Leopard asked, “Ra-Marânge, for what reason do you laugh?” He replied, “I laugh, because this matter is a small affair. You, Njĕgâ, so big and strong, you do not know this little thing!” Leopard acknowledged, “Yes: I have not been able to find it out.” Ra-Marânge said, “Tell me the names of your friends.” Leopard answered “I have no friends. Nkambi dislikes me, Nyare refuses me, Ngowa the same. Of all animals, none are friendly to me.” Ra-Marânge said, “Not so; think exactly; think again.” Leopard was silent and thought; and then said, “Yes, truly, I have one friend, Ntori.” The Doctor said, “But, look! If you find a friend, it is not well to tell him all the thoughts of your heart. If you tell him two or three, leave the rest. Do not tell him all. But, you, Njĕgâ, you consider that Ntori is your friend, and you show him all the thoughts of your heart. But, do you know the heart of Ntori, how it is inside? Look what he does! If you let him know that you are going next day to kill this and that, then he starts out at night, and goes to inform those animals, ‘So-and-so, said Njĕgâ; but, be you on your guard.’ Now, look! if you wish to be able to kill other animals, first kill Ntori.” Leopard was surprised, “Ngâ! (actually) Ntori lies to me?” Ra-Marânge said, “Yes.”
So, Leopard returned to his town. And he sent a child to call Rat. Rat came.
Leopard said, “Ntori! these days you have not come to see me. Where have you been?” Rat replies, “I was sick.” Leopard says, “I called you today to sit at my table to eat.” Rat excused himself, “Thanks! but the sickness is still in my body; I will not be able to eat.” And he went away.
Whenever Rat visited or spoke to Leopard, he did not enter the house, but sat on a chair by the door. Leopard daily sent for him; he came; but constantly refrained from entering the house.
Leopard says in his heart, “Ntori does not approach near to me, but sits by the door. How shall I catch him?” Thinking and thinking, he called his wife, and said, “I have found a plan by which to kill Ntori. Tomorrow, I will lie down in the street, and you cover my body with a cloth as corpses are covered. Wear an old ragged cloth, and take ashes and mark your body, as in mourning; and go you out on the road wailing, ‘Njĕgâ is dead! Njĕgâ, the friend of Ntori is dead!’ And, for Ntori, when he shall come as a friend to the mourning, put his chair by me, and say, ‘Sit there near your friend.’ When he sits on that chair, I will jump up and kill him there.” His wife replies, “Very good!”
Next morning, Leopard, lying down in the street, pretended that he was dead. His wife dressed herself in worn-out clothes, and smeared her face, and went clear on to Rat’s village, wailing “Ah! Njĕgâ is dead! Ntori’s friend is dead!” Rat asked her, “But, Njĕgâ died of what disease? Yesterday, I saw him looking well, and today comes word that he is dead!” The wife answered, “Yes: Njĕgâ died without disease; just cut off! I wonder at the matter—I came to call you; for you were his friend. So, as is your duty as a man, go there and help bury the corpse in the jungle.” Rat went, he and Leopard’s wife together. And, behold, there was Leopard stretched out as a corpse! Rat asked the wife, “What is this matter? Njĕgâ! is he really dead?” She replied, “Yes: I told you so. Here is a chair for you to sit near your friend.”
Rat, having his caution, had not sat on the chair, but stood off, as he wailed, “Ah! Njĕgâ is dead! Ah! my friend is dead!”
Rat called out, “Wife of Njĕgâ! Njĕgâ, he was a great person: but did he not tell you any sign by which it might be known, according to custom, that he was really dead?” She replied, “No, he did not tell me.” (Rat, when he thus spoke, was deceiving the woman.) Rat went on to speak, “You, Njĕgâ, when you were living and we were friends, you told me in confidence, saying, ‘When I, Njĕgâ, shall die, I will lift my arm upward, and you will know that I am really dead.’ But, let us cease the wailing and stop crying. I will try the test on Njĕgâ, whether he is dead! Lift your arm!”
Leopard lifted his arm. Rat, in his heart, laughed, “Ah! Njĕgâ is not dead!” But, he proceeded, “Njĕgâ! Njĕgâ! you said, if really dead, you would shake your body. Shake! if it is so!” Leopard shook his whole body. Rat said openly, “Ah! Njĕgâ is dead indeed! He shook his body!” The wife said, “But, as you say he is dead, here is the chair for you, as chief friend, to sit on by him.” Rat said, “Yes: wait for me; I will go off a little while, and will come.” Leopard, lying on the ground, and hearing this, knew in his heart, “Ah! Ntori wants to flee from me! I will wait no longer!” Up he jumps to seize Rat, who, being too quick for him, fled away. Leopard pursued him with leaps and jumps so rapidly that he almost caught him. Rat got to his hole in the ground just in time to rush into it. But his tail was sticking out; and Leopard, looking down the hole, seized the tail.
Rat called out, “You have not caught me, as you think! What you are holding is a rootlet of a tree.” Leopard let go of the tail. Rat switched it in after him, and jeered at Leopard, “You had hold of my tail! And you have let it go! You will not catch me again!” Leopard, in a rage, said, “You will have to show me the way by which you will emerge from this hole; for, you will never come out of it alive!”