The Twelve African Novels (A Collection). Edgar Wallace

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СКАЧАТЬ he had adventured along a new river which had never before existed, and thus had come to the Isisi. That was a good excuse, as Mahmud knew. It was more difficult to explain the selling of rifles, for it is a practice which all civilised nations very properly hold as unpardonable. Much more difficult was it to account for twenty-one slaves discovered in the bottom of the felucca. Yet the man had a permit to “recruit labour,” signed by one Dom Reynaldo de Costa y Ferdinez, Portuguese governor of a coast colony.

      Sanders had a horror of “complications,” especially with Portuguese authorities, for complications meant long, long letters, reports, minutes, memoranda, and eventually blue books. This meant years of correspondence, official investigations, and a kick at the end, whether he was right or wrong.

      “By all laws. El Mahmud,” he said, “you have forfeited your life, yet I accept part of your story, though, God knows, I believe you lie! My steamer shall take you to a place which is twenty miles from the Portuguese, and there you shall be set free with food and arms.”

      “What of my ship and cargo?” asked El Mahmud.

      “I shall burn the one and confiscate the other,” said Sanders.

      El Mahmud shrugged his shoulders.

      “All things are ordained,” he said.

      Sanders took him on board and steamed to a place indicated by the trader — it was nearer his camp — and released him with rifles and ammunition for his followers and ten days’ supply of food.

      “Go with God,” said Sanders in the vernacular.

      El Mahmud stood on the bank and watched the steamer sweeping out to midstream.

      He waited till its nose was turned downstream and Sanders was plainly to be seen on the bridge, then sat down carefully, raised his rifle, taking deliberate aim, and fired.

      Sanders was giving instructions to Abiboo concerning the repacking of Hotchkiss cartridges which had been laid on the deck in preparation for eventualities.

      “These—” he said, then stumbled forward.

      Abiboo caught him in his arms, and lowered him to the deck.

      “The man — do not let him escape,” said Sanders faintly.

      Abiboo picked up a cartridge, opened the breech of the long-barrelled Hotchkiss, and slipped it in.

      El Mahmud was running swiftly toward the cover of the forest. He had two hundred yards of bare ground to cover, and Abiboo was firing a gun which was as accurately sighted as a rifle. Moreover, he had plenty of time, and was not flurried.

      The terrified followers of El Mahmud, returning that night to search for their master, were constantly finding him.

      The moon came up over the forest and fretted the river with silver, and Toloni, King of the Akasava, watched from the shore for the omen which Tilagi, the witchdoctor, had promised.

      He had long to wait before he saw the ripple which a swimming crocodile makes, but when it came into view, crossing the river in a straight line from shore to shore, he had no eyes for aught else.

      Straight as an arrow it sped, undeviating by a single curve from the true line.

      “That is a good omen,” said Toloni, and rose from the shadow of the bush which hid him from view.

      He waited a little while, then struck noiselessly into the forest, swinging his spears.

      He came upon his six councillors sitting patiently by the side of the forest path.

      “All is as should be,” he said. “Tilagi has spoken the truth, for the crocodile crossed from bank to bank, and the day of the Akasava has come.”

      He led the way back to the sleeping city and gained his big hut. It was empty, by his orders. A fire smouldered in the centre of the hut, and his bed of skins was ready for him on the raised frame bedstead.

      He went out again into the open.

      “Send Tilagi to me,” he said to the waiting headman.

      When the old man came — a skinny old man, walking laboriously by the aid of a stick, Toloni called him into the hut.

      “Father,” he said, “at the full of the moon, as the tide was high, I saw the black crocodile leave his pool on the Isisi bank, and he swam from shore to shore even as you said.”

      The old man said nothing, nodding his head.

      “All this is favourable to my plans,” said the King, “and it shall fall out as you say.”

      “You are a great king,” croaked the old man. “There never was in this land so great a king, for you have the mind of a white man, and are greater than Sandi. Other kings and chiefs of the Akasava were fools, and died like fools on a certain high tree, Sandi putting a rope about their necks; but they had black men’s brains.”

      The King walked up and down the length of his hut. He was a tall man, splendidly built, and he carried his head high.

      “All men are with me,” he said. “Isisi, N’Gombi, Bomongo — —”

      He paused.

      “And the Ochori, lord king,” said the witchdoctor. “Yes, they are with you, though the foreigner who rules them is one with Sandi.”

      “That is a matter which needs settlement,” said the King; “yet we must move quickly, for Sandi will soon be back. It is now three days since he left, and the boat-with-the-wheel travels swiftly.”

      Messengers came and went all that day. Five times was the King aroused from his slumbers to receive messages and to answer questions. The Isisi people were nervous; they feared Sandi.

      Would the King swear by death that if the plan did not prosper he would tell Sandi that he forced the Isisi to act by threats and cruelties? The N’Gombi had a queen of Sandi’s house; should they slay her? She had a lover who would kill her very quickly, having access to her hut.

      “Do not kill her,” was the message Toloni sent, “for I know she is very beautiful. She shall have a hut in the shadow of my great house.”

      The Lesser Isisi people were impatient. There were two mission stations in their country; should they stay and burn?

      “These are small matters,” said Toloni the King. “First we must take Sanders, and him we will sacrifice according to ancient practice. Then all other matters will be simple and easy.”

      That night when darkness came and his unconscious people gossiped about the fires — none were in the secret of the coming great events save Toloni’s councillors and certain headmen of other tribes — a lokali rattled musically on the outskirts of the town.

      The King, in his hut, heard the signal-drum, and knew from its note that it answered some far-off fellow.

      Very faintly the distant drum was sounding news from village to village, every roll, every staccato tap, every crescendo having its special meaning.

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