Samba: A Story of the Rubber Slaves of the Congo

by Herbert Strang

CHAPTER XIV

Lokolobolo's First Fight

"I am afraid we are in for it now," said Jack, as he sat with Barney, when the camp had become quiet, discussing the situation. "Elbel will know well enough who played the bogie, and he has now another grievance against me. I wonder what he will do."

"I would not disthress meself about it at all, sorr," said Barney. "He had a peep at a Pepper's ghost widout paying for a ticket, and 'tis himself that ought to be plased."

"Don't you ever have a fit of the dumps, Barney? You seem to live always in the top of spirits."

"What would be the good uv doing anything else, sorr? I've too little flesh on me bones now; what would I be if I grizzled?"

"I'm glad enough, I assure you. I don't know what I should have done without you. Uncle little imagined what he was leaving me to. Do you think anything has happened to him? It is three months since he went away, and five weeks since I had any news of him. I am getting anxious."

"'Tis true he is behind, like the cow's tail, sorr. An 'tis meself can explain it. Ye see, sorr, I've noticed wan thing about these niggers. Time is not much to an Irishman, to be sure, but 'tis less than nothing to a nigger. They don't keep count uv the days; an almanac would be clean beyond them; and 'tis my belief Nando has just put the master back a month, sorr, unbeknown."

"That's an original explanation, at any rate. But by Jove! here's Samba again. What does he want now?"

"Him say mudder lib for plenty sick, sah," said Lepoko, called in to interpret. "Mudder plenty tired fust; muss stand all de night in hut; no gib no food; her no can go no more; tumble down in forest. Samba say please massa, let fader and mudder come; please, please, massa, please, massa, him say please massa plenty too much all time."

"We must have them in, I suppose," said Jack, unable to resist the appeal in Samba's eyes and gestures. "I didn't want them here, they only add to our dangers and difficulties. Let him fetch them, Lepoko; he must be careful; if they are captured again they are sure to be shot."

Samba's face shone with delight. He scampered away. An hour passed before he returned. Mboyo was carrying his wife in his arms; she was in the last stage of exhaustion. They were given shelter in Lepoko's hut; and that night, when Samba curled himself up to sleep with Pat, for the first time for many weeks he was a happy boy.

Jack had but just finished his breakfast next morning when a note was brought him from Elbel.

MONSIEUR,—

On m'a fait informer que les deux individus échappés de ce village sont a présent réfugiés dans votre camp. J'ai l'honneur de vous sommer de rendre ces individus immédiatement, en outre le petit garçon dont j'ai déjà demandé la reddition. Au cas que lesdits sujets de PEtat du Congo ne soient pas ramenés dans ce village avant midi cejourd'hui, je serai obligé de faire à leur égard des démarches qui me sembleront bonnes.

Agréez, monsieur, l'assurance de ma
considération distinguée,
ELBEL,
Agent de la Société cosmopolite
du Commerce du Congo.

"What do you think of this, Barney? He says he's been told that the two persons who escaped from Ilola are now in my camp. He has the honour to request that I will give them up at once. Listen: 'In case the said subjects of the Congo State are not brought back to this village by noon to-day, I shall be compelled to take such steps in regard to them as may seem to me good.' Very precise and formal. My answer shall be a little shorter."

He lost no time in penning his reply. He wrote:

SIR,—

The three people you mention are with me. I shall be glad to learn the offence with which they are charged, and by what authority you take it upon yourself to try them and punish them.

Yours truly,
JOHN CHALLONER.

"We shall get no answer to that, Barney."

But he was mistaken. A second note was brought him in which Elbel refused to explain or justify his actions to Monsieur Challoner. He was responsible to his Société and to the administration of the Free State. He repeated his threat that at twelve o'clock, failing compliance with his demand, he would take steps to recover the fugitives, and concluded by saying that Monsieur Challoner must be answerable for the consequences.

"The fat's in the fire now, sorr," said Barney, when Jack had translated this letter to him. "I suppose you'll just say 'Go and be hanged' in answer to that?"

"No. I shan't answer it on paper. The crisis has come at last, Barney. I couldn't attack Elbel yesterday and be responsible for the first blow. But things are changed now. His action in regard to these poor people is sheer persecution; they've sought my protection, and no Englishman that I ever heard of has given up a wretch fleeing from persecution. We'll have to stand firm now, Barney. Elbel shan't get hold of them if I can prevent it."

"I'm wid ye, sorr, heart and soul. Sure an Irishman is not the man to stand by and see poor people ill-treated. What'll we do to get ready for him, sorr?"

