“This fly will not get the fever here,” Stas thought joyfully.
Afterwards they commenced to converse about the elephant, as Nell was incapable of talking of anything else and did not cease going into transports over his stature, trunk, and tusks, which in reality were prodigious. Finally she asked:
“Honestly, Stas, isn’t he wise?”
“As Solomon,” answered Stas. “But what makes you think so?”
“Because when I asked him not to drink any more, he obeyed me at once.”
“If before that time he had not taken any lessons in English and nevertheless understands it, that really is miraculous.”
Nell perceived that Stas was making merry with her, so she gave him a scolding; after which she said:
“Say what you wish, but I am sure that he is very intelligent and will become tame at once.”
“Whether at once I don’t know, but he may be tamed. The African elephants are indeed more savage than the Asiatic; nevertheless, I think that Hannibal, for instance, used African elephants.”
“And who was Hannibal?”
Stas glanced at her indulgently and with pity.
“Really,” he said, “at your age, you are not supposed to know such things. Hannibal was a great Carthaginian commander, who used elephants in his war with the Romans, and as Carthage was in Africa, he must have used African—”
Further conversation was interrupted by the resounding roar of the elephant, who, having eaten and drunk his fill, began to trumpet; it could not be known whether from joy or from longing for complete freedom. Saba started up and began to bark, while Stas said:
“There you have it! Now he is calling companions. We will be in a nice predicament if he attracts a whole herd here.”
“He will tell them that we were kind to him,” Nell responded hastily.
But Stas, who indeed was not alarmed, as he reckoned that even if a herd should rush towards them, the glare of the fire would frighten them away, smiled spitefully and said:
“Very well! very well! But if the elephants appear, you won’t cry, oh no! Your eyes will only perspire as they did twice before.”
And he began to tease her:
“I do not cry, only my eyes perspire—”
Nell, however, seeing his happy mien, conjectured that no immediate danger threatened them.
“When he gets tame,” she said, “my eyes will not perspire, though ten lions should roar.”
“Why?”
“For he will defend us.”
Stas quieted Saba, who would not stop replying to the elephant; after which he deliberated somewhat and spoke thus:
“You did not think of one thing, Nell. Of course, we will not stay here for ages but will proceed farther; I do not say at once. On the contrary, the place is good and healthy; I have decided to stop here — a week, perhaps, — perhaps two, for you, and all of us as well, are entitled to a rest. Well, very good! As long as we stay here we will feed the elephant, though that will be a big task for us all. But he is locked up and we cannot take him with us. Well then, what later? We shall go and he will remain here and again will endure the pangs of hunger until he dies. Then we shall be all the more sorry for him.”
Nell saddened very much and for some time sat in silence, evidently not knowing what reply to make to these just remarks, but after a while she raised her head and, brushing aside the tufts of hair which fell over her eyes, turned her gaze, full of confidence, on the boy.
“I know,” she said, “that if you want to, you will get him out of the ravine.”
“I?”
And she stretched out her little finger, touched Stas’ hand with it, and repeated:
“You.”
The sly little woman understood that her confidence would flatter the boy and from that moment he would ponder on how to free the elephant.
V
The night passed quietly and though, on the southern side of the sky, big clouds gathered, the morning was beautiful. By Stas’ orders, Kali and Mea, immediately after breakfast, began to gather melons and acacia pods as well as fresh leaves and all kinds of fodder, which they deposited upon the brink of the ravine.
