Harry Milvaine: or, The Wanderings of a Wayward Boy

He was only going to quench his thirst after all, but well he knew that to have been found but five yards from his post would have cost him his life. No wonder he was careful. Harry’s mind was made up in a moment, and more quickly than lightning’s flash. How fast one must think on occasions like the present! He sprang lightly but silently to his feet the very moment he saw the Somali deposit his rifle and shot-belt on the bank and bend down towards a pool.

Next minute Harry, exerting all his young strength, had seized and flung him far into the stream.

A plash by night in an African river is but little likely to awake any one encamped by its banks. So far Harry was safe, but would the Indian give the alarm?

He did not wait to think, he only snatched up the weapons and the shot-belt and darted away like a red deer swiftly along the riverside. He wondered to hear no shout.

The truth is, the Somali sentinel feared to give it; to him it would have meant death, whatever it might be to Harry.

But looking round shortly, he was hardly surprised to find he was hotly pursued by the sentinel. He ran on for about two hundred yards farther, and, on looking round again, he noticed that the Somali was fast gaining on him. So Harry stopped.

His Highland blood was up.

“I won’t run from one man,” he said, “neither will I kill him; I’ll give him a throw, though, if he likes, after the manner of Donald Dinnie.”

So he stood and waited.

He had not long to wait. The Indian had divested himself of the linen jacket he wore, and next moment confronted him, panting, but with gleaming eyes and on murder intent. That is, murder if he could manage it quietly.

“Halt!” cried Harry, in Swahili, as he came to the charge. “No farther, or you die!”

The rest of his speech to the Somali he continued, partly in Swahili, partly in English, the former language being rather meagre in phraseology. But this is the gist of what he did say:

“I could kill you if I liked. It would be mean, however. Now take your time and get your breath, then if you like I’ll give it to you English fashion.”

He paused, and the Somali stood there glaring and foaming with fury.

After a minute —

“Time’s up,” said Harry, and, taking two or three paces to the rear, he threw rifle and shot-belt on the ground; then, pointing to them —

“Touch these, my friend, if you dare,” he said.

No two biddings did the Somali require. He sprang towards the rifle as springs the jungle cat on its prey. Harry’s blow was finely planted, and I am sure that Indian must have imagined, for the time being, that there were considerably more stars in the sky than ever he had seen before.

He rose and flew at Harry. He flew but to fall, and he rose and rose again, only to fall and fall again!

Harry could not help admiring his pluck.

He was conquered at last, though.

Then, getting up, half stunned, from the grass, he extended his arms towards Harry.

“Kill me,” he said, “kill me, but not thus. Kill me with the English sword, for if I go back to my people without my prisoner, they will kill me with fire.”

“Come to think of it, my good fellow,” said Harry, “there need be no killing in the matter. You can’t go back. Come with me. The tables are turned: you shall now be the slave, I the master. I will be good and kind to you if you are faithful; if not, I will let the daylight into you.”

The reply of the savage was affecting enough. He bowed himself to the earth first; then, still on his knees, took Harry’s right hand and bent his head until his brow touched it.

“That will do, my good fellow. I don’t care for palaver, you know. But let us have action. Now you shall prove how far you are willing to serve me. Go back to your fellows, a rascally crew they are, and fetch another rifle and more ammunition, and just a little provisions if you can.”

The Somali knew what he meant, even if he did not understand precisely all that was said.

He was up and away in a moment.

Harry Milvaine waited and listened. He thought the time would never pass. Would the Somali be true or be treacherous? He might rouse his sleeping companions, and, while he was still standing here in the broad staring light of the moon, stealthily surround and re-capture him.

The very thought made him change his ground. He drew himself away under the shade of some mimosa trees and waited there.

At last a single figure, armed with a rifle and carrying a bag, drew up in the clearing that Harry had left, and looked about him in some surprise. It was Harry’s ex-foe.

Harry soon joined him.

“You have stayed long,” he said.

“I have plenty of ammunition, something to eat, and the rifle, and – ”

“Well, and what else?”

“Nothing else,” said the Indian, showing a row of teeth like alabaster; “I have floated all the rest of the ammunition down stream.”

“You are clever, but hark! did you not hear some sound? I believe they are stirring.”

“No, no, that was a lion miles away.”

“Come, then, lead on.”

“Which way?”

“West. They are sure to think I have gone in the direction of the coast.”

“Come, then.”

