Resnick - Adventures

ADVENTURES
 
                   CAST OF CHARACTERS

     _The Dutchman_, who prefers to think of his slave-trading 
operation as an International Employment Placement Service. 
     _Erich Von Horst_, a con man's con man. 
     _Herbie Miller_, ivory poacher and part-time vampire. 
     _Long Schmidt_ and _Short Schmidt_, a pair of brothers from 
Pittsburgh who became gods at the lost kingdom of the Malaloki. 
     _Burley Rourke_, a doctor specializing in diseases of the 
gullible. 
     _Rosepetal Schultz_, who differs from most ancient Egyptian 
queens in that she was born twenty-three years ago in Brooklyn.  
     _The Rodent_, undersized killer of either sixteen or thirty-
five men, who changed his name from the Weasel for professional 
reasons. 
     _Mr. Christian_, officer aboard the good ship Dying Quail. 
     _Bloomstoke_, a tall, bronzed British nobleman who is living 
with a tribe of apes while hiding from his creditors. 
     _Neeyora_, just your typical naked blonde white goddess, who 
tips the scales at four hundred pounds, give or take an ounce. 
     _Capturing Clyde Calhoun_, who brings 'em back alive. Not 
intact, but alive. 
     _Amen-hetep III_, whose mummy carries a half-clad girl 
through the streets of Cairo before checking in at Shepheard's 
Hotel. 
     _Major Theodore Dobbins_, a man with a taste for rich widows, 
who is also a speculator in certain perishable commodities 
imported from far exotic China and points east. 
     And our narrator, The _Right Reverend Honorable Doctor 
Lucifer Jones_: his religion is a little something he and the Lord 
worked out between themselves one afternoon, his tabernacle is the 
most prosperous brothel in British East Africa, and he has serious 
disagreements with the authorities of fourteen different African 
nations over the finer points of the law. On the other hand, he 
means well. 

Chapter 1

                        THE WHITE GODDESS

     I knew a real live vampire. It was in Africa about seventy 
years ago, and his name was Herbie Miller. He didn't look much 
like a vampire, I suppose -- walked around in khaki pants that he 
cut off above the knees, and his hair wasn't slicked down or 
nothing. I can't say he was real fond of crosses, but daylight 
didn't bother him none, and he had no problems walking over 
running water, except that he couldn't swim and narrow bridges 
scared the hell out of him. 
     I don't know why he should have been so interested in me, 
especially considering that I was a man of the cloth back then, 
but he was. When he wasn't trying to nab me in the neck, which was 
pretty difficult inasmuch as poor Herbie was barely five feet tall 
with his boots on, he kept coming up with crazy schemes about how 
I should go to the local hospital -- not Schweitzer's, but one 
you've probably never heard of -- and borrow some blood, for which 
he promised to pay me in pounds or dollars or rupees or whatever 
else he'd gotten off one of his more recent meals. 
     You know, I think about Herbie and some of the others I met, 
and I'd have to say that even without the animals -- and I never
did see all that many of them anyway, except for the time I was an 
ivory poacher -- Africa was a pretty interesting place to be back 
then. I had my flock and my tabernacle, and of course there was 
Herbie, who came smack-dab between my little business excursions 
into opium and brothels, and there were Long Schmidt and Short 
Schmidt, a pair of brothers who became gods, and there was 
Capturin' Clyde Calhoun and a batch of others. 
     Africa was full of colorful folk like that in the old days. 
They called themselves adventurers and explorers and hunters and 
missionaries, but what they mostly were were outcasts. They 
gathered in the civilized cities, most of them: Johannesburg, 
Nairobi, Mombasa, Pretoria, places like that. Every now and then 
they'd go out into the bush -- only bad pulp writers ever called 
it the jungle -- after everything from ivory to lost gold mines to 
half-naked white priestesses. A lot of them found ivory, and a few 
found gold, but the only man I ever knew who went into the bush 
and found himself a white woman was an Irishman named Burley 
Rourke. 
     I met him just a few days after I got off the boat, young and 
hopeful and sporting my first beard. Due to a series of 
unfortunate misunderstandings during an informal game of chance, I 
had been invited to inspect the premises of the Johannesburg gaol, 
which, while tastefully appointed, was nevertheless not the 
temporary residence I would have picked had the choice been mine. 
     Rourke was lying on a cot in the adjacent cell. He was a 
tall, cadaverous man, with bushy black eyebrows and an enormous 
dimple on his chin. He had the longest, whitest, most delicate 
fingers I had ever seen on a man, and since even his fingernails 
were clean, I asked him if he, like myself, was being incarcerated 
due to a certain flexibility toward the hard and fast rules of the 
game. He allowed that this was indeed the case, and I asked him if 
his trade was cards or dice. 
