CHAPTER VIII
THE DWARF FOLK
It was dawn at last. All night it had rained as it can rain in West
Africa, falling on the wide river with a hissing splash, sullen and
continuous. Now, towards morning, the rain had ceased and everywhere
rose a soft and pearly mist that clung to the face of the waters and
seemed to entangle itself like strands of wool among the branches of
the bordering trees. On the bank of the river at a spot that had been
cleared of bush, stood a tent, and out of this tent emerged a white
man wearing a sun helmet and grey flannel shirt and trousers. It was
Alan Vernon, who in these surroundings looked larger and more
commanding than he had done at the London office, or even in his own
house of Yarleys. Perhaps the moustache and short brown beard which he
had grown, or his skin, already altered and tanned by the tropics, had
changed his appearance for the better. At any rate it was changed. So
were his manner and bearing, whereof all the diffidence had gone. Now
they were those of a man accustomed to command who found himself in
his right place.
"Jeekie," he called, "wake up those fellows and come and light the
oil-stove. I want my coffee."
Thereon a deep voice was heard speaking in some native tongue and
saying:
"Cease your snoring, you black dogs, and arouse yourselves, for your
lord calls you," an invocation that was followed by the sound of
kicks, thumps, and muttered curses.
A minute or two later Jeekie himself appeared, and he also was much
changed in appearance, for now instead of his smart, European clothes,
he wore a white robe and sandals that gave him an air at once
dignified and patriarchal.
"Good-morning, Major," he said cheerfully. "I hope you sleep well,
Major, in this low-lying and accursed situation, which is more than we
do in boat that half full of water, to say nothing of smell of black
man and prevalent mosquito. But the rain it over and gone, and
presently the sun shine out, so might be much worse, no cause at all
complain."
"I don't know," answered Alan, with a shiver. "I believe that I am
fever proof, but otherwise I should have caught it last night, and--
just give me the quinine, I will take five grains for luck."
"Yes, yes, for luck," answered Jeekie as he opened the medicine chest
and found the quinine, at the same time glancing anxiously out of the
corner of his eye at his master's face, for he knew that the spot
where they had slept was deadly to white men at this season of the
year. "You not catch fever, Little Bonsa," here he dropped his voice
and looked down at the box which had served Alan for a pillow, "see to
that. But quinine give you appetite for breakfast. Very good chop this
morning. Which you like best? Cold ven'son, or fish, or one of them
ducks you shoot yesterday?"
"Oh! some of the cold meat, I think. Give the ducks to the boatmen, I
don't fancy them in this hot place. By the way, Jeekie, we leave the
Qua River here, don't we?"
"Yes, yes, Major, just here. I 'member spot well, for your uncle he
pray on it one whole hour; I pretend pray too, but in heart give
thanks to Little Bonsa, for heathen in those days, quite different
now. This morning we begin walk through forest where it rather dark
and cool and comfortable, that is if we no see dwarf people from whom
good Lord deliver us," and he bowed towards the box containing Little
Bonsa.
"Will those four porters come with us through the forest, Jeekie, as
they promised?"
"Yes, yes, they come. Last night they say they not come, too much
afraid of dwarf. But I settle their hash. I tell them I save up bits
of their hair and toe nails when they no thinking, and I mix it with
medicine, and if they not come, they die every one before they get
home. They think me great doctor and they believe. Perhaps they die if
they go on. If so, I tell them that because they want show white
feather, and they think me greater doctor still. Oh! they come, they
come, no fear, or else Jeekie know reason why. Now, here coffee,
Major. Drink him hot before you go take tub, but keep in shallow
water, because crocodile he very early riser."
Alan laughed, and departed to "take tub." Notwithstanding the
mosquitoes that buzzed round him in clouds, the water was cool and
pleasant by comparison with the hot, sticky air, and the feel of it
seemed to rid him of the languor resulting from his disturbed night.
