"I will find this tail," he said stoutly, and went forth to his hunting,
discouraged by the knowledge that the white antelope is seen once in the
year, and then by chance.
Now this woman, although counted cold by many former suitors, and
indubitably discovered so by her husband, had one lover who was of her
people, and when the seeker of white antelope tails had departed she
sent a message to the young man.
That evening Sanders was "tied up" five miles from the village, and was
watching the sun sinking in the swamp which lay south and west of the
anchorage, when N'mika came down river in his canoe, intent on his
quest, but not so intent that he could pass his lord without giving him
due obeisance.
"Ho, N'mika!" said Sanders, leaning over the rail of the boat, and
looking down kindly at the solemn figure in the canoe, "men up and down
the river speak of you as the wonderful lover."
"That is true, lord," said N'mika simply; "for, although I paid two
thousand matakos for this woman, I think she is worth more rods than
have ever been counted."
Sanders nodded, eyeing him thoughtfully, for he suspected the unusual
whenever women came into the picture, and was open to the conviction
that the man was mad.
"I go now, lord, to serve her," N'mika said, and he played with one of
the paddles with some embarrassment; "for my wife desires a tail of a
white antelope, and there is no antelope nearer than the N'gombi
country--and white antelopes are very little seen."
Sanders's eyebrows rose.
"For many months," continued N'mika, "I must seek my beautiful white
swish; but I am pleased, finding happiness in weariness because I serve
her."
Sanders made a sign, and the man clambered on deck.
"You have a powerful ju-ju," he said, when N'mika stood before him, "for
I will save you all weariness and privation. Three days since I shot a
white antelope on the edge of the Mourning Pools, and you shall be given
its tail."
Into the hands of the waiting man he placed the precious trophy, and
N'mika sighed happily.
"Lord," he said simply, "you are as a god to me--and have been for all
time; for you found me, and named me the 'Child of Sacrifice,' and I
hope, my fine master, to give my life in your service. This would be a
good end for me."
"This is a little thing, N'mika," said Sanders gently; "but I give you
now a greater thing, which is a word of wisdom. Do not give all your
heart to one woman, lest she squeeze it till you are dead."
"That also would be a great end," said N'mika and went his way.
It was a sad way, for it led to knowledge.
Sanders was coming up the river at his leisure. Two days ahead of him
had gone a canoe, swiftly paddled, to summon to the place of snakes,
near the elephants' ground where three small rivers meet (it was
necessary to be very explicit in a country which abounded in elephants'
playgrounds and haunts of snakes, and was, moreover, watered by
innumerable rivers), a palaver of the chiefs of his land.
To the palaver in the snake-place came the chiefs, high and puisne, the
headmen, great and small, in their various states. Some arrived in war
canoes, with _lokali_ shrilling, announcing the dignity and pride of the
lazy figure in the stern. Some came in patched canoes that leaked
continually. Some tramped long journeys through the forest--Isisi,
Ochori, Akasava, Little N'gombi and Greater Isisi. Even the shy bushmen
came sneaking down the river, giving a wide berth to all other peoples,
and grasping in their delicate hands spears and arrows which, as a
precautionary measure, had been poisoned with tetanus.
Egili of the Akasava, Tombolo of the Isisi, N'rambara of the N'gombi,
and, last but not least, Bosambo of the Ochori, came, the last named
being splendid to behold; for he had a robe of green velvet, sent to him
from the Coast, and about his neck, suspended by a chain, jewelled at
intervals with Parisian diamonds, was a large gold-plated watch, with a
blue enamel dial, which he consulted from time to time with marked
insolence.
They sat upon their carved stools about the Commissioner, and he told
them many things which they knew, and some which they had hoped he did
not know.
"Now, I tell you," said Sanders, "I call you together because there is
peace in the land, and no man's hand is against his brother's, and thus
it has been for nearly twelve moons, and behold! you all grow rich and
fat."
"Kwai!" murmured the chiefs approvingly.
"Therefore," said Sanders, "I have spoken a good word to Government for
you, and Government is pleased; also my King and yours has sent you a
token of his love, which he has made with great mystery and
intelligence, that you may see him always with you, watching you."
He had brought half a hundred oleographs of His Majesty from the
headquarters, and these he had solemnly distributed. It was a
head-and-shoulder photograph of the King lighting a cigarette, and had
been distributed gratis with an English Christmas number.
"Now all people see! For peace is a beautiful thing, and men may lie
down in their huts and fear nothing of their using. Also, they may go
out to their hunting and fear nothing as to their return, for their
wives will be waiting with food in their hands."
"Lord," said a little chief of the N'gombi, "even I, a blind and
ignorant man, see all this. Now, I swear by death that I will hold the
King's peace in my two hands, offending none; for though my village is a
small one, I have influence, owing to my wife's own brother, by the same
father and of the same mother, being the high chief of the
N'gombi-by-the-River."
"Lord Sandi," said Bosambo, and all eyes were fixed upon a chief so
brave and so gallantly arrayed, who was, moreover, by all understanding,
related too nearly to Sandi for the Commissioner's ease. "Lord Sandi,"
said Bosambo, "that I am your faithful slave all men know. Some have
spoken evilly of me, but, lo! where are they? They are in hell, as your
lordship knows, for we were both Christians before I learnt the true way
and worshipped God and the Prophet. Nevertheless, lord, Mussulman and
Christian are one alike in this, that they have a very terrible hell to
which their enemies go----"
"Bosambo," said Sanders interrupting, "your voice is pleasant, and like
the falling of rain after drought, yet I am a busy man, and there are
many to speak."
Bosambo inclined his head gravely. The conference looked at him now in
awe, for he had earned an admonition from Sandi, and still lived--nay!
still preserved his dignity.
"Lord," said Bosambo. "I speak no more now, for, as you say, we have
many private palavers, where much is said which no man knows; therefore
it is unseemly to stand between other great speakers and your honour."
He sat down.
"You speak truly, Bosambo," said Sanders calmly. "Often we speak in
private, you and I, for when I speak harshly to chiefs it is thus--in
the secrecy of their huts that I talk, lest I put shame upon them in the
eyes of their people."
"O, ko!" said the dismayed Bosambo under his breath, for he saw the good
impression his cryptic utterance had wrought wearing off with some
rapidity.
After the palaver had dispersed, a weary Sanders made his way to the
_Zaire_. A bath freshened him, and he came out to a wire-screened patch
of deck to his dinner with some zest. A chicken of microscopic
proportions had been the main dish every night for months.
He ate his meal in solitude, a book propped up against a bottle before
him, a steaming cup of tea at one elbow, and a little electric hand-lamp
at the other.
He was worried. For nine months he had kept a regiment of the Ochori on
the Isisi border prepared for any eventualities. This regiment had been
withdrawn. Sanders had an uncomfortable feeling that he had made a bad
mistake. It would take three weeks to police the border again.
Long after the meal had been cleared away he sat thinking, and then a
familiar voice, speaking with Abiboo on the lower deck, aroused him.
He turned to the immobile Houssa orderly who squatted outside the fly
wire.
"If that voice is the voice of the chief Bosambo, bring him to me."
A minute later Bosambo came, standing before the meshed door of the
fly-proof enclosure.
"Enter, Bosambo," said Sanders, and when he had done so: "Bosambo," he
said, "you are a wise man, though somewhat boastful. Yet I have some
faith in your judgment. Now you have heard all manner of people
speaking before me, and you know that there is peace in this land. Tell
me, by your head and your love, what things are there which may split
this friendship between man and man?"
