Part 3

The Native Commissioner was hurrying home. It was nearly midday and getting hot. Moreover, he had been on a long journey and was anxious to get back to his bungalow which, for him, meant a measure of civilisation. His garden, his books, prints on the wall, white ducks, fair cooking and no more tinned food for a while, a cool verandah and occasional converse with his fellow officials. At daylight he had left his caravan to follow whilst he pushed on ahead.

His sturdy horse also had thoughts of home for, in spite of the heat, he cantered briskly along the dusty road without any encouragement from his master. Half a mile from the house a short cut skirted a patch of young gum trees and led through the servants' compound to the back door of the bungalow.

The horse, without hesitation and not waiting for direction, took the short cut. As a general rule the Commissioner chose the longer way. He preferred entering his own house by the front door; he had designed and built his home himself and had given much thought to its face and approach, for, who could tell, might he not some day lead an English bride up the winding drive?

The Commissioner let the beast have his way: he was amused and, leaning forward, patted his horse's neck.

As he clattered through the compound he caught sight of some of his servants conversing with a stranger. There was nothing remarkable in that, but two things he noticed. One, that his people did not see or hear him until he was almost abreast of them, and secondly, that the stranger, a native from the river district, let him pass without the usual salute.

He rode on and dismounted at the back of the house. A groom took his horse. A small boy opened the door for him and led him through to the front hall. The Commissioner dropped into a chair and, after a short rest, busied himself with getting comfortable.

A shave, followed by a hot bath, a change into "slacks," a light luncheon, and a pipe. Then he attacked his accumulated mail. He had scarcely sorted his home from his official letters--the latter could well wait--when his head house boy came in rather breathless.

"Morena," he said, "what is to-day?"

"What do you mean, the day of the month or of the week, and why do you ask?"

"Oh no," said the boy, "but what is the number of the day?"

"Tuesday the sixth. Why?"

"It is only that I wanted to know, for has not the Morena been absent for a great many days?"

"Well, it's the sixth, Tuesday the sixth of September."

"Thank you, Morena."

The boy withdrew.

The Native Commissioner turned to his letters again. His mother had written pages telling him of his sister's engagement to his oldest friend; his sister wrote more pages about her happiness; his father referred to his younger brother at Oxford, to the engagement just announced, and described the latest strike at some length.

Presently he got up and went out to the verandah to stretch his legs. He admired his garden and mentally praised his own cunning in setting it out. The rains had not yet broken but some of the trees were already in new leaf. What a blaze of colour there would be in a few weeks!

"Morena, what day is it to-day?"

Turning, he met the gaze of a garden labourer who, spade in hand, was standing slightly in advance of some half a dozen of his fellows.

"The sixth. But why do you ask?"

"It is because black people do not know how to count, and one day with us is as another."

All returned to their work. A few minutes later the dog boy came with a litter born during his master's absence. They were a likely looking lot and the native took personally the remarks passed upon his charge: he appeared to assume responsibility for their colour, shape and sex.

"Morena, what day is it to-day?"

"Why?"

"See, Morena, I mark each day on a stick; the dogs were born ten days ago."

"Well, it's the sixth."

"Thank you, Morena."

At sundown the cattle came in. The herdsman came up to the house to report that the two calves born whilst his master was away on his journey were heifers, and received a few shillings as a reward for his good management When bull calves came the cattle herd made many excuses and neither expected nor received any reward.

"You have done well."

"Thank you, Morena," said the boy, tying the silver in a corner of his loin cloth. "What is the number of the day to-day?"

Now this was the fourth time the question had been asked. What did it mean? Could it mean anything of importance and, if so, what?

But the Commissioner decided in his own mind that his people had some trivial dispute and were appealing to him to settle a knotty point. Still, he felt a little curious as to what that point might be, but knowing natives well, concluded that he would hear about it all in good time.

He asked no question this time but replied simply: "The sixth."

