Jules Verne (42 page)

"Mrs. Weldon," said he, "Tom and his companions have been sold for the
markets of Oujiji!"

"May God protect them!" said Mrs. "Weldon, shedding tears.

"Nan died on the way, Dick Sand has perished—"

"Nan dead! and Dick!" cried Mrs. Weldon.

"Yes, it is just for your captain of fifteen to pay for Harris's
murder with his life," continued Negoro. "You are alone in Kazounde,
mistress; alone, in the power of the 'Pilgrim's' old cook—absolutely
alone, do you understand?"

What Negoro said was only too true, even concerning Tom and his
friends. The old black man, his son Bat, Acteon and Austin had
departed the day before with the trader of Oujiji's caravan, without
the consolation of seeing Mrs. Weldon again, without even knowing that
their companion in misery was in Kazounde, in Alvez's establishment.
They had departed for the lake country, a journey figured by hundreds
of miles, that very few accomplish, and from which very few return.

"Well?" murmured Mrs. Weldon, looking at Negoro without answering.

"Mrs. Weldon," returned the Portuguese, in an abrupt voice, "I could
revenge myself on you for the bad treatment I suffered on board the
'Pilgrim.' But Dick Sand's death will satisfy my vengeance. Now,
mistress, I become the merchant again, and behold my projects with
regard to you."

Mrs. Weldon looked at him without saying a word.

"You," continued the Portuguese, "your child, and that imbecile who
runs after the flies, you have a commercial value which I intend to
utilize. So I am going to sell you."

"I am of a free race," replied Mrs. Weldon, in a firm tone.

"You are a slave, if I wish it."

"And who would buy a white woman?"

"A man who will pay for her whatever I shall ask him."

Mrs. Weldon bent her head for a moment, for she knew that anything was
possible in that frightful country.

"You have heard?" continued Negoro.

"Who is this man to whom you will pretend to sell me?" replied Mrs.
Weldon.

"To sell you or to re-sell you. At least, I suppose so!" added the
Portuguese, sneering.

"The name of this man?" asked Mrs. Weldon.

"This man—he is James W. Weldon, your husband."

"My husband!" exclaimed Mrs. Weldon, who could not believe what she
had just heard.

"Himself, Mrs. Weldon—your husband, to whom I do not wish simply to
restore his wife, his child, and his cousin, but to sell them, and, at
a high price."

Mrs. Weldon asked herself if Negoro was not setting a trap for her.
However, she believed he was speaking seriously. To a wretch to whom
money is everything, it seems that we can trust, when business is in
question. Now, this was business.

"And when do you propose to make this business operation?" returned
Mrs. Weldon.

"As soon as possible."

"Where?"

"Just here. Certainly James Weldon will not hesitate to come as far as
Kazounde for his wife and son."

"No, he will not hesitate. But who will tell him?"

"I! I shall go to San Francisco to find James Weldon. I have money
enough for this voyage."

"The money stolen from on board the 'Pilgrim?'"

"Yes, that, and more besides," replied Negoro, insolently. "But, if
I wish to sell you soon, I also wish to sell you at a high price.
I think that James Weldon will not regard a hundred thousand
dollars—"

"He will not regard them, if he can give them," replied Mrs. Weldon,
coldly. "Only my husband, to whom you will say, doubtless, that I am
held a prisoner at Kazounde, in Central Africa—"

"Precisely!"

"My husband will not believe you without proofs, and he will not be so
imprudent as to come to Kazounde on your word alone."

"He will come here," returned Negoro, "if I bring him a letter written
by you, which will tell him your situation, which will describe me as
a faithful servant, escaped from the hands of these savages."

"My hand shall never write that letter!" Mrs. Weldon replied, in a
still colder manner.

"You refuse?" exclaimed Negoro.

"I refuse!"

The thought of the dangers her husband would pass through in coming
as far as Kazounde, the little dependence that could be placed on the
Portuguese's promises, the facility with which the latter could retain
James Weldon, after taking the ransom agreed upon, all these reasons
taken together made Mrs. Weldon refuse Negoro's proposition flatly and
at once. Mrs. Weldon spoke, thinking only of herself, forgetting her
child for the moment.