And away went Nanungamanoo. And by daybreak they were many, many miles from the camp of Mahmoud.

Book Three – Chapter Three.

A Chapter of Surprises – A Mysterious Pack, and a Mysterious Appearance

Danger sharpens one’s wits. It makes the old young again, and the young old – in judgment.

Harry was no fool from the commencement, and he now reasoned rightly enough, that Mahmoud with his savage caravan, as soon as he missed the runaways, would naturally conclude that they had gone back towards the coast.

This, however, was precisely the thing that Harry had no present intention of doing. And why? it may be asked. Ought he not to be glad of the freedom he had once more obtained, and make the best of his way to some friendly village or town by the sea-shore? Perhaps; but then Harry was a wayward youth. He was wayward and headstrong, but on this occasion I think he had right on his side.

“I cannot and will not return,” he said to himself, “without making some effort to find my poor fellows – if, indeed, they be still alive. Besides, this is a strange and a lovely land, and there are strange adventures to be met with. I must see a little of it while I am here.”

You will notice, reader, that hope was already throwing its glamour over the poor lad’s mind. He dearly loved nature, but while being dragged away as a prisoner, although some parts of the country through which he passed had been charming enough, he could not bear to gaze on their beauty while he was a slave.

Flowers grew in abundance on many parts of the plains; they grew in patches, in beds of gorgeous colour, here, there, and everywhere – pale blue, dark blue, yellow, crimson, and modest brown; they carpetted the ground, and even trailed up over and beautified the stunted scrub bushes. As Burns hath it, these flowers —

“Sprang wanton to be pressed.”

At another time their sunlit glory would have dazzled him, now they had seemed to mock him in his misery, and he had crushed them under foot.

Great birds sailed majestically and slowly overhead, or flew with that lazy indifference peculiar to some of the African species, ascending some distance, then letting themselves fall again, putting no more exertion into the action of flight than was absolutely necessary, but sauntering along through the air, as it were. Never mind, they were happy, and Harry had hated them because they were so happy – and free. Long after the caravan had left the coast, sea-birds even came floating round them.

“Come away, Harry!” they seemed to scream. “Come away – away – away!”

They were happy too. Oh, he had thought, if he could only be as free, and had their lithesome, lissom wings!

Monster butterflies like painted fans, browns, vermilions, and ultramarines hovered indolently over the flowers. How they appeared to enjoy the sunshine!

Even the bronzy green or black beetles that moved about among the grass or over the bare patches of ground had something to do, something to engross their minds, thoroughly to the exclusion of every other consideration in life.

As for the lovely sea-green lizards with broad arrows of crimson on their shoulders, they simply squatted, panting, on stones, or lay along reed-stalks, making the very most of life and sunshine; while as for the giant cicadas, their happiness considerably interfered with the business of their little lives, because they were so very, very, very happy that they had to stop about every two minutes to sing.

But now, why Harry was free and as happy as any of them – at present, at all events.

As he trudged along in the moonlight he could not help making a little joke to himself.

“Go back!” he said, half aloud. “No, Scotchmen never go back.”

Well, then, Mahmoud, after retreating for some distance towards the coast, would no doubt resume his journey. Of this Harry felt sure enough, because Nanungamanoo told his new master, before they had gone very far that night, that the Arab priest was on his way to a far distant country, quite unknown to any other trader, there to purchase a gang of slaves from a king, who would sell his people for fire-water.

“The scoundrels!” said Harry.

“Yes, sahib.”

“Both I mean; both king and priest. I’d tie them neck to neck and drown them as one drowns kittens.”

“Yes, sahib.”

“And no one else knows of this territory?”

“No white man, sahib.”

“The villain! A little nest of his own that he robs periodically. A happy hunting-ground all to himself. So you think Mahmoud will shortly come on this way?”

“Sure to, sahib.”

Harry considered a short time, then —

“Well, Nanungamanoo, my good fellow, it won’t do to get in front of him. He would soon find our trail.”

“Yes, sahib, and kill us with fire.”

“Would he now? That would not be pleasant, Nanungamanoo. By the way, Nanungamanoo, what an awful name you have! Excuse me, Nanungamanoo, but we must really try to find you a shorter. Do you understand, Mr Nanungamanoo? We’ll boil that name of yours down, or extract the essence of it and let you have that. But touching this pretty priest, this amiable individual, who hesitates not to buy poor slaves for rum, although he is far too good to fight for them. He’ll be along this way in a day or two. Now I greatly object to be hurried, especially when I am out upon a little pleasure trip like the present – ha! ha! I don’t think for a moment that either an Arab or any of you Somali fellows are half so clever at picking up a trail as your genuine North American backwoods Indian; but then, you know, even an Arab or a Somali couldn’t go past the mark of an old camp-fire without smelling a rat. Do you understand, Mr Nanungamanoo? – bother your name, it’s a regular twice-round the clock business!”

