"Well, what is it?" asked Tom.
"Sah him uncle!" repeated the boy; and then, to Tom's amazement, he rattled off a story of how, some ten days before, he had overheard a conversation between his late master and the interpreter to the expedition.
"Palaver man bad man, sah. Much bad. Talk bad things. Say black man hide; white man walk so." He took a pace or two with head erect, eyes looking straight ahead, and arms straight down his thighs. "White man no see not much; bang! soosh! white man all dead."
Everything he said was illustrated with many strange pantomimic gestures, and Tom was at first puzzled what to make of it all. Then he set himself patiently to question the boy, using the simplest words, and from his answers he put together, bit by bit, a most astonishing story. About a fortnight before, the Portuguese had come with Mbutu from the forest west of the Nyanza, accompanied by an Arab, and had taken up his quarters in a small bungalow not far from rail-head. He was in and out all day, engaged in some mysterious business which the boy had never succeeded in fathoming, while the Arab had disappeared on their arrival in Kisumu. One hot night Mbutu, feeling restless and unable to sleep, went outside the bungalow with a pipe of his master's which he intended to smoke. He was fumbling in his loin-cloth for a match, when he saw a figure slinking cautiously towards him. His movements were so stealthy and furtive that Mbutu's curiosity was at once aroused. Unfortunately for the stranger, who clearly wished to escape observation, the moon was high, and Mbutu, concealed by a friendly post in the compound, watched him steal up to the bungalow, enter quietly, and shut the door. The boy, avoiding the patches of moonlight, crept round the veranda with the noiselessness of a cat till he came to a half-open window. A lamp was burning in the room, throwing a long beam of light into the darkness without, and in skirting this bright zone the boy tripped over an empty wooden crate from which the cook obtained his supply of firewood. The impact of Mbutu's shins against the sharp edges of the crate set the thing creaking, but the noise was drowned by the yelp of a jackal in a nullah hard by, and after a few moments of anxious suspense Mbutu breathed again. He peeped cautiously round the edge of the window. The room was empty, but as the light had not been removed Mbutu concluded that his master would soon return. This proved to be the case, for in less than a minute the Portuguese appeared, moved quickly to the window, and lifted the iron rod as though to close it. But the night was so hot that he changed his mind, comfort prevailing over caution. He left the window as it was, and simply lowered the blind. Then, turning to the door, he beckoned his visitor into the room. A thin beam of light still filtered between the bottom of the blind and the window-sill, and Mbutu's sharp eyes noticed that the sill was wide, projecting some inches from the wall. He saw that under this he could lie without fear of detection, and probably hear all that passed inside. So he crept beneath the shelter of the sill, and strained his quick ears.
For a time he could make out little of what the two men were saying. Then their voices rose, they became "much jolly", as he said, after the Portuguese had produced a flask of his own special brandy, and Mbutu heard every word distinctly. They were discussing a plan concerted between them during the journey to Kisumu, and congratulating each other on its success. The Arab, apparently, was connected with the chief against whom the punitive expedition was directed, and the dago having reasons of his own for desiring its failure, they had put their heads together. The result of their scheming was that the Arab had somehow got himself recommended to Captain Lister, the intelligence-officer of the expedition, as interpreter and guide, his real intention being to lead it into an ambush, cunningly devised between the chief and the Portuguese. The European officers were to be killed by picked marksmen in the first moments of confusion and the plotters hoped to lay their trap so carefully that not a soul would escape. What his master's motives were Mbutu had been unable to discover, though he had heard a mysterious reference to a store of ivory and a run of slaves. After a time the "special brandy" began to take effect, and both the men fell asleep. The light went out, and Mbutu stole away.
Tom only pieced this together by degrees. When the meaning of it all was clear to him, he gave a long whistle and stood staring at the black boy. Suddenly a suspicion flashed across his mind as he remembered what he had read of the imaginativeness of the African native and his genius for inventing fairy tales.
"You're not making this up?" he said sternly. "Why didn't you tell all this before the expedition started?"
Mbutu spread out his hands.
"What for good?" he said. "Me tell? White man say 'Bosh! Liar! Get out!'" He shook his fist and lifted his foot with the accuracy of long experience. "Mbutu no lub kiboko. White man all same for one."
He pointed expressively to the scars and weals left on his shoulders by his recent thrashings with the kiboko.