“Yau! What gun, Baas?”
Sonnenberg nearly choked with fury, and made a step forward as though to strike the Kaffir. The latter, however, moved not a muscle, standing there as imperturbably as though there were no infuriated white man within a mile of him.
“Look here!” stuttered the Jew, “if you don’t drop this infernal fooling I’ll—I’ll—kill you. Didn’t you tell me you had got the gun all right? Didn’t you?”
“Childlike and bland” hardly expresses the mild open reproachfulness which sat upon Tom’s broad and sable countenance. He shook his head with a pleasant smile.
“Nay what, Baas. I said no word about any gun. You asked me if I got what I wanted, and I replied that I did.”
The Jew fairly danced; to the vast but veiled amusement of his retainer, who would have a delicious incident to relate from kraal to kraal, from hut to hut, in his wanderings for many a long day; for Kaffirs are keen mimics, and the reproduction of Sonnenberg in his wrath would throw crowds into roaring, rolling, riotous laughter, whenever he should feel like bringing it forth.
“You damnable black scoundrel!” hissed the Jew. “Give me back my money, and then go—g-go to hell.”
“Nay what, Baas. You gave me some money to buy a gun, and now you ask it back. Besides, I have not got it. My brother Ndimbi is taking care of it.”
“I’ll have you both in the tronk for theft. You’ll get five years at least, the pair of you infernal thieves.”
“Theft? Thieves?” repeated the Kaffir, in magnificent surprise. “Au! You are joking, Baas. Did you not give me money to buy a gun with, and tell me even where I could most likely get it? My brother Ndimbi was by, and heard it all. And now you ask for it back again. Nay, Baas, I can’t return it, for Ndimbi has it. I owe him nearly all of it, so as I could not get a gun I thought I had better pay it.”