登陆注册
5271100000022

第22章 Chapter II.(3)

"Oh, no, I can stand it well enough. It's only a little warm." He gave a slight cough, and laid his head down sideways on his arm. His eyes watched mechanically the Colonial's manipulation of the bird. He had left England to escape phthisis; and he had gone to Mashonaland because it was a place where he could earn an open-air living, and save his parents from the burden of his support.

"What's Halket doing over there?" he asked suddenly, raising his head.

"Weren't you here this morning?" asked the Colonial. "Didn't you know they'd had a devil of a row?"

"Who?" asked the Englishman, half raising himself on his elbows.

"Halket and the Captain." The Colonial paused in the plucking. "My God, you never saw anything like it!"

The Englishman sat upright now, and looked keenly over the bushes where Halket's bent head might be seen as he paced to and fro.

"What's he doing out there in this blazing sun?"

"He's on guard," said the Colonial. "I thought you were here when it happened. It's the best thing I ever saw or heard of in my whole life!"

He rolled half over on his side and laughed at the remembrance. "You see, some of the men went down into the river, to look for fresh pools of water, and they found a nigger, hidden away in a hole in the bank, not five hundred yards from here! They found the bloody rascal by a little path he tramped down to the water, trodden hard, just like a porcupine's walk.

They got him in the hole like an aardvark, with a bush over the mouth, so you couldn't see it. He'd evidently been there a long time, the floor was full of bones of fish he'd caught in the pool, and there was a bit of root like a stick half gnawed through. He'd been potted, and got two bullet wounds in the thigh; but he could walk already. It's evident he was just waiting till we were gone, to clear off after his people. He'd got that beastly scurvy look a nigger gets when he hasn't had anything to eat for a long time.

"Well, they hauled him up before the Captain, of course; and he blew and swore, and said the nigger was a spy, and was to be hanged tomorrow; he'd hang him tonight, only the big troop might catch us up this evening, so he'd wait to hear what the Colonel said; but if they didn't come he'd hang him first thing tomorrow morning, or have him shot, as sure as the sun rose. He made the fellows tie him up to that little tree before his tent, with riems round his legs, and riems round his waist, and a riem round his neck."

"What did the native say?" asked the Englishman.

"Oh, he didn't say anything. There wasn't a soul in the camp could have understood him if he had. The coloured boys don't know his language. I expect he's one of those bloody fellows we hit the day we cleared the bush out yonder; but how he got down that bank with his leg in the state it must have been, I don't know. He didn't try to fight when they caught him; just stared in front of him--fright, I suppose. He must have been a big strapping devil before he was taken down.

"Well, I tell you, we'd just got him fixed up, and the Captain was just going into his tent to have a drink, and we chaps were all standing round, when up steps Halket, right before the Captain, and pulls his front lock--you know the way he has? Oh, my God, my God, if you could have seen it!

I'll never forget it to my dying day!" The Colonial seemed bursting with internal laughter. "He begins, 'Sir, may I speak to you?' in a formal kind of way, like a fellow introducing a deputation; and then all of a sudden he starts off--oh, my God, you never heard such a thing! It was like a boy in Sunday-school saying up a piece of Scripture he's learnt off by heart, and got all ready beforehand, and he's not going to be stopped till he gets to the end of it."

"What did he say," asked the Englishman.

"Oh, he started, How did we know this nigger was a spy at all; it would be a terrible thing to kill him if we weren't quite sure; perhaps he was hiding there because he was wounded. And then he broke out that, after all, these niggers were men fighting for their country; we would fight against the French if they came and took England from us; and the niggers were brave men, 'please sir'--(every five minutes he'd pull his forelock, and say, 'please sir!')--'and if we have to fight against them we ought to remember they're fighting for freedom; we shouldn't shoot wounded prisoners when they were black if we wouldn't shoot them if they were white!' And then he broke out pure unmitigated Exeter Hall! You never heard anything like it! All men were brothers, and God loved a black man as well as a white; Mashonas and Matabele were poor ignorant folk, and we had to take care of them. And then he started out, that we ought to let this man go; we ought to give him food for the road, and tell him to go back to his people, and tell them we hadn't come to take their land but to teach them and love them. 'It's hard to love a nigger, Captain, but we must try it; we must try it!'--And every five minutes he'd break out with, 'And I think this is a man I know, Captain; I'm not sure, but I think he comes from up Lo Magundis way!'--as if any born devil cared whether a bloody nigger came from Lo Magundis or anywhere else! I'm sure he said it fifteen times. And then he broke out, 'I don't mean that I'm better than you or anybody else, Captain; I'm as bad a man as any in camp, and I know it.' And off he started, telling us all the sins he'd ever committed; and he kept on, 'I'm an unlearned, ignorant man, Captain; but I must stand by this nigger; he's got no one else!' And then he says--'If you let me take him up to Lo Magundis, sir, I'm not afraid; and I'll tell the people there that it's not their land and their women that we want, it's them to be our brothers and love us. If you'll only let me go, sir, I'll go and make peace; give the man to me, sir!'" The Colonial shook with laughter.