A month had passed since he had left Old Calabar, and owing to the
incessant rains the journeying had been hard. Indeed the white men
there thought that he was mad to attempt to go up the river at this
season. Of course he had said nothing to them of the objects of his
expedition, hinting only that he wished to explore and shoot, and
perhaps prospect for mines. But knowing as they did, that he was an
Engineer officer with a good record and much African experience, they
soon made up their minds that he had been sent by Government upon some
secret mission that for reasons of his own he preferred to keep to
himself. This conclusion, which Jeekie zealously fostered behind his
back, in fact did Alan a good turn, since owing to it he obtained
boatmen and servants at a season when, had he been supposed to be but
a private person, these would scarcely have been forthcoming at any
price. Hitherto his journey had been one long record of mud,
mosquitoes, and misery, but otherwise devoid of incident, except the
eating of one of his boatmen by a crocodile which was a particularly
"early riser," for it had pulled the poor fellow out of the canoe in
which he lay asleep at night. Now, however, the real dangers were
about to begin, since at this spot he left the great river and started
forward through the forest on foot with Jeekie and the four bearers
whom he had paid highly to accompany him.
He could not conceal from himself that the undertaking seemed somewhat
desperate. But of this he said nothing in the long letter he had
written to Barbara on the previous night, sighing as he sealed it, at
the thought that it might well be the last which would ever reach her
from him, even if the boatmen got safely back to Calabar and
remembered to put it in the post. The enterprise had been begun and
must be carried through, until it ended in success--or death.
An hour later they started. First walked Alan as leader of the
expedition, carrying a double-barrelled gun that could be used either
for ball or shot, about fifty cartridges with brass cases to protect
them from the damp, a revolver, a hunting-knife, a cloth mackintosh,
and lastly, strapped upon his back like a knapsack, a tin box
containing the fetish, Little Bonsa, which was too precious to be
trusted to anyone else. It was quite a sufficient load for any white
man in that climate, but being very wiry, Alan did not feel its
weight, at any rate at first.
After him in single file came the four porters, laden with a small
tent, some tinned provisions and brandy, ammunition, a box containing
beads, watches, etc. for presents, blankets, spare clothing and so
forth. These were stalwart fellows enough, who knew the forest, but
their dejected air showed that now they had come face to face with its
dangers, they heartily wished themselves anywhere else. Indeed,
notwithstanding their terror of Jeekie's medicine, at the last moment
they threw down their loads intending to make a wild rush for the
departing boat, only to be met by Jeekie himself who, anticipating
some such move, was waiting for them on the bank with a shotgun. Here
he remained until the canoe was too far out in the stream for them to
reach it by swimming. Then he asked them if they wished to sit and
starve there with the devils he would leave them for company, of if
they would carry out their bargain like honest men?
The end of it was they took up their loads again and marched, while
behind them walked the terrible and gigantic Jeekie, the barrels of
the shotgun which he carried at full cock and occasionally used to
prod them, pointing directly at their backs. A strange object he
looked truly, for in addition to the weapons with which he bristled,
several cooking-pots were slung about him, to say nothing of a cork
mattress and a mackintosh sheet tied in a flat bundle to his
shoulders, a box containing medicines and food which he carried on his
head, and fastened to the top of it with string like a helmet on a
coffin, an enormous solar-tope stuffed full of mosquito netting, of
which the ends fell about him like a green veil. When Alan
remonstrated with him as to the cork mattress, suggesting that it
should be thrown away as too hot to wear, Jeekie replied that he had
been cold for thirty years, and wished to get warm again. Guessing
that his real reason for declining to part with the article, was that
his master should have something to lie on, other than the damp
ground, Alan said no more at the time, which, as will be seen, was
fortunate enough for Jeekie.
For a mile or more their road ran through fantastic-looking mangrove
trees rooted in the mud, that in the mist resembled, Alan thought,
many-legged arboreal octopi feeling for their food, and tall reeds on
the tops of which sat crowds of chattering finches. Then just as the
sun broke out, strongly, cheering them with its warmth and sucking up
the vapours, they entered sparse bush with palms and great cotton
trees growing here and there, and so at length came to the borders of
the mighty forest.
