Читать книгу Sandi the King-Maker - Edgar Wallace - Страница 3

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IN the village of P'pie, at the foot of that gaunt and hungry mountain which men called Limpisi, or Limbi, there lived a young man whose parents had died when he was a child, for in those far-off days the Devil Woman of Limbi demanded double sacrifices, and it was the custom to slay, not the child who was born upon her holy day—which was the ninth of the new moon—but his parents.

Therefore he was called by acclamation M'sufu-M'goba—'the-fortunate-boy-who-was-not-his-own-father'. All children who are born of sacrificed parents are notoriously clever, and M'sufu was favoured of ghosts and devils. It is said that when he was walking-young he climbed up to the cave of the Holy Devil Woman herself, passing through the guard of Virgins, who kept the hillside, in a most miraculous way, and that he had tottered into that dreadful cave whence no human had emerged alive, and had found the Old Woman sleeping.

He came forth alive and again reached the village. So it was said—and said secretly between husband and wife, or woman and lover (for these latter trust one another). Aloud or openly not one spoke of such a fearful exploit or even mentioned the Old Woman, save parabolically or by allusion.

But to this visit and the inspiration of The Cave-of-Going-In were ascribed the wonderful powers which came to him later in life.

It is told that, seated at food with one of the families which had adopted him, he suddenly broke an hour's silence.

"K'lama and his goat are dead by the deepstones."

"Silence, little child," said his indignant foster-parent. "Are you not ashamed to talk when I am eating? In this way all devils get into a man's body when his mind is thrown all ways."

Nevertheless, a search-party was sent out, and K'lama and his goat were found dead at the bottom of a rocky bluff; and one old man had seen this happen, the goat being suddenly mad and leaping with K'lama at the leash of it, just as the sun rim tipped the mountain-top. At such an hour had M'sufu spoken!

Then another miracle. One Doboba, a gardener, had flogged M'sufu for stealing bananas from his garden.

"Man," said M'sufu, rubbing his tingling seat, "a tree will fall upon you in two nights, and you will be with the ghosts."

And two nights after this Doboba died in such a way.

The story and the fame of M'sufu spread until his name was spoken even in the intimate places of the Old King's hut. And there came one Kabalaka, Chief of all the Tofolaka, this being the country which is separated from the Ochori by the Ghost Mountains, and Kabalaka was a great man in the king's eyes, being his seni-seni, which means Chief Minister.

"Oh, prophesy for me, M'sufu," he said, and before the whole twittering village—aghast at the advent of this amazing prince and his ten companies of spearmen and his dancing women—M'sufu stood up.

"Lord," he said "the crops of the land will be good and better than good. But the crops of the Fongini shall die, because no rain will come and the earth will crack."

"What else?" said Kabalaka, not displeased, for he hated the Fongini and Lubolama, their chief, and was jealous of his influence with the Old King.

"Lord," said the young seer, sweating greatly, "the son of your wife is sick and near to death, but on the rind of the moon he shall live again."

Kabalaka bent his brows, for he loved the son of his wife, and made a forced march back to Rimi-Rimi to find the child already laid for death, with clay upon his eyelids.

"Wait until the rind of the moon, for this child will not die," said Kabalaka in a confident tone, but inwardly aching.

So they waited, watching the fluttering breath of the boy, the women-folk going out every morning to pluck green leaves to deck their bodies in the death dance. But on the rind of the moon the child opened his eyes and smiled and asked for milk.

And then a week later, when the people of The True Land, as Rimi-Rimi was called, were labouring to get in their mighty crops, there came to the city Lubolama of the Fongini, begging remission of tribute.

"For my crops have failed, Old King," he said, "and there has been no rain, so that the fields are cut with great cracks."

That night the Old King sent for M'sufu, and the prophet, wearing a beautiful brass chain which the grateful Kabalaka had sent him, arrived in the city at the very hour the king's guard pulled down Hughes at Hughes Lloyd Thomas, Inspector of Territories in the service of the British Government.

Lloyd Thomas, in the days before he entered the Service, had been an evangelist—a fiery Welsh revivalist who had stirred the Rhondda Valley by the silvery eloquence of his tongue. Something of a mystic, fay as all Celts are, he had strangely survived the pitfalls which await earnest men who take service under Government. It was the innate spirituality of the man, the soul in him, and his faith, that made him smile whimsically up into the lowered face of K'salugu M'popo, the Old One, Lord and Paramount Lord of the Great King's territory.

