The gorillas in the cage looked at them disappear and tried to get out of the cage to go along, but they couldn’t get out.
Finally Mr. Hagenbach said me, “Hennery, I guess your Pa has got what is coming to him this time. Rastus will probably drag your Pa up a tree and eat him when his appetite comes back, but we can’t help him, so we better haul the cage and the gorillas that have not had any tobacco to camp, and in a day or two we will all come out here and find your father’s bones and bury them.”
And then we all went to camp, and the poor gorillas just remained listlessly in the cage, mourning as though they knew Rastus and his boy were dead. We fed them everything we could spare, but they would not eat, and by watching them we found there was a case of jealousy in the cage, as two male gorillas seemed to be stuck on a young female, and they were scrapping all the time.
Gee, but we needed Pa worse than ever to settle the gorilla dispute, but we all felt that Pa was not of this earth any more, and the camp took on an air of mournfulness, and they all wanted to adopt me, ’cause I was alone in the world. There was not much sleep in camp that night, and the next day we were going out with guns to find Pa’s remains and shoot Rastus, but a little after daylight we heard the night watchman say to the cook, who was building a fire, “Look who’s here, and what do you know about that,” and he called the whole camp up, and we looked out across the veldt and there came Pa astradle of a Zebra, with Rastus’ boy up behind him and Rastus thoroughly subdued, leading the Zebra with a hay rope Pa had twisted out of grass.
The whole camp came to attention and Pa scratched a match on Rastus’ hair and lighted a cigarette, and when he got near enough he said: “Slept in the crotch of a tree all night. Gave Rastus and his boy a drink of whiskey out of my flask and cured them of the tobacco sickness, had some mangoes for breakfast, sent Rastus to catch a Zebra, and here we are ready for coffee and pancakes.”
Pa got off his zebra, opened the door of the cage and pointed to it, and Rastus and his boy got in, and Pa kicked Rastus right where the hair was worn off sitting down, and Rastus looked at Pa as though that was all right and he deserved it. Then Pa closed the door, washed his hands and sat down to breakfast, and when Mr. Hagenbach said, “Old man, you have got Barnum and Forepaugh skinned a mile,” Pa said, “O that is nothing; I have located a marsh full of wild Buffaloes, and we will go out there and get a drove of them in a few days.
“They are the ugliest and fightingest animals in the world, but I will halter break some of them and ride them without any saddle.” Mr. Hagenbach said he believed it, and Pa said, “Hennery, one spell I thought you would be an orphan, but whiskey saved you. When they got a big drink of whiskey they began to laugh, and then fell on my neck and cried, just like a white man when he is too drunk to fight. Well, I am going to take a nap,” and Pa laid down on a bale of hay and slept all day, and the crowd talked about what a hero he was.
CHAPTER XVII.
The Boy’s Experience With an African Buffalo—The Boy’s Pa Shoots Roman Candles to Scare the Buffaloes—The Boy’s Pa Tames the Wild Animals.