Part 8

Two days before the "Great Man" was due to arrive, old Garamapingwe, the musician, passed that way. He stopped to pay his respects to Williams.

"Good day, my father."

"Good day to you, Garamapingwe."

"What are the news, my Chief?"

"I look to you for news."

"Oh, there is nothing but the coming of the 'Great Man.'"

"Yes, he is coming."

"I should like to see the 'Great Man.'"

"You shall, Garamapingwe."

"Much thanks to you, my Chief."

An idea occurred to Williams. No doubt the sport which he had planned to provide would be excellent, but what about the evenings spent round the camp fire after dinner?

It might happen that his guests did not want to play bridge. He himself detested the game--most unnatural of him, but there it was. He disliked "shop" out of hours, and one could have too much talk of personal experiences. He must provide for a possible gap.

How many men in a thousand had heard native African music? Not the stuff you can hear any day from the boys' compound at the back of the house, but music, worthy of the name of music, made by men like Garamapingwe? Very few.

So Williams added to his plan.

* * * * *

It was Friday. The Great Man had been shooting for three days. The first two were decidedly promising. Nothing very wonderful had been shot, but very fair heads of eland, buffalo, roan and waterbuck had been secured by various members of the party.

The Great Man had done fairly well, but he was perhaps more at home with a shot gun.

But Friday had been a bad day. At the Great Man's request Williams had gone with him to look for Sable antelope. So far no one had shot a Sable. Well, they came across Sable, and in this manner.

At daylight all had gone their several ways.

The Great Man and Williams had gone east. Good luck, Sable spoor and quite fresh. Williams was a fair tracker: he had picked up something of the art from the bushmen down south. They followed it, Williams leading, carefully. The report of a rifle in the distance! The Great Man stopped. Williams felt savage. Who was this poaching? Who had left his beat and jumped their claim? He motioned the Great Man to sit down.

They waited.

They waited for ten minutes and then the snapping of a twig, somewhere to the left, attracted Williams's attention.

By Jingo, there they were, the Sable.

Led by a cow, a noble herd of Sable antelope came slowly through the forest.

The Great Man looked at Williams, who grinned and commanded quiet by lifting his hand.

On they came, cows, cows and more cows. Where was the bull? Surely a big bull accompanied such a herd of cows?

More cows and young bulls, but as yet no big, black, outstanding bull.

Williams was puzzled.

The Great Man became restive under inaction: to him there was no apparent difference between a cow and a bull. He had never seen Sable antelope before.

The huge herd filed past within forty yards.

Still no bull.

The Great Man looked at Williams and his expression was none too pleasant.

Williams felt desperate. He began to think it best after all to let the Great Man kill a good cow and have done with it when, looking to the left, he saw the bull. It was the bull! Black as ink, with a snow-white belly. Horns seemed above the average.

A great spasm of joy gripped Williams's heart. Here was a bull worthy of the Great Man, the direct representative of the Sovereign.

In response to a sign from Williams, the Great Man looked, saw, raised his rifle and--Williams checked him. Good Heavens, what was the matter with that bull? Seemed to be going short, off fore. It couldn't be.

Then he motioned to the Great Man to take his shot. The next moment the noble bull crashed to the ground and the cows filed on at a gallop and so out of sight.

"A good shot and a good bull, Sir," said Williams, but he was conscious of a sickening sense of dread.

They hurried up. The bull lay stone dead with a bullet exactly placed behind the shoulder.

"Shall I mark out the head skin for you, Sir? You'll want to keep this head?"

"Yes, please."

Williams worked like a man possessed. He cut the sleek, black skin from the withers to the brisket as the bull lay. Without moving the carcass he made a slit up the mane to the base of the skull. Here he stopped and listened. He heard something. Footsteps approaching. With a gasp of despair he dropped his hunting knife and faced the way the bull had come.

