In Zanzibar

Front matter

PFOUR BELLS bo ante By Ralph D. Paine

2 ee

| Author of ‘‘ Roads of Adventure,” ‘‘ Comrades |. of the Rolling Ocean,”’ “‘ First Down, ey | Kentucky! ”’ etc.

II

HAVE you ever heard of Djibuti? It is the little city of French Somaliland that clings to the edge of an African desert where the Gulf of Aden shimmers in the glare of breathless days and the red sunsets paint it gorgeously. Djibuti is where one goes ashore if he desires to visit the ancient, unconquerable kingdom of Abyssinia whose feudal lords wage mighty wars among their mountains and no more than the echoes thereof come to the outside world. A race of Christian warriors from time immemorial, they carry the banners of Saint George and Saint Gabriel into battle or kiss the crucifix ere they charge in swirling squadrons of cavalry.

Here life runs much as when the slim, brown Balkis, Queen of Sheba, rode down from this her realm of Ethiopia with her opulent retinue, her ivory, apes, and peacocks, and the gold of Ophir, to make the acquaintance of the canny young Solomon, King of the Jews.

A railroad winds up from Djibuti, a three days’ journey to the remote Abyssinian capital of Addis- Abeba, but tourists seldom find their way thither. These are creatures of habit, moving in ruts and following the crowd, wherefore certain nooks and corners of a primitive world are still unspoiled.

Roving very far from home on a voyage to the Indian Ocean, the scout cruiser Toledo was displaying her flag in ports never before visited by an Amer-

IN ZANZIBAR F ican man-of-war. It was a sight to thrill the heart of a Yankee exile, if there had been such a one on - the beach of Djibuti, this slim, gray ship of surpassing speed which possessed a grace and beauty denied the massive fighting machines of the battle fleet.

Her ‘shake-down cruise,’ they called it, the pur-

pose of which was to tune up anew ship and to school a crew of five hundred officers and men in the intricate, exacting team-play of the modern naval service. Even in this age of turbine engines and all manner of amazing electrical devices, the landlubber must go to sea to become a sailor. King Neptune still rules his boisterous realm, and to be his lawful subject one should go rolling out to meet all weathers as it was in the days of topsail yards, straining shrouds, and the winds that blew the ships along. _ The Toledo swarmed with active youngsters in white clothes while the quick notes of a bugle or the bird-like quaver of the boatswain’s pipe called them from one routine task to another. Scrub and paint and polish, with inspections, gunnery drills, and battle stations in the day’s work! To be slack in little things is to invite slackness in the chief essentials. Such is the eternal gospel of the Navy. In time of peace the competent commander thinks of little else than to be as ready as possible for the emergencies of war, no matter how remote these may be. Secluded and detached from the populace which pays the bills, the Navy lives its own strenuously absorbed existence afloat.

Mr. Cassius Stackpole was a man of long service and vast experience. He was at home in most of the Seven Seas. As the paymaster’s assistant, he had fathomed the iniquities and could combat the extortions of ship-chandlers, fuel agents, dragomans, bumboats, money changers, and native markets. He was the veteran of the Toledo’s supply office. As a linguist he could air a smattering of divers strange tongues. His aspect of matured wisdom, of familiarity with exotic climes and races, suggested a modern Ulysses in a white uniform with the shoulder straps of a warrant officer.

The social distinction between the wardroom and the ‘warrant officers’ ‘country’ of a naval vessel is not easy to convey to a layman. It is the difference between commissioned rank and the lack of it. The dignified, courteous Mr. Stackpole, for example, was unlikely to receive a card to a conventional French or British club in these African ports. Officially he was an enlisted man while the downy ensign fresh from the Naval Academy was officially a gentleman. By traditional usage, caste and discipline are interwoven in all military service.

A mellowed philosopher, the chief pay clerk was untroubled by an inferiority complex. He moved in his orbit of manifold responsibilities with no waste motion. It ruffled him a little that the godless youngsters of the crew called him ‘Old Man’ Stackpole. He was indeed guilty of having lived forty years. The sedentary habit of long office hours between decks, in a maze of paper work, had increased his weight, but he still carried it well. He had an appearance of substantial composure. The urbane features were a trifle fleshy, reminding one of some judge or senator in a portrait gallery.

