Tom Willoughby's Scouts Part 1

TOM WILLOUGHBY'S SCOUTS.

by Herbert Strang.

CHAPTER I--TANGANYIKA

Among the pa.s.sengers who boarded the _Hedwig von Wissmann_ at Kigoma on Lake Tanganyika, one June day in 1914, there were two who engaged more particularly the attention of those already on deck. The first was a tall stalwart man of some fifty years, with hard blue eyes, full red cheeks, a square chin, and a heavy blond moustache streaked with grey.

He stepped somewhat jerkily up the gangway, brought his hand stiffly to his brow in response to the salute of the first officer, and was led by that deferential functionary to a chair beneath the deck awning.

The second presented a striking contrast. Equally tall, he was slim and loosely built, with lean, sunburnt, hairless cheeks, a clean upper lip that curved slightly in a natural smile, and brown eyes that flashed a look of intelligent interest around. He walked with the lithe easy movements of athletic youth, turned to see that the porter was following with his luggage, a single travelling trunk and a rifle case, and satisfied on that score, picked up a deck-chair and planted it for himself where the awning would give shade without shutting off the air.

Both these new arrivals wore suits of white drill, and pith helmets; but whereas the elder man was tightly b.u.t.toned, suggesting a certain strain, the younger allowed his coat to hang open, showing his soft shirt and the c.u.mmerbund about his waist.

The gangway was pulled in, a seaman cast off the mooring rope, and the vessel sheered off from the landing-stage with those seemingly aimless movements with which a steamer, until she is well under way, responds to the signals from the bridge. In a few minutes the _Hedwig von Wissmann_ was heading southward down the lake, on her three-hundred-mile voyage to Bismarckburg.

The younger of the two pa.s.sengers lit a cigarette and un.o.btrusively took stock of his fellow-travellers. The tall man before mentioned was already puffing at a long black cigar, and a steward, with marked servility, had placed a gla.s.s of some lemon-coloured liquid on a table at his elbow. Beyond him four men of middle age, also provided with cigars and gla.s.ses, were playing cards, not in dignified silence, like Sarah Battle of immortal memory, but with a sort of voracity, and a voluble exchange of gutturals. Sitting apart, smoking a dark briar pipe, sat a grizzled and somewhat shabby pa.s.senger who, though the brim of his panama was turned down over his eyes, had nevertheless watched and drawn conclusions about the two strangers.

"H'm! Public school--nineteen, perhaps--griffin--nice lad--clean," his disjointed thoughts ran. "T'other fellow--Potsdam--goose step--beer barrel--don't like the breed."

For a while he sat smoking, giving a little grunt now and then, and now and then a glance at the young Englishman. Presently he heaved himself out of his chair, tilted back his hat, and waddling a few steps, planted himself with legs apart in front of the youth.

"Harrow or Rugby, sir?" he said without preamble.

"Neither, sir," replied the other with a smile. "I was at quite an obscure grammar school--not a public school in the--well, in the swagger sense."

The old man's grey eyes twinkled.

"H'm!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "Don't get up." He took a chair that stood folded against one of the stanchions and drew it alongside.

"Name, sir?"

The youth looked into the face of his questioner, saw nothing but benevolence there, and thinking "Queer old stick!" answered--

"Willoughby--Tom Willoughby."

"H'm! Not Bob Willoughby's son, by any chance?"

"My father's name was Robert, sir."

"Takes after his mother, I suppose," the old man murmured to himself, but audibly. "Hasn't got Bob's nose. I knew him," he went on aloud.

"Saw in _The Times_ he was gone: sorry, my lad. Haven't seen him since '98, when I was in Uganda. Haven't been out since; wanted to run round once more before I'm laid on the shelf. Going to Rhodesia, I presume?"

"No: only as far as Bismarckburg: my father was interested in some land on the edge of the Plateau."

"German land, begad!"

"Well, you see he was partner with a German: went equal shares with him in a coffee plantation seven or eight years ago."

"H'm! Why didn't he stick to mines?" said the old gentleman in one of his audible asides. "And you step into his shoes, I suppose?"

"Not exactly, sir. He left his property to my brother and me jointly.

We decided that Bob--he's twenty-four--had better stick to the commission business in London, and I should come out and learn planting, or at any rate see if it's worth while going on; the plantation has never paid, and it's lucky for us we don't depend on it."

