Yet the Ochori people will be sorry, for the curse which you have taken from us you have given to your people, and surely they will rise against you.”

“E-wa!” murmured his counsellors, nodding their heads wisely. “The Ochori will rise against their chief, for he has loosened an evil one in their midst.”

Bosambo rose, for night was falling and he desired to begin the return stage of his journey.

“The Ochori are a very proud people,” he said. “Never have they had a great devil before; the Isisi, the Akasava, the N’Gombi, the Bush folk, and the Lesser Isisi, the Bomongo, the Boungendi–all these tribes have devils in many variety, but the Ochori have had none and they were very sad. Now their stomachs are full of pride for M’shimba-m’shamba, the green one, is with them, roving the forest in which we have loosed him, in a most terrifying way.”

He left the Akasava in a thoughtful mood, and set his State canoe for the juncture of the river.

That night the Akasava chief called together all his headmen, his elders, his chief fighting men and all men of consequence.

The staccato notes of the lokali called the little chiefs of outlying villages, and with them their elder men. From the fourth hour of night till the hour before dawn the palaver lasted.

“O chiefs and people,” said Sekedimi, “I have called you together to tell you of a great happening. For M’shimba-m’shamba, who since the beginning of the world has been the own devil of the Akasava people, is now no longer ours. Bosambo, of the Ochori, has bound him and carried him away.”

“This is certainly a shame,” said one old man; “for M’shimba-m’shamba is our very own devil, and Bosambo is an evil man to steal that which is not his.”

“That is as I think,” said Sekedimi. “Let us go to Sandi, who holds court by the border of the N’Gombi country, and he shall give us a book.”

Sanders was at that time settling a marriage dispute, the principal article of contention being: if a man pays six thousand matakos (brass rods) for a wife, and in the first twelve months of her married life she develop sleeping-sickness, was her husband entitled to recover his purchase price from her father? It was a long, long palaver, requiring the attendance of many witnesses; and Sanders was deciding it on the very common-sense line that any person selling a damaged article, well knowing the same to be damaged, was guilty of fraud. The evidence, however, exonerated the father from blame, and there only remained a question of equity. He was in the midst of the second half of the trial when the chief of the Akasava, with his headman, his chief slave, and a deputation of the little chiefs waited upon him.

“Lord,” said Sekedimi, without preliminary, “we have covered many miles of country and traversed rivers of surprising swiftness; also we encountered terrible perils by the way.”

“I will excuse you an account of your adventures,” said the Commissioner, “for I am in no mood for long palavers. Say what is to be said and have done.”

Thereupon Sekedimi told the story of the filched devil from the beginning, when he had, with a fine sarcasm, presented the Swift Walker to the Ochori.

Now Sanders knew all about M’shimba-m’shamba. Moreover, he knew that until very recently the chief himself was in no doubt as to what the “green one” really was.

It was characteristic of him that he made no attempt to turn the chief to a sense of his folly.

“If Bosambo has taken M’shimba-m’shamba,” he said gravely, “then he has done no more than you told him to do.”

“Now I spoke in jest,” said Sekedimi, “for this devil is very dear to us, and since we can no more hear his loud voice in our forests we are sad for one who is gone.”

“Wait!” said Sanders, “for is this the season when M’shimba-m’shamba walks? Is it not rather midway between the rains that he comes so swiftly? Wait and he will return to you.”

But Sekedimi was in no mood for waiting.

“Master, if I go to Bosambo,” he said, “and speak kindly to him, will he not return the green one?”

“Who knows?” said Sanders wearily. “I am no prophet.”

“If my lord gave me a book–” suggested Sekedimi.

“This is no book palaver,” said Sanders briefly; “but justice between man and man. For if I give you a book to Bosambo, what shall I say when Bosambo asks me also for a book to you?”

“Lord, that is just,” said Sekedimi, and he went his way. With twelve of his principal chiefs he made the journey to the Ochori City, carrying with him gifts of goats and fat dogs, salt and heavy rings of brass.