Curse the fellow! There he was; the Great Man's A.D.C., babbling like the fool he was. He was talking in English to the native who accompanied him. "Are you sure you are on the right track?" The native said nothing because he didn't understand one word of any language but his own. The A.D.C. headed straight for the Great Man's bull. Presently he looked up and walked forward smiling.

"Hullo, Soames, what are you doing here in my patch of country?"

"I hit a Sable bull about two miles back and followed him."

"You hit a bull?"

"Yes, Sir."

"So I have killed your bull for you, have I?"

"Oh no, Sir. It's your bull, of course."

"My dear boy, I know the laws of shooting. Mr. Williams, was this bull hit before I killed him?"

"I'll look, Sir," said Williams, feeling like a detected thief.

Fancy having to say "yes" to the question! There was the bullet hole in the off fore fetlock. What a shot!

* * * * *

The party dined under a sense of restraint that night. The Great Man congratulated his A.D.C. on having secured a fine bull, but that didn't improve matters.

After dinner it was a silent party round the camp fire.

Williams spoke.

"Would you like to hear some African music, Sir?"

"Very much indeed. Do you play?"

"No, Sir, but I have a man here."

"By all means let us hear him."

Garamapingwe was sent for.

The old musician came, followed by two other natives. He himself carried two curious looking musical instruments, one of the men carried another; the third man, led by a little native boy, was blind and empty handed.

The three natives greeted the Great Man suitably who as suitably replied.

They then sat down on the other side of the fire and Garamapingwe struck a few bold chords. No common musician he.

Williams said something in the vernacular to Garamapingwe, who replied.

"What did he say?" asked the Great Man.

"I asked him what he was going to sing," replied Williams, "and he said: 'The Song of the Great Occasion.'"

"Will you please ask him what this great occasion is of which he is going to sing?"

The question was put and the reply translated. "The great occasion is the visit paid to our poor country by the Great Man who represents the King of the white men."

"How very interesting! Please tell him to proceed."

Garamapingwe sang and played vigorously. He played an instrument with either hand. His companion played one with both his hands. The blind man droned in chorus to Garamapingwe's recitative. It was a very fine performance. The Great Man had an ear for music. Williams was delighted, for the Great Man seemed both pleased and interested.

The second verse was ended and the third began, when suddenly the blind man leaped into the air, interrupting the harmony with a piercing shriek.

All but Williams and the natives thought this part of the performance. They were not left long in doubt. Clutching wildly at his clothing, the blind man moaned and moaned and moaned. He stripped himself and turned to the fire to be inspected by his fellows. The Great Man's wife fled to her tent. Williams had the musicians hustled away.

A large scorpion had crept up and stung the blind man as he sat.

Thus the song of the Great Occasion ended abruptly.

THE DESCENT OF MAN.

Randall was skinning a monkey. He had shot two monkeys during the morning and had already skinned one of them. He collected monkeys and had done so steadily for years.

Randall was District Commissioner and Magistrate of a large tract of British Africa. One of the many men who live and die unheard of by the British public; men who quietly but efficiently "administer" England's African possessions.

Some day, perhaps, England may realise what a debt it owes to these unknown men.

I was Randall's assistant. I had served for four years; that is to say, one year beyond the probationary period. I had made good to the extent of getting on the Establishment, and held the rank of Assistant Native Commissioner.

Randall had been in the Service for twenty-three years. In his dealings with the natives he was firm and just. He had a deep sympathy for the people entrusted to his care, but he successfully concealed it from them. He used to say to me "Play the game with your people but don't slobber over them, they don't understand that sort of thing."

It has often been said that all men who have spent more than ten years in the heart of Africa are mad. I have known few saner men than Randall, but I cannot deny that he had one peculiarity: he collected monkeys.

I could never understand why he shot the wretched things, or why he skinned them in such a peculiar way. Let me explain.

Randall only shot one kind of monkey, and only the mature male of that kind. Having bagged his monkey, he would consult a shabby little black pocket-book, make an entry in it, and then set to work to skin the beast.