The news of his return spread quickly and several officials dropped in for a "sundowner." Headquarters news, dull and trivial as it usually is, was quickly disposed of. The Browns had gone home on leave, Jones had just come back, and Robinson had passed the law exam very well. A lion had been heard outside the township, and a mad cur had run amok through the compounds and, as a result, several good dogs had been shot and half a dozen natives sent south for treatment.

What sport had the Commissioner had?

On the whole, bad; he had missed a black-maned lion in a patch of bush near the river, and as the beast slipped through to the main forest he didn't bother to follow. He had, however, bagged a small leopard and two full-grown cheetahs. There were plenty of birds and buck about and, oh, yes, he had killed a bad old buffalo bull who nearly turned the tables on him. After listening to the details of the adventure, the visitors rose to leave.

No, he would not join them at the Club later, he felt tired and was looking forward to a comfortable bed for a change.

The Commissioner dined alone and turned in early.

In the morning he woke with a start. It was late, nearly eight o'clock; what the deuce were his people about?

He jumped out of bed and went to the bath-room. The bath was not set ready. He called to his boy. There was no answer. He slipped on a dressing gown and went to the kitchen. It was empty, the fire was not even lighted. He went back to the house for a pair of slippers and a hat and walked across to the native compound. By this time he was very angry.

To his amazement, the compound was quite empty. On his way back he looked in at the stable. His horses whinnied: they had not been fed, nor had the stable been cleaned. He fed the horses himself and then walked over to the cattle kraal. His half-dozen cows had not been milked.

At that moment the Magistrate came up.

"What's the matter with the natives?"

"I don't know, why?"

"Not a black soul in the township will do a hand's turn."

"Mine aren't here."

"Is there going to be a rising?"

"Certainly not. You people who live in camp are always expecting risings."

"Well, you know best, of course, but the boys refuse to work. They say Lizizi has told them not to."

"Who's Lizizi?"

"How should I know? I came to ask you that."

"Never heard of him."

"Well, what are you going to do about it?"

"I don't know yet. Send some of your people down to me, mine have made themselves scarce."

"Right, but what are you going to do to them?"

"Nothing, of course, except question them."

"I'll send my two house boys down."

"Send your cook as well."

"Why my cook?"

"Because I haven't had my breakfast yet."

"Well, neither have I for that matter."

"Then you had better come with them, we'll have breakfast all right."

The Magistrate went away and the Commissioner returned to his house to dress.

He hated having no bath; he disliked, too, going without breakfast. Discomfort on a journey he thought nothing of, but discomfort in his own home was ridiculous.

When the Commissioner emerged from his room, dressed but unshaven, and in a very bad temper, he found his head native in the hall and the rest of the servants standing on the verandah.

"We wish to speak with you," said the boy.

"I, too, have something to say."

"We cannot work to-day. To-morrow we will work."

"You will work to-day and now."

"No, Morena, we cannot work to-day, to-morrow we will work well."

"Why can't you work to-day?"

"Because Lizizi says we may not work to-day."

"Who's Lizizi?"

"A great doctor."

"Where is he?" said the Commissioner, looking round.

"No, he is not here, Morena, he lives on the Zambesi. He sent his man with a message yesterday."

"Was that the messenger I saw in the compound?"

"Yes, Morena."

"Where is he?"

"He has gone."

"Where?"

"He did not say where he was going. He told us he must carry the master's messages."

"What are the messages?"

"No man may work for his master to-day."

"What are the others?"

"That is all he said to us."

"Have you eaten this morning?"

"Yes, Morena."

"Then bring breakfast for the Magistrate and me, and quickly."

"But, Morena--"

"Well?"

"I may not work to-day."

"Breakfast is food, not work. Bring it."

"Yes, Morena."

The boy went out. The Commissioner turned to the rest of his servants.

"You won't work to-day?"

The cattle herd answered: "We may not, it is forbidden."

"Who forbids you?"

"Lizizi."

"Who is Lizizi?"

"The great doctor."

"Great?"

"Yes, Morena. Does he not jump into the river and come out alive on the third day?"

"I should say not, but where does he live?"

"At Minanga, on the Zambesi."