As Nell firmly insisted upon feeding her new friend herself, Stas cut for her from a young bifurcated fig tree something in the shape of a pitchfork in order to make it easier for her to shove down the supplies to the bottom of the ravine. The elephant trumpeted from morn, evidently calling for his refreshments, and when afterwards he beheld on the brink that same little white being who had fed him the previous day, he greeted her with a joyful gurgle and at once stretched out his trunk towards her. In the morning light he appeared to the children still more prodigious than on the preceding day. He was lean but already looked brisker and turned his small eyes almost joyfully on Nell. Nell even claimed that his fore legs had grown thicker during the night, and began to shove fodder with such zeal that Stas had to restrain her and in the end when she got out of breath too much, take her place at the work. Both enjoyed themselves immensely; the elephant’s “whims” amused them especially. In the beginning he ate everything which fell at his feet, but soon, having satisfied the first cravings of hunger, he began to grow fastidious. Chancing upon a plant which was not to his taste, he beat it over his fore leg and afterwards tossed it upwards with his trunk, as if he wanted to say, “Eat this dainty yourselves;” finally, after having appeased his hunger and thirst, he began to fan with his prodigious ears with evident contentment.
“I am sure,” said Nell, “that if we went down to him he would not hurt us.”
And she began to call to him:
“Elephant, dear elephant, isn’t it true you would not do any harm to us?”
And when the elephant nodded his trunk in reply she turned to Stas:
“There, you see he says ‘Yes.’”
“That may be,” Stas replied. “Elephants are very intelligent animals and this one undoubtedly understands that we both are necessary to him. Who knows whether he does not feel a little gratitude towards us? But it would be better not to try yet, and particularly not to let Saba try, as the elephant surely would kill him. But with time they become even friendly.”
Further transports over the elephant were interrupted by Kali who, foreseeing that he should have to work every day to feed the gigantic beast, approached Stas with an ingratiating smile and said:
“Great master, kill the elephant, and Kali will eat him instead of gathering grass and branches.”
But the “great master” was now a hundred miles from a desire to kill the elephant and, as in addition he was impulsive, he retorted:
“You are a donkey.”
Unfortunately he forgot the Kiswahili word for donkey and said it in English. Kali, not understanding English, evidently took it for some kind of compliment or praise for himself, as a moment later the children heard how he, addressing Mea, boastfully said:
“Mea has a dark skin and dark brain, but Kali is a donkey.”
After which he added with pride:
“The great master himself said that Kali is a donkey.”
In the meantime Stas, ordering both to tend the little lady as the eye in the head and in case of any accident to summon him at once, took the rifle and went to the detached rock which blocked the ravine. Arriving at the place he inspected if attentively, examined all its cracks, inserted a stick into a crevice which he found near the bottom, and carefully measured its depths; afterwards he returned slowly to the camp and, opening the cartridge box, began to count the cartridges.
He had barely counted three hundred when from a baobab tree growing about fifty paces from the tent Mea’s voice resounded.
“Master! Master!”
Stas approached the giant tree, whose trunk, hollowed through decay near the ground, looked like a tower, and asked:
“What do you want?”
“Not far away can be seen zebras, and further on antelopes are feeding.”
“Good! I will take a rifle and go,
for it is necessary to cure meat. But why did you climb the tree, and what are you doing there?”
The girl answered in her sad, melodious voice:
“Mea saw a nest of gray parrots and wanted to bring a young one to the little lady, but the nest is empty, so Mea will not get any beads for her neck.”
“You will get them because you love the little lady.”
The young negress came down the rugged bark as quickly as possible, and with eyes glistening with joy began to repeat:
“Oh! Yes! Yes! Mea loves her very much — and beads also.”
Stas gently stroked her head, after which he took the rifle, closed the cartridge box, and started in the direction in which the zebras were pastured. After a half hour the report of a shot reached the camp, and an hour later the young hunter returned with the good news that he had killed a young zebra and that the locality was full of game; that he saw from a height besides zebras, a numerous herd of ariel antelopes as well as a group of water-bucks pasturing in the vicinity of the river.
Afterwards he ordered Kali to take a horse, and despatched him for the slaughtered game, while he himself began to inspect carefully the gigantic baobab trunk, walk around it, and knock the rugged bark with the barrel of his rifle.
