Old Reliable in Africa/Chapter 31
CHAPTER XXXI
JEWELS OF KINGS
ZACK was getting sore on the catfish proposition. That day he only served fourteen customers and for two pans full of tempting fish he couldn't get a nibble.
"Hommit," he complained to the substitute interpreter, "dis sho beats my time. Dese niggers done got in some kind of a humbug, an' I can't ketch on. What you reckin' tis?"
Mahomet Mansour shook his turbaned head. Although suspecting a scheme whereof Said was stirring the pot, Mahomet couldn't get to the bottom of it. That's what chafed Mahomet, and set him to prying.
Trade being slack, Old Reliable had plenty of time to lean against the post and talk. "I got to start dese new niggers to eatin' catfish. Got to give 'way premiums, or sumpin' like dat. Dat's it! Dat's it! Same as dey gives away at de movin' picture show on Saddy night. Tell 'em dat, Hommit."
The bewildered Mahomet didn't tell 'em anything; he didn't try; for he hadn't the slightest comprehension of what Zack was telling him. Zack glared into his vacant eyes, then backed him up against the post. "Now, Hommit, you listen to me reel good" Mahomet did listen, with stolid face, while Zack expounded the intricacies of "Give-away Night" at the moving picture shows.
"'Splain dat to 'em. Ev'y nigger gits a button—free, gratis fer nothin'. Be sho an' say dat. Dat's what de man always specify, in front o' de movin' picture show."
A less shifty gentleman than Mahomet Mansour might have been in a predicament. Or if Tombi had stayed on his job where Said had planted him, even then Mahomet must have failed to convey a straight message to the natives, for tricky Tombi would have twisted it to suit the purposes of Said. But the wrath of Allah fell upon Said when McDonald transferred Tombi to headquarters and sent that stupid lump Agha to interpret for the Hot Cat. Agha knew no English, but could blunder through a few simple sentences in Shilluk. Mahomet could not understand Shilluk, and Zack talked only United States talk. So there they stood, Agha being the middle man.
Fluent as he was, Mahomet hesitated to tackle a demonstration of "Give-away Night," until Zack shoved him out and commanded: "Tell 'em dat. Put plenty ginger in it."
"Very good, Effendi."
When Mahomet turned to Agha he needed a forty-acre lot for the gestures, shouts and vilifications to make the other Arab comprehend. Agha lacked ginger, and a cynical audience treated his premium proposition to a fizzle. Not a single customer broke cover. Zack was disgusted. He wheeled abruptly, and went behind the counter.
"Somebody's gwine to eat dis catfish. Here, pup! here, pup!" Two perfectly spontaneous dogs gulped down the pieces that Zack tossed. Other dogs volunteered—barking, snapping, snarling, excited dogs, and the crisp chunks vanished steadily. The first pan was empty, and the second dwindled low as Zack doled it out with exasperating deliberation. The Shilluks began to stir restlessly, until hungry black Kudit could endure it no longer. He kicked the dogs aside and planked down his piaster.
"Now dat's de way to eat a man-size bait o' catfish. You gits de fust prize." Zack fumbled in his pocket, drew out a Spottiswoode campaign button, and pinned it in Kudit's mop of hair. Instantly the herd stampeded, and piasters rattled on the bench; the tag end of the dishpan disappeared, at one piaster per. But it required much palavering to pacify their uproar when a jewel per was not also forthcoming.
"Shet up, you niggers! Hommit, tell' em I'll give ev'y one o' my reg'lar customers a button on Saddy night. Tell 'em dat—quick."
Mahomet lifted his voice to Agha, and Agha secured a hearing. The Shilluks listened sullenly, as Said the Deceitful had spoken naught of this. They crowded around Kudit, and felt his prize. Of a verity it was genuine.
"Ev'y one o' my reg'lar customers gits a badge like dat on Saddy night. Reg'lar customers, mind you—got to buy catfish ev'y day 'twixt now an' den. Tell 'em dat, Hommit."
By this time Zack had got yard-broke to Arab shrills and trebles, so he did not mind what Mahomet was saying to Agha. Agha balked and shook his head; and Mahomet appealed to Zack. "Agha say he no tell 'em dat. Agha feared. Maybe if Black Effendi no give peoples jewels, peoples kill Agha for big lie."
"Shucks! dat's all right, I'm 'sponsible. It's a cinch—a lead pipe cinch. Tell 'em dat, Hommit."
Via Mahomet and Agha, the Black Effendi dispatched his assurances of a lead-pipe cinch, which touched off another disputation. The natives listened eagerly. Agha found himself the storm center of a mob. Agha explained; Agha grew excited. Agha tore his way through the crowd and spoke to Mahomet. Mahomet turned blandly to Zack: "Agha say very good, Effendi. Peoples much try be quiet."
During the next four days every black creature on Wadi Okar remained intensely quiet. Colonel Spottiswoode observed it in the fields, McDonald commented on it at the table. And the king's head men knew why in the tukuls. The catfish stand was choked with customers. Zack summoned Fudl and Mahomet to help him as extra salesmen, but every customer insisted upon paying his piaster into the hands of the Black Effendi himself, none other. Each purchaser called his own name many, many times, impressing it upon the Black Effendi, until Zack got tired. "Git away from here; I ain't gwine to fergit you. Nobody 'members a nigger's name, but I knows yo' favor."