"Never paid in eight years? It's time it did. What's your German partner about? I'm an old hand; my name's Barkworth, and I was a friend of your father. My advice is, if your coffee hasn't paid in eight years, cut your losses and try cotton."

"It may come to that; that's what I'm out to discover; but my brother thought it at least worth while looking into things on the spot with Mr.

Reinecke----"

"Curt Reinecke?" said Mr. Barkworth abruptly.

"Yes."

"I know him--or did, twenty years ago. _He's_ your partner. H'm!" He blew out a heavy cloud of smoke. Tom looked at him a little anxiously.

"Mr. Reinecke has had a lot of bad luck, sir," he said. "He was always hoping the tide would turn, Bob suggested that he might be incompetent, but my father had complete confidence in him."

"Reinecke incompetent! Bosh! He's clever enough."

There was something in Mr. Barkworth's tone that caused Tom to say--

"I've never met him myself, and I should really be glad of any information, sir. You see, it's rather awkward, dealing with a man old enough to be my father, I mean, and----"

"Yes, of course. Reinecke is a clever fellow; I've nothing against him, but I recommend you to go carefully. I don't like him, but then I don't like Germans."

"I can't say I do," said Tom. "I spent a year in Germany. But I've met a few jolly decent chaps, and seeing that my father thought so highly of Mr. Reinecke----"

"You're predisposed in his favour. Naturally. Well, keep an open mind.

Don't be in a hurry to decide. That's an old man's advice. I'm nearly seventy, my lad, and the older I get the more I learn. With people, now--there's the man who falls on the neck of the first comer, and wishes he hadn't. There's the man who stiffens his back and freezes, and then finds that he's lost his chance of making a friend. Don't be like either: 'prove all things'--and men--'and hold fast to that which is good.' H'm! I'm beginning to preach: sure sign of dotage.--You haven't seen a view like that before."

It was indeed a new and an enchanting experience to Tom Willoughby, this voyage on the vast lake, or inland sea, that stretches for four hundred miles in the heart of equatorial Africa. Looking eastward to the nearer sh.o.r.e, he beheld a high bank richly clad with forest jungle, fringed and festooned with lovely creepers and climbing plants. Below, the blue waters, tossed by a south-east breeze, broke high upon a wilderness of rugged rocks; above, ma.s.ses of cloud raced across the green heights, revealing now and then patches of bare brown rock, now and then the misty tops of distant mountains. The coastline was variegated with headlands, creeks, and bays; southward could be discerned the bold mountainous promontory of Kungwe. Here and there Arab dhows with their triangular sails and the low log canoes of native fishermen hugged the sh.o.r.e; and birds with brilliant plumage glittered and flashed as they darted in and out among the foliage or swooped down upon the surface in search of food.

Tom feasted his eyes on these novel scenes until a bugle summoned the pa.s.sengers to luncheon. He would have found it a slow meal but for his new friend. They were placed side by side at some distance from the captain, the intervening seats being occupied by the Germans. The planters talked shop among themselves, and Tom was amused at the obsequious grat.i.tude they showed to Major von Rudenheim, the newly arrived German officer, when he dispensed them a word now and then, as a man throws a bone to a dog. The major had the place of honour next the captain, whose bearing towards him was scarcely less deferential.

Through the meal the two Englishmen were almost ignored by the rest.

Afterwards, however, when the planters had returned to their cards and Major von Rudenheim and Mr. Barkworth had both disappeared, Captain Goltermann came up to Tom where he sat alone on deck.

"Fine country, Mr. Villoughby," he said pleasantly. "I hope you like zis trip."

"Thanks, captain, it's quite charming; but I'm not what we call a tripper."

"So! It is business, not pleasure, zat bring you? But zere shall be pleasure _and_ business, I zink. If I can a.s.sist you----"

"Thanks again. I expect Mr. Reinecke to meet me at Bismarckburg."

"Mr. Reinecke! He is great friend of mine. You are lucky to go to him--as pupil, perhaps?"

It seemed to Tom that the amiable captain was trying to pump him, and he smiled inwardly.

"I daresay I could learn a good deal from Mr. Reinecke," he said, guardedly, but with great amiability.