Oh! dark, dark was that forest; he who entered it from the cheerful
sunshine felt as though suddenly and without preparation he had
wandered out of the light we know into some dim Hades such as the old
Greek fancy painted, where strengthless ghosts flit aimlessly,
mourning the lost light. Everywhere the giant boles of trees shooting
the height of a church tower into the air without a branch; great rib-
rooted trees, and beneath them a fierce and hungry growth of creepers.
Where a tree had fallen within the last century or so, these creepers
ramped upwards in luxuriance, their stems thick as the body of a man,
drinking the shaft of light that pierced downwards, drinking it with
eagerness ere the boughs above met again and starved them. Where no
tree had fallen the creepers were thin and weak; from year to year
they lived on feebly, biding their time, but still they lived, knowing
that some day it would come. And always it was coming to those
expectant parasites, since from minute to minute, somewhere in the
vast depths, miles and miles away perhaps, a great crash echoed in the
stillness, the crash of a tree that, sown when the Saxons ruled in
England, or perhaps before Cleopatra bewitched Anthony, came to its
end at last.
On the second day of their march in the forest Alan chanced to see
such a tree fall, and the sight was one that he never could forget. As
it happened, owing to the vast spread of its branches which had killed
out all rivals beneath, for in its day it had been a very successful
tree embued with an excellent constitution by its parent, it stood
somewhat alone, so that from several hundred yards away as these six
human beings crept towards it like ants towards a sapling in a
cornfield, its mighty girth and bulk set upon a little mound and the
luxuriant greenness of its far-reaching boughs made a kind of
landmark. Then in the hot noon when no breath of wind stirred,
suddenly the end came. Suddenly that mighty bole seemed to crumble;
suddenly those far-reaching arms were thrown together as their support
failed, gripping at each other like living things, flogging the air,
screaming in their last agony, and with an awful wailing groan
sinking, a tumbled ruin, to the earth.
Silence again, and in the midst of the silence Jeekie's cheerful
voice.
"Old tree go flop! Glad he no flop on us, thanks be to Little Bonsa.
Get on, you lazy nigger dog. Who pay you stand there and snivel? Get
on or I blow out your stupid skull," and he brought the muzzle of the
full-cocked, double-barrelled gun into sharp contact with that part of
the terrified porter's anatomy.
Such was the forest. Of their march through it for the first four
days, there is nothing to tell. Its depths seemed to be devoid of
life, although occasionally they heard the screaming of parrots in the
treetops a couple of hundred feet above, or caught sight of the dim
shapes of monkeys swinging themselves from bough to bough. That was in
the daytime, when, although they could not see it, they knew that the
sun was shining somewhere. But at night they heard nothing, since
beasts of prey do not come where there is no food. What puzzled Alan
was that all through these impenetrable recesses there ran a distinct
road which they followed. To the right and left rose a wall of
creepers, but between them ran this road, an ancient road, for nothing
grew on it, and it only turned aside to avoid the biggest of the trees
which must have stood there from time immemorial, such a tree as that
which he had seen fall; indeed it was one of those round which the
road ran.
He asked Jeekie who made the road.
"People who come out Noah's Ark," answered Jeekie, "I think they run
up here to get out of way of water, and sent them two elephants ahead
to make path. Or perhaps dwarf people make it. Or perhaps those who go
up to Asiki-land to do sacrifice like old Jews."
"You mean you don't know," said Alan.
"No, of course don't know. Who know about forest path made before
beginning of world. You ask question, Major, I answer. More lively
answer than to shake head and roll eyes like them silly fool porters."
It was on the fourth night that the trouble began. As usual they had
lit a huge fire made of the fallen boughs and rotting tree trunks that
lay about in plenty. There was no reason why the fire should be so
large, since they had little to cook and the air was hot, but they
made it so for the same reason that Jeekie answered questions, for the
sake of cheerfulness. At least it gave light in the darkness, leaping
up in red tongues of flame twenty or thirty feet high, and its roar
and crackle were welcome in the primeval silence.
