The Ivory Trail/Chapter 14

a while we looked like having trouble with Coutlass. We gave Brown a rifle, and distributed the other Mausers among Kazimoto and our best boys, but we did not dare trust the Greek with a weapon he might use against us, and be resented that bitterly. He had an answer to Fred’s subterfuge that as a white man he would need a license before daring to carry firearms. “I dare do anything! I care nothing for law!” he argued, and Fred nodded.

That night we reveled in luxury, for after the life we had led recently it took time to reaccustom any of us to the common comforts. Schillingschen traveled with every provision for his carcass and his belly; and we plundered him.

We put the prisoners and our own porters in a hut in the nearest native village (less than half a mile away) under the watchful eye of Kazimoto and the shot-gun, dividing Schillingschen’s two large tents between ourselves. The others offered me the camp-bed as a recent invalid, but I refused, and Will won it by matching coins. We divided the blankets in the same way, and all the spare underwear. Brown and Coutlass had to be satisfied with cotton blankets from a bale of trade goods; but when they had rifled enough to build up good thick mattresses as well as coverings, there were still two apiece for our boys and all the porters.

The chop-boxes were a revelation. The man had with him food enough for at least a year’s traveling, including all the canned delicacies that hungry men dream about in the wilderness. Before we slept we ate so enormously of so very many things that it was a wonder that we were able to sleep at all.

We all hoped Schillingschen would die, for it was a hard problem what to do with him. He had no papers in his possession, beyond a diary written in German schrift that even Will could not make head or tail of, for all his knowledge of the language; and a very vague map bearing the imprint of the British government, filled in by himself with the names of the villages he had passed on his way. There was no proof that we could find that would have condemned him of nefarious practices in a British court of law.

“And believe me,” argued Will, sprawling on the plundered bed, blowing the smoke of a Melachrino through his nose, “your local British judges would take the word of Professor Schillingschen against all of ours, backed up by simply overwhelming native evidence! They’re so in awe of Schillingschen’s professorial degree, and of his passports, and his letters of introduction from this and that mogul that they wouldn’t believe him guilty of arson if they caught him in the act!”

“Something’s got to be done with him pretty soon, though,” answered Fred from the floor, lying at ease on a pillow and a folded Jaeger blanket, smoking a fat cigar.

Coutlass and Brown were singing songs outside the tent and I sat in a genuine armchair with my feet on a box full of canned plum pudding. (Nobody knows, who has not hungered on the high or low veldt—who has not eaten meat without vegetables for days on end, and then porridge without salt or sugar—how good that common, export, canned plum pudding is! To sit with my feet on the case that contained it was the arrogance of affluence!)

“We have his stores and his papers,” said I. “We have his Baganda; and as time goes on, and his other spies begin to come in, we shall have them, too, if we’re half careful. Why don’t we let him go, to tell his own tale wherever he likes?”

“Maybe he’ll die yet!” said the optimist on the camp-bed, blowing more cigarette smoke.

“Suppose he doesn’t. We’ve done our best to keep him alive. He’s quit bleeding. Suppose we let him go, and he lays a charge against us. Suppose they send after us and bring us in. We’ve his diary and his men—evidence enough,” said I.

“You bally ass!” Fred murmured.

“Cuckoo!” laughed Will.

“I don’t believe he’d dare approach a British official with his story,” said I.

“Incredible imbecile!” Fred answered. “He has the gall of a brass monkey.”

“And magnetism—loads of it,” Will added. “He’d make the Pope play three-card monte.”

“To say nothing,” continued Fred, “of the necessity of not letting the government know we’re here! Rather than turn him loose, I’d march him into Kisumu and hand him over. But, as Will says wisely, our proconsuls would believe him, and put us under bonds for outraging a distinguished foreigner.”

“Well, then,” said I, “what the devil shall we do with him? Offer something constructive, you two solons!”

“Have the four men we borrowed from the island bolted home yet?” wondered Will.

“They hadn’t this evening,” I answered. “I don’t believe they’ll venture home until we stop feeding them. They were hungry on their island. Our shortest commons then seemed affluence. Now they’re in heaven!”

