Black Mischief (3 page)

‘I know
that.’

‘Are
you mad, Krikor? Do you want to drown us all?’

‘You
must leave these things to me, my flower. There is no need to worry. Ali is not
coming with us. All I want is my eighty rupees for Mr Marx’s petrol. Have you
finished your packing? We start as soon as Ali returns with the money.’

‘Krikor,
you wouldn’t … you aren’t going to leave me behind, are you?’

‘I
should not hesitate to do so if I thought it necessary. Finish your packing,
girl. Don’t cry. Finish your packing. You are coming to Malindi. I have said
it. Finish your packing. I am a just man and a peaceful man. You know that.
But in time of war one must look after oneself and one’s own family. Yes, one’s
family, do you hear me? Ali will bring us the money. We shall not take him to
Malindi. Do you understand? If he is a trouble I shall hit him with my stick.
Don’t stand there like a fool. Finish your packing.’

The sun
had now set. As Ali walked back to the fort through the dark lane he was aware
of new excitement in the people around him. Groups were hurrying to the waterfront,
others stood in their doorways chattering eagerly. He heard the words ‘Seyid’,
‘Victory’ and ‘Army’. In the open space before the harbour he found a large
crowd collected with their backs to the water, gazing inland over the town. He
joined them and in the brief twilight saw the whole dark face of the hills
alight with little points of fire. Then he left the crowd and went to the old
fort. Major Joab, the officer of the guard, stood in the court studying the
hills through field-glasses.

‘You
have seen the fires inland, secretary?’

‘I have
seen them.’

‘I
think there is an army encamped there.’

‘It is
the victorious army, major.’

‘Praise
God. It is what we have waited to see.’

‘Certainly.
We should praise God whether in prosperity or adversity,’ said Ali, piously; he
had accepted Christianity on entering Seth’s service. ‘But I bring orders from
the Emperor. You are to take a picket and go with them to the Amurath Bar.
There you will find the Armenian Youkoumian, a little fat man wearing a black
skull cap. You know him? Very well. He is to be put under arrest and taken a
little outside the town. It does not matter where, but take him some distance
from the people. There you are to hang him. Those are the Emperor’s orders.
When it is done, report to me personally. There is no need to mention the
matter directly to His Majesty. You understand?’

‘I
understand, secretary.’

Upstairs,
Seth was deep in a catalogue of wireless apparatus.

‘Oh,
Ali, I have decided on the Tudor model in fumed oak. Remind me tomorrow to
write for it. Is there still no news?’

Ali
busied himself in arranging the papers on the table and fitting the typewriter
into its case.

‘Is
there no news?’

‘There
is news of a kind, Majesty. I opine that there is an army bivouacked in the
hills. Their fires are visible. If your majesty will come outside, you will see
them. No doubt they will march into the city tomorrow.’

Seth
sprang gaily from his chair and ran to the window. ‘But this is magnificent
news. The best you could have brought. Ali, I will make you a Viscount
tomorrow. The army back again. It is what we have been longing for the last six
weeks, eh, Viscount?’

‘Your
majesty is very kind. I said
an
army. There is no means of knowing which
one it may be. If, as you surmise, it is General Connolly, is it not curious
that no runner has come to salute your majesty with news of the victory?’

‘Yes,
he should have sent word.’

‘Majesty,
you are defeated and betrayed. Everyone in Matodi knows it except yourself.’

For
.the first time since the beginning of the campaign, Ali saw that there was
uncertainty in his master’s mind. ‘If I am defeated,’ said Seth, ‘the
barbarians will know where to find me.’

‘Majesty,
it is not too late to escape. Only this evening I heard of a man in the town
who has a launch hidden outside the harbour. He means to leave in it himself,
for the mainland, but he would sell it at a price. There are ways for a small
man to escape where a great man like your majesty. would be trapped. For two
thousand rupees he will sell this boat. He told me so, in so many words. He
named the price. It is not much for the life of an Emperor. Give me the money,
Majesty, and the boat shall be here before midnight. And in the morning Seyid’s
troops will march into the town and find it empty.’.

Ali
looked hopefully across the table, but before he had finished speaking he
realized that Seth’s mood of uncertainty was past.

‘Seyid’s
troops will not march into the town. You forget that I have the Tank. Ali, you
are talking treasonable nonsense. Tomorrow I shall be here to receive my
victorious general.’

‘Tomorrow
will show, Majesty.’

‘Tomorrow
will show.’

‘Listen,’
said Ali, ‘my friend is very loyal to your majesty and a most devoted man.
Perhaps if I were to use my influence he might reduce his price.’

‘I
shall be here in the morning to receive my army.’

‘Suppose
he would accept eighteen hundred rupees?’

‘I have
spoken.’

Without
further discussion Ali picked up his typewriter and left the room. As he opened
the doors his ears caught the inevitable shuffle of bare feet, as a spy slipped
away down the dark passage. It was a sound to which they had grown accustomed
during the past months.

In his
own quarters Ali poured out a glass of whisky and lit a cheroot. Then he drew
out a fibre trunk from beneath the bed and began a methodical arrangement of
his possessions preparatory to packing them. Presently there was a knock at
the door and Major Joab came in.

‘Good
evening, secretary.’

‘Good
evening, major. The Armenian is dead?’

‘He is
dead. Heavens, how he squealed. You have whisky there.’

‘Will
you help yourself?’

‘Thank
you, secretary … you seem to be preparing for a journey.’

‘It is
well to be prepared — to have one’s things in good order.’

‘I
think there is an army in the hills.’

‘It is
what they are saying.’

‘I
think it is the army of Seyid.’

