Samba Part 10

Two shots rang out as one. But apparently there had been a difference of opinion as to which of the animals was the nearest. One of them disappeared; another, with a wild roar of pain and rage, plunged into the reeds; the rest sank below the surface. Nando, knowing the ways of hippopotami, began to paddle with frantic vigour, and set the canoe going at a rapid pace down stream, much to the indignation of Pat, who stood with his forefeet on the side of the canoe, barking fiercely.

Half a minute later a head appeared above the surface some fifty yards behind; then another and another: but the beasts seemed to have recovered from the alarm, for after a long cow-like stare at the receding canoe, they turned and swam ash.o.r.e, to rejoin their companions in the reeds.

"Easy all!" said Mr. Martindale. "We'll give 'em a quarter of an hour to settle down, then we'll go back. What about your bet, eh, Jack?"

"It's your hippo, uncle, no doubt of that," said Jack with a rueful smile. "An awful fluke, though; you didn't hit once to my twice coming up stream."

"A fluke, was it? I kind o' notice that when you young fellows make a good shot or pull off a good stroke at billiards or anything else, it's real good play; whereas an old boy like me can only do anything decent by a fluke."

"Well, you've lost him, anyway. The hippo hasn't come up."

"Too c.o.c.ksure, my boy; he's only just below the surface."

The beast mortally wounded by Mr. Martindale's rifle was lying in shallow water. Pat could no longer restrain himself. He leapt overboard and swam towards the hippo, barking with excitement, and becoming frantic when he found that it was just out of his reach. In his eagerness to attack the animal he even made an attempt to dive, so comical that all on board the canoe were convulsed with laughter.

Being paddled to the spot, Mr. Martindale found that the beast was quite dead.

"Now what are we to do with him?" said Mr. Martindale. "Shall we go back and send a party to cut him up?"

"No, no, sah," said Nando instantly. "Tie rope; pull, pull; hippo he come 'long all behind."

"Tow him, eh? Very well. I allow that'll save time."

A rope was fastened firmly about the beast's neck and jaws; the other end was fixed to the canoe; and the men began to paddle down stream, towing the hippo. The tendency of the animal being to sink, the canoe seemed to Jack to be dangerously low in the water at the stern. But they had only a part of the usual complement of men on board, and the paddlers were among the most skilful on the Congo. They had gone but a few strokes when Jack, glancing back, caught sight of Imbono's canoe returning. Like Mr. Martindale's it was keeping fairly close to the bank. All at once a great shout of alarm broke from the chief's paddlers; their easy swing was quickened to desperate exertion, and they pulled out violently towards the middle of the stream.

"By Jove! uncle, a hippo's after them," cried Jack.

Just astern of the chief's canoe, between it and the sh.o.r.e, a huge hippopotamus, with jaws distended, showing his gleaming tusks, was swimming along in pursuit. For a little he gained, and Jack's pulse beat more quickly with excitement as he saw that the enraged beast was not more than half a dozen yards from the canoe. But the gap widened as soon as the six strong paddlers had settled down to their quickened stroke.

Imbono, sitting in the stern, had caught sight of the white men as his canoe cut for a few moments across the current, and with the natural vanity of the negro he began to show off. At a word from him one of the crew dropped his paddle, and, catching up a spear, hurled it at the pursuing hippo. There was a hoa.r.s.e bellow from the animal, and a wild cheer from the men; the shaft of the spear was seen standing almost perpendicularly above the hippo's shoulder. With fierce exertion the beast increased his pace, and the gap momentarily diminished; but the negro resumed his paddle, and again the canoe drew away.

As the canoe came almost level with the towed hippo at a considerable distance towards mid-stream, Imbono ordered the same manoeuvre to be repeated. But fortune doubly befriended the pursuing animal. Just as the negro was poising his spear, a submerged tree stopped the canoe with a sudden jerk; the man lost his balance and fell overboard; half of the crew followed him into the water, the rest tumbled over one another into the bottom of the canoe. Imbono had been thrown backward as the vessel struck the snag. He had barely time to rise and plunge into the water when there was a hideous crackling sound; the stern of the canoe was caught between the hippo's gaping jaws and crunched to splinters.

The consequences of the chief's temerity would have been amusing but for his manifest danger. The negroes were swimming in all directions, keeping as much as possible under water to escape the eyes of the hippo; but Imbono, an older man than the rest, was not so expert a swimmer, and Jack saw with concern that the hippo, leaving the sinking canoe, was making straight for the chief.

A hippopotamus may be distanced by a canoe, but not by a man swimming.

Imbono did not look behind, but seemed to know instinctively that death was within a few yards of him, and he struck out more and more desperately for the bank.

