KABAMBARI
A belt of matted woodland. At the edge, three Belgian officers, in light uniform and white topee, lying prone, and peering cautiously out through glasses. Before them, a wide clearing, with a mud-walled town in the midst, and huge forest-trees beyond. Behind, a few score stalwart Bangala, strewn panting on the ground. Over all, the swarming sunlit haze of tropical Africa.
The gates stand open; peace reigns in Kabambari. But what is peace in Kabambari? Some hundreds of negro slaves are tilling sorghum in the cultivated tract outside the stockaded walls. Their chains clank as they move heavily down the field, dogged by an Arab overseer armed with rifle, scimitar, and whip. The pitiless sun, scorching their bent backs, blackens the scars left by the more pitiless scourge.
In the copse there is a whispered word of command; the negro soldiers spring silently to their feet, line up as best the broken ground permits, and then, at the heels of their white officers, charge out into the sunlight. No yell nor cheer, as they dash towards the open gate; the overseer, ere he can give the alarm, is bayoneted while his finger is on the trigger; the slaves, listless, apathetic, have scarcely time to realize their taskmaster's doom before the thin line has swept past them and through the gates. Then there is a sudden sharp crackle of musketry; cries of startled fear and savage triumph; and by ones and twos and threes, turbaned figures pour out of the far side of the town, a scanty remnant of the Arab garrison. One by one they drop as they cross the open; only a few gain the shelter of the forest. The heirs of Tippu Tib are broken and dispersed. The struggle has been long, the issue doubtful; but now, after years of stern fighting, the great Arab empire, founded upon murder, rapine, and slavery, is scattered to the winds. One thing only is wanting to make this last victory complete. Rumaliza, the Arab commander, Tippu Tib's ablest lieutenant, has escaped the net. Whether to live and build anew the dread fabric raised by his late chief; or whether to die in the gloomy depths of the Great Forest by starvation or disease, or by the poisoned arrow of the Bambute--who can say?
CHAPTER I: Fitting Out an Expedition
The Major--A New Friend--By Rail to Uganda--Dr. O'Brien Introduces Himself--The Major Orders a Retreat--Left Behind
A suit of boating flannels and a straw hat are no doubt a convenient, cool, and comfortable outfit for a July day on the Thames, but they fail miserably to meet the case on an average hot morning in Central Africa. So Tom Burnaby found as he walked slowly through Kisumu, stopping every now and again to mop his face and wish he were well out of it. If his dress had not betrayed him, his undisguised interest in the scene would in itself have bespoken the "griffin" to the most casual observer. The few Europeans whom he met eyed him with looks half of amusement, half of concern. One advanced as if to address him, then repented of the impulse and passed on.
Suddenly his attention was arrested by a noise ahead, gradually increasing in intensity as he approached. "The queerest noise you ever heard in your life," he wrote in a letter to a chum at home. "Imagine some score of huge ginger-beer bottles turned topsy-turvy and the fizz gurgling out, with a glug, glug, glug, and a sort of gigantic fat chuckle at the end,--then more glugging and chuckling, and chuckling and glugging. I was wondering what it meant, when suddenly I came to a huge shed, and then I saw the cause of all the row. About a hundred natives, as black as your hat, their skins shining like polished bronze, were working away at baggage and packages of all sorts, rolling up canvas, packing boxes and bales, tugging at ropes, and all the time jabbering and cackling and laughing and glug-glugging like a cageful of monkeys.
"I stood still and watched them for a minute, and then there was a sudden lull in the uproar, and I heard my old uncle's voice for the first time. There he was, the dear old chap, perched on a pile of ammunition-boxes, and the language he was using was evidently so warm that it was a wonder the whole show didn't blow up. I could only make out a word here and there, most of it was double Dutch to me; but whatever it was, it made those poor black fellows bustle for all they were worth. Then in the middle of his address the old boy suddenly caught sight of my unlucky self. You should have seen the expression on his face! He stopped as if a live shell had pitched into the shed; and--well, what happened then must keep till our next meeting. I could never do justice to the interview in a letter."
To say that Major John Burnaby was surprised at the sudden appearance of his nephew in Kisumu only feebly expresses his state of mind. After a few seconds of speechlessness, his feelings found vent in the deliberate exclamation: