bush on the right--“Buffalo.”
I looked, and after a while distinguished the beast’s head, chiefly
because he kept moving his ears to ward off the flies; but for the life
of me I could not see his body.
“Shall I shoot?” I asked the chief.
“If you can kill,” he replied shortly.
I thought the doubt ridiculous at ten yards’ range; besides, I had a
double-barrelled ·450 Rigby and felt that if one shot failed to kill,
the second would not. I knew the chances, knew that if he were not
killed the great beast could rush through the thorn bushes as we would
go through rushes, whereas we should all be kept to the path, and as
he could move twice as fast as we could, in ten minutes he would have
killed us all. But I felt sure and, besides, I was excited. The beast
was looking right at me, so I aimed just below the horns and between
the eyes and fired. With a grunt the buffalo pitched forward on his
knees and rolled over, dead.
In a trice the Swahili tribesmen had cut their way through the thorns
and we were standing over the dead body of a fine young bull. They
all made much of the shot, though in truth it was not a good one.
Either I had aimed a little high or the rifle had thrown high at the
short range, and only the force of the nitrous powder had driven the
steel-pointed bullet through two inches at least of the bossed horn
into the brain. As a matter of fact the whole head was traversed, for
we found the bullet in the skin of the neck.
That evening we halted in a clearing and I saw an African feast; it
began about six in the evening and went on till after midnight. Each
man stuffed down ten pounds, at least, of buffalo meat, and with a
bottle of Cape “smoke” they soon became half delirious with excitement,
mimicking my shot and the fall of the buffalo a hundred times. The
chief, too, though less excited, was just as enthusiastic. I was
immediately christened “Rahala,” or the man who kills dead.
Next morning the chief told me that we had nearly reached our
destination, and I found that every quarter of a mile or so we had to
turn out of the path and make a detour in order to avoid some murderous
trap or snare. The whole forest was mined for some three miles deep. I
began to have a high opinion of Suleiman’s power and cunning.
I was soon to have convincing evidence of it. A little after noon
we came through the forests into the open and found ourselves in
cultivated fields of maize and vegetables. I did not pay much attention
to these surroundings at the time, for there was a broad road rising
steadily, and half-an-hour or so of rapid walking brought us out on
a grass-covered slope and in front, a mile above us, there was a
collection of kraals, and people moving about like bees before the
hives. Beyond the grassy slope again the mass of the mountain rose in
almost a cliff at least a thousand feet in height and thickly wooded;
the kraals were all together near the foot of this natural bastion.
About a quarter of a mile away from the Big Kraal we were met by some
messengers who came to conduct us to the presence of the Great Chief.
We found Suleiman seated alone in front of his kraal, with at least two
hundred Swahili warriors about him, all armed with repeating rifles;
the source of his power was obvious enough.
Chief Suleiman impressed me; he was an imposing figure, with large
head, beaked nose and hawk-like eyes, evidently an Arab, or Semite, if
you will, of pure race. Usually his eyes were half closed, peering at
once and reflective, with a myriad of tiny wrinkles about them, as if
he lived in the Great Desert, where men have to shield their eyes from
excess of light. Some remark would interest him and suddenly his eyes
would flash wide open and the imperious hawk-glance would shock you. He
was somewhat above middle height, forty-two or forty-five years of age;
his thick black hair and beard were slightly grey already and he was
rather stout. An air of high courage and command seemed to emanate from
him. He rose from his chair to meet me, took my offered hand, put me in
a seat on his right and sat down. While this was going on all the men
about him bowed with their hands on their hearts and profuse “salaams.”
It was evidently peace.
Though he talked Swahili at first I soon found that Suleiman knew
English and French, and talked both much better than I could talk
Swahili. Strange to say, as soon as he spoke English he put off some of
his pride of place and became more human and friendly. I learned that
he had been born near Tangiers and had lived for ten years near Biskra:
like most successful men he preferred the English to the French. He
was curious to know in what way I represented the British Government,
and when I assured him I had no official position whatever, he was
still more curious to find out why I had come at the risk of my life
to Central Africa. I told him I loved the wild freedom of the life and
loved to watch the habits of wild beasts and birds, and even to note
the characteristics of native customs. “It rests me,” I said, “to live
as a hunter and watch life as it was a hundred thousand years ago.”
