CAPTAIN ARCOLL TELLS A TALE
It froze in the night, harder than was common on the Berg even in
winter, and as I crossed the road next morning it was covered with
rime. All my fears had gone, and my mind was strung high with
expectation. Five pencilled words may seem a small thing to build hope
on, but it was enough for me, and I went about my work in the store
with a reasonably light heart. One of the first things I did was to
take stock of our armoury. There were five sporting Mausers of a cheap
make, one Mauser pistol, a Lee-Speed carbine, and a little
nickel-plated revolver. There was also Japp’s shot-gun, an old hammered
breech-loader, as well as the gun I had brought out with me. There was
a good supply of cartridges, including a stock for a .400 express which
could not be found. I pocketed the revolver, and searched till I
discovered a good sheath-knife. If fighting was in prospect I might as
well look to my arms.
All the morning I sat among flour and sugar possessing my soul in as
much patience as I could command. Nothing came down the white road from
the west. The sun melted the rime; the flies came out and buzzed in the
window; Japp got himself out of bed, brewed strong coffee, and went
back to his slumbers. Presently it was dinner-time, and I went over to
a silent meal with Wardlaw. When I returned I must have fallen asleep
over a pipe, for the next thing I knew I was blinking drowsily at the
patch of sun in the door, and listening for footsteps. In the dead
stillness of the afternoon I thought I could discern a shuffling in the
dust. I got up and looked out, and there, sure enough, was some one
coming down the road.
But it was only a Kaffir, and a miserable-looking object at that. I had
never seen such an anatomy. It was a very old man, bent almost double,
and clad in a ragged shirt and a pair of foul khaki trousers. He
carried an iron pot, and a few belongings were tied up in a dirty
handkerchief. He must have been a _dacha_[1] smoker, for he coughed
hideously, twisting his body with the paroxysms. I had seen the type
before—the old broken-down native who had no kin to support him, and no
tribe to shelter him. They wander about the roads, cooking their
wretched meals by their little fires, till one morning they are found
stiff under a bush.
The native gave me a good-day in Kaffir, then begged for tobacco or a
handful of mealie-meal.
I asked him where he came from.
“From the west, Inkoos,” he said, “and before that from the south. It
is a sore road for old bones.”
I went into the store to fetch some meal, and when I came out he had
shuffled close to the door. He had kept his eyes on the ground, but now
he looked up at me, and I thought he had very bright eyes for such an
old wreck.
“The nights are cold, Inkoos,” he wailed, “and my folk are scattered,
and I have no kraal. The aasvogels follow me, and I can hear the
blesbok.” “What about the blesbok?” I asked with a start.
“The blesbok are changing ground,” he said, and looked me straight in
the face.
“And where are the hunters?” I asked. “They are here and behind me,” he
said in English, holding out his pot for my meal, while he began to
edge into the middle of the road.
I followed, and, speaking English, asked him if he knew of a man named
Colles.
“I come from him, young Baas. Where is your house? Ah, the school.
There will be a way in by the back window? See that it is open, for
I’ll be there shortly.” Then lifting up his voice he called down in
Sesuto all manner of blessings on me for my kindness, and went
shuffling down the sunlit road, coughing like a volcano.
In high excitement I locked up the store and went over to Mr Wardlaw.
No children had come to school that day, and he was sitting idle,
playing patience. “Lock the door,” I said, “and come into my room.
We’re on the brink of explanations.”
In about twenty minutes the bush below the back-window parted and the
Kaffir slipped out. He grinned at me, and after a glance round, hopped
very nimbly over the sill. Then he examined the window and pulled the
curtains.
“Is the outer door shut?” he asked in excellent English. “Well, get me
some hot water, and any spare clothes you may possess, Mr Crawfurd. I
must get comfortable before we begin our _indaba_.[2] We’ve the night
before us, so there’s plenty of time. But get the house clear, and see
that nobody disturbs me at my toilet. I am a modest man, and sensitive
about my looks.”