"Go to your work. I will visit this Lizizi. There is some mistake. The messenger is a foolish fellow, he had forgotten his master's words. I will see to it. Tell all the people that I go on a visit to Lizizi. He who does not work now and at once and well will meet with misfortune."

The servants dispersed to their various occupations. Slowly at first, and with evident reluctance; but, hearing that the head boy was busy getting his master's breakfast, they, too, set about their various duties.

When the Magistrate arrived he found everything normal. He had breakfast with the Commissioner. When the meal was over he found his own servants had gone back to his compound. The word had spread abroad that the Commissioner would visit Lizizi and put matters right.

"How did you do it?"

"Just talked to them a little."

"No violence, I hope?"

"Unnecessary."

"What was it all about?"

"I know no more than you, but intend to find out."

In a few hours the Commissioner was on his way to Minanga, on the Zambesi, the home of Lizizi, the great doctor.

II.

All next day, and for several days following, natives might be seen passing south in the direction of Minanga. The curious thing about these flocks of travellers was that they were chiefly composed of children--little children, from infants in arms to boys and girls of nine or ten, none older. When questioned, the parents would reply simply: "We are called. We are called to Minanga by Lizizi--by Lizizi, the great doctor."

The native servants who worked in the houses of the officials could, or would, give no fuller explanation. "Yes, they are called by Lizizi," was the only answer to all questioning.

In the Club, speculation as to what the Commissioner would do monopolised the conversation. Nearly all the officials wagered on a native rising. The Commandant of Police went about to prepare systematically for an event of this kind.

III.

The Commissioner travelled light and quickly. He, too, passed hordes of natives, mostly children. He, too, learnt that Lizizi called--that Lizizi had apparently mustered all the children of the district. He was now doubly certain that this was no native rebellion, or the children would have been conspicuously absent. He grudged Lizizi this implicit obedience. Two could not run the same country.

At length he approached Minanga. The neighbouring villages were thronged with children. In Minanga itself there were many hundreds. The Commissioner rode to the centre of the village and demanded to be shown Lizizi's hut. He was led up the hill to a single small hut built half-way up the slope. In front of it grew a huge tamarind tree.

"There is Lizizi," said his guide, pointing to an old man sitting on a stool in front of the hut.

The Commissioner watched. A strange performance was going on. A long queue of children was moving slowly past the seated figure, and as each child was marshalled forward--screaming with fright, for the most part--the old man put his hands on its head.

The Commissioner rode up to the hut. The old man touched the head of the child in front of him with his crossed thumbs; that was all, and the child passed hurriedly on to join a throng, already large, of others who had passed through the ordeal, or whatever it was.

On seeing the Commissioner the old man rose and seated himself on the ground, clapping his hands by way of greeting.

This curious native wore a large pair of spectacles, which gave him a benevolent air. His feet were bare--so, too, was his head--but he was otherwise clothed to the extent of a patched and very dirty shirt and an aged pair of trousers.

"Are you Lizizi?" asked the Commissioner.

"Morena, I am his slave."

"Where is Lizizi?"

"He walked on the water. Then he went to the bottom of the river and stayed there. After three days he came out alive and well. Some people said so who saw him."

"Where is he now?"

"Who can tell?"

"Did you send that message to the servants of the white men, saying that they were not to work?"

"I sent my master's message."

"What are you doing to these children?"

"My master said they must come."

"What for?"

"I put my hands on them, as my master said. Lizizi said: 'Let the children come, the little children, and do not stop them.' And Lizizi said: 'You must work for six days, and on the seventh day you must not do anything.'"

So that was the explanation. It came to the Commissioner in a flash.

"Who are you?" he asked.

"My name is Sinyoro."

"You have worked for a white man?"

"Yes, I was with the Mission."

"I thought as much."

"Lizizi" was the nearest this native could get to Jesus. The poor old man was, it transpired, a little mad. He had lived with the missionaries for many years, and had recently asked permission to visit friends on the Zambesi. The head missionary had let him go. As he afterwards explained, he knew the man was a little mad, but quite harmless. They had christened him James--James Sinyoro.