     "Neither," he said. "I'm a doctor, specializing in diseases 
of the gullible." 
     That's when I knew we were going to hit it off just fine. 
     "How about yourself?" said Rourke. "You look like some kind 
of preacher man, all done up in black like you are." 
     "Indeed I am, Brother Rourke," I said with some modesty. "I 
don't know how a respectable man like me got involved with all 
them sinful characters in the first place. I suppose I was just 
following the good Lord's mandate to consider every man my 
brother. 'Course, I never have gotten around to viewing all the 
women exactly as sisters." 
     "And what religion do you preach?" asked Rourke. 
     "One me and the Lord worked out betwixt ourselves one 
afternoon," I said. 
     Actually, the way I see it, my calling was determined the day 
I was born. We had a little farm outside Moline, Illinois, and 
once I was alive and secure, my mother sent my father to the 
county courthouse to register my name, which was to be Lucas Jones 
or Lucius Jones, I'm still not sure which. But my father was a man 
who loved his liquor, and by the time he got there he came up with 
as close an approximation as he was capable at the time.
     Which is how I got to be Lucifer Jones. 
     Anyway, they say that every action has an equal and opposite 
reaction, and I guess toting the name Lucifer around made me 
painfully aware of who I was named after. I just naturally kind of 
gravitated toward the church, especially after I saw the size of 
our poorbox, and pretty soon me and God formed sort of a two-man 
company, and I went out and did His business. And a pretty good 
business it was, until the day a couple of Federal men came 
around. Up until then I had always thought that paying income 
taxes was voluntary, like going into the army and such. Well, I'd 
have stayed and fought them, but the Lord says that vengeance is 
His, so I took off down the Mississippi one night and hopped the 
first ship out of New Orleans. 
     "Well, now," said Rourke when I'd told him the story, adding 
only a minimum number of poetic flourishes, "I do believe we're 
going to be friends, Saint Luke. You don't mind if I call you 
that, do you?" 
     "It's got a nice, down-to-earth sound to it, Brother Rourke," 
I allowed. "In fact, now that I roll it around on my tongue, I 
like it more and more. I think, with your kind permission, that 
I'll be having these godless black heathen build me the Tabernacle 
of Saint Luke. Once I leave my present vile surroundings, that 
is." 
     "Oh," said Rourke, furrowing up his forehead and tugging at 
his mustache. "That's too bad. But, of course, if a man's got the 
call..." 
     "It's a kind of weak call at this moment," I said quickly, 
wondering what he had in mind. "Nothing that couldn't be fought 
off for a couple of months if I was to dig in tooth and nail." I 
gritted my teeth, prepared to make the effort, and he must of 
mistook it for a grin, because he grinned right back at me. 
     He unbuttoned his shirt pocket and unfolded a huge sheet of 
paper. Then he dusted it off a bit and passed it through the bars 
to me. 
     "Ever see one of these?" he asked. 
     I took a quick look and handed it back. 
     "If it's a map to King Solomon's mines, I've seen about 
twenty. If it's to the elephants' burial ground. they're kind of 
rare. I don't imagine I've seen much more than half a dozen in the 
week I've been here." 
     He chuckled. "Actually, it's a map to the lost gold mine of 
the Zulus. Only one I've seen." 
     "Must have been lost a good long time," I opined. "I don't 
recall ever seeing a Zulu wearing anything but leopard-claw 
necklaces." 
     "Well, what do you think?" asked Rourke. 
     "About the gold mine?" I asked. 
     "About the map."
     He was still grinning at me, and all of a sudden a great big 
Heavenly revelation smote me right between the eyes, and out of 
courtesy I returned his smile. 
     "How many do you think we could make?" I asked. 
     "Well, we'd have to hunt up some real old paper, and figure 
out what kind of charcoal the natives draw with. Need about three 
bob for materials, I should think." 
     "You supplied the map, Brother Rourke," I said. "I'll supply 
the capital. I've got a dozen copies of the Good Book stashed in 
my hotel room. It shouldn't be too hard to sell them. There's 
plenty of widows in town who can find solace in the words of Our 
Lord and His prophets." 
     "Fine," he said. "I figure we ought to be able to make up 
about fifty." 
     "That's a lot of maps," I said. "We wouldn't want to flood 
the market." 
     He looked shocked. "That would be immoral. I'm surprised that 
such a thought would even cross your mind, Saint Luke. Personally, 
just for propriety's sake, I don't think we should sell more than 
five an hour." 
     "At least, not until we get to Pretoria," I agreed. 
     We consummated our partnership with a solemn handshake. 

                             #

     Burley and I got turned out about a week later, and within 
another week we had made and sold almost two hundred maps, 
accumulating a substantial little nest egg along the way. 