They had staked him out before the Old King's hut, and his head was hot from the king's fire which burnt behind him. His travel-soiled drill was stiff with his blood, great rents and tears in his coat showed his broad white chest and the dark brown V of his shirt opening; but though he lay on the very edge of darkness, his heart was big within him, and he smiled, thanking God in his soul that there was no woman whose face would blanch at the news, or child to wonder or forget, or mother to be stricken.

"Ho, Tomini," said the Old King mockingly, and blinking down at his prisoner through his narrow eye-slits, "you called me to palaver before my people, and I am here."

Lloyd Thomas could turn his head, did he desire, and see a sector of that vast congregation which waited to witness his end—tier upon tier of curious brown faces, open-eyed with interest, children who desired sensational amusement. Truly he knew that all the city of Rimi-Rimi was present.

"I came in peace, K'salugu M'popo," he said, "desiring only to find Fergisi and his daughter: for evil news has gone out about them, and his own wife came to my king, telling of a killing palaver. Therefore my king has sent me, bringing you many beautiful presents, and knowing that you are strong for him, and will tell me about this God-man."

The presents were stacked in a heap by the side of the Old King's stool—bolts of cloth, shimmering glass necklaces, looking-glasses such as kings love, being in gift frames.

The king withdrew his eyes from the prisoner and bent down to pick up a necklace. He held it in his hand for a moment, and then, without a word, tossed it into the fire. At a word from his master, Kabalaka picked up the remainder and flung them into the blaze.

Lloyd Thomas set his teeth, for he knew the significance of this.

"Lord, since I am to die, let me die quickly." he said quietly.

"Let Jububu and M'tara, who skin men easily, come to me," said the Old King, and two naked men came from behind the fire, their little knives in their hands.

"O king—" it was Lloyd Thomas who mocked now, and there was a fire in his eyes which was wonderful "—O skinner of men and slayer of little girls, one day and another day you shall live, and then shall come one in my place, and he shall smell you out and feed your bodies to the fishes."

"Let the skinning men work slowly," said the Old King, rubbing his scrubby chin, and the two who knelt at Lloyd Thomas's feet whetted their little knives on the palms of their hands.

"He shall come—behold, I see him!" cried the doomed man. "Sandi Ingonda, the tiger, and the cater of kings!"

The king half rose from his chair, his puckered face working.

"O men, let me speak," he said huskily, "for this man has said a wicked thing, Sandi being dead. Yet if he lived, who can cross the mountains of ghosts, where my regiments sit? Or can his iron puc-a-puc force a way through the swift waters of the river?"

"He will come," said the prisoner solemnly, "and he shall stand where I lie, and on that hour you shall die, K'salugu M'popo."

The Old Man blinked and blinked.

"This is evil talk, and this man is a liar, for Sandi is not. Did not the man of the Akasava say that Sandi went out upon the black waters and fell through a hole in the world?"

"Lord king, it was said," agreed Kabalaka.

The king sat back on his stool.

"If Sandi comes, he dies, by death," he swore uneasily, "for I who sent the daughter of the God-man, into the earth and delivered the God-man himself to the Terrible Woman of Limbi, even I have no fear. O M'sufu!"

And there came from amongst the women behind the king a youth wearing a glittering chain.

"O M'sufu, see this man. Now prophesy for me, shall Sandi come to this land, where he has never come before, for is not this land called Allimini*, and was there not held a great palaver because the white Frenchis came, cala cala and how may Sandi, who is neither Frenchi nor Allimini, but Inegi, put foot in this land?"

[*German]

M'sufu realized the splendour of the moment, and strutted forth, his head thrown back, his arms extended.

"Hear me, Great King. Hear M'sufu, who has strange and lovely powers. For I say that Sandi shall not come to this land again—neither to the king's country, nor to the lands of the base people on the lower river. He is as dead."

The Old King was on his feet, his legs trembling.

"Hear him!" he yelled, and snatched his killing spears from the ground beside him. "O Tomini, hear this man—liar—liar—liar!"

And with every word, he struck, though he might have saved himself the trouble, for Lloyd Thomas died at the first blow.

The Old King looked down at his work, and his head was shaking.

"O ko," he said, "this is a bad palaver, for I have killed this man too quickly. Now, M'sufu, your voice has been beautiful to me, and you shall build in the shadow of my hut. For I know now that Sandi will not come. But if a devil is in your heart, and you have spoken lies, you shall lie where he lies, the Cold One, and my skinning men shall know your voice."