On the last crucial afternoon, Saturday, the white men noticed a suppressed excitement which ran like a tremor amongst the Shilluks in the fields. Every man kept at his plow and hoe and planting; every eye kept upon the descending sun. Lyttleton—seasoned in Sudan warfare—felt a vague uneasiness. "Something's up," he said. McDonald saw it, the Colonel felt it; the head man knew why.
"Quitting time," McDonald called to the head man. Tools were instantly stacked, and every negro bolted for the catfish stand. They moved definitely, for each man knew where he was going, and what he meant to do. Nobody loafed, nobody straggled, not a black loitered, and the whites watched them anxiously.
"Hadn't we better go and see what's happening?" suggested McDonald.
"No," Lyttleton shook his head. "Better wait, and keep both eyes open."
From their accustomed seats on the porch, they watched developments at the Hot Cat. There seemed a far larger crowd than usual, more dense, but not disorderly; no cause for alarm, and the gentlemen fell to talking of other things.
Everybody swarmed around the Hot Cat Eating House, which left headquarters quite deserted. This presented Said's opportunity as he came slinking back from his three days of journeying to sell jewels amongst the Shilluks. First peering cautiously about him, he dodged into the Black Effendi's tukul, and lost not a moment in slashing out the bottom of the treasure trunk. A glitter burned his fever-frenzied eyes, as he thrust his hand within the trunk, and felt around for the box of jewels. It was not there. He withdrew his hand, and began tearing out the contents of the trunk, until nothing whatever remained. The box was gone. He bounded erect, and called down the maledictions of Allah upon that Black Effendi who had removed the treasure, upon the traitors Tombi and Odok who had permitted it.
For a moment Said stood dazed and stupefied, then raged distractedly about the tukul, searching everywhere, until Zack's belongings lay in a trampled pile. Then, with a volley of imprecations, he burst out, waving a long knife and shouting, "Odok! Odok! Odok!" Towards the river he dashed, and went racing past the quarters, in a patter of red shoes, a flutter of striped gown, gaunt, cadaverous and gone mad. McDonald saw him and bounded down the steps, in chase. "What's the matter?" called Lyttleton.
"That Dongalawi carries a knife. Going to be trouble."
Proceedings at the Hot Cat had been methodically conducted. In the beginning Zack made every regular customer stand outside a circle which he drew in the sand. Then he called, fed, decorated, and pushed them back with such impartial promptness that they obeyed. The grand distribution was almost ended; only one plate of fish and a handful of buttons remained when the frantic Said burst into the circle, with Mr. Bim three paces behind.
The first thing Said saw was not their greasy lips, nor grinning black faces, but their jewels, one, two, three—hundreds—thousands—millions upon millions of jewels, dancing before his eyes to madden him. On the sand beside Old Reliable lay the overturned and empty treasure box. The stricken Dongalawi stood mute, confronting a nightmare of triumphant black faces sneering into his; a hideous vision of jewels, jewels, jewels which mocked him with their sparkle. Tremblingly he put out his finger and touched a badge, then dropped, beat his head against the earth, groveled face downward, rolled on his back and screamed. Zack promptly dashed a pail of water into his face.
"What's the matter with Said?" Major Lyttleton ran up and demanded. For the first time Zack noticed the three white men, who now stood over the writhing Dongalawi.
"He got a fever. Side's been sick fer de longes'"
"But this knife?" Lyttleton stooped to pick up the evil weapon.
"Huh!" Zack answered; "tain't no harm in Side."
"Mahomet, Fudl, take this man to the hospital." But Lyttleton was not satisfied as to Said's intentions with the knife.
It was an ignominious exit for the Dongalawi who had schemed such greatness, legs first, and struggling against six stout men. "No, Colonel, nothing serious," McDonald explained, "merely a touch of sun. They'll bring him round in a couple of days."
Even the dramatic episode of Said did not dull Zack's mind to the fact that something else had caught the Colonel's eye, a campaign badge, an other, another, dozens of them. One on every negro. The crowd looked like a Spottiswoode ratification meeting. The Colonel stared, and his face grew very red.
"Zack! You, Zack!" he shouted. "Where's that nigger?"
But Zack had darted away, and the tail of his apron was even now disappearing behind a tukul. McDonald sat down on the bench to laugh. Lyttleton leaned against the catfish stand and waved his hand at the grinning Shilluks. "Your constituents, my dear Colonel; you're elected, by an overwhelming majority."
"Make it unanimous," added McDonald, pinning a badge on Lyttleton and one upon himself.
While the Colonel stood staring at the tukul behind which Old Reliable had vanished, McDonald called a Shilluk's attention to the face of the portrait, and pointed to Colonel Spottiswoode himself. A great light burst upon those negroes. Every negro examined his own badge, then scanned the White Effendi's face. It was HE, verily it was HE. They stood in The Presence.
Like a scared rabbit Zack peeped out from his hiding place, to watch the bunch of negroes crowding round the Colonel, in every attitude of supplication. The Colonel wheeled from one to another, while his face grew purpler.
"Dar now!" said Zack to himself; "Cunnel sho is gwine Democratic agin'. Lemme 'rive away from dis neighborhood."
But the Colonel didn't go Democratic. He broke into a laugh, and dropped on the bench. "Oh, let up, Mac! This joke's on me. Get word to these niggers that I'll send down soda-water for the crowd. I'm going to treat my enthusiastic constituents; this is my first and only chance."