all those poor people! Abandon them! Of course, I shall do nothing so criminal.”
Sanders did not swoon.
“But — but,” he said, “do they want to stay?”
“They did not at first, but after I had told them your story they understood something of their position.”
“Oh!” said Sanders. He gathered himself together and walked back to the boat.
Bosambo paddled downstream to meet the Commissioner and lay his troubles before him. “Lord,” he said ruefully, “I did not know that this new palaver would be pleasing to my people. I have sent the flower of my nation to the God-woman, and they will not come back.”
“It is written,” said Sanders.
They had met in the middle of the river. Just as the Zaire was turning Bosambo had come alongside, and now they stood on the deck together, silent in the consciousness of their mutual failure.
From the shore came a sound of singing. It was the evening hymn of the new converts.
The music came to an end, there was a pause, and then a sharp roll of melody.
“Ah-min!” echoed Bosambo bitterly. “And, lord, I taught them that word.”
XIII. A Maker of Spears
North of the Akasava country and on the left bank of the Isisi is a veritable forest of elephant grass. Here in the cool of the evening, and later, the hippo come to wallow and for social intercourse. Here, too, buck and the small but terrible buffalo come to bathe and drink.
For ten miles without a break the jungle runs and there is no tree or hill behind the green curtain to reveal what manner of country lies beyond.
It is a marsh for fifty miles and in the centre is an island unapproachable save by secret ways such as a few Akasava men know and jealously preserve.
No corporation working under a charter or great seal of state is so close, so exclusive as is that of “The Keepers of the Water Path.”
The secret is kept in one family and is known only to the male members. There is a story that a woman once discovered the mystery of the open water — for open water there is in the maze of grass — and that she unwittingly betrayed her knowledge. They took her, so the story runs, her own brothers and blood kindred, and they drowned her in the water. This must have been calacala — long ago — before keen-eyed and swift-handed justice made its appearance in the shape of Mr. Commissioner Sanders.
To the uninitiated it might seem that the secret way was not of any great importance. True, the best fish came into the creek and the family had that advantage.
But as Sanders discovered, the marsh land was of some strategical importance, for it effectively separated the Akasava from the Isisi. It made sudden raidings such as are common between tribes with contiguous frontiers impossible, also it offered no hiding place to malefactors, and for this reason alone it was wiser to preserve the Keepers of the Marsh in their mystery.
Sanders was in the Akasava territory, in the village nearest the marsh, when an unfortunate thing occurred.
There was a woman of the frontier who had been married to an old chief whose name was Likilivi. He was chief not only of the village, but of the family which kept the marsh, and he was an important man — but old.
Now all men know that the makers of spears, and of iron work generally, are the N’Gombi people.
They are born craftsmen, skilful and very cunning. Also, in parenthesis, they are great thieves and once stole a little anvil from the Zaire, which was converted into spear heads and steel cups before the anvil was missed.
Yet Likilivi, a man of the Akasava, was the most famous worker of spears on the river. So famous that hunters and warriors came from all parts to buy his weapons. His father before him, and his father, had also made spears, but none equal in keenness or in temper to those which Likilivi made in his big work hut. And he made them with extraordinary rapidity, he and the two sons of his house, so that he grew rich and powerful.
He was old, too old for the girl his wife, who hated him from the first, hated him fiercely till her young heart nearly burst with the fury of her emotions.
She ran from him, was brought back and beaten. She sat down to brood and find a way out, whilst from the adjoining hut came the “tink — tink — tink” of hammered steel, as Likilivi and his grown sons pounded spear heads into shape.
If you take a piece of glass no bigger than the top of your thumb, place it in a mortar and industriously pound and grind at it, you will, in course of time, produce a fine white powder smooth to the touch and, though insoluble, yet easily administered to man.
You must be patient, and have plenty of time to make your powder “fit,” as they say on the coast, but M’ciba (this was the girl’s name) had all the time there was to prepare her release.
Old Likilivi came from his workshop one afternoon; he was a little soured because some innocent villager with a taste for crude arithmetic had asked him how it came about that so few men made so many spears.
He was at best an old and sour man, he was no more amiable because of this embarrassing question.
“The sun has come to me,” his wife should have said politely, as he came to the hut where she sat crushing corn. (The white powder and the mortar and ironwood pestle were discreetly hidden.)
She said nothing.
“If you do not speak to me,” said the old man sourly, “I will break your head.”
The girl did not speak. She went about her work, which was the preparation of his food. She made him a mess of manioc, and fish, and she added a judicious quantity of fine white powder.
The old chief ate his meal, muttering to himself and casting evil eyes at her.
When he had finished he beat her for no particular reason save that he felt like beating her, then he went to bed.
He woke up in the night. She was not lying at his side as was her duty. By the dull red light of the fire he saw her sitting with her back against the hut wall, her hands clasping her knees, watching him with grave eyes.
“M’ciba,” he gasped, and the sweat was standing on his forehead, “I have the sickness-mongo.”
She said nothing and he did not speak again.
An hour later she covered her body with dust and sitting down before the hut wailed her grief, and the awakened village hurried forth to find Likilivi near to death, with his face twisted painfully.
By the aid of an extraordinary constitution and the employment of a drastic but effective native remedy the chief did not die. M’ciba had wailed too soon.
It was many weeks before Likilivi recovered. He suspected nothing. As soon as he was well he took the pliant half of his hunting spear and thrashed her.
“For you are a fool,” he said, “or you would have called for help sooner, and I should have recovered more quickly.”
She took her beating meekly, knowing that she deserved more, but her hatred grew.
Her treatment by her husband was scandal in the village, for native folk are kind, and it is not customary or good form to beat one’s womenkind.
Then M’ciba committed her crowning indiscretion.
Likilivi, his cousin and his sons, prepared to make one of their periodical visits to the marsh — a matter of some importance and considerable secrecy. There was to be a great netting of fish, and other high mysteries were to be enacted — foolish mysteries, you might think them, such as the sacrificing of chicken