     Of course, the bush was getting a little crowded by then, 
what with a couple hundred of hopeful investors looking for that 
lost gold mine, so we swung north to Bechuanaland, where 
we stopped at an occasional outpost and dispensed maps, medical 
care, and salvation with equal vigor. I began taking contributions 
to the Tabernacle of Saint Luke, and Rourke made a little extra 
pin money by curing two settlers who didn't have heart attacks and 
another who hadn't broken his leg. When he came to a trader who 
really _did_ have blackwater fever, he decided that it was time for 
us to get moving again. 
     Now, there are a lot of ways for a newly-arrived American and 
a newly-arrived Irishman to travel through Africa, but foot-
slogging ain't one of them. When we weren't pulling scorpions out 
of our clothes and ticks off our skins, we spent most of our time 
starving and getting rained on. For what was supposed to be a hot, 
arid country, I never did see so much rain in all my life. It 
ruined what was left of the maps, but since we had sold about 
three hundred by that time, it didn't seem like such a great loss. 
     Besides, we soon figured out that Zulu gold mines weren't 
real high on our itinerary, whereas a map to the nearest city 
would have been a right welcome blessing. 
     I remember that one night just before our food was due to run 
out I fell asleep next to an old termite mound. I was still 
dreaming about an exceptionally nubile daughter of King Solomon, 
or perhaps it was King David, when Burley kicked me in the ribs. I 
took the Lord's name in vain a couple of times and tried to go 
back to sleep, but then he kicked me again. 
     "Get on your feet, Saint Luke," he said. "We've got company." 
     I jumped up right quick at that, and peered off in the 
direction he was looking. There were about twenty half-naked black 
savages off in the distance, all of them carrying spears and 
shields. 
     "Do you reckon they're cannibals, Brother Rourke?" I asked, 
holding up a hand to shade my eyes from the morning sun. 
     "Too far away," said Rourke. "I can't see their teeth." 
     "What have their teeth got to do with it?" 
     "I read somewhere that all cannibals file their teeth," he 
said. 
     I remembered some gossip I had heard about old Doc Peterson 
back in Moline before they locked him away, and I knew _he_ sure 
didn't file _his_ teeth, so I kind of discounted that theory. But 
they were getting closer now, and most of them looked pretty full, 
so I figured that it wasn't worth worrying about for the time 
being. 
     "What do you think we ought to do?" asked Rourke. "Heal 'em 
or convert 'em?" 
     "They don't look like they need much of either," I said, as 
they approached to within a hundred yards. "I don't suppose you 
know Zulu or Tswana?" 
     He shook his head. "They don't speak much of either back in 
Dublin. How about beads? I'm told they go crazy for beads." 
     "Sounds reasonable, Brother Rourke," I said. "I didn't know 
you had any." 
     "Me? Of course not. Don't you have any rosary beads in your 
pockets?" 
     "Wrong religion," I replied. 
     The savages were about forty yards away now, and muttering 
amongst themselves. They had slowed down a bit, but were still 
approaching. 
     "They look like they mean business," said Rourke. "Suppose we 
ought to make a run for it?" 
     "To where?" I asked. "We don't even know where we are." 
     "The way I figure it," said Rourke, "Cairo's north and the 
Cape's south. Take your choice." 
     But by then they had split up, and a moment later we were 
surrounded. Pulling the Good Book from my pocket, I cleared my 
throat, raised my hands above my head, and took a step forward. 
     _"Brethren!"_ I shouted, and they all jumped back a couple of 
steps. "In the Book of Herod, Chapter 8, Verse 3, the Lord God 
said unto Moses: Thou shall not eat thy neighbor!" 
     The leader of the heathens stopped dead in his tracks and 
blinked his eyes very rapidly. 
     "You're getting to them," said Rourke out of the side of his 
mouth. "Say something else. Maybe a little hellfire and 
damnation." 
     "And the children of Israel were wicked," I intoned. "And you 
know _why_ they were wicked? Because they ate two wayfarers who 
had mistakenly wandered into their city. For does not Jesus say 
that to err is human, but to forgive divine? And the children of 
Israel, who were dressed a far sight better than you, you Godless 
savages, were cast out into the desert to wander for forty years! 
Do you want that to happen to you, you ignorant barbarians?" 
     "Oh, you got 'em on the run, Saint Luke!" said Rourke. "You 
really got 'em going!" 
     Well, they got going, all right, but in the wrong direction, 
and a few seconds later the leader was standing so close to me 
that l could just about smell his breath. 
     "Make him smile," said Rourke. "I still want to get a look at 
his teeth." 
     The savage responded with an enormous grin. "Like so?" he 
asked in a deep gravelly voice. Then, frowning, he extended a 
forefinger and poked me right in the short ribs. "You come!" He 
jabbed Rourke with the butt of his spear. "You too!" 