“What are you doing?” Nell asked him. He replied:
“Look what a giant! Fifteen men holding each other’s hands could not encircle that tree, which perhaps remembers the times of the Pharaohs. But the trunk at the bottom is decayed and hollow. Do you see that opening? Through it one can easily reach the middle. We can there arrange a room in which we all can live. This occurred to me when I saw Mea among the branches, and afterwards when I stalked the zebra I was continually thinking of it.”
“Why, we are to escape to Abyssinia.”
“Yes. Nevertheless it is necessary to recuperate, and I told you yesterday that I had decided to remain here a week, or even two. You do not want to leave your elephant, and I fear for you during the rainy season, which has already commenced and during which fever is certain. To-day the weather is fine; you see, however, that the clouds are gathering thicker and thicker and who knows whether it will not pour before night? The tent will not protect you sufficiently and in the baobab tree if it is not rotten to the top, we can laugh at the greatest downpour. It will be also safer in it than in the tent for if in the evening we protect this opening with thorns and make a little window to afford us light, then as many lions as want to may roar and hover around. The spring rainy season does not last longer than a month and I am more and more inclined to think that it will be necessary to wait through it. And if so, it is better here than elsewhere, and better still in that gigantic tree than under the tent.”
Nell always agreed to everything that Stas wanted; so she agreed now; the more so, as the thought of remaining near the elephant and dwelling in a baobab tree pleased her immensely. She began now to think of how she would arrange the rooms, how she would furnish them, and how they would invite each other to “five o’clocks” and dinners. In the end they both were amused greatly and Nell wanted at once to inspect her new dwelling, but Stas, who with each day acquired more experience and prudence, restrained her from too sudden housekeeping.
“Before we live there,” he said, “it is first necessary to bid the present tenants to move out, if any such are found there.”
Saying this, he ordered Mea to throw into the interior of the baobab tree a few lighted boughs, which smoked profusely because the branches were fresh.
In fact, it appeared that he did well as the gigantic tree was occupied by housekeepers upon whose hospitality no reliance could be placed.
VI
There were two apertures in the tree, one large, about a half a yard from the ground; the other smaller, and about as high as the first story of a city residence. Mea had scarcely thrown the lighted, smoking branches into the lower one when immediately out of the upper one big bats began to fly; squeaking and blinded by the luster of the sun, they flew aimlessly about the tree. But after a while from the lower opening there stole out, like lightning, a real tenant, in the person of a monstrous boa, who evidently, digesting the remnants of the last feast in a semi-somnolent state, had not become aroused and did not think of safety until the smoke curled in his nostrils. At the sight of the strong body, which, like a monstrous spring, darted out of the smoking interior of the tree, Stas grabbed Nell in his arms and began to run with her in the direction of the open jungle. But the reptile, itself terror-stricken, did not think of pursuing them; instead, winding in the grass and among the scattered packages, it slid away with unheard-of speed in the direction of the ravine, seeking to hide amid the rocky fissures and crannies. The children recovered their composure. Stas placed Nell on the ground and rushed for his rifle, and afterwards pursued the snake in the direction of the ravine, Nell following him. But after going a score of paces such an extraordinary spectacle struck their eyes that they stood still as if thunderstruck. Now high above the ravine appeared in the twinkling of an eye the body of the snake, and, describing a zigzag in the air, it fell again to the bottom. After a while it appeared a second time and again fell. The children, reaching the brink, saw with amazement that their new friend, the elephant, was amusing himself in this manner, for having first despatched the snake twice upon an aerial journey, at present he was crushing its head with his prodigious foot which resembled a log. Having finished this operation, he again lifted the still quivering body with his trunk; this time, however, he did not toss it upwards, but directly into the waterfall. After this, nodding both ways and fanning himself with his ears, he began to gaze keenly at Nell, and finally stretched out his trunk towards her as if claiming a reward for his heroic and, at the same time, sensible deed.
Nell ran at once to the tent and returning with a box full of wild figs, began to throw a few at a time to him, while he searched for them in the grass and placed one after another in his mouth. Those which fell in deeper crevices, he blew out with such force that, with the figs, stones the size of a man’s fist flew up. The children received this exhibition with applause and laughter. Nell went back several times for new supplies, not ceasing to contend with each fig that the elephant was entirely tamed and that they could even at that moment go down to him.