“Do you collect ivory?” was the next question, for ivory is the road to
wealth in Africa.
“No. I have a pair of enormous horns just for specimens, and that is
all.”
“How do you protect yourself from wandering bands of warriors of this
or that tribe?”
“I have a dozen well-armed men,” I replied.
“As well armed as mine?” he asked, and I nodded, smiling; no conception
of the seriousness of the question even dawned on me.
We talked more than an hour, and then he invited me to dinner in his
kraal. The food was very good indeed, but the wine was a sort of
native product, and I contented myself with tasting it. After the
meal we came out and sat before the kraal, and suddenly a dozen girls
came and danced before us, Arab fashion. Some were negresses, but one
or two were Arabs of the famous Ouled-Nail tribe, hereditary dancers
by profession, as graceful as possible, sylph-like, indeed, for they
all exercise assiduously and train themselves as strenuously as our
prize-fighters.
The show amused and interested me, for the girls were of different
colour and very different type, but all had been selected by no
mean judge for their beauty. The Arabs were, of course, white, but
there were two or three golden-brown girls, whom Suleiman spoke of
disdainfully as Copt-Christians, and in contrast with these the shining
bronze of the natives, with their pearly white teeth and flashing dark
eyes.
The natives were only clothed in the “moocha” tablier about their
waists; but the Copts and Arabs were swathed in silk veils that floated
about the slim figures, now revealing, now concealing rounded limbs and
curves. The music was a slow chant of the girls’ voices, punctuated
by the beat of the tom-tom. Large fires had been lighted, because at
sundown a chilliness came into the mountain air.
It would have been impossible, I thought, to have imagined a more
primitive or a more picturesque scene. The girls danced between us and
the fires, their figures and waving limbs etched, so to speak, against
the red glow, while all around the natives sat or hunkered down as a
living frame. Gradually the girls left off, the natives first, and
then the Copts, while the trained Arab professionals continued to show
all their powers, from the famous _danse du Ventre_ to posturings and
abandonments, such as the Almas of India display. The fires had died
down and the round yellow moon had climbed high above the trees.
“Bedtime,” said Suleiman. “You will find beds and servants yonder,” and
he pointed to a kraal near by.
“You have given me a royal entertainment,” I said. “I am infinitely
obliged to you.”
His eyes flashed and, as we parted, he summed up:
“Power and women. What else is there in life?”
I laughed and made some remark about wishing that I could show him
equal hospitality and that I would do my best when my carriers came. He
waved his hand to me: “To-morrow is another day.”
Next morning I was a little surprised to find all my men grouped round
the kraal Suleiman had allotted them. The Chief told me he thought I
should be more comfortable if he hastened to bring up my baggage and
stores. I could only thank him for his foresight. At the same time a
doubt of his good faith occurred to me, but I showed no sign of any
suspicion; in fact I scarcely felt enough for the apprehension to
become articulate.
I had armed a dozen of my best men with Springfield rifles and
automatic pistols, and Suleiman, I found, was very eager to know how
far the pistols could carry and whether they would kill or not. I soon
proved to him that they were more trustworthy and far deadlier than his
“trade” rifles, which often burst or jammed. Seeing his admiration of
the automatic pistols I made him a present of one and remarked casually
that when I returned to the coast I’d send him up a hundred; his face
lit up at the promise. Before leaving me that morning he pointed out
a kraal some distance away which he had allotted to my carriers and
baggage, but, fortunately for me, my armed guards always slept about
my kraal, and so I told him. The Chief bowed, smiling (he was really a
born diplomat), and went away after saying he would send food in for
me. Fortunately, again, I asked him to lunch with me, as I had some
champagne.
We had a great lunch and Suleiman, though a Mohammedan, drunk much more
than was good for him, and indeed was not to be seen for the rest of
the day. But about nightfall one of the Arab dancers whom I had admired
the evening before presented herself, declaring proudly that she had
been sent to me as a present by the Great Chief. I laughed and shook my
head, telling her she must return to the Great Chief’s kraal, as women
were not allowed in my religion.