I brought him what he wanted, and looked on at an amazing
transformation. Taking a phial from his bundle, he rubbed some liquid
on his face and neck and hands, and got rid of the black colouring. His
body and legs he left untouched, save that he covered them with shirt
and trousers from my wardrobe. Then he pulled off a scaly wig, and
showed beneath it a head of close-cropped grizzled hair. In ten minutes
the old Kaffir had been transformed into an active soldierly-looking
man of maybe fifty years. Mr Wardlaw stared as if he had seen a
resurrection.
“I had better introduce myself,” he said, when he had taken the edge
off his thirst and hunger. “My name is Arcoll, Captain James Arcoll. I
am speaking to Mr Crawfurd, the storekeeper, and Mr Wardlaw, the
schoolmaster, of Blaauwildebeestefontein. Where, by the way, is Mr
Peter Japp? Drunk? Ah, yes, it was always his failing. The quorum,
however, is complete without him.”
By this time it was about sunset, and I remember I cocked my ear to
hear the drums beat. Captain Arcoll noticed the movement as he noticed
all else. “You’re listening for the drums, but you won’t hear them.
That business is over here. To-night they beat in Swaziland and down
into the Tonga border. Three days more, unless you and I, Mr Crawfurd,
are extra smart, and they’ll be hearing them in Durban.”
It was not till the lamp was lit, the fire burning well, and the house
locked and shuttered, that Captain Arcoll began his tale.
“First,” he said, “let me hear what you know. Colles told me that you
were a keen fellow, and had wind of some mystery here. You wrote him
about the way you were spied on, but I told him to take no notice. Your
affair, Mr Crawfurd, had to wait on more urgent matters. Now, what do
you think is happening?” I spoke very shortly, weighing my words, for I
felt I was on trial before these bright eyes. “I think that some kind
of native rising is about to commence.”
“Ay,” he said dryly, “you would, and your evidence would be the spying
and drumming. Anything more?”
“I have come on the tracks of a lot of I.D.B. work in the
neighbourhood. The natives have some supply of diamonds, which they
sell bit by bit, and I don’t doubt but they have been getting guns with
the proceeds.”
He nodded, “Have you any notion who has been engaged in the job?”
I had it on my tongue to mention Japp, but forbore, remembering my
promise. “I can name one,” I said, “a little yellow Portugoose, who
calls himself Henriques or Hendricks. He passed by here the day before
yesterday.”
Captain Arcoll suddenly was consumed with quiet laughter. “Did you
notice the Kaffir who rode with him and carried his saddlebags? Well,
he’s one of my men. Henriques would have a fit if he knew what was in
those saddlebags. They contain my change of clothes, and other odds and
ends. Henriques’ own stuff is in a hole in the spruit. A handy way of
getting one’s luggage sent on, eh? The bags are waiting for me at a
place I appointed.” And again Captain Arcoll indulged his sense of
humour. Then he became grave, and returned to his examination.
“A rising, with diamonds as the sinews of war, and Henriques as the
chief agent. Well and good! But who is to lead, and what are the
natives going to rise about?”
“I know nothing further, but I have made some guesses.”
“Let’s hear your guesses,” he said, blowing smoke rings from his pipe.
“I think the main mover is a great black minister who calls himself
John Laputa.”
Captain Arcoll nearly sprang out of his chair. “Now, how on earth did
you find that out? Quick, Mr Crawfurd, tell me all you know, for this
is desperately important.”
I began at the beginning, and told him the story of what happened on
the Kirkcaple shore. Then I spoke of my sight of him on board ship, his
talk with Henriques about Blaauwildebeestefontein, and his hurried
departure from Durban.
Captain Arcoll listened intently, and at the mention of Durban he
laughed. “You and I seem to have been running on lines which nearly
touched. I thought I had grabbed my friend Laputa that night in Durban,
but I was too cocksure and he slipped off. Do you know, Mr Crawfurd,
you have been on the right trail long before me? When did you say you
saw him at his devil-worship? Seven years ago? Then you were the first
man alive to know the Reverend John in his true colours. You knew seven
years ago what I only found out last year.”
