CHAPTER VII--TOM SEIZES THE OCCASION

Tom had many occasions during the next ten days to rejoice in the possession of an excellent servant. Mwesa was everything in turn--hunter, cook, valet, hospital orderly; and in every capacity he was efficient. His snares and traps stocked the larder; the grain, he had brought from the plantation was eked out with wild fruits gathered in the forest; and out of the one simple cooking-pot he produced as great a variety of good things as a conjurer out of a hat. Always with the same gravity and the same muttering of spells, he anointed and massaged Tom's ankle daily, and never failed to sing the praises of his uncle Mirambo. His constant cheerfulness acted as a tonic on his master's spirits, and with reviving health Tom felt braced to endure whatever hardship the future might bring.

At last the day came when he declared that he was ready to start for Abercorn. He had talked over his plans with Mwesa, handicapped, however, by the fact that neither he nor the negro knew the route or the character of the country to be travelled. The extent of his information was that Abercorn lay somewhere to the south-west, and from a hazy recollection of a map glanced at during his voyage from England he guessed that the town was forty or fifty miles away. Under the most favourable conditions he could hardly hope to cover that distance in less than three days: if the country was specially difficult the journey might last even weeks.

It was unfortunate that Reinecke's plantation lay across the direct route. In order to avoid it, he must make a considerable detour, which would add he knew not how many miles to the journey. And then he would have to cross the main German road connecting Bismarckburg on Lake Tanganyika with Neu Langenburg about twenty miles north-west of Lake Nyassa. This, the only practicable highway, might be crowded with transports and would certainly be patrolled; but he hoped by careful scouting to discover some part of its great length where, either by day or by night, he could safely make the crossing.

Deciding to attempt a start at dawn on the following day, the two made their simple preparations. Mwesa stuffed into his wallet all the edible fruits he could gather, and after cooking the last meal, took his pot to the lake, and washed it thoroughly. He filled with water a couple of gourds, one of which he fitted with a grass thong for slinging over Tom's shoulder. Tom cleaned his rifle, bathed in the lake, keeping a wary eye open for crocodiles, and washed out his only shirt, with a sigh for the contents of his travelling case, now, he supposed, appropriated by Reinecke.

They were about to turn in early that evening when Mwesa jumped up suddenly and darted out of the low entrance to the hut. Tom, surprised, followed him, and found him standing in an attitude of expectancy just outside. A few moments later he heard a human cry, faint and muffled, as if coming from a great distance. Mwesa was greatly excited.

"Two time," he cried, turning his head in the direction from which the sound had come.

"You heard it before?" Tom asked.

Mwesa held up his hand enjoining silence. They waited. A minute or two passed; the cry was repeated, and Mwesa, still more excited, said:

"Mhehe call; man belong me."

"One of your own people! It must be some one from the plantation. Answer him ... No, wait. Reinecke may be setting a trap for us. Perhaps he has visited the pit and discovered my escape, and guesses I may be somewhere in the forest."

Again they heard the cry.

"Who knows you are with me, besides Mirambo?" asked Tom.

"Mushota, no more, sah. Mirambo say no tell: berry wise man, Mirambo."

"Then I think we had better answer: it may be Mirambo himself. But we will not call here; let us get away from the hut. It will not do to risk bringing an enemy here."

It was now nearly dark. Adopting Mwesa's precaution, they climbed one of the trees that formed the boundary of their enclosure, dropped to the ground outside the zariba, and made their way into the nullah. The cry was repeated once more; this time it was louder. When they had walked nearly a quarter of a mile down the nullah, Tom ordered Mwesa to answer, and the boy let out a curious series of notes, like the dropping scale of the hornbill. There was a shout in response.

"Mushota, sah," cried Mwesa, his big eyes gleaming. "He say what place me be."

"Tell him."

Mwesa directed his cousin, and in a few minutes the lad, so strangely like him, came bounding along in the middle of the watercourse. The two negroes embraced, and Mushota, his features and arms working with excitement, poured out a story in a torrent of clicks and gurgles, every now and then glancing at Tom, who stood a little apart.

Mwesa's expressive countenance showed that the story affected him deeply. He turned to his master, and seemed to strive to find English words in which to repeat what he had heard.

"Come, let us get back to our hut," said Tom. "We can only just see to find our way. You can tell me all about it as we go."

Tom had two natural gifts rare in one who was little more than a schoolboy--patience and sympathy. He could be stiff enough with his equals in rank and education; but with this faithful negro lad, ignorant, struggling to express himself in a strange and difficult language, he was so patient that Mwesa's stumbling utterance became more coherent as he told Mushota's story, and Tom was able to grasp its essentials.

