“Uncle,” he said, “we are like the Hyrax who had to trap the Elephant.” After a pause he added, “The Hyrax did it.”
The Alo Man gave Mpoko a quick glance, pleased and surprised and interested. “What is inside your mind, Mpoko?” he asked.
“This,” said Mpoko. “There is a deep elephant pit on the trail over the mountain to Tswki’s country. The hunters found it when they were chasing the hyrax today. Tswki has much ivory, and the trader loves ivory. He asks about it all the time.”
The Alo Man’s mind began to link itself with Mpoko’s as one monkey swinging through the tree tops catches the paw of another. “Go on, my son,” he said.
“We are a little people,” said Mpoko. “We cannot fight the trader. But Tswki could, and he would do it if he were angry. If the trader came to take his ivory, Tswki would be very angry. The trader has many men to serve him. But if they were in the elephant pit, they could not serve him.”
“Eh-eh-eh-eh!” chuckled the Alo Man, as a plan dawned upon him. “You are as wise as the very old Hyrax himself. Go now to sleep, or your head in the morning will be as white as his.”
Mpoko was not sure whether the Alo Man really thought his ideas worth anything, or not. But on the next day there was another and a better palaver, and a plan was worked out by the chief and the Alo Man and the wisest of the old men, in which Mpoko, as was only right, had a chance to do his part.
Word went out to all the friendly villages to watch the river for any sign of strange boats or men. When the Arab trader came back from the market, the river villages knew exactly what they were going to do.
The Arab had planned to take each village by itself, beginning with this one, attack the people suddenly by night, kill all who were not able to travel, and send the others down with a guard to the place where his boat was waiting. Before the news of the raids had gone out so that the people of the country could resist him, he would be away.
But now he began to hear stories of a chief on the other side of the mountain who had much ivory. Slaves, in the trade slang, were called “black ivory,” but this ivory was the real kind—solid elephant tusks. It struck the trader that if he could get this ivory and make his new slaves carry it, this would turn out to be a very profitable trip indeed.