CHAPTER XI--TOM'S NEW ALLIES
The more Tom thought over the probabilities of the case, the less likelyit appeared to him that the Germans, if engaged in serious operations onthe frontier, would spare a force for dealing immediately with mutineerswho might be rounded up at leisure. At the same time the situation wasso uncertain that he could not afford to neglect the opportunity ofpreparing for a possible attack. It was equally important that heshould get timely notice of the enemy's approach, and that could besecured only by starting an efficient system of scouting. As soon as hehad dealt with the askaris, therefore, he got Mirambo to choose a dozenactive and trustworthy young men, and arranged that they should go outin parties of six on alternate days, to reconnoitre as much ground southof the nullah as they could cover between dawn and dark. He could notyet entrust them with rifles uncontrolled: they had no other arms thanthe agricultural implements; but while the first six were absent, thesecond could fashion wooden spears which would suffice for protectionagainst wild animals. There were no villages in the immediateneighbourhood of the nullah, or between that and the plantation, so thatcollisions with hostile tribes were scarcely to be feared.
Tom then passed to the consideration of the problem of the camp.Accompanied by Mirambo and Mwesa he explored the whole length or thenullah between the bend and the lake, a distance of perhaps half a mile.The width varied a good deal; the sides were almost perpendicular; andthe stream, being the outflow from an upland lake, descended in a seriesof cascades. At present there was little volume of water; but in acouple of months, with the opening of the rainy season, the level of thelake would rise, and what was now a trickling rivulet might become araging torrent. Tom hoped that by that time his occupation of thenullah would be at an end. Preparing for the worst, however, he came tothe conclusion that the ground on either side of the stream would be aninsecure camping-place, and decided to plant his temporary villagearound the spot where he and Mwesa had found a refuge a few days before.It was in the heart of a wood, where the nullah broadened out to morethan three times its average width, and was defended on the northernside by the lake. The building of huts would take a considerable time,because the wood must be cleared of beasts, and the able-bodied men mustbe employed in completing the defences lower down the nullah; butcertain parts of the work could be done by the younger women and theelder children.
While some of the people were engaged in preparing this _ex tempore_village, Tom set others to strengthen the barricade across the nullah.As he watched them, it occurred to him that the position would gain insecurity if he used the stream to form a moat, and he at once startedtwo gangs digging at the extreme ends of the breastwork, a foot or twoin front of it. At the close of the next day the moat was finished--aditch six feet broad by four deep, extending right across the nullahexcept where the stream flowed in the centre. A man might easily leapover it, but his leap would land him amid the branches of the trees. Itwould be useful in checking a rush, especially if it were unnoticeduntil the enemy were actually upon it; and when, on its farther side, anumber of low bushes and clumps of long grass had been planted, Tomfound by experiment that the water was not seen until he came withinhalf a dozen yards of it.
The defences of the slopes right and left then engaged Tom's attention.There were not enough trees on the spot to form effective barricades,and the only means of checking the enemy if they scaled the low heightswas to dig trenches. The labour would be long and toilsome, for theground must first be cleared of the brushwood; but in no other way couldthe enemy be prevented from swarming down into the nullah. At the endof a week the western and eastern slopes, for about thirty yards fromthe end of the nullah, were each scored with a deep trench, fortifiedwith a parapet constructed of the earth that had been removed.
A second line of defence might be necessary, and for this there was nobetter position than the bend of the nullah, nearly half a mile to thenorth. The sides being here steep, almost perpendicular, it wasimpossible to haul trees from the forest above for a breastwork likethat at the entrance; so Tom had the bed of the nullah cleared of coverfor a space of about two hundred yards, and a trench with a strongparapet carried from side to side.
The work was still unfinished when one day the scouts, for the firsttime, reported that they had sighted the enemy. About ten miles awaythey had seen a band of young natives marching towards Bismarckburg incharge of a German officer and a small party of askaris. It seemedclear that these negroes were recruits for the German forces, and Tom,relying on the scouts' statement that the askaris were few in number,decided to make an attempt to prevent the natives from being turned intowhat Captain Goltermann had called "black Germans."
