THE TAMER OF BEASTS
Native folk, at any rate, are but children of a larger growth. In the
main, their delinquencies may be classified under the heading of
"naughtiness." They are mischievous and passionate, and they have a
weakness for destroying things to discover the secrets of volition. A
too prosperous nation mystifies less fortunate people, who demand of
their elders and rulers some solution of the mystery of their rivals'
progress. Such a ruler, unable to offer the necessary explanation, takes
his spears to the discovery, and sometimes discovers too much for his
happiness.
The village of Jumburu stands on the edge of the bush country, where the
lawless men of all nations dwell. This territory is filled with fierce
communities, banded together against a common enemy--the law. They call
this land the B'wigini, which means "the Nationless," and Jumburu's
importance lies in the fact that it is the outpost of order and
discipline.
In Jumburu were two brothers, O'ka and B'suru, who had usurped the
chieftainship of their uncle, the very famous K'sungasa, "very famous,"
since he had been in his time a man of remarkable gifts, which he still
retained to some extent, and in consequence enjoyed what was left of
life.
He was, by all accounts, as mad as a man could be, and in circumstances
less favourable to himself his concerned relatives would have taken him
a long journey into the forest he loved so well, and they would have put
out his eyes and left him to the mercy of the beasts, such being the
method of dealing with lunacy amongst people who, all unknown to
themselves, were eugenists of a most inflexible kind.
But to leave K'sungasa to the beasts would have been equivalent to
delivering him to the care of his dearest friends, for he had an
affinity for the wild dwellers of the bush, and all his life he had
lived amongst them and loved them.
It is said that he could arrest the parrot in the air by a "cl'k!" and
could bring the bird screeching and fluttering to his hand. He could
call the shy little monkeys from the high branches where they hid, and
even the fiercest of buffaloes would at his word come snuffling and
nosing his brown arm.
So that, when he grew weak-minded, his relatives, after a long palaver,
decided that for once the time-honoured customs of the land should be
overridden, and since there was no other method of treating the blind
but that prescribed by precedent, he should be allowed to live in a
great hut at the edge of the village with his birds and snakes and
wild cats, and that the direction of village affairs should pass to his
nephews.
Mr. Commissioner Sanders knew all this, but did nothing. His task was to
govern the territory, which meant to so direct affairs that the
territory governed itself. When the fate of K'sungasa was in the
balance, he sent word to the chief's nephews that he was somewhere in
the neighbourhood, and that the revival of the bad old custom of
blinding would be followed by the introduction of the bad new custom of
hanging; but this had less effect upon the council of relatives--to whom
Sanders's message was not transmitted--than the strange friendship which
K'sungasa had for the forest folk.
The nephews might have governed the village, exacted tribute,
apportioned fishing rights, and administered justice for all time, but
for the fact that there came a period of famine, when crops were bad and
fish was scarce, and when, remarkably enough, the village of L'bini,
distant no more than a few hours' paddling, had by a curious coincident
raised record crops, and had, moreover, a glut of fish in their waters.
There was the inevitable palaver and the inevitable solution. O'ka and
B'suru led ten canoes to the offending village, slaughtered a few men
and burnt a few huts. For two hours the combatants pranced and yelled
and thrust at one another amidst a pandemonium of screaming women, and
then Lieutenant Tibbetts dropped from the clouds with a most substantial
platoon of Houssas, and there was a general sorting out.
Sanders held a court on one of the middle islands near the Residency,
and B'suru was sent to the Village of Irons for the term of his natural
life. O'ka, who had fled to the bush, escaped, however, and with him a
headman and a few followers.
Lieutenant Tibbetts, who had spent two profitable days in the village of
Jumburu, came back to the Residency a very thoughtful young man.
"What is the matter with Bones?" asked Captain Hamilton.
His sister smiled over her book, but offered no other comment.
"Do you know, Pat?" demanded Hamilton sternly.
Sanders looked at the girl with a twinkle in his grey eyes, and lit a
cheroot. The relationships between Patricia Hamilton and Bones were a
source of constant joy to him. Taciturn and a thought dour as he was,
Pat would never have suspected the bubbling laughter which arose behind
that lean brown face, unmovable and, in his moments of most intense
enjoyment, expressionless.
"Bones and I have a feud," said the girl.