At the moment when the canoe struck the snag, Jack had seized his rifle; but after the catastrophe, canoe, hippo, and swimming natives were so intermingled that he could not venture a shot at the beast without the risk of hitting a man. The hippo's huge body provided a target sufficiently broad, indeed; but Jack knew that to strike it anywhere save at a vital spot would merely add to the beast's rage and make it doubly formidable to the men in the water. When he saw the plight of the chief, however, the great head now only a couple of yards behind him, the jaws already opening, disclosing the vast red chasm flanked by gleaming tusks and molars--when Jack saw Imbono thus in the very article of peril, he could no longer hesitate. The canoe was already at rest. Bidding Nando keep it steady, Jack raised his rifle to his shoulder and took careful aim.

The chief was gasping for breath after a vain attempt to dodge the beast by diving; the horrid jaws were just about to snap, when a shot rang out. A squealing grunt came from the closing gullet; the uncouth actions of the beast ceased; and he began to sink slowly and silently beneath the surface.

"A1!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Mr. Martindale. "That makes up for your miss, Jack."

"Oka mo!"[1] shouted the negroes. Imbono's men had gained the bank, but the chief himself, overcome more by his fright than his exertions, seemed unable to swim any farther.

"Quick, haul him in, Jack," said Mr. Martindale. "There may be a crocodile after him next!"

A few strokes of the paddles brought the canoe within reach of the chief. Laughing heartily--the negro's laugh is always very near the surface--Nando and a comrade hoisted Imbono into the canoe.

"Me tell Imbono he oughter die of shame," said Nando gravely.

"What on earth for?" asked Mr. Martindale.

"What for, sah! Has he not made big puddle in ma.s.sa's canoe? He plenty much wet, sah."

"Well, he couldn't help that. Tell him we're glad he came off so well.

You need not say anything about the puddle."

But Nando had his own views as to the proper thing to do. As he spoke the chief glanced at the pool of water that had flowed from his body, and replied in a tone that was clearly apologetic.

"He say he die with shame him so wet, sah," said Nando. "Him no do it no more. Say he praise de young Inglesa for shooting de hippo; say he gib ma.s.sa de hippo and manioc and bananas and anyfing whatever dat ma.s.sa like. Say he want ma.s.sa and young ma.s.sa to be blood brudder. Me say berrah good; tell him oughter had sense before."

"That's all right. We'll accept supplies with pleasure, and pay for them. The hippo is Mr. Jack's already, of course. As for becoming his blood brothers, I don't just know right off what that means; but if it'll please him, and doesn't mean any nastiness, we'll think it over."

The canoe, towing Mr. Martindale's hippo, was rapidly paddled down stream to the encampment, the second beast being left to drift slowly down the river until, in the course of some hours, it should finally rise to the surface. On landing the chief renewed his protestations of grat.i.tude, then went off to the village, to polish himself up, said Nando, and replace his ruined headdress, a curious structure of cloth and feathers stuck on to the chignon into which his hair was gathered.

Mr. Martindale sent back another canoe to find and tow down the dead hippo. When it was hauled up on the low sandy bank, Jack and his uncle went down to examine it.

"You said I missed, uncle," cried Jack. "What do you make of this?"

He pointed to a furrow ploughed across the full breadth of the beast's forehead.

"Nothing but a bullet did that, I know. My shot must have hit him, but didn't enter the skull. I suppose he hid in the reeds, and vented his fury on the chief. He happened to have a harder skull than your hippo, uncle; you see it was a fluke after all."

Mr. Martindale slowly cut and lighted a cigar. Not until he had watched a big cloud of smoke float across the river did he speak. Then he said quietly--

"Just so!"

Somehow Jack felt that he had not the better of the argument.

Before the sun went down, a group of men came from Ilola staggering under loads of grain and fruit, a quant.i.ty large enough to supply the camp for several days. That night the men had a royal feast, consuming so many hippo steaks that Barney professed himself indignant.

"Bedad! 'tis greedy scoundhrels they are," he said, "Wheniver me mother gave us bhoys a stew--and 'twas not often, ye may be sure, meat being the price it was--'twas wan tiny morsel uv mutton, and a powerful lot uv murphies: she said too much meat would spoil our complexion and ruin our tempers. And begorra! isn't it meself that proves it!"

Mr. Martindale laughed at Barney's logic.

"I'm not afraid of the n.i.g.g.e.rs' complexions or their tempers," he said; "I only hope they won't keep up that hullabaloo all night and spoil our sleep."

The men were indeed very uproarious, and remained around their fires for the greater part of the night, recounting for the hundredth time the exciting events of the day, and composing on the spot songs in praise of the young white man whose fire-stick had slain the terror of the river. One of these songs seemed especially to strike their fancy, and it remained a favourite for many days:--

Happy Imbono!

Oh! oh! Imbono!

Who saved Imbono?

The good stranger!

The young stranger!

The brave stranger!

Good Jacko!

Young Jacko!

Brave Jacko!

He came to Ilola!

Happy Ilola!