"Lord," said Bosambo, preparing to orate at length, "I know of two
things which may bring war, and the one is land and such high matters as
fishing rights and hunting grounds, and the other is women. And, lord,
since women live and are born to this world every hour of the day,
faster--as it seems to me--than they die, there will always be voices to
call spears from the roof."
Sanders nodded. "And now?" he asked.
Bosambo looked at him swiftly. "Lord," he said suavely, "all men live
in peace, as your lordship has said this day, and we love one another
too well to break the King's peace. Yet we keep a regiment of my Ochori
on the Akasava border to keep the peace."
"And now?" said Sanders again, more softly.
Bosambo shifted uncomfortably. "I am your man," he said, "I have eaten
your salt, and have shown you by various heroic deeds, and by terrible
fighting, how much I love you, lord Sandi."
"Yet," said Sanders, speaking rather to the swaying electric bulb
hanging from the awning, "and yet I did not see the chief of the little
Isisi at my palaver."
Bosambo was silent for a moment. Then he heaved a deep sigh.
"Lord," he said, with reluctant admiration, "you have eyes all over your
body. You can see the words of men before they are uttered, and are
very quick to read thoughts. You are all eyes," he went on
extravagantly, "you have eyes on the top of your head and behind your
ears. You have eyes----"
"That will do," said Sanders quietly. "I think that will do, Bosambo."
There was another long pause.
"And I tell you this, because there are no secrets between you and me.
It was I who persuaded the little chief not to come."
Sanders nodded. "That I know," he said.
"For, lord, I desired that this should be a very pleasant day for your
lordship, and that you should go away with your heart filled with
gladness, singing great songs; also, as your lordship knows, the Ochori
guard has left the Akasava border."
There was no mistaking the significance.
"Why should Bimebibi make me otherwise?" asked Sanders, ignoring the
addition.
"Lord," said Bosambo loftily, "I am, as you know, of the true faith,
believing neither in devils nor spells, save those which are prescribed
by the blessed Prophet, it is well known that Bimebibi is a friend of
ghosts, and has the eye which withers and kills. Therefore, lord, he is
an evil man, and all the chiefs and peoples of this land are for
chopping him--all save the people of the Lesser Isisi, who greatly love
him."
Again Sanders nodded.
The Lesser Isisi were the fighting Isisi; they held the land between the
Ochori and the Akasava, and were fierce men in some moments, though
gentle enough in others. Yet he had had no word from N'mika that
trouble was brewing. This was strange. Sanders sat in thought for the
greater part of ten minutes. Then he spoke.
"War is very terrible," he said, "for if one mad man comes up against
five men who are not mad, behold! they become all mad together. I tell
you this, Bosambo, if you do well for me in this matter, I will pay you
beyond your dreams."
"How can a man do well?" asked Bosambo.
"He shall hold this war," said Sanders.
Bosambo raised his right arm stiffly.
"This I would do, lord," he said gravely; "but it is not for me, for
Bimebibi will cross with the Akasava just as soon as he knows that the
Ochori do not hold the border."
"He must never know until I bring my soldiers," said Sanders; "and none
can tell him." He looked up quietly, and met the chief's eye. "And
none can tell him?" he challenged.
Bosambo shook his head. "N'mika sits in his village, lord," said he;
"and N'mika is a great lover of his wife by all accounts."
Sanders smiled. "If N'mika betrays me," he said, "there is no man in
the world I will ever trust."
* * * * *
N'mika faced his wife. He wore neither frown nor smile, but upon her
face was the terror of death. On a stool in the centre of the hut was
the tail of the white antelope, but to this she gave no attention, for
her mind was busy with the thoughts of terrible reprisals.
They sat in silence; the fire in the centre of the big hut spluttered
and burnt, throwing weird shadows upon the wattle walls.
When N'mika spoke his voice was even and calm.
"Kira, my wife," he said, "you have taken my heart out of me, and left a
stone, for you do not love me."
She licked her dry lips and said nothing.
"Now, I may put you away," he went on, "for the shame you have brought,
and the sorrow, and the loneliness."
She opened her mouth to speak. Twice she tried, but her tongue refused.
Then, again:
"Kill me," she whispered, and kept her staring eyes on his.
N'mika, the Wonderful Lover, shook his head.
"You are a woman, and you have not my strength," he said, half to
himself, "and you are young. I have trusted you, and I am afraid."
She was silent.
If the man, her lover, did what she had told him to do in the frantic
moment when she had been warned of her husband's return, she might have
saved her life--and more.
He read her thoughts in part.
"You shall take no harm from me," he said; "for I love you beyond
understanding; and though I stand on the edge of death for my kindness,
I will do no ill to you."
She sprang up. The fear in her eyes was gone; hate shone there
banefully. He saw the look, and it scorched his very soul--and he
heard.
It was the soft pad-pad of the king's guard, and he turned to greet
Bimebibi's head chief.
His wife would have run to the guard, but N'mika's hand shot out and
held her.
"Take him--take him!" she cried hoarsely "He will kill me--also he plots
against the king, for he is Sandi's man!"
Chekolana, the king's headman, watched her curiously, but no more
dispassionate was the face her husband turned upon her.
"Kira," he said, "though you hate me, I love you. Though I die for this
at the hands of the king, I love you."
She laughed aloud.
She was safe--and N'mika was afraid. Her outstretched finger almost
touched his face.
"Tell this to the king," she cried, "N'mika is Sandi's man, and knows
his heart----"
The headman, Chekolana, made a step forward and peered into N'mika's
face.
"If this is true," he said, "you shall tell Bimebibi all he desires to
know. Say, N'mika, how many men of the Ochori hold the border?"
N'mika laughed.
"Ask Sandi that," he said.
"Lord! lord!"--it was the woman, her eyes blazing--"this I will tell
you, if you put my man away. On the border there is----"
She gasped once and sighed like one grown weary, then she slid down to
the floor of the hut--dead, for N'mika was a quick killer, and his
hunting-knife very sharp.
"Take me to the king," he said, his eyes upon the figure at his feet,
"saying N'mika has slain the woman he loved; N'mika, the Wonderful
Lover; N'mika, the Child of Sacrifice, who loved his wife well, and
loved his high duty best."
No other word spoke N'mika.
They crucified him on a stake before the chief's hut, and there Sanders
found him three days later, Bimebibi explained the circumstances.
"Lord, this man murdered a woman, so I killed him," he said.
He might have saved his breath, for he had need of it.
*CHAPTER XI*
*"THEY"*
In the Akarti country they worshipped many devils, and feared none, save
one strange devil, who was called "Wu," which in our language means
"They."
"Remember this," said Sanders of the River, as he grasped the hand of
Grayson Smith, his assistant.
"I will not forget," said that bright young man; "and, by the way, if
anything happens to me, you might find out how it all came about, and
drop a note to my people--suppressing the beastly details."
Sanders nodded.
"I will make it a pretty story," he said; "and, whatever happens, your
death will be as instantaneous and as painless as my fountain-pen can
make it."
"You're a brick!" said Grayson Smith, and turned to swear volubly in
Swaheli at his headman--for Smith, albeit young, was a great linguist.
Sanders watched the big canoe as it swung into the yellow waters of the
Fasai; watched it until it disappeared round a bank, then sent his
steamer round to the current, and set his course homeward.
To appreciate the full value of the Akartis' independence, and their
immunity from all attack, it must be remembered that the territory
ranged from the Forest-by-the-Waters to the Forest-by-the-Mountains. It
was a stretch of broad, pastoral lands, enclosed by natural defences.
Forest and swamp on the westward kept back the rapacious people of the
Great King, mountain and forest on the south held the Ochori, the
Akasava, and the Isisi.