“Well, that’s my story,” I said. “I don’t know what the rising is
about, but there’s one other thing I can tell you. There’s some kind of
sacred place for the Kaffirs, and I’ve found out where it is.” I gave
him a short account of my adventures in the Rooirand.
He smoked silently for a bit after I had finished. “You’ve got the
skeleton of the whole thing right, and you only want the filling up.
And you found out everything for yourself? Colles was right; you’re not
wanting in intelligence, Mr Crawfurd.”
It was not much of a compliment, but I have never been more pleased in
my life. This slim, grizzled man, with his wrinkled face and bright
eyes, was clearly not lavish in his praise. I felt it was no small
thing to have earned a word of commendation.
“And now I will tell you my story,” said Captain Arcoll. “It is a long
story, and I must begin far back. It has taken me years to decipher it,
and, remember, I’ve been all my life at this native business. I can
talk every dialect, and I have the customs of every tribe by heart.
I’ve travelled over every mile of South Africa, and Central and East
Africa too. I was in both the Matabele wars, and I’ve seen a heap of
other fighting which never got into the papers. So what I tell you you
can take as gospel, for it is knowledge that was not learned in a day.”
He puffed away, and then asked suddenly, “Did you ever hear of Prester
John?”
“The man that lived in Central Asia?” I asked, with a reminiscence of a
story-book I had as a boy. “No, no,” said Mr Wardlaw, “he means the
King of Abyssinia in the fifteenth century. I’ve been reading all about
him. He was a Christian, and the Portuguese sent expedition after
expedition to find him, but they never got there. Albuquerque wanted to
make an alliance with him and capture the Holy Sepulchre.”
Arcoll nodded. “That’s the one I mean. There’s not very much known
about him, except Portuguese legends. He was a sort of Christian, but I
expect that his practices were as pagan as his neighbours’. There is no
doubt that he was a great conqueror. Under him and his successors, the
empire of Ethiopia extended far south of Abyssinia away down to the
Great Lakes.”
“How long did this power last?” I asked wondering to what tale this was
prologue.
“That’s a mystery no scholar has ever been able to fathom. Anyhow, the
centre of authority began to shift southward, and the warrior tribes
moved in that direction. At the end of the sixteenth century the chief
native power was round about the Zambesi. The Mazimba and the Makaranga
had come down from the Lake Nyassa quarter, and there was a strong
kingdom in Manicaland. That was the Monomotapa that the Portuguese
thought so much of.”
Wardlaw nodded eagerly. The story was getting into ground that he knew
about.
“The thing to remember is that all these little empires thought
themselves the successors of Prester John. It took me a long time to
find this out, and I have spent days in the best libraries in Europe
over it. They all looked back to a great king in the north, whom they
called by about twenty different names. They had forgotten about his
Christianity, but they remembered that he was a conqueror.
“Well, to make a long story short, Monomotapa disappeared in time, and
fresh tribes came down from the north, and pushed right down to Natal
and the Cape. That is how the Zulus first appeared. They brought with
them the story of Prester John, but by this time it had ceased to be a
historical memory, and had become a religious cult. They worshipped a
great Power who had been their ancestor, and the favourite Zulu word
for him was Umkulunkulu. The belief was perverted into fifty different
forms, but this was the central creed—that Umkulunkulu had been the
father of the tribe, and was alive as a spirit to watch over them.
“They brought more than a creed with them. Somehow or other, some
fetich had descended from Prester John by way of the Mazimba and Angoni
and Makaranga. What it is I do not know, but it was always in the hands
of the tribe which for the moment held the leadership. The great native
wars of the sixteenth century, which you can read about in the
Portuguese historians, were not for territory but for leadership, and
mainly for the possession of this fetich. Anyhow, we know that the
Zulus brought it down with them. They called it _Ndhlondhlo_, which
means the Great Snake, but I don’t suppose that it was any kind of
snake. The snake was their totem, and they would naturally call their
most sacred possession after it.
“Now I will tell you a thing that few know. You have heard of Tchaka.