It concerned Mirambo. The old hunter, once a chief and a warrior of renown among his own people, had not taken kindly to the methods of the German drill-sergeant. Day after day he had been flogged by the overseers for slowness of movement or some other fault in drill, and at last the German sergeant, who had hitherto left punishment to the Arabs, had kicked the man in the presence of the whole company of recruits. Mirambo had retaliated with a swift blow that knocked the German off his feet. The sergeant, when he got up, was on the point of shooting the negro; but the head overseer, interposing, explained that Mirambo was Reinecke's best hunting man, and the sergeant had then ordered him to be chained up until Reinecke returned from Bismarckburg. Only a few days before, a negro had been shot for a similar offence, and Mushota feared that his father would suffer the same fate. Knowing the whereabouts of the white man who had befriended his cousin, he had stolen out at midday when even the indefatigable German rested, and had come to beg the m'sungu to save his father.

"But why come to me? What can I do?" asked Tom, astonished at the confidence with which Mwesa put his cousin's plea. It was almost laughable that they should seek help of him, a fugitive, one whom Reinecke had tried to kill, a single man without resources in an enemy's country.

"Sah English," exclaimed Mwesa. "Sah savvy big medicine, white man medicine. Sah boss, no fear."

Touched by this childlike faith in the power either of the English name or of "white man medicine," which he supposed to mean some magic art, he was at a loss what answer to make. He was willing enough to help, but quite unable to see how. It seemed best to temporise--to refrain from immediately dashing the negroes' hopes, and to explain to them presently how impossible was the feat besought of him.

"We will talk it over in our hut," he said, and was then sorry he had deferred the inevitable disappointment, for Mwesa clapped his hands and laughed, and said to Mushota a few words that set him laughing too. His caution had only strengthened their belief in him.

The two negroes chattered together the rest of the way to the hut, and Tom was left to his by no means pleasant reflections. How could he break the unpalatable truth to these simple souls? What would be the effect on them? He could enter into their feelings through the recollection of an incident of his own childhood. His father had promised him, a child of five, the present of a horse, and he remembered the bitter tears he shed when the horse turned out to be a wooden toy instead of the expected creature of flesh and bone. The negro is always a child.

And then he found himself thinking: "Why not risk a visit to the plantation? It's running my head into a noose, perhaps; but after all I owe to Mwesa I may at least show him that I'm ready to do what I can. He can get in and out: why shouldn't I? Reinecke is absent. I don't suppose he ever confided to the Arabs his pleasant intentions with regard to me; perhaps I might venture to tackle them (provided the drill sergeants aren't about), and get them to release Mirambo.... What tosh! of course that's impossible: still, I might at least reconnoitre, and I'll be hanged if I don't."

It was dark when they reached the hut, but the slight glow from the fire that Mwesa had kept always burning in the enclosure revealed to Tom the look of hopeful contentment on the faces of the two negroes. They all squatted at the entrance, and Tom asked:

"When will Reinecke be back?"

Mwesa translated to his cousin. The answer was, "To-morrow night."

"How many Germans are at the plantation?'

"One: the other had accompanied Reinecke."

"And how many askaris?"

"Six; the others had gone to Bismarckburg."

Tom pondered this information. He had no chance if he was caught; the likelihood of his being able to release Mirambo had almost vanished. And what if the man, by some lucky stroke, were released? Would he consent to escape without his family? There were five in all: the larger the party, the more difficult to evade pursuit. "It's all utterly hopeless," thought Tom. "They will see it for themselves if I go and talk to them on the spot."

He told the boys what he proposed to do, at the same time warning them that no good would come of it. The promise overshadowed the warning: the m'sungu would go; every other good thing would follow. Half vexed, half amused by what seemed sheer unreason, Tom bade them sleep: perhaps with morning they would see facts as they were.

Before the glimmering dawn had penetrated the nullah, when the four-footed creatures had slunk to their dens and the birds were beginning to stir, the three clambered down on the outside of the zariba and started on their long tramp. Tom wished to reach the plantation before mid-day; he would then perhaps see for himself how the German drilled his dusky recruits.

On arriving in the neighbourhood of the plantation, Mwesa struck off to the left, and led the way stealthily through dense bush where there was no path, and none but himself could have found the track of his own previous journeys. They came presently to the stream that supplied the plantation with water. Climbing down the steep moss-covered bank, they crept quietly along the bed until they reached the thorn fence, which formed an impenetrable barrier across the stream. In the bank, just on the outside, Mwesa pulled aside a curtain of rank grass, revealing a hole scarcely larger than a drain pipe. Mushota crawled into it, Mwesa signed to Tom to follow him: he himself entered last, having remained to see that the grass fell naturally over the entrance to this narrow tunnel.

The passage through the tunnel took less than a minute, but Tom felt almost suffocated before he reached open air again. He said to himself that it was like crawling in a grave. Some day, he thought, the earth will fall in; he wondered that such a tunnel, made with no art, had not collapsed long ago. Its inner end opened into the hollow trunk of a tree. Climbing until his eyes were on a level with a small hole scooped out of the wood, he looked out upon the plantation.