“I understand,” replied Nanungamanoo, “much that you say even in English.”

“Well, Mr Nanungamanoo, if you behave yourself and are long with me, I’ll put you to school and teach you myself – good English. But,” continued Harry, “we must have this angelic Mahmoud on ahead of us. So if you can find a place to hide, we will let him pass and give him a fair start. For, as you say that you know this route well, and no other, we must be content to keep it for some time to come at all events.”

“Yes, sahib; and I know the place to hide. Come.”

“I’ll follow as fast as you like, Mr Nanungamanoo. But, first and foremost, just let us see what you have in that bundle of yours – to eat, I mean. I haven’t really felt so genuinely hungry since I was taken prisoner. My eyes! Nanungamanoo, what a size your bundle is! You seem to have looted the whole camp.”

The Somali laid down the burden and prepared to open it. It was wrapped in a kind of coarse blue-striped cloth, much admired by certain tribes of savages.

They had reached a patch of high clearing in the jungle, the moon was shining very brightly, so, although there were lions about, there was very little fear of an attack, these gentry much preferring to catch their foes unawares and by daylight.

The Somali undid his bundle precisely like a packman of olden times, showing off the wares he had for sale.

“This is the food,” he said.

“What! dry rice? Why, my good fellow, I’m not a fowl.”

“Fowl – yes, yes,” cried Nanungamanoo, the first words he had spoken in English. “Here is fowl and rice curry.”

“Ha! glorious!” cried Harry. “Capitally cooked too, done to a turn, tastes delicious. Have a bit yourself, old man. No doubt Mahmoud had intended this for his own little breakfast. I feel double the individual now, Nanungamanoo,” said Harry, after he had done ample justice to the viands of his late lord and master, “double the individual. Now suppose we proceed to investigate still further the contents of your mysterious pack? That’s the ammunition, is it? A goodly lot too! But what is in that other pack? There are wheels within wheels, and packs within packs, my clever Nanungamanoo. You are afraid to touch it – to open it. Give it to me, I will.”

So saying he quickly undid the lashing.

“Why,” he continued in astonishment, as he lifted the things up one by one, “my own best uniform jacket – two pairs of white duck pants – my Sunday-go-meeting pairs – one – two – three – four flannel shirts, my best ones too – a pair of canvas shoes – a packet of new uniform buttons, and a yard of gold lace – three cakes of eating chocolate, and a box of cough drops that old Yonitch gave me as a parting gift. Why, Nanungamanoo, as sure as we’re squatting here, and the moon shining down over us both, that old thief has been and gone and robbed my sea-chest! I see his little game, Nanungamanoo: he was taking these things of mine away into the interior to that happy hunting-ground of his, to swop them away along with myself to the drunken old king for slaves. Yes, and they would have stripped me of the uniform I now wear, and given me an old cow’s hide instead with the horns stuck over my brow and the tail hanging down behind. Oh! Mr Mahmoud, but I have spoiled your fun. But there they are, goodness be praised, and I must not be too hard on old Mahmie after all, for he did save my life.”

Nanungamanoo laughed a sneering laugh.

“You were too valuable to burn,” he said.

“Do you really suppose then, my worthy Nanungamanoo, that Mahmoud looked upon the matter as a commercial transaction?”

“Now you speak Hindustanee. I do not know.”

“Never mind, make up the bundle again, and let us trudge. From the position of the moon it must be getting on towards morning.”

Nanungamanoo held up three fingers and proceeded with his work.

“Three o’clock, is it? Well, heave round, let us up anchor and be off.”

After re-establishing his valuable pack, Nanungamanoo carefully collected the bones of the feast and threw them under a bush, and was proceeding to obliterate the marks they had made on the withered grass by raising it again with his foot, when a twig cracked in a neighbouring thicket. Both Harry and Nanungamanoo speedily clutched their rifles.

Almost immediately after a black and nearly naked figure emerged slowly into the moonlight, and stood at some little distance, holding up one arm across his face as if to protect it from the blow of the bullet Nanungamanoo would have fired, but Harry thrust his arm up.