From watching him I gathered this much: he kept only the head and shoulders and one arm of each monkey. Sometimes it was the right arm, sometimes the left, never both. Some kind of calculation in the pocket-book appeared to be necessary before he could determine which arm he wanted.

I also observed that he carefully cleaned all particles of flesh from the skull and arm bones and, having put some preservative on the skin, wrapped it round the skull and bones, making a neat little parcel of the whole. After labelling the specimen, he packed it away in a box which was carried, wherever he travelled, by his body servant, Monga.

On reaching the Station, after a journey in the District, Monga and his master would repack the contents of the box in a large tin-lined case. Randall had three such cases. Two of them were quite full, the third nearly so.

I never questioned Randall about his hobby. Once I shot a monkey and gave it to Monga, thinking his master would skin it; but he did not; he simply told his man to throw it away. As he said nothing to me about it, I let the matter drop and made no more advances.

As I said before, on this particular morning Randall had shot two monkeys. He decided to keep the left arm in each case. Monga was squatting on the ground in front of him, holding the body of the dead monkey whilst his master skinned it. The pair were silent; from long practice Monga knew exactly what was required of him and needed no instructions. Presently Randall said "This is the last one, Monga: no more monkeys after this one."

Monga accepted the statement without comment, but it set me speculating afresh upon the object of Randall's quaint hobby. However, as my Chief offered no explanation, I did not ask for one.

When the skinning was all but done, Monga permitted himself to remark, "Monkeys were men like me once, Morena."

Randall paused and looked gravely at Monga for a moment; then, bending to his task once more, he said, "Monga, I believe you, tell me more."

Now, if Monga resembled anything, it was a monkey. His eyes were set close together, his nose was very small, his lower jaw protruded slightly, and his forehead was very low and much puckered. I saw the humour of the conversation and wanted to laugh, but to have done so would, I felt, have lowered me in the estimation of my Chief. Randall had once said to me: "Blackmore, in spite of your ridiculous name, you should get on in the Native Department. Had your name been Whitelaw, or even Smith, you would not have been handicapped. You have a stupid name to live down, for this is a black man's country. However, always remember this: never laugh with a native, and only laugh at him if he is deserving of punishment and you wish to punish him. Only a fool beats a native; ridicule is a cleaner form of punishment, and not as brutalising."

I suppressed my desire to laugh, and Monga resumed.

"Yes, Morena, monkeys were men once just the same as we are. They lived in their own villages in nice huts; they had their own chiefs, and spoke like people do.

"But they became lazy--lazy to hoe their fields and to weed them; lazy to build their huts and to plaster them. So they said to each other: 'It is a bad thing to work; let us go to the forest and live there, and we will find fruits in the forest to eat.' So they went to the forest and lived there.

"One day one said: 'Are we not tired of making clothes? Let us grow hair on our bodies that we may be warm always.' And all agreed and grew hair on their bodies.

"When the autumn came, and the grain in the lands was ripe, the lazy ones came to steal from the men's gardens. The men tried to watch their gardens, but the thieves were too clever.

"The monkeys had their servants, and when they wanted food they sent their servants on to see if there were any men in the lands. If there were no men there they would steal corn and pumpkins and melons and calabashes, and carry them away to the forest.

"And if they found a sleeping man watching the fields they passed by him gently; and when they had finished stealing they would cut some twigs and beat him severely. And when the man woke up and began to run away, they would laugh at him and mock him.

"When the monkeys returned to the forest with the foods which they had stolen, they lit fires and cooked them. Then the people, seeing the smoke, came with sticks and assegais, and beat some monkeys and killed others.

"Then the monkeys said: 'It is not good to have fire, for the men see it and come and kill us.' So now the monkeys steal when the men are not looking, and eat the food uncooked in the trees at night."

Randall made only one comment. He asked Monga where the monkeys got their tails from. But Monga admitted that he did not know.

Randall had now finished his skinning, and had made the usual neat little parcels; Monga brought the box and carefully packed them in with the rest.

The travelling box was quite full!

* * * * *

A few days later Randall developed black-water fever and died. We carried his body back to the Station and buried him at the foot of a large baobab tree. The natives for many miles round attended.

When all was over, and Randall's successor was on his way to take charge of the district, Monga came to me and reminded me that there were some monkey skins in the travelling box to be packed away in the large tin-lined case. As he knew more of his master's strange hobby than I did, he did the packing whilst I looked on.

When the last skin had been transferred I realised that the case was quite full, and would not have held another one. This, I remember, struck me as being uncanny. Between us we soldered up the tin lining and nailed on the lid of the case.

Then Monga looked at me for instructions. This set me thinking. Why on earth did Randall collect monkeys? I examined the lids of the cases and found his name and home address neatly painted on each. Clearly, therefore, he had intended to take them home. But this did not explain why he had collected them. I thought of the shabby little black note-book, so went into the house and looked through it. All I could gather was that Randall had collected three hundred and eighty right-armed and one hundred and twenty left-armed skins. Five hundred wretched monkeys--and what for? And why not two hundred and fifty right arms and two hundred and fifty left; or why not all right or all left?

I went back to where Monga stood by the cases, and asked him why his master had collected the monkeys. He seemed surprised at my question; it apparently never occurred to him to inquire into the why and the wherefore of any of his master's acts. He seems to have accepted all his master did or said as a matter of course.

The whole thing was monstrous. I could not send the wretched things to his people at home. They would think him mad, as perhaps he was as regards his hobby, but no saner man ever lived so far as anything else was concerned.

Then I had an inspiration. I ordered a large hole to be dug at the foot of another tree, which stood about a hundred yards from that under which Randall's grave lay. Into this hole I had the three cases carried, and the earth shovelled back. Monga didn't disapprove, or, if he did, he made no protest. I think he took the whole thing as a matter of course, as was his way.

I never found out, nor can I imagine, why Randall collected the heads and shoulders of five hundred monkeys--three hundred and eighty with right arms and one hundred and twenty with left arms attached.

Someone reading this story may guess or may know. For myself, I frankly admit defeat.

THE RAILWAY CONTRACTOR.

Bositi had returned to his village after six years' absence. Most of the time he had spent on the railway construction, where the work was heavy and the pay light. In physique he was improved almost beyond recognition.

The large blue-and-yellow tin box which he carried on his head contained the miscellaneous goods upon which he had spent some of his wages. Much of his money had gone in drink, more in gambling.

After Bositi had been away two years the headman and elders presumed his death. So, too, did his wife; she married again, and had presented her new husband with two children.

Bositi was unreasonable about it. On being told that he was supposed to be dead, he insulted the headman and beat the woman who was once his wife. When her husband protested, he beat him too.

After he had thus relieved his feelings he opened his box, and took from it many strings of pink and white beads; these he gave to the mothers of the pretty marriageable girls of the village. In return he received much strong beer. The beer made him drunk--too drunk to beat or insult anyone else, but not too drunk to grasp securely in a moist hand the key of his precious box.

Next morning he made his peace with the headman by giving him a hat, but he rudely rebuffed his late wife, whose cupidity was excited by the size of that blue-and-yellow tin box.

He also made friends with the men of the village--not excluding him who had married his wife--by distributing pieces of strong twist tobacco.

After a few days' rest he made certain selections from the treasure in his box and set out for the Chief's village. When there he showed off. He wore his best clothes, and spoke bad English fluently and loudly in the traders' stores. While his money lasted the traders suffered him; when it was spent he was told not to come again.

The Chief soon heard of him and sent for him.

Bositi had never been presented at Court before. He was immensely impressed. He squatted in the sand, one of a long row of strangers to the capital, with his gifts neatly folded before him. Immediately in front of him was a long thatched building. Three sides of it were closed in with reed mats, the fourth was open to the public. This, a lounger told him, was the National Council House, or Khotla.