The boldest of the N'gombi never ventured across the saw-shaped peaks of
the big mountains, even though loot and women were there for the taking.
The king of the Akarti was undisputed lord of vast territories, and he
had ten regiments of a thousand men, and one regiment of women, whom he
called his "Angry Maidens," who drank strong juices, and wrestled like
men.
Since he was king from the Forest-by-the-Mountains to the
Forest-by-the-Waters he was powerful and merciless, and none said "nay"
to N'raki's "yea," for he was too fierce, and too terrible a man to
cross.
Culuka of the Wet Lands once came down into N'raki's territory, and
brought a thousand spears.
Now the Wet Lands are many miles from the city of the king, and the raid
that Culuka planned injured none, for the raided territories were poor
and stony.
But N'raki, the killer, was hurt in his tenderest spot, and he led his
thousands across the swamps to the city of Culuka, and he fought him up
to the stockades and beyond. The city he burnt. The men and children
he slew out of hand. Culuka he crucified before his flaming hut, and,
thereafter, the borders of the killer were immune from attack.
This was a lesson peculiarly poignant, and when the French
Government--for Culuka dwelt in a territory which was nominally under
the tricolour--sent a mission to inquire into the wherefores of the
happening, N'raki cut off the head of the leader, and sent it back with
unprintable messages intended primarily for the governor of French West
Africa, and eventually for the Quai d'Orsay.
N'raki lived, therefore, undisturbed, for the outrage coincided with the
findings of the Demarcation Commission which had been sitting for two
years to settle certain border-line questions. By the finding of the
Commission all the Akarti country became, in the twinkling of an eye,
British territory, and N'raki a vassal of the King of England--though he
was sublimely unconscious of the honour.
N'raki was an autocrat of autocrats, and of his many battalions of
skilled fighting men, all very young and strong, with shining limbs and
feathered heads, he was proudest of his first regiment.
These were the tallest, the strongest, the fleetest, and the fiercest of
fighters, and he forbade them to marry, for all men know that women have
an evil effect upon warriors; and no married man is brave until he has
children to defend, and by that time he is fat also.
So this austere regiment knew none of the comforts or languor of love,
and they were proud that their lord, the king, had set them apart from
all other men, and had so distinguished them.
At the games they excelled, because they were stronger and faster,
knowing nothing of women's influence; and the old king saw their
excellence, and said "Wa!"
There was a man of the regiment whose name was Taga'ka, who was a fine
man of twenty. There was also in the king's city a woman of fifteen,
named Lapai, who was a straight, comely girl, and a great dancer.
She was a haughty woman, because her uncle was the chief witch-doctor,
and such was her power that she had put away two husbands.
One day, at the wells, she saw Taga'ka, and loved him; and meeting him
alone in the forest, she fell down before him and clasped his feet.
"Lord Taga'ka," said she, "you are the one man in the world I desire."
"I am beyond desire," said Taga'ka, in his arrogant pride; "for I am of
the king's regiment, and women are grass for our feet."
And not all her allurements could tempt him to so much as stroke her
face; and the heart of the woman was wild with grief.
Then the king fell sick, and daily grew worse.
The witch-doctors made seven sacrifices, and learnt from grisly
portents, which need not be described in detail, that the king should
take a long journey to the far end of his kingdom, where he should meet
a man with one eye, who would live in the shadow of the royal hut.
This he did, journeying for three months, till he came to the appointed
place, where he met a man afflicted in accordance with the prediction.
And the man sat in the shadow of the king's hut.
Now, it is a fact, which none will care to deny, that the niece of the
chief witch-doctor had planned the treatment of the king. She had
planned it with great cleverness, and she it was who saw to it that the
deformed man waited at the king's hut.
For she loved Taga'ka with all the passion of her soul, and when the
long months passed, and the king remained far away, and Lapai whispered
into the young man's ear, he took her to wife, though death would be his
penalty for his wrong-doing.
The other men of the royal regiment, who held Taga'ka a model in all
things austere, seeing this happen, said: "Behold! Taga'ka, the
favourite of the king, has taken a woman to himself. Now, if we all do
this, it would be better for Taga'ka, and better for us. The king, the
old man, will forgive him, and not punish us."
It might have been that N'raki, the king, would have ended his days in
the place to which his medicine-man had sent him, but there arose in
that district a greater magician than any--a certain wild alien of the
Wet Lands, who possessed magical powers, and cured pains in the king's
legs by a no more painful process than the laying on of hands, and whom
the king appointed his chief magician. And this was the end of the
uncle of Lapai; for, if no two kings can rule in one land, most
certainly no two witch-doctors can hold power.
And they killed the deposed uncle of Lapai, and used the blood for
making spells.
One morning the new witch-doctor stood in the presence of N'raki the
king.
"Lord king," he said, "I have had a dream, and it says that your
lordship shall go back to your city, and that you shall travel secretly,
so that the devils who guard the way shall not lay hands upon you."
N'raki, the king, went back to his city unattended, save by his personal
guard, and unheralded, to the discomfort of the royal regiment.
And when he learnt what he learnt, he administered justice swiftly. He
carried the forbidden wives to the top of a high mountain and cast them
over a cliff, one by one, to the number of six hundred.
And that mountain is to this day called "The Mountain of Sorrowful
Women."
One alone he spared--Lapai. Before the assembled people in judgment he
spared her.
"Behold this woman, people of the Akarti!" he said; "she that has
brought sorrow and death to my regiment. To-day she shall watch her
man, Taga'ka, burn; and from henceforth she shall live amongst you to
remind you that I am a very jealous king, and terrible in my anger."
The news of the massacre filtered slowly through the territories. It
came to the British Government, but the British Government is a cautious
Government where primitive natives are concerned.
Sanders, sitting between Downing Street and the District Commissioners
of many far-away and isolated spots, realised the futility of an
expedition. He sent two special messages, one of which was to a young
man named Farquharson, who, at the moment, was shooting snipe on the big
swamp south of the Ambalina Mountains. And this young man swore like a
Scotsman because his sport had been interrupted, but girded up his
loins, and, with half a company of the King's African Rifles, trekked
for the city.
On his way he ran into an ambush, and swore still more, for he realised
that death had overtaken him before he had had his annual holiday.
He called for his orderly.
"Hafiz," he said in Arabic, "if you should escape, cross the country to
the Ochori land by the big river. There you will find Sandi; give him
my dear love, and say that Fagozoni sent a cheerful word, also that the
Slayer of Regiments is killing his people."
An hour later Farquharson, or Fagozoni, as they called him, was lying
before the king, his unseeing eyes staring at the hard, blue heavens,
his lips parted in the very ghost of a smile.
"This is a bad palaver," said the king, looking at the dead man. "Now
they will come, and I know not what will happen."
In his perturbation he omitted to take into his calculations the fact
that he had in his city a thousand men sick with grief at the loss of
their wives.
N'raki, the king, was no coward. There was a prompt smelling out of all
suspicious characters. Even the councillors about his person were not
exempt, for the new witch-doctor found traces of disloyalty in every
one.
With the aid of his regiment of virgins, he held his city, and
ruthlessly disposed of secret critics. These included men who stood at
his very elbow, and there came a time when he found none to whom he
might transmit his thoughts with any feeling of security.
News came to him that there was an Arab caravan traversing his western
border, trading with his people, and the report he received was
flattering to the intelligence and genius of the man in charge of the
party.
N'raki sent messengers with gifts and kind words to the intruder, and on
a certain day there was brought before him the slim Arab, Ussuf.
