Tom Burnaby Part 3

Such was his story, told disconnectedly, the English pieced out with occasional phrases in Swahili, the _lingua franca_ of Eastern and Central Africa. Through all the narrative there was a convincing note of reality. The boy pleaded to be allowed to serve Tom for the rest of his life till, as he said, the "long night" came. He would not ask for wages, he could live on anything--nothing; and he flung himself down at Tom's feet, imploring him not to drive him away.

"Poor chap!" said Tom. "Sorry for you, but what can I do? My uncle wouldn't have me, or I might have made some use of you. And there's no chance now; he's away with the expedition to Ankori."

Mbutu's eyes opened to their fullest extent.

"Sah him uncle!" he cried.

He looked puzzled and anxious, and yet seemed to hesitate.

"Well, what is it?" asked Tom.

"Sah him uncle!" repeated the boy; and then, to Tom's amazement, he rattled off a story of how, some ten days before, he had overheard a conversation between his late master and the interpreter to the expedition.

"Palaver man bad man, sah. Much bad. Talk bad things. Say black man hide; white man walk so." He took a pace or two with head erect, eyes looking straight ahead, and arms straight down his thighs. "White man no see not much; bang! soosh! white man all dead."

Everything he said was ill.u.s.trated with many strange pantomimic gestures, and Tom was at first puzzled what to make of it all. Then he set himself patiently to question the boy, using the simplest words, and from his answers he put together, bit by bit, a most astonishing story.

About a fortnight before, the Portuguese had come with Mbutu from the forest west of the Nyanza, accompanied by an Arab, and had taken up his quarters in a small bungalow not far from rail-head. He was in and out all day, engaged in some mysterious business which the boy had never succeeded in fathoming, while the Arab had disappeared on their arrival in Kisumu. One hot night Mbutu, feeling restless and unable to sleep, went outside the bungalow with a pipe of his master's which he intended to smoke. He was fumbling in his loin-cloth for a match, when he saw a figure slinking cautiously towards him. His movements were so stealthy and furtive that Mbutu's curiosity was at once aroused. Unfortunately for the stranger, who clearly wished to escape observation, the moon was high, and Mbutu, concealed by a friendly post in the compound, watched him steal up to the bungalow, enter quietly, and shut the door. The boy, avoiding the patches of moonlight, crept round the veranda with the noiselessness of a cat till he came to a half-open window. A lamp was burning in the room, throwing a long beam of light into the darkness without, and in skirting this bright zone the boy tripped over an empty wooden crate from which the cook obtained his supply of firewood. The impact of Mbutu's shins against the sharp edges of the crate set the thing creaking, but the noise was drowned by the yelp of a jackal in a nullah hard by, and after a few moments of anxious suspense Mbutu breathed again. He peeped cautiously round the edge of the window. The room was empty, but as the light had not been removed Mbutu concluded that his master would soon return. This proved to be the case, for in less than a minute the Portuguese appeared, moved quickly to the window, and lifted the iron rod as though to close it. But the night was so hot that he changed his mind, comfort prevailing over caution. He left the window as it was, and simply lowered the blind. Then, turning to the door, he beckoned his visitor into the room. A thin beam of light still filtered between the bottom of the blind and the window-sill, and Mbutu's sharp eyes noticed that the sill was wide, projecting some inches from the wall. He saw that under this he could lie without fear of detection, and probably hear all that pa.s.sed inside. So he crept beneath the shelter of the sill, and strained his quick ears.

For a time he could make out little of what the two men were saying.

Then their voices rose, they became "much jolly", as he said, after the Portuguese had produced a flask of his own special brandy, and Mbutu heard every word distinctly. They were discussing a plan concerted between them during the journey to Kisumu, and congratulating each other on its success. The Arab, apparently, was connected with the chief against whom the punitive expedition was directed, and the dago having reasons of his own for desiring its failure, they had put their heads together. The result of their scheming was that the Arab had somehow got himself recommended to Captain Lister, the intelligence-officer of the expedition, as interpreter and guide, his real intention being to lead it into an ambush, cunningly devised between the chief and the Portuguese. The European officers were to be killed by picked marksmen in the first moments of confusion and the plotters hoped to lay their trap so carefully that not a soul would escape. What his master's motives were Mbutu had been unable to discover, though he had heard a mysterious reference to a store of ivory and a run of slaves. After a time the "special brandy" began to take effect, and both the men fell asleep. The light went out, and Mbutu stole away.

Tom only pieced this together by degrees. When the meaning of it all was clear to him, he gave a long whistle and stood staring at the black boy. Suddenly a suspicion flashed across his mind as he remembered what he had read of the imaginativeness of the African native and his genius for inventing fairy tales.

"You're not making this up?" he said sternly. "Why didn't you tell all this before the expedition started?"

Mbutu spread out his hands.

"What for good?" he said. "Me tell? White man say 'Bosh! Liar! Get out!'" He shook his fist and lifted his foot with the accuracy of long experience. "Mbutu no lub kiboko. White man all same for one."

He pointed expressively to the scars and weals left on his shoulders by his recent thrashings with the kiboko.

"Then why have you told me now?" demanded Tom.

The boy for a few instants looked puzzled; then his features expanded in a cheerful smile as he said:

"No kiboko heah, sah! Sah little son of big sah! Sah Mbutu him fader and mudder!"

