Just as Barega reached his place a man came dashing up the village from the northern gate, never pausing till he stood before the chief. It was one of the principal scouts. In breathless haste he stated that he had learned that a strong Arab force was advancing through the forest. It was bent on some great enterprise, for the caravan included thousands of slaves, carrying all the paraphernalia of a camp and large stores of provisions. It was by this time only twelve marches away, and was coming steadily in the direction of the village. The news went through the assembly in an instant, and silenced every tongue. The medicine-man straightened himself, and with something of his former assurance proclaimed that the white man was accountable, and that unless he were expelled or slain the village would fall an easy prey to the enemy. He evidently welcomed the diversion, and was preparing for a long harangue, when Tom, advancing, stilled the gathering murmurs with an imperious gesture.
"Chief," he said, "heed not what the medicine-man says. It is a trial of strength between our magic to-day; if his medicine proves the stronger, turn me out or slay me; but if mine, then I promise you I will not leave you till we have made a good account with your Arab foes. I know the Arabs; I have fought them; I have been a prisoner among them and escaped; I saved you from them. Is it a bargain?"
Loud shouts of assent broke from the whole company, and the chief, with a dignified inclination of the head, said: "It shall be so." Then, amid breathless silence, the trial of strength commenced.
Tom had resolved from the outset that he would make no attempt to persuade the natives that Mabruki's medicine was mere vanity and hollowness. Superstitions generations old could not be banished in a night. His object was to show, not that the medicine did not exist, but that it was poor medicine, quite unworthy of an important village, and not to be compared with the medicine he himself had at command. He began with a short speech in which he recited the history of the affair up to the present, finding it rather difficult to get on without the interpreting aid of Mbutu, who was not at hand. He laid stress on the strange disaster that had befallen the primest cattle, and reminded the people how the medicine-man had professed to discover that he was the cause, if not the agent, of the death of the bulls. If this accusation was merely the outcome of spite and hatred, the Bahima would know how much reliance to place on it. If, however, it were really due to the operation of Mabruki's magic--here Tom turned swiftly toward the medicine-man, and cried: "We shall see what faith can be placed on the words of an ignoramus like this. Bahima and Bairo, look!"
He seized the bell, which the medicine-man had placed on the basket at his feet. Mabruki stood mute and motionless with astonishment as Tom, ringing the bell with the same large gestures as his enemy, began to march round the circle. Before he had walked ten paces Tom found, as he had expected, that by a simple mechanical contrivance the clapper could be fixed at the will of the performer, and the trick had not been discovered only because no one else in the village had dared to touch the magic bell. He walked on solemnly round the circle until he came to the place where Mabruki stood scowling, and then, though he agitated the bell with more than ordinary violence, not a sound came from it.
Tom surprises Mabruki
There was for a moment a silence as of death. Then a low growl rumbled round the throng. The katikiro laughed, the chief frowned ominously, as Tom, keeping a wary eye on Mabruki, flung the bell contemptuously at his feet. The medicine-man was livid with wrath. The scorn of his enemy, the murmurs of the spectators, the despiteful usage of his fetish, whose terrors were now gone for ever, were too much for him. With a snarl of rage the burly negro hurled himself at Tom, aiming a vicious blow at him with a strangely-carved fetish staff he carried in his hand. It was the very move Tom had intended to provoke; if only Mabruki could be goaded to attack him he was confident of the issue. His confidence appeared to be shared by Msala, who, alone of that vast throng, seemed to be excited rather with suppressed merriment than with any emotion of doubt or fear. The crowd gazed open-mouthed, for Mabruki was to all appearance easily able to overpower the slim stripling opposed to him. But as the big man lurched forward Tom stepped nimbly aside and evaded the blow. Before Mabruki could recover he found his wrist firmly grasped, and was jerked sharply forward, his elbow being gripped as in a vice by Tom's left hand. Then Tom brought into play a trick of Japanese wrestling he had learnt from a ship's engineer, who had taken advantage of visits to the island empire to make a study of methods unrecognized and unknown in Cumberland and Cornwall. The medicine-man instinctively resisted when he felt the forward pull. Instantly reversing his movement, Tom pushed his opponent's elbow up with the left hand while pulling his hand outwards and downwards with the right. At the same time he placed his leg behind his opponent's knee, and before the astonished magician could realize what was happening, with a sharp jerk he was thrown on to his back, the earth seeming to shake under his seventeen stone of corpulence.
The whole operation had not occupied more than a few seconds. The medicine-man in an African village is rather feared than beloved; he has countless ways of making his dreaded tyranny felt. When, therefore, the people saw the man whose power they had held in awe so rapidly overthrown, apparently without any exertion on the part of his opponent, a great shout of mocking laughter burst from them. The katikiro was bent double with delight, and even Barega's face relaxed its habitual gravity, Mabruki, with no breath left in his unwieldy body, thoroughly cowed, was in no condition to renew the attack. He still lay upon the ground as Tom explained that he had turned Mabruki's medicine upon him, and shown that white medicine had enabled himself to do what no other man among them, not even the strongest, could have accomplished. Mabruki had brought his humiliation upon himself.
"But this," he added, "is mere trifling. In my country we leave such simple things to the children. If you wish to see what the white man's magic is like, pay heed to what I am about to do. And I warn you, be satisfied with that, lest worse befall."