Alan lay upon the cork mattress in the open, for here there was no
need to pitch the tent; if any rain fell above, the canopy of leaves
absorbed it. He was amusing himself while he smoked his pipe with
watching the reflection of the fire-light against a patch of darkness
caused probably by some bush about twenty yards away, and by picturing
in his own mind the face of Barbara, that strong, pleasant English
face, as it might appear on such a background. Suddenly there, on the
identical spot he did see a face, though one of a very different
character. It was round and small and hideous, resembling in its
general outline that of a bloated child. At this distance he could not
distinguish the features, except the lips, which were large and
pendulous, and between them the flash of white teeth.
"Look here," he whispered to Jeekie in English, and Jeekie looked,
then without saying a word, lifted the shotgun that lay at his side
and fired straight at the bush. Instantly there arose a squeaking
noise, such as might be made by a wounded animal, and the four porters
sprang up in alarm.
"Sit down," said Jeekie to them in their own tongue, "a leopard was
stalking us and I fired to frighten it away. Don't go near the place,
as it may be wounded and angry, but drag up some boughs and make a
fence round the fire, for fear of others."
The men who dreaded leopards, looking on these animals, indeed, with
superstitious reverence, obeyed readily enough, and as there was
plenty of wood lying within a few yards, soon constructed a /boma/
fence that, rough as it was, would serve for protection.
"Jeekie," said Alan presently as they laboured at the fence, "that was
not a leopard, it was a man."
"No, no, Major, not man, little dwarf devil, him that have poisoned
arrow. I shoot at once to make him sit up. Think he no come back
to-night, too much afraid of shot fetish. But to-morrow, can't say.
Not tell those fellows anything," and he nodded towards the porters,
"or perhaps they bolt."
"I think you would have done better to leave the dwarf alone," said
Alan, "and they might have left us alone. Now they will have a blood
feud against us."
"Not agree, Major, only chance for us put him in blue funk. If I not
shoot, presently he shoot," and he made a sound that resembled the
whistling of an arrow, then added, "Now you go sleep. I not tired, I
watch, my eyes see in dark better than yours. Only two more days of
this damn forest, then open land with tree here and there, where dwarf
no come because he afraid of lion and cannibal man, who like eat him."
As there was nothing else to be done Alan took Jeekie's advice and in
time fell fast asleep, nor did he wake again till the faint light
which for the want of a better name they called dawn, was filtering
down to them through the canopy of boughs.
"Been to look," said Jeekie as he handed him his coffee. "Hit that
dwarf man, see his blood, but think others carry him away. Jeekie very
good shot, stone, spear, arrow, or gun, all same to him. Now get off
as quick as we can before porters smell a rat. You eat chop, Major, I
pack."
Presently they started on their trudge through those endless trees,
with Fear for a companion. Even the porters, who had been told
nothing, seemed more afraid than usual, though whether this was
because they "smell rat," as Jeekie called it, or owing to the
progressive breakdown of their nervous systems, Alan did not know.
About midday they stopped to eat because the men were too tired to
walk further without rest. For an hour or more they had been looking
for a comparatively open place, but as it chanced could find none, so
were obliged to halt in dense forest. Just as they had finished their
meal and were preparing to proceed, that which they had feared,
happened, since from somewhere behind the tree boles came a volley of
reed arrows. One struck a porter in the neck, one fixed itself in
Alan's helmet without touching him, and no less than three hit Jeekie
on the back and stuck there, providentially enough in the substance of
the cork mattress that he still carried on his shoulders, which the
feeble shafts had not the strength to pierce.