Bosambo received him ceremoniously, accepted his gifts but declined to favour him.

“Sekedimi,” he said, “I am wax in the hands of my people. I fear to anger them; for they love M’shimba-m’shamba better than they love their goats or their salt or their wives.”

“But no one sees him till the middle time between the rains,” said Sekedimi.

“Last night we heard him,” persisted Bosambo steadily; “very terrible he was, and my people trembled and were proud.”

For many hours the chief of the Akasava pleaded and argued, but without avail.

“I see that you have a heart of brass,” said Sekedimi at length; “therefore, Bosambo, return me the presents I brought, and I will depart.”

“As to the presents,” said Bosambo, “they are dispersed, for swift messengers have carried them to the place where M’shimba-m’shamba sits and have put them where he may find them, that he may know the Akasava remember him with kindness.”

Empty-handed the chief returned.

He sent courier after courier in the course of the next month, without effect. And as time wore on his people began to speak against him. The crops of two villages failed, and the people cursed him, saying that he had sold the ghost and the spirit of fortune.

At last, in desperation, he paid another visit to Bosambo.

“Chief,” he said, when all ceremonies had been observed, “I tell you this: I will give you fifty bags of salt and as much corn as ten canoes can hold if you will return to me our green one. And if your pride resists me, then I will call my spears, though Sandi hang me for it.”

Bosambo was a wise man. He knew the limit of human endurance. Also he knew who would suffer if war came, for Sanders had given him private warning.

“My heart is heavy,” he said. “Yet since you are set upon this matter I will return you M’shimba-m’shamba, though I shall be shamed before my people. Send me the salt and the corn, and when the tide of the river is so high and the moon is nearly full I will find the green one and bring him back to your land.”

Sekedimi went back to his city a happy man. In a week the salt and the corn were delivered and the canoes that brought them carried a message back. On such a day, at such an hour, the green one would be cut loose in the forest of the Akasava. Afterwards, Bosambo would come in state to announce the transfer.

At the appointed time the chief of the Akasava waited by the river beach, two great fires burning behind him to guide Bosambo’s canoe through the night. And behind the fires the population of the city and the villages about stood awed and expectant, biting its knuckles.

Tom-tom! Tom-tom! Tom-tom! Over the water came the faint sound of Bosambo’s drum and the deep-chested chant of his paddlers. In half an hour his canoe grounded and he waded ashore.

“Lord Sekedimi,” he greeted the chief, “this night I have loosened M’shimba-m’shamba, the green one, the monster. And he howled fearfully because I left him. My heart is sore, and there is nothing in my poor land which gives me pleasure.”

“Fifty sacks of my salt I sent you,” said Sekedimi unpleasantly; “also corn.”

“None the less, I am as an orphan who has lost his father and his mother,” moaned Bosambo.

“Let the palaver finish, chief,” said Sekedimi, “for my heart is also sore, having lost salt and corn.”

“I see that you have no stomach for pity,” said Bosambo, and re-embarked.

Clear of the Akasava city, Bosambo regained his spirits, though the night was stormy and great spots of rain fell at intervals.

The further he drew from the Akasava chief the more jovial he became, and he sang a song.

“There are fools in the forest,” he bawled musically; “such as the ingonona who walks with his eyes shut; but he is not so great a fool as Sekedimi.

“He is like a white man who is newly come to this land.

“He is like a child that bums his fingers.

“He is simple and like a great worm.”

He sang all this, and added libellous and picturesque particulars.

“Lord chief,” said the headman suddenly, arresting his song, “I think we will make for the shore.”

Over the trees on the right bank of the river lightning flickered with increasing brightness, and there was a long continuous rumble of thunder in the air.

“To the middle island,” ordered Bosambo.

The headman shivered.

“Lord, the middle island is filled with spirits,” he said.

“You are a fool,” said Bosambo; but he ordered the canoe to the left bank.

Brighter and more vivid grew the lightning, louder and louder the crackle and crash of thunder.