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The warriors of M'tela debouched on the open plain, seemingly without end. The sun glinted from their upraised, polished spears; their ostrich plumes swayed gently as though a wind ruffled a field of sombre grain tassels; the anklets and leg bracelets clashed softly together to produce in the aggregate a rhythmic marching cadence. Their front was nearly a quarter of a mile in width.
"You will be all right with the men I shall leave you. When you feel able to do so, follow on. I'll leave a plain trail." She objected feebly; but immediately, seeing that this would not touch his mood, she asked him the reason of his haste. "I'll tell you," he replied, "about a week distant is a chief named M'tela. Did you ever hear of him?" "M'tela?" she repeated the name thoughtfully.
Nevertheless, M'tela was a large man, amply built, his muscles overlaid by smoother, softer flesh. He possessed dignity without aloofness, a rare combination, and one that invariably indicates a true feeling of superiority. As he moved forward he glanced lazily and good-humouredly to right and left at his people, in the manner of a genial grown-up among small children.
Of the tribes are the Inglishee to which I belong, which is the most powerful of all like your own people of the Kabilagani in this land and also another tribe called the Duyche, only a little less powerful. These two tribes are now at war." "A-a-a-a," observed M'tela interestedly. "One of the Duyche is in your country, oh, King. I have met him and defeated him by my magic.
Time would come when M'tela would ceremoniously bring in his real present assuredly magnificent as beseeming his power. Then, Kingozi knew, he should be able to reciprocate in degree. He could not do so; he could not use his accustomed methods; he could not even exhibit his trump card the deadly wonder of the weapon that could kill at a distance.
Thence shortly appeared other women with huge burdens of firewood carried by means of a strap, after the fashion of the Canadian tump-line; and still others with m'wembe, bananas, yams, eggs, n'jugu nuts, and gourds of smoked milk. Evidently M'tela did not do things by halves. The customary routine of the camp went on.
Winkleman puffed out his chest and protruded his great beard. "This war foolishness!" he mumbled. "Yes, we have much to talk about. Nevertheless," said Kingozi with slight embarrassment, "it is necessary that I do my duty according to my orders. And my orders were much like yours to get the alliance of this M'tela.
Whether it has been transferred from the English, or has been adopted more directly from the babbling of infants, "papa" is perfectly good Swahili. When M'tela addressed Kingozi as "papa" he not only acknowledged him as a guest, but he admitted the white man to the intimacy that exists between equals in rank. M'tela was friendly. Two days passed.
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!
"Short, square men. Very black. Hair that is long and stands out like a little tree." "What do they say?" "Bwana, they speak a language that no man here understands. And this is strange: that they do not come from the direction of Nairobi." "Perhaps they are men from M'tela." "No, bwana, that cannot be, for they carry a barua. They came from a white man."
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