Everybody sprang up and with a curious fascination instead of
attempting to do anything, watched the porter who had been hit in the
neck somewhere in the region of the jugular vein. The poor man rose to
his feet with great deliberation, reminding Alan in some grotesque way
of a speaker who has suddenly been called on to address a meeting and
seeks to gain time for the gathering of his thoughts. Then he turned
towards that vast audience of the trees, stretched out his hand with a
declamatory gesture, said something in a composed voice, and fell upon
his face stone dead! The swift poison had reached his heart and done
its work.
His three companions looked at him for a moment and the next with a
yell of terror, rushed off into the forest, hurling down their loads
as they ran. What became of them Alan never learned, for he saw them
no more, and the dwarf people keep their secrets. At the time indeed
he scarcely noticed their departure, for he was otherwise engaged.
One of their hideous little assailants, made bold by success, ventured
to run across an open space between two trees, showing himself for a
moment. Alan had a gun in his hand, and mad with rage at what had
happened, he raised it and swung on him as he would upon a rabbit. He
was a quick and practised shot and his skill did not fail him now, for
just as the dwarf was vanishing behind a tree, the bullet caught him
and next instant he was seen rolling over and over upon its further
side.
"That very nice," said Jeekie reflectively, "very nice indeed, but I
think we best move out of this."
"Aren't you hurt?" gasped Alan. "Your back is full of arrows."
"Don't feel nothing, Major," he answered, "best cork mattress, 25/3 at
Stores, very good for poisoned arrow, but leave him behind now,
because perhaps points work through as I run, one scratch do trick,"
and as he spoke Jeekie untied a string or several strings, letting the
little mattress fall to the ground.
"Great pity leave all those goods," said Jeekie, surveying the loads
that the porters had cast away, "but what says Book? Life more than
raiment. Also take no thought for morrow. Dwarf people do that for us.
Come, Major, make tracks," and dashing at a bag of cartridges which he
cast about his neck, a trifling addition to his other impedimenta, and
a small case of potted meats that he hitched under his arm, he poked
his master in the back with the muzzle of his full-cocked gun as a
signal that it was time to start.
"Keep that cursed thing off me," said Alan furiously. "How often have
I told you never to carry firearms at full cock?"
"About one thousand times, Major," answered Jeekie imperturbably, "but
on such occasion forget discreetness. My ma just same, it run in
family, but story too long tell you now. Cut, Major, cut like hell.
Them dwarfs be back soon, but," he puffed, "I think, I think Little
Bonsa come square with them one day."
So Alan "cut" and the huge Jeekie blundered along after him, the
paraphernalia with which he was hung about rattling like the hoofs of
a galloping giraffe. Nor for all his load did he ever turn a hair.
Whether it were fear within or a desire to save his master, or a
belief in the virtues of Little Bonsa, or that his foot was, as it
were, once more upon his native heath, the fact remained that
notwithstanding the fifty years, almost, that had whitened his wool,
Jeekie was absolutely inexhaustible. At least at the end of that
fearful chase, which lasted all the day, and through the night also,
for they dared not camp, he appeared to be nearly as fresh as when he
started from Old Calabar, nor did his spirits fail him for one moment.
When the light came on the following morning, however, they perceived
by many signs and tokens that the dwarf people were all about them.
Some arrows were shot even, but these fell short.
"Pooh!" said Jeekie, "all right now, they much afraid. Still, no time
for coffee, we best get on."
So they got on as they could, till towards midday the forest began to
thin out. Now as the light grew stronger they could see the dwarfs, of
whom there appeared to be several hundred, keeping a parallel course
to their own on either side of them at what they thought to be a safe
distance.
"Try one shot, I think," said Jeekie, kneeling down and letting fly at
a clump of the little men, which scattered like a covey of partridges,
leaving one of its number kicking on the ground. "Ah! my boy," shouted
Jeekie in derision, "how you like bullet in tummy? You not know
Paradox guaranteed flat trajectory 250 yard. You remember that next
time, sonny." Then off they went again up a long rise.
"River other side of that rise," said Jeekie. "Think those tree-
monkeys no follow us there."
