Tom Burnaby Part 21

It rose and swelled; he recognized it; it was a marching-song he had not heard for years! His heart gave a great leap for joy; beyond a doubt these were Barega's men approaching; his agony was over. Hardly knowing whether to run back to his master or to run forward to meet his fellow-countrymen, he stood irresolute, his breath coming and going in quick pants. He tried to join in the song, but his throat was parched, and his voice broke in a soundless sob. He waited, waited; there was commotion in the forest; crickets and cicadas had raised their notes, as though to drown the unaccustomed sounds. He heard the crackle of snapped twigs and the rustle of parted leaves; then, a deeper blackness in the black, a form appeared, and another, and another.

"Wekaine kenaina? Can you see me?"

The words, shrilled from Mbutu's lips, brought the runners to a dead stop. There was silence for a brief moment.

"Mesitoka! I cannot!" came the answer. "Who are you?"

"Ema Mbutu, muzungu katikiro! I am Mbutu, the white man's katikiro!"

Then ensued a scene that must have provoked from the sylvan deities a kindly sympathetic smile. The foremost of the line of strangers advanced and greeted Mbutu, who was almost beside himself with excitement and relief. He wasted no time in words; he was all eagerness to lead the negroes to his master. Running in advance, then doubling back like a dog, he led the tall Muhima along the track. It was Barega's katikiro, and with him were thirty spearmen. In single file they followed Mbutu, turned aside towards the clearing, and were soon collected in a group around the blazing watch-fire--thirty tall straight warriors, the pick of Barega's body-guard, breathing hard, but ready at a word to run again. The katikiro informed Mbutu that their departure had been delayed by exciting events in their village. They had come with all speed, and behind them was another band bringing goats and flour and cooking-utensils to provide food for the sick man. A brief rest, and he was ready to start on the return journey, and he proposed to travel through the night, so that the muzungu at his first removal should not have to endure the day's heat. The spearmen, squatting in a circle about the fire, showed their native politeness by obeying the katikiro's command to talk in subdued tones.

After an hour's rest, four of the Bahima gently lifted Tom into a litter they had brought with them, and the order of march was formed. The line was led by the mugurusi, the chief's provider of firewood, who was followed by fourteen of the spearmen; then came the katikiro at the head of Tom's litter, borne by four, Mbutu walking behind; and the rear was brought up by the remaining eleven. They marched with long regular swing, and before they had gone far the omutezi wahanga, or harpist, who strode along immediately in front of the katikiro, struck up the marching-song:

"Yakuba emundu ngagayala Mukamaw.a.n.ge Katabuzi eikyasenga Amaso zamynka mwenywera omwenge".

Bravely he fights; no foeman doth he dread; Never by craven chief will I be led; Let me drink and drink till mine eyes be red.

Three hours' march brought them to the camp, where they were boisterously greeted by an equal band gathered about a huge fire. A large iron pot was placed in the midst of the fire, and in it the flesh of a goat was simmering in stew, thickened with plantain flour. When the new-comers had eaten their fill, a guard was set, the katikiro himself undertaking to share with Mbutu the duty of watching his master.

At dawn they resumed the march, the katikiro deciding to finish the journey by easy stages, resting for three hours at least in the hottest part of the day. The route lay through country that was thickly wooded, but not such dense forest as the wayworn travellers had just traversed.

Every care was taken to protect Tom from the sun's rays and the a.s.saults of insects, an awning being cleverly arranged about his litter, with air-holes defended from insects by a fine network of goats'-hair. The sick man was fed at intervals with diluted marwa, and with soup whenever the procession stopped.

On the way, especially when they encamped for the night, the katikiro, a man of exceedingly pleasant countenance and genial manner, talked a good deal to Mbutu, asking innumerable questions, and showing the most lively interest in the story of the ambush. In return he gave the boy, to whom he appeared to have taken a strong fancy, some very interesting information about affairs in his village. He half apologized, indeed, for the non-appearance of his chief with the rescue-party. It was due to most important events. When week after week pa.s.sed by, and the chief had not returned from his great elephant-hunt, Mabruki, the medicine-man, declared after consulting his fetishes that Barega was dead. Who was to be his successor? Mabruki had at first sounded some of the more important men as to their willingness to accept himself; but finding that there was a strong feeling against anyone not of the chief's blood, he had nominated Barega's elder brother, the weak and vicious Murasi, who, drunk or sober, was completely under his thumb.

