“The old chap hemmed and hawed, but finally explained that there was no threat implied, merely a friendly contest between rival demons.
“Markley was willing to let it go at that, so that without much further parleying, details were arranged for the exhibition next morning, and we turned in for the night, leaving the niggers dancing and prancing in some kind of a ceremonial outside the hut.
“ ‘Mark,’ I asked, as we were undressing in the dark. ‘You noticed that phonograph in the throne room. How do you expect to make much of an impression when they’re acquainted with such things.’
“ ‘Sound and fury, sound and fury, me lad,’ he chuckled. ‘I’m not expecting to impress the king of Buhu, much. But one must always consider the mob. Whatever Buhu is up to, he’s out to impress the rabble—and so are we. Damn, I wish I had a drink.’
“The next morning we were escorted to the sacred cavern where Buhu did his tricks. It was large, about one hundred feet deep, with a wide, high-arching mouth and appeared to have been caused by erosion at some time when the river bed lay in front of it.
“Here Buhu kept his charms and talismans, most of them in a stinking heap in one corner. There were bones, both human and animal, strange herbs, and charms, of all varieties. The air was rank with unidentifiable stinks. A fire was kept burning at the entrance, with the result that the place was full of smoke most of the time, which, whirling and eddying inside, caused a really ghostly effect.
“At the invitation of the morose witch doctor Markley here set up the mouthpiece of big mouf, the intruder. We rigged some lights from a storage battery and soon had everything in readiness. At the magician’s command the whole population of the village—about three hundred persons—shuffled hesitatingly into the cavern.
“Personally I thought Buhu’s show was pretty poor stuff. It wouldn’t even have made a hit on the variety stage at home. There were a few parlor magic tricks, a clever attempt at group hypnotism which succeeded fairly well with the natives, but left Markley and myself untouched, and a final tableau where Buhu seemed to vanish in a cloud of red smoke, immediately reëntering the cavern through the audience. That was really deserving of applause, but didn’t impress the crowd greatly. Perhaps the trick had grown stale by repetition. It was the climax of the show and Buhu signed for us to begin.
“Markley had placed the apparatus under a dim red light, and with the true showman’s instinct had posed Eta, in her crimson shawl and shoes, beside it. After making a somewhat wobbly salaam to the machinery he immediately got busy, tuning in on a London station with very little amplification, so that just a whisper of sound filled the cave. It was an organ recital. The natives shivered and shifted their positions. As he began cutting in amplification the notes swelled and seemed almost to solidify, the sounds shuddering in the great cave like the wings of an imprisoned bird.
“Even I, who had become well acquainted with the possibilities of the thing, felt the spell. Every note was perfect.