The covenant - James A. Michener [42]
'You're like all young men in the world. Remembering a lovely girl who is far away while being tormented by another just as lovely, who is close at hand . . . like Hlenga.'
'On your next trip to my village . . .'
'I doubt I shall ever wander so far again.'
'You will. You're like me. You love baobabs and lions prowling your camp at night.'
The old man laughed again. 'Perhaps I am like you. But you're like me. You love rivers that must be forded and paths through dark forests. I never went back, and neither will you.'
On the morrow, with a kiss from Hlenga on his lips, this young man, twenty-one years old, set forth with his porters to deliver a collection of gold, ivory tusks and other trading goods to the waiting ships, and so heavy was the burden that progress under any circumstances would have been tedious; through the forests and swamps which separated them from the sea it was punishing. Nxumalo, as personal representative of the king, headed the file, but he was guided by a man who had made the difficult traverse once before. They covered only ten miles a day, because they were so often forced by turbulent rivers or steep declivities to abandon established trails. They were tormented by insects and had to keep watch against snakes, but they were never short of water or food, for rain was plentiful and animals abounded.
At the end of the sixth day everyone had subsided into a kind of grudging resignation; hour after hour would pass with no speech, no relief from the heat, the sweat and the muddy footing. It was travel at its worst, infinitely more demanding than a trip of many miles through the western savanna or southward into baobab country. This was liana land, where vines hung down from every tree, tormenting and ensnaring, where one could rarely move unimpeded for ten feet in any direction.
But always there lay ahead the fascinating lure of Sofala, with its ships, and Chinese strangers, and the glories of India and Persia. Like a tantalizing magnet it drew the men on, and at night, when the insects were at their worst, the men would talk in whispers of women who frequented the port and of Arabs who stole any black who tried to visit with these women. The travelers had an imperfect understanding of the slave trade; they knew that men of foreign cast traveled the Zambezi capturing any who strayed, but these invaders had never dared invade Zimbabwe and risk a disruption of the gold supply, so their habits were not known. Nor did the murmuring blacks have any concept of where they might be taken if they were captured; Arabia they knew only for its carvings, India for its silks.
When the great escarpments were descended and the level lowlands reached, the travelers still had more than a hundred miles of swampy flat country with swollen rivers to negotiate, and again progress was minimal. It was now that young Nxumalo asserted his leadership, dismissing his guide to the rear and forcing his men into areas they preferred to avoid. He had come upon a well-marked trail which must lead to the sea, and as his men straggled behind, unable to keep the pace he was setting with his lighter burden, they began to meet other porters coming home from Sofala or were overtaken by swifter-moving files heading for the port, and a lively excitement spread through the group.
'We must not step inside a ship,' the guide repeated on the last night, 'and all bargaining is to be done by Nxumalo, for he knows what the king requires.'
'We will wait,' Nxumalo said, 'until the Arabs make us good offers, and they must be better than what they offer us at home, for this time we have done the hauling, not they.' He was prepared to linger at Sofala for months, selling his goods carefully and obtaining only those things his community most needed.
'What we really seek,' he reminded them, 'is salt.' Even his gold bars would be bartered if he could