Murasi, accordingly, became chief, and Mabruki appointed himself kasegara, or steward of the household. The katikiro himself, an easy-going man, ready, like the Vicar of Bray, to serve anyone so long as he retained his own office, had given his adhesion to the new chief, and remained katikiro.

These arrangements had hardly been made when Barega suddenly reappeared.

The majority of the Bahima were unfeignedly glad to see their chief again; he had a kingly presence, they knew his prowess as warrior and hunter, and loved him as a fair-dealing ruler in peace. A small minority of the Bahima, however, with a considerable number of their Bairo dependents, had hoped great things of Murasi's accession, and were disposed to stick to their new chief. But the medicine-man saw that his game was up; he lost no time in obsequiously making his peace with Barega, and was the loudest in upbraiding Murasi when he whimpered at his fall from power. But though Mabruki was outwardly the loyalest subject of his chief, he was deeply chagrined at the failure of his bid for greatness, and inwardly resolved to seize the first opportunity, fair or foul, of reinstating the elderly drunkard and getting rid of Barega.

This news gave some concern to Mbutu. With internal dissension in the village he was not sure that his master's life would be safe. But when he imparted his fears to the katikiro, that burly and cheerful soul laughed them away, a.s.suring him that the chief's party, already numerically the stronger, would grow still larger as time went on.

On the fourth afternoon after leaving the forest, the katikiro informed Mbutu that they were approaching the village. The ground began to rise gently, and was less thickly covered with scrub. By and by a large banana-plantation came into view, a welcome sight to Mbutu's eyes, and beyond it wide fields of maize, beans, sweet-potatoes, sorghum, and tobacco, in some of which negro women were at work. They looked curiously at the closed litter as it pa.s.sed, and then with one consent flung down their clumsy implements and followed at the end of the line, behind the spearmen.

Pa.s.sing through these extensive plantations, the procession arrived at a wide open s.p.a.ce on which a herd of splendid long-horned oxen were tethered. The katikiro explained that these were the chief's own cattle, the animals belonging to the rest of the community being kept beyond the southern extremity of the village. Then they came to a number of huts made of gra.s.s and wattles, with untidy hayc.o.c.k roofs coming nearly down to the ground, and low doorways. The population had so largely increased that these huts had been built outside the village stockade, which at last came into sight, surmounting a steep acclivity.

The ascent was by a narrow path, running straight up the incline, with a deep depression of rough land on the left, and on the right a banana-plantation. There was a gate in the stockade, and at this Mbutu saw a large crowd gathered. In front, was a group of young boys, their graceful forms almost bare of clothing, the foremost of them being Mwonga, the chief's young brother. Behind this group stood Barega himself among his princ.i.p.al men, all dressed in their ceremonial array for the occasion. Tom was quite unconscious of the gorgeousness of the finery there displayed in his honour, for during the day he had patently become worse, and Mbutu feared that he had reached the village only to find a grave. As the procession reached the gates formal greetings were exchanged between Mwonga the mutuma and the first spearman.

"Is it well?"

"It is well."

"Ah!"

"Ah!"

"Um!"

"Um!"

Such was the dialogue, a conversation in those regions never ending without a number of sighs and grunts. Then the group of boys parted, and the chief came forward. Over his woolly tufts of hair he wore a cap of antelope-skin, adorned with a mighty crest of c.o.c.k's feathers, and across his breast was slung a broad shoulder-belt of leopard-skin, from which depended a miscellaneous a.s.sortment of the tags and ta.s.sels of fetish mysteries. He stepped forward with a splendid air of dignity.

The katikiro then advanced to the head of the procession, and removed the fillets from his hair as a sign of respect. Then ensued another brief dialogue.

"Hast thou slept well?"