He was a sort of black Napoleon early in the last century, and he made
the Zulus the paramount power in South Africa, slaughtering about two
million souls to accomplish it. Well, he had the fetich, whatever it
was, and it was believed that he owed his conquests to it. Mosilikatse
tried to steal it, and that was why he had to fly to Matabeleland. But
with Tchaka it disappeared. Dingaan did not have it, nor Panda, and
Cetewayo never got it, though he searched the length and breadth of the
country for it. It had gone out of existence, and with it the chance of
a Kaffir empire.”
Captain Arcoll got up to light his pipe, and I noticed that his face
was grave. He was not telling us this yarn for our amusement.
“So much for Prester John and his charm,” he said. “Now I have to take
up the history at a different point. In spite of risings here and
there, and occasional rows, the Kaffirs have been quiet for the better
part of half a century. It is no credit to us. They have had plenty of
grievances, and we are no nearer understanding them than our fathers
were. But they are scattered and divided. We have driven great wedges
of white settlement into their territory, and we have taken away their
arms. Still, they are six times as many as we are, and they have long
memories, and a thoughtful man may wonder how long the peace will last.
I have often asked myself that question, and till lately I used to
reply, ‘For ever because they cannot find a leader with the proper
authority, and they have no common cause to fight for.’ But a year or
two ago I began to change my mind.
“It is my business to act as chief Intelligence officer among the
natives. Well, one day, I came on the tracks of a curious person. He
was a Christian minister called Laputa, and he was going among the
tribes from Durban to the Zambesi as a roving evangelist. I found that
he made an enormous impression, and yet the people I spoke to were
chary of saying much about him. Presently I found that he preached more
than the gospel. His word was ‘Africa for the Africans,’ and his chief
point was that the natives had had a great empire in the past, and
might have a great empire again. He used to tell the story of Prester
John, with all kinds of embroidery of his own. You see, Prester John
was a good argument for him, for he had been a Christian as well as a
great potentate. “For years there has been plenty of this talk in South
Africa, chiefly among Christian Kaffirs. It is what they call
‘Ethiopianism,’ and American negroes are the chief apostles. For
myself, I always thought the thing perfectly harmless. I don’t care a
fig whether the native missions break away from the parent churches in
England and call themselves by fancy names. The more freedom they have
in their religious life, the less they are likely to think about
politics. But I soon found out that Laputa was none of your flabby
educated negroes from America, and I began to watch him.
“I first came across him at a revival meeting in London, where he was a
great success. He came and spoke to me about my soul, but he gave up
when I dropped into Zulu. The next time I met him was on the lower
Limpopo, when I had the pleasure of trying to shoot him from a boat.”
Captain Arcoll took his pipe from his mouth and laughed at the
recollection.
“I had got on to an I.D.B. gang, and to my amazement found the
evangelist among them. But the Reverend John was too much for me. He
went overboard in spite of the crocodiles, and managed to swim below
water to the reed bed at the side. However, that was a valuable
experience for me, for it gave me a clue.
“I next saw him at a Missionary Conference in Cape Town, and after that
at a meeting of the Geographical Society in London, where I had a long
talk with him. My reputation does not follow me home, and he thought I
was an English publisher with an interest in missions. You see I had no
evidence to connect him with I.D.B., and besides I fancied that his
real game was something bigger than that; so I just bided my time and
watched.
“I did my best to get on to his dossier, but it was no easy job.
However, I found out a few things. He had been educated in the States,
and well educated too, for the man is a good scholar and a great
reader, besides the finest natural orator I have ever heard. There was
no doubt that he was of Zulu blood, but I could get no traces of his
family. He must come of high stock, for he is a fine figure of a man.
“Very soon I found it was no good following him in his excursions into
civilization. There he was merely the educated Kaffir; a great pet of
missionary societies, and a favourite speaker at Church meetings. You
will find evidence given by him in Blue-Books on native affairs, and he
counted many members of Parliament at home among his correspondents. I
let that side go, and resolved to dog him when on his evangelizing
tours in the back-veld.
