Cupid in Africa

by Percival Christopher Wren

  CHAPTER XIII_Baking_

  When Bertram was awakened by Ali at four o’clock the next morning, hefeared he would be unable to get up. Had he been at home, he would haveremained in bed and sent for the doctor. His head felt like lead, everybone in his body ached, and he had that horrible sense of internal_malaise_, than which few feelings are more discouraging, distressing andenervating.

  The morning smelt horrible, and, by the light of the candle-lamp, thefloor was seen to have resigned in favour of the flood. Another problem:Could a fair-sized man dress himself on a tiny camp-bed beneath a smallmosquito curtain? If not, he must get out of bed into the water, andpaddle around in that slimy ooze which it hid from the eye but not fromthe nose. Subsidiary problem: Could a man step straight into a pair ofwet boots, so as to avoid putting bare feet into the mud, and thenwithdraw alternate feet from them, for the removal of pyjamas and theputting-on of shorts and socks, while the booted foot remained firmlyplanted in the slush for his support?

  Or again: Sitting precariously on the edge of a canvas bed, could anagile person, with bare feet coyly withdrawn from contact with thefoulness beneath, garb his nether limbs to the extent that permitted thepulling-on of boots? . . .

  He could try anyhow. . . . After much groping and fumbling, Bertrampulled on his socks and shorts, and then, still lying on his bed, reachedfor his boots. These he had left standing on a dry patch beneath hisbed, and now saw standing, with the rest of his kit, in a couple ofinches of filthy water. Balancing himself on the sagging edge of thestrip of canvas that served as bed-laths, palliasse and mattress, hestruggled into the resisting and reluctant boots, and then boldly enteredthe water, pleased with the tactics that had saved him from touching itbefore he was shod. . . . It was not until he had retrieved his soddenputtees and commenced to put them on, that he realised that he was stillwearing the trousers of his pyjamas!

  And then it was that Bertram, for the first time in his life, furiouslyswore—long and loud and heartily. Let those who say in defence of Warthat it rouses man’s nobler instincts and brings out all that is best inhim, note this deplorable fact.

  Could he keep them on, or must he remove those clinging, squelching bootsand partially undress again?

  Striped blue and green pyjamas, showing for six inches between his shortsand his puttees, would add a distinctly novel touch to the uniform of aBritish officer. . . . No. It could not be done. Ill as he felt, anddeeply as he loathed the idea of wrestling with the knots in the soddenboot-laces of those awful boots, he must do it—in spite of tremblinghands, swimming head, and an almost unconquerable desire to lie downagain.

  And then—alas! for the moral maxims of the copy-books, the wise saws andmodern instances of the didactic virtuous—sheer bad temper came to hisassistance. With ferocious condemnations of everything, he cut hisboot-laces, flung his boots into the water, splashed about violently inhis socks, as he tore off the offending garments and hurled them afterthe boots, and then completed his dressing with as little regard towater, mud, slime, filth, and clay as though he were standing on thecarpet of his dressing-room in England.

  “_I’m fed up_!” quoth he, and barged out of the _banda_ in a frame ofmind that put the Fear of God and Second-Lieutenant Bertram Greene intoall who crossed his path. . . . (_Cupid_ forsooth!)

  The first was Ali Suleiman, who stood waiting in the rain, until he couldgo in and pack his master’s kit.

  “Here—you—pack my kit sharp, and don’t stand there gaping like a fish ina frying-pan. Stir yourself before I stir _you_,” he shouted.

  The faithful Ali dived into the _banda_ like a rabbit into its hole.Excellent! This was the sort of _bwana_ he could reverence. Almost hadhe been persuaded that this new master was not a real gentleman—he was sogentle. . . .

  Bertram turned back again, but not to apologise for his harsh words, ashis better nature prompted him to do.

  “Where’s my breakfast, you lazy rascal?” he shouted.

  “On the table in Mess _banda_, please God, thank you, sah,” replied AliSuleiman humbly, as one who prays that his grievous trespasses may beforgotten.

  “Then why couldn’t you say so, you—you—you—” and here memories of theNaval Officer stole across his subconsciousness, “you blundering burden,you posthumous porridge-punter, you myopic megalomaniac, you pernicious,piebald pacifist. . . .”

  Ali Suleiman rolled his eyes and nodded his head with every epithet.

