Part 57 (1/2)
The whole tribe rose at once and flitted along beside us on our landward side We could not hear a footfall, or a breath They passed through dry grass without rustling, neither stuoverned by one all-absorbing thought that they acted in absolute unison That the thought was food did not, even in their starving state,need for silence
We with our leather boots ether
We passed along the lake shore for half atall as a stripped tree in the pale uncertain light, threw up an arm and waved it in a circle Instantly the whole tribe vanished It was as if a puff of wind had blown theic lantern and suddenly switched off at the perfor ht and followed a narrow track across a neck of land that jutted out into the lake We approached a low rise, and as he drew near the top of that he went down on hands and knees, crawling up the last few yards so cautiously that I had to stare hard to be sure he was there at all
As soon as Fred caet down and crawl too; so we all knelt down and crawled behind Fred, striving tothe unhappy chief so full of fury at the noise we did make that he writhed in nervous torment
On top of the rise Fred stopped and in iradually One by one we followed suit until, lying prone in line along the ridge within thirty paces of the water,at last ere after
Bathed in the ht, head and shoulders clear of the reat bull hippopotah his little placid eyes Out there nothing troubled him, as for instance the mosquitoes troubled us He had eaten his fill, for soinning to feel sleepy, for he opened his enorht toward us--three tons of meat on the hoof, less than a hundred yards away, stock-still, and unsuspicious!
The chief began whispering unintelligible warnings in a voice so low that it sounded like the drone of insects Fred thrust the rifle forward inch by inch and, taking his time about it, settled himself comfortably for the shot It was no easy shot in that uncertain light at a doard angle The glare of the sun on the lake had troubled his eyes during the last few days The shi+ht was deceptive noished he would pass the rifle to Will, or even to Brown of Luers into the earth beside me in almost uncontrollable excitement But Fred was unperturbed, and the chief, as nervous enough to detect the slightest sign of nervousness in Fred, did not seem to mistrust him for one second
Three tiger, but each tiain The target a hippo offers to a Mauser rifle bullet is notonly the ear and eye and the narrow space between the for a cool shot to cole, it is none too ain that Fred would pass the rifle to Will, or to Brown--or to me! Yet if he had passed it to me I should have trean to haunt me of ould happen if Fred should miss!
What would the effect be on wild folk tortured by hunger and keyed to the pitch of frenzy by suspense? Then, even while atched, another problean to co ripples and little waves in front of it The moment those came near the hippo he would vanish froht when they can see it mirrored on a perfectly still surface
I cursed Fred between set teeth, alh for him to hear me; for the hippo did move His head was a foot nearer water-level; he had seen or heard so under water when Fredout into the still night like the crack of Judg for it in such suspense
Instantly the aht apart Where stilly blackness had been, now four or five hundred crazy shadows leaped and danced,noises intended to express joy
Out on the water the stricken hippo pitched head doard and plunged like a reat waves that were darkened with his life-blood A whole herd, several hundred strong, eh from the water to take one swift look at hi wind overswept the little whirlpools they all ht, as they dived to seek seclusion somewhere and no doubt to choose the
Our quarry plunged a last time, and stayed under Noas new anxiety
In twenty ain, but no uess where, and the wind and currents would very swiftly hide his great carcass somewhere amid the acres of papyrus unless sharp eyes were alert
But the papyrus was friend as well as foe In a space of ti men of the tribe had uncovered three canoes, hidden froh reeds, and the rest of the tribe-- the shore to watch from between the stalks
In less than fifteen minutes some one yelled, and even the very old ape at Fred's rifle and our clothes and boots, began running like hares toward the sound In twenty rass ropes and leather thongs, they had hauled the huge carcass to the shore and rolled it out of the water, where it lay glistening in s upperin yet There was time-honored custonorant wachenzie would have fallen to without ceremony He drove them off A white man had slain that animal; therefore the white man's choice of meat was first, and he very leisurely and skillfully cut out the enor before he would let theer [ Plural of machenzie, ”h, the tribe fell to, naked, with little naked knives--tearing off the thick hide in foot-wide strips, and hacking the red flesh into lu, while they worked The little bits of children, each chewing raw bloodythes of strugglingthe baskets al until their jaws ran blood
Nothing asted The blood was caught in pools in part of the hide, spread like an apron on the earth, and lapped up by whoever could get to it The very guts were gathered up in baskets to be cooked And where the last little soft iron dagger had done its work, the blood had been drunk, and the last scrap of hide bad been cut into strips, to be chehen the s of the past, the enorht like those of an abandoned wreck, picked as clean as if the kites had done it
”Have we done a co at the crowd's distended paunches ”There's a good bull hippo the less
We've saved the lives for a tiratitude”
But he rong They did They brought Fred a woliest; which lier than Want, also she wasThe chief led her by the hand, she hanging back and hiding her face under one arm (which left the rest of her nakedness unprotected) He seized Fred's hand and put the woman's in it
”Now you're spliced!” Brown explained ”Married to the gal forever in presence of legal witnesses!”