Tom Willoughby's Scouts: A Story of the War in German East Africa

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Tom Willoughby's Scouts: A Story of the War in German East Africa Page 7

by Herbert Strang


  CHAPTER VII--TOM SEIZES THE OCCASION

  Tom had many occasions during the next ten days to rejoice in thepossession of an excellent servant. Mwesa was everything inturn--hunter, cook, valet, hospital orderly; and in every capacity hewas efficient. His snares and traps stocked the larder; the grain, hehad brought from the plantation was eked out with wild fruits gatheredin the forest; and out of the one simple cooking-pot he produced asgreat a variety of good things as a conjurer out of a hat. Always withthe same gravity and the same muttering of spells, he anointed andmassaged Tom's ankle daily, and never failed to sing the praises of hisuncle Mirambo. His constant cheerfulness acted as a tonic on hismaster's spirits, and with reviving health Tom felt braced to endurewhatever hardship the future might bring.

  At last the day came when he declared that he was ready to start forAbercorn. He had talked over his plans with Mwesa, handicapped,however, by the fact that neither he nor the negro knew the route or thecharacter of the country to be travelled. The extent of his informationwas that Abercorn lay somewhere to the south-west, and from a hazyrecollection of a map glanced at during his voyage from England heguessed that the town was forty or fifty miles away. Under the mostfavourable conditions he could hardly hope to cover that distance inless than three days: if the country was specially difficult the journeymight last even weeks.

  It was unfortunate that Reinecke's plantation lay across the directroute. In order to avoid it, he must make a considerable detour, whichwould add he knew not how many miles to the journey. And then he wouldhave to cross the main German road connecting Bismarckburg on LakeTanganyika with Neu Langenburg about twenty miles north-west of LakeNyassa. This, the only practicable highway, might be crowded withtransports and would certainly be patrolled; but he hoped by carefulscouting to discover some part of its great length where, either by dayor by night, he could safely make the crossing.

  Deciding to attempt a start at dawn on the following day, the two madetheir simple preparations. Mwesa stuffed into his wallet all the ediblefruits he could gather, and after cooking the last meal, took his pot tothe lake, and washed it thoroughly. He filled with water a couple ofgourds, one of which he fitted with a grass thong for slinging overTom's shoulder. Tom cleaned his rifle, bathed in the lake, keeping awary eye open for crocodiles, and washed out his only shirt, with a sighfor the contents of his travelling case, now, he supposed, appropriatedby Reinecke.

  They were about to turn in early that evening when Mwesa jumped upsuddenly and darted out of the low entrance to the hut. Tom, surprised,followed him, and found him standing in an attitude of expectancy justoutside. A few moments later he heard a human cry, faint and muffled,as if coming from a great distance. Mwesa was greatly excited.

  "Two time," he cried, turning his head in the direction from which thesound had come.

  "You heard it before?" Tom asked.

  Mwesa held up his hand enjoining silence. They waited. A minute or twopassed; the cry was repeated, and Mwesa, still more excited, said:

  "Mhehe call; man belong me."

  "One of your own people! It must be some one from the plantation.Answer him ... No, wait. Reinecke may be setting a trap for us. Perhapshe has visited the pit and discovered my escape, and guesses I may besomewhere in the forest."

  Again they heard the cry.

  "Who knows you are with me, besides Mirambo?" asked Tom.

  "Mushota, no more, sah. Mirambo say no tell: berry wise man, Mirambo."

  "Then I think we had better answer: it may be Mirambo himself. But wewill not call here; let us get away from the hut. It will not do torisk bringing an enemy here."

  It was now nearly dark. Adopting Mwesa's precaution, they climbed oneof the trees that formed the boundary of their enclosure, dropped to theground outside the zariba, and made their way into the nullah. The crywas repeated once more; this time it was louder. When they had walkednearly a quarter of a mile down the nullah, Tom ordered Mwesa to answer,and the boy let out a curious series of notes, like the dropping scaleof the hornbill. There was a shout in response.