"What did the Captain say?" asked the Englishman.

同类推荐
  • 兵制

    兵制

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • The Purcell Papers

    The Purcell Papers

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 洞玄子

    洞玄子

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 复斋日记

    复斋日记

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 台案汇录乙集

    台案汇录乙集

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 大波(全集)

    大波(全集)

    李劼人著作《大波》分为两个版本,一个是1937年的老版本。一个是新中国成立后1956年作者的重写本,两个版本的内容相差很大,几本没有重复的内容。本书是作者1937年版本《大波》,作为1937年版本完整呈现,分上中下三卷。主要内容为为反对清政府出卖川汉铁路筑路权,夏之时、林绍泉等人组织了保路同志会,遭到血腥镇压。保路运动由请愿发展为武装反抗。作品事件纷繁,人物众多,反映了辛亥革命前后各阶级、各阶层、各政治派别之间错综复杂的斗争。《大波》这部小说,在其浓郁的地方色彩之中,反应了一个人心浮动的动荡时代,它描摹了一个轩然大波时代的众生面相,对于研究方言文学和记事文学都具有很高的价值。
  • 农门悍妻:将军大人请留步

    农门悍妻:将军大人请留步

    从小她就被定命里带煞气,会害死同父异母的庶弟,重男轻女的爹为苏家唯一的儿子,将她这个嫡女丢在乡下。揭不开锅的情况下她为了吃饱,开始了自力更生。银子开始大把大把的赚。家里亲戚又开始来找她麻烦。“识相点把银子交给我们保管。”给你们那还不如把银子丢到水里去。一道圣旨将他们两个陌生人绑了在一起。“安分点!不然休了你。”她还觉得很委屈呢,她又不喜欢他,不过她倒是巴不得他休了她。当大将军喜欢上她之后……“娘子,儿子重要还是夫君重要?”“儿子。”夫君没了还可以再找,儿子是她身上掉下的。某人正好借此机会修理她冷落他那么久。“你要干嘛?”“滚床单!”--情节虚构,请勿模仿
  • 空房子

    空房子

    妻子又回来了,在我杀死她后的第七天。我打开卫生间灯的时候,奈美那颗美丽的头颅就在洗手池里,被我切断的脖根处残缺不齐,昏黄灯光下她的皮肤开始腐烂发紫,微微张开的嘴里伸出一条舌头,白色的虫子在鼻翼边蠕动,混浊的眼珠正对着镜子端详自己,一如她生前那样喜爱臭美……
  • 二憨中选

    二憨中选

    这是1986年的事。当了20多年的生产队长,紧接着又当了两年多村民小组长的余爷突然宣布再干一年就不干了。这事一时成了枣树岭组的重大新闻和村民们的热门话题。村民们不相信这是事实,因为余爷只有50多岁,精力充沛,经验丰富,而且一直干得好好的。“听说余爷不想当组长了,有这回事吗?”黄昏时分,刚从二舅家串门回来的二憨,在村口碰见大聪,这样向大聪问道。大聪也不答话,而是习惯地伸出右手的食指和中指做成剪刀状,二憨自然知道,这是大聪向自己讨烟抽。
  • 拖拉机汽车底盘构造与维护

    拖拉机汽车底盘构造与维护

    为深入贯彻《国务院关大力推进职业教育改革与发展的决定》以及教育部等六部委《关实施职业院校制造业和现代服务业技能型紧缺人才培养培训工程的通知》精神,宁夏农业学校积极推进课程改革和教材建设,我校农业机械使用与维护专业建设指导委员会及专业教师按照教育部颁布的《中等职业院校农业机械使用与维护专业领域技能型紧缺人才培养培训指导方案》的要求,编写了本书,以供我校农业机械使用与维护专业实训使用。
  • 独立(青少年成长智慧丛书)

    独立(青少年成长智慧丛书)

    青少年成长智慧丛书》针对当代少年儿童应具备的十种素质,把古今中外的经典故事按关键词归类,精编成十本故事集。每个故事后设计有“换位思考”与“成长感悟”小栏目。用以充分调动孩子们思考问题的积极性,给孩子们以无限启迪。
  • 亦玉堂稿

    亦玉堂稿

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 温病指南

    温病指南

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 那个大佬被打了

    那个大佬被打了

    “跑,再跑!”周身被寒气包裹着的男人一脸阴霾。“人家怕嘛!”缩在墙角的女人在瑟瑟发抖。“怕?怕什么?”男人嘴角勾起一抹邪魅的笑,故作疑惑状。“讨厌,就,就是怕那个……”秀丽的小脸上写满了委屈。“乖,不怕啊!”温柔的声音一下子迷惑了缩在墙角的女人。“你,禽兽…………”话音刚落,就被男子打横抱起,阔步走向柔软的大床。开始了他们没羞没骚的“生活”!!!“听说夫人曾当着全世界的面,甩了您一巴掌,那最后您是怎么惩罚夫人的呢?”“嗯,大概是白天跪键盘,晚上……”
  • TOM SAWYER ABROAD

    TOM SAWYER ABROAD

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。