“Their canoes must be where they left them in the papyrus.”

“Sure. Who’d steal a canoe?”

“Whoever could find them,” Fred answered. “But they’re skillfully hidden. Why don’t we put Schillingschen and his ten pet blacks into those canoes, with a little food and no rifles—and show them the way to German East?”

“Because,” said I, “they wouldn’t go. They’d turn around and paddle for Kisumu, to file complaint against us.”

“Don’t you suppose,” suggested Will, “that Schillingschen’s own men ’ud insist on going home? Out on the water, ten to one, without guns or too much food, they wouldn’t have the same fear of him they had formerly.”

“That chance is too broad and long and deep,” said Fred. “Altogether too bulky to be taken. Let’s sleep on it. This cigar’s done, and I’m drowsy. Are you quite sure Schillingschen’s hands are fast behind him? Then good night, all!”

The problem looked no easier next morning, with Schillingschen recovered sufficiently to be hungry and sit up. There was a look in his eye of smoldering courage and assurance that did not bode well for us, and when we untwisted the iron wire from his wrists to let him wash himself and eat he looked about him with a sort of quick-fire cunning that belied his story of headache.

He was much too astute a customer to be judged superficially. I whispered to Fred not to shackle him again too soon, and sat near and watched him, close enough for real safety, yet not so close that he might not venture to try tricks. He said nothing whatever, but I noticed that his eye, after roving around the tent, kept returning again and again to a chop-box that stood near the foot of the bed.

Now I had unpacked that chop-box and repacked it the previous night. I knew everything it contained—exactly how many cans of plum pudding. It was the box I had rested my feet on. I felt perfectly sure he knew as well as I what the box contained, and to suppose he would sit there planning to recover canned food, however dainty, was ridiculous.

Wherefore it was a safe conclusion he was trying to deceive me as to his real intention. I put my foot on the box again, and he frowned, as much as to say I had forestalled his only hope. Pretending to watch the box and him, I examined every detail of the tent, particularly that side of it opposite the box, away from where it seemed he wanted me to look.

The human eye is a highly imperfect piece of mechanism and the human brain is mostly grayish slush. It was minutes before I detected the edge of his diary, sticking out from the pocket of Fred’s shooting coat that itself protruded from under the folded blanket on which Fred had slept. It was nearer to Schillingschen than to me. After watching him for about fifteen minutes, during which he made a great fuss about his headache, I was quite sure it was the diary that interested him.

I stooped and extracted it from the coat pocket. The grimace he made was certainly not due to headache.

“Fred!” I called out, and he and Will came striding in together.

“That diary’s the key,” I said. “It’s important. It holds his secrets!”

Will was swift to put that to the test.

“What will you offer?” he asked Schillingschen. “We want you to go back direct to German East. Will you go, if we give you back your diary?”

Schillingschen blundered into the trap like a buffalo in strange surroundings.

“Ja wohl!” he answered. “Give me that, and you shall never see me again!”

At that Fred threw himself full length on his blanket and took one of Schillingschen’s cigars.

“Of course,” he said, “you would give anything for leave to take those words back! You needn’t try to hide the wince—we fully appreciate the situation! What do you say, you fellows? How about last night’s idea? Who mooted it? Shall we send him back by canoe to German East, with a guarantee that if he doesn’t go we’ll hand over diary and him to our government?”

“Better send the book to the commissioner at Nairobi, or Mombasa, or wherever he is,” suggested Will. “Then if the ‘prof’ here doesn’t get a swift move on he’s liable to be overtaken by the cops, I should say.”

“Let’s make no promises,” said I. “I vote we simply give him time to get away.”

At that the German saw the weak side of our case in a flash.

“If you dared give that diary to your government,” be growled, “you would do so without bargaining with me! Why do you propose to let me go? Out of love for me? No! But because you dare not appeal to your government! Give me that diary, and I will go at once to German East, not otherwise! It is only a diary,” he added. “Nothing important—merely my private jottings and memoranda.”

Fred turned toward me so that Schillingschen could not see his face.