Behold him, then, stepping ashore to the stone causeway which extended far out across the coral reefs of the harbor of Djibuti. No one would have surmised that Somaliland was strange to him. His deportment indicated that he felt calmly confident of finding his way about. He was at home anywhere. From the water scrambled a flock of naked Somali urchins who had been swimming around the Toledo and diving for coins. They surrounded Mr. Stackpole, clamoring for backsheesh, but he waved them aside without impatience and bargained with the black driver of a rickety carriage. These two harangued each other in what passed for French. The dialogue became vehement. Just when violence seemed imminent, the Somali surrendered. With a grin, he agreed to transport Mr. Stackpole at his own price. Here was a foreigner who could not be cheated. It was unique.

Away rattled the decrepit hack while behind it trotted one of the urchins who had emerged from the sea. He could be distinguished from the others by curious streaks of brown in the kinky wool that covered his pate. This made him an oddity. The boy, who was perhaps a dozen years old, had an intelligent face. His nose was not flat nor his lips thick. Black as was the shiny skin, he was not to be mistaken for an African negro. In his blood, perhaps, was the Arab strain that is found among the Somalis and in the Abyssinian lowlands. Burning sun and salt water might have bleached those brindled streaks in his wool or possibly they were a freak of heredity.

All this escaped the attention of Mr. Cassius Stackpole who was unaware that the persistent urchin trailed him in clouds of dust. First impressions of Djibuti were surprisingly agreeable. The buildings were of stone and concrete facing wide streets with small parks of bright flowers. Shops and cafés were shaded by long arcades that offered refuge from the glare. Obviously the modern creation of a colonial policy, the place had charm, touches of the agreeable. The French officials and merchants had endeavored to make their exile something more than endurable.

The native quarter was another story. An open square incredibly filthy was crowded with caravans come in from the desert to trade, ragged nomads, and grass huts, camels, goats, and donkeys. Their market shed was literally dark with buzzing curtains of flies. The chief pay clerk, who was a methodical if not an enthusiastic sightseer, felt squeamish and hastened on. He perceived the need of a chair at a little table in front of the Hétel de France where the trees rustled in a breeze from the harbor.

A cooling drink, ice and soda and the ruddy hue of Dubonnet, was grateful. He reflected that France held fast to her coastwise strip of Somaliland as the gateway of the inland traffic. And some day Abyssinia might crumble. Then there would be a scramble for the pieces. That dirty native quarter, now — it was like the French in Algiers — the front yard spick-and-span, Paris in miniature — but when you climbed the hill to the Arab town—ugh! The English ruled with a broom in one hand, whether the natives liked it or not.

There presently appeared the skinny, bright-eyed urchin who had pursued Mr. Stackpole from the quay. He had acquired a little fan of woven grass, shaped like a flag. Solemnly he took his stand and waved the fan to refresh Mr. Stackpole’s perspiring brow. He could not be driven away. This was his self-appointed task. Eager to be of service, he volunteered a shrill question or two:

‘You allé pos’-offeece, M’sieu? Me show you. Buy baskeet? Trés bien? Me’ get cheap.’

At a near-by table sat a French naval officer, a lieutenant, by his gold sleeve-stripes. He was a thick-set, competent looking young man with a ruddy cheek and an engaging smile. The cosmopolitan Mr. Stackpole found no difficulty in opening a conversation. Politely he inquired:

‘You are attached to the gunboat anchored astern of the Toledo, my lieutenant? A converted yacht, I take it.’

‘Yes, the Diane once belonged to an American millionaire. She was purchased by our naval service during the War. It is a very tiresome patrol, this Gulf of Aden, my friend. Hot, and so little diversion.’

Ke) IN ZANZIBAR

‘A patrol?’ asked Mr. Stackpole. ‘You interest me. Mostly on this coast?’

‘Entirely. We try to catch the sailing dhows that run slaves across to the Arabian ports. A few of the Arab traders are still active. They manage to smuggle some slaves out of Abyssinia, not many, but enough to make it a nuisance, I assure you. The dhows dodge in and out at night. They are the devil to find. Secret signals warn them when the Diane goes out on patrol. We have not had much luck.’