Sanders smiled.
"Not as violent a feud as O'ka and I have, I hope?" he said.
She frowned a little and looked at him anxiously.
"But you don't worry about the threats of the people you have punished?"
she asked.
"I haven't punished O'ka," said Sanders, "and an expedition into the
bush would be too expensive an affair. He has apparently settled with
the B'wigini people. If they take up his feud, they might give trouble.
But what is your trouble with Bones?"
"You must ask him," she said.
Hamilton's opportunity came next day, when Bones applied for leave.
"Leave?" said Captain Hamilton incredulously. "Leave, Bones? What the
dickens do you want leave for?"
Bones, standing as stiff as a ramrod before the office table at which
his superior sat, saluted.
"Urgent private affairs, sir," he said gruffly.
"But you haven't any private affairs," protested Hamilton. "Your life is
an open book--you were bragging about that fact yesterday."
"Sir and brother-officer," said Bones firmly, "a crisis has arisen in my
young life. My word, sir, has been called into doubt by your jolly old
sister. I desire to vindicate my honour, my reputation, an' my
veracity."
"Pat has been pulling your leg!" suggested Hamilton, but Bones shook his
head.
"Nothin' so indelicate, sir. Your revered an' lovely relative--God
bless her jolly old heart!--expressed her doubt in _re_ leopards an'
buffaloes. I'm goin' out, sir, into the wilds--amidst dangers, Ham, old
feller, that only seasoned veterans like you an' me can imagine--to
bring proof that I am not only a sportsman, but a gentleman."
The timely arrival of Miss Patricia Hamilton, very beautiful in dazzling
white, with her solar helmet perched at an angle, smote Bones to
silence.
"What have you been saying to Bones?" asked Hamilton severely.
"She said----"
"I said----"
They began and finished together.
"Bones, you're a tell-tale," accused the girl.
"Go on," said Bones recklessly. "Don't spare me. I'm a liar an' a thief
an' a murderer--don't mind me!"
"I simply said that I didn't believe he shot the leopard--the one whose
skin is in his hut."
"Oh, no," said Bones, with heavy sarcasm, "I didn't shoot it--oh, no! I
froze it to death--I poisoned it!"
"But did you shoot it?" she asked.
"Did I shoot it, dear old Ham?" asked Bones, with great calmness.
"Did you?" asked Hamilton innocently.
"Did I shoot at that leopard," Bones went on deliberately, "an' was he
found next mornin' cold an' dead, with a smile on his naughty old
face?"
Hamilton nodded, and Bones faced the girl expectantly.
"Apologize, child," he said.
"I shall do nothing of the kind," she replied, with some heat. "Did
Bones shoot the leopard?"
She appealed to her brother.
Hamilton looked from one to the other.
"When the leopard was found----" he began.
"Listen to this, dear old sister," murmured Bones.
"When the leopard was found, with a spear in its side----"
"Evidently done after death by a wanderin' cad of a native," interposed
Bones hastily.
"Be quiet, Bones," commanded the girl, and Bones shrugged his shoulders
and obeyed.
"When the leopard was found," continued Hamilton, "he was certainly
beyond human aid, and though no bullet mark was discovered, Bones
conclusively proved----"
"One moment, dear old officer," interrupted Bones. He had seen out of
the tail of his eye a majestic figure crossing the square.
"Will you allow me to produce scientific an' expert evidence?"
Hamilton assented gravely, and Bones went to the door of the orderly
room and roared a name.
"I shall produce," he said quietly, but firmly, "the evidence of one
who enjoyed the confidence of dear old Professor What's-his-name, the
eminent thigumy-ologist. Oh, Ali!"
Ali Abid, a solemn figure, salaamed in the doorway.
Not for nothing had he been factotum to a great bacteriologist before
the demise of his master had driven him to service with a lieutenant of
Houssas. His vocabulary smelt of the laboratory, his English was pure,
undefiled, and unusual.
"Ali, you remember my leopard?"
"Sir," said Ali, shaking his head, "who can forget?"
"Did I kill him, Ali?" asked Bones. "Tell the lady everything."
Ali bowed to the girl.
