every new
arrival in this country will try to take the law in his own hands. I
hope he fines him the limit!"
"Give me your hunting-knife, Fred!" said I, and Fred laughed as he
passed it to me. For the moment I think he thought I meant to plunge
it into the too talkative official's breast.
First they called a few township cases. A drunken Muhammedan was fined
five rupees, and a Hindu was ordered to remove his garbage heap before
noon. Three natives were ordered to the chain-gang for a week for
fighting, and a Masai charged with stealing cattle was remanded. Then
my case was called, very solemnly, by a magistrate scarcely any older
than myself.
The police officer acted as prosecutor. He stated that "acting on
information received" he had proceeded to the hotel. Outside of which
he saw a buck hanging (buck produced in evidence); that he had entered
the hotel, found me at breakfast, and that I had not denied having shot
the buck. He called his two colored askaris to prove that, and they
reeled off what they had to say with the speed of men who had been
thoroughly rehearsed. Then he put the German on the stand, and
Schillingschen, with a savage glare at me, turned on his verbal
artillery. He certainly did his worst.
"This morning," he announced, after having been duly sworn on the Book,
"that young man whose name I do not know approached my tent while I was
dressing. The sound of a rifle being fired had awakened me earlier
than usual. He carried a rifle, and I put two and two together and
concluded he had shot something. Not having seen him ever before, and
he standing before my tent, I asked him his name. He refused to tell
me, and that made me suspicious. Then came my four boys carrying a
buck, which they assured me they had seen him shoot. I asked him
whether he had a license to shoot game, and he at once threatened to
shoot me if I did not mind my own business. Therefore, I sent a note
to the police at once."
His four boys were then put on the stand in turn, and told their story
through an interpreter. Their words identical. If the interpreter
spoke truth one account did not vary from the next in the slightest
degree, and that fact alone should have aroused the suspicion of any
unprejudiced judge.
Having the right to cross-examine, I asked each in turn whether the
rifle I had brought with me to court was the same they had seen me
using. They asserted it was. Then I recalled the German and asked him
the same question. He also replied in the affirmative. I asked him
how he knew. He said he recognized the mark on the butt where the
varnish had been chafed away.
Then I handed the hunting knife I had borrowed from to the police
officer and demanded that he have the bullet cut out of the buck's
carcass. The court could not object to that, so under the eyes of at
least fifty witnesses a flattened Mauser bullet was produced. I called
attention to the fact that my rifle was a Lee-Enfield that could not
possibly have fired a Mauser bullet. The court was young and very
dignified--examined the bullet and my rifle--and had to be convinced.
"Very well," was the verdict on that count, "it is proved that you did
not shoot this particular buck, unless the police have evidence that
you used a different rifle."
The policeman confessed that he had no evidence along that line, so the
first charge was dismissed.
"But you are charged," said the magistrate, "with carrying an
unregistered rifle, and shooting without a license."
For answer I produced my certificate of registration and the big game
license we had paid for in Mombasa.
"Why didn't you say so before?" demanded the magistrate.
"I wasn't asked," said I.
"Case dismissed!" snapped his honor, and the court began to empty.
"Don't let it stop there!" urged Will excitedly. "That Heinie and his
boys have all committed perjury; charge them with it!"