"You shall write that letter!" continued the Portuguese.

"No!" replied Mrs. Weldon again.

"Ah, take care!" exclaimed Negoro. "You are not alone here! Your child
is, like you, in my power, and I well know how—"

Mrs. Weldon wished to reply that that would be impossible. Her heart
was beating as if it would break; she was voiceless.

"Mrs. Weldon," said Negoro, "you will reflect on the offer I have made
you. In eight days you will have handed me a letter to James Weldon's
address, or you will repent of it."

That said, the Portuguese retired, without giving vent to his anger;
but it was easy to see that nothing would stop him from constraining
Mrs. Weldon to obey him.

Left alone, Mrs. Weldon at first only fixed her mind on this thought,
that eight days would pass before Negoro would return for a definite
answer. There was time to reflect and decide on a course of action.
There could be no question of the Portuguese's probity except in his
own interest. The "market value" that he attributed to his prisoner
would evidently be a safeguard for her, and protect her for the time,
at least, against any temptation that might put her in danger. Perhaps
she would think of a compromise that would restore her to her husband
without obliging Mr. Weldon to come to Kazounde. On receipt of a
letter from his wife, she well knew that James Weldon would set out.
He would brave the perils of this journey into the most dangerous
countries of Africa. But, once at Kazounde, when Negoro should have
that fortune of a hundred thousand dollars in his hands, what guaranty
would James W. Weldon, his wife, his son and Cousin Benedict have,
that they would be allowed to depart? Could not Queen Moini's caprice
prevent them? Would not this "sale" of Mrs. Weldon and hers be better
accomplished if it took place at the coast, at some point agreed upon,
which would spare Mr. Weldon both the dangers of the journey to the
interior, and the difficulties, not to say the impossibilities, of a
return?

So reflected Mrs. Weldon. That was why she had refused at once to
accede to Negoro's proposition and give him a letter for her husband.
She also thought that, if Negoro had put off his second visit for
eight days, it was because he needed that time to prepare for his
journey. If not, he would return sooner to force her consent.

"Would he really separate me from my child?" murmured she.

At that moment Jack entered the hut, and, by an instinctive movement,
his mother seized him, as if Negoro were there, ready to snatch him
from her.

"You are in great grief, mother?" asked the little boy.

"No, dear Jack," replied Mrs. Weldon; "I was thinking of your papa!
You would be very glad to see him again?"

"Oh! yes, mother! Is he going to come?"

"No! no! He must not come!"

"Then we will go to see him again?"

"Yes, darling Jack!"

"With my friend Dick—and Hercules—and old Tom?"

"Yes! yes!" replied Mrs. Weldon, putting her head down to hide her
tears.

"Has papa written to you?" asked little Jack.

"No, my love."

"Then you are going to write to him, mother?"

"Yes—yes—perhaps!" replied Mrs. Weldon.

And without knowing it, little Jack entered directly into his mother's
thoughts. To avoid answering him further, she covered him with kisses.

It must be stated that another motive of some value was joined to
the different reasons that had urged Mrs. Weldon to resist Negoro's
injunctions. Perhaps Mrs. Weldon had a very unexpected chance of being
restored to liberty without her husband's intervention, and even
against Negoro's will. It was only a faint ray of hope, very vague as
yet, but it was one.

In fact, a few words of conversation, overheard by her several days
before, made her foresee a possible succor near at hand—one might say
a providential succor.

Alvez and a mongrel from Oujiji were talking a few steps from the hut
occupied by Mrs. Weldon. It is not astonishing that the slave-trade
was the subject of conversation between those worthy merchants.
The two
brokers
in human flesh were talking business. They were
discussing the future of their commerce, and were worried about
the efforts the English were making to destroy it—not only on the
exterior, by cruisers, but in the interior, by their missionaries and
their travelers.

Jose-Antonio Alvez found that the explorations of these hardy pioneers
could only injure commercial operations. His interlocutor shared his
views, and thought that all these visitors, civil or religious, should
be received with gun-shots.

This had been done to some extent. But, to the great displeasure of
the traders, if they killed some of these curious ones, others escaped
them. Now, these latter, on returning to their country, recounted
"with exaggerations," Alvez said, the horrors of the slave-trade, and
that injured this commerce immensely—it being too much diminished
already.