“For six months I stuck to him like a leech. I am pretty good at
disguises, and he never knew who was the broken-down old Kaffir who
squatted in the dirt at the edge of the crowd when he spoke, or the
half-caste who called him ‘Sir’ and drove his Cape-cart. I had some
queer adventures, but these can wait. The gist of the thing is, that
after six months which turned my hair grey I got a glimmering of what
he was after. He talked Christianity to the mobs in the kraals, but to
the indunas[3] he told a different story.”
Captain Arcoll helped himself to a drink. “You can guess what that
story was, Mr Crawfurd. At full moon when the black cock was blooded,
the Reverend John forgot his Christianity. He was back four centuries
among the Mazimba sweeping down on the Zambesi. He told them, and they
believed him, that he was the Umkulunkulu, the incarnated spirit of
Prester John. He told them that he was there to lead the African race
to conquest and empire. Ay, and he told them more: for he has, or says
he has, the Great Snake itself, the necklet of Prester John.”
Neither of us spoke; we were too occupied with fitting this news into
our chain of knowledge.
Captain Arcoll went on. “Now that I knew his purpose, I set myself to
find out his preparations. It was not long before I found a mighty
organization at work from the Zambesi to the Cape. The great tribes
were up to their necks in the conspiracy, and all manner of little
sects had been taken in. I have sat at tribal councils and been sworn a
blood brother, and I have used the secret password to get knowledge in
odd places. It was a dangerous game, and, as I have said, I had my
adventures, but I came safe out of it—with my knowledge.
“The first thing I found out was that there was a great deal of wealth
somewhere among the tribes. Much of it was in diamonds, which the
labourers stole from the mines and the chiefs impounded. Nearly every
tribe had its secret chest, and our friend Laputa had the use of them
all. Of course the difficulty was changing the diamonds into coin, and
he had to start I.D.B. on a big scale. Your pal, Henriques, was the
chief agent for this, but he had others at Mozambique and Johannesburg,
ay, and in London, whom I have on my list. With the money, guns and
ammunition were bought, and it seems that a pretty flourishing trade
has been going on for some time. They came in mostly overland through
Portuguese territory, though there have been cases of consignments to
Johannesburg houses, the contents of which did not correspond with the
invoice. You ask what the Governments were doing to let this go on.
Yes, and you may well ask. They were all asleep. They never dreamed of
danger from the natives, and in any case it was difficult to police the
Portuguese side. Laputa knew our weakness, and he staked everything on
it.
“My first scheme was to lay Laputa by the heels; but no Government
would act on my information. The man was strongly buttressed by public
support at home, and South Africa has burned her fingers before this
with arbitrary arrests. Then I tried to fasten I.D.B. on him, but I
could not get my proofs till too late. I nearly had him in Durban, but
he got away; and he never gave me a second chance. For five months he
and Henriques have been lying low, because their scheme was getting
very ripe. I have been following them through Zululand and Gazaland,
and I have discovered that the train is ready, and only wants the
match. For a month I have never been more than five hours behind him on
the trail; and if he has laid his train, I have laid mine also.”
Arcoll’s whimsical, humorous face had hardened into grimness, and in
his eyes there was the light of a fierce purpose. The sight of him
comforted me, in spite of his tale.
“But what can he hope to do?” I asked. “Though he roused every Kaffir
in South Africa he would be beaten. You say he is an educated man. He
must know he has no chance in the long run.”
“I said he was an educated man, but he is also a Kaffir. He can see the
first stage of a thing, and maybe the second, but no more. That is the
native mind. If it was not like that our chance would be the worse.”
“You say the scheme is ripe,” I said; “how ripe?”
Arcoll looked at the clock. “In half an hour’s time Laputa will be with
’Mpefu. There he will stay the night. To-morrow morning he goes to
Umvelos’ to meet Henriques. To-morrow evening the gathering begins.”
“One question,” I said. “How big a man is Laputa?”