"Miss or madame," he said, "the leopard (_Felis pardus_), a wild beast
of the Felidae family, is indigenous to forest territory. The subject in
question--to wit, the skin thereof exhibited by Sir Bones--was
particularly ferocious, and departed this life as a result of hunting
conducted by aforesaid. Examination of subject after demise under most
scientific scrutiny revealed that said leopard (_Felis pardus_) suffered
from weak heart, and primary cause of death was diagnosed as shock
occasioned by large 'bang' from Sir Bones's rifle."
"What did I say?" asked Bones complacently.
"Do you mean to tell me," gasped the girl, "that you _frightened_ the
leopard to death?"
Bones spread out his hands disparagingly.
"You have heard the evidence, dear old sister," he said; "there is
nothing to add."
She threw back her head and laughed until her grey eyes were swimming in
tears.
"Oh, Bones, you humbug!" she laughed.
Bones drew himself up more stiffly than ever, stuck his monocle in his
eye, and turned to his chief.
"Do I understand, sir," he said, "that my leave is granted?"
"Seven days," said Hamilton, and Bones swung round on his heel, knocked
over Hamilton's stationery rack, stumbled over a chair, and strode
gloomily from the hut.
When Patricia Hamilton woke the next morning, she found a note pinned to
her pillow.
We may gloss over the impropriety of the proceedings which led to
this phenomenon. Bones was an artist, and so small a matter as the
proprieties did not come into his calculations.
Patricia sat up in bed and read the letter.
"DEAR OLD FRIEND AND DOUTTING THOS."
(Bones's spelling was always perfectly disgraceful),--
"When this reaches you, when this reaches you, I shall be far, far
away on my long and dangerus journey. I may not come back, I may
not come back, for I and a faithful servant are about to penetrate
to the lares of the wild beasts of the forest, of the forest. I am
determined to wipe out the reproach which you have made. I will
bring back, not a dead leppard, not a dead leppard, but a live one,
which I shall seeze with my own hands. I may lose my life in this
rash and hazardus enterprise, but at least I shall vindycate my
honour.--Farewell, dear old Patrisia.
"Your friend,
"B."
"Which proves," said Hamilton, when he was shown the letter, "that Bones
is learning to spell. It only seems yesterday when he was spelling
'Hamilton' with three m's. By the way, how did you get this letter?"
"I found it pinned to the door," said Patricia tactfully.
Bones went by the shortest route to Jumburu, and was received without
enthusiasm, for he had left a new chief to rule over a people who were
near enough to the B'wigini to resent overmuch discipline. But his
business was with K'sungasa, for the two days' stay which Bones had made
in the village, and all that he had learnt of the old tamer, had been
responsible for his reckless promise to Patricia Hamilton.
He came at a critical moment, for K'sungasa, a thin and knobbly old man,
with dim eyes and an incessant chuckle, was very near his end. He lay
on a fine raised bed, a big yellow-eyed wild cat at his feet, a monkey
or two shivering by the bedside, and a sprawling litter of kittens--to
which the wild cat leapt in a tremble of rage when Bones entered the
hut--crawling in the sunlight which flooded the hut.
"Lord Tibbetti," croaked the old man, "I see you! This is a good time,
for to-morrow I should be dead."
"K'sungasa," said Bones, seating himself gingerly, and looking about for
the snake which was usually coiled round the old man's stool, "that is
foolish talk, for you will see many floods."
"That is fine talk for the river folk," grinned the old man, "but not
for we people of the forest, who never see flood and only little-little
rivers. Now, I tell you, lord, that I am glad to die, because I have
been full of mad thoughts for a long time, but now my mind is clear.
Tell me, master, why you come."
Bones explained his errand, and the old man's eyes brightened.
"Lord, if I could go with you to the forest, I would bring to you many
beautiful leopards by my magic. Now, because I love Sandi, I will do
this for you, so that you shall know how wise and cunning I am."
In the woods about the village was a wild plant, the seeds of which,
when pounded and boiled in an earthen vessel, produced, by a rough
method of distillation, a most pungent liquid. Abid spoke learnedly of
_pimpinella anisum_, and probably he was right.[4]
[Footnote 4: Both anise and star anise (_Illicium anisatum_) are to be
found in the Territories, as also is a small plant which has all the
properties (and more) of _Pimpinella anisum_. This was probably the
plant.--AUTHOR.]
