“I’m the queen.”
Sanders looked at her anxiously. To women in his country he had
conscientious objections; mad women he barred.
“I’m the queen,” she repeated, evidently pleased with the sensation she
had created. “My! I never thought I should be a queen. My grandfather
used to be a gardener of Queen Victoria’s before he came to N’York–“
“But–” said the staggered Commissioner.
“It was like this,” she rattled on. “When Toby was in Philadelphia at the
theological seminary I was a help at Miss Van Houten’s–that’s the
boarding house–an’ Toby paid a lot of attention to me. I thought he was
joshin’ when he told me he was going to be a king, but he’s made good all
right. And I’ve written to him every week, and he’s sent me the money to
come along–“
“Toby?” said Sanders slowly. “Who is Toby?”
“Mr. Tobolaka–King Tobolaka,” she said.
A look of horror, which he did not attempt to disguise, swept over the
face of the Commissioner. “You’ve come out to marry him–a black man?” he
gasped.
The girl flushed a deep red. “That’s my business,” she said stiffly. “I’m
not asking advice from you. Say, I’ve heard about you–your name is mud
along this old coast, but I’m not afraid of you. I’ve got a permit to go
up the Isisi, and I’m going.”
She was on her feet, her arms akimbo, her eyes blazing with anger, for,
womanlike, she felt the man’s unspoken antagonism.
“My name may be mud,” said Sanders quietly, “and what people say about me
doesn’t disturb my sleep. What they would say about me if I’d allowed you
to go up-country and marry a black man would give me bad nights. Miss
Tavish, the mail-boat leaves in an hour for Sierra Leone. There you will
find a steamer to take you to England. I will arrange for your passage
and see that you are met at Southampton and your passage provided for New
York.”
“I’ll not go,” she stormed; “you don’t put that kind of bluff on me. I’m
an American citizeness and no dud British official is going to boss
me–so there!”
Sanders smiled. He was prepared to precipitate matters now, to violate
treaties, to create crises, but he was not prepared to permit what he
regarded as an outrage. In turn she bullied and pleaded; she even wept,
and Sanders’s hair stood on end from sheer fright.
To make the situation more difficult, a luxurious Isisi canoe with twenty
paddlers had arrived to carry her to the city, and the headman in charge
had brought a letter from her future lord welcoming her in copper-plate
English. This letter Sanders allowed the man to deliver. In the end,
after a hasty arrangement, concluded by letter with the captain of the
boat, he escorted Millie Tavish to the beach.
She called down on his head all the unhappiness her vocabulary could
verbalise; she threw with charming impartiality the battle of Bannockburn
and Bunker’s Hill at his stolid British head. She invoked the shades of
Washington and William Wallace.
“You shall hear of this,” she said as she stepped into the surf-boat.
“I’m going to tell the story to every paper.”
“Thank you!” said Sanders, his helmet in his hand. “I feel I deserve it.”
He watched the boat making a slow progress to the ship and returned to
his bungalow.
Bosambo Of The River (1914)
CHAPTER IV
THE FALL OF THE EMPEROR
“My poor soul!” said the Houssa captain. He looked down into the
long-seated chair where Sanders sprawled limply. “And is the owdacious
female gone?” asked the soldier.
“She’s gone,” said Sanders.
The Houssa clapped his hands, not in applause but to summon his orderly.
“Ahmet,” he said gravely, speaking in Arabic, “mix for the lord Sandi the
juice of lemons with certain cunning ingredients such as you know well;
let it be as cool as the hand of Azrael, as sweet as the waters of Nir,
and as refreshing as the kisses of houris–go with God.”
“I wish you wouldn’t fool,” said Sanders, irritated.
“This is a crisis of our affairs,” said Hamilton the Houssa. “You need a
tonic. As for myself, if this had happened to me, I should have been in
bed with a temperature. Was she very angry?”
Sanders nodded.
“She called, me a British loafer and a Jew in the same breath.
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