The Witch Doctor and other Rhodesian Studies Part 37

"MONDAY, 26th JUNE, 19--.

SIR,

I have the honour to report that there is a native rising. This p.m. I met a large crowd of them who behaved in such a queer way that I thought it best to go back to camp, seeing that I had only two police boys with me and they having no rifles and me only a few rounds.

On the way back to camp I fell in with the trader Jones with a mob of cattle, whose partner Wilkie has been killed by the natives and he anxious to come into laager.

I am putting the camp in a state of defence with the help of the said Jones and await orders.

Your obedient servant, JOSEPH WILSON, Sergeant in Charge.

So there was something in it after all. Wrenshaw went into his tent and wrote a reply to the Sergeant of Police:

To SERGEANT JOSEPH WILSON,

I have read your letter to the Commandant and will deal with it. Do not worry overmuch about the rising, I will attend to that too.

Remain in camp or you might miss me, I am coming your way.

RICHARD WRENSHAW.

After a short consultation with his juniors Wrenshaw issued his orders.

He sent for his horse, told the interpreter to get his pony, and also to saddle-up and load a pack mule. The two Native Commissioners were to carry on as usual, accepting the tax from those who came to pay.

It was nearly midday. He had to cover twenty miles by sundown. This was easy enough for himself and his interpreter, but he would also take his gunbearer and his cook. He believed in being comfortable, and saw no reason for roughing it now. The two on foot would have to hurry.

II.

It was after sundown when the party reached their destination. The cook had stubbed his toe against a root in the path.

Taking advantage of the remaining light, Wrenshaw helped the interpreter to pitch the patrol tent. The cook collected wood for an all-night fire and then fetched water from the nearest stream half-a-mile away. The gunbearer cut coa.r.s.e gra.s.s for bedding for the horses. Each servant had his job, which he performed with the precision born of long practice.

The camping ground was well-chosen. In front was a level plain, probably a mile wide. After the first quarter of a mile it was very swampy; a single path led across it to the high ground which flanked the river beyond. Wrenshaw knew this path, he was probably the only living white man who did. The high ground was thickly covered with palm trees; behind the spot chosen for the camp was mile upon mile of thin forest.

When bringing in his last load of gra.s.s the gunbearer stumbled over a native lying face downwards on the ground.

He stirred him with his foot. "Now then, you, what do you want?"

As he could get no satisfactory reply he brought the fellow to Wrenshaw, who asked who he was.

"One of Nanzela's men, Morena."

"Nanzela the Barushu?"

"He is."

"Where is he now?"

"On the river bank."

"With his people?"

"With his people."

"What are you doing here?"

"I was on my way to join him when you arrived. I was afraid, and hid myself."

"You may go to Nanzela and give him a message. Say that I have come.

That I come because I hear Nanzela boasts. He says he will not pay the Government tax. That he asks for war. Tell him that if by sunrise to-morrow he does not come to me with tax-money in his hands, I shall come to him with a gun in mine."

Whilst Wrenshaw had been speaking the native's eyes had wandered. He was making a mental note of the white man's forces. There was the white man himself--an unknown quant.i.ty--an alien black man in clothes who interpreted the white man's words, a native of a neighbouring tribe attending to two horses, and a half-caste busy with some cooking-pots at the fire. So far as he could see there were no more than these. He looked again at the white man and wondered what his real strength might be. However, it didn't matter, as by this time Nanzela had posted scouts on every path, and the police camp, some miles away, was being watched.

The white man, too, would be watched.

The sun had set, and it was now quite dark save for the camp fire which the cook had made. A mile away, on the high ground by the river, little points of light appeared. The Barushu were lighting their fires and preparing for the night. Judging by the distance on either hand to which these fires extended, the natives had a.s.sembled in some force.

Presently the sound of a drum, then of another, then of many, reached the white man's ear.

"What is that sound?"

"I do not know, Morena."

"Are they not drums?"

"They are drums."

"War drums?"

"I do not know."

"What is their message?"

"I do not know."

The man, of course, lied; he could read their message as well as any other native of his tribe within earshot.

"Go, give my message to Nanzela."

The man turned to go, bidding the white man rest in peace.

"Go safely," was the reply.

Presently the cook announced "Dinner ready, sir," and Wrenshaw moved to the small camp table. The moment he sat down he felt he could not eat.

He had decided on his lonely journey in the heat of the moment--of the midday sun, as it were; now that it was dark and cold, he wished he had brought one of his a.s.sistants with him.

On second thoughts he was very glad he had come alone. If there was going to be trouble--and it looked uncommonly like it--a life might have been needlessly sacrificed.

His cook aroused him from his mooning by: "Soup's cold, sir."