“Are you willing to start for Kisumu at once with that book?” he asked, and I nodded. He winked at me so violently that I could not trust myself to answer aloud and keep a straight face.

“Very well,” he said. “Suppose you start with it to-morrow morning. At the end of a week we’ll turn the professor home to follow his own nose!”

Schillingschen shrugged his shoulders and refused to be drawn into further argument. We gave him a good meal from his own provisions, and then once more made his hands fast with wire behind him and left him to sleep off his rage if he cared to in a corner of the tent.

Later that morning we sent for the Baganda—gave him a view of Schillingschen trussed and helpless—and questioned him about the man he boasted he knew, who could tell us what Schillingschen was after. He was so full of fear by that time that he held back nothing.

He assured us the German was after buried ivory. There was a man, who had promised to meet Schillingschen, who knew where to find the ivory and would lead the way to it. He did not know names or places—knew only that the man would be found waiting at a certain place, and was not white.

“How did you get that information?” Fred demanded.

“By listening.”

“When? Where?”

“At night, months ago, in Nairobi, outside the professor’s tent. I lay under the fly among the loads and listened. The man came in the dark, and went in the dark. I did not see him. I did not hear him called by name. He must have been an old man. Speaking Kiswahili, he admitted he knew where the ivory is. He said he saw it buried, and that he alone survives of all men who buried it. He promised to lead the professor to the place on condition that the Germans shall release his brother, and his brother’s wife, and two sons whom they keep in prison on a life-sentence. The professor agreed, but said, ‘Wait! There are first those people who also think they know the secret. Perhaps they do! Wait until after I have dealt with them. Then you shall take me to the place! After that your criminal relations shall be pardoned! Here is money. Go and wait for me at the place we spoke of when we talked before.’”

We each cross-examined him in turn, but could not make him change his story in any essential. He merely exaggerated the parts that he guessed might please us, and begged to be allowed to run before Schillingschen could break loose and get after him.

By noontime, when we gave him his second meal, Schillingschen had made up his own mind that his case was desperate and called for heroic remedy.

“All right,” he growled. “I need that diary. Hand it to me and I’ll tell you how to find what you’re after!”

“You mean about the man who’s to meet you?” suggested Fred blandly.

Schillingschen started as if shot.

“One of your men is an eavesdropper,” Fred assured him with a cheerful nod. “That plug has been pulled already, Professor!”

“Let’s play the cards face up!” Will interrupted impatiently. “Listen, Schillingschen. You’re an all-in scoundrel. You’re a spy. You’re a bloody murderer of women and defenseless natives. If we could prove that we wouldn’t argue with you. We know you burned that dhow with the women in it, but we’ve got no evidence, that’s all. We know the German government wants that ivory, and we know why. We also want it. Our only reason for secrecy is that we hope for better terms from the British government. We’ve nothing to fear, except possible financial loss. If you prefer to come with us to Kisumu and have the whole matter out in court, all you need do is just say so. On the other hand, if you want to get out of this country before your diary can reach the hands of the British High Commissioner—you’d just better slide, that’s all!”

“You’ve only until dawn to think it over,” remarked Fred.

“You poor boob!” continued Will. “You imagine we’re criminals because you’re one yourself! The difference between your offer and ours is that you’re bluffing and we know it, whereas we’re not bluffing by as much as a hair, and the quicker you see that the better for you!”

“Oh, rats! Let’s take him in with us to Kisumu!” said I, and at that Professor Schillingschen capitulated.

“Very well” he said. “Kurz und gut. I will leave the country. Permit me to take only food enough, and my porters, and one gun!”

“No guns!” said Fred promptly.

Schillingschen sighed resignedly, and we went out of the tent to talk over ways and means. In spite of our recent experience of Germany’s colonial government we were still so ignorant of the workings of the mens germanica that we took his surrender at face value.

The problem of getting him down to the lake shore safely was none too simple. I was soft hearted and headed enough to propose that we should loose his hands, now that he had surrendered, and permit him reasonable liberty. Will—least inclined of all of us to cruelty—was disposed to agree with me. We might have overborne Fred’s objections if Coutlass and Brown, returning from walking off their overnight debauch together, had not shouted and beckoned us in a mysterious sort of way, as if some new discovery puzzled them.