This entertained Mr. Stackpole, blasé as he was. He had taken it for granted that the slave trade, like piracy, had been wiped out. The lieutenant explained with a yawn that the Abyssinian Government was anxious to suppress the traffic in accordance with its promise to the League of Nations. The rascally Arabs, however, would run the risks as long as there was a market for their human merchandise.

He changed the subject. It bored him, as not in the least picaresque. Mere damned drudgery in the course of service on a foreign station! With a nod he indicated the black boy who continued to fan the chief pay clerk with tireless fidelity.

‘I have talked with this youngster,’ said the lieu- - tenant. ‘A precocious monkey. He isa Shoan, of the best fighting stock of Abyssinia. His father fled for his life at the end of the civil war between the armies of the Negus, Ras Mikael, and the Empress Zeoditou. It was a struggle for the throne of the great Menelik. This father of the boy may come dragging himself past the hotel at any moment. He

IN ZANZIBAR II is crippled. One arm and one foot were cut off in battle. He sells the beautifully made Shoan baskets for a few francs each. After his wounds healed, his friends brought him and his family to the coast. His life was not safe in his own country. He had been a petty chief of some influence. I have heard him tell the story of the final onslaught of Dedjatch Tababa with thirty thousand troops against fifty thousand Shoans. Horsemen and foot soldiers were mingled in one tremendous mélée. Rifles exploded like crackers, lances dipped their bloody points, scimitars thudded against raw-hide shields, men in chainmail shirts rolled in the meadow grass, stabbing, choking each other, mad to kill.’

Mr. Cassius Stackpole turned in his chair to look at the brindled waif with the fan, an atom of humanity washed up by a tide of barbaric carnage. He gave the boy a handful of the Djibuti francs, stamped from tin. The youngster knelt to kiss his benefactor’s hand. In his childish voice he repeated over and over again that he was the faithful servant of the big American officer. His name was Matheos, said he, and he would be waiting at the quay whenever his master came ashore.

‘Matheos?’ echoed the chief pay clerk.

‘Many of them bear Biblical names,’ explained the lieutenant. ‘One of the generals in this recent civil war was Ras Gebri-Christos. Pardon me, but I must now return to the Diane. Will you be good enough to visit the gunboat and stay for luncheon?’

Mr. Stackpole had to decline. He had some other errands in Djibuti. At his heels trotted little black Matheos, ready to ply his fan when the chief pay clerk tarried in the bank or the post-office. So fast and so far had those bare feet pattered that he was permitted to ride in the antique carriage when it toiled out on the causeway where a launch from the cruiser was waiting.

Two flippant young wardroom officers had been rambling about the town. They had noted the stately progress of Mr. Cassius Stackpole and his | ebony retainer. It aroused their sense of humor. Although the chief pay clerk could not fairly be called a pompous man, a trace of bland self-importance did make alittle black boy with a fan seem quite the proper thing. Nor did it escape the crew of the launch, including the freckled coxswain. They grinned behind Mr. Stackpole’s broad back and decided that no liberty party would be complete unless they could each rate a black boy with a fan. This was true Oriental luxury, they were prepared to tell the cock-eyed world.

In the afternoon a bevy of these amphibious blackamoors swam out to the ship and yelled for coins. Heedless of sharks, they paddled and scrambled and dived hour after hour. The agile Matheos was conspicuously marked by those brown streaks in his wool. When Mr. Stackpole sauntered on deck after a sweltering session with the paymaster, his protégé raised a joyous shout of welcome.

The other warrant officers, including the chief boatswain, the electrical gunner, and the chief carpenter, made comments ribald and unkind. Because of ‘Old Man’ Stackpole’s respectable record in the service, they were reluctant to air a scandal, but he was always boasting of having been everywhere. Possibly he had visited Djibuti before and was trying to cover it up. That kid with the piebald thatch, now— but the virtuous Mr. Stackpole seemed so upset by these wicked slurs that his friends refrained from teasing him.

Sensitive to ridicule, he vowed to himself that he would parade the town no more with little Matheos and his fan. He would tell the boy to make himself scarce. It was too late, however, to smother the senseless joke. It would be passed along among the five hundred men of the cruiser, from the navigating bridge to the torrid depths where the black gang stood its watches.