“The biggest thing that the Kaffirs have ever produced. I tell you, in
my opinion he is a great genius. If he had been white he might have
been a second Napoleon. He is a born leader of men, and as brave as a
lion. There is no villainy he would not do if necessary, and yet I
should hesitate to call him a blackguard. Ay, you may look surprised at
me, you two pragmatical Scotsmen; but I have, so to speak, lived with
the man for months, and there’s fineness and nobility in him. He would
be a terrible enemy, but a just one. He has the heart of a poet and a
king, and it is God’s curse that he has been born among the children of
Ham. I hope to shoot him like a dog in a day or two, but I am glad to
bear testimony to his greatness.”
“If the rising starts to-morrow,” I asked, “have you any of his plans?”
He picked up a map from the table and opened it. “The first rendezvous
is somewhere near Sikitola’s. Then they move south, picking up
contingents; and the final concentration is to be on the high veld near
Amsterdam, which is convenient for the Swazis and the Zulus. After that
I know nothing, but of course there are local concentrations along the
whole line of the Berg from Mashonaland to Basutoland. Now, look here.
To get to Amsterdam they must cross the Delagoa Bay Railway. Well, they
won’t be allowed to. If they get as far, they will be scattered there.
As I told you, I too have laid my train. We have the police ready all
along the scarp of the Berg. Every exit from native territory is
watched, and the frontier farmers are out on commando. We have regulars
on the Delagoa Bay and Natal lines, and a system of field telegraphs
laid which can summon further troops to any point. It has all been kept
secret, because we are still in the dark ourselves. The newspaper
public knows nothing about any rising, but in two days every white
household in South Africa will be in a panic. Make no mistake, Mr
Crawfurd; this is a grim business. We shall smash Laputa and his men,
but it will be a fierce fight, and there will be much good blood shed.
Besides, it will throw the country back another half-century. Would to
God I had been man enough to put a bullet through his head in cold
blood. But I could not do it—it was too like murder; and maybe I shall
never have the chance now.”
“There’s one thing puzzles me,” I said. “What makes Laputa come up here
to start with? Why doesn’t he begin with Zululand?”
“God knows! There’s sure to be sense in it, for he does nothing without
reason. We may know to-morrow.”
But as Captain Arcoll spoke, the real reason suddenly flashed into my
mind: Laputa had to get the Great Snake, the necklet of Prester John,
to give his leadership prestige. Apparently he had not yet got it, or
Arcoll would have known. He started from this neighbourhood because the
fetich was somewhere hereabouts. I was convinced that my guess was
right, but I kept my own counsel.
“To-morrow Laputa and Henriques meet at Umvelos’, probably at your new
store, Mr Crawfurd. And so the ball commences.”
My resolution was suddenly taken.
“I think,” I said, “I had better be present at the meeting, as
representing the firm.”
Captain Arcoll stared at me and laughed. “I had thought of going
myself,” he said.
“Then you go to certain death, disguise yourself as you please. You
cannot meet them in the store as I can. I’m there on my ordinary
business, and they will never suspect. If you’re to get any news, I’m
the man to go.”
He looked at me steadily for a minute or so. “I’m not sure that’s such
a bad idea of yours. I would be better employed myself on the Berg,
and, as you say, I would have little chance of hearing anything. You’re
a plucky fellow, Mr Crawfurd. I suppose you understand that the risk is
pretty considerable.”
“I suppose I do; but since I’m in this thing, I may as well see it out.
Besides, I’ve an old quarrel with our friend Laputa.”
“Good and well,” said Captain Arcoll. “Draw in your chair to the table,
then, and I’ll explain to you the disposition of my men. I should tell
you that I have loyal natives in my pay in most tribes, and can count
on early intelligence. We can’t match their telepathy; but the new type
of field telegraph is not so bad, and may be a trifle more reliable.”
Till midnight we pored over maps, and certain details were burned in on
my memory. Then we went to bed and slept soundly, even Mr Wardlaw. It
was strange how fear had gone from the establishment, now that we knew
the worst and had a fighting man by our side.
[1] Hemp.
[2] Council.
[3] Lesser chiefs.