The party, when sighted, was marching very slowly, following a nativepath that wound through dense bush, and crossed the track between theplantation and the nullah. Tom calculated that if he started at once hewould arrive at a position where he might ambush the enemy just beforethey reached the road to Bismarckburg. With his untrained men he couldnot risk a stand-up fight; but he hoped that the advantage of surprise,if the patrol was really so small as the scouts declared, would enablehim to achieve his end without fighting.
Selecting twenty of the men who had been with him in his little actionin the forest, he led them out, with Mwesa, and followed rapidly on theheels of the scouts. In about an hour and a half they came to the spothe had fixed on, and while he posted the men in the bush on both sidesof the track, he sent the scouts to worm their way eastward and watchfor the enemy. The interval before they returned was long enough forthe men and himself to regain breath. It was perhaps half an hour laterwhen they came quietly through the brushwood with news that the enemywere in sight.
At the place where Tom had posted himself the track ran fairly straightfor more than a hundred yards, and he was able to take stock of theparty with which he had to deal while it was still distant. First cametwo unarmed natives, evidently guides; then a German non-commissionedofficer; behind him two German privates, followed by a string ofnegroes. The tail of the party was out of sight.
Seeing how few were the armed men at the head of the column, Tominstantly resolved on a bold course. His own men were concealed amongthe bushes; they had their orders. He stepped out on to the track,accompanied only by Mwesa, just before the negro guides reached him.They halted in surprise, and looked round towards the German thirtyyards behind.
"Tell them to come on, Mwesa," said Tom.
The boy called to them, and they at once hastened on. Tom spoke to themin German, but they evidently did not understand him. Meanwhile theGerman sergeant had quickened his step, and hearing German on the lipsof the stranger, he approached unsuspiciously, halted, clicked his heelstogether, and waited, as a well-trained subordinate will, for hissuperior to address him.
"Halt your men, Sergeant," said Tom.
The sergeant started. Quicker-witted than the sergeant whom Tom had soeasily disposed of at the plantation, he detected a foreign accent inthe stranger's speech. Tom gave him no time to consider.
"Your life depends on your keeping cool," he went on quickly. "Don'tmake a sound. Keep your arms still and face me. The bush on both sidesis lined with troops who will fire at the slightest hostile movement.Halt your men."
The sergeant hesitated for the fraction of a second, then called to theprivates a few yards away to pass word along the column.
"They are halted," he said; "but there is something I don't understandhere." He looked incredulously around him. "I don't know who you are,but if you are bluffing----"
"Let me convince you."
Tom parted a clump of thick bush on one side of the track, disclosing anegro kneeling, with his rifle pointed straight at the German. In a bushon the other side, nearly opposite, he showed another man. Movinghalf-a-dozen paces down the track he revealed yet another man, finger ontrigger, to the astonished sergeant.
"Your position is quite hopeless, you see," Tom went on. "You hadbetter surrender quietly. Give me your revolver
."
The German threw a glance over his shoulder at the privates, standing atthe head of the column of negroes.
"At once! Don't hesitate!" said Tom. "Your men will be shot down ifthey attempt resistance. Your revolver."
The man handed over the weapon sullenly.
"Now tell those men of yours to come forward one at a time and lay theirrifles down on the track in front of me. Don't say another word."
The sergeant gave the order. The men, with a look of mingled curiosityand wonderment, advanced, laid down their rifles, and at Tom's commandwalked a few yards along the track, then halted.
"Mwesa, go and tell those natives to come past me, slowly, and then turninto the bush and wait. Tell them nothing else.... You have men at therear?" he added to the sergeant.
"Yes."
"Who are they?"
"Askaris."
"How many?"
"Twenty."
"Then when they come up behind the negroes you will give them the sameorder as you gave your Germans. Stand here by me."
The negroes, all strong young men, defiled past Tom in silence, theireyes wide with anxiety and dread. He counted sixty. In their rear camethe twenty askaris. One by one they laid down their rifles and passedon, looking with surprise at their officer's glowering face.
"That is all?" asked Tom.
"All."
"Then we will go. Give me your whistle."
The sergeant unslung the whistle from his shoulder. Tom blew a shrillnote, and his men started out of the bush and lined up on the track. TheGerman cursed when he saw that they were less in number than his ownmen; Tom felt that he would have writhed had he known that none of themwas trained. At the present moment he was lost in wonderment at thefact of a young white man, in German territory but clearly not a German,having at his command negroes who were just as clearly not Germanaskaris, but possessed German rifles.
