Bosambo of the River

Bosambo was not to blame for every crime laid at his door. He had a feud with the Akasava, not without reason. The death of M'Kovo his enemy was not sufficient to extinguish the obligation, for the Akasava had spilt blood, and that rankled for many months. He was by nature a thief, being a Krooman from the Liberian coast before he came to be king over the simple and fearful Ochori.

So when all the trouble between the Akasava and Ochori seemed at rest, Sanders had occasion to come to the Ochori country in a hurry – and the river was low.

There is no chart of the big river worth two cents in the dry season, because unexpected sand banks come barking up in the fairway, and there are whole stretches of river wherein less than a fathom of water runs. Sometimes the boy sitting on the bow of the Zaire, thrusting a pliant rod into the stream, would cry through his nose that there were two fathoms of water when there was but one.

He was, as I have beforetime said, of the Kano folk, and somewhat religious, dreaming of a pilgrimage to Mecca, and a green band round his tarboosh.

"I declare to you the glory of God and a fathom and a little."

Bump!

"Get overboard, you talkative devil!" said Sanders, who was more annoyed because this was the fourteenth bank he had struck since he left headquarters. So the whole crew jumped waist deep into the water, and singing a little song as they toiled, pushed the boat clear.

Sanders struck his thirty-ninth bank just before he came to the village of Ochori, and he landed in a most unamiable mood.

"Bosambo," he said, "I have two minds about you – the one is to hang you for your many wickednesses, the other is to whip you."

"Master," said Bosambo with grave piety, "all things shall be as ordained."

"Have no fear but that it will be one or the other," warned the Commissioner. "I am no dog that I should run from one end of the state to the other because a thieving black man raids in forbidden territory."

Bosambo, whose guilty conscience suggested many reasons for the unexpected visit of the Commissioner, seemed less genuinely astonished.

"Master, I am no nigger," he said, "being related by birth and previous marriages to several kings, also – "

"You are a liar," said Sanders, fuming, "and related by birth and marriage to the father of liars; and I did not come to talk about your uninteresting family, but rather to discuss a matter of night raiding."

"As to night raiding" said Bosambo frankly, "I know nothing about that. I went with my councillors to the Akasava, being anxious to see the new chief and tell him of my love; also," he said piously, "to say certain Christian prayers by the grave of my enemy, for, as you know, lord, our faith teaches this."

"By night you went," said Sanders, ignoring the challenge of "our faith," "and Akasava city may easily be gained in broad daylight; also, when the Akasava fell upon you, you had many goats tied up in your canoes.

"They were my goats," said Bosambo with dignity. "These I brought with me as a present to the new chief."

In his exasperation Sanders swore long and fluently.

"Blood has paid for blood," he said wrathfully, "and there shall be no more raidings. More than this, you shall stay in this city and shall not move therefrom till you have my word."

"Lord Sandi," said Bosambo, "I hear to obey."

A light of unholy joy came momentarily into the eyes of the Commissioner, flickered a moment, and was gone, leaving his face impassive.

"You know, Bosambo," he said mildly – for him, "that I have great faith in you; therefore I leave you a powerful fetish, who shall be as me in my absence."

He took from the pocket of his uniform jacket a certain round box of silver, very pleasant to the touch, being somewhat like a flattened egg.

Sanders had set his pedometer that morning.

"Take this and wear it for my sake," he said.

Bosambo threaded a chain through its loop of silver and hung it about his neck.

"Lord," he said gratefully, "you have done this thing before the eyes of my people, and now they will believe all I tell them regarding your love for me."

Sanders left the Ochori city next morning.

"Remember," he warned, "you do not go beyond the borders of your city."

"Master," said Bosambo, "I sit fasting and without movement until your lordship returns."

He watched the Zaire until she was a white speck on the placid face of the water; then he went to his hut.

Very carefully he removed the silver case from his neck and laid it in the palm of his hand.

"Now, little devil," he addressed it, "who watches the coming and going of men, I think I will learn all about you. O hanger of M'Kovo!"

He pressed the knob – he had once possessed a watch, and was wise in the way of stem springs – the case flew open, and showed him the little dials.

He shook the instrument violently, and heard a faint clicking. He saw a large hand move across the second of a circle.

Bearing the pedometer in his hand, he paced the length of the village street, and at every pace the instrument clicked and the hand moved. When he was still it did not move.

"Praise be to all gods!" said Bosambo. "Now I know you, O Talker! For I have seen your wicked tongue wagging, and I know the manner of your speech."

He made his way slowly back to his hut.

Before the door his new baby, the light of his eyes, sprawled upon a skin rug, clutching frantically at the family goat, a staid veteran, tolerant of the indignities which a small brown man-child might put upon him. Bosambo stopped to rub the child's little brown head and pat the goat's sleek neck.

Then he went into the hut, carefully removed the tell-tale instrument from the chain at his neck, and hid it with other household treasures in a hole beneath his bed.

At sundown his lokali brought the fighting men together.

"We go to the Akasava," he said, addressing them briefly, "for I know a village that is fat with corn and the stolen goats of the Ochori. Also the blood of our brothers calls us, though not so loudly as the goats."

He marched away, and was gone three days, at the end of which time he returned minus three men – for the Akasava village had resisted his attentions strenuously – but bringing with him some notable loot.

News travels fast on the river, especially bad news, and this reached Sanders, who, continuing his quest for hut tax, had reached the Isisi.

On the top of this arrived a messenger from the Akasava chief, and Sanders went as fast as the Zaire could carry him to the Ochori city.

Bosambo heard of his coming.

"Bring me, O my life and pride," he said to his wife, "a certain silver box which is under my bed; it is so large and of such a shape."

"Lord," said his wife, "I know the box well."

He slipped the loop of the string that held it over his head, and in all calmness awaited his master's coming.

Sanders was very angry indeed, so angry that he was almost polite to his erring chief.