We walked about a hundred and fifty yards to where they stood by a row of low ant-hills. Neither of them was in a sociable frame of mind. It was obvious from the moment we could see their faces clearly that they had not called us to enjoy a joke. They stood like two dumb bird-dogs, pointing, and we had to come about abreast of them before we knew why we were summoned.

There lay five clean-picked skeletons, one on each ant-hill. One was a big bird’s; one looked like a dog’s; the third was a snake’s; the fourth a young antelope’s; and the fifth was certainly that of a yellow village cur, for some of the hairs from the tip of its tail were remaining, not yet borne off by the ants.

The skeletons lay as if the creatures had died writhing. There were pegs driven into the earth that had evidently held them in position by the sinews. Most peculiar circumstance of all, there was a camp-chair standing very near by, with its feet deep in the red earth, as if a very heavy man had sat in it.

I went back to the camp and told Kazimoto to bring one of the professor’s men. Kazimoto had to do the talking, for we did not know the man’s language, nor he ours.

Yes, the professor always did that to animals. He liked to sit and watch them and keep the kites away. He said it was white man’s knowledge (science?). Yes, the animals were pegged out alive on the ant-hills, and the professor would sit with his watch in his hand, counting the minutes until they ceased from writhing. It was part of the duty of the ten to catch animals and bring them alive to him in camp for that purpose. No, they did not know why he did it, except that it was white man’s knowledge. No, natives did not do that way, except now and then to their enemies. The professor always made threats he would do so to them if they ran away from him, or disobeyed, or misbehaved. Certainly they believed him! Why should they not believe him? Did not Germans always keep their word when they talked of punishment?

We decided after that to let Schillingschen lie bound, whether or not the iron wire cut his wrists. We did not trouble to go back to inquire whether he needed drink, but let him wait for that until supper-time. The remainder of that afternoon we spent discussing who should have the disagreeable and not too easy task of taking the professor to the lake and sending him on his way. We sat with our backs against a rock, with the firearms beside us and a good view of all the countryside, very much puzzled as to whether to leave Coutlass behind in camp (with Brown and the whisky) or send him (with or without Brown) and one or two of us on the errand. He was a dangerous ally in either case.

Evening fell, and the good smell of supper came along the wind to find us still undecided. We returned to the tent thinking that perhaps something Schillingschen himself might say would help us to decide one way or the other.

“Better see if the brute wants a drink,” said Fred, and I went in ahead to offer him water.

He was gone! Clean gone, without a trace, or a hint as to how he managed it! I called the others, and we hunted. The sides of the tent were pegged down tight all around. The front, it is true, was wide open, but we had sat in full view of it and not so much as a rat could have crept out without our seeing. There were no signs of burrowing. He was not under the bed, or behind the boxes, or between the sides of the tent and the fly. The only cover for more than a hundred yards was the shallow depression along which we had come to the capture of the camp, and that was the way he must have taken. But that, too, had been practically in full view of us all the time.

We counted heads and called the roll. Coutlass was close by. It did not look as if he had played traitor this time. Brown was sleeping off his headache in the shade. Kazimoto and all the boys were accounted for. The prisoners were safe. No donkeys were missing—no firearms—and no loads. The earth had simply opened up and swallowed Schillingschen, and that was all about it!

He had not made off with his pocket diary. Fred had that. There and then we packed it in an empty biscuit tin and buried it under a rock, Will and I keeping watch while Fred did the digging and covering up. It was too likely that Schillingschen would come back in the night and try to steal it for any of us to care about keeping it on his person.

It was too late to look far and wide for him that evening. A hunter such as he could have lain unseen in the dark with us almost stepping on him. Gone was all appetite for supper! We nibbled, and swore, and smoked—locked up the whisky—defied either Brown or Coutlass to try to break the boxes open—and arranged to take turns on sentry-go all that night, Will, Fred, and I—declining very pointedly offers by the other two to have their part in keeping watch. In spite of lack of evidence we suspected Coutlass; and we knew no particular reason for having confidence in Brown.