The unhappy chief pay clerk was compelled to stay on board the next day to handle the intricate accounts of the ship’s pay-roll. With profound relief he watched two hundred bluejackets shove off in the liberty party with money burning holes in their pockets. They had grumbled, as usual, over various stoppages, but he was an old hand at the game and they had put nothing over on him. His , accounts balanced to a penny, he retired to a quiet spot beneath an awning and solaced himself with a book and a pipe.

IIT

MEANWBHILE the liberty party was invading Djibuti, eager to discover what excuse it had to offer for existing in this land of barren desolation. Martin Donnelly, machinist’s mate, was in one of his glum humors. It was a crime to send a ship to such a dump as this. Moreover, he disliked Frenchmen. He was big-boned, hairy, and tattooed. Continuous hot weather had melted him down until he was almost gaunt. Whenever he came on deck from a watch in the engine-room, the sweat dripped from his bare arms and heavy shoulders and spattered on deck. With the ferocious aspect of a cave man, his voice was mild and his demeanor ordinarily gentle. This made him incongruous.

With him strolled a boyish shipmate, Seaman William Sprague. He looked like a youth whose diversions were harmless. Honest eyes with a glint of mischief in them, a disarming smile, he was the typical recruit, clean, supple, intelligent, that is the pride of the service. He was at that age when a pimple on his chin worried him seriously, and he was ready to squander his pay on the ship’s tailor to have his uniform fit just so. Impatience of discipline and a temper that flared now and then had involved him in minor punishments. At heart he was sound. In the forecastle symphony orchestra he passionately performed on the saxophone.

IN ZANZIBAR is

- Martin Donnelly’s critical survey of Djibuti was given another slant when he spied at his elbow the alert little Matheos of the brindled pate who had been scurrying about to find Mr. Stackpole in the crowd. He was like a dog in quest of a beloved master. Disappointed, he selected Donnelly as a person worthy of temporary allegiance. He was tall and strong and had the frowning air of command. He would be a valiant man in battle.

“Well, look who’s here,’ said Martin. ‘Old Man Stackpole’s little black striker, funny fan and everything. He wants to sign on with me.’

‘Don’t you let him get away,’ advised William Sprague. ‘Strut your stuff. You are big and ugly enough to be the Sheik of Somaliland.’

Donnelly chuckled and repented of his yearning to take Djibuti to pieces and see what made it tick. He would drift from one sidewalk café to another, amiably looking on, while his black boy fanned him, held a match for his cigarette, and mustered the peddlers of curios for an inspection of their wares. It would be a calm, sensible liberty. ‘Kid’ Sprague decided to trail along. He might have to stand by. With the best of intentions, the black-browed machinist’s mate seemed fated to loom in the midst of unexpected events. At present there were no portents of trouble, but you never could tell.

Donnelly demanded baskets as souvenirs. Matheos ran to look for them. Soon he returned with a scarred, maimed veteran of Abyssinian warfare, his own father, who made painfully halting progress with a crutch. Here was no whining mendicant, but a strong man brought low, whose glance flashed like that of a captive falcon. A crinkly beard covered his chin. A tiny silver cross was suspended by a cord around his neck. The brown, muscular chest was bare. He was of a different race from the lathy, excitable Somalis.

Learning who he was, Martin Donnelly felt pity for him. A voluble café waiter spoke English and volunteered as an interpreter.

‘A scrapper, eh?’ said Martin. ‘And he got his. The boy is a chip of the old block. Ask him how much he wants for the three baskets. Don’t beat him down. Here is where I lay off dickerin’ for once.’

Having paid the price, the sailor asked in jest:

“How much for the boy?’

The father displayed no surprise, but talked rapidly to the waiter who announced:

‘Five hundred francs, he says.’

‘For the love of Mike, will he honestly sell him to me for twenty-five dollars?’

‘Yes, sir. He has plenty more boys. It is very hard to live. Five hundred francs is tremendous much money for him. He never saw so much money in his life.’

‘Huh, what does little Matheos think about it?’

‘He is delighted to have you take him to America in the grand warship. All people in America are rich. He will get rich, too.’

‘Could you beat it, Kid?’ rumbled Martin.

‘Forget it,’ was the earnest advice. Trouble lifted on the horizon like a small, dark cloud. ‘You are cuckoo, Martin. You can’t buy this young smoke as if he was a basket. For Heaven’s sake, what are you going to do with him?’