"O Ussuf," said the king, "I have heard of you, and of your wisdom.
Often you have journeyed through my territories, and no man has done you
hurt."
"Lord king," said the Arab, "that is true."
The king looked at him thoughtfully. N'raki, in those days, had reached
his maturity; he was a wise, cunning man, and had no illusions.
"Arabi," he said, "this is in my mind: that you shall stay here with me,
living in the shadow of my hut, and be my chief man, for you are very
clever, and know the ways of foreign people. You shall have treasures
beyond your dreams, for in this land there is much dead ivory hidden by
the people of my fathers."
"Lord king," said Ussuf, "this is a very great honour, and I am too mean
and small a man to serve you. Yet it is true I know the ways of foreign
people, and I am wise in the government of men."
"This also I say to you," the king went on slowly, "that I do not fear
men or devils, yet I fear 'They,' because of their terrible cruelty.
Now if you will serve me, so that I avert the wrath of these, you shall
sit down here in peace and happiness."
Thus it came about that Ussuf, the Arab, became Prime Minister to the
King of Akarti, and two days after his arrival the new witch-doctor was
put away with promptitude and dispatch by a king who had no further use
for him.
All the news that came from the territories to Sanders was that the
country was being ruled with some wisdom. The fear of "They" was an
ever-present fear with the king. The long evenings he sat with his Arab
counsellor, thinking of that mysterious force which lay beyond the
saw-back.
"I tell you this, Ussuf," he said, "that my heart is like water within
me when I think of 'They,' for it is a terrible devil, and I make
sacrifices at every new moon to appease its anger."
"Lord king," said Ussuf, "I am skilled in the way of 'They,' and I tell
you that they do not love sacrifices."
The king shifted on his stool irritably.
"That is strange," he said, "for the gods told me in a dream that I must
sacrifice Lapai."
He shot a swift glance at the Arab, for this Ussuf was the only man in
the city who did not deal scornfully with the lonely, outcast woman,
whose every day was a hell.
It was the king's order that she should walk through the city twice
between sunrise and sunset, and it was the king's pleasure that every
man she met should execrate her; and although the native memory is
short, and the recollection of the tragedy had died, men feared the king
too much to allow her to pass without a formal curse.
Ussuf alone had walked with her, and men had gasped to see the kindly
Arabi at her side.
"You may have this woman," said the king suddenly, "and take her into
your house."
The Arab turned his calm eyes upon the wizened face of the other.
"Lord," he said, "she is not of my faith, being an unbeliever and an
infidel, and, according to my gods, unworthy."
He was wise to the danger his undiplomatic friendship had brought him.
He knew the reigns of Prime Ministers were invariably short.
He had become less indispensable than he had been, for the king had
regained some of his lost confidence in the loyalty of his people;
moreover, he had aroused suspicion in the Akartis' mind, and that was
fatal.
The king dismissed him, and Ussuf went back to his hut, where his six
Arab followers were.
"Ahmed," he said to one of these, "it is written in the blessed Word
that the life of man is very short. Now I particularly desire that it
shall be no shorter than the days our God has given to me. Be prepared
to-morrow, therefore, to leave this city, for I see an end to my power."
He rose early in the morning, and went to the palaver which began the
day. He was not perturbed to discover the seat usually reserved on the
right of the king occupied by a lesser chief, and his own stool placed
four seats down on the left.
"I have spoken with my wise counsellors," said the king, "also with
witch-doctors, and these wise men have seen that the crops are bad, and
that there is no fortune in this land, and because of this we will make
a great sacrifice."
Ussuf bowed his head.
"Now, I think," said King N'raki slowly, "because I love my people very
dearly, and I will not take any young maidens, as is the custom, for the
fire, and for the killing, that it would be good for all people if I
took the woman Lapai."
All eyes were fixed on Ussuf. His face was calm and motionless.
"Also," the king went on, "I hear terrible things, which fill my stomach
with sorrow."
"Lord, I hear many things also," said Ussuf calmly; "but I am neither
sorry nor glad, for such stories belong to the women at their
cooking-pots and to men who are mad because of sickness."
N'raki made a little face.
"Women or madmen," he said shortly, "they say that you are under the
spell of this woman, and that you are plotting against this land, and
have also sent secret messengers to 'They,' and that you will bring
great armies against my warriors, eating up my country as Sandi ate up
the Akasava and the lands of the Great King."
Ussuf said nothing. He would not deny this for many reasons.
"When the moon comes up," said the king, and he addressed the assembly
generally, "you shall tie Lapai to a stake before my royal house, and
all the young maidens shall dance and sing songs, for good fortune will
come to us, as it came in the days of my father, when a bad woman died."
Ussuf made no secret of his movements that day. First he went to his hut
at the far end of the village, and spoke to the six Arabs who had come
with him into the kingdom.
To the headman he said:
"Ahmed, this is a time when death is very near us all, be ready at
moonrise to die, if needs be. But since life is precious to us all, be
at the little plantation at the edge of the city at sunset, as soon as
darkness falls and the people come in to sacrifice."
He left them and walked through the broad, palm-fringed street of the
Akarti city till he came to the lonely hut, where the outcast woman
dwelt. It was such a hut as the people of Akarti built for those who are
about to die, so that no dwelling-place might be polluted with the
mustiness of death.
The girl was starting on her daily penance--a tall, fine woman. She
watched the approach of the king's minister without expressing in her
face any of the torments which raged in her bosom.
"Lapai," said Ussuf, "this night the king makes a sacrifice."
He made no further explanation, nor did the girl require one.
"If he had made this sacrifice earlier, he would have been kind," she
said quietly, "for I am a very sorrowful woman."
"That I know, Lapai," said the Arab gently.
"That you do not know," she corrected. "I had sorrow because I loved a
man and destroyed him, because I love my people and they hate me, and
now because I love you, Ussuf, with a love which is greater than any."
He looked at her; there was a strange pity in his eyes, and his thin,
brown hands went out till they reached to her shoulders.
"All things are with the gods," he said. "Now, I cannot love you,
Lapai, although I am full of pity for you, for you are not of my race,
and there are other reasons. But because you are a woman, and because
of certain teachings which I received in my youth, I will take you out
of this city, and, if needs be, die for you."
He watched her as she walked slowly down towards where the people of the
Akarti waited for her, drawn by morbid curiosity, since the king's
intention was no secret. Then he shrugged his shoulders helplessly.
At nine o'clock, when the virgin guards and the old king went to find
her for the killing, she had gone.
So also had Ussuf and his six Arabi. The king's _lokali_ beat
furiously, summoning all the country to deliver into his hands the woman
and the man.
* * * * *
Sanders, at that moment, was hunting for the Long Man, whose name was
O'Fasa. O'Fasa was twelve months gone in sleeping-sickness, and had
turned from being a gentle husband and a kindly father into a brute
beast. He had speared his wife, cut down the Houssa guard left by
Sanders to keep the peace of his village, and had made for the forest.
Now, a madman is a king, holding his subjects in the thrall of fear, and
since there was no room in the territory for two kings and Sanders, the
Commissioner came full tilt up the river, landed half a company of black
infantry, and followed on the ravaging trace of the madman.
At the end of eight days he came upon O'Fasa, the Long Man. He was
sitting with his back against a gum-tree, his well-polished spears close
at hand, and he was singing the death song of the Isisi, a long low,
wailing, sorrowful song, which may be so translated into doggerel
English:
Life is a thing so small
That you cannot see it at all;
Death is a thing so wise
That you see it in every guise.
Death is the son of life,
Pain is his favourite wife.
