Prester John (17 page)

There is a story of one of King Arthur's knights – Sir Percival, I think – that once, riding through a forest, he found a lion fighting with a serpent. He drew his sword and helped the lion, for he thought it was the more natural beast of the two. To me Laputa was the lion, and Henriques the serpent; and though I had no good will to either, I was determined to spoil the serpent's game. He was after the rubies, as I had fancied; he had never been after anything else. He had found out about Arcoll's preparations, and had sent him a warning, hoping, no doubt, that, if Laputa's force was scattered on the Letaba, he would have a chance of getting off with the necklace in the confusion. If he succeeded, he would go over the Lebombo to Mozambique, and whatever happened afterwards in the rising would be no concern of Mr Henriques. I determined that he should fail; but how to manage it I could not see. Had I had a pistol, I think I would have shot him; but I had no weapon of any kind. I could not warn Laputa, for that would seal my own fate, even if I were believed. It was clear that Laputa must go to Dupree's Drift, for otherwise I could not escape; and it was equally clear that I must find the means of spoiling the Portugoose's game.

A shadow fell across the sunlight, and I looked up to see the man I was thinking of standing before me. He had a cigarette in his mouth, and his hands in the pockets of his riding-breeches. He stood eyeing me with a curious smile on his face.

‘Well, Mr Storekeeper,' he said, ‘you and I have met before under pleasanter circumstances.'

I said nothing, my mind being busy with what to do at the Drift.

‘We were shipmates, if I am not mistaken,' he said. ‘I dare say you found it nicer work smoking on the after-deck than lying here in the sun.'

Still I said nothing. If the man had come to mock me, he would get no change out of David Crawfurd.

‘Tut, tut, don't be sulky. You have no quarrel with me. Between ourselves,' and he dropped his voice, ‘I tried to save you; but you had seen rather too much to be safe. What devil prompted you to steal a horse and go to the cave? I don't blame you for overhearing us; but if you had had the sense of a louse you would have gone off to the Berg with your news. By the way, how did you manage it? A cellar, I suppose. Our friend Laputa was a fool not to take better precautions; but I must say you acted the drunkard pretty well.'

The vanity of nineteen is an incalculable thing. I rose to the fly.

‘I know the kind of precaution you wanted to take,' I muttered.

‘You heard that too? Well, I confess I am in favour of doing a job thoroughly when I take it up.'

‘In the Koodoo Flats, for example,' I said.

He sat down beside me, and laughed softly. ‘You heard my little story? You are clever, Mr Storekeeper, but not quite clever enough. What if I can act a part as well as yourself?' And he thrust his yellow face close to mine.

I saw his meaning, and did not for a second believe him; but I had the sense to temporize.

‘Do you mean to say that you did not kill the Dutchmen, and did not mean to knife me?'

‘I mean to say that I am not a fool,' he said, lighting another cigarette. ‘I am a white man, Mr Storekeeper, and I play the white man's game. Why do you think I am here? Simply because I was the only man in Africa who had the pluck to get to the heart of this business. I am here to dish Laputa, and by God I am going to do it.'

I was scarcely prepared for such incredible bluff. I knew that every word was a lie, but I wanted to hear more, for the man fascinated me.

‘I suppose you know what will happen to you,' he said, flicking the ashes from his cigarette. ‘Tomorrow at Inanda's Kraal, when the vow is over, they will give you a taste of Kaffir habits. Not death, my friend – that would be simple enough – but a slow death with every refinement of horror. You have broken into their sacred places, and you will be sacrificed to Laputa's god. I have seen native torture before, and his own mother would run away shrieking from a man who had endured it.'

I said nothing, but the thought made my flesh creep.

‘Well,' he went on, ‘you're in an awkward plight, but I think I can help you. What if I can save your life, Mr Storekeeper? You are trussed up like a fowl, and can do nothing. I am the only man alive who can help you. I am willing to do it, too – on my own terms.'

I did not wait to hear those terms, for I had a shrewd guess what they would be. My hatred of Henriques rose and choked me. I saw murder and trickery in his mean eyes and cruel mouth. I could not, to be saved from the uttermost horror, have made myself his ally.

‘Now listen, Mr Portugoose,' I cried. ‘You tell me you are a spy. What if I shout that through the camp? There will be short shrift for you if Laputa hears it.'

He laughed loudly. ‘You are a bigger fool than I took you for. Who would believe you, my friend? Not Laputa. Not any man in this army. It would only mean tighter bonds for these long legs of yours.'

By this time I had given up all thought of diplomacy. ‘Very well, you yellow-faced devil, you will hear my answer. I would not take my freedom from you, though I were to be boiled alive. I know you for a traitor to the white man's cause, a dirty I.D.B. swindler, whose name is a byword among honest men. By your own confession you are a traitor to this idiot rising. You murdered the Dutchmen and God knows how many more, and you would fain have murdered me. I pray to Heaven that the men whose cause you have betrayed and the men whose cause you would betray may join to stamp the life out of you and send
your soul to hell. I know the game you would have me join in, and I fling your offer in your face. But I tell you one thing – you are damned yourself. The white men are out, and you will never get over the Lebombo. From black or white you will get justice before many hours, and your carcass will be left to rot in the bush. Get out of my sight, you swine.'

In that moment I was so borne up in my passion that I forgot my bonds and my grave danger. I was inspired like a prophet with a sense of approaching retribution. Henriques heard me out; but his smile changed to a scowl, and a flush rose on his sallow cheek.

‘Stew in your own juice,' he said, and spat in my face. Then he shouted in Kaffir that I had insulted him, and demanded that I should be bound tighter and gagged.

It was Arcoll's messenger who answered his summons. That admirable fellow rushed at me with a great appearance of savagery. He made a pretence of swathing me up in fresh raw-hide ropes, but his knots were loose and the thing was a farce. He gagged me with what looked like a piece of wood, but was in reality a chunk of dry banana. And all the while, till Henriques was out of hearing, he cursed me with a noble gift of tongues.

The drums beat for the advance, and once more I was hoisted on my horse, while Arcoll's Kaffir tied my bridle to his own. A Kaffir cannot wink, but he has a way of slanting his eyes which does as well, and as we moved on he would turn his head to me with his strange grimace.

Henriques wanted me to help him to get the rubies – that I presumed was the offer he had meant to make. Well, thought I, I will perish before the jewel reaches the Portuguese's hands. He hoped for a stampede when Arcoll opposed the crossing of the river, and in the confusion intended to steal the casket. My plan must be to get as near the old priest as possible before we reached the ford. I spoke to my warder and told him what I wanted. He nodded, and in the first mile we managed to edge a good way forward. Several things came to aid us. As I have said, we of the centre were not marching in close ranks, but in a
loose column, and often it was possible by taking a short cut on rough ground to join the column some distance ahead. There was a
vlei
, too, which many circumvented, but we swam, and this helped our lead. In a couple of hours we were so near the priest's litter that I could have easily tossed a cricket ball on the head of Henriques who rode beside it.

Very soon the twilight of the winter day began to fall. The far hills grew pink and mulberry in the sunset, and strange shadows stole over the bush. Still creeping forward, we found ourselves not twenty yards behind the litter, while far ahead I saw a broad glimmering space of water with a high woody bank beyond.

‘Dupree's Drift,' whispered my warder. ‘Courage, Inkoos;
*
in an hour's time you will be free.'

*
Boer elephant guns.

*
Henriques has already told us about the crossing at Dupree's Drift.

*
Great chief.

The dusk was gathering fast as we neared the stream. From the stagnant reaches above and below a fine white mist was rising, but the long shallows of the ford were clear. My heart was beginning to flutter wildly, but I kept a tight grip on myself and prayed for patience. As I stared into the evening my hopes sank. I had expected, foolishly enough, to see on the far bank some sign of my friends, but the tall bush was dead and silent.

The drift slants across the river at an acute angle, roughly SSW. I did not know this at the time, and was amazed to see the van of the march turn apparently upstream. Laputa's great voice rang out in some order which was repeated down the column, and the wide flanks of the force converged on the narrow cart-track which entered the water. We had come to a standstill while the front ranks began the passage.

I sat shaking with excitement, my eyes straining into the gloom. Water holds the evening light for long, and I could make out pretty clearly what was happening. The leading horsemen rode into the stream with Laputa in front. The ford is not the best going, so they had to pick their way, but in five or ten minutes they were over. Then came some of the infantry of the flanks, who crossed with the water to their waists, and their guns held high above their heads. They made a portentous splashing, but not a sound came from their throats. I shall never know how Laputa imposed silence on the most noisy race on earth. Several thousand footmen must have followed the riders, and disappeared into the far bush. But not a shot came from the bluffs in front.

I watched with a sinking heart. Arcoll had failed, and there was to be no check at the drift. There remained for me only the horrors at Inanda's Kraal. I resolved to make a dash for freedom, at all costs, and was in the act of telling Arcoll's man to cut my bonds, when a thought occurred to me.

Henriques was after the rubies, and it was his interest to get Laputa across the river before the attack began. It was Arcoll's business to split the force, and above all to hold up the leader. Henriques would tell him, and for that matter he must have assumed himself, that Laputa would ride in the centre of the force. Therefore there would be no check till the time came for the priest's litter to cross.

It was well that I had not had my bonds cut. Henriques came riding towards me, his face sharp and bright as a ferret's. He pulled up and asked if I were safe. My Kaffir showed my strapped elbows and feet, and tugged at the cords to prove their tightness.

‘Keep him well,' said Henriques, ‘or you will answer to Inkulu. Forward with him now and get him through the water.' Then he turned and rode back.

My warder, apparently obeying orders, led me out of the column and into the bush on the right hand. Soon we were abreast of the litter and some twenty yards to the west of it. The water gleamed through the trees a few paces in front. I could see the masses of infantry converging on the drift, and the churning like a cascade which they made in the passage.

Suddenly from the far bank came an order. It was Laputa's voice, thin and high-pitched, as the Kaffir cries when he wishes his words to carry a great distance. Henriques repeated it, and the infantry halted. The riders of the column in front of the litter began to move into the stream.

We should have gone with them, but instead we pulled our horses back into the darkness of the bush. It seemed to me that odd things were happening around the priest's litter. Henriques had left it, and dashed past me so close that I could have touched him. From somewhere among the trees a pistol-shot cracked into the air.

As if in answer to a signal the high bluff across the stream burst into a sheet of fire. ‘A sheet of fire' sounds odd enough for scientific warfare. I saw my friends were using shotguns and firing with black powder into the mob in the water. It was humane and it was good tactics, for the flame in the grey dusk had the appearance of a heavy battery of ordnance.

Once again I heard Henriques' voice. He was turning the column to the right. He shouted to them to get into cover, and take the water higher up. I thought, too, that from far away I heard Laputa.

These were maddening seconds. We had left the business of cutting my bonds almost too late. In the darkness of the bush the strips of hide could only be felt for, and my Kaffir had a woefully blunt knife.
Reims
are always tough to sever, and mine had to be sawn through. Soon my arms were free, and I was plucking at my other bonds. The worst were those on my ankles below the horse's belly. The Kaffir fumbled away in the dark, and pricked my beast, so that he reared and struck out. And all the while I was choking with impatience, and gabbling prayers to myself.

The men on the other side had begun to use ball-cartridge. I could see through a gap the centre of the river, and it was filled with a mass of struggling men and horses. I remember that it amazed me that no shot was fired in return. Then I remembered the vow, and was still more amazed at the power of a ritual on that savage horde.

The column was moving past me to the right. It was a disorderly rabble which obeyed Henriques' orders. Bullets began to sing through the trees, and one rider was hit in the shoulder and came down with a crash. This increased the confusion, for most of them dismounted and tried to lead their horses in the cover. The infantry coming in from the wings collided with them, and there was a struggle of excited beasts and men in the thickets of thorn and mopani. And still my Kaffir was trying to get my ankles loose as fast as a plunging horse would let him.