Bones of the River - Edgar Wallace [17]
For seven days and seven nights Bones was marooned between bank and bank, sleeping secretly at nights on such middle islands as he met with, and at the end of that time returned to the point of departure. M’kema came down to the beach.
“Lord, you cannot come here,” he said, “for since you have gone the arms of my young men have healed owing to the magic of their fathers.”
That night, when Bones had decided upon forcing a passage to the big river, the relief from the Zaire fought its way into the village and left him a clear path. Bones went back in triumph to headquarters and narrated his story.
“And there was I, dear old thing, a martyr, so to speak, to jolly old science, standing, as it were, with my back to the wall. I thought of jolly old Jenner–”
“Where were you, Bones? I can’t quite place your defence,” said Hamilton, peering over a map of the territory. “Were you in M’kema’s village?”
“No, sir, I skipped,” said Bones in triumph. “I went across the river to–”
Hamilton gasped. “Into the French territory?”
“It’s a diplomatic incident, I admit,” said Bones, “but I can explain to the President exactly the motives which led me to violate the territory of a friendly power – or, at least, they were not so friendly either, if you’d seen the ‘Petit Parisienne’ that came out by the marl–”
“But you were in the French village? That is all I want to know,” said Hamilton with deadly quiet.
“I certainly was, old thing.”
“Come with me,” said Hamilton.
He led the way to Bones’ hut and opened the door.
“Get in, and don’t come near us for a month,” he said. “You’re isolated!”
“But, dear old thing, I’m Health Officer!”
“Tell the microbes,” said Hamilton.
And isolated Bones remained. Every morning Hamilton came with a large garden syringe, and sprayed the ground and the roof thereof with an evil-smelling mixture. And, crowning infamy of all, he insisted upon handing the unfortunate Bones his meals through the window at the end of a long bamboo pole.
The Health Officer had come out of isolation, and had ceased to take the slightest interest in medical science, devoting his spare time to a new architectural correspondence course, when M’kema, summoned to headquarters, appeared under escort and in irons, to answer for his sins.
“Lord, Tibbetti did a great evil, for he took our people, who were well, and made them sick. Because their arms hurt them terribly they tried to chop him.”
Sanders listened, sitting in his low chair, his chin on his fist.
“You are an old man and a fool,” he said. “For did not the sickness come to the Isisi? And did not the villagers have their mourning – all except yours, M’kema, because of the magic which Tibbetti had put into their arms? Now, you are well, and the other villagers have their dead. How do you account for that, M’kema?”
M’kema shook his head. “Lord,” he said, “it was not by the magic of Tibbetti, for he made us ill. We are well people, and the sickness passed us because we followed the practice of our fathers, and took into the forest a woman who was very old and silly, and, putting out her eyes, left her to the beasts. There is no other magic like this.”
“What’s the use?” asked the despairing Sanders, and M’kema, hearing these words in English, shivered, suspecting a new incantation.
THE BLACK EGG
There is a new legend on the river, and it is the legend of a devil who came from a black egg and hated its new master so powerfully that it slew him.
Once upon a time in the Isisi land, the birds ceased suddenly from gossiping at the very height of day, and goats and dogs stood up on their feet and looked uneasily from left to right, and there was in the world a sudden and an inexplicable hush, so that men came out of their huts to discover what was the matter.
And whilst they were so standing, gaping at a silence which was almost visible, the world trembled, and down the long street of the Isisi city came a wave and a billowing of earth, so that houses shook and men fell on to their knees in their fear. Then came another tremble and yet another billowing of solid ground, and