Sanders went slowly across the clearing, his automatic pistol in his
hand.
O'Fasa looked at him and laughed.
"O'Fasa," said Sanders gently, "I have come to see you, because my King
heard you were sick."
"O ko!" laughed the other. "I am a great man when kings send their
messengers to me."
Sanders, his eye upon the spears, advanced warily.
"Come with me, O'Fasa," he said.
The man rose to his feet. He made no attempt to reach his spears. Of a
sudden he ducked, and turned, running swiftly towards the black heart of
the forest. Sanders raised his pistol, and hesitated a second--just too
long. He could not kill the man, though by letting him live he might
endanger the lives of his fellows and the peace of the land.
The Commissioner was in an awkward predicament. Ten miles beyond was the
narrow gap which led into the territory of N'raki. To lead an armed
expedition through that gap would bring about complications which it was
his duty and desire to avoid. The only hope was that O'Fasa would
double back, for the trail they followed left little doubt as to where
he had gone. Unerringly, with the instinct of the hunted beast, he had
made for the gap.
They came to the gorge, palm-fringed, and damp with the running waters,
at sunset, and camped. They found the spoor of the hunted man, lost it,
and picked it up again. At daybreak Sanders, with two men, pushed
through the narrow pass and came into the forbidden territory. There
was no sign of the fugitive.
Sanders's _lokali_ beat out four urgent messages. They were addressed to
a Mr. Grayson Smith, who might possibly be in that neighbourhood, but if
he received them, he sent no reply.
Now, madmen and children have a rooted dislike for strange places, and
Sanders, backing on this, fixed his ambush in the narrow end of the
gorge. Sooner or later O'Fasa would return. At any rate, he decided to
give him four days. Thus matters stood when the sometime minister,
Ussuf, with a woman and five Arabi, made for the gap, with the swift and
tireless guards of the king at their heels.
Three times the Arab had halted to fight off his pursuers, and in one of
these engagements he had sustained his only casualty, and had left a
dead Arab follower on the ground of his stand.
The gap was in sight, when a regiment of the north, summoned by
_lokali_, swept down on his left and effectively blocked his retreat.
Ussuf took up his position on a little rocky hill. His right was
protected by swamp land, and his left and rear were open.
"Lapai," he said, when he had surveyed the position, "it seems to me
that the death you desire is very close at hand. Now, I am very sorry
for you, but God knows my sorrow can do little to save you."
The woman looked at him steadily.
"Lord," she said, "I am very glad if you and I go down to hell together,
for in some new, strange world you might love me, and I should be
satisfied."
Ussuf laughed, showing his straight rows of white teeth in genuine
amusement.
"That we shall see," he said.
The attack came almost at once, but the rifles of the six shot back the
assault. At the end of two hours the little party stood intact. A
second attack followed; one man of the Arab guard went down with an
arrow through his throat, but Ussuf's shooting was effective, and again
the northern regiment drew off.
Before the hill, and in the direction of Akarti city, was the king's
legion. It was from this point that Ussuf expected the last destroying
assault.
"Lapai," he said, turning round, "I----"
The woman had gone! In the fury of the defence he had not noticed her
slip away from him. Suddenly she appeared half-way down the hill and
turned to him.
"Come back!" he called.
She framed her mouth with two hands that her words might carry better.
In the still evening air every word came distinctly.
"Lord," she said, "this is best, for if they have me, they will let you
go, and death will come some day to you, and I shall be waiting."
She turned and ran quickly down the hill towards the stiff lines of
warriors below.
Then suddenly appeared out of the ground, as It seemed, a tall, lank
figure right in her path. She stopped a moment, and the man sprang at
her and lifted her without an effort. Ussuf raised his rifle and
covered them, but he dare not shoot.
There was another interested spectator. King N'raki, a vengeful man,
and agile despite his years, had followed as eagerly as the youngest of
his warriors, and now stood in the midst of his counsellors, watching
the scene upon the hill.
"What man is that?" he asked. "For I see he is not of our people."
Before the messengers he would have dispatched could be instructed, the
tall man, running lightly with his burden, came towards him, and laid a
dead woman almost at the king's feet.
"Man," he said insolently, "I bring you this woman, whom I have killed,
because a devil put it into my heart to do so."
"Who are you?" asked N'raki. "For I see you are a stranger."
"I am a king," said O'Fasa, the Long Man; "greater than all kings, for I
have behind me the armies of white men."
The humour of this twisted truth struck him of a sudden, for he burst
into a fit of uncontrollable laughter.
"You have the armies of the white men behind you?" repeated N'raki
slowly, and looked nervously from side to side.
"Behold!" said O'Fasa, stretching out his hand.
The king's eyes followed the direction of the hand. Far away across the
bare plain he saw black specks of men advancing at regular intervals.
The sinking sun set the bayonets of Sander's little force aglitter. The
Commissioner had heard the firing, and had guessed much.
"It is 'They,'" said King N'raki, and blinked furiously at the Long Man,
O'Fasa.
He turned swiftly to his guard.
"Kill that man!" he said.
* * * * *
Sanders brought his half-company of Houssas to the hill and was met
half-way by Ussuf.
"I heard your rifles," he said. "Have you seen anything of a long chap,
of wild and aggressive mien!" He spoke in English, and Ussuf replied in
the same language.
"A tall man?" he asked, and Sanders wondered a little that a man so
unemotional as was Grayson Smith, of the Colonial Intelligence, should
speak so shakily.
"I think he is here," said the Englishman in Arab attire, and he led the
way down the hill.
N'raki's armies had moved off swiftly. The fear of "They" had been
greater in its effect than all its legions.
The Englishmen made their way to where two figures lay in a calm sleep
of death.
"Who is the woman?" asked Sanders.
"A native woman, who loved me," said Grayson Smith simply, and he bent
down and closed the eyes of the girl who had loved him so well.
*CHAPTER XII*
*THE AMBASSADORS*
There is a saying amongst the Akasava:
"The Isisi sees with his eyes, the N'gombi with his ears, but the Ochori
sees nothing but his meat."
This is translated badly, but in its original form it is immensely
subtle. In the old days before Bosambo became chief, king, headman, or
what you will, of his people, the Ochori were quite prepared to accept
the insulting description of their sleepiness without resentment.
But this was _cala-cala_, and now the Ochori are a proud people, and it
is not good to throw insulting proverbs in their direction, lest they
throw them back with something good and heavy at the end of it.
The native mind works slowly, and it was not until every tribe within
three hundred miles had received some significant indication of the
change which had come about in the spirit and character of this timorous
people, that they realised the Ochori were no longer a race which might
serve as butts for the shafts of wisdom.
There was a petty chief of the Isisi who governed a great district, for,
although "Isisi" means "small" the name must not be taken literally. He
had power under his king to call palavers on all great national
questions, such as the failure of crops, the shifting of
fishing-grounds, and the infidelities of highly-placed women.
One day he called his people together--his counsellors, his headmen, and
all sons of chiefs--and he laid before them a remarkable proposition.
"In the days of my father," said Embed, "the Ochori were a weak and
cowardly people; now they have become strong and powerful. Last week
they came down upon our brothers of the Akasava and stole their goats
and laid shame upon them, and behold! the Akasava, who are great
warriors, did nothing more than send to Sandi the story of their sorrow.
Now it seems to me that this is because Bosambo, the chief, has a devil
of great potency, and I have sent to my king to ask him to entreat the
lord Bosambo to tell us why these things should be."
The gathered counsellors nodded their heads wisely. There was no doubt
at all that Bosambo had the advantage of communication with a devil; or
if this were not so, he was blessed to a minor degree with a nodding
acquaintance with one of those ghosts in which the forest of the Ochori
abounded.