  "Mushota, sah," cried Mwesa, his big eyes gleaming. "He say what placeme be."

  "Tell him."

  Mwesa directed his cousin, and in a few minutes the lad, so strangelylike him, came bounding along in the middle of the watercourse. The twonegroes embraced, and Mushota, his features and arms working withexcitement, poured out a story in a torrent of clicks and gurgles, everynow and then glancing at Tom, who stood a little apart.

  Mwesa's expressive countenance showed that the story affected himdeeply. He turned to his master, and seemed to strive to find Englishwords in which to repeat what he had heard.

  "Come, let us get back to our hut," said Tom. "We can only just see tofind our way. You can tell me all about it as we go."

  Tom had two natural gifts rare in one who was little more than aschoolboy--patience and sympathy. He could be stiff enough with hisequals in rank and education; but with this faithful negro lad,ignorant, struggling to express himself in a strange and difficultlanguage, he was so patient that Mwesa's stumbling utterance became morecoherent as he told Mushota's story, and Tom was able to grasp itsessentials.

  It concerned Mirambo. The old hunter, once a chief and a warrior ofrenown among his own people, had not taken kindly to the methods of theGerman drill-sergeant. Day after day he had been flogged by theoverseers for slowness of movement or some other fault in drill, and atlast the German sergeant, who had hitherto left punishment to the Arabs,had kicked the man in the presence of the whole company of recruits.Mirambo had retaliated with a swift blow that knocked the German off hisfeet. The sergeant, when he got up, was on the point of shooting thenegro; but the head overseer, interposing, explained that Mirambo wasReinecke's best hunting man, and the sergeant had then ordered him to bechained up until Reinecke returned from Bismarckburg. Only a few daysbefore, a negro had been shot for a similar offence, and Mushota fearedthat his father would suffer the same fate. Knowing the whereabouts ofthe white man who had befriended his cousin, he had stolen out at middaywhen even the indefatigable German rested, and had come to beg them'sungu to save his father.

  "But why come to me? What can I do?" asked Tom, astonished at theconfidence with which Mwesa put his cousin's plea. It was almostlaughable that they should seek help of him, a fugitive, one whomReinecke had tried to kill, a single man without resources in an enemy'scountry.

  "Sah English," exclaimed Mwesa. "Sah savvy big medicine, white manmedicine. Sah boss, no fear."

  Touched by this childlike faith in the power either of the English nameor of "white man medicine," which he supposed to mean some magic art, hewas at a loss what answer to make. He was willing enough to help, butquite unable to see how. It seemed best to temporise--to refrain fromimmediately dashing the negroes' hopes, and to explain to them presentlyhow impossible was the feat besought of him.

  "We will talk it over in our hut," he said, and was then sorry he haddeferred the inevitable disappointment, for Mwesa clapped his hands andlaughed, and said to Mushota a few words that set him laughing too. Hiscaution had only strengthened their belief in him.

  The two negroes chattered together the rest of the way to the hut, andTom was left to his by no means pleasant reflections. How could hebreak the unpalatable truth to these simple souls? What would be theeffect on them? He could enter into their feelings through therecollection of an incident of his own childhood. His father hadpromised him, a child of five, the present of a horse, and he rememberedthe bitter tears he shed when the horse turned out to be a wooden toyinstead of the expected creature of flesh and bone. The negro is alwaysa child.

  And then he found himself thinking: "Why not risk a visit to theplantation? It's running my head into a noose, perhaps; but after all Iowe to Mwesa I may at least show him that I'm ready to do what I can.He can get in and out: why shouldn't I? Reinecke is absent. I don'tsuppose he ever confided to the Arabs his pleasant intentions withregard to me; p
erhaps I might venture to tackle them (provided the drillsergeants aren't about), and get them to release Mirambo.... What tosh!of course that's impossible: still, I might at least reconnoitre, andI'll be hanged if I don't."

