Part 11

"Ahmed," he said to one of these, "it is written in the blessed Word that the life of man is very short. Now I particularly desire that it shall be no shorter than the days our God has given to me. Be prepared to-morrow, therefore, to leave this city, for I see an end to my power."

He rose early in the morning, and went to the palaver which began the day. He was not perturbed to discover the seat usually reserved on the right of the king occupied by a lesser chief, and his own stool placed four seats down on the left.

"I have spoken with my wise counsellors," said the king, "also with witch-doctors, and these wise men have seen that the crops are bad, and that there is no fortune in this land, and because of this we will make a great sacrifice."

Ussuf bowed his head.

"Now, I think," said King N'raki slowly, "because I love my people very dearly, and I will not take any young maidens, as is the custom, for the fire, and for the killing, that it would be good for all people if I took the woman Lapai."

All eyes were fixed on Ussuf. His face was calm and motionless.

"Also," the king went on, "I hear terrible things, which fill my stomach with sorrow."

"Lord, I hear many things also," said Ussuf calmly; "but I am neither sorry nor glad, for such stories belong to the women at their cooking-pots and to men who are mad because of sickness."

N'raki made a little face.

"Women or madmen," he said shortly, "they say that you are under the spell of this woman, and that you are plotting against this land, and have also sent secret messengers to 'They,' and that you will bring great armies against my warriors, eating up my country as Sandi ate up the Akasava and the lands of the Great King."

Ussuf said nothing. He would not deny this for many reasons.

"When the moon comes up," said the king, and he addressed the assembly generally, "you shall tie Lapai to a stake before my royal house, and all the young maidens shall dance and sing songs, for good fortune will come to us, as it came in the days of my father, when a bad woman died."

Ussuf made no secret of his movements that day. First he went to his hut at the far end of the village, and spoke to the six Arabs who had come with him into the kingdom.

To the headman he said:

"Ahmed, this is a time when death is very near us all, be ready at moonrise to die, if needs be. But since life is precious to us all, be at the little plantation at the edge of the city at sunset, as soon as darkness falls and the people come in to sacrifice."

He left them and walked through the broad, palm-fringed street of the Akarti city till he came to the lonely hut, where the outcast woman dwelt. It was such a hut as the people of Akarti built for those who are about to die, so that no dwelling-place might be polluted with the mustiness of death.

The girl was starting on her daily penance--a tall, fine woman. She watched the approach of the king's minister without expressing in her face any of the torments which raged in her bosom.

"Lapai," said Ussuf, "this night the king makes a sacrifice."

He made no further explanation, nor did the girl require one.

"If he had made this sacrifice earlier, he would have been kind," she said quietly, "for I am a very sorrowful woman."

"That I know, Lapai," said the Arab gently.

"That you do not know," she corrected. "I had sorrow because I loved a man and destroyed him, because I love my people and they hate me, and now because I love you, Ussuf, with a love which is greater than any."

He looked at her; there was a strange pity in his eyes, and his thin, brown hands went out till they reached to her shoulders.

"All things are with the gods," he said. "Now, I cannot love you, Lapai, although I am full of pity for you, for you are not of my race, and there are other reasons. But because you are a woman, and because of certain teachings which I received in my youth, I will take you out of this city, and, if needs be, die for you."

He watched her as she walked slowly down towards where the people of the Akarti waited for her, drawn by morbid curiosity, since the king's intention was no secret. Then he shrugged his shoulders helplessly.

At nine o'clock, when the virgin guards and the old king went to find her for the killing, she had gone.

So also had Ussuf and his six Arabi. The king's _lokali_ beat furiously, summoning all the country to deliver into his hands the woman and the man.

* * * * *

Sanders, at that moment, was hunting for the Long Man, whose name was O'Fasa. O'Fasa was twelve months gone in sleeping-sickness, and had turned from being a gentle husband and a kindly father into a brute beast. He had speared his wife, cut down the Houssa guard left by Sanders to keep the peace of his village, and had made for the forest.