"And thus says my lord, the king of the Akasava, and of all the
territories and the rivers and the unknown lands beyond the forest as
far as the eye can see," the chief went on. "He sends me his message by
his counsellor, saying: 'It is true Bosambo has a devil, and for the
sake of my people I will send to him, asking him to put his strength in
our hands, that we may be wise and bold.'"
Now this was a conclusion which had been arrived at simultaneously by
the six nations, and, although the thoughts of their rulers were not
communicated in such a public fashion, the faith in Bosambo's
inspiration was universal, and the idea that Bosambo should be thus
approached was a violent and shameless plagiarism on the part of the
chief Emberi.
One morning in the late spring the ambassadors of the powers came
paddling up to Ochori city in twelve canoes with their headmen, their
warriors, their beaters of drums and their carriers. Bosambo, who had
no faith whatever in humanity, was warned of their approach and threw
the city into a condition of defence. He himself received the
deputation on the foreshore, and the spokesman was Emberi.
"Lord Bosambo," said the chief, "we come in peace, and from the chief
and the kings and all the peoples of these lands."
"That may be so," said Bosambo, "and my heart is full of joy to see you.
But I beg of you that you land your spearmen and your warriors and your
beaters of drums on the other side of the river, for I am a timorous
man, and I fear that I cannot in this city show you the love and honour
which Sandi has asked me to give even to common people."
"But, lord," protested the chief, who, to do him credit, had no warlike
or injurious ideas concerning his host, "on the other side of the water
there is only sand and water and evil spirits."
"That may be so," said Bosambo; "but on this side of the river there are
me and my people, and we desire to live happily for many years. I tell
you, that it is better that you should all die because of the sand and
the water and the evil spirits, than that I should be slain by those who
do not love me."
"My master," said Emberi pompously, "is a great king and a great lover
of you."
"Your master," said Bosambo, "is a great liar."
"He loves you," protested Emberi.
"He is still a great liar," said Bosambo; "for the last time I met him
he not only said that he would come with his legions and eat me up, but
he also called me evil names, such as 'fish-eater' and 'chicken,' and
'fat dog.'"
Bosambo spoke without fear of consequences because he had a hundred of
his picked men behind him, and all the advantage of the sloping beach.
He would have turned the delegates back to their homes, but that the
persistent and alarmed Emberi succeeded in interesting him in his
announcements, and, more important, there were landed from one of the
canoes, rich presents, including goats and rice and a looking-glass,
which latter was, explained Emberi, the very core of his master's soul.
In the end Bosambo left his hundred men to hold the beach, and Emberi
persuaded his reluctant followers to make their home on the sandy shore
across the river.
Then, and only then, did Bosambo unbend, and had prepared one of his
famous feasts, to which all the chiefs of the land contributed in the
shape of meat and drink--all the chiefs, that is, except Bosambo, who
made a point of giving nothing away to anybody in any circumstances.
The palaver that followed was very interesting, indeed, to the chief of
the Ochori. One by one, from nine in the morning to four in the
following morning, the delegates spoke.
Much of their speeches dealt with the superlative qualities which
distinguished Bosambo's rule--his magnificent courage, his noble
generosity--Bosambo glanced quickly round to see the faces of the
counsellors who had reluctantly provided the feast--and to the future
which awaited all nations which imitated all his virtues.
"Lord, I speak the truth," said Emberi, "and thus it runs that all
people from the sea where the river ends, to the leopard's mouth from
whence it has its source, know that you are familiar with devils that
give you courage and cunning and tell you magic, so that you can make
men from rats."
Bosambo nodded his head gravely.
"All this is true," he said. "I have several devils, although I do not
always use them. For, as you know, I am a follower of a particular
faith, and was for one life-time a Christian, believing in all manners
of mysteries of which you know nothing--Marki, Luki, and Johnny Baptist,
who are not for you."
He looked round at the awed men and shook his head.
"Nor do you know of the wonders they worked, such as curing burns, and
striking dead, and cutting ears. Now I know these things," he continued
impressively, "therefore Sandi loves me, for he also is a God-man, and
often comes to me to speak with him concerning these white men."
"Lord, what are devils?" asked an impatient delegate.
"Of the devils," repeated Bosambo, "I have many."
He half closed his eyes and was silent for the space of two minutes. He
gave the impression that he was counting his staff--and, indeed, this
was the idea precisely that he wished to convey.
"O ko!" said Emberi in a hushed voice. "If it is true, as you say it
is, then our master desires that you shall send us one devil or two that
we might be taught the peculiar manner of these wonderful ghosts."
Bosambo coughed, and glanced round at the sober faces of his advisers.
"I have many devils who serve me," he began. "There is one I know who is
very small and has two noses--one before him and one behind--so that he
may smell his enemy who stalks him. Also there is one who is so tall
that the highest trees are grass to his feet. And another one who is
green and walks upside down."
For an hour Bosambo orated at length on daemonology, even though he
might never have known the word. He drew on the misty depths of his
imagination. He availed himself of every recollection dealing with
science. He spoke of ghosts who were familiar friends, and came to his
bidding much in the same way that the civilised dog comes to his
master's whistle.
The delegates retired to their huts for the night in a condition of
panic when Bosambo informed them that he had duly appointed a particular
brand of devil to serve their individual needs, and protect them against
the ills which the flesh is heir to.
Now Ochori city and the Ochori nation had indeed awakened from the spell
of lethargy under the beneficent and drastic government of Bosambo, and
it is known in the history of nations, however primitive or however
advanced they may be, that no matter how excellent may be the changes
effected there will be a small but compact party who regard the reformer
as one who encumbers the earth. Bosambo had of his own people a small
but powerful section who regarded all changes with horror, and who saw
in the new spirit which the chief had infused into the Ochori, the
beginning of the end. This is a view which is not peculiar to the
Ochori.
There were old chiefs and headmen who remembered the fat and idle days
which preceded the upraising of Bosambo, who remembered how easy it was
to secure slave service, and, remembering, spoke of Bosambo with
unkindness. The chief might have settled the matter of devils out of
hand in his own way, and would, I doubt not, have sent away the
delegation happily enough with such messages of the Koran as he could
remember written on the paper Sanders had supplied him for official
messages.
But it was not Bosambo's way, nor was it the way with the men with whom
he had to deal to expedite important palavers. Normally, such a
conference as was now assembled, would last at least three days and
three nights. It seemed that it would last much longer, for Bosambo had
troubles of his own.
At dawn on the morning following the arrival of the delegation, a
dust-stained messenger, naked as he was born, came at a jog-trot and
panting heavily from the bush road which leads to the Elivi, and without
ceremony stood at the door of the royal hut.
"Lord Bosambo," said the messenger, "Ikifari, the chief of Elivi, brings
his soldiers and headmen to the number of a thousand, for a palaver."
"What is in his heart?" said Bosambo.
"Master," said the man, "this is in his heart: there shall be no roads
in the Ochori, for the men of Elivi are crying out against the work.
They desire to live in peace and comfort."
Bosambo had instituted a law of his own--with the full approval of
Sanders--and it was that each district should provide a straight and
well-made forest road from one city to another, and a great road which
should lead from one district to its neighbour.
Unfortunately, every little tribe did not approach the idea with the
enthusiasm which Bosambo himself felt, nor regard it with the approval
which was offered to this most excellent plan by the King's Government.
