"Where was he? What has he been doing all these months?"
"Faith, I have not got to the bottom of it yet; but so far as I can make out he has been administering a corner of the Congo Free State, raising a regular army, smashing the slave-trade, and taching the negroes something of the blessings of civilization. I mean it, bedad; the padre tould me all he knew, but sure there's a deal more to be tould yet.--Have ye got a cigar, Mr. Barkworth? I forgot my case, and have been wearying for one for three weeks. Hark'e! Those blacks outside are beginning a hullabaloo. I must put a stop to that. Come and see what they're after."
The host of natives who had solemnly escorted Kuboko to the shore of the Great Lake had begun to build fires in the neighbourhood of the bungalow in preparation for camping. The German commandant made a wry face when he saw their intention, and had already sent some of his men to order them to a more convenient distance. The awed silence with which they had looked on at the greeting between Kuboko and his friends had given place to chattering and laughing and singing, and the doctor took pains to impress upon them that the noise would disturb Kuboko's rest. His expostulation was effectual; they ate their evening meal in comparative silence.
It was long past midnight before any of the Europeans retired to rest. Seated in the largest room of the German commandant's bungalow, Sir John Burnaby and his party listened while the padre told of his discovery of Tom. Never before had Mr. Barkworth so keenly felt the drawbacks he suffered through want of familiarity with French. He would not allow the padre's story to be interrupted by any attempt at interpretation, but listened with a painful effort to follow it, and got Lilian, tired as she was, to give it privately in outline afterwards. But he there and then vowed that one of his first duties on reaching home would be to agitate for the compulsory teaching of conversational French, and decided to found a prize at his old school for proficiency in the subject.
Father Chevasse told how, as he was returning by easy stages from a visit to a mission-station at the upper end of Lake Tanganyika, he had heard vague rumours of battles fought far to the north between the Arabs and a confederation of negroes under the leadership of a white man. As he proceeded, the stories became more and more circumstantial and the details more and more extraordinary. He learnt that the intrepid commander was quite young, a man of marvellous powers, able to turn lakes into engines of destruction, and to bring fire out of the heavens. Such stories, even after he had made all allowances for the natives' exuberant imagination, awakened his curiosity; and suddenly it occurred to him that, improbable as it seemed, the white man might be no other than the long-lost Tom. "Nothing British surprises me," he interpolated with a smile. He hastened his march, made diligent enquiry at every village through which he passed, and by and by encountered people who had actually formed part of the confederacy and fought under the stranger's command. The information given by them did but strengthen his growing conviction, and when he at last, under the guidance of a Muhima, reached Mwonga's village, he was rejoiced to find that his surmise was correct. Almost the first person he saw on entering the stockade was Mbutu, who ran up to him, threw himself at his feet, and broke out into ejaculations of delight mingled with entreaty. He was led to a hut in the centre of the village, and there saw Tom, lying on a couch covered with clean linen--Tom indeed, but the pale shadow of his former self. Bit by bit the padre learnt from one and another the story of his deeds, from his capture by the Arabs to the final destruction of their island fortress. After that noteworthy event every vestige of the stronghold had been burnt or razed to the ground. A search was made for the treasure which rumour attributed to the Arabs, and beneath the flooring of Rumaliza's house, in cellars extending for many yards under the surface of the soil, had been discovered an immense hoard, the accumulation of many years--hundreds of ivory tusks worth untold gold. The few Arabs who had survived the fight had been sent eastwards under escort, and their Manyema dependants disbanded. Many of these threw in their lot with the conquerors. Then the Bahima force had started on its return journey, bringing the captured treasure in triumph to the village.
Tom's wound had become more and more painful, and though he tried at first to walk with his men, he found himself obliged, after one day, to give up the attempt, and was carried for the rest of the way in a litter. On the journey he had talked long and earnestly with the katikiro and other officials, suggesting and advising them as to their movements and the future government of the village in case he died. They had only reached the village two days before the missionary's arrival, and, at Mbutu's entreaty, the katikiro was arranging to despatch messengers to the shore of the Victoria Nyanza with a request for help. The padre at once sent off one of his own attendants under a strong escort to Bukoba, the nearest European station, and the German commandant had forwarded the message immediately to Kisumu.
"My own knowledge and skill in surgery is but slight," added the missionary, "but I did what I could until our friend Dr. O'Brien arrived."
"He extracted the bullet," said the doctor; "capitally too. It was an ugly wound."
"And Tom bore the pain with marvellous fortitude. Happily, he sank into unconsciousness before I had completed my task, and never so much as murmured when he awoke to the full sense of his agony and helplessness. I made arrangements at once to convey him here, and the villagers, whose devotion to him transcends anything I have ever before seen in the natives, of their own accord organized the procession which you have just witnessed. We were already half-way here when Dr. O'Brien reached us, and his skill completed what my clumsier hands had begun. I have given you only a sketch of what this young hero has been able, under God's mercy, to accomplish; indeed, I am not able to fill in all the details, for Tom himself has been too ill to talk, and is, besides, very reticent about his own actions. One fact stands out pre-eminent, and no distrust of native stories can explain it away. He has stamped out a pestilent gang of slave-raiders, and may with a whole heart sing 'Magnificat!' And though we dare not be so sanguine as to expect that the lessons of self-sacrifice, courage, justice, brotherly kindness, he has by his example taught the natives, will never be effaced from their minds, yet they must bear fruit, and certainly he has prepared the way for me and my brethren, Catholic or Protestant. You have a nephew to be proud of, Sir John."
Next morning, the commandant, who had considerately effaced himself on the previous night, resumed his autocratic air, and told the assembled natives bluntly that he would be delighted to see the last of them. In their wholesome dread of the Wa-daki, they took the very broad hint and prepared to return to their remote wilds.