     We acceded to his wishes, not caring to dwell upon the 
alternatives for any considerable length of time. They didn't 
treat us unkindly, but then no competent butcher likes to bruise 
the meat, so I can't say that we were real quick to develop a 
mutual trust with our black companions. We walked the better part 
of a day, stopping every now and then for water and privy calls, 
and when night came we built a big fire and huddled around it, 
more from cold than from fear of man-eating beasts, of which there 
weren't none, except maybe for our present company. 
     Finally the leader walked over to us and sat himself down, 
cross-legged. He pointed to himself and said, "Kitunga." 
     "Rourke," said Burley, tapping himself on the chest. "And 
this here's Saint Luke." 
     Kitunga solemnly extended his hand, kind of upside down, and 
shook each of ours. 
     "Does this mean you're not going to eat us?" asked Rourke. 
     "Eat you?" said Kitunga, and laughed. "No. No. Not eat." 
     "Then what do you want from us?" said Rourke. 
     _"Chumbi-chumbi,"_ said Kitunga. 
     "Sounds like some kind of ritual," said Rourke. "What the 
devil does it mean?" 
     Kitunga flashed every tooth in his head. "Make babies," he 
said. He shook our hands again, spat in the fire, and began 
walking away. 
     "Hold on a minute!" I said, jumping up. "What do you mean, 
make babies?" 
     "Make babies," said Kitunga solemnly. With the forefinger of 
one hand and the fist of the other, he gave us a graphic and 
vigorous analogy. 
     "You mean you want us to make babies with some naked black 
barbarians?" I demanded. 
     "Not black," said Kitunga. "Like you." 
     "You mean a white woman?" asked Rourke. 
     "Yes, yes," said Kitunga. "White woman." 
     As you can imagine, we immediately fell to discussing this 
development between ourselves while Kitunga ambled off to sleep 
with his men. Back in those days there were lots of tales making 
the rounds about white women who were priestesses or goddesses of 
heathen black tribes, but while they sounded good over a lonely 
campfire or in the bar of the Norfolk Hotel, they were about as  
likely to be true as our lost Zulu gold mine. 
     "The way I see it, Brother Rourke," I said after considerable 
thought, "is that these here savages have killed some hunting 
party except for a white woman, whom they've doubtless got chained 
to a post in their village, and whom they probably ravish by the 
hour." 
     "I don't know that I'm real pleased about this turn of 
events, Saint Luke," said Rourke. "Oh, I'll admit that it beats 
being eaten, but I suppose she's going to want us to rescue her." 
     It _was_ a kind of gloomy thought at that, and I said as 
much. "Still," I added, "it's the Christian thing to do." 
     "Maybe you could tell her to turn the other cheek, a 
fascinating thought in itself," said Rourke. 
     "Well, I suppose we'd at least better make sure she _wants_ 
to be rescued before we go about upsetting Kitunga," I suggested. 
     "Right," agreed Rourke. "A person can get used to anything in 
time. Maybe she's gotten to where she likes being ravished." 
     "A telling point," I agreed. 
     We fell silent for a while, and then an interesting notion 
hit me. 
     "Brother Rourke," I said, "I think we've been looking at this 
situation all wrong." 
     "How so?" he asked. 
     "Why should a bunch of healthy young bucks want our help 
ravishing a prisoner?" 
     "I hadn't quite gotten around to considering that," he 
admitted. "Now that you mention it, it doesn't really make a lot 
of sense, does it?" 
     "It sure as hell don't." 
     "Scientific curiosity, maybe?" he said. 
     "Nope," I said. "I been mulling on it for a couple of minutes 
now, and it seems to me that if they was choosing partners for 
this white woman, they'd just naturally choose themselves." 
     "Makes sense," said Rourke, nodding his head thoughtfully. 
     "Well, then, it stands to reason that if bringing us back 
with them ain't _their_ idea, it must be _hers_." 
     "Sensible," muttered Rourke. "Sensible." 
     "And if she's giving orders to a batch of spear-toting 
heathen like Kitunga and his buddies, she must be a pretty 
powerful little lady." 
     "Holy shit!" exclaimed Rourke suddenly. "An oversexed white 
priestess!" He stared up at the clouds, which were covering up the 
stars as usual, and got a faraway look on his face. "Golden hair 
down to her waist," he said, "and breasts like white cantaloupes. 
Maybe a bracelet or an armband or two..." 
     Well, I couldn't see that the picture he was painting was all 
that much more enticing than a naked white woman staked out 
spread-eagled on the ground, but I could tell that Rourke didn't 
want to be bothered none, so I fell to thinking about what kind of 
tabernacle me and this white priestess could build right here in 
the bush before we got around to trading ivory and other such 
trinkets with civilized folks. I didn't know how big her tribe 
was, but if Kitunga's group was just a foraging party, I figured 
we'd have an awful lot of manpower able to respond to a terse 
command or two. As for Burley, I decided that he wasn't such an 
all-fired bad fellow, and I'd probably let him stick around as a 
resident witch doctor, so long as he didn't impose on our 
hospitality too often, like coming over to dinner of a Sunday or 
asking us to steal a white woman for him too. 