Now, a madman is a king, holding his subjects in the thrall of fear, and since there was no room in the territory for two kings and Sanders, the Commissioner came full tilt up the river, landed half a company of black infantry, and followed on the ravaging trace of the madman.

At the end of eight days he came upon O'Fasa, the Long Man. He was sitting with his back against a gum-tree, his well-polished spears close at hand, and he was singing the death song of the Isisi, a long low, wailing, sorrowful song, which may be so translated into doggerel English:

Life is a thing so small That you cannot see it at all; Death is a thing so wise That you see it in every guise. Death is the son of life, Pain is his favourite wife.

Sanders went slowly across the clearing, his automatic pistol in his hand.

O'Fasa looked at him and laughed.

"O'Fasa," said Sanders gently, "I have come to see you, because my King heard you were sick."

"O ko!" laughed the other. "I am a great man when kings send their messengers to me."

Sanders, his eye upon the spears, advanced warily.

"Come with me, O'Fasa," he said.

The man rose to his feet. He made no attempt to reach his spears. Of a sudden he ducked, and turned, running swiftly towards the black heart of the forest. Sanders raised his pistol, and hesitated a second--just too long. He could not kill the man, though by letting him live he might endanger the lives of his fellows and the peace of the land.

The Commissioner was in an awkward predicament. Ten miles beyond was the narrow gap which led into the territory of N'raki. To lead an armed expedition through that gap would bring about complications which it was his duty and desire to avoid. The only hope was that O'Fasa would double back, for the trail they followed left little doubt as to where he had gone. Unerringly, with the instinct of the hunted beast, he had made for the gap.

They came to the gorge, palm-fringed, and damp with the running waters, at sunset, and camped. They found the spoor of the hunted man, lost it, and picked it up again. At daybreak Sanders, with two men, pushed through the narrow pass and came into the forbidden territory. There was no sign of the fugitive.

Sanders's _lokali_ beat out four urgent messages. They were addressed to a Mr. Grayson Smith, who might possibly be in that neighbourhood, but if he received them, he sent no reply.

Now, madmen and children have a rooted dislike for strange places, and Sanders, backing on this, fixed his ambush in the narrow end of the gorge. Sooner or later O'Fasa would return. At any rate, he decided to give him four days. Thus matters stood when the sometime minister, Ussuf, with a woman and five Arabi, made for the gap, with the swift and tireless guards of the king at their heels.

Three times the Arab had halted to fight off his pursuers, and in one of these engagements he had sustained his only casualty, and had left a dead Arab follower on the ground of his stand.

The gap was in sight, when a regiment of the north, summoned by _lokali_, swept down on his left and effectively blocked his retreat. Ussuf took up his position on a little rocky hill. His right was protected by swamp land, and his left and rear were open.

"Lapai," he said, when he had surveyed the position, "it seems to me that the death you desire is very close at hand. Now, I am very sorry for you, but God knows my sorrow can do little to save you."

The woman looked at him steadily.

"Lord," she said, "I am very glad if you and I go down to hell together, for in some new, strange world you might love me, and I should be satisfied."

Ussuf laughed, showing his straight rows of white teeth in genuine amusement.

"That we shall see," he said.

The attack came almost at once, but the rifles of the six shot back the assault. At the end of two hours the little party stood intact. A second attack followed; one man of the Arab guard went down with an arrow through his throat, but Ussuf's shooting was effective, and again the northern regiment drew off.

Before the hill, and in the direction of Akarti city, was the king's legion. It was from this point that Ussuf expected the last destroying assault.

"Lapai," he said, turning round, "I----"

The woman had gone! In the fury of the defence he had not noticed her slip away from him. Suddenly she appeared half-way down the hill and turned to him.

"Come back!" he called.

She framed her mouth with two hands that her words might carry better. In the still evening air every word came distinctly.