However, James, it seemed, had been trying his prentice hand at missionary work, and had given orders based on the little he remembered of the Mission Bible teaching.

* * * * *

James Sinyoro returned to the Mission Station, and the district to its normal tranquillity.

MIRONDA--A WOMAN.

The Paramount Chief had many wives. A newly arrived missionary, determined to convert the great man, opened his attack by asking why he had so many wives. The answer was disconcerting: "For political reasons." This matter of the Chief's was a rock upon which all missionary endeavours foundered. The Chief must discard all his wives, save one. The Chief was determined to keep them all.

To another reformer he said: "Leave me alone. Do what you will with the children and young people. Leave me to myself. You have shown me that my beliefs are foolish. You have not proved to me that yours are any wiser."

A third good man, about to transfer his activities to other fields, offered to present the Chief with his bright brass bedstead provided he became a Christian.

"Let me see it," said the old heathen. The bed was produced. "I have a better one. I paid a trader ten head of cattle for it." So no bargain was struck.

I think there must have been some grounds for saying that he clung to his many wives "for political reasons," because they, or at any rate some of them, were more trouble to the Chief than they were perhaps worth.

There was Mavevana, for instance, who was large and fat and therefore very beautiful from a native point of view, but whose tongue was a constant source of strife without and within the harem.

I should explain that each wife had her own group of huts. These groups--there were seventeen of them--were surrounded by a high reed fence, strengthened by sharply-pointed poles. The harem was a village within a village. Outside the fence the common people lived.

Each woman had her slaves. A strong guard of fully-armed men patrolled the harem at night. Old Sikoro, the keeper of the harem, was about day and night.

Then there was Mironda. Poor Mironda, who later paid, as women do, be they white, black or yellow.

Mironda was rather nearer to yellow than to black. I think she had some European blood in her. One does not often see a native woman with hazel eyes nor with freckles; and besides, she was very tall and slim.

As a special mark of his good will the Chief once took me through his harem. That is how I first came to see Mironda.

The woman aroused my interest. When we entered her compound she glared at her lord and master as a caged beast does upon free men. She did not for a moment take her eyes off him. She never so much as glanced in my direction. Her eyes caught the light once and reflected it as do those of a cat, a tiger. Yes, that was it, she put me in mind of a caged tiger.

She clasped her hands continuously during our short stay. The click, click, click of her ivory bangles drew my attention to her hands. Her hands and her wrists were very small, her finger nails long and sharp. I noticed her hands particularly because she had solid ivory bangles on each arm from wrist to elbow. These bangles were very small and, as they were solid, could only pass over very small hands.

I saw this curious woman twice only: the second time was some years later.

As I have said before, old Sikoro was the keeper of the harem. I hated him instinctively the moment I first set eyes on him: I hated him more when I heard the whole story.

Sikoro had only one eye. In his youth he had had smallpox, which pitted his face remorselessly and destroyed one eye. He wore a soldier's red tunic, the colour dimmed with age and dirt. Perched on his head was a tall cone-shaped fur cap which he plucked off whenever he met a superior. He was always plucking it off, not because he was really inferior in the black man's social scale to all he so saluted; on the contrary, in view of his office, he was an important person; he was over polite because he chose to appear humble.

The man knew his power well: his occupation gave him the ear of the Chief. All realized this and were ready to show him the respect which was justly his due: Sikoro was before them in showing respect, which was unnecessary. Men did not understand this humbleness of his and feared him. Sikoro loved their fear.

The woman, Mironda, alone had no fear of him. She despised the man and did not try to hide it. She often refused to see him. It was only utter boredom that induced her to admit him to her compound at all. The truth is he was a great gossip and was the link between the harem and the outer world. Sikoro knew everything, was an authority on everything, and the first to hear all news.

Now this is what befell Mironda. I don't blame her; no one could. I consider her a victim of circumstances. The old, old story. A young and impulsive woman, an elderly, much married lord, a well-favoured young man. The long and the short of it is that Mironda was in the end divorced; but the manner of that divorce enrages me whenever I think of it.