     Ten minutes later Rourke was still drawing verbal pictures in 
the damp night air. By now he'd got her hair down to her ankles, 
and her breasts were the size of honeydew melons. Seems to me that 
he'd done away with her armbands, too. He just kept whispering to 
nobody in particular all night, and by morning he was busy working 
out the color of her eyes and how narrow her waist was. 
     Once the sun came up it got warm enough to start traveling 
again -- no matter how hot the days are in Africa, the nights are 
enough to convince you that you've wandered into Eskimo country by 
mistake -- and Kitunga gave us each a none-too-gentle nudge with 
the butt of his spear. We began walking, mostly over open 
veldtland, but occasionally going through sky-high grasses on old 
elephant and rhino trails, and I fell to questioning him about the 
white woman. 
     It didn't help much, since Kitunga had just about run through 
his entire English vocabulary the day before. I couldn't tell how 
his tribe had come by this woman, or what she looked like, or if 
she had been there so long she'd forgotten how to speak in a 
civilized language, or even why she felt the need to make babies. 
One thing he did let drop that she was a medicine woman, which was 
probably as close to being a high priestess as a person could get 
among these heathen, so Rourke was right on that point at least. I 
figured it was all to the good, since once she and I started 
taking field trips to Nairobi and places like that, the tribe 
would need a good medicine man, and even if Rourke couldn't 
cure a dysentery germ, he could probably talk it to death. 
     We walked for two more days. I tried to figure out where we 
were, but one tree looks pretty much like another, and it was 
raining so much I never did get a fix on the Southern Cross or any 
of the constellations, so finally I gave up on it and just 
followed along. When we bedded down that second night Kitunga gave 
us to understand, more through gestures than words, that we would 
reach his village the next morning. 
     "And that's where we'll meet your witchwoman?" I asked. 
     "Yes, yes," he said. 
     "And then we both move in with her?" 
     "Just one," said Kitunga. 
     "Just one?" said Rourke, looking a little upset. "What 
happens to the other?" 
     Kitunga shrugged and walked away. 
     "Looks like the winner gets to eat the loser, Brother 
Rourke," I said at last. 
     "I'd never eat you, no matter what," said Rourke devoutly. 
     I fully agreed with that remark, and me and the Lord fell to 
discussing the matter between ourselves, trying to figure out how 
best not to present Rourke with any such opportunity. 
     On the surface of it, there was no problem that I could see, 
what with me being a handsome and vigorous young stallion, 
possessed as I was with the eye of a hawk, the heart of a lion, 
and the gentle hand of a lady. But women are peculiar creatures in 
matters of taste, and a woman who would send a small battalion of 
naked warriors out in search of a bed partner was likely to be a 
little more peculiar than most. 
     So, having dwelled on the matter for some time, I waited 
until Rourke was asleep and borrowed a sharp hunting knife from 
Kitunga. Then I walked to a nearby river, cut off my beard and 
shaved as close as I could, and washed out all my clothes. On the 
way back I passed a pile of elephant dung which had been sitting 
there for some days, picked some up, and carefully smeared it over 
Rourke's shirt and pants as he slept. I couldn't be sure he'd 
accept it in the sporting manner in which it was done, so I 
wandered over to where Kitunga's boys were sleeping and piled in 
with them. One of them spent half the night grabbing at my ass and 
giggling, but I awoke whole and in one piece. 
     Matter of fact, what woke me up was Rourke, screaming at the 
top of his lungs. He'd flung off all his clothes except for his 
boots, and was jumping up and down in a right impressive fit of 
rage. His eyes fell on me, and he pointed an accusing finger in my 
direction. 
     "You did it, you Judas!" he screamed. "You son of a bitch! 
You want her all to yourself! You did it!" 
     "Calm yourself, Brother Rourke," I said, stepping forward, 
but still keeping a couple of warriors between him and me. "I 
don't know quite what you're talking about." 
     "Damn your hide!" he screamed. "You know bloody well what I'm 
talking about! Mark my words, you sure as hell aren't going to 
have her, not without one whopping big fight!" 
     I just looked at Kitunga and shrugged. He grinned and 
motioned his men to get moving. "Go now," he said. 
     "Now just a goddamned minute!" snapped Rourke. "I've got to 
clean up first." 
     Kitunga walked over and pointed the business end of his spear 
at him. "Go now," he said. 
