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Updated: May 29, 2025
"I am Cumner's Son," replied the lad, and once more he spoke the sacred countersign. To Cumner's Son when all was told, Pango Dooni said: "If my son be dead where those jackals swarm, it is well he died for his friend. If he be living, then it is also well.
"I will go and tell them," said Cumner's Son gladly, and he made as if to open the door. "Not till dawn," commanded the beggar. "Let them suffer for their sins. We hold the knowledge of life and death in our hands." "But my father, and Tang-a-Dahit, and Pango Dooni." "Are they without sin?" asked the beggar scornfully. "At dawn, only at dawn!" So they sat and waited till dawn.
"A man will ride for a face that he loves, even to the Dreadful Gates," answered Tang-a-Dahit. "But what is this of the men of my clan?" Then the lad told him of those whose heads hung on the rear Palace wall, where the Dakoon lay dying, and why he rode to Pango Dooni. "It is fighting and fighting, naught but fighting," said Tang-a-Dahit after a pause; "and there is no peace.
"By the word of a hillsman, but thou shalt have thy will," said the chief. "We are seven hundred men choose whom to fight." "The oldest or the youngest," answered the man. "Pango Dooni or Cumner's Son." Before the chief had time to speak, Cumner's Son struck the man with the flat of his sword across the breast. The man did not lift his arm, but looked at the lad steadily for a moment.
This would be sure not to leave the river till the turn of the tide, two hours after dark, when she was expected to drop down with her cargo of unfortunates, collected at a kind of stockade by a black chief, who was supposed to be working in collusion with a merchant, whose store up the river had been ostensibly started for dealing in palm oil, ivory and gold dust with the above chief, a gentleman rejoicing in the name of Quoshay Dooni.
Only Pango Dooni himself was silent, for he was thinking much of what should be done at Mandakan. They came out upon the plateau where the fortress stood, and five hundred mounted men marched past, with naked swords and bare krises in their belts, and then wheeled suddenly and stood still, and shot their swords up into the air the full length of the arm, and called the battle-call of their tribe.
"Let go." "Cut him down!" snarled the voice again. He fired twice quickly. Then he remembered the tribe-call given his father by Pango Dooni. Rising in his saddle and firing again, he called it out in a loud voice. His plunging horse had broken away from two of the murderers; but one still held on, and he slashed the hand free with his sword.
Children of heavenly Mandakan, Pango Dooni has lived at variance with us, but now he is our friend. A strong man should rule in the Palace of Mandakan as my brother and the friend of my people. I speak for Pango Dooni. For whom do you speak?" As he had said, so said all the people in the Hall of the Heavenly Hours, and it was taken up with shouts by the people in the Palace yard.
So I told the Dakoon, and I told him also that Boonda Broke was ready to steal into his Palace even before he died. He started up, and new life seemed given him. Calling his servants, he clothed himself, and he came forth and ordered out his troops. He bade me take my men to keep the road against Pango Dooni.
At the Residency another thousand men encamped, with a hundred hillsmen and eighty English, under the command of Tang-a-Dahit and McDermot. By the Fountain of the Sweet Waters, which is over against the Tomb where the Dakoon should sleep, another thousand men were patrolled, with a hundred hillsmen, commanded by a kinsman of Pango Dooni.
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