THE CHILD OF SACRIFICE
Out of the waste came a long, low wail of infinite weariness. It was like the cry of a little child in pain. The Government steamer was drifting at the moment. Her engine had stopped whilst the engineer repaired a float which had been smashed through coming in contact with a floating log.
Assistant-Commissioner Sanders, a young man in those days, bent his head, listening. Again the wail arose; this time there was a sob at the end of it. It came from a little patch of tall, coarse elephant grass near the shore.
Sanders turned to his orderly.
"Take a canoe, O man," he said in Arabic, "and go with your rifle." He pointed. "There you will find a monkey that is wounded. Shoot him, that he may suffer no more, for it is written, 'Blessed is he that giveth sleep from pain.'"
Obedient to his master's order, Abiboo leapt into a little canoe, which the Zaire carried by her side, and went paddling into the grass.
He disappeared, and they heard the rustle of elephant grass; but no shot came.
They waited until the grass rattled again, and
Abiboo reappeared with a baby boy in the crook of his arm, naked and tearful.
This child was a first-born, and had been left on a sandy spit so that a crocodile might come and complete the sacrifice.