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"Nevertheless we are very powerful sufficiently so to destroy you and your whole army in a moment, should we choose to do so. Would you like to witness a specimen or two of our power?" M'Bongwele glanced somewhat nervously about him for a second or two, and then with an obvious effort answered: "Yes." "I see that some of your followers here are armed with bows," continued the professor.
The professor then in compassion suggested the steadying of the ladder at its foot, when the king, promptly giving the necessary order to his suite, ascended to the deck, leaving those who followed him to manage as best they could. The first glance of the travellers satisfied them that in king M'Bongwele they had a man of more than ordinary intelligence to deal with.
Giving free rein to these ambitious ideas and aspirations, the chief paced thoughtfully to and fro in a retired corner of the village until about ten o'clock that night, when his impatience could no longer be curbed, and he felt that he must sally forth to ascertain, if possible, the fate of M'Bongwele and his party.
But they had no intention whatever of seeking an audience with the king; they had a very shrewd suspicion of what had actually taken place; and having by this time formed a tolerably accurate estimate of the royal character, they felt convinced that their only chance of advantageously dealing with M'Bongwele lay in forcing upon him the character of a suitor to them.
And it was for the purpose of securing these unfortunate creatures' restoration to reason that M'Bongwele now resolved to invoke the potent aid of his new prisoners.
"There is no doubt that Lualamba was, for a savage, an exceedingly shrewd fellow; and it was not very long ere we detected in him an evident desire to lure the four Spirits of the Winds into the presence and perchance the power of his master, M'Bongwele, who, he informed us, would be highly gratified by a visit from such celestial beings, whatever might be his sentiments with regard to mere men.
M'Bongwele was an ignorant savage, it is true, but he was possessed of a dauntless courage, a persistency of purpose, and an unscrupulous craftiness and ambitiousness of character which would have won him distinction of a certain unenviable kind in any community.
Merely to lie exposed in this fashion, immovably fixed to the earth, until death from starvation and thirst came to the relief of the sufferer would, one might suppose, be considered a sufficiently severe punishment to satisfy every demand of justice to say nothing of the exactions of revenge; but such a death was much too easy to be acceptable to a man whose lust of cruelty was so insatiable as that of M'Bongwele.
The attempt was made in due course, and, like the others, it proved, as might be expected, a miserable failure. Poor M'Bongwele was now completely at a loss; he knew not what to do.
The illumination of the ship was maintained until the cavalcade was well clear of the ruins, when the side-ladder was drawn up, the lights extinguished, and M'Bongwele was left to make the remainder of his way as best he could in the darkness. "Well," said the professor as the quartette wended their way below to dinner, "how have I managed?"
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