The tree was a few feet within the thorn fence. Some little distance to the left were the huts and sheds occupied by the negroes. In front of these was the broad, clear, level space that was the usual playground of the children and the promenade of the elders when work was done. Now, however, no children sported upon it. Some sixty sturdy negroes, ranging in age from sixteen to forty and upwards, were drawn up in ranks. At each end hovered an Arab overseer with his whip. And facing the recruits, some yards away from them, stood the German sergeant, a stiff, thick-set, bull-necked soldier, differing from hundreds of his kind whom Tom had seen in Germany only in his uniform, which, more suited to the African climate, was less complimentary to the sergeant's tight figure. The sergeant bellowed an order, in words that seemed to be German acclimatised; the negroes hesitated, then, each interpreting the command in his own way, became a mob instead of a half company. The German stamped and roared; the overseers cracked their whips; and the scared recruits scrambled back somehow into their original formation.

The sun beat fiercely down upon the scene, and the perspiring sergeant, a martyr to duty, drew a finger round the inside of his coat collar and tried again. Brandishing the light cane he carried, he hurled abuse at the negroes in his hybrid dialect, and having thus let off steam, repeated his sharp words of command. It was evident that he was attempting to teach the recruits how to form extended order from fours, and Tom almost sympathised with him as the men blundered in the simplest movements. They appeared to be unable to distinguish "right turn" from "left turn"; and even those who had once moved correctly seemed to be unable to remember for five minutes what they had learnt.

"Mirambo no dis place, sah," whispered Mwesa over his shoulder.

The words recalled the purpose of his visit. Mirambo was no doubt tied up in the hut which Reinecke used as a jail for refractory labourers. It was at the further end of the row of huts, in full view from every part of the parade ground. An askari was standing at ease outside it. Tom's sense of the hopelessness of any attempt at rescue was deepened. Surely Mwesa himself must realise it. Sorry as he was, Tom felt that there was nothing to be done.

A sudden commotion drew his attention once more to the drilling. The sergeant, incensed by the repeated blunders of one particularly stupid negro, had lifted his cane and dealt the man several vicious cuts across the face. Yelling with pain and rage, the victim had sprung upon the sergeant, hurled him to the ground, and seized him by the throat. Two of the overseers had just rushed to the spot, and were dragging the negro from the prostrate German. There was much chattering and excitement among the other recruits and the negroes who were looking on from the huts.

The sergeant rose stiffly to his feet, and with apoplectic fury ordered the Arabs to tie the culprit hand and foot. As they were doing so, Tom, who had been boiling with indignation at the German's brutality, had one of those sudden inspirations which are often turning-points in a career. Bidding the two lads follow him, he clambered up to the fork of the tree, let himself down to the ground on the rear side, and ran, under cover of a line of bushes, until he was some thirty yards nearer the body of recruits. Then, stiffening himself, he emerged into the open, rifle in hand, and advanced with quick martial strides across the parade ground. Until that moment he had not been seen; the sergeant and the Arabs had their backs towards him; but the sudden silence that fell upon the negroes as they beheld the young m'sungu, who had been absent so long, followed by the two boys, attracted the German's attention. He swung round to see what it was that all eyes were fixed on so intently, and stared with amazement when, from the lips of the tall young white man within a few paces of him, came the sharp command in German--

"Sergeant, release that man."

The instinct of military obedience on which Tom had reckoned did not fail. The sergeant saluted; at a word from him the Arabs released the negro from his bonds; the recruits broke their ranks and rushed towards Tom with yells of delight, and from the dwellings along one side of the parade ground the whole negro population, men, women and children, trooped forth shouting welcome to the m'sungu, and utterly regardless of the overseers. The sergeant's authority had vanished. A few seconds before he had had behind him the prestige of German rule; in yielding to the command of an Englishman (whom he did not yet know as an Englishman) he had become a thing of naught to these impressionable Africans.

Before he had collected his muddled wits he was surprised to hear that he was under arrest, and found himself on his way with two of the Arabs to the jail hut, under guard of two of his own askaris. Tom, wondering how long the man's stupefaction would last, followed to the hut, ordered Mirambo to be released, and the door to be shut and bolted.

As he turned away, he saw one of the overseers bolting across the parade ground in the direction of the gate.

"After him, Mwesa," he cried, and the boy, who had followed him like a shadow, instantly darted after the runaway, accompanied by a troop of his fellow negroes. The Arab, whose whip had formerly been a terror to them, was chased across the plantation, and, just as he reached the gate, was seized by a score of sinewy hands and hauled back with yells of triumphant glee, to join the other prisoners in the lock-up. Tom, with Mwesa as interpreter, ordered Mirambo to collect all the men on the parade ground, and there wait for him. Then, astonished and a little intimidated by his own success, he hurried to the bungalow. Reinecke was expected to return that evening. It was now past noon; within the next five or six hours there must be some hard thinking if this unexpected development was to be turned to the best account.