  It was dark when they reached the hut, but the slight glow from the firethat Mwesa had kept always burning in the enclosure revealed to Tom thelook of hopeful contentment on the faces of the two negroes. They allsquatted at the entrance, and Tom asked:

  "When will Reinecke be back?"

  Mwesa translated to his cousin. The answer was, "To-morrow night."

  "How many Germans are at the plantation?'

  "One: the other had accompanied Reinecke."

  "And how many askaris?"

  "Six; the others had gone to Bismarckburg."

  Tom pondered this information. He had no chance if he was caught; thelikelihood of his being able to release Mirambo had almost vanished.And what if the man, by some lucky stroke, were released? Would heconsent to escape without his family? There were five in all: thelarger the party, the more difficult to evade pursuit. "It's allutterly hopeless," thought Tom. "They will see it for themselves if Igo and talk to them on the spot."

  He told the boys what he proposed to do, at the same time warning themthat no good would come of it. The promise overshadowed the warning:the m'sungu would go; every other good thing would follow. Half vexed,half amused by what seemed sheer unreason, Tom bade them sleep: perhapswith morning they would see facts as they were.

  Before the glimmering dawn had penetrated the nullah, when thefour-footed creatures had slunk to their dens and the birds werebeginning to stir, the three clambered down on the outside of the zaribaand started on their long tramp. Tom wished to reach the plantationbefore mid-day; he would then perhaps see for himself how the Germandrilled his dusky recruits.

  On arriving in the neighbourhood of the plantation, Mwesa struck off tothe left, and led the way stealthily through dense bush where there wasno path, and none but himself could have found the track of his ownprevious journeys. They came presently to the stream that supplied theplantation with water. Climbing down the steep moss-covered bank, theycrept quietly along the bed until they reached the thorn fence, whichformed an impenetrable barrier across the stream. In the bank, just onthe outside, Mwesa pulled aside a curtain of rank grass, revealing ahole scarcely larger than a drain pipe. Mushota crawled into it, Mwesasigned to Tom to follow him: he himself entered last, having remained tosee that the grass fell naturally over the entrance to this narrowtunnel.

  The passage through the tunnel took less than a minute, but Tom feltalmost suffocated before he reached open air again. He said to himselfthat it was like crawling in a grave. Some day, he thought, the earthwill fall in; he wondered that such a tunnel, made with no art, had notcollapsed long ago. Its inner end opened into the hollow trunk of atree. Climbing until his eyes were on a level with a small hole scoopedout of the wood, he looked out upon the plantation.

  The tree was a few feet within the thorn fence. Some little distance tothe left were the huts and sheds occupied by the negroes. In front ofthese was the broad, clear, level space that was the usual playground ofthe children and the promenade of the elders when work was done. Now,however, no children sported upon it. Some sixty sturdy negroes, rangingin age from sixteen to forty and upwards, were drawn up in ranks. Ateach end hovered an Arab overseer with his whip. And facing therecruits, some yards away from them, stood the German sergeant, a stiff,thick-set, bull-necked soldier, differing from hundreds of his kind whomTom had seen in Germany only in his uniform, which, more suited to theAfrican climate, was less complimentary to the sergeant's tight figure.The sergeant bellowed an order, in words that seemed to be Germanacclimatised; the negroes hesitated, then, each interpreting the commandin his own way, became a mob instead of a half company. The Germanstamped and roared; the overseers cracked their whips; and the scaredrecruits scrambled back somehow into their original formation.

  The sun beat fiercely down upon the scene, and the perspiring sergeant,a martyr to duty, drew a finger round the inside of his coat collar andtried again. Brandishing the light cane he carried, he hurled abuse atthe negroes in his hybrid dialect, and having thus let off steam,repeated his sharp words of command. It was evident that he wasattempting to teach the recruits how to form extended order from fours,and Tom almost sympathised with him as the men blundered in the simplestmovements. They appeared to be unable to distinguish "right turn" from"left turn"; and even those who had once moved correctly seemed to beunable to remember for five minutes what they had learnt.

