Killers Kraal | Page 6

quickly broken up into warring fractions. But Yamo
Galagi had inaugurated a Golden Age, and the Bantu had not forgotten
him. His name lived in tradition and fable. He was a truly admirable
man, they said. A man So brave and of such infallible cruelty that a
command beaten out on his great drum was speedily fulfilled. But the
drum spoke no more now--for who should beat the drum of so great a
man? Surely his hand would shrivel and become the hand of a dead
man. And at the voice of the drum so many would remember and

grieve. Or, perchance, their hearts would grow strong again, for did not
the Old Ones whisper among themselves that when the drum was heard
again it would be the ghost-voice of the Galagi calling his warriors to
battle and the Bantu to greatness?
And to this day Portuguese governors kept their ears tuned to such talk.
More than one of them had spent much treasure and not a little blood in
vain attempts to get possession of Yamo Galagi's drum. Ever present in
their minds was the fear that some aspiring chieftain, less superstitious
than his fellows, might unearth the fabulous drum, or a working
facsimile thereof, and fill the jungles with its seditious clamor.
And there was a feature of the constitution of the old, Lunda kingdom
that held peculiar interest for Rick. It was the queen-consort, the
Mateyenda. The odd part about this female ruler was that she was not
the king's wife, but a member of the royal line possessing her own court
and her own income. Moreover she had the power of deciding the
election of a new Galagi, as the petty chiefs who now held all that was
left of the Lunda kingdom were now called. It appeared that she was
allowed to marry, but her husbands were called "wives", and, generally
speaking, had no influence at all. Thus the kingdom had had two heads
in existence at one time which had been neither mutually exclusive, nor
in mutual hostility.
From what Sheena had told him of her past, Rick reasoned that Ebid
Ela had at one time been Mateyenda of the Lunda kingdom, and that
the old woman had bequeathed her high office to the white foster-child
she had cared for from infancy. This would account for the
extraordinary influence Sheena had over the Abama clans.
Thinking about it all, Rick had come to a better understanding of what
he was up against in the lovely person of Sheena. But it had not had the
effect of cooling his ardour, or of weakening his determination to take
the girl back to the coast with him someday. He was merely willing to
coneede that it would take longer than he had anticipated when the idea
had first occured to him. Though usually he walked where the angels
feared to tread he could be as timid as a dik-dik when caution was
indicated, and he had lived among Africans long enough to know that it

was wise to speak softly in the presence of their gods.
"Take it slow and easy, young feller, he counseled himself. "She is as
wild as a cage full of cheetahs, and twice as dangerous. Just let her get
used to seeing you around. It might take ten years but it'll be worth it."
There was no fresh meat in the camp, and before sunrise Sheena was
ghosting along the game trails that threaded the forest, and by sunup
she was hack in the camp with a fat bush-buck. The morning air was
bland with the odor of roasting meat when Rick came out of the tent to
sit on his heels on the other side of the fire. She gave him a sidelong
look and asked:
"Your head is better now?"
"As good as new. And now it Is in my heart to say--"
"What is in your heart does not trouble me," she checked him quickly.
"What is in your head does. Tomorrow I leave this place. When do you
start downriver?"
"Too much for one man to carry," he said. "I have no porters."
"I have not forgotten that when a white Bwana treks he must have his
servants to cut a path for him," she said with gentle derison. "You will
have porters, never doubt it. And they will see to it that their Bwana
does not mistake his direction."
"Sheena must he obeyed," he said with a faint smile. And she gave him
a sharp look. Quiet submission was not what she had expected. It was
not in his nature, and she felt uneasy. Then it flashed into her mind that
he might not be as well as he said he was. She smiled and said:
"You would do