Then Raggy Muffin advanced.

“Golla-mussy, massa! What for you want to shoot poor Raggy?”

“But, Raggy,” cried Harry, “in the name of mystery how came you here?”

“I came, massa, to cut your cords ob bondage, all same as de little mouse cut de cords ob de great big lion.”

“But where did you come from, Raggy? Sit down, poor boy, your cheeks are thin, sit down and pick a bone.”

“No, no, massa, not here, not here. Dey am all alive in Mahmoud’s camp, I can ’ssure you ob dat.”

“You came through there?”

“I came to cut your cords ob bondage, massa.”

“Well?”

“Well, den I see dat de bird hab flown.”

“Yes, Raggy.”

“Den I pick up ebery ting I see lying about handy, massa. Den I follow your trail.”

“Ha! ha! ha! So you’ve been looting too, have you? Well, Raggy, get your parcel and let us be off. Lead on, Nanungamanoo.”

“La! massa,” said Raggy, grinning all over, “suppose I hab one long name like dat nigger, I cut it all up into leetle pieces, and hab one for ebery day in de week.”

The march was now recommenced.

The Somali trode gingerly on ahead, picking his way through the flowery sward, as if afraid to leave the slightest trail.

Harry and Raggy came up behind.

It was evident the Somali was now making a détour; at all events they shortly found themselves at the river, which was here broad and shallow. This they forded, taking care to keep their packs and rifles dry.

Into a weird-looking bit of forest they now plunged.

A weird-looking forest indeed. Every tree seemed an ogre in the moonlight. Yet the air was heavily odorous with the sweet breath of some species of mimosa bloom, and the ground was for the most part free from undergrowth.

The forest grew darker and darker as they proceeded, and they could hear a lion growl in the distance. He was far away, yet Harry clutched his rifle and drew little Raggy close up to his side.

He was not sorry when the moonlight shone down on them once more through the branches of a baobab tree. Here they stopped to breathe.

On again, and now the way began to ascend, still in the forest, and still comparatively in the gloom.

Up and up and up they went. It was quite a mountain for this district. At last the trees and then the bushes deserted them; then they were on the bluff, and Harry turned round to look.

Why, away down yonder – close under them it appeared – they could see the blazing camp-fire of Mahmoud’s caravan.

“Are we not too near, Nanungamanoo?”

“No. They will not stir till daylight Arabs are not brave at night. When they do start they will go towards the sun. We will wait and watch and see.”

And so it fell out, for no sooner had the clouds begun to turn bright yellow and crimson than the stir commenced in the camp.

Somalis ran hither and thither, it is true.

The babel of voices was terrible.

Mahmoud himself was here, there, and everywhere, and the whacks he freely dealt his soldiers with a bamboo cane were audible even to our friends on the hill-top. But when all was said and done, the caravan started back towards the coast, and in a few minutes there was silence all over the beautiful landscape.

Book Three – Chapter Four.

In African Wilds – Adventure with a Lion

A little way down the hill, and looking towards the north, was a cave in the rocks, and a cool delightful corner our friends found it, soon as the sun “got some weigh” on him, and his beams no longer slanted over the plain.

While Raggy was eating his modest breakfast Harry went some distance apart, and, taking out a little Book – it was a gift from his mother – he read a portion where a leaf was turned down.

Seems funny that a boy should carry a Bible with him, does it not? Well, reader, I can tell you this much: I have known many and many a sailor boy do so, and I never found that they were a bit the worse for it.

Mind you this, I have no patience with superstition, and I do hate cant; nor do I for a moment mean to say that our Book acts as a kind of amulet: but putting the matter in a plain, practical, common sense kind of a way, you and I have both immortal souls, you know, and we want to be guided how to save them. Well, the Book tells us the way. But that is not all. In times of danger – and a sailor comes across these pretty often – a blink into the Bible often gives a fellow heartening. You open it probably at the very passage that does so, and, even if you do not, you know where to find such passage.

And this does do good. Oh! I have proved it over and over again. I have a little old Book there that I have carried about the world for years and years. It has many a dog’s-ear, but they are intentional, for each one marks a passage, and to every dog’s-ear a story is attached. All point to little crumbs of comfort I have had in scenes of danger or even pestilence – here and there in many lands. Some day, if spared, I mean to write the story of this particular old Book of mine, and I do not think it will be devoid of interest to those who may care to peruse it.