"Lord," she said, "this is best, for if they have me, they will let you go, and death will come some day to you, and I shall be waiting."

She turned and ran quickly down the hill towards the stiff lines of warriors below.

Then suddenly appeared out of the ground, as It seemed, a tall, lank figure right in her path. She stopped a moment, and the man sprang at her and lifted her without an effort. Ussuf raised his rifle and covered them, but he dare not shoot.

There was another interested spectator. King N'raki, a vengeful man, and agile despite his years, had followed as eagerly as the youngest of his warriors, and now stood in the midst of his counsellors, watching the scene upon the hill.

"What man is that?" he asked. "For I see he is not of our people."

Before the messengers he would have dispatched could be instructed, the tall man, running lightly with his burden, came towards him, and laid a dead woman almost at the king's feet.

"Man," he said insolently, "I bring you this woman, whom I have killed, because a devil put it into my heart to do so."

"Who are you?" asked N'raki. "For I see you are a stranger."

"I am a king," said O'Fasa, the Long Man; "greater than all kings, for I have behind me the armies of white men."

The humour of this twisted truth struck him of a sudden, for he burst into a fit of uncontrollable laughter.

"You have the armies of the white men behind you?" repeated N'raki slowly, and looked nervously from side to side.

"Behold!" said O'Fasa, stretching out his hand.

The king's eyes followed the direction of the hand. Far away across the bare plain he saw black specks of men advancing at regular intervals. The sinking sun set the bayonets of Sander's little force aglitter. The Commissioner had heard the firing, and had guessed much.

"It is 'They,'" said King N'raki, and blinked furiously at the Long Man, O'Fasa.

He turned swiftly to his guard.

"Kill that man!" he said.

* * * * *

Sanders brought his half-company of Houssas to the hill and was met half-way by Ussuf.

"I heard your rifles," he said. "Have you seen anything of a long chap, of wild and aggressive mien!" He spoke in English, and Ussuf replied in the same language.

"A tall man?" he asked, and Sanders wondered a little that a man so unemotional as was Grayson Smith, of the Colonial Intelligence, should speak so shakily.

"I think he is here," said the Englishman in Arab attire, and he led the way down the hill.

N'raki's armies had moved off swiftly. The fear of "They" had been greater in its effect than all its legions.

The Englishmen made their way to where two figures lay in a calm sleep of death.

"Who is the woman?" asked Sanders.

"A native woman, who loved me," said Grayson Smith simply, and he bent down and closed the eyes of the girl who had loved him so well.

*CHAPTER XII*

*THE AMBASSADORS*

There is a saying amongst the Akasava:

"The Isisi sees with his eyes, the N'gombi with his ears, but the Ochori sees nothing but his meat."

This is translated badly, but in its original form it is immensely subtle. In the old days before Bosambo became chief, king, headman, or what you will, of his people, the Ochori were quite prepared to accept the insulting description of their sleepiness without resentment.

But this was _cala-cala_, and now the Ochori are a proud people, and it is not good to throw insulting proverbs in their direction, lest they throw them back with something good and heavy at the end of it.

The native mind works slowly, and it was not until every tribe within three hundred miles had received some significant indication of the change which had come about in the spirit and character of this timorous people, that they realised the Ochori were no longer a race which might serve as butts for the shafts of wisdom.

There was a petty chief of the Isisi who governed a great district, for, although "Isisi" means "small" the name must not be taken literally. He had power under his king to call palavers on all great national questions, such as the failure of crops, the shifting of fishing-grounds, and the infidelities of highly-placed women.

One day he called his people together--his counsellors, his headmen, and all sons of chiefs--and he laid before them a remarkable proposition.

"In the days of my father," said Embed, "the Ochori were a weak and cowardly people; now they have become strong and powerful. Last week they came down upon our brothers of the Akasava and stole their goats and laid shame upon them, and behold! the Akasava, who are great warriors, did nothing more than send to Sandi the story of their sorrow. Now it seems to me that this is because Bosambo, the chief, has a devil of great potency, and I have sent to my king to ask him to entreat the lord Bosambo to tell us why these things should be."

