“Because there were five strong niggers who didn’t trust me; so, on second thoughts, I determined to keep my old post as cook.”
“Then do you mean to say that it was mere accident that brought you to the coast of Africa?”
“Not a bit of it; the only accident—and a very lucky one it was—was meeting you on the very spot where we stranded. But it was my doing that we got so far. Young Sands understood nothing more of navigation than the use of the log and compass. Well, one fine day, you understand, the log remained at the bottom of the sea, and one night the compass was tampered with, so that the Pilgrim, scudding along before a tempest, was carried altogether out of her course. You may imagine the young captain was puzzled at the length of the voyage; it would have bewildered a more experienced head than his. Before he was aware of it, we had rounded Cape Horn; I recognized it through the mist. Then at once I put the compass to rights again, and the Pilgrim was carried northeastwards by a tremendous hurricane to the very place I wanted. The island Dick Sands took for Easter Island was really Tristan da Cunha.”
“Good!” said Harris; “I think I understand now how our friends have been persuaded to take Angola for Bolivia. But they are undeceived now, you know,” he added.
“I know all about that,” replied the Portuguese.
“Then what do you intend to do?” said Harris.
“You will see,” answered Negoro significantly; “but first of all tell me something about our employer, old Alvez; how is he?”
“Oh, the old rascal is well enough, and will be delighted to see you again,” replied Harris.
“Is he at the market at Bihé?”
“No, he has been at his place at Kazonndé for a year or more.”
“And how does business go on?”
“Badly enough, on this coast,” said Harris; “plenty of slaves are waiting to be shipped to the Spanish colonies, but the difficulty is how to get them embarked. The Portuguese authorities on the one hand, and the English cruisers on the other, almost put a stop to exportation altogether; down to the south, near Mossamedes, is the only part where it can be attempted with any chance of success. To pass a caravan through Benguela or Loande is an utter impossibility; neither the governors nor the chefés4 will listen to a word of reason. Old Alvez is therefore thinking of going in the other direction towards Nyangwé and Lake Tanganyika; he can there exchange his goods for slaves and ivory, and is sure to do a good business with Upper Egypt and the coast of Mozambique, which supplies Madagascar. But I tell you, Negoro,” he added gravely, “I believe the time is coming when the slave-trade will come to an end altogether. The English missionaries are advancing into the interior. That fellow Livingstone, confound him! has finished his tour of the lakes, and is now working his way towards Angola; then there is another man named Cameron who is talking about crossing the continent from east to west, and it is feared that Stanley the American will do the same. All this exploration, you know, is ruinous to our business, and it is to our interest that not one of these travellers should be allowed to return to tell tales of us in Europe.”
Harris spoke like a merchant embarrassed by a temporary commercial crisis. The atrocious scenes to which the slave-dealers are accustomed seems to render them impervious to all sense of justice or humanity, and they learn to regard their living merchandise with as small concern as though they were dealing with chests of tea or hogsheads of sugar.
But Harris was right when he asserted that civilization must follow the wake of the intrepid pioneers of African discovery. Livingstone first, and after him, Grant, Speke, Burton, Cameron, Stanley, are the heroes whose names will ever be linked with the first dawnings of a brighter age upon the dark wilds of Equatorial Africa.
Having ascertained that his accomplice had returned unscrupulous and daring as ever, and fully prepared to pursue his former calling as an agent of old Alvez the slave dealer, Harris inquired what he proposed doing with the survivors of the Pilgrim now that they were in his hands.
“Divide them into two lots,” answered Negoro, without a moment’s hesitation, “one for the market, the other. …”
He did not finish his sentence, but the expression of his countenance was an index to the malignity of his purpose.
“Which shall you sell?” asked the American.
“The niggers, of course. The old one is not worth much, but the other four ought to fetch a good price at Kazonndé.”
“Yes, you are right,” said Harris; “American-born slaves, with plenty of work in them, are rare articles, and very different to the miserable wretches we get up the country. But you never told me,” he added, suddenly changing the subject, “whether you found any money on board the Pilgrim!”
“Oh, I rescued a few hundred dollars from the wreck, that was all,” said the Portuguese carelessly; “but I am expecting. …” he stopped short.
“What are you expecting?” inquired Harris eagerly.
“Oh, nothing, nothing,” said Negoro, apparently annoyed that he had said so much, and immediately began talking of the means of securing the living prey which he had been taking so many pains to entrap. Harris informed him that on the Cuanza, about ten miles distant, there was at the present time encamped a slave caravan, under the control of an Arab named Ibn Hamish; plenty of native soldiers were there on guard, and if Dick Sands and his people could only be induced to travel in that direction, their capture would be a matter of very little difficulty. He said that of course Dick Sands’ first thought would naturally be how to get back to the coast; it was