     Rourke's shoulders sagged. He paused just long enough to 
transfer his money from his pants pocket into his boot and started 
walking off with us. He made a pretty comical picture walking 
through the bush, six and a half feet tall, skinny as a rail, and 
wearing nothing but his beat-up old hunting boots, but I thought 
it safer to admire him from afar and always kept half a dozen men 
between us. 
     In about two hours we reached the top of a hill, and, looking 
down, I could see a batch of thorn huts sitting beside a stream 
that ran through a large valley. 
     I adjusted my jacket, buttoned my shirt up to the collar, 
tried to comb my hair a bit with my fingers, and turned to 
Kitunga. 
     "What's her name?" I asked. 
     "Neeyora," he said. 
     It had a lovely lilt to it, just the kind of name that ought 
to go with being a gorgeous priestess among these godless savages, 
and I started marching down the hill to the valley so as not to 
prolong Rourke's agony any more than was strictly necessary. 
     When I got within about a hundred yards of the village I 
stopped right sudden-like and blinked my eyes once or twice. Then 
I looked ahead again to make sure it was no mirage. 
     "Brother Rourke," l said. He stopped in his tracks and just 
glared at me without answering. "I done a terrible thing this 
morning, a wickedly sinful thing, and I want to make amends. If 
you'd like my clothes, all except for my hat which I need to 
shield me from the heat and the rain, I'll gladly turn them over 
to you right now." 
     "What the hell are you talking about?" said Rourke, a totally 
unwarranted look of suspicion on his face. 
     "I just don't want the Lord looking down with displeasure on 
me for trying to trick you like I did," I said. 
     I started unbuttoning my shirt, but Kitunga pointed his spear 
right at the middle of my belly and, smiling like all get-out, 
shook his head vigorously. 
     "But I just want to give him something to wear," I said. 
     "No, no," he said, prodding my belly with the point of his 
spear blade. 
     "What's this all about?" demanded Rourke, walking over. 
     "You were right about her being blonde," I said. "But you 
were a little on the conservative side about her breasts." 
     "What do you mean?" said Rourke, looking suspicious. 
     "Not honeydew melons, Brother Rourke," I said with a sigh. 
"Watermelons." 
     He shaded his eyes and looked toward the village. There, 
sitting in front of the largest hut, was our half-naked white 
priestess. More to the point, she was about ninety-five percent 
naked; it would have taken the hide of a small elephant to cover 
half of her. 
     Her hair was blonde under the dirt and the grease. Even as we 
approached I couldn't tell what color her eyes were; they were 
sunken too far beneath the folds of flab to even tell if she had 
any. Her shoulder spread would have done a bull gorilla proud, and 
her breasts, which sagged down well below her waist, could have 
given sustenance to an army. She was sitting in the mud, rolling 
bones and the dried-out carcasses of small lizards on the ground 
in front of her. It looked like she was trying to sit cross-
legged, but her legs were too fat to bend. Rourke had been wrong 
about the bracelet too. I don't think they could have made one big 
enough to fit her. 
     _"That?"_ gasped Rourke. "That's Neeyora?" 
     Kitunga nodded. 
     Rourke turned to me, grinning. "I don't know how to thank 
you, Saint Luke!" His eyes darted over the ground. "You don't see 
any more elephant shit, do you?" Then he began laughing and threw 
a dungcovered arm around my shoulders. "We'll let bygones be 
bygones!" he said, and began walking up to Neeyora's hut. 
     "Father, why hast Thou forsaken me?" I muttered, and allowed 
myself to be led into the village. 
     Neeyora looked up, and if she was less than desirable in 
repose, she was absolutely mind-boggling in animation. She grinned 
from ear to ear, a pretty fair distance given the size of her 
face, said something I couldn't understand to Kitunga, and began 
licking her lips. Two of the villagers helped her slowly to her 
feet, and she approached us, giggling like a crazy woman. Her tiny 
little eyes -- now that I was close enough, I could see that they 
were red -- darted from one of us to the other. She reached out 
and pinched my upper arm, and Rourke just stood there, laughing 
like a lunatic. 
     Then she walked over to the Irishman, who was every bit as 
dirty and foul-smelling and naked as she was, and it was love at 
first sight. She gave a jubilant little scream, threw her arms 
around him -- which practically made the bottom three-quarters of 
him vanish from sight -- and began dragging him off to her hut. 
     "Don't just stand there, Luke!" hollered Rourke. "Do 
something! " 
     If I'd had my mouth organ with me I suppose I could have 
played "Here Comes the Bride," but under the current circumstances 
I thought it best to keep a low profile, so other than offering 
Brother Rourke a few appropriate quotes on love and marriage from 
the Good Book, I just smiled and waved goodbye to him as he 
vanished into the darkened recesses of his bridal bower. A high-
pitched shriek a couple of minutes later gave me to understand 
that he had also vanished into the darkened recesses of his bride. 