  “Oh, my God, sah,” said he, as Bertram paused for breath, “I am a dam manmos’ blasted sinful”—and, so ridiculous a thing is temper, that Bertramneither laughed nor saw cause for laughter.

  Splashing across to the Mess _banda_, he discovered a battered metalteapot, an enamelled tumbler, an almost empty tin of condensed milk, anda tin plate of very sad-looking porridge. By the light of a lamp thatappealed more to the olfactory and auditory senses than to the optic, heremoved from the stodgy mess the well-developed leg of some insectunknown, and then tasted it—(the porridge, not the leg).

  “_Filthy muck_,” he remarked aloud.

  “Sahib calling me, sir?” said a voice that made him jump, and the Cook’sUnderstudy, a Goanese youth, stepped into the circle of light—or oflesser gloom.

  “Very natural you should have thought so,” answered Bertram. “I said_Filthy Muck_.”

  “Yessir,” replied the acting deputy assistant adjutant cooklet, proudly,“I am cooking breakfast for the Sahib.”

  “_You_ cooked this?” growled Bertram, and half rose, with so menacing anexpression and wild an eye that the guilty fled, making a note that thiswas a Sahib to be properly served in future, and not, as he had foolishlythought him, a poor polite soul for whom anything was good enough. . . .

  Pushing the burnt and nauseating horror from him, Bertram essayed to pourout tea, only to find that the fluid was readily procurable from anywherebut the spout. A teapot that will not “pour out” freely is an annoyanceat the best of times, and to the most placid of souls. (The fact thattea through the lid is as good as tea through the spout is more thancounter-balanced by the fact that tea in the cup is better than tea onthe table-cloth. And it is a very difficult art, only to be acquired bypatient practice, to pour tea into the cup and the cup alone, from thetop of a spout-bunged teapot. Try it.)

  Bertram’s had temper waxed and deepened.

  “_Curse the thing_!” he swore, and banged the offending pot on the table,and, forgetting his nice table-manners, blew violently down the spout.This sent a wave of tea over his head and scalded him, and there thedidactic virtuous, and the copy-book maxims, scored.

  Sorely tempted to call to the cooklet in honeyed tones, decoy him nearwith fair-seeming smiles, with friendly gestures, and then to fling thething at his head, he essayed to pour again.

  A trickle, a gurgle, a spurt, a round gush of tea—and the pale wanskeletal remnants of a once lusty cockroach, sodden and soft, leapt intothe cup. Swirling round and round, it seemed giddily to explore its newunresting-place, triumphant, as though chanting, with the AncientMariner, some such pæan as

  “I was the first that ever burst Into this silent tea. . . .”

  Heaven alone knew to how many cups of tea that disintegrating corpse hadcontributed of its best before the gusts of Bertram’s temper hadcontributed to its dislodgment.

  (Temper seems to have scored a point here, it must be reluctantlyconfessed.)

  Bertram arose and plunged forth into the darkness, not daring to trusthimself to call the cook.

  Raising his clenched hands in speechless wrath, he drew in his breaththrough his clenched teeth—and then slipped with catastrophic suddennesson a patch of slimy clay and sat down heavily in very cold water.

  He arose a distinctly dangerous person. . . .

  Near the ration-dump squatted a solid square of naked black men, notprecisely savages, raw _shenzis_ of the jungle, but something betweenthese and the Swahilis who work as personal servants, gun-bearers, andthe better class of _safari
_ porters. They were big men and lookedstrong. They smelt stronger. It was a perfectly indescribable odour,like nothing on earth, and to be encountered nowhere else on earth—savein the vicinity of another mass of negroes.

  In the light of a big fire and several lanterns, Bertram saw that the menwere in rough lines, and that each line appeared to be in charge of aheadman, distinguished by some badge of rank, such as a bowler hat, atobacco tin worn as an ear-ring, a pair of pink socks, or a frock coat.These men walked up and down their respective lines and occasionallysmote one of their squatting followers, hitting the chosen one withoutfear or favour, without rhyme or reason, and apparently without doingmuch damage. For the smitten one, without change of expression orposition, emitted an incredibly thin piping squeal, as though inacknowledgment of an attention, rather than as if giving natural vent toanguish. . . .