But the "monkeys" appeared to be angry and determined. They would not
come any more within the range of the Paradox, but they still marched
on either side of the two fugitives, knowing well that at last their
strength must fail and they would be able to creep up and murder them.
So the chase went on till Alan began to wonder whether it would not be
better to face the end at once.
"No, no, if say die, can't change mind to-morrow morning," gasped
Jeekie in a hoarse voice. "Here top rise, much nearer than I thought.
Oh, my aunt! who those?" and he pointed to a large number of big men
armed with spears who were marching up the further side of the hill
from the river that ran below.
At the same moment these savages, who were not more than two hundred
yards away, caught sight of them and of their pursuers, who just then
appeared on the ridge to the right and left. The dwarfs, on perceiving
these strangers, uttered a shrill yell of terror, and wheeled about to
fly to their fastnesses in the forest, which evidently they regretted
ever having left. It was too late. With an answering shout the
spearsmen, who were extended in a long line, apparently hunting for
game, charged after them at full speed. They were fresh and their legs
were long. Therefore very soon they overtook the dwarfs and even got
in front of them, heading them off from the forest. The end may be
guessed,--save a few whom they reserved alive, they killed them
mercilessly, and almost without loss to themselves, since the little
forest folk were too terrified and exhausted to shoot at them with
their poisoned arrows, and they had no other weapons.
In fact, as Alan discovered afterwards, for generations there had been
war between them, since all the other tribes hate the dwarfs, whom
they look upon as dangerous human monkeys, and never before had the
big men found such a chance of squaring their account.
When Jeekie saw this fearful-looking company, for the first time his
spirits seemed to fail him.
"Ogula!" he exclaimed with a groan and sat himself upon a flat rock,
pulling Alan down beside him. "Ogula! Know them by hair and spears,"
he repeated. "Up gum tree now, say good-night."
"Why? Who are they?" gasped Alan.
"Great cannibal, Major, eat man, eat us to-night, or perhaps to-morrow
morning when we nice and cool. Say prayers, Major, quick no time
waste."
"I think I will shoot an Ogula or two first," said Alan grimly, as he
stood up and lifted his gun.
"No, not shoot, no good. Pretend not be afraid, best chance. Let
Jeekie think, let Jeekie think," and he slapped his forehead with his
large hand.
Apparently the action brought inspiration, for next instant he grabbed
his master by the arm and dragged him back behind the shelter of a big
boulder which they had just passed. Then with really marvellous
swiftness he cut the straps of the tin box that Alan wore upon his
back, and since there was no time to find the key and unlock it,
seized the little padlock with which it was fastened between his
finger and thumb, and putting out his great strength, with a single
wrench twisted it off.
"What are you----" began Alan.
"Hold tongue," he answered savagely, "make you god, I priest. Ogula
know Little Bonsa. Quick, quick!"
In a minute it was done, the golden mask was clapped on to Alan's
head, and the leather thongs were fastened. Moreover, Jeekie himself
was arrayed in the solar-tope to which all this while he had clung,
allowing streams of green mosquito netting to hang down over his white
robe.
"Come out now, Major," he said, "and play god. You whistle, I do
palaver."
Then hand in hand they walked from behind the rock. By this time the
particular company of the cannibals that was opposite to them, which
happened to include their chief, had climbed the steep slope of the
hill and arrived within a distance of twenty yards. Having seen the
two men and guessed that they had taken refuge behind the rock, their
spears were lifted to kill them, since when he beholds anything
strange, the first impulse of a savage is to bring it to its death.
They looked; they saw. Of a sudden down went the raised spears.
Some of those who held them fell upon their faces, while others turned
to fly, appalled by the vision of this strangely clad man with the
head of gold. Only their chief, a great yellow-toothed fellow who wore
a necklace of baboon claws, remained erect, staring at them with open
mouth.
Alan blew the whistle that was set between the lips of the mask, and
they shivered. Then Jeekie spoke to them in some tongue which they
understood, saying:
"Do you, O Ogula, dare to offer violence to Little Bonsa and her
priests? Say now, why should we not strike you dead with the magic of
the god which she has borrowed from the white man?" and he tapped the
gun he held.
