“In two or three days, Kalulu, thou wilt be as well-dressed as any son of an Arab in Zanzibar; but now I must show thee my mother and my home. When we are outside the city thou canst tell us thy story.”
In half an hour they were in the country; and Kalulu, when requested to begin, said:
“I went out to look for game, and coming to the forest I saw smoke, and men wearing Arab clothes. I went to their camp when I found they were Arabs, not thinking they could act as they did. They spoke me fair at first; but while I was seated alongside of the chief his men sprang on me, and they chained me. I struggled hard at first, but they hurt me and abused me as if they meant to kill me. We travelled that night through the forest, and every night until we came to Unyanyembe, where we were kept in a house in a dark room. After a few days we began another journey, which ended at this sea. On coming to the island the chief put me to work in the field; but they could not get me to work. They beat and beat me every day; but I would not work, and the chief, finding he could do nothing with me, sent me with many more to be sold. That is the story.”
“Dost thou know that thou art my slave now, Kalulu? But when I was a slave of thine thou didst set me free and protect me by making me thy brother. I do the same to thee now. Thou art free, and I shall be a brother to thee, and my mother shall be thy mother,” said Selim.
“And mine too, Kalulu,” said Abdullah; “Selim shall not keep thee all to himself. My mother wants to see thee. And here we are at my mother’s house, to which I ask thee to come now.”
In a few moments they were at the door, and Abdullah invited Selim and Kalulu to walk in. They were led up a flight of stairs, and presently stood in an ante-chamber. Leaving their slippers outside, Abdullah ushered his two friends into a spacious saloon, close to the walls of which ran a luxurious divan, covered with soft silken carpeting, the like of which Kalulu had never dreamed of before; the floor was also covered with Persian carpets of great thickness.
“Ah, Kalulu, my house is not so grand as Selim’s; but it is better than most Arab houses,” said Abdullah. “Stay here a moment until I go to prepare my mother.”
Abdullah was not gone long before he returned with his mother, whose face was veiled by a thin muslin gauze, but who, on seeing that the stranger was but a boy, threw off the veil and advanced towards him, and began to thank him in the sweetest tones he ever heard. She also told him to make the house his home whenever he liked, or whenever Selim could spare him, and after saying all that was required of her to say by her son, she vanished into her own room.
After his mother had gone, Abdullah said: “Thou seest, Kalulu, that our women have customs different from thine. Wert thou a man, thou shouldst never have seen her face? Yet thou art such a big boy now, my mother is even afraid of thee. However, whatever my mother failed to tell thee, her son says. Thou art welcome: come early or late, thou must consider all my mother or I have at thy service. These are the words of my mother and of myself.”
“Thou hast done with Kalulu for the present, Abdullah. Come thou with us to my mother,” said Selim.