‘Take him home as a present for my dear old mother in Bridgeport, you simp,’ was the stubborn reply. ‘When the lumbago ketches her, she is on her beam ends for somebody to help her with the housework. She can train this bright lad and bring him up right. And I'll send him to school and learn him to vote the Democratic ticket.’

‘But you can’t hide him in the ship.’

‘Why hide him, Kid? The chief engineer is allowed to keep his German police dog on board. This boy of mine will rate as another pet, understand?’

‘I might as well argue with the for’ard twin turret,’ sighed William Sprague.

‘Don’t talk at me like that,’ Donnelly protested. ‘Listen! Any guy in this man’s navy will try anything once. Suppose we keep the boy on board overnight and sort of tactfully spring him on the executive to-morrow. If he blows up, we can send little Matheos ashore. I have taken an awful fancy to this Abyssinian tadpole. And at twenty-five dollars he is a genuine bargain. I can play him two ways. I need a mascot, honest I do, Kid. There ain’t a superstitious hair in my head, but some kind of a jinx has surely got a twist on me. Things don’t break right. Life has been one jam after another on this cruise. Look what happened to me in

Algiers. And the camel that bit my neck at the Pyr- . amids. And the stewed Englishman that run his flivver plumb off the dock on Christmas Eve at Port Soudan — me sober in the back seat and fourteen feet of water before we hit bottom!’

‘Buy the boy, then. What’s the use?’ wearily exclaimed Seaman Sprague. ‘Never say I didn’t warn you. You had better keep darn quiet about it or these French cops will throw you in the hoosgow as a slave trader.’

Impervious to insults or rebukes, the obstinate machinist’s mate fished out a roll of bank-notes and peeled off five hundred francs. The crippled warrior accepted them with grave courtesy. The transaction was finished. If he felt the natural emotions of a parent, they were stoically repressed. A half-grown boy with a dingy wisp of cloth around his waist had changed ownership. Martin Donnelly resented being called a slave trader. He was merely adding another curio to his collection.

‘T ought to put some kind of clothes on him, Kid. Let’s go look for a store. It don’t seem right to take him off to a smart ship with nothing on but a geestring.’

They managed to insert Matheos into a white shirt and breeches much too large for him, and clapped a straw hat on his head. Donnelly bought him a cheap American watch and a box of candy. The boy was proud, but acutely uncomfortable. He wriggled and scratched until his owner suggested:

‘We'll have to peel the shirt off him, Kid. And ee, a the ship’s tailor can chop those pants off like a pair of trunks. For a Christian, he certainly has been runnin’ wild and free.’

Later in the afternoon they went off to the Toledo, hiring a shore boat instead of waiting for a launch. Up the gangway lumbered Martin Donnelly, respectfully reporting to the officer of the deck. At his heels was the twenty-five-dollar urchin carrying the baskets and other purchases. The officer let him pass and thought no more about it, assuming that Donnelly had brought the boy along to help him aboard with his stuff. The truth was too fantastic for surmise. For several generations the American Navy in foreign waters had been unfamiliar with the slave trade.

In the orderly commotion of supper, with the mess tables crowding the berth deck, the black curio was unheeded. Donnelly tucked him away in an airy torpedo compartment and smuggled in a plate of beans, fried spuds, bread and jam, pickles, and a mug of coffee. Matheos ate until his stomach was as tight as a drum. Then he curled upon the steel deck and went to sleep for the night. He had been granted a glimpse of heavenly bliss.

On certain other occasions it had occurred to Martin Donnelly that he was, by nature, an impulsive ‘man, very apt to leap before he looked. Pondering it overnight, he was almost persuaded that here might be one of those instances. Now and then the flighty Kid Sprague showed good sense. Perhaps he was right. Possibly it was advisable to

2Q IN ZANZIBAR send the little Abyssinian derelict ashore. His father would be five hundred francs richer.

Unfortunately Donnelly had to stand a watch from four to eight in the morning. He shook Matheos awake and sternly commanded him to remain hidden in the torpedo compartment until further notice. When he came off watch, however, the disobedient slave had vanished. It was a trying situation. William Sprague had no information to offer. He was righteously indifferent. Served the old dumb-bell of a Donnelly right. Let him worry!