"This is witchcraft," answered the chief. "We saw two men running,
hunted by the dwarfs, not three minutes ago, and now we see--what we
see," and he put his hand before his eyes, then after a pause went on
--"As for Little Bonsa, she left this country in my father's day. He
gave her passage upon the head of a white man and the Asiki wizards
have mourned her ever since, or so I hear."
"Fool," answered Jeekie, "as she went, so she returns, on the head of
a white man. Yonder I see an elder with grey hair who doubtless knew
of Little Bonsa in his youth. Let him come up and look and say whether
or no this is the god."
"Yes, yes," exclaimed the chief, "go up, old man, go up," and he
jabbed at him with his spear until, unwillingly enough, he went.
The elder arrived, making obeisance, and when he was near, Alan blew
the whistle in his face, whereon he fell to his knees.
"It is Little Bonsa," he said in a trembling voice, "Little Bonsa
without a doubt. I should know, as my father and my elder brother were
sacrificed to her, and I only escaped because she rejected me. Down on
your face, Chief, and do honour to the Yellow God before she slay
you."
Instantly every man within hearing prostrated himself and lay still.
Then Jeekie strode up and down among them shouting out:
"Little Bonsa has come back and brought to you, Man-eaters, a fat
offering, an offering of the dwarf-people whom you hate, of the
treacherous dwarf-people who when you walk the ancient forest path,
murder you with their poisoned arrows. Praise Little Bonsa who
delivers you from your foes, and hearken to her bidding. Send on
messengers to the Asiki saying that Little Bonsa comes home again from
across the Black Water bringing the White Preacher, whom she led away
in the day of their fathers. Say to them that the Asiki must send out
a company that Little Bonsa and the Magician with whom she ran away,
may be escorted back to her house with the state which has been hers
from the beginning of time. Say to them also that they must prepare a
great offering of pure gold out of their store, as much gold as fifty
strong men can carry, not one handful less, to be given to the White
Magician who brings back Small Swimming Head, for if they withhold
such an offering, he and Little Bonsa will vanish never to be seen
again, and curses and desolation will fall upon their land. Rise and
obey, Chief of the Ogula."
Then the man scrambled to his feet and answered:
"It shall be done, O Priest of the Yellow God. To-morrow at the dawn
swift messengers will start for the Gold House of the Asiki. To-night
they cannot leave, as we are all very hungry and must eat."
"What must you eat?" asked Jeekie suspiciously.
"O Priest," answered the chief with a deprecatory gesture, "when first
we saw you we hoped that it would be the white man and yourself, for
we have never tasted white man. But now we fear that you will not
consent to this, and as you are holy and the guardian of the god, we
cannot eat you without your own consent. Therefore fat dwarf must be
our food, of which, however, there will be plenty for you as well as
us."
"You dog!" exclaimed Jeekie in a voice of furious indignation. "Do you
think that white men and their high-born companions, such as myself,
were made to fill your vile stomachs? I tell you that a meal of the
deadly Bean would agree better with you, for if you dare so much as to
look on us, or on any of the white race with hunger, agony shall seize
your vitals and you and all your tribe shall die as though by poison.
Moreover, we do not touch the flesh of men, nor will we see it eaten.
It is our '/orunda/,' it is consecrate to us, it must not pass our
lips, nor may our eyes behold it. Therefore we will camp apart from
you further up the stream and find our own food. But to-morrow at the
dawn the messengers must leave as we have commanded. Also you shall
provide strong men and a large canoe to bear Little Bonsa forward
towards her own home until she finds her people coming out to greet
her.
"It shall be done," answered the chief humbly, "Everything shall be
done according to the will of Little Bonsa spoken by her priest, that
she may leave a blessing and not a curse upon the heads of the tribe
of the Ogula. Say where you wish to camp and men shall run to build a
house of reeds for the god to dwell in."
