The Twelve African Novels (A Collection). Edgar Wallace

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СКАЧАТЬ Crack!” The shot intended for the king missed him, and broke the leg of a soldier behind.

      It had been hopeless from the first; this Sanders realized with some philosophy, as he lay stretched on the baked earth, trussed like a fowl, and exceedingly uncomfortable. At the first shot Abiboo, obeying his instructions, would turn the bows of the steamer down stream; this was the only poor satisfaction he could derive from the situation.

      Throughout that long day, with a pitiless sun beating down upon him, he lay in the midst of an armed guard, waiting for the death which must come in some dreadful form or other.

      He was undismayed, for this was the logical end of the business. Toward the evening they gave him water, which was most acceptable. From the gossip of his guards he gathered that the evening had been chosen for his exit, but the manner of it he must guess.

      From where he lay he could see, by turning his head a little, the king’s tent, and all the afternoon men were busily engaged in heaping fiat stones upon the earth before the pavilion. They were of singular uniformity, and would appear to be specially hewn and dressed for some purpose. He asked his guard a question.

      “They are the dancing stones, white man,” said the soldier, “they come from the mountain near the city.” When darkness fell a huge fire was lit; it was whilst he was watching this that he heard of the Zaire’s escape, and was thankful.

      He must have been dozing, exhausted in body and mind, when he was dragged to his feet, his bonds were slipped, and he was led before the king. Then he saw what form his torture was to take.

      The flat stones were being taken from the fire with wooden pincers and laid to form a rough pavement before the tent.

      “White man,” said the king, as rude hands pulled off the Commissioner’s boots, “the woman Daihili would see you dance.”

      “Be assured, king,” said Sanders, between his teeth, “that some day you shall dance in hell in more pleasant company, having first danced at the end of a rope.”

      “If you live through the dancing,” said the king, “you will be sorry.” A ring of soldiers with their spears pointing inward surrounded the pavement, those on the side of the tent crouching so that their bodies might not interrupt the Great One’s view.

      “Dance,” said the king; and Sanders was thrown forward. The first stone he touched was only just warm, and on this he stood still till a spear-thrust sent him to the next. It was smoking hot, and he leapt up with a stifled cry. Down he came to another, hotter still, and leapt again— “Throw water over him,” said the amused king, when they dragged the fainting man off the stones, his clothes smouldering where he lay in an inert heap.

      “Now dance,” said the king again — when out of the darkness about the group leapt a quivering pencil of yellow light.

      Ha-ha-ha-ha-a-a-a!

      Abiboo’s Maxim-gun was in action at a range of fifty yards, and with him five hundred Ochori men under that chief of chiefs, Bosambo.

      For a moment the Yitingi stood, and then, as with a wild yell which was three parts fear, the Ochori charged, the king’s soldiers broke and fled.

      They carried Sanders to the steamer quickly, for the Yitingi would re-form, being famous night fighters. Sanders, sitting on the deck of the steamer nursing his burnt feet and swearing gently, heard the scramble of the Ochori as they got into their canoes, heard the grunting of his Houssas hoisting the Maxim on board, and fainted again.

      “Master,” said Bosambo in the morning, “many moons ago you made charge against the Ochori, saying they would not fight. That was true, but in those far-off days there was no chief Bosambo. Now, because of my teaching, and because I have put fire into their stomachs, they have defeated the soldiers of the Great King.” He posed magnificently, for on his shoulders was a mantle of gold thread woven with blue, which was not his the night before.

      “Bosambo,” said Sanders, “though I have a score to settle with you for breaking the law by raiding, I am grateful that the desire for the properties of others brought you to this neighbourhood. Where did you get that cloak?” he demanded.

      “I stole it,” said Bosambo frankly, “from the tent of the Great King; also I brought with me one of the stones upon which my lord would not stand. I brought this, thinking that it would be evidence.” Sanders nodded, and bit his cigar with a little grimace. “On which my lord would not stand,” was very prettily put.

      “Let me see it,” he said; and Bosambo himself carried it to him.

      It had borne the heat well enough, but rough handling had chipped a corner; and Sanders looked at this cracked corner long and earnestly.

      “Here,” he said, “is an argument that no properly constituted British Government can overlook — I see Limbili’s finish.” The rainy season came round and the springtime, before Sanders again stood in the presence of the Great King. All around him was desolation and death. The plain was strewn with the bodies of men, and the big city was a smoking ruin. To the left, three regiments of Houssas were encamped; to the right, two battalions of African Rifles sat at “chop,” and the snappy notes of their bugles came sharply through the still air.

      “I am an old man,” mumbled the king; but the girl who crouched at his side said nothing. Only her eyes never left the brick-red face of Sanders.

      “Old you are,” he said, “yet not too old to die.”

      “I am a great king,” whined the other, “and it is not proper that a great king should hang.”

      “Yet if you live,” said Sanders, “many other great kings will say, ‘We may commit these abominations, and because of our greatness we shall live.’”

      “And what of me, lord?” said the girl in a low voice.

      “You!” Sanders looked at her. “Ho, hi,” he said, as though he had just remembered her. “You are the dancing girl? Now we shall do nothing with you, Daihili — because you are nothing.” He saw her shrink as one under a lash.

      After the execution, the Colonel of the Houssas and Sanders were talking together.

      “What I can’t understand,” said the Colonel, “is why we suddenly decided upon this expedition. It has been necessary for years — but why this sudden activity?”

      Sanders grinned mysteriously.

      “A wonderful people, the English,” he said airily. “Old Man Limbili steals British subjects, and I report it. ‘Very sad,’ says England. He wipes out a nation. ‘Deplorable!’ says England. He makes me dance on the original good-intention stones of Hades. ‘Treat it as a joke,’ says England; but when I point out that these stones assay one ounce ten pennyweights of refined gold, and that we’ve happed upon the richest reef in Central Africa, there’s an army here in six months!”

      I personally think that Sanders may have been a little unjust in this point of view. After all, wars cost money, and wars of vengeance are notoriously unprofitable.

VII. The Forest of Happy Dreams

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