For road-making is a bad business. It brings men out early in the
morning, and keeps them working with the sweat running off their bare
backs in the hot hours of the day. Also there were fines and levies
which Bosambo the chief took an unholy joy in extracting whenever
default was made.
Of all the reluctant tribes, the Elivi were the most frankly so. Whilst
all the others were covered with a network of rough roads--slovenly
made, but roads none the less--Elivi stood a virgin patch of land two
hundred miles square in the very heart of make-shift civilisation.
Bosambo might deal drastically with the enemy who stood outside his
gate. It was a more delicate matter when he had to deal with a district
tacitly rebellious, and this question of roads threatened to develop,
unhappily.
He had sent spies into the land of the Elivi and this was the first man
back.
"Now it seems to me," said Bosambo, half to himself, "that I have need
of all my devils, for Ikifari is a bitter man, and his sons and his
counsellors are of a mind with him."
He sent his headman to his guests with a message that for the whole day
he would be deep in counsel with himself over this matter of ghosts; and
when late in the evening the van of the Elivi force was sighted on the
east of the village, Bosambo, seated in state in his magnificent
palaver-house, adorned with such Christmas plates as came his way,
awaited their arrival.
Limberi, the headman, went out to meet the disgruntled force.
"Chief," he said, "it is our lord's wish that you leave your spears
outside the city."
"Limberi," said Ikifari, a hard man of forty, all wiry muscle and
leanness, "we are people of your race and your brothers. Why should we
leave our spears--we who are of the Ochori?"
"You do not come otherwise," said Limberi decisively. "For across the
river are many enemies of our lord, and he loves you so much, that for
his own protection, he desired your armed men--your spearmen and your
swordsmen--to sit outside. Thus he will be confident and happy."
There was no more to be done than to obey.
Ikifari with his counsellors followed the headman to the palaver, and
his insolence was notable.
"I speak for all Elivi," he said, without any ceremonious preliminaries.
"We are an oppressed people, lord Bosambo, and our young men cry out
with great voices against your cruelty."
"They shall cry louder," said Bosambo, and Ikifari, the chief, scowled.
"Lord," he said sullenly, "if it is true that Sandi loves you, he also
loves us, and no man is so great in this land that he may stir a people
to rebellion."
Bosambo knew this was true--knew it without the muttered approval of
Ikifari's headmen. He ran his eye over the little party. They were all
there--the malcontents. Tinif'si, the stout headman, M'kera and
Calasari, the lesser chiefs; and there was in their minds a certain
defiance which particularly exasperated Bosambo. He might punish one or
two who set themselves up against his authority, but here was an
organised rebellion. Punishment would mean fighting, and fighting would
weaken his position with Sanders.
It was the moment to temporise.
Fortunately the devil deputation was not present. It was considered to
be against all etiquette for men of another nation to be present at the
domestic councils of their neighbours. Otherwise some doubt might have
been born in the bosom of Emberi as to the efficacy of Bosambo's devils
at this particular moment.
"And this I would say to you, lord," said Ikifari, and Bosambo knew that
the crux of the situation would be revealed. "We Elivi are your dogs.
You do not send for us to come to your great feasts, nor do you honour
us in any way. But when there is fighting you call up our spears and
our young men, and you send us abroad to be eaten up by your terrible
enemies. Also," he went on, "when you choose your chiefs and
counsellors to go pleasant journeys to such places where they are
honoured and feasted, you send only men of the Ochori city."
It may be said here that from whatever source Bosambo derived his
inspiration, he had certainly acquired royal habits which were foreign
to his primitive people. Thus he would dispatch envoys and ambassadors
on ceremonious visits bearing gifts and presents which they themselves
provided and returning with richer presents which Bosambo acquired. It
was, if the truth be told, a novel and pleasant method of extracting
blackmail--pleasant because it gave Bosambo little trouble, and afforded
his subordinates titillation of importance, and no one had arisen to
complain save these unfortunate cities of Akasava--Isisi and
N'gombi--which entertained his representatives.
"It is true I have never sent you," said Bosambo, "and my heart is sore
at the thought that you should think evil of me because I have saved you
all this trouble. For my heart is like water within me. Yet a moon
since I sent Kill, my headman, bearing gifts to the king of the bush
people, and they chopped him so that he died, and now I fear to send
other messengers."
There was an unmistakable sneer on Ikifari's face.
"Lord," he said, with asperity, "Kili was a foolish man and you hated
him, for he had spoken evilly against you, stirring up your people.
Therefore you sent him to the bushmen and he did not come back." He
added significantly: "Now I tell you that if you send me to the bushmen
I do not go."
Bosambo thought a moment.
"Now I see," he said, almost jovially, "that Ikifari, whom I love better
than my own brother"--this was true--"is angry with me because I have
not sent him on a journey. Now I shall show how much I love you, for I
will send you all--each of you--as guests of my house, bearing my word
to such great nations as the Akasava, the Isisi, the N'gombi; also to
the people beyond the river, who are great and give large presents."
He saw the faces brighten, and seized the psychological moment.
"The palaver is finished," said Bosambo magnificently.
He ordered a feast to be made outside the city for his unwelcome guests,
and summoned the devil delegates to his presence.
"My friends," he said, "I have given this matter of devils great
thought, and since I desire to stand well with you and with your master,
I have spent this night in company with six great devils, who are my
best friends and who help me in all matters. Now I tell you this--which
is known only to myself and to you, whom I trust--that to-day I send to
your master six great spirits which inspire me."
There was a hush. The sense of responsibility, which comes to the
nervous who are suddenly entrusted with the delivery of a ferocious
bull, fell upon the men of the delegation.
"Lord, this is a great honour," said Emberi, "and our masters will send
many more presents than your lordship has ever seen. But how may we
take these devils with us, for we are fearful and are not used to their
ways?"
Bosambo bowed his head graciously.
"That also filled my thoughts," he said, "and thus I have ordered it. I
shall take six of my people--six counsellors and chiefs, who are to me
as the sun and the flowers--and by magic I will place inside the heart
of each chief and headman one great devil. You shall take these men
with you, and you shall listen to all they say save this." He paused.
"These devils love me, and they will greatly desire to return to my city
and to my land, where they have been so long. Now I tell you that you
must treat them kindly. Yet you must hold them, putting a guard about
them, and keeping them in a secret place, so that Sandi may not find
them and hear of them. And they will bring you fortune and prosperity
and the courage of lions."
* * * * *
Sanders was coming up river to settle a woman palaver, when he came slap
into a flotilla of such pretension and warlike appearance that he did
not hesitate for one moment.
At a word, the canvas jackets were slipped from the Hotchkiss guns, and
they were swung over the side. But there was no need for such
preparations, as he discovered when Emberi's canoe came alongside.
"Tell me, Emberi," said Sanders, "what is this wonderful thing I
see--that the Akasavas and the Isisi, and the N'gombi and the people of
the lower forest sail together in love and harmony?"
"Lord," said Emberi proudly, "this is Bosambo's doing."
Sanders was all suspicion.
"Now I know that Bosambo is a clever man," he said, "yet I did not know
that he was so great a character that he could bring together all men in
peace, but rather the contrary."
"He has done this because of devils," said Emberi importantly. "Behold,
there are certain things about which I must not speak to you, and this
is one of them. So, Sandi, ask me no more, for I have sworn an oath."
Leaning over the steamer Sanders surveyed the flotilla. His keen eyes
ranged the boat from stem to stern. He noted with interest the presence
of one Ikifari, who was known to him. And Ikifari in a scarlet coat was
a happy and satisfied man.
"O Ikifari," bantered Sanders, "what of my roads?"