  Every porter had a red blanket, and practically every one wore a _panga_.The verbs are selected. They _had_ blankets and they _wore_ pangas. Theblankets they either sat upon or folded into pads for insertion beneaththe loads they were to carry upon their heads. The _pangas_ wereattached to strings worn over the shoulder. This useful implement servesthe African as toothpick, spade, axe, knife, club, toasting-fork, hammer,weapon, hoe, cleaver, spoon, skinning-knife, and every other kind oftool, as well as being correct jungle wear for men for all occasions, andin all weathers. He builds a house with it; slays, skins and dismembersa bullock; fells a tree, makes a boat, digs a pit; fashions a club,spear, bow or arrow; hews his way through jungle, enheartens his wife,disheartens his enemy, mows his lawn, and makes his bed. . . .

  Not far away, a double company of the Hundred and Ninety-Eighth “stoodeasy.” The fact that they were soaked to the skin did nothing to givethem an air of devil-may-care gaiety.

  The Jemadar in command approached and saluted Bertram, who recognised thefeatures of Hassan Ali.

  “It’s _you_, is it!” he grunted, and proceeded to explain that theJemadar would command the rear-guard of one hundred men, and that by thetime it was augmented to a hundred and fifty by the process of picking upflankers left to guard side-turnings, the column would be halted whilefifty men made their way up to the advance-guard again, and so on.

  “D’you understand?” concluded Bertram.

  “_Nahin_, _Sahib_,” replied the Jemadar.

  “_Then fall out_,” snapped Bertram. “I’ll put an intelligent private incommand, and you can watch him until you do,” and then he broke intoEnglish: “I’ve had about enough of you, my lad, and if you give me any ofyour damned nonsense, I’ll twist your tail till you howl. Call yourselfan _officer_! . . .” and here the Jemadar, saluting repeatedly, like anautomaton, declared that light had just dawned upon his mind and that heclearly understood.

  “And so you’d better,” answered Bertram harshly, staring with a hardscowl into the Jemadar’s eyes until they wavered and sank. “So you’d_better_, if you want to keep your rank. . . . March one hundred mendown the path past the Officers’ Mess, and halt them a thousand yardsfrom here. . . . The coolies will follow. You will return and fall inbehind the coolies with the other hundred as rear-guard. See that thecoolies do not straggle. March behind your men—so that you are the verylast man of the whole convoy. D’you understand?”

  Jemadar Hassan Ali did understand, and he also understood that he’d madea bad mistake about Second-Lieutenant Greene. He was evidently one ofthose subtle and clever people who give the impression that they are not_hushyar_, {142} that they are foolish and incompetent, and then suddenlydestroy you when they see you have thoroughly gained that impression.

  Respect and fear awoke in the breast of the worthy Jemadar, for headmired cunning, subtlety and cleverness beyond all things. . . . Hemarched a half of his little force off into the darkness, halted themsome half-mile down the path (or rivulet) that led into the jungle, putthem in charge of the senior Havildar and returned.

  Meanwhile, Lieutenant Bridges, in a cloak and pyjamas, had arrived,yawning and shivering, to superintend the loading up of the porters. Atan order, given in Swahili, the first line of squatting Kavirondo aroseand rushed to the dump.

  “Extraordinary zeal!” remarked Bertram to Bridges.

  “Yes—to collar the lightest loads,” was the illuminating reply.

  The zeal faded as rapidly as it had glowed when he coldly pointed withthe _kiboko_, which was his badge of office and constant companion, tothe heavy ammunition-boxes.

  “I should keep that near the advance-guard and under a special guard ofits own,” said he.

  “I’m going to—naturally,” replied Bertram shortly, and added: “Hurry themalong, please. I want to get off to-day.”

  Bridges stared. This was a much more assured and autocratic person thanthe mild youth he had met at the water’s edge a day or two ago.

  “Well—if you like to push off with the advance-guard, I’ll see that aconstant stream of porters files off from here, and that your rear-guardfollows them,” said he.

  “Thanks—I’ll not start till I’ve seen the whole convoy ready,” repliedBertram.

  Yesterday he’d have been glad of advice from anybody. Now he’d take itfrom no one. Orders he would obey, of course—but “a poor thing but mineown” should be his motto with regard to his method of carrying outwhatever he was left to do. They’d told him to take their beastlyconvoy; they’d left him to do it; and he’d do it as he thought fit. . . .Curse the rain, the mud, the stench, the hunger, sickness and the beastlypain that nearly doubled him up and made him feel faint. . . .