“You see, Stas; we now shall have a defender. For he is afraid of nobody in the desert — neither lion, nor snake, nor crocodile. And he is very good and surely loves us.”
“If he is tamed,” said Stas, “and if I can leave you under his care, then really I can go hunting in perfect peace, for a better defender for you I could not find in all Africa.”
After a while he added:
“The elephants of this place are wild, but I have read that Asiatic elephants, for instance, have a strange weakness for children. It has never occurred in India that an elephant has harmed a child, and if one falls in a rage, as sometimes happens, the native keepers send children to pacify him.”
“Ah, you see! You see!”
“In any case you did well in not allowing me to kill him.”
At this Nell’s pupils flashed with joy like two little greenish flames. Standing on tiptoe, she placed both her hands on Stas’ shoulders and, tilting her head backward, asked, gazing into his eyes:
“I acted as if I had how many years? Tell me! As if I had how many years?”
And he replied:
“At least seventy.”
“You are always joking.”
“Get angry, get angry, but who will free the elephant?”
Hearing this, Nell began at once to fawn like a little kitten.
“You — and I shall love you very much and he will also.”
“I am thinking of that,” Stas said, “but it will be hard work and I shall not do it at once, but only when we are ready to start upon a farther journey.”
“Why?”
“Because if we should free him before he is entirely tame and becomes attached to us, he would go away at once.”
&nb
sp; “Oh! He won’t go away from me.”
“You think that he already is like me,” retorted Stas with impatience.
Further conversation was checked by the arrival of Kali, who brought with him the slain zebra and its colt, which had been partly devoured by Saba. It was the good fortune of the mastiff that he rushed after Kali, and was not present at the encounter with the python for he would have chased after him and, overtaking him, would have perished in his murderous coils before Stas could come to his aid. For eating the zebra he received, however, from Nell a tongue-lashing which after all he did not take too much to heart as he did not even hide his lolling tongue, with which he came running in from the hunt.
Stas announced in the meantime to Kali that he intended to arrange a dwelling in the interior of the tree and related to him what had occurred during the smoking out of the trunk, as well as how the elephant had handled the snake. The idea of living in the baobab tree, which would afford a protection not only against the rain but also against the wild animals, pleased the negro very much; but on the other hand the conduct of the elephant did not meet his approval.
“The elephant is foolish,” he said, “so he threw the nioka (snake) into the thundering water, but Kali knows that nioka is good; so he will search for it in the thundering waters, and bake it as Kali is wise — and is a donkey.”
“It is agreed that you are a donkey,” Stas answered, “but of course you will not eat the snake.”
“Nioka is good,” repeated Kali. And pointing at the slain zebra, he added:
“Better than that niama.”
After which both went into the baobab tree and occupied themselves in arranging the dwelling. Kali, having found on the river-side a flat stone the size of a sieve, placed it in the trunk, heaped burning coals upon it, and afterwards continually added more fuel, watching only that the decayed wood on the inside did not ignite and cause the conflagration of the whole tree. He said that he did this in order that “nothing should bite the great master and the bibi.” In fact it appeared that this was not a useless precaution, for as soon as smoke filled the interior of the tree and spread even on the outside there began to creep out of the cracks in the bark a great variety of creatures; scarabees, black and cherry-colored, shaggy spiders big as plums, caterpillars of the thickness of a finger, covered as though with thorns, and loathsome and at the same time venomous scolopendras whose bite may even cause death. In view of what was occurring on the outside of the trunk it was easy to surmise how many similar creatures must have perished from the fumes of the smoke on the inside. Those which fell from the bark and lower branches upon the grass were crushed unmercifully with a stone by Kali, who was continually gazing at the upper and lower openings as if he feared that at any moment something strange might appear in either of them.
Complete Works of Henryk Sienkiewicz Page 637