The chief looked up. "Lord, they shall be made," he said, "though my
young men die in the making. I go now to make a grand palaver for my
friend and father Bosambo, for he trusts me above all men and has sent
me to the Isisi."
Sanders knew something of Bosambo's idiosyncrasies, and nodded.
"When you come back," he said, "I will speak on the matter of these
roads. Tell me now, my friend, how long do you stay with the Isisi?"
"Lord," said Ikifari, "I stay for the time of a moon. Afterwards I go
back to the Ochori, bearing rich presents which my lord Bosambo has made
me swear I will keep for myself."
"The space of a moon," repeated Sanders.
He turned to ring the engines "Ahead" and did not see Emberi's hand go
up to cover a smile.
*CHAPTER XIII*
*GUNS IN THE AKASAVA*
"Thank God!" said the Houssa captain fervently, "there is no war in this
country."
"Touch wood!" said Sanders, and the two men simultaneously reached out
and laid solemn hands upon the handle of the coffee-pot, which was
vulcanite.
If they had touched wood who knows what might have happened in the first
place to Ofesi the chief of Mc-Canti?
Who knows what might have happened to the two smugglers of gold from the
French territory?
The wife of Bikilini might have gone off with her lover, and Bikilini
resigned and patient taken another to wife, and the death men of the
Ofesi might never have gone forth upon their unamiable missions, or
going forth have been drowned, or grown faint-hearted.
Anyway it is an indisputable fact that neither Sanders nor Captain
Hamilton touched wood on the occasion.
And as to Bannister Fish----?
That singular man was a trader in questionable commodities, for he had
not the nice sentiments which usually go with the composition of a white
man.
Some say that he ran slaves from Angola to places where a black man or a
black woman is worth a certain price; that he did this openly with the
connivance of the Government of Portugal and made a tolerable fortune.
He certainly bought more poached ivory than any man in Africa, and his
crowning infamy up to date was the arming of a South Soudanese
Mahdi--arms for employment against his fellow-countrymen.
There are certain manufacturers of small arms in the Midlands who will
execute orders to any capacity, produce weapons modern or antiquated at
a cost varying with the delicacy or mechanism of the weapon. They have
no conscience, but have a hard struggle to pay dividends because there
are other firms in Liege who run the same line of business, but produce
at from 10 per cent. to 25 per cent. lower cost.
Mr. Bannister Fish, a thin, wiry man of thirty-four, as yellow as a
guinea and with the temper of a fiend, was not popular on the coast,
especially with officials. Fortunately Africa has many coasts, and
since Africa in mass was Mr. Fish's hunting-ground, rather than any
particular section, the coast men--as we know the coast--saw little of
him.
It was Mr. Fish's boast that there was not twenty miles of coast line
from Dakka to Capetown, and from Lourenco Marques to Suez, that had not
contributed something of beauty to his lordly mansion on the top of
Highgate Hill.
You will observe that he omits reference to the coast which encloses
Cape Colony, and there is a reason. Cape Colony is immensely civilised,
has stipendiary magistrates and a horrible breakwater where
yellow-jacketed convicts labour for their sins, and Mr. Fish's sins were
many. He tackled Sanders's territory in the same spirit as a racehorse
breeder will start raising Pekingese poodles--not for the money he could
make out of it, but as an amusing sideline.
He worked ruin on the edge of the Akasava country, operating from the
adjoining foreign territories, and found an unholy joy in worrying
Sanders, whom he had met once and most cordially disliked.
His dislike was intensified on the next occasion of their meeting, for
Sanders, making a forced march across the Akasava, seized the caravan of
Mr. Bannister Fish, burnt his stores out of hand, and submitted the
plutocrat of Highgate Hill to the indignity of marching handcuffed to
headquarters. Mr. Fish was tried by a divisional court and fined L500,
or, as an alternative, awarded twelve months imprisonment with hard
labour.
The fine was paid, and Mr. Fish went home saying horrible things about
Mr. Commissioner Sanders, which I will not sully these fair pages by
repeating.
Highgate Hill is a prosaic neighbourhood served by prosaic motor-buses,
and not the place where one would imagine wholesale murder might be
planned, yet from his domain in Highgate Mr. Fish issued certain
instructions by telephone and cablegram, and at his word men went
secretly into Sanders's territory looking for the likely man.
They found Ofesi, and Highgate spoke to the Akasava to some purpose.
In the month of February in a certain year Mr. Fish drove resplendently
in his electric landau from Highgate to Waterloo. He arrived on the
Akasava border seven weeks later no less angry with Sanders than he had
ever been, and of a cheerful countenance because, being a millionaire,
he could indulge in his hobbies, and his hobby was the annoyance of a
far-away Commissioner who, at that precise moment was touching vulcanite
and thinking it wood.
Ofesi, the son of Malaka, the son of G'nani, was predestined.
Thus it was predicted by the famous witch-doctor Komonobologo, of the
Akasava.
For it would appear that on the night that Ofesi came squealing into the
world, there were certain solar manifestations such as an eclipse of the
moon and prodigious shooting of stars, which Komonobologo translated
favourably to the clucking, sobbing and shrill whimpering morsel of
whitey-brown humanity.
Thus Ofesi was to rule all peoples as far as the sun shone (some three
hundred miles in all directions according to local calculations), and he
should not suffer ignominious death at the hand of any man.
Ofesi (literally "the Born-Lucky") should be mighty in counsel and in
war; should shake the earth with the tread of his legions; might risk
and gain, never risk and lose; was the favoured of ju-jus and ghosts;
and would have many sons.
The hollow-eyed woman stretched on the floor of the hut spoke faintly of
her happiness, the baby with greedy mouth satisfying the beast in him
said nothing, being too much occupied with his natural and instinctive
desires.
Such prophecies are common, and some come to nothing. Some, for no
apparent reason, stick fest to the recipients.
Ofesi--his destiny--was of the sticking kind.
When Sanders took up his duties on the river, Ofesi was a lank and
awkward youth of whom his fellows stood in awe.
Sanders was in awe of nobody. He listened quietly to the recital of
portents, omens, and the like, and when it was finished, he delivered a
little homily on the fallibility of human things and the extraordinarily
high death-rate which existed amongst those misguided people who walked
outside the rigid circle of the land.
Ofesi had neighbours more hearty than Sanders, and by these he was
accepted as something on account of the total wonder which the years
would produce.
So Ofesi grew and flourished, doing much mischief in his way, which was
neither innocent nor boyish, and the friendly hand which is upraised to
small boys all the world over never fell sharply upon his well-covered
nerves, because Ofesi was predestined and immune.
In course of time he was appointed by the then king of the Akasava to
the chieftainship of the village of Mi-lanti, and the city of the
Akasava breathed a sigh of relief to see his canoe go round the bend of
the river out of sight.
No report of the chief's minor misdoings came to Sanders because this
legend of destiny carried to all the nations save and except one.
It is said that Ofesi received more homage and held a more regal court
in his tiny principality than did the king his master; that N'gombi,
Isisi, and the tribes about sent him presents doubly precious, and that
he had a household of sixty wives, all contributed by his devotees. It
was also said that he made the intoxicating distributions of Mr. Fish
possible, but Sanders had no proof of this.
He raided his friends impartially, did all manner of unpleasant things,
terrorised the river from the Lesser Isisi to the edge of the Ochori,
and the fishermen watching his war canoes creeping stealthily through
the night would say: "Let no man see the lord Ofesi; lest in the days to
come he remember and blind us."
Whether from sheer cunning or from the intuitive faculty which is a part
of genius, Ofesi grew to stout manhood without once violating the border
line of the Ochori.