Hamilton had a sister who wrote wittily and charmingly every week, and there was another girl... Still, two letters and a bright pink paper or two made a modest postbag by the side of Lieutenant Tibbetts" mail.
There came to Bones every mail day a thick wad of letters and parcels innumerable, and he could sit at the big table for hours on end, whistling a little out of tune, mumbling incoherently. He had a trick of commenting upon his letters aloud, which was very disconcerting for Hamilton. Bones would open a letter and get half-way through it before he began his commenting.
"...poor soul...dear! dear!...what a silly old a.s.s...ah, would you...don"t do it, Billy..."
To Hamilton"s eyes the bulk of correspondence rather increased than diminished.
"You must owe a lot of money," he said one day.
"Eh!"
"All these...!" Hamilton opened his hand to a floor littered with discarded envelopes. "I suppose they represent demands..."
"Dear lad," said Bones brightly, "they represent popularity I"m immensely popular, sir," he gulped a little as he fished out two dainty envelopes from the pile before him; "you may not have experienced the sensation, but I a.s.sure you, sir, it"s pleasing, it"s doocidly pleasing!"
"Complacent a.s.s," said Hamilton, and returned to his own correspondence.
Systematically Bones went through his letters, now and again consulting a neat little morocco-covered note-book. (It would appear he kept a very careful record of every letter he wrote home, its contents, the date of its despatch, and the reply thereto.) He had reduced letter writing to a pa.s.sion, spent most of his evenings writing long epistles to his friends mostly ladies of a tender age and had incidentally acquired a reputation in the Old Country for his brilliant powers of narrative.
This, Hamilton discovered quite by accident. It would appear that Hamilton"s sister had been on a visit was in fact on the visit when she wrote one letter which so opened Hamilton"s eyes and mentioned that she was staying with some great friends of Bones". She did not, of course, call him "Bones," but "Mr Tibbetts."
"I should awfully like to meet him," she wrote, "he must be a very interesting man. Aggie Vernon had a letter from him yesterday wherein he described his awful experience lion-hunting.
"To be chased by a lion and caught and then carried to the beast"s lair must have been awful!
"Mr Tibbetts is very modest about it in his letter, and beyond telling Aggie that he escaped by sticking his finger in the lion"s eye he says little of his subsequent adventure. By the way, Pat, Aggie tells me that you had a bad bout of fever and that Mr Tibbetts carried you for some miles to the nearest doctor. I wish you wouldn"t keep these things so secret, it worries me dreadfully unless you tell me even the worst about yourself. I hope your interesting friend returned safely from his dangerous expedition into the interior he was on the point of leaving when his letter was despatched and was quite gloomy about his prospects..."
Hamilton read this epistle over and over again, then he sent for Bones.
That gentleman came most cheerfully, full of fine animal spirits, and "Just had a letter about you, Bones," said Hamilton carelessly.
"About me, sir!" said Bones, "from the War Office I"m not being decorated or anything!" he asked anxiously.
"No nothing so tragic; it was a letter from my sister, who is staying with the Vernons."
"Oh!" said Bones going suddenly red.
"What a modest devil you are," said the admiring Hamilton, "having a lion hunt all to yourself and not saying a word about it to anybody."
Bones made curious apologetic noises.
"I didn"t know there were any lions in the country," pursued Hamilton remorselessly. "Liars, yes! But lions, no! I suppose you brought them with you and I suppose, you know also, Bones, that it is considered in lion-hunting circles awfully rude to stick your finger into a lion"s eye? It is bad sportsmanship to say the least, and frightfully painful for the lion."
Bones was making distressful grimaces.
"How would you like a lion to stick his finger in your your eye?" asked Hamilton severely; "and, by the way, Bones, I have to thank you." eye?" asked Hamilton severely; "and, by the way, Bones, I have to thank you."
He rose solemnly, took the hand of his reluctant and embarra.s.sed second and wrung.
"Thank you," said Hamilton, in a broken voice, "for saving my life."
"Oh, I say, sir," began Bones feebly.
"To carry a man eighty miles on your back is no mean accomplishment, Bones especially when I was unconscious"
"I didn"t say you were unconscious, sir. In fact, sir" floundered Lieutenant Tibbetts as red as a peony.
"And yet I was unconscious," insisted Hamilton firmly. "I am still unconscious, even to this day. I have no recollection of your heroic effort; Bones, I thank you."
"Well, sir," said Bones, "to make a clean breast of the whole affair"
"And this dangerous expedition of yours, Bones, an expedition from which you might never return that," said Hamilton in a hushed voice, "is the best story I have heard for years."