She seemed much hurt, told me she could serve me in many ways, and
began unwinding her swathing veils. When I stopped her showing her
beauty she would have me touch her arms and breasts and hips to prove
that she was firm everywhere, as a trained boy might have been. Were it
not for her too large nose she would indeed have been a model of rare
beauty. But I could not assume the responsibility for her, so I sent
her back pitilessly, and as it turned out I could not have acted more
wisely, for I thereby won a priceless ally.
The third or fourth day I had been Suleiman’s guest two or three things
happened that gave me pause. Tapp, my English servant, came to me,
saying he could not find his automatic pistol, and when I questioned
him I found that he had been flirting with one of the Arab dancers,
and he believed she had taken it. Tapp was a Cockney youth, undersized
and ugly, but wiry and healthy, extremely clever with horses and,
strange to say, with machines also, willing to make himself useful in
any way, brimful of the spirit of adventure, yet quick-witted in life
and extraordinarily loyal. “I thought I ought to tell you the story,
sir,” he said, “because that Chief Suleiman’s a slippery sort of gent,
and in my opinion he’s up to no good; he’s put our carriers slap-bang
in the middle of his soldiers, where they’re no use to us,” he added
significantly. I told him to keep his eyes and ears open and report
anything suspicious, and I assured him that I was on the look-out,
though I didn’t believe in any danger. I had a couple of automatic
pistols that were not being used, and I knew the value both of a small
gift and large promises.
The next afternoon Suleiman came and told me that he wanted me to come
to his kraal to see his daughter. I looked surprised, and he added, “My
only real child. The others don’t matter; but Rachel is beautiful. I
was married to her mother in Algiers,” he added. “She was of the great
tribe of the Ouled-Nail--the tribe in which all the women are dancers
from generation to generation.” An hour or so later I went over to
Suleiman’s kraal, and I took with me the automatic pistols; his people
would perhaps cease stealing them when he got a couple for nothing. But
I forgot what I came to do when Rachel, his daughter, came towards me
out of the gloom. She was short rather than tall, with very fair skin,
and showed hardly a trace of her Jewish origin. Her nose was slightly
aquiline, but the eyes were blue--at once candid and cordial eyes that
met yours fairly, and lent her a sort of innocent air, at variance with
her quiet, self-possessed manner. There were contrasts in her that
piqued curiosity. “I wonder if you know why I am glad to meet you?” she
asked, after father had introduced us.
“No,” I replied, a little astonished at the unusualness of the
greeting. “No, I can’t imagine, except, perhaps, out of loneliness.”
“I have books,” she replied, “and am not lonely--at least not very,”
she added truthfully. “But I wished to meet you because my father said
you knew French and had lived in Paris, and because--well, because you
sent Micah back to him--the dancer, I mean,” she added hastily, for
the Chief seemed about to break in, as if he wanted to complete her
thought. “He thinks Micah a miracle of beauty.”
“She’s certainly pretty,” I said, “and has a lovely figure; but she
speaks only a very few words of French, and I thought she’d be happier
with her companions than with a stranger of another race.”
Rachel clapped her hands together with a little crow of delight. “I
told you so, father,” she said; and then to me: “You were quite right;
she snores dreadfully; what could you expect with that nose! But won’t
you be seated? What’s in the package?” she added, pointing to the
parcel in which I had the automatics.
“Something for the Chief,” I replied, and I took out the pistols and
handed them to him. Suleiman started and the hawk’s eyes stared at me.
I saw at once that Tapp’s suspicions had been well founded. I should
have to take care.
“I had a couple of these pistols over,” I added significantly, “and
I thought you might like them, Chief, and if you do, and find them
useful, I can write to London and get you as many as you wish.”
He was trembling with eagerness. “I’d like to try them myself,” he
broke in, “then I’ll talk to you.”
“Sure, sure,” I interjected, putting the parcel with the cartridges
into his hands. “You have five hundred shots there, and fifty will tell
you all about them.”
In a trice he was out of the kraal, his usual dignity thrown off in
his excitement. As we sat down Rachel looked at me.
“You are very clever,” she said thoughtfully, “and I like clever
people. But how did you know?”
“Know what?” I asked.
“Know,” she replied, “that my father is crazy to have all new weapons.
His power,” she added, “is founded on his rifles.”
“Oh, that’s nothing,” I replied negligently. “The Chief has treated me
well. I wanted him to have the pistols.”