     Well, Kitunga and I and the boys wandered over to one of the 
huts and started drinking some home-brewed beer and swapping tall 
stories. I didn't understand a word they said, and I don't imagine 
they understood me either, but what with the beer and all we 
became pretty fast friends by the time Rourke staggered out of his 
hut a couple of hours later. I don't think Job at his lowest could 
have looked any worse. 
     All the fire had gone out of his eyes, and he looked kind of 
shrunken. He collapsed next to me, and I handed him a cup of 
native brew. He drank it without a word. 
     I turned to Kitunga. "Now that he's made the babies, can we 
go?" 
     That tickled Kitunga's funnybone for some reason, and he 
emitted a roar of laughter. 
     This was a little unsettling, for I still didn't know exactly 
what happened to unsuccessful suitors. Rourke looked like he 
wouldn't have the energy to leave anyway, so I decided to let the 
subject drop for the moment. 
     We sat there swigging beer and singing songs for a little 
while longer, and then I heard a deep voice bellow: _"Rerrk!"_
     "Oh, God, not again!" muttered Rourke. 
     _"Rerrk!"_ hollered Neeyora, sounding just a little louder 
than a bull elephant in _musth_. 
     Rourke reached into his boot and pulled out his share of our 
money, which was about three hundred British pounds. 
     "Take it," he said. "It's all yours. If you ever get back to 
civilization..." 
     "I'll organize a party and come back here for you," I 
promised, crossing a couple of fingers behind my back. 
     He laughed weakly. "I'll never last that long. No, what I 
want you to do is buy a headstone for me and plant it in the 
graveyard at Johannesburg. If there's any money left" -- I assured 
him there would be, and made a solemn vow to see to it -- "walk 
into the nearest bar and buy a round for everyone in the house and 
drink to my memory." 
     "You sure you wouldn't rather have your name engraved on a 
pew in my tabernacle?" I asked thoughtfully. 
     "Just do what I said," whispered Rourke. 
     _"Rerrk!"_
     Two of Kitunga's men helped Rourke to his feet and led him 
back to his blushing bride. 
     While he was gone, the rest of us got down to serious 
drinking. I quietly suggested to the Lord that now might be an 
admirable time for Him to give me the strength of ten men because 
my heart was pure, and sure enough, I was the only one who didn't 
pass out in the next hour. I quietly filled my canteen with one 
last batch of brew and walked on out of the village just as free 
as a bird. 
     When I reached the top of the hill I paused to take one last 
look, partly out of sentiment but mostly to make sure that no one 
was pursuing me yet. There wasn't a sign of life in the whole 
village. Then I saw a figure crawl out of a hut and start making 
toward the beer, and a few seconds later I heard a truly ear-
splitting scream of _"RERRK!"_
     And that was the last I ever saw of Burley Rourke and his 
white priestess.

Chapter 2

                             PARTNERS 

     I wandered north and east, fell in for a while with a 
Canadian named Pinder who was single-handedly drinking his way 
from the Cape to Cairo, made it to the railhead in Uganda, and 
took the train all the way to Mombasa on the coast, where I had 
the bad fortune to run into three different parties I had sold 
maps to. They failed totally to see the humor in the situation or 
to realize that their donations had gone to a worthy cause, and 
discretion being the better part of valor, I took a vigorous 
stroll to the south and wound up in Dar-es-Salaam, which was the 
capital of Tanganyika. 
     Dar-es-Salaam wasn't like any other town in British East. It 
was on the ocean, but wasn't much of a seaport; it was in Africa, 
but there was nothing bigger or more ferocious than a goat within 
thirty miles; it was a capital, but it couldn't have held six 
buildings that could resist a strong wind. It was composed, in 
almost equal parts, of East Indians, black Africans, and 
reprobates from all over the world. 
     I felt right at home. 
     I took a room at the only hotel in town, shaved and showered, 
had a big dinner, and went to Maurice's, a bar down by the 
waterfront. Sometime around midnight I found myself in the back 
room, betting on scorpion races, and the Lord being on my side, I 
wound up the night with about two thousand pounds in winnings. 
     When I returned to my room I found a man sitting down on one 
of the chairs there. He was tall, though nowhere near as tall as 
Rourke, with piercing gray eyes and a neatly trimmed little 
goatee. He was dressed all in black: hat, shirt, tie, vest, 
jacket, belt, pants, socks, shoes. In point of fact, he made my 
preaching clothes look like an outfit of gossamer gaiety. 
     "Begging your pardon, brother," I said, "but ain't you in 
the wrong room?" 
     "I hardly think so," he said in a voice so slick and cultured 
you could have used it for cooking oil. "Allow me to introduce 
myself. My name is Dobbins, Major Theodore Dobbins, late of His 
Majesty's armed forces." He handed me his card, which was just a 
little frayed around the edges, and was black with white 
lettering on it.