The gathered counsellors nodded their heads wisely. There was no doubt at all that Bosambo had the advantage of communication with a devil; or if this were not so, he was blessed to a minor degree with a nodding acquaintance with one of those ghosts in which the forest of the Ochori abounded.

"And thus says my lord, the king of the Akasava, and of all the territories and the rivers and the unknown lands beyond the forest as far as the eye can see," the chief went on. "He sends me his message by his counsellor, saying: 'It is true Bosambo has a devil, and for the sake of my people I will send to him, asking him to put his strength in our hands, that we may be wise and bold.'"

Now this was a conclusion which had been arrived at simultaneously by the six nations, and, although the thoughts of their rulers were not communicated in such a public fashion, the faith in Bosambo's inspiration was universal, and the idea that Bosambo should be thus approached was a violent and shameless plagiarism on the part of the chief Emberi.

One morning in the late spring the ambassadors of the powers came paddling up to Ochori city in twelve canoes with their headmen, their warriors, their beaters of drums and their carriers. Bosambo, who had no faith whatever in humanity, was warned of their approach and threw the city into a condition of defence. He himself received the deputation on the foreshore, and the spokesman was Emberi.

"Lord Bosambo," said the chief, "we come in peace, and from the chief and the kings and all the peoples of these lands."

"That may be so," said Bosambo, "and my heart is full of joy to see you. But I beg of you that you land your spearmen and your warriors and your beaters of drums on the other side of the river, for I am a timorous man, and I fear that I cannot in this city show you the love and honour which Sandi has asked me to give even to common people."

"But, lord," protested the chief, who, to do him credit, had no warlike or injurious ideas concerning his host, "on the other side of the water there is only sand and water and evil spirits."

"That may be so," said Bosambo; "but on this side of the river there are me and my people, and we desire to live happily for many years. I tell you, that it is better that you should all die because of the sand and the water and the evil spirits, than that I should be slain by those who do not love me."

"My master," said Emberi pompously, "is a great king and a great lover of you."

"Your master," said Bosambo, "is a great liar."

"He loves you," protested Emberi.

"He is still a great liar," said Bosambo; "for the last time I met him he not only said that he would come with his legions and eat me up, but he also called me evil names, such as 'fish-eater' and 'chicken,' and 'fat dog.'"

Bosambo spoke without fear of consequences because he had a hundred of his picked men behind him, and all the advantage of the sloping beach. He would have turned the delegates back to their homes, but that the persistent and alarmed Emberi succeeded in interesting him in his announcements, and, more important, there were landed from one of the canoes, rich presents, including goats and rice and a looking-glass, which latter was, explained Emberi, the very core of his master's soul.

In the end Bosambo left his hundred men to hold the beach, and Emberi persuaded his reluctant followers to make their home on the sandy shore across the river.

Then, and only then, did Bosambo unbend, and had prepared one of his famous feasts, to which all the chiefs of the land contributed in the shape of meat and drink--all the chiefs, that is, except Bosambo, who made a point of giving nothing away to anybody in any circumstances.

The palaver that followed was very interesting, indeed, to the chief of the Ochori. One by one, from nine in the morning to four in the following morning, the delegates spoke.

Much of their speeches dealt with the superlative qualities which distinguished Bosambo's rule--his magnificent courage, his noble generosity--Bosambo glanced quickly round to see the faces of the counsellors who had reluctantly provided the feast--and to the future which awaited all nations which imitated all his virtues.

"Lord, I speak the truth," said Emberi, "and thus it runs that all people from the sea where the river ends, to the leopard's mouth from whence it has its source, know that you are familiar with devils that give you courage and cunning and tell you magic, so that you can make men from rats."

Bosambo nodded his head gravely.