One morning she was sitting on a mat in the shade thrown by the overhanging thatch of her hut. She was singing in a low voice and threading beads picked with the point of her needle from a wooden bowl held by a small girl slave.

The father of Mbututu Was killed on the sand bank Wei ye-i, wei i-ye, Wei ye-i, wei i-ye, The father of Mbututu Was killed on the sand bank Wei ye-i, etc.

The monotonous chant in a minor key was interrupted by someone scratching on the reed fence.

"Go," said Mironda to the child, "see who it is."

The child put down the bowl of beads and ran to the fold in the fence which formed the gate. She looked out. A glance was sufficient. She ran back past her mistress and into a far hut, muttering as she went "Ma--we! Ma--we! It is Sikoro!"

Mironda moved uneasily on her mat, then fell to fumbling nervously with the brightly-dyed bark patterns which ornamented it.

Sikoro slouched into the compound, removing his fur cap as he came. Just inside he knelt down and sat on his heels, placing his cap on the ground beside him. He arranged his voluminous skirts carefully round him and then clapped his hands very respectfully.

Mironda did not look at him. After a short interval Sikoro broke the silence.

"Good day to you, Morena."

"Yes, good day."

"And has the Chief's wife slept well?"

"She has."

"And the slaves of her house, have they slept well?"

"They have."

"And is the Chief's wife pleased with the new shawl chosen by Sikoro as a gift from the Chief to his wife?"

"It is all right."

Sikoro relapsed into silence and Mironda did not speak. Presently the man got up and, in a crouching attitude, shuffled nearer and sat down as close as possible to the edge of the woman's mat without actually touching it. To touch the mat of the Chief's wife would have been an offence, to come so near to it was studied insolence.

Mironda looked up angrily, met the bloodshot eye of Sikoro and opened her mouth as if to speak. Instead of doing so, however, she looked away and examined the work upon which she had been engaged when the man arrived.

Sikoro grinned and, detaching from his belt a small gourd, emptied some snuff into the palm of his hand.

This was a deliberate insult to the Chief's wife and conclusive evidence to her, if indeed she needed it, that she might now expect the worst.

Sikoro blew his nose unpleasantly and loudly sniffed up the snuff from the palm of his hand. Then, clearing his throat, he said: "Someone has stolen one of the Chief's heifers."

"Eh."

"A yellow one which the Chief might well have sold to a Jew."

"So."

"It is no great loss to the Chief, as the heifer is barren."

Mironda's eyes blazed with fury; she had no child.

"The thief has been caught."

"What will be done with him?"

Ah! he had aroused her interest at last. Sikoro smiled pleasantly as he said: "He will, of course, be strangled."

"Will not the Missionaries prevent it?"

"The Missionaries? They do not know and may not know for many days, and anyhow, what could they do?"

"The white man's Government will prevent the killing of people."

"No doubt the white man's Government will do many foolish things, but the Magistrate has not yet come."

"He is coming soon."

"But they strangle Miyobo to-day, now."

No name had been mentioned before: indeed it was not necessary even now; Mironda had known Sikoro's errand from the manner of entry into her compound.

The abominable man leant forward and repeated: "Now, now, now," then put his hand to his ear. The woman listened, too, and heard distinctly the shriek and gurgle of a dying man: then silence save for the pattering of slaves' feet and their shrill inquiries and conjectures. Miyobo had been strangled just outside the compound in which the woman sat.

Mironda looked at Sikoro with wide eyes of fear. He, of course, enjoyed the situation. Did he not hate this woman for her overbearing pride? Had not she and Miyobo fooled him more than once, and had it not been the merest chance which had delivered them into his hand?

His one eye contracted with merriment, a cruel smile lifted his lip and disclosed a row of sharply-filed teeth--the tribal mark of a subject race; he was a freed slave.

Pointing to the bangles on the woman's arm, Sikoro asked: "What are you doing with the Chief's ivory?"

One by one Mironda took her bangles off and placed them on the mat before her.

"Is not that the Chief's new shawl?"