"Sir," said Bones, speaking under the stress of considerable emotion, "I am clean bowled, sir. The light-hearted fairy stories which I write to cheer, so to speak, the sick-bed of an innocent child, sir, they have recoiled upon my own head. Peccavi, mea culpa Peccavi, mea culpa, an" all those jolly old expressions that you"ll find in the back pages of the dictionary."
"Oh, Bones, Bones!" chuckled Hamilton.
"You mustn"t think I"m a perfect liar, sir," began Bones, earnestly.
"I don"t think you"re a perfect liar," answered Hamilton, "I think you"re the most inefficient liar I"ve ever met."
"Not even a liar, I"m a romancist, sir," Bones stiffened with dignity and saluted, but whether he was saluting Hamilton, or the spirit of Romance, or in sheer admiration was saluting himself, Hamilton did not know.
"The fact is, sir," said Bones confidentially, "I"m writing a book!"
He stepped back as though to better observe the effect of his words.
"What about?" asked Hamilton, curiously.
"About things I"ve seen and things I know," said Bones, in his most impressive manner.
"Oh, I see!" said Hamilton. "One of those waistcoat-pocket books."
Bones swallowed the insult with a gulp.
"I"ve been asked to write a book," he said, "my adventures an" all that sort of thing. Of course they needn"t have happened, really"
"In that case, Bones, I"m with you," said Hamilton. "If you"re going to write a book about things that haven"t happened to you, there"s no limit to its size."
"You"re bein" a jolly cruel old officer, sir," said Bones, pained by the cold cynicism of his chief. "But I"m very serious, sir. This country is full of material. And everybody says I ought to write a book about it why, dash it, sir, I"ve been here nearly two months!"
"It seems years," said Hamilton.
Bones was perfectly serious, as he had said. He did intend preparing a book for publication, had dreams of a great literary career, and an ultimate membership of the Athenaeum Club belike. It had come upon him like a revelation that such a career called him. The week after he had definitely made up his mind to utilise his gifts in this direction, his outgoing mail was heavier than ever. For to three and twenty English and American publishers, whose names he culled from a handy work of reference, he advanced a business-like offer to prepare for the press a volume "of 316 pages printed in type about the same size as enclosed," and to be ent.i.tled:
MY WILD LIFE AMONGST CANNIBALS.
by Augustus Tibbetts, Lieutenant of Houssas Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society; Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society; Member of the Ethnological Society and Junior Army Service Club.
Bones had none of these qualifications, save the latter, but as he told himself he"d jolly soon be made a member if his book was a howling success. No sooner had his letters been posted than he changed his mind, and he addressed three and twenty more letters to the publishers, altering the t.i.tle to:
THE TYRANNY OF THE WILDS.
Being Some Observations on the Habits and Customs of Savage Peoples by Augustus Tibbetts, (Lt.) With a Foreword by Captain Patrick Hamilton.
"You wouldn"t mind writing a foreword, dear old fellow?" he asked.
"Charmed," said Hamilton. "Have you a particular preference for any form?"
"Just please yourself, sir," said a delighted Bones, so Hamilton covered two sheets of foolscap with an appreciation which began: "The audacity of the author of this singularly uninformed work is to be admired without necessarily being imitated. Two months" residence in a land which offered many opportunities for acquiring inaccurate data, has resulted in a work which must stand for all time as a monument of murderous effort," etc.
Bones read the appreciation very carefully.
"Dear old sport," he said, a little troubled, as he reached the end, "this is almost uncomplimentary."
You couldn"t depress Bones or turn him from his set purpose. He scribed away, occupying his leisure moments with his great work. His normal correspondence suffered cruelly, but Bones was relentless. Hamilton sent him north to collect the hut tax, and at first Bones resented this order, believing that it was specially designed to hamper him.
"Of course, sir," he said, "I"ll obey you, if you order me in accordance with regulations an" all that sort of rot, but believe me, sir, you"re doin" an injury to literature. Unborn generations, sir, will demand an explanation"
"Get out!" said Hamilton crossly.
Bones found his trip a blessing that had been well disguised. There were many points of interest on which he required first-hand information. He carried with him to the Zaire Zaire large exercise books on which he had pasted such pregnant labels as "Native Customs," "Dances," "Ju-jus," "Ancient Legends," "Folk-lore," etc. They were mostly blank, and represented projected chapters of his great work. large exercise books on which he had pasted such pregnant labels as "Native Customs," "Dances," "Ju-jus," "Ancient Legends," "Folk-lore," etc. They were mostly blank, and represented projected chapters of his great work.
All might have been well with Bones. More virgin pages might easily have been covered with his sprawling writing and the book itself, converted into honest print, have found its way, in the course of time, into the tuppenny boxes of the Farringdon book-mart, sharing its soiled magnificence with the work of the best of us, but on his way Bones had a brilliant inspiration. There was a chapter he had not thought of, a chapter heading which had not been born to his mind until that flashing moment of genius.
