“It can be done,” I said quietly. “We two are here to do it.”
This kind of talk was jolly difficult for me, chiefly because of Stumm’s asides in German to the official. I had, above all things, to get the credit of knowing no German, and, if you understand a language well, it is not very easy when you are interrupted not to show that you know it, either by a direct answer, or by referring to the interruption in what you say next. I had to be always on my guard, and yet it was up to me to be very persuasive and convince these fellows that I would be useful. Somehow or other I had to get into their confidence.
“I have been for years up and down in Africa—Uganda and the Congo and the Upper Nile. I know the ways of the Kaffir as no Englishman does. We Afrikanders see into the black man’s heart, and though he may hate us he does our will. You Germans are like the English; you are too big folk to understand plain men. ‘Civilize,’ you cry. ‘Educate,’ say the English. The black man obeys and puts away his gods, but he worships them all the time in his soul. We must get his gods on our side, and then he will move mountains. We must do as John Laputa did with Sheba’s necklace.”
“That’s all in the air,” said Stumm, but he did not laugh.
“It is sober common sense,” I said. “But you must begin at the right end. First find the race that fears its priests. It is waiting for you—the Mussulmans of Somaliland and the Abyssinian border and the Blue and White Nile. They would be like dried grasses to catch fire if you used the flint and steel of their religion. Look what the English suffered from a crazy Mullah who ruled only a dozen villages. Once get the flames going and they will lick up the pagans of the west and south. This is the way of Africa. How many thousands, think you, were in the Mahdi’s army who never heard of the Prophet till they saw the black flags of the Emirs going into battle?”
Stumm was smiling. He turned his face to the official and spoke with his hand over his mouth, but I caught his words. They were: “This is the man for Hilda.” The other pursed his lips and looked a little scared.
Stumm rang a bell and the lieutenant came in and clicked his heels. He nodded towards Peter. “Take this man away with you. We have done with him. The other fellow will follow presently.”
Peter went out with a puzzled face and Stumm turned to me.
“You are a dreamer, Brandt,” he said. “But I do not reject you on that account. Dreams sometimes come true, when an army follows the visionary. But who is going to kindle the flame?”
“You,” I said.