“When you write to London for more,” she said quietly, “I’d show him
the letter and let him send it. It’ll get to Mombasa quickly,” she
added, smiling.
I noted the advice and gave Suleiman the letter the morning after.
Meantime I went on talking to Rachel. For some reason or other she
interested me. She moved gracefully and was beautifully formed--as,
indeed, all the women of her tribe are apt to be; for as dancers they
have developed in the centuries the perfect dancer’s figure. They are
nearly all slight and round, with small breasts and fine limbs. Most
Arabs, I think, have small wrists and ankles, and Rachel happened
besides to have an interesting, pretty face and the curious, frank
ways of one who has always been in authority, so to speak, and had to
consider nothing but her own pleasure.
Almost at once she asked me: “Are you married?” and when she heard I
was free she rounded her shoulders and hugged herself, so to speak, in
a funny little gesture, very expressive of intimate pleasure.
At once, too, she asked me about Paris. I had to tell her what
women did there, and speak of theatres and dances and jewellery and
dresses--dresses especially. “How did they dress in the evenings?”
A little maliciously I told her how low the dresses were being worn,
and her eyes made pictures of all I saw and all I left unsaid as well.
“Do you like those low dresses?” she asked, and I confessed that I did,
that the Paris Opera House was a splendid sight with the myriads of
nude shoulders set off by the diamond and pearl necklaces.
The music, too, interested her, and she got up and went over to a sort
of musical box, which presently wheezed forth _Voi che Sapete_ and
_Caro Nome_ and half-a-dozen other favourite airs. Rachel had musical
talent and could hum (and did hum in and out of season) more tunes than
I had ever heard of.
In many respects she was a child of nature, and if my talk did not
interest her, she usually began humming or singing some tune to
herself in a way that set all my nerves on edge. What pleased her must
evidently please everyone else, and she had no voice, poor girl!
I soon found that she thought over everything I said and acted on it
very ingeniously.
Suleiman asked me to dinner a day or so later and told me Rachel was
going to be there, and sure enough she appeared in a dress without
shoulder-straps, as I had said, and cut far lower even that one would
find in Paris. But her figure was almost perfect, and she was as
pleased as a child when I praised it.
When the dancing girls came in she drew back, and we talked together
in the mouth of the kraal. She asked me again whether “she was pretty
this way,” and she touched her low dress. I told her she made one want
to kiss her, she was so pretty. “Why not?” she asked simply, and our
intimacy began.
After my gift of the automatics and my letter to London ordering a
hundred more pistols of the same calibre Chief Suleiman became very
confidential, and gradually I learned all about him and his pretty
daughter. Whenever I was in any doubt as to the Chief’s motives Rachel
enlightened me and unconsciously, at the same time, discovered her own
character.
Suleiman was a Mohammedan, and while studying him I found I was getting
an astonishing insight into his religion; for his faith was merely the
garment of his spirit. He was of an incomparable, a brutal sensuality;
he could imagine no heaven without houris, and his individualism was
just as marked. Mohammed’s view of life was that of the Arab sheik; he
wanted “justice” for all men, kindness to dependents and those of the
true faith; but there he stopped. Suleiman had no conception that the
claims of other weaker human beings were as valid as his; Socialism
was clean beyond his horizon; he thought it as silly as an American
banker thinks it or a French Bourbon. And Rachel was as self-centred as
her father, as resolved to get what she wanted out of life. All this
dawned on me gradually through the intercourse of many days and weeks
and shall be told in the next chapter. Here and now I just want to
say that as Suleiman grew friendly he showed a wonderful hospitality.
He devised a great game-beat for me, where I feasted my eyes for days
and nights on all sorts of strange beasts; he taught me, or one of his
conjurers did, that snakes talk, and often I spent the night listening
to the “mambas” or cobras making weird noises, which the conjurer often
interpreted rightly.
He always knew, for example, when they were going to separate; the
curious way they rubbed their bodies and heads together before they
parted taught me that our human “good-night kiss” may perhaps be found
all through nature, even in the rustling of the leaves.
But feastings with dances afterwards constituted the chief element in
Suleiman’s hospitality, and one incident illumined the man’s whole
being to me in such an astonishing way I must give it as it took place.
I had asked him about African cooking, I remember, told him I wanted a
distinctively African meal, and he promised he would have one prepared
if I cared to provide the “sweet, foaming wine,” as he called champagne.