  Grayne strolled over.

  “Time you bunged off, my lad,” quoth he, loftily.

  “If you’ll mind your own business, I shall have the better chance to mindmine,” replied Bertram, eyeing him coldly—and wondering at himself.

  Grayne stared open-mouthed, and before he could speak Bertram washounding on a lingering knot of porters who had not hurried off to theline as soon as their boxes of biscuit were balanced on their heads, butstood shrilly wrangling about something or nothing.

  “_Kalele_! _Kalele_!” shouted Bertram, and sprang at them with raisedfist and furious countenance, whereat they emitted shrill squeals andfled to their places in the long column.

  He had no idea what “_Kalele_!” meant, but had heard Bridges and theheadman say it. Later he learnt that it meant “Silence!” and was a veryuseful word. . . .

  Ali Suleiman approached, seized three men, and herded them before him tofetch Bertram’s kit. Having loaded them with it, he drove them to thehead of the column and stationed them in rear of the advance-guard.

  Returning, he presented Bertram with a good, useful-looking cane.

  “_Bwana_ wanting a _kiboko_,” said he. “_Shenzis_ not knowing anythingwithout _kiboko_ and not feeling happy in mind. Not thinking _Bwana_ isa real master.”

  Yesterday Bertram would have chidden Ali gently, and explained that kindhearts are more than coronets and gentle words than cruel whips. To-dayhe took the cane, gave it a vicious swish, and wished that it were indeeda _kiboko_, one of those terrible instruments of hippopotamus hide, fourfeet in length, as thick as a man’s wrist at one end, tapering until itwas of the thinness of his little finger at the other. . . .

  A big Kavirondo seized a rum jar. His bigger neighbour dropped a heavybox and tried to snatch it from him. He who had the lighter jar clung toit, bounded away, and put it on his head. The box-wallah, following,gave him a sudden violent blow in the back, jerking the jar from hishead.

  Raising his cane, Bertram brought it down with all his strength on thestarboard quarter of the box-wallah as he stooped to grab the jar. Witha wild yelp, he leapt for his box and galloped to his place in thecolumn.

  “Excellent!” said Bridges, “you’ll have no trouble with the _safari_people, at any rate.”

  “I’ll have no trouble with anybody,” replied Bertram with a quiettruculence that surprised himself, “not even with a _Balliol_ negro.”

  Bridge
s decided that he had formed his estimate of Lieutenant Greene toohastily and quite wrongly. He was evidently a bit of a tough lad when hegot down to it. Hot stuff. . . .

  At last the dump had disappeared completely, and its original componentsnow swayed and turned upon the heads of a thousand human beasts ofburden—human in that they walked erect and used fire for cooking food;beasts in that they were beastly and beast-like in all other ways. Amongthem, and distinguished by being feebler of physique, and, if possible,feebler of mind, was a party of those despised savages, the Kikuyu,rendered interesting as providing the great question that shook theChurch of England to its foundations, and caused Lord Bishops to forgetthe wise councils of good Doctor Watts’ hymn. (It is to be feared thatamong the even mightier problems of the Great War, the problem of thespiritual position and ecclesiastical condition of the CommunicatingKikuyu has been temporarily lost sight of. Those who know the gentleman,with his blubber-lipped, foreheadless face, his teeth filed to sharppoints, his skin a mass of scar patterns, done with a knife, and hissoulless, brainless animalism and bestiality, would hate to think he wasone short on the Thirty-Nine Articles or anything of that sort.)

  Bertram gave a last injunction to Jemadar Hassan Ali, said farewell toBridges, and strode to the head of the column. Thence he sent out a“point” of a Havildar and three men, and waited to give the word toadvance, and plunge into the jungle, the one white man among some fifteenhundred people, all of whom looked to him, as to a Superior Being, forguidance and that competent command which should be their safeguard.

  As the point disappeared he turned and looked along the apparentlyendless line, cried “_Quick March_,” and set off at a smart pace, thefirst man of the column.

  He was too proud and excited to realise how very ill he felt, or to beashamed of the naughty temper that he had so clearly and freelyexhibited.