But there! I am digressing, and I humbly beg my readers pardon; it was all owing to Harry’s getting away, in behind that bit of tangled scrub, in order to perform his morning devotions. Well, the truth is he did feel very, very grateful to be free.

But stay, will he be able to retain that freedom? And this brings me back to my tale.

He went back to the place where he had left Raggy enjoying the leg of a fowl.

The boy was sitting near the mouth of the cave.

“Enjoyed it, Raggy?”

“Ah!” and Raggy smacked his lips and rolled his eyes, “he am plenty much sweet, massa.”

“There’s a wing there too, Raggy. There you are, have that.”

“Tank you, massa. You am bery good, massa.”

I dare say Raggy would have eaten a whole fowl had it been offered to him. After all African fowls are not very big, nor very fat; but very matter-of-fact and self-possessed – that is their moral character.

I have gone into an African village in the evening, just as the fowls were all going to roost in the trees, my object being to buy half a dozen for the pot. As soon as the natives were convinced that the white man had not come to eat a baby, but that he really wanted to buy “tuck-tuck-chow-chow,” and had copper money in his hand to pay for the dainty, then all hands would turn out, and such a hunt you never saw, and such fluttering of wings and skraiching. I have felt sorry for the fowls.

When I got what I wanted, the rest of the “tuck-tucks” would go quietly to roost again as if nothing had happened. I envy such equanimity.

I remember that two fowls got loose in the boat once. It was blowing stiff, and the white spray was dashing over us. Well, any other birds would have jumped overboard. Not so these African fowls. They simply got on the gun’ale, and, as soon as the squall was over, coolly commenced to arrange their feathers. This regard for personal appearance in a scene of such danger – for they must have known they were going to pot – is something that one does not know whether most to admire or wonder at.

Having fully satisfied the needs of nature, Raggy was prepared to give some little account of his adventures. Briefly they were as follows, and in Raggy’s own language.

“You see, massa, befoh de sun rise on dat drefful night on de shore, de Somali Indians, all plenty well-armed, plenty big knife, plenty spear and gun, dey come and wake all our poor blue-jackets. ‘Come quiet,’ dey say; ‘suppose you make bobbery, den we kill you quick.’ Dey tak us all away behind de sandhills, and I tink first and fohmost dey am goin’ to obfuscate us.”

“Suffocate us you mean, Raggy.”

“All de same meaning, massa. But dey tie our arms till de blood tingle all down de fingers, and dey tie us roun’ de neck till we all feel chickey-chokey, and our eyes want to bust and relieve demselves. Den away we all go. I look back, and see dat poor massa not follow, and my heart am bery sad. Ober de hills and de plains we walk. Poor white man’s feet soon get tire and blister all, and in two tree day dey walk all de same’s one chicken on de stove-top. Dey Somalis and de big Arab – he one bad, bad man – dey talk. Dey not tink I understand what dey say. Dey speak ob where dey am going to de country ob King Kara-Kara, to sell all de men for slabes and get a tousand niggers foh ’em. Den dey speak ob you. You, dey say, am wo’th de lot Raggy heah all, and listen, and tink, and I want to set you free. One day one man he fall sick – one ohdinary seaman, massa, name is Davis – he fall bery, bery sick. Den de Arab soldier look at him and look at him. You nebah get well, he say. Den he take him by de two leg and pull him along de grass to a bush; and oh! it was drefful, massa, to heah poor Davis crying for mussy ’cause he hab a wife and piccaninnies at home, he tole ’em. No mussy in dat Arab’s eye. No mussy in his heart, he take de ugly spear and stab – stab – stab – Poor Davis jes say ‘Oh!’ once or twice, den he die. Plenty oder men sick after dis, but dey not lie down. Dey jes walk on weary, weary. Byemby we come to wells. Den de men get better. But Raggy hab eno’ ob dis. He steal away at night. How de lion roah in de jungle, and how de tiger (the leopard is frequently so called in Africa) jump about, and de wild hyaenas come out in de moonlight and laugh at poor Raggy. Raggy’s heart bery full ob feah. But he no say much. Suppose dey only laugh, dat not hurt much. Suppose dey bite, den Raggy die. I walk and walk foh days. I not hab much food. But I catch de mole and de mouse, I eatee he plenty quick. Den byemby I come to Mahmoud’s trail, and I follow on and up till one day I see de caravan on de hill, den I lie and sleep till night Massa knows all de rest.”