The Devil in the Bush
Page 16
The Congo-Ruzi, moribund when I knew it, has ceased to exist. There were legal questions about the majority block of stock that came to Jacqueline from Gérôme. Jacqueline had no heirs. I believe there has been some kind of receivership appointed, but all that is left of the Congo-Ruzi as a company is some papers which are shuffled from lawyer to lawyer while their fees nibble away at the bit of remaining capital until before long it will have disappeared. As for the station grounds themselves, we thought for a while that the government might use them, but nothing came of it and I imagine that in the couple of years that have elapsed the bush has made a good start at taking over. I doubt that Henri’s house is anything more by now than a few naked iron pipes.
I have had two letters from the Boutegourdes. The first was from Papa, written on a letterhead of the Colonial Agricultural Administration in Léopoldville, thanking me for my help in getting him a place as general supervisor of the wartime emergency agricultural programs. After my surveys I thought that the position should be created and Tommy Slattery recommended that it be set up, and he took my suggestion that Papa Boutegourde fill it. It has worked out well and should go on into a good peacetime job too. In his letter Papa Boutegourde was happy for Madame and Gabrielle, who were busy and flourishing in Léopoldville.
This must have been true about Madame and Gabrielle, because the next was not exactly a letter, but Gabrielle’s wedding announcement. The Belgian name of her husband wasn’t one that I recognized and I have never heard anything about him, but there was a Brussels address on the invitation along with the Léopoldville one, so I take it he was a good enough catch.
Miss Finney is a regular correspondent even if she is an unsatisfactory one. Every three months I get a letter from her, but they are all short, and always just about the same. The last one was rather mellower than usual, though. It came from the hotel in Costermansville and said:
Hoopie dear—
We have finished another of our rounds and are here at the Bruxelles again for a couple of weeks’ rest. No changes. Emily will always be the same and so, I fear, shall I. I keep pumping the natives full of medicine and Emily keeps them up to scratch on their hymns. I have stopped arguing with Emily over the relationship of the body and the soul, because I’m sick of the first, and the second is my own business.
We love you dearly,
M.F.
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All the characters and events portrayed in this work are fictitious.
THE DEVIL IN THE BUSH
A Felony & Mayhem “Vintage” mystery
PUBLISHING HISTORY
First print edition (Simon & Schuster): 1945
First Felony & Mayhem print edition: 2005
Felony & Mayhem digital edition: 2017
Copyright ©1945 by Matthew Head
Copyright renewed 1973 by Matthew Head
All rights reserved
E-book ISBN: 978-1-63194-109-2