Tidings came from the warrant officers’ quarters. Matheos had roamed about until, by chance, he caught sight of the portly, dignified figure of Mr. Cassius Stackpole emerging on deck for a breath of air before breakfast. The boy joyfully beheld the master of his first choice, whom he had deésired to serve rather for sentiment than for cash. Now he resolved to adhere to the admirable chief pay clerk like a barnacle. A stickler for the regulations of the service, Mr. Stackpole was annoyed, not to say flustered. He could not understand, for the life of him, how the small rascal had been able to sneak on board the ship. He would be bundled ashore at once.

With broken words and frantic gestures, Matheos conveyed the fact that he couldn’t be kicked off in this summary fashion. He had been properly bought and paid for and was consigned to America. It would be like stealing property to take him away from his owner.

‘God bless me, what crazy notion is this?’ muttered the bewildered chief pay clerk. ‘Has one of the men actually bought a slave? It’s incredible. It may result in complications with the French administration.’

With this he towed the troublesome Matheos to the upper deck. Discipline held the crew quiet, but to a man they were jubilantly interested. The snickers became audible. The black boy grinned nervously and showed the whites of his eyes. Something had gone wrong with his destiny. He sensed this much. He pointed at the glowering Donnelly who peered from behind a ventilator. The brawny machinist’s mate seemed coy and bashful. Mr. Stackpole advanced majestically to confront him, clutching Matheos by one ear.

‘See here, Donnelly, I am amazed! Were you drunk on liberty?’

‘No, sir, and never am, and you know it. What do you mean by takin’ hold of my property in that careless way? You are liable to damage it. There’s no use in bawling out the fact that this was a bargain sale. I intend to get rid of the boy, don’t [?’

‘But you committed a serious offense against the laws of this French colony, in the first place. And now you violate the regulations covering the presence of unauthorized persons aboard a naval vessel.’

‘Pipe down, if you please, Mr. Stackpole. I was sort of soft-hearted and mushy yesterday. The less fuss, the sooner mended.’

There was merit in the argument. Mr. Stackpole retreated below, leaving the luckless pickaninny in the grasp of Martin Donnelly. Not long after this, the bugle sounded unexpected calls that sent the deck watch to stations on the run. The boats, floating at the mooring booms, were cast free to be hooked to the falls and hoisted aloft to the davits. The order had come from the captain, after consultation with the navigating officer. The word ran through the ship that the weather signs were ominous. An oily sea, a hazy sky, and a rapidly falling barometer indicated a violent disturbance.

The harbor of Djibuti was fairly well sheltered unless the wind should blow straight from seaward. The captain of the Toledo proposed to run no chances. He concluded to cut his visit short and steam out into the Gulf of Aden in order to avoid the peril of a lee shore and a network of sandy shoals. Without fuss or delay, the anchor winch heaved in the ponderous cable while the boats were swung inboard, chocked, and lashed. It was done in man-ofwar style. Moving slowly out, the long, gray cruiser signaled a farewell to Djibuti. :

IV

MARTIN DONNELLY scowled and scratched his head. He was entangled in a snarl of circumstances. The Toledo would probably proceed down the coast to Mombasa, the next port of call, which was almost a week distant. The Lord only knew what was to be done with twenty-five dollars’ worth of slave whom nobody seemed to want. Matheos had refused to remain stowed away. The fat was in the fire. The unhappy Donnelly resolved to appeal to the executive officer, as had been the original intention. Better have it out than to be dodging about in this uneasy state of mind.

The executive, or second in command, was a burly, red-necked man, in build much like Mr. Cassius Stackpole, but with more ability and greater driving power. Never sparing himself, anxious to tune the ship to the highest degree of efficiency, he was respected by the men although they did not like him. He was too incessantly zealous.

When Martin Donnelly ventured to accost him, he was coming out of the captain’s cabin with a radio sheet in his hand. Apparently the message had irritated him.

‘What is it, Donnelly? Shoot!’ he snapped out.

‘Well, sir, I sort of adopted a little black boy in Djibuti — er — temporarily, sir,’ began the elaborate explanation. ‘That is, he came off to the ship with some baskets for me, and there was no time to put him on the beach. The ship sailed. May I keep him for a pet, same as the chief engineer’s police dog that eats as much and takes up more room —’