     I extended my hand. "The Right Reverend Doctor Jones at your 
service," I said. 
     "Well, my dear Doctor Jones," he said, pulling out a 
cigarette and putting it into a mother-of-pearl holder, "I shan't 
beat about the bush. I have come to you because I am in need of 
your help." 
     "I'm always happy to help a soul in need, Major," I said, 
sitting down on the edge of the bed. "Of course, you understand 
that spiritual aid and comfort does get a little expensive at this 
time of night."
     "It is not spiritual aid that I seek, sir," he said with a 
dry chuckle. "Indeed it is not. I am given to understand that you 
came into possession of a considerable amount of money earlier 
this evening. Is this not correct?" 
     "The Good Lord saw fit to smile upon me," I admitted.
     "Excellent!" He was positively beaming now while puffing away 
at his cigarette. "Then I am in the position to suggest a brief 
alliance which may work to our mutual benefit, involving as it 
does a pooling of resources." 
     "This money is being held in escrow for the Tabernacle of 
Saint Luke," I replied with dignity. Then I thought about it, and 
added, "However, to be perfectly honest, construction ain't due to 
begin for another few months when the rainy season ends, and I 
imagine my parishioners wouldn't be averse to an extremely 
conservative short-term investment." 
     "I understand perfectly, my dear sir," he said with a smile. 
Even his teeth looked oily. "I deal in commodities, Doctor Jones. 
Many of these are in the form of highly perishable goods imported 
from the fields of far, exotic China. Such a shipment is currently 
aboard a vessel anchored not five hundred yards from us." He 
paused to light another cigarette. "May I presume that you fully 
comprehend my position?" 
     "I think we're on the same wave length," I allowed.
     "Well, then, you can imagine my dismay when I discovered that 
my associate, who was on his way here from Marrakech, was waylaid 
and murdered by a band of Arab slave traders. My goods are in the 
harbor, my principals await their delivery in the Mediterranean, 
my caravan has been hired, yet I am temporarily unable to set the 
wheels of industry in motion. The entire enterprise has ground to 
a halt for lack of the necessary capital. Worse yet, my 
competitors, knowing that something has gone amiss, are waiting 
like jackals at the kill. In brief, sir, I must have no less than 
seventeen hundred British pounds. The return on your investment, 
within a mere matter of days, will be tenfold." 
     "What's the nature of your competition?" I asked. 
     He waved a hand vaguely, as if shooing a fly away. "Men of 
little breeding and less ethics. Hardly worthy of notice, except 
for this unfortunate turn of affairs. One of them is actually a 
trafficker in human flesh." 
     "Not God-fearing gentlemen like us?" 
     "My dear Doctor Jones!" he said, shaking my hand warmly. "We 
understand one another completely! May I assume that we are 
partners?" 
     "I'll have to spend the night in prayer, conferring with the 
Lord and getting His advice on the subject," I said. "Suppose I 
meet you for dinner at Maurice's tomorrow night and give you my 
decision at that time?" 
     "Certainly," he said, rising and walking to the door. Just 
before he left, he turned and said, "Remember, my dear sir, that 
God helps those who help themselves." 
     "That sentiment ain't never far from my mind," I assured him. 
     After he left, I settled down to thinking seriously about the 
Major's proposal. I felt certain that, understanding my goals as 
He did, the Lord wouldn't mind my entering into this little 
enterprise. Just the same, as my Silent Partner, I knew that He'd 
want me to look into all aspects of it very carefully. For 
example, it stood to reason that if the goods were still aboard 
the ship, the Major's competition also lacked the necessary 
funding, and while a thousand percent profit was a healthy return 
on my investment, I could build my tabernacle a lot quicker with a 
two thousand percent return. Therefore, just before I fell asleep, 
I made up my mind to see if I couldn't hunt up the Major's rivals. 
     As it turned out, I didn't have to do much in the way of 
hunting at all. I was sitting at my table on the hotel's veranda 
the next morning, drinking my coffee and waiting for some ostrich 
eggs and toast, when a stout gentleman dressed in a soiled white 
suit walked up and seated himself opposite me. His hair was so 
thin that his skull shone through in half a hundred places, all 
red and covered with sweat which ran down his face in little 
rivulets until it got caught up in his beard. 
     "Doctor Jones?" he said, pulling out a handkerchief and 
mopping his forehead. He had an accent I couldn't quite place. 
     "The Right Reverend Doctor Jones," I acknowledged, sipping my 
coffee. 
     "It has come to my attention that you had a visitor last 
night." 
     "I've nothing to hide, brother," I said. "I met with Major 
Theodore Dobbins, late of His Majesty's armed forces." 
     He laughed. "Until he was court-martialed