‘That,
too, is being said.’

‘As you
say, secretary, it is well to be prepared.’

‘Will
you take a cheroot, major? I expect that there are many people in Matodi who
would be glad to leave. The army will be here tomorrow.’

‘It is
not far away. And yet there is no way of leaving the town. The boats are all
gone. The railway is broken. The road leads straight to the encampment.’

Ali
folded a white drill suit and bent over the trunk, carefully arranging the
sleeves. He did not look up as he said: ‘I heard of a man who had a boat. It
was spoken of in the bazaar, I forget by whom. An ignorant fellow no doubt. But
this man, whoever it was, spoke of a boat concealed outside the harbour. He was
going to the mainland tonight. There was room for two others, so they said. Do
you think a man would find passengers to the mainland at five hundred rupees
each? That is what he asked.’

‘It is
a great price for a journey to the mainland.’

‘It is
not much for a man’s life. Do you think such a man, supposing there is any
truth in the tale, would find passengers?’

‘Perhaps.
Who can tell? A man of affairs who can take his wisdom with him — a foreigner
with no stock but a typewriter and his clothes. I do not think a soldier would
go.’

‘A
soldier might pay three hundred?’

‘It is
not likely. What life would there be for him in a foreign country? And among
his own people he would be dishonoured.’

‘But he
would not hinder others from going. A man who would pay five hundred rupees for
his passage money, would not grudge another hundred to the guard who allowed
him to pass?’

‘Who
can say? Some soldiers might hold that a small price for their honour.’

‘But
two hundred.’

‘I
think soldiers are for the most part poor men. It is seldom they earn two
hundred rupees…. Well, I must bid you good night, secretary. I must return to
my men.’

‘How
late do you stay on guard, major?’

‘Till after
midnight. Perhaps I shall see you again.’

‘Who
can say? … Oh, major, you have forgotten your papers.’

‘So I
have. Thank you, secretary. And good night.’ The major counted the little pile
of notes which Ali had placed on the dressing-table. Two hundred exactly. He
buttoned them into his tunic pocket and returned to the guard house.

Here,
in the inner room, sat Mr Youkoumian talking to the captain. Half an hour
before the little Armenian had been very near death, and awe of the experience
still overcast his normally open and loquacious manner. It was not until the
rope was actually round his neck that he had been inspired to mention the
existence of his launch. His face was damp and his voice jerky and subdued.

‘What
did the Indian dog say?’

‘He
wanted to sell me a place in the boat for five hundred rupees. Does he know
where it is hidden?’

‘Fool
that I was, I told him.’

‘It is
of little consequence. He gave me two hundred rupees to let him past the guard,
also some whisky and a cheroot. There is no need for us to worry about Ali.
When do we start?’

‘There
is one point, officers … my wife. There is not room for her in the boat. She
must not know of our departure. Where was she when you — when we left the café
together?’

‘She
was making a noise. One of the corporals locked her in the loft.’

‘She
will get out of there.’

‘You
leave all that to us.’

‘Very
well, major. I am a just man and a peaceable man. You know that. I only want to
be sure that everything will be agreeable for everyone.’

Ali
finished his packing and sat down to wait. ‘What’s Major Joab up to?’ he
wondered. ‘It is curious his refusing to leave the town. I suppose he thinks he
will get a price for Seth in the morning.’

Night and the fear of
darkness. In his room at the top of the old fort Seth lay awake and alone, his
eyes wild with the inherited terror of the jungle, desperate with the acquired loneliness
of civilization. Night was alive with beasts and devils and the spirits of dead
enemies; before its power Seth’s ancestors had receded, slid away from its
attack, abandoning in retreat all the baggage of Individuality; they had lain
six or seven in a hut between them and night only a wall of mud and a ceiling
of thatched grass; warm, naked bodies breathing in the darkness an arm’s reach
apart, indivisibly unified so that they ceased to be six or seven scared blacks
and became one person of more than human stature, less vulnerable to the peril
that walked near them. Seth could not expand to meet the onset of fear. He was
alone, dwarfed by the magnitude of the darkness, insulated from his fellows,
strapped down to mean dimensions.

The
darkness pulsed with the drumming of the unknown conquerors. In the narrow
streets of the city the people were awake — active and apprehensive. Dark
figures sped to and fro on furtive errands, hiding from each other in doorways
till the way was empty. In the houses they were packing away bundles in secret
places, little hoards of coins and jewellery, pictures and books, ancestral
sword hilts of fine workmanship, shoddy trinkets from Birmingham and Bombay,
silk shawls, scent bottles, anything that might attract attention next morning
when the city was given over to loot. Huddled groups of women and children were
being herded to refuge in the cellars of the old houses or into the open
country beyond the walls; goats, sheep, donkeys, livestock and poultry of all
kinds jostled with them for precedence in the city gates. Mine Youkoumian,
trussed like a chicken on the floor of her own bedroom, drib bled through her gag
and helplessly writhed her bruised limbs.

Ali,
marching back to the fort under arrest between two soldiers, protested angrily
to the captain of the guard.

‘You
are making a great mistake, captain. I have made all arrangements with the
major for my departure.’

‘It is
the Emperor’s orders that no one leaves the city.’

‘When
we see the major he will explain everything.’

The
captain made no reply. The little party marched on; in front between two other
soldiers shambled Ali’s servant, bearing his master’s trunk on his head.

When
they reached the guard-room, the captain reported. ‘Two prisoners, major,
arrested at the South Gate attempting to leave the city.’

‘You
know me, major; the captain has made a mistake. Tell him it is all right for me
to go.’

‘I know
you, secretary; captain, report the arrests to His Majesty.’