The Chief had not yet arrived, but his orchestra was playing idly. It consisted of three gigantic harmonicas and a number of drums. The instrumentalists showed their utter contempt of all common people by talking loudly as they strummed and thumped.

The Court Fool was aping birds. He had a bunch of feathers in his hair and a few stuck in his waist-belt behind; this was the extent of his make-up. For the moment he was imitating a crested crane. The bird is beautiful, the Fool was hideous; yet such was his art of mimicry that all recognised the bird he had chosen to represent.

The Town Crier paused for a moment to bawl something unintelligibly, and then passed on his way.

Some oxen straying by stopped to sniff at some rubbish. The armed guards drove them off with a few cuts of their raw hide whips.

Bositi had brought as a present to the Chief a large blanket with a realistic lion printed on it, a highly-coloured pocket handkerchief, and a new brass tinder box. He mentally contrasted his gifts with those brought by other men--mostly to the disadvantage of the others.

One old man was about to offer two goodly tusks of ivory. By the fuss the hangers-on made of this old man it was very evident that a possessor of ivory commanded very much respect.

Bositi had smuggled an old Tower musket across the border and knew where to get powder. He promised himself an elephant with larger tusks than those displayed by his rival.

Presently there was a stir. The Chief was coming! The orchestra struck up energetically; the Fool twirled rapidly round on one foot; the hangers-on crouched and shaded their faces as from the rising sun; the long row of visitors bent forward until their foreheads touched the sand; the guards fell upon one knee and all clapped their hands.

Bositi literally buried his face in the sand; a little got into his right eye and annoyed him for days to come.

The Chief moved towards the Council House, preceded by a number of body servants, one of whom pointed with a long stick to imaginary stumps and stones over which his lord and master, if not warned, might trip.

Another carried the Chief's chair. This chair was strongly made on the European pattern. The seat of it was covered with the hide of a Sable antelope, from which constant use had worn much of the hair. A rude face was carved on the bar which supports the sitter's back. To this face men do reverence when the Chief is not in his chair.

A third man beat with two small drum-sticks upon a large harmonica, which was suspended by a bark rope from his neck.

Another carried a green umbrella, not open, because the Chief himself had a smaller one in his own hand.

The sight of the Chief filled Bositi with awe. He paid no attention to the crowd of councillors following in the footsteps of the august personage. He felt that his own finery, which had been much admired by the common herd, was really very mean.

For the Chief had on a grey top hat with a wide black band to it. He wore a long magenta dressing gown, which fell open as he strode forward, disclosing a pair of pepper and salt trousers. On his feet he had a magnificent--in Bositi's eyes--pair of new bright yellow boots. In his free hand he carried an eland's tail fitted as a fly-whisk, with an ivory and ebony handle.

In spite of his absurd clothes the Chief had a certain air of dignity. He was heavily built and stooped slightly at the shoulders with age; his small beard was tinged with grey.

He stepped along firmly, however, and Bositi noticed with jealousy that his eyes lit up as they rested for a moment on the two great tusks of ivory brought by the old man.

The Chief entered the Council House and sat down. Immediately all present raised their hands and shouted a salutation with such good will that the orchestra was not heard for a space. The Court Fool hopped round with renewed energy. The official Praiser shouted:

The great lion! The bull elephant! The thunderer! The greatest of all lions!

The salutations died down and the orchestra came to its own again.

There is no hurry in a native Council House. The band played out its selection and the Court Fool continued to gyrate. One by one the Councillors took their seats in the Chamber. This was a lengthy business: each man in turn seated himself on the ground before the Chief and clapped his hands and bowed several times; then, collecting his skirts round him, he moved in a crouching position to his accustomed seat.

At length quiet prevailed. One by one the visitors were marshalled forward to present their gifts and state their case--if they had one to state.

Many trivial matters were discussed and trumpery gifts bestowed upon the Chief, when it came to the turn of the old man with the ivory.