"I have slept well."

"Very well?"

"Very well."

"Very well indeed?"

"Very well indeed."

"I am thy servant."

"Thou art my servant."

"Ma!"

"Ma!"

"Mum!"

"Mum!"

And the grunting being finished, the chief went up to the litter, and, discarding his array, which seemed to irk him, he bent over to look at his sick visitor. He turned, and beckoned to the medicine-man, who all the time had stood a little behind, scowling darkly, for he felt by no means tenderly towards the white youth who had saved Barega from the Arabs, and thereby tumbled down the short-lived authority of Murasi. He stepped forward at the chief's bidding, and pulled a preternaturally solemn face as he scanned the unconscious Englishman. He shook his head, causing his fantastic head-dress of skin and feathers to make strange gyrations, and the wooden charms about his neck to clatter as they knocked together. Fingering the tufts of fetish-gra.s.s dangling from a string across his shoulder, he gravely announced that the muzungu would surely die. Mbutu had been anxiously watching the man of mystery, and he shuddered as he heard his master's doom. But the katikiro shrugged his shoulders behind Mabruki's back, and the chief himself, in a tone of petulant annoyance, bade the medicine-man retire. Then the procession was re-formed, and, amid a crowd of nearly two thousand, mingled Bahima and Bairo, men, women, and children, the whole population having turned out to see the wonderful white man who had given their chief back to them, Tom was carried to the centre of the village, where the katikiro's hut, standing nearest to the chief's, had been a.s.signed to him. The katikiro was the essence of good-nature; and when Barega ordered him, in conjunction with the mwobisi wamarwa (his cup-bearer), and the muchumbi wanyama (his chief cook), to provide everything necessary for the white man's comfort, he went smiling to do his master's behest.

A fortnight pa.s.sed away, and during that time Tom hovered between life and death. As day followed day, and Mbutu, worn almost to a skeleton with watching and anxiety, saw no change in his master's condition, he felt the bitterness of despair. Mabruki offered to make medicine and employ all the mysteries of his art. He produced one day a gourd filled with mead, in which a kind of hay had been steeped for twenty-four hours. Acting on the advice of the katikiro, who had become his bosom friend, Mbutu accepted the offering with profuse thanks; but as soon as Mabruki had turned his back, the katikiro advised the boy to throw the liquor away, though he refused to say plainly why. From that time Mbutu maintained a still more jealous guard over his master. He kept the hut spotlessly clean, renewing every day the gra.s.s that covered the floor, and doing all that he could, by changing the arrangement of the skins and calico sheets upon the rough clay settle, to render Tom's position easy.

Thus the weary days went by. For a short period each day Tom was conscious, alive to the presence and the attentions of Mbutu and his friend Msala the katikiro. At such times he would swallow a little goat-broth, or an egg beaten up in milk, relapsing into unconsciousness again. He was too ill to think; he was only conscious of terrible weakness and pain. He could not sit up, could scarcely move his arms, and when it was necessary to change his position, Mbutu had to lift him.

One morning, realizing more clearly than before the dreadful prostration of his body, he was possessed of a presentiment that he would die.

"I shan't bother you much longer," he said faintly to Mbutu. "When I am gone you'll find my uncle and tell him all about it, won't you?"

Mbutu could not speak for the lump in his throat. At this moment the katikiro entered, bringing a fresh gourd of banana wine. Mbutu poured a little between his master's lips, and watched him in an agony of suspense. Tom opened his eyes.

"I should like to thank the chief," he said. "Ask that good Msala to fetch him."

The katikiro soon returned with the chief, and they stood at the foot of the settle, their intelligent faces expressing a real sympathy with the sufferer. He tried to speak to them, but his voice failed. Barega advanced and clasped his hand. A strange drowsiness was stealing upon him; with a strong effort he moved his lips again.

"Chief," he said, "I thank you for your kindness. If ever you--"

But the sentence remained unfinished, a dark cloud seemed to come between his face and the chief's; his eyes closed, and the silence was only broken by an irrepressible sob from Mbutu.

CHAPTER XII