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Simba must point thus; and then must start in that direction. Bwana Nyele will follow a few steps. Then Simba will say: 'Many more, bwana, over there only a little distance." Kingozi uttered this last sentence in atrocious Swahili. "You must say it in just that way, like a shenzi. Say it." Simba repeated the words and accent. "Yes, that is it.
"Then at night you waited, and you speared Mavrouki with the shenzi spear, and you left it in his back, for you said to yourself, 'men will think a shenzi has done this thing. Then you went quietly to your fire, and cooked potio, and your own spear was all the time where the askaris were lying." Kingozi paused. He knew without Cazi Moto's whispered assurance that every shot had told.
"A shenzi has killed Mavrouki with a spear," the man answered her question. She stood for some time watching the torches. Then she saw Kingozi himself take his place by the pile of loads. "Fall in!" he commanded sharply. She returned to her tent. "Here!" she addressed the crouching Nubian. "It is as I said. You have been a fool. You have killed a porter by mistake.
"It is important that you make yourself a shenzi. This magic is a bad magic otherwise. Then at the moment I have named, Simba as a shenzi will take this magic bone and hold it out to Bwana Nyele saying nothing. Bwana Nyele will say words, perhaps in Swahili which Simba will understand; perhaps in some other language which he will not understand.
Kingozi whirled and levelled his forefinger at the Nubian. "Why did you use a shenzi spear?" he demanded. Over Chake's face had come the blank, lifeless expression of the obstinate savage. Kingozi recognized it, and knew that further interrogation was a matter of much time and patience. His eyes and head ached cruelly. "Very well," he answered the Nubian's unspoken opposition. "You'll keep.
The next cut above the shenzi, or wild man, is the individual who has been on safari as carrier, or has otherwise been much employed around white men. From this experience he has acquired articles of apparel and points of view. He is given to ragged khaki, or cast-off garments of all sorts, but never to shoes.
I was not in the least alarmed at this somewhat startling announcement, as the Indians called all the natives of the interior of Africa shenzi, or savages; and on looking round I saw five tall, slim Masai approaching in Indian file, each carrying a six-foot spear in his right hand. "Come," he replied, "I will show you many." This filled me with interest at once. "How far away are they?" I asked.
If to-morrow old Stick-in-the-mud drifts around quite on his own, like any other shenzi, and if the women come into camp freely, why then we're all right." "And otherwise?" "Well, if the sultani stays away, and if you don't see any women at all, and if the men are painted and carry their shields they will always carry their spears that won't be so favourable." "In which case we fight?"
After an hour the scouts returned with news of a water-hole where, undoubtedly, the strange safari would camp. All then hurried on. Concealed in a thicket Simba proceeded with great zest to make himself over into a shenzi. In every savage is a good deal of the small boy; so this disguising himself pleased him immensely.
They squatted on their heels below the white man in his chair, and looked up at him with bright, devoted eyes. "Listen," he said. "The matter is this: the Inglishee are at war with the Duyche. Over from the Congo comes a Duyche known as Bwana Nyele. It is his business to reach this shenzi king, M'tela, and persuade M'tela to fight on the side of the Duyche.
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