The order of the march home was quickly arranged. Half Tom's men wentahead, carrying the captured rifles. They were followed by theliberated natives, who, imagining that they had only exchanged oneservitude for another, trudged on in gloomy silence. Tom's motive innot dismissing them at once was to link them to the British cause bymeans of the impression which he hoped they would gain from hisdefensive measures at the nullah, and he knew that they would break awaythe moment they realised that they were free. Behind them marched theaskaris, then five more of his riflemen escorting the German privates.He kept the sergeant by his side, and the rear was brought up by Mwesaand the rest of his men.
The capture of a German prisoner gave Tom an opportunity of learningsomething of the course of events on the frontier. He considered howbest to open up the subject with the sergeant, and decided that perfectfrankness would probably serve him best.
"You are naturally surprised, Sergeant," he said, "at finding anEnglishman on your side of the border."
"An Englishman!" growled the sergeant. "I thought you were a Belgian."
"Indeed! Are you at war with Belgium too?"
"There is no Belgium. It belongs now to the Kaiser."
"Dear me! I understand that Paris has fallen: you have therefore Franceand Britain against you; but Belgium--did she break her neutrality?
"I don't know anything about that; but I do know that Belgium and halfFrance are now in our hands; your Navy is defeated; and London will soonbe at our mercy."
"You make me tremble! And what about Abercorn?"
The sergeant blinked.
"London is rather far away," Tom went on. "I am much more deeplyinterested at present in places nearer at hand. You were going toattack Abercorn, I understood. No doubt you took it as easily as yourtroops took Paris."
The German's frown relieved Tom of his anxiety. Smiling, he continued:
"Come now, Sergeant, you may as well tell the truth, you know. You havenothing to lose by it. You found Abercorn a harder nut than youexpected, eh?"
"You seem to know a lot," said the German gloomily. "Did you comeacross from Rhodesia?"
"No: I came from Kigoma on the _Hedwig von Wissmann_."
"Ach!"
"What is the matter?"
"There are always misfortunes; we can't win everything."
"You don't mean to say----"
"I mean to say that the other Wissmann boat, the _Hermann von Wissmann_,allowed itself to be surprised at Sphinxhaven on Nyassa."
"And was captured? Really we must take that as a set-off against yourdefeat of our Navy--in the North Sea, I suppose. But to come back toAbercorn."
"You know as well as I do that we were beaten off. The English werefour to one: what else could be expected?"
"I see! That explains why you have been ranging the country forrecruits. But I understood that your forces in East Africa hopelesslyoutnumbered the British."
"So they do, but not everywhere. In the north we have cut the UgandaRailway, captured Mombasa and Nairobi, and are sweeping the English intothe sea."
"Well, they'll be quite at home there! It's our native element, youknow. These successes must console you for your failure at Abercorn:they'll lighten your captivity, Sergeant."
"That is true," said the German, blind to irony. "And I shall not beyour prisoner long."
"I hope not, I'm sure."
"It was a trick. You would never have beaten me in fair fight; and theEnglish, when they win at all, only win by trickery. Everybody knowsthat."
"Trickery, and superior numbers, as at Abercorn! Don't you think theKaiser had better throw up the sponge, then? It would save trouble."
The sergeant was so much horrified by the suggestion that he launchedout into a violent denunciation of England and all things English, andpainted a dismal picture of the dismembered British Empire. Tom let himrun on: he had heard something like it in Germany, and had taken itthen, as he took it now, as the raving of impotent envy. He wouldprobably have listened to the German with less serenity had he known towhat lengths the pitiless logic of militarism had carried the Kaiser'shelots on the stricken fields of Europe.
They were welcomed at the nullah with shouts of joy by the people, whohad thronged behind the barricade and on the slopes. Astonishment saton the faces of the Germans when they were admitted by the singlegateway and marched up the nullah, past the trench, to the villagegrowing by the lake.
"You keep us here, with niggers?" said the sergeant.
"Yes: until I have the pleasure of escorting you to Abercorn," repliedTom. "You are white men: I don't want to have to tie you up: but Ishall do so unless you give me your word not to attempt to escape."
