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"Let me have it," he ordered. It was passed into his hands, and proved to be one of the two oil lanterns kept for emergencies. But Kingozi sent the headman for one of the candle lanterns in everyday use, and a half-dozen short candles. "These are better," he said; "and qua heri, Simba. If you do these things well, large backsheeshi for you all." "Qua heri, bwana" said Simba, and was gone.
The visitor concluded his remarks which as far as they could be understood were entirely general: and, with a final courtly wave of the hand, turned away. Then Kingozi spoke, abruptly, curtly. "Have your people bring me eggs," he said, "milk, m'wembe." The old man, somewhat abashed, made the most dignified retreat possible through the keenly attentive audience of his own people.
And, parenthetically, from that moment Bibi-ya-chui the Leopard Woman was the name by which she was known among the children of the sun. She did not greet him in any way, but turned her head to address commands. "Bring a chair for the bwana; bring cigarettes; bring balauri lime juice " Kingozi found himself established comfortably.
At the signal Kingozi stopped and looked back inquiringly over his shoulder. Mali-ya-bwana was pointing cautiously to a low red clay ant hill immediately in their path and about thirty yards ahead. To the casual glance it looked no different from any of the hundreds of others of like size and colour everywhere to be seen.
The squatting savages had not moved a muscle, but their shining black eyes had not missed a single detail. Six hours later the Leopard Woman's camp had arrived, had been pitched, and everything was running again as usual. The new askari headman, Jack, had reported pridefully to Kingozi. The latter had nodded a careless acknowledgment; and had referred the man to his mistress.
Their peculiarly weird moans came in chorus; and every once in a while arose the shrill, prolonged titter that has earned them the name of "laughing hyena." "Bibi-ya-chui," he told her at length. She considered this, her red lower lip caught between her teeth. "The Leopard Woman," she repeated, "and it is thus that I am known! You, Kingozi the Bearded One; I, Bibi-ya-chui the Leopard Woman!"
"You have heard the memsahib speak, you men of the memsahib's safari," remarked Kingozi; then: "You, Jack, whom I made chief of askaris, you speak." "What does the bwana say of this?" came Jack's deep voice after a moment. "You have heard." "What the bwana says is law." "Does any man of you think differently? Speak!" No voice answered. Kingozi turned to where, he knew, the Leopard Woman stood.
As the beast did not slow up in the first ten yards, but rather settled into its stride, Kingozi took rapid aim and fired. His intention was neither to kill nor to cripple his antagonist. If that had been the case, he would have used the heavy double rifle that Mali-ya- bwana held ready near his elbow. The bullet inflicted a slight flesh wound in the outer surface of the beast's left shoulder.
He did not look back. In a moment he had disappeared. The prospect was empty of human life. She arose. For an instant her face was convulsed with a fairly demoniac fury. Then a mask of blankness obliterated all expression. She followed. Two hours into the night Kingozi, following in the rear, saw a cluster of lights, and shortly came to a compact group of those who had gone before him.
Until his influence over M'tela was quite assured, Winkleman's arrival would probably turn the scale. She had not prevented Kingozi's arriving before the Bavarian; but she might hold the Englishman comparatively powerless. That was understandable. Kingozi felt he might even love her the more for this evidence of a faithful spirit. But the last few days!
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