In a day or two the feast was arranged, and as usual now Rachel took
her place at the board. We had an ostrich egg on a sort of native
spinach, and then a small roast that looked like a leg of lamb or kid.
I should have thought nothing of it if Suleiman had not expatiated on
its merits even before it was brought on the table.
“What sort of meat is it?” I asked casually; “what do you call it in
French?”
“Taste it,” he said, putting a large slice on my plate. “Taste it
and tell me what you think; this is the best meat in the world, the
sweetest and most tender, and agrees with everyone; a fever-sick man
can digest it.”
I looked at Rachel and she nodded, smiling encouragement. She evidently
thought as much of it as her father. But now my curiosity was roused; I
turned the meat over; it was very close-grained and evidently tender,
though it was dark in colour.
“What is it called in English?” I asked. “Surely you know its name in
French or English, or at least you can describe it.” And I filled their
glasses and my own with champagne.
Suleiman saw he could get me no further, so he began: “It is the best
meat on earth; that is, tenderer,” and he pointed to the pear-like
joint, “than lamb, sweeter than kid or chicken. If you won’t taste it
till you know, then learn that it is the thigh, properly kept for a
fortnight and smoked, of a young girl about thirteen years old----”
“Did she die?” I asked, cold with horror.
“Sure,” he said with a loud laugh, “that’s not alive, is it?”
“Was she killed?”
“In a row,” he remarked, waving his hand. “She was in a slave-gang and
got in the way of a Swahili’s spear when her mother fainted.”
The whole scene flashed before me.
“Good God!” I cried, and poured down my glass of champagne while
drawing back from the table.
They both laughed. Suleiman said: “Look at the effect of mere
prejudice, stupid prejudice. Try it, man, and you’ll get the same
liking for it we have; won’t he, Rachel?”
Rachel agreed, but I got up and went to the door of the kraal. God’s
sunshine even seemed unreal to me--from that moment on I began to think
better of some prejudices.
II
I have often wondered since how I came to put myself into Suleiman’s
power without hesitation or suspicion. And even more curious it seems
how I learned to know the dangers of my position bit by bit and just in
time to save my skin.
After my letter to London, ordering one hundred automatic pistols for
him, Suleiman promised me a wonderful entertainment.
“I will show you all Africa can show,” he said, “in beauty.”
Naturally I thanked him, and we were still in talk when a sort of
headman, Abdulla, “salaamed” before him, calling “Sultan.”
This Abdulla was a Bajoon, a tribe of mixed negroid and Arab descent,
a mixture which gave him intelligence above the average. He was very
short and broad, evidently powerful, and though probably not more than
thirty always had his head shaved--shaved, as I found out by chance,
with a piece of broken bottle-glass. Abdulla was the Sultan’s right
hand in all ways, and deserved to be. He was not only intelligent
as Europeans estimate intelligence, but a master of slave-craft and
bush-craft as well. He came, it appeared, to announce to the Sultan
that a herd of elephants had been located on the other side of the
_shamba_ (the Swahili word for a native clearing). Abdulla’s excitement
was contagious, and when he wound up with _Wananame labuda_, “Males
too, I heard!” I saw that Suleiman was keenly interested.
“A troop of elephants, isn’t it?” I asked.
“Yes,” replied Suleiman; “males and females in a herd. Do you love
shooting, like most Englishmen?”
“No,” I answered. “But I’d love to study a mixed troop on the feed
without being seen.”
“Without being seen,” repeated Suleiman disdainfully, “is easy enough:
elephants have poor sight; but without being smelt is another thing.
Besides, the males seldom feed with the females. Elephants are hard
to kill,” he went on significantly, “and a wounded elephant is more
dangerous than a buffalo in bush.”
“Our modern rifles kill elephants as easily as deer,” I replied
carelessly.
Suleiman flashed his hawk-glance on me, in surprise I thought, and
his daughter’s phrase came into my head that her father’s power was
“founded on his rifles.”
He was probably even more desirous of getting fine rifles than
automatic pistols. But for the moment he said nothing, save that he
would have the elephants kept in the same bush till next morning.
Abdulla assured him that was easy, for the forest was full of rubber
bushes, and the elephants loved the fruit.