"You can go and get some of the men to rig up platforms at several points inside the stockade. What a lucky thing it was we taught 'em how to board and floor the huts! Those planks will come in handy now. And stay: set two or three men to bore loopholes in the stockade—not our riflemen; the men who've lost their right hands can manage that, perhaps, with their left if they try. Meanwhile, parade the riflemen. I'll come out to them in a few minutes."

When the men were paraded, Jack felt very proud of his little company. They were all alert, eager, ready. Jack explained to them through Lepoko what the difficulty was.

"I don't want you to fight against your will," he said. "If any man is unwilling to fight he may leave the camp if he chooses, or remain and do any other work required. But if he elects to fight he must obey orders, do his best, and never give in. You understand that: never give in!"

The men responded with loud cries of approval. Not a man of them fell out of the ranks. The exercise and drill they had undergone had filled them with military ardour; they were proud of their new accomplishments, and evidently eager to test them in earnest. And the white officials were so well hated that the opportunity of setting one at defiance was in itself a sufficient motive. Jack paid them a compliment on their readiness to serve—the negro dearly loves praise—and after inspecting each man's rifle and ammunition, dismissed them to various duties in the camp until the moment for action arrived.

The day's water supply had scarcely been got in, and there were no vessels at hand for storing a large quantity. The stock of food in the camp was sufficient to keep the whole population for three days on full rations, and might be eked out for a week or more if each man's allowance was reduced. It was inevitable that the idea of a siege should cross Jack's mind, and he foresaw that the difficulty about water would prove serious. Meanwhile, he could at least send out a few men to obtain supplies of food from the chief's other villages. He chose for this errand the men least likely to be useful as fighters, and impressed on them the necessity of avoiding Elbel's men. It would not be long before Elbel had the surrounding country closely patrolled, and then no man would be able to approach without taking his life in his hand. What supplies they should succeed in collecting were to be held concealed in the forest until there was an opportunity of conveying them into the camp without danger.

There were now within his stockade, besides himself and Barney, twenty-two men armed with rifles; the chief Mboyo, with his wife and Samba; fifteen men, ten women, and twenty-five children who had sought asylum with him; and the livestock of the natives—a few goats and fowls. Pat was one by himself. There were rifles for twenty men besides the twenty-two, but the fugitives were too much maimed, or too much reduced in strength by their sufferings, to make it seem worth while to arm them. Four or five, however, had recovered very rapidly, and seemed likely to prove useful recruits. They had at any rate enough reason for fighting well; not only on behalf of their chief, but in memory of their own sufferings. Pending an opportunity of teaching them the use of the rifle, Jack armed them with spears and employed them as sentries. A careful watch was kept to guard against surprise, which was little likely to occur in broad daylight across the wide open space between the two settlements.

Jack awaited with no little anxiety the approach of noon, trying to forecast Elbel's course of action. The Belgian had, so far as he had been able to gather, about sixty men armed with Albini rifles, with probably as many hangers-on; but the natives' conceptions of arithmetic are so vague that this information could not be relied on; the actual number might be larger or smaller. It was not likely that the followers of the forest guards could be utilized as fighting men; but the guards themselves were well armed and full of confidence, for they had become accustomed to lording it over the virtually unarmed and helpless populace from whose forced labour the Congo Free State derives its profits. Jack was quite prepared to find that Elbel, knowing that his opponent's men had but recently been armed, and were not, like his own men, to all intents professional soldiers, would think himself strong enough to rush the camp, especially as, since the day of his arrival, the Belgian had appeared to show no further interest in the force at Jack's disposal.

"Perhaps he thinks we've drilled them merely for parade," he remarked with a smile to Barney. "But I think he'll find we can hold our own. I'm not afraid of a direct attack. But if he tries to starve us out it'll be a different matter. I'm bothered about the water."

"Be aisy, sorr. Whin I was a bhoy me mother often did not know at breakfast time where the supper was coming from; but I only went to bed wance widout it, and that was whin I'd eaten it before the time, and was put to bed early as a punishment."

Soon after twelve o'clock the sentries reported that the white man was approaching from the direction of the village. Jack hastened to the platform near the gate, which he had had barricaded, and saw Elbel at the head of about forty men, at his side a negro bearing a white flag. About fifty yards from the stockade he halted, and formally demanded the surrender of the fugitives. In phrases as formal as his own Jack replied that they would not be given up.