Bones and his assistant made many excursions into the woods before they
found and brought back the right plant. Fortunately it was seed-time,
and once he was on the right track Bones had no difficulty in securing
more than a sufficient quantity for his purpose.
He made his distillation under the old man's directions, the fire
burning in the middle of the hut. As the drops began to fall from the
narrow neck of his retort, a fault sweet aroma filled the hut. First the
cat, then the monkeys began to show signs of extraordinary agitation.
Cat and kittens crouched as near the fire as they could, their heads
craned towards the brown vessel, mewing and whimpering. Then the monkeys
came, bright-eyed and eager.
The scent brought the most unexpected beasts from every hole and crevice
in the hut--brown rats, squirrels, a long black snake with spade-shaped
head and diamond markings, little bush hares, a young buck, which came
crashing through the forest and prinked timidly to the door of the hut.
The old man on the bed called them all by name, and snapped his feeble
fingers to them; but their eyes were on the retort and the crystal
drops that trembled and fell from the lip of the narrow spout.
* * * * *
A week later a speechless group stood before the Residency and focussed
their astonished gaze upon the miracle.
"The miracle" was a half-grown leopard cub, vividly marked. He was
muzzled and held in leash by a chain affixed to a stout collar, and
Bones, a picture of smug gratification, held the end of the chain.
"But how--how did you catch him?" gasped the girl.
Bones shrugged his shoulders.
"It is not for me, dear old friend, to tell of nights spent in the
howlin' forest," he quavered, in the squeaky tone which invariably came
to him when he was excited. "I'm not goin' to speak of myself. If you
expect me to tell you how I trailed the jolly old leopard to his grisly
lair an' fought with him single-handed, you'll be disappointed."
"But did you track him to his lair?" demanded Hamilton, recovering his
speech.
"I beg of you, dear old officer, to discuss other matters," evaded Bones
tactfully. "Here are the goods delivered, as per mine of the
twenty-fourth instant."
He put his hand to his pocket mechanically, and the cub looked up with a
quick eager stare.
"Bones, you're a wonderful fellow," said Sanders quietly.
Bones bowed.
"And now," he said, "if you'll excuse me, I'll take my little friend to
his new home."
Before they realized what he was doing, he had slipped off the chain.
Even Sanders stepped back and dropped his hand to the automatic pistol
he carried in his hip pocket.
But Bones, unconcerned, whistled and marched off to his hut, and the
great cat followed humbly at his heels.
That same night Bones strode across from his hut to the Residency,
resolved upon a greater adventure yet. He would go out under the
admiring eyes of Patricia Hamilton, and would return from the Residency
woods a veritable Pied Piper, followed by a trail of forest denizens.
In his pocket was a quart bottle, and his clothes reeked with the scent
of wild aniseed. As a matter of fact, his secret would have been out the
moment he entered Sanders's dining-room, but it so happened that his
programme was doomed to interruption.
He was half-way across the square when a dark figure rose from the
ground and a harsh voice grunted "Kill!"
He saw the flash of the spear in the starlight and leapt aside. A hand
clutched at his jacket, but he wrenched himself free, leaving the
garment in his assailant's hands.
He was unarmed, and there was nothing left but flight.
Sanders heard his yell, and sprang out to the darkness of the verandah
as Bones flew up the steps.
He saw the two men racing in pursuit, and fired twice. One man fell, the
other swerved and was lost in the shadows.
An answering shot came from the Houssa sentry at the far end of the
square. Sanders saw a man running, and fired again, and again missed.
Then out of the darkness blundered Ali Abid, his face grey with fear.
"Sir," he gasped, "wild animal (_Felis pardus_) has divested muzzlement
and proper restraint, and is chasing various subjects outrageously."
Even as he spoke a fourth figure sped across the ground before the
Residency, so close that they could see the bundle he carried under his
arm.
"My jacket!" roared Bones. "Hi, stop him! Good Lord!"
Swift on the heels of the flying man came a streak of yellow fur....
Whether O'ka of the Jumburu outpaced the leopard, or the leopard
overtook O'ka, is not known, but until the rains came and washed away
the scent of crude aniseed, Bones dared not leave his hut by night for
fear of the strange beasts that came snuffling at his hut, or sat in
expectant and watchful circles about his dwelling, howling dismally.