The mongrel agreed to that, and deplored it; above all, concerning the
markets of N'yangwe, of Oujiji, of Zanzibar, and of all the great
lake regions. There had come successively Speke, Grant, Livingstone,
Stanley, and others. It was an invasion! Soon all England and all
America would occupy the country!

Alvez sincerely pitied his comrade, and he declared that the provinces
of Western Africa had been, till that time, less badly treated—that
is to say, less visited; but the epidemic of travelers was beginning
to spread. If Kazounde had been spared, it was not so with Cassange,
and with Bihe, where Alvez owned factories. It may be remembered,
also, that Harris had spoken to Negoro of a certain Lieutenant
Cameron, who might, indeed, have the presumption to cross Africa from
one side to the other, and after entering it by Zanzibar, leave it by
Angola.

In fact, the trader had reason to fear, and we know that, some years
after, Cameron to the south and Stanley to the north, were going
to explore these little-known provinces of the west, describe the
permanent monstrosities of the trade, unveil the guilty complicities
of foreign agents, and make the responsibility fall on the right
parties.

Neither Alvez nor the mongrel could know anything yet of this
exploration of Cameron's and of Stanley's; but what they did know,
what they said, what Mrs. Weldon heard, and what was of such great
interest to her—in a word, what had sustained her in her refusal to
subscribe at once to Negoro's demands, was this:

Before long, very probably, Dr. David Livingstone would arrive at
Kazounde.

Now, the arrival of Livingstone with his escort, the influence which
the great traveler enjoyed in Africa, the concourse of Portuguese
authorities from Angola that could not fail to meet him, all that
might bring about the deliverance of Mrs. Weldon and hers, in spite of
Negoro, in spite of Alvez. It was perhaps their restoration to their
country within a short time, and without James W. Weldon risking his
life in a journey, the result of which could only be deplorable.

But was there any probability that Dr. Livingstone would soon visit
that part of the continent? Yes, for in following that missionary
tour, he was going to complete the exploration of Central Africa.

We know the heroic life of this son of the tea merchant, who lived
in Blantyre, a village in the county of Lanark. Born on the 13th of
March, 1813, David Livingstone, the second of six children, became,
by force of study, both a theologian and doctor. After making his
novitiate in the "London Missionary Society," he embarked for the
Cape in 1840, with the intention of joining the missionary Moffat in
Southern Africa.

From the Cape, the future traveler repaired to the country of the
Bechnanas, which he explored for the first time, returned to Kuruman
and married Moffat's daughter, that brave companion who would be
worthy of him. In 1843 he founded a mission in the valley of the
Mabotsa.

Four years later, we find him established at Kolobeng, two hundred
and twenty-five miles to the north of Kuruman, in the country of the
Bechnanas.

Two years after, in 1849, Livingstone left Kolobeng with his wife, his
three children and two friends, Messrs. Oswell and Murray. August 1st,
of the same year, he discovered Lake N'gami, and returned to Kolobeng,
by descending the Zouga.

In this journey Livingstone, stopped by the bad will of the natives,
had not passed beyond the N'gami. A second attempt was not more
fortunate. A third must succeed. Then, taking a northern route, again
with his family and Mr. Oswell, after frightful sufferings (for lack
of food, for lack of water) that almost cost him the lives of his
children, he reached the country of the Makalolos beside the Chobe, a
branch of the Zambezi. The chief, Sebituane, joined him at Linyanti.
At the end of June, 1851, the Zambezi was discovered, and the doctor
returned to the Cape to bring his family to England.

In fact, the intrepid Livingstone wished to be alone while risking his
life in the daring journey he was going to undertake.

On leaving the Cape this time, the question was to cross Africa
obliquely from the south to the west, so as to reach Saint Paul de
Loanda.

On the third of June, 1852, the doctor set out with a few natives.
He arrived at Kuruman and skirted the Desert of Kalahari. The 31st
December he entered Litoubarouba and found the country of the
Bechnanas ravaged by the Boers, old Dutch colonists, who were masters
of the Cape before the English took possession of it.