While this brief exchange of courtesies was going on, the sentries stationed on similar platforms within the stockade had turned round with natural curiosity to see what was passing, and withdrew their attention from the ground they were supposed to be watching. All at once Jack felt a tug at his arm, and looking round, saw Samba excitedly pointing to the rear of the camp. A score of Elbel's riflemen were scurrying across the open ground. To Jack's surprise they were headed by a white man in military uniform. Was this the Captain Van Vorst, he wondered, who, Elbel had told him, was coming up the river? Had he to contend with a regular officer of the State as well as an official of the Concession? One thing was clear, that while his attention was being held by the parade of the men in front, an attempt was being made to rush the camp from the rear.

Jack gave no sign of his discovery, but quietly ordered Barney to take ten men with rifles and five with spears and deal with the attackers when their heads or hands appeared above the stockade.

"Keep out of sight until they're upon you," he added in a low tone. "Fifteen men on the platform will be equal to more than double their number trying to scramble over."

He had kept his face turned towards Elbel as he spoke, apparently intent upon a serious consideration of what the Belgian was saying.

"I varn you. Dis is not child's play. Vunce more I say gif up de people; den I interfere no more. I am satisfied. But if you refuse, den I repeat: I will haf de people, and you shall see vat it is to defy de officers of de Free State."

Jack was spared the necessity of replying. A series of yells and cries of pain told that the rear attack had begun. Next moment a couple of shots rang out from the trees behind Elbel, and Jack, whose head just appeared over the stockade, felt one bullet whistle close above his topee, while a second embedded itself beside him in one of the saplings of which the stockade was constructed. Taken in conjunction with the attempted surprise, this was as close an approximation to the methods of an assassin as could well be imagined; and Jack, as he dodged down out of harm's way, felt, not for the first time, that he had to deal with a man who was not only astute but quite unscrupulous.

In less than a minute the attack on the stockade had become general. The assailants showed no want of dash. Perhaps they were encouraged by the impunity with which they had hitherto made their assaults on native villages similarly protected. But the conditions were different now. The defenders were armed with weapons as precise and deadly as those of the attackers themselves. Elbel's men came forward at a rush, in a more or less compact body, and Jack was amply satisfied with the result of his training as his men, at a sign from him, poured a volley through the loopholes bored in the stockade, while the enemy were still a dozen yards distant. Several of them dropped; Jack's men were completely screened from any effectual reply.

The moral effect of white leadership became apparent when the forest guards, scarcely realizing their losses in the excitement of their dash towards the stockade, helped one another to swarm up, many effecting a lodgment on the top. It was at this point that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the defenders of an African village would have flung away their arms and run. But the discipline of the past two months told. At Jack's command, before the enemy on the stockade had made their footing sufficiently sure to enable them to use their weapons, the men within, clubbing their rifles, sprang at them and hurled them to the ground.

Meanwhile Barney, who thanks to Samba's watchfulness had been enabled to forestall the surprise in the rear, had beaten off the attack and sent the enemy scurrying for cover. Leaving only three or four men under Lepoko to watch the position there, Jack was able to bring almost the whole of his force to bear on repelling the main attack. Elbel had greatly reduced his chances of success by detaching a third of his body; and he entirely lost their co-operation, for when they were repulsed by Barney they made no attempt to rally, but simply disappeared from the fight.

Elbel and his men were crouching at the foot of the stockade in temporary security, for in that position the defenders could not bring their rifles to bear upon them. Jack heard him give his men an order; in a few seconds a crowd of black heads again appeared above the stockade, but now some thirty yards from the point where the first assault had been made. With Barney at his right hand Jack led his men to the spot. From his platform he might have shot the attackers down with comparative ease; but he was determined from the first to do his best to avoid bloodshed, never forgetting his uncle's injunction to use rifles only in the last resort. The enemy themselves had no chance of firing, for they no sooner showed their heads above the palisade than they were beset by the defenders. There was a brisk five minutes in which Jack and Barney found plenty to do leading their men wherever the show of heads, hands, and shoulders over the stockade was thickest. Barney was in his element. His rifle fell like a flail, and for every blow that got home he shouted a wild "Hurroo!" which evoked responsive yells from the negroes beside him, catching his enthusiasm. Jack's heart glowed as he saw how stoutly they fought.

It was not until the enemy had made two attempts to mount the stockade that they realized how very different their present task was from the massacre of unresisting men, women, and children that had hitherto represented their idea of fighting. The first repulse merely surprised and enraged them: they could not understand it; they were not accustomed to such a reception; and they yelled forth threats of exacting a terrible vengeance. But when for the second time they found themselves hurled back, they had no heart for further effort. Suddenly Elbel discovered that he was alone, except for one man lying stark beside him; the unwounded had scampered across the open to the shelter of the nearest trees. Some half dozen who had been hit with rifle bullets or clubbed at the palisade, were dragging themselves painfully towards the same shelter.