Upon yet another exercise book, he pasted the label of a chapter which was to eclipse all others in interest. Behold then, this enticing announcement, boldly printed and ruled about with double lines:
THE SOUL OF THE NATIVE WOMAN.
It was a fine chapter t.i.tle. It was sonorous, it had dignity, it was full of possibilities. "The Soul of the Native Woman," repeated Bones, in an ecstasy of self-admiration, and having chosen his subject he proceeded to find out something about it.
Now, about this time, Bosambo of the Ochori might, had he wished and had he the literary quality, have written many books about women, if for no other reason than because of a certain girl named D"riti.
She was a woman of fifteen, grown to a splendid figure, with a proud head and a chin that tilted in contempt, for she was the daughter of Bosambo"s chief counsellor, granddaughter of an Ochori king, and ambitious to be wife of Bosambo himself.
"This is a mad thing," said Bosambo when her father offered the suggestion, "for, as you know, T"meli, I have one wife who is a thousand wives to me."
"Lord, I will be ten thousand," said D"riti, present at the interview and bold; "also, Lord, it was predicted at my birth that I should marry a king and the greater than a king."
"That is me," said Bosambo, who was without modesty, "yet, it cannot be."
So they married D"riti to a chief"s son who beat her till one day she broke his thick head with an iron pot, whereupon he sent her back to her father demanding the return of his dowry and the value of his pot.
She had her following, for she was a dancer of fame and could twist her lithe body into enticing shapes. She might have married again, but she was so scornful of common men that none dare ask for her. Also the incident of the iron pot was not forgotten, and D"riti went swaying through the village she walked from the hips, gracefully a straight, brown, girl-woman desired and unasked.
For she knew men too well to inspire confidence in them. By some weird intuition which certain women of all races acquire, she had probed behind their minds and saw with their eyes, and when she spoke of men, she spoke with a conscious authority, and such men, who were within earshot of her vitriolic comments, squirmed uncomfortably, and called her a woman of shame.
So matters stood when the Zaire Zaire came flashing to the Ochori city and the heart of Bones filled with pleasant antic.i.p.ation. came flashing to the Ochori city and the heart of Bones filled with pleasant antic.i.p.ation.
Who was so competent to inform him on the matter of the souls of native women as Bosambo of the Ochori, already a crony of Bones, and admirable, if for no other reason, because he professed an open reverence for his new master? At any rate, after the haggle of tax collection was finished, Bones set about his task.
"Bosambo," said he, "men say you are very wise. Now tell me something about the women of the Ochori."
Bosambo looked at Bones a little startled.
"Lord," said he, "who knows about women? For is it not written in the blessed Sura of the Djin that women and death are beyond understanding?"
"That may be true," said Bones, "yet, behold, I make a book full of wise and wonderful things and it would be neither wise nor wonderful if there was no word of women."
And he explained very seriously indeed that he desired to know of the soul of native womanhood, of her thoughts and her dreams and her high desires.
"Lord," said Bosambo, after a long thought, "go to your ship: presently I will send to you a girl who thinks and speaks with great wisdom and if she talks with you, you shall learn more things than I can tell you."
To the Zaire Zaire at sundown came D"riti, a girl of proper height, hollow backed, bare to the waist, with a thin skirting of fine silk cloth which her father had brought from the Coast, wound tightly about her, yet not so tightly that it hampered her swaying, lazy walk. She stood before a disconcerted Bones, one small hand resting on her hip, her chin (as usual) tilted down at him from under lashes uncommonly long for a native. at sundown came D"riti, a girl of proper height, hollow backed, bare to the waist, with a thin skirting of fine silk cloth which her father had brought from the Coast, wound tightly about her, yet not so tightly that it hampered her swaying, lazy walk. She stood before a disconcerted Bones, one small hand resting on her hip, her chin (as usual) tilted down at him from under lashes uncommonly long for a native.
Also, this Bones saw, she was gifted with more delicate features than the native woman can boast as a rule. The nose was straight and narrow, the lips full, yet not of the negroid type. She was in fact a pure Ochori woman, and the Ochori are related dimly to the Arabi tribes.
"Lord, Bosambo the King has sent me to speak about women," she said simply.
"Doocidly awkward," said Bones to himself, and blushed. "O, D"riti," he stammered, "it is true I wish to speak of women, for I make a book that all white lords will read."
"Therefore have I come," she said. "Now listen, O my lord, whilst I tell you of women, and of all they think, of their love for men and of the strange way they show it. Also of children"
"Look here," said Bones, loudly. "I don"t want any any private information, my child"
Then realising from her frown that she did not understand him, he returned to Bomongo.
"Lord, I will say what is to be said," she remarked, meekly, "for you have a gentle face and I see that your heart is very pure."