"All this is true," he said. "I have several devils, although I do not always use them. For, as you know, I am a follower of a particular faith, and was for one life-time a Christian, believing in all manners of mysteries of which you know nothing--Marki, Luki, and Johnny Baptist, who are not for you."

He looked round at the awed men and shook his head.

"Nor do you know of the wonders they worked, such as curing burns, and striking dead, and cutting ears. Now I know these things," he continued impressively, "therefore Sandi loves me, for he also is a God-man, and often comes to me to speak with him concerning these white men."

"Lord, what are devils?" asked an impatient delegate.

"Of the devils," repeated Bosambo, "I have many."

He half closed his eyes and was silent for the space of two minutes. He gave the impression that he was counting his staff--and, indeed, this was the idea precisely that he wished to convey.

"O ko!" said Emberi in a hushed voice. "If it is true, as you say it is, then our master desires that you shall send us one devil or two that we might be taught the peculiar manner of these wonderful ghosts."

Bosambo coughed, and glanced round at the sober faces of his advisers.

"I have many devils who serve me," he began. "There is one I know who is very small and has two noses--one before him and one behind--so that he may smell his enemy who stalks him. Also there is one who is so tall that the highest trees are grass to his feet. And another one who is green and walks upside down."

For an hour Bosambo orated at length on daemonology, even though he might never have known the word. He drew on the misty depths of his imagination. He availed himself of every recollection dealing with science. He spoke of ghosts who were familiar friends, and came to his bidding much in the same way that the civilised dog comes to his master's whistle.

The delegates retired to their huts for the night in a condition of panic when Bosambo informed them that he had duly appointed a particular brand of devil to serve their individual needs, and protect them against the ills which the flesh is heir to.

Now Ochori city and the Ochori nation had indeed awakened from the spell of lethargy under the beneficent and drastic government of Bosambo, and it is known in the history of nations, however primitive or however advanced they may be, that no matter how excellent may be the changes effected there will be a small but compact party who regard the reformer as one who encumbers the earth. Bosambo had of his own people a small but powerful section who regarded all changes with horror, and who saw in the new spirit which the chief had infused into the Ochori, the beginning of the end. This is a view which is not peculiar to the Ochori.

There were old chiefs and headmen who remembered the fat and idle days which preceded the upraising of Bosambo, who remembered how easy it was to secure slave service, and, remembering, spoke of Bosambo with unkindness. The chief might have settled the matter of devils out of hand in his own way, and would, I doubt not, have sent away the delegation happily enough with such messages of the Koran as he could remember written on the paper Sanders had supplied him for official messages.

But it was not Bosambo's way, nor was it the way with the men with whom he had to deal to expedite important palavers. Normally, such a conference as was now assembled, would last at least three days and three nights. It seemed that it would last much longer, for Bosambo had troubles of his own.

At dawn on the morning following the arrival of the delegation, a dust-stained messenger, naked as he was born, came at a jog-trot and panting heavily from the bush road which leads to the Elivi, and without ceremony stood at the door of the royal hut.

"Lord Bosambo," said the messenger, "Ikifari, the chief of Elivi, brings his soldiers and headmen to the number of a thousand, for a palaver."

"What is in his heart?" said Bosambo.

"Master," said the man, "this is in his heart: there shall be no roads in the Ochori, for the men of Elivi are crying out against the work. They desire to live in peace and comfort."

Bosambo had instituted a law of his own--with the full approval of Sanders--and it was that each district should provide a straight and well-made forest road from one city to another, and a great road which should lead from one district to its neighbour.

Unfortunately, every little tribe did not approach the idea with the enthusiasm which Bosambo himself felt, nor regard it with the approval which was offered to this most excellent plan by the King's Government.

For road-making is a bad business. It brings men out early in the morning, and keeps them working with the sweat running off their bare backs in the hot hours of the day. Also there were fines and levies which Bosambo the chief took an unholy joy in extracting whenever default was made.