Jack, watching from his platform, perceived that Elbel was not among the retreating crowd. Was he hurt, he wondered? The next moment, however, he saw the Belgian sprint after his men, bending his head between his shoulders as a boy does to avoid a snowball. Several of Jack's men who had joined him on the platform brought their rifles to the shoulder, and only a curt stern order from Jack to drop their weapons saved Elbel from almost certain death.

"Bedad, thin, 'tis a pity not to let them have their way, sorr," expostulated Barney.

"That may be," replied Jack, "but I'm only on the defensive, remember. We're in no danger for the present; they've had enough of it; it's not for me to continue the fight. I hope Elbel has learnt a lesson and will leave us alone."

"Sure I do not agree wid you at all at all, sorr," said Barney, shaking his head. "To judge by the phiz uv him, Elbel is a disp'rate bad character. And isn't it all his deeds that prove it, with his whips and his forest guards—blagyards I call 'em—and all? Why, sorr, whin ye knocked him down the other day, why didn't he stand up fair and square and have it out wid ye? 'Twas an illigant chance which no gentleman, no Irishman, bedad! would have missed for worlds. Gentleman! 'Tis not the fortieth part uv a gentleman he has anywhere about him. 'Twas not the trick uv a gentleman to try to take ye by the back stairs while he blarneyed ye at the front door. And did he not try to murder ye before the fight began? A dirty trick, sorr; I would have let my men shoot him widout the hundredth part uv a scruple."

Jack was compelled to smile at Barney's honest indignation.

"All you say is very true," he said, "but we couldn't take a leaf out of his book, you know, Barney. Besides, look at it in another way. Suppose we shot Elbel? What would happen to uncle's mining venture? There's another Belgian here—I wonder where he came from. Apparently he has skedaddled. He'd certainly go and report to the authorities what had happened. You may be sure he wouldn't put our side of the case; and even if he did, there's no knowing how the Free State people would twist the evidence. They say the Free State judges are completely under the thumb of the executive. No doubt Elbel himself—who I suppose has to account for the cartridges his men use—will report this fight as a little affair with natives revolting against the rubber collection. He hasn't come well enough out of it to be anxious to call general attention to the matter. We've got off with a few bruises, I'm thankful to say; and we may very well be satisfied to let the quarrel rest there if Elbel takes no further steps."

Barney shook his head.

"Ye're a powerful hand at argyment, sorr," he said, "and ye'd be elected at the top uv the poll if ye stood as mimber uv Parlimint for Kilkenny. But an Irishman niver goes by argyment: he goes by his feelings, and my feeling is that there's no good at all in a man who refuses such an illigant chance uv a stand-up fight."

"Well, he's not altogether a ruffian. Look! there are three of his negroes coming with a flag of truce, to fetch the poor fellow who was killed, I expect. The State officials as a rule look on the negro as so much dirt; but Elbel seems to have some of the instincts of a human being."

"Bedad thin, I wouldn't be surprised if they're cannibals come for their dinner."

"Shut up, Barney. It's too terrible to think of. You'll take away my appetite; here's Samba, coming to tell us, I hope, that dinner's ready."

Jack scanned the neighbourhood. Save for the negroes carrying their dead comrade there was no sign of the enemy. He left two sentries on guard and returned to his hut, hot and famished. The sultry heat of the tropical afternoon settled down over the camp. Outside the stockade all was still; inside, the natives squatted in front of their huts, volubly discussing the incidents of the morning, and watching the antics of Pat, who, having been tied up, much to his disgust, during the fight, was profiting by his liberty to romp with the children.

The victory did not pass unchronicled. Before the negroes retired to rest, one of them had composed a song which will be handed down from father to son and become a tradition of his tribe:—

To the house of the dog
To fight Lokolobolo.
Inglesa was he,
Brave Lokolobolo,
Lion and leopard,
Friend of Imbono,
Chief of Ilola.

Came Elobela,
(Chorus) Yah!
Bad Elobela,
(Chorus) Yo!
To the house of the dog
Came Lokolobolo,
(Chorus) Yah! Yo!
Short was the fight.
Where is he now,
Sad Elobela?
Gone to the forest,
Beating his head,
Hiding his eyes
From Lokolobolo,
Friend of Imbono,
Lion and leopard,
Brave Lokolobolo.