The Twelve African Novels (A Collection). Edgar Wallace

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      Bosambo was in many ways a model chief.

      He dispensed a justice which was, on the whole, founded on the purest principles of equity. Somewhere, hundreds of miles away, sat Sanders of the River, and upon his method Bosambo, imitative as only a coast man can be, based his own. He punished quickly and obeyed the law himself as far as it lay within him to obey anything.

      There was no chief as well disciplined as he, else it would have been a bad day’s work for Sekedimi of the Akasava, for Bosambo was a man of high spirit and quick to resent affront to his dignity. And Sekedimi had wounded him deeply.

      But Bosambo was a patient man; he had the gift which every native possesses of pigeonholing his grievances. Therefore he waited, putting aside the matter and living down his people’s disapproval.

      He carried a pliant stick of hippo hide that helped him considerably in preserving their respect.

      All things moved orderly till the rains had come and gone.

      Then one day at sunset he came again to the Akasava City, this time with only ten paddlers. He walked through the street unattended, carrying only three light spears in his left hand and a wicker shield on the same arm. In his right hand he had nothing but his thin, pliant stick of hippo skin, curiously carved.

      The chief of the Akasava had word of his coming and was puzzled, for Bosambo had arrived in an unaccustomed way — without ostentation.

      “The dawn has come early,” he said politely.

      “I am the water that reflects the light of your face,” replied Bosambo with conventional courtesy.

      “You will find me in a kind mood,” said Sekedimi; “and ready to listen to you.”

      He was fencing cautiously; for who knew what devilish lies Bosambo had told Sandi?

      Bosambo seated himself before the chief.

      “Sekedimi,” said he, “though my skin is black, I am of white and paramount people, having been instructed in their magic, and knowing their gods intimately.”

      “So I have heard; though, for my part, I take no account of their gods, being, as they tell me, for women and gentle things.”

      “That is true,” said Bosambo, “save one god, whose name was Petero, who was a great cutter off of ears.”

      Sekedimi was impressed.

      “Him I have not heard about,” he admitted.

      “Knowing these,” Bosambo went on, “I came before the rains to speak of M’shimba-m’shamba, the green one, who walks crookedly.”

      “This is the talk of children,” said Sekedimi; “for M’shimba-m’shamba is the name our fathers gave to the whirlwind that comes through the forest — and it is no devil.”

      Sekedimi was the most enlightened chief that ever ruled the Akasava and his explanation of M’shimba-m’shamba was a perfectly true one.

      “Lord chief,” said Bosambo earnestly, “no man may speak with better authority on such high and holy matters as devils as I, Bosambo, for I have seen wonderful sights and know the world from one side to the other. For I have wandered far, even to the edge of the world which looks down into hell; and I have seen wild leopards so great that they have drunk up whole rivers and eaten trees of surprising height and thickness.”

      “Ko, ko,” said the awestricken counsellors of the chief who stood about his person; and even Sekedimi was impressed.

      “Now I come to you,” said Bosambo, “with joyful news, for my young men have captured M’shimba-m’shamba, the green one, and have carried him to the land of the Ochori.”

      This he said with fine dramatic effect, and was pleased to observe the impression he had created.

      “We bound the green one,” he went on, “with N’Gombi chains, and laid the trunk of a tree in his mouth to silence his fearful roaring. We captured him, digging an elephant pit so deep that only men of strongest eyesight could see the bottom, so wide that no man could shout across it and be heard. And we took him to the land of the Ochori on a hundred canoes.”

      Sekedimi sat with open mouth.

      “The green one?” he asked incredulously.

      “The green one,” said Bosambo, nodding his head; “and we fastened together four shields, like that which I carry, and these we put over each of his eyes, that he might not see the way we took him or find his way back to the Akasava.”

      There was a long silence.

      “It seems,” said Sekedimi, after a while, “that you have done a wonderful thing; for you have removed a devil from our midst. Yet the Ochori people will be sorry, for the curse which you have taken from us you have given to your people, and surely they will rise against you.”

      “E-wa!” murmured his counsellors, nodding their heads wisely. “The Ochori will rise against their chief, for he has loosened an evil one in their midst.”

      Bosambo rose, for night was falling and he desired to begin the return stage of his journey.

      “The Ochori are a very proud people,” he said. “Never have they had a great devil before; the Isisi, the Akasava, the N’Gombi, the Bush folk, and the Lesser Isisi, the Bomongo, the Boungendi — all these tribes have devils in many variety, but the Ochori have had none and they were very sad. Now their stomachs are full of pride for M’shimba-m’shamba, the green one, is with them, roving the forest in which we have loosed him, in a most terrifying way.”

      He left the Akasava in a thoughtful mood, and set his State canoe for the juncture of the river.

      That night the Akasava chief called together all his headmen, his elders, his chief fighting men and all men of consequence.

      The staccato notes of the lokali called the little chiefs of outlying villages, and with them their elder men. From the fourth hour of night till the hour before dawn the palaver lasted.

      “O chiefs and people,” said Sekedimi, “I have called you together to tell you of a great happening. For M’shimba-m’shamba, who since the beginning of the world has been the own devil of the Akasava people, is now no longer ours. Bosambo, of the Ochori, has bound him and carried him away.”

      “This is certainly a shame,” said one old man; “for M’shimba-m’shamba is our very own devil, and Bosambo is an evil man to steal that which is not his.”

      “That is as I think,” said Sekedimi. “Let us go to Sandi, who holds court by the border of the N’Gombi country, and he shall give us a book.”

      Sanders was at that time settling a marriage dispute, the principal article of contention being: if a man pays six thousand matakos (brass rods) for a wife, and in the first twelve months of her married life she develop sleeping-sickness, was her husband entitled to recover his purchase price from her father? It was a long, long palaver, requiring the attendance of many witnesses; and Sanders was deciding it on the very СКАЧАТЬ