To avoid the ignominy of being kept in bonds the Germans gave theirparole readily enough. Tom arranged with Moses for their rations, thenreturned to the rescued negroes whom he had left under guard lower down.They, meanwhile, had been regaled with stories, freely embroidered, ofwhat the m'sungu had done, and when he appeared among them theirdowncast expression had been replaced by looks of hope. He learnt fromMwesa that they had been collected from several villages to theeastward, near Lake Rukwa, some fifteen miles away. Mwesa brought tohim a young negro whom he introduced as the son of M'setu, the chief ofthe largest of these villages.
"Tell them they can all go home," said Tom. "This young man may take hisfather a message from me. The Germans will no doubt raid the villagesagain for men. It is not likely I shall be able to help them a secondtime. M'setu, then, had better march away with all his people intoBritish territory and remain there until the war is over."
The negroes laughed, leapt, embraced one another when they heard thatthey were free. Without delay they poured out through the gate andflocked away towards the east. Not even the chief's son stayed to thanktheir rescuer. But the incident had a strange sequel two daysafterwards. About midday one of the scouts came running back to reportthat a large body of spearmen, led by a great chief, was marchingthrough the forest in the direction of the nullah. They were not on awarlike expedition, for behind the chief three men led each
a goat,which could only be intended as peace-offerings.
"Go and see who they are, Mwesa," said Tom. "They are not to comeacross the clearing until I know what they want."
Presently Mwesa returned, smiling with even more enjoyment than usual.
"Him M'setu, sah," he said: "come for talk with sah."
"Very well. Bring him along; he can come in with six of his men: therest remain outside."
Mwesa ran back into the forest, and soon reappeared at the side of apowerful negro of middle age. A throng of negroes about a hundredstrong followed him to the edge of the clearing. There at his orderthey squatted in a long line, and the chief himself, accompanied by hisson and five other men--three of whom led milk-white goats bleatingdolefully--marched at Mwesa's heels towards the gate, where Tom stoodwaiting.
"Him M'setu, sah," said Mwesa, by way of introduction.
Tom at once stepped forward and grasped the chief by the hand, an actwhich brought a smile of pleasure to the face of his six companions anda shout from the men watching intently two hundred yards away.
M'setu began to speak. After one sentence he paused, looking to Mwesato interpret.
"Him say sah him fader and mudder," said Mwesa.
Tom acknowledged the compliment with a smile.
The chief began again, inquiring after Tom's health, the health of hisfather, mother, wife, children, cattle, and so on, until Tom felt ratheroverwhelmed by his politeness. By and by he came to business.
"Him say berry glad sah him good send back men all same. Him say bringgoats for sah him pot, berry nice goats. Him say come alonga sah: whatfor? sah kill all dem Wadaki, so M'setu him came alonga sah kill Wadakiall same."
"You mean that I am to kill all the Germans, and he will come and help?"
"Dat just what M'setu say," said Mwesa, delighted that his master hadunderstood him so well.
"Well, you must tell him that that's not my job. I couldn't rid thecountry of Germans if I tried, but the British will come across theborder by and by and eat them all up. Tell him that."
M'setu's response was very long-winded. The gist of it was that heexpected another recruiting visit from the Germans. He had heard thatthey had been thrown back across the border by the British, and wastherefore not inclined to go to the trouble of removing all his peoplefrom their villages, but would rather stay and defend himself, with theassistance of the m'sungu, who had already rescued his young men.
Tom was a good deal perplexed how to deal with this ingenuous offer ofan alliance. M'setu's warriors, armed only with spears, would be wipedout by a single machine-gun, and Tom could do nothing to help them:outside his nullah he would be as much at the Germans' mercy as they. Onthe other hand, the chief's men, familiar with a wider stretch ofcountry than the Wahehe from the plantation, could do inestimableservice as scouts, and might give him early warning of movements ofwhich otherwise he would be unaware. Through Mwesa he explained asclearly as he could the difficulties of the situation, and in the upshotmade an arrangement with M'setu by which the chief guaranteed to providea company of skilled scouts, and Tom in his turn promised to lendassistance to M'setu if he was threatened, and in the last resort togive his people shelter in the nullah.
M'setu departed, well satisfied with the result of his interview.
"What time sah eat goats?" asked Mwesa.
"Eat them! I'm not going to eat them," said Tom. "Take them up toMoses and tell him to look after them. We'll have some milk by and by."
Tom Willoughby's Scouts: A Story of the War in German East Africa Page 11