  "Mirambo no dis place, sah," whispered Mwesa over his shoulder.

  The words recalled the purpose of his visit. Mirambo was no doubt tiedup in the hut which Reinecke used as a jail for refractory labourers. Itwas at the further end of the row of huts, in full view from every partof the parade ground. An askari was standing at ease outside it. Tom'ssense of the hopelessness of any attempt at rescue was deepened. SurelyMwesa himself must realise it. Sorry as he was, Tom felt that there wasnothing to be done.

  A sudden commotion drew his attention once more to the drilling. Thesergeant, incensed by the repeated blunders of one particularly stupidnegro, had lifted his cane and dealt the man several vicious cuts acrossthe face. Yelling with pain and rage, the victim had sprung upon thesergeant, hurled him to the ground, and seized him by the throat. Twoof the overseers had just rushed to the spot, and were dragging thenegro from the prostrate German. There was much chattering andexcitement among the other recruits and the negroes who were looking onfrom the huts.

  The sergeant rose stiffly to his feet, and with apoplectic fury orderedthe Arabs to tie the culprit hand and foot. As they were doing so, Tom,who had been boiling with indignation at the German's brutality, had oneof those sudden inspirations which are often turning-points in a career.Bidding the two lads follow him, he clambered up to the fork of thetree, let himself down to the ground on the rear side, and ran, undercover of a line of bushes, until he was some thirty yards nearer thebody of recruits. Then, stiffening himself, he emerged into the open,rifle in hand, and advanced with quick martial strides across the paradeground. Until that moment he had not been seen; the sergeant and theArabs had their backs towards him; but the sudden silence that fell uponthe negroes as they beheld the young m'sungu, who had been absent solong, followed by the two boys, attracted the German's attention. Heswung round to see what it was that all eyes were fixed on so intently,and stared with amazement when, from the lips of the tall young whiteman within a few paces of him, came the sharp command in German--

  "Sergeant, release that man."

  The instinct of military obedience on which Tom had reckoned did notfail. The sergeant saluted; at a word from him the Arabs released thenegro from his bonds; the recruits broke their ranks and rushed towardsTom with yells of delight, and from the dwellings along one side of theparade ground the whole negro population, men, women and children,trooped forth shouting welcome to the m'sungu, and utterly regardless ofthe overseers. The sergeant's authority had vanished. A few secondsbefore he had had behind him the prestige of German rule; in yielding tothe command of an Englishman (whom he did not yet know as an Englishman)he had become a thing of naught to these impressionable Africans.

  TOM MAKES A DIVERSION.]

  Before he had collected his muddled wits he was surprised to hear thathe was under arrest, and found himself on his way with two of the Arabsto the jail hut, under guard of two of his own askaris. Tom, wonderinghow long the man's stupefaction would last, followed to the hut, orderedMirambo to be released, and the door to be shut and bolted.

  As he turned away, he saw one of the overseers bolting across the paradeground in the direction of the gate.

  "After him, Mwesa," he cried, and the boy, who had followed him like ashadow, instantly darted after the runaway, accompanied by a troop ofhis fellow negroes. The Arab, whose whip had formerly been a terror tothem, was chased across the plantation
, and, just as he reached thegate, was seized by a score of sinewy hands and hauled back with yellsof triumphant glee, to join the other prisoners in the lock-up. Tom,with Mwesa as interpreter, ordered Mirambo to collect all the men on theparade ground, and there wait for him. Then, astonished and a littleintimidated by his own success, he hurried to the bungalow. Reineckewas expected to return that evening. It was now past noon; within thenext five or six hours there must be some hard thinking if thisunexpected development was to be turned to the best account.

 

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