Tom could doubt no longer; truth spoke in every line and dimple of the boy's earnest face. But what was he to do? Glancing at the carriage clock on the mantel-piece, he saw that it wanted only ten minutes of seven, the hour fixed by Mr. Barkworth for dinner. He wondered if he had better consult his new friend, for whom he had already begun to entertain warm feelings of regard. Calling the major's Indian servant, he gave the boy into his hands with instructions to keep a sharp eye on him, and hurried off, his brain in a whirl.

"Ah, here you are, then!" said Mr. Barkworth, coming forward as Tom entered the bungalow, and laying a friendly hand on his shoulder.

"Punctuality, now; that's a fine thing. The padre came a moment ago.

I'll introduce you, h'm!"

He turned and led the way into an inner room, where Tom saw a figure that would have commanded attention in any company. It was that of a tall man of about fifty years, with clean-cut features of olive hue, mobile lips with the fine curves of a Roman orator's, and grayish hair falling back in flowing lines from his temples. He was dressed in the simple white robe of an Arab, with no ornament save a small gold cross pendent on his breast. The simplicity of his attire served only to heighten the natural dignity of his bearing.

"H'm! Mossoo--Mossoo-- Now, what on earth's the French for Thomas!

Mossoo Tom Burnaby, Pere Cheva.s.se. And a fine fellow, sir," he added to Tom, _sotto voce_.

The missionary smiled as he shook hands.

"I have seen you already," he said in French. "I was a spectator the other day of that little scene, Mr. Burnaby, when you played the part of Good Samaritan."

"Ah!" said Mr. Barkworth, catching the phrase. "Who's been falling among thieves, padre?"

The missionary briefly told the story of Tom's summary treatment of the Portuguese, and though Mr. Barkworth's French was decidedly shaky, he made out a few leading words here and there, and got a tolerable grasp of the incident.

"Well now, I call that fine," he said; "Rule Britannia, and all that sort of thing, you know. And what became of the black boy? I warrant, now, he never even said thank you. No grat.i.tude in these natives; I know 'em."

Tom was on the point of confuting Mr. Barkworth with the best of evidence, but Lilian's entrance checked the words as they rose to his lips, and by the time they were seated at the dinner-table his host's volatile mind was occupied with other matters.

Looking back on this dinner afterwards, Tom wondered how he managed to get through it without breaking down. He listened to the quiet, mellow voice of the missionary, and envied the fluency of Lilian's French; he smiled inwardly at Mr. Barkworth's desperate efforts to follow the conversation, and good-humoured laughter at his own mishaps; he even made his own modest contribution, and, after the first moments of diffidence, was put quite at his ease by the Frenchman's perfect courtesy. And yet, all the time, through all the talk, he felt one sentence dinning and throbbing in his head: "What am I to do? What am I to do?" He imagined his uncle in the depth of the forest, fighting for dear life amid a horde of savage blacks, and overborne at the last by sheer weight of numbers! A cold thrill shot through him, and he started, to answer haphazard some remark from Lilian or the missionary, not knowing what he said. Once or twice Lilian looked at him enquiringly, wondering at his strange absent-mindedness, and then he collected himself with an effort and tried to appear unconcerned.

After dinner Mr. Barkworth settled himself in an easy-chair and lit a cigar, and while the others sat chatting together he dropped asleep.

The missionary gave his listeners an account of the work of the White Fathers' mission to which he belonged, and chanced to mention an incident that had occurred among a Bahima tribe. Bahima! That was the name of the race to which Mbutu belonged. Tom knew that his time was come. Speaking as quietly as his excitement allowed, he told Mbutu's story. The missionary looked incredulous; Lilian's fair cheeks paled, and she cried:

"Oh, what a wicked, wicked thing!"

"Eh? What?" said Mr. Barkworth, waking with a start. "As I was saying, these natives never show any grat.i.tude. Now I remember a case when I was in Trinidad. An overseer there--"

But Lilian had seated herself at her father's feet, and laid her hand on his knee.

"Father," she said, "Mr. Burnaby has some strange and terrible news to tell you."

"G.o.d bless my soul, you don't say so! What in the world has happened?"

"Mr. Barkworth," said Tom, "the boy I saved from the Portuguese came to me to-day and told me of a diabolical plot between his master and the dragoman of the expedition to lead my uncle into a trap. What can be done to warn him?"

"What! What! Ambush Jack Burnaby! Ridiculous nonsense! Never heard of such a thing. More like a bit out of Henty than a real thing. H'm!

Come now, what did the young rascal say?"

Tom repeated the story, giving, as nearly as he could, the minutest details told him by Mbutu.

Mr. Barkworth took out his handkerchief and blew his nose. "H'm!

c.o.c.k-and-bull story altogether. I know these natives. Taradiddles, sir!"

"But why doubt the boy, sir? His story was so circ.u.mstantial, and he looked so earnest and truthful."

"H'm! What do you say about it, mossoo?"

"It is extraordinary, certainly," replied the Frenchman. "Could we not send for the boy? He would not try any tricks with me."

"Right! we'll have the boy. Fine thing--a knowledge of their gibberish.

Hi, you there! Go down at once to Major Burnaby's bungalow and bring back the black boy there. Clutch him by the hair or he'll wriggle away.

I know them."

One of the servants disappeared, and soon returned with Mbutu. The boy had been waked out of a sound sleep, and looked rather scared, but a few words in his own tongue from the missionary soon put him at ease, and he answered all his questions readily. After a searching examination Father Cheva.s.se turned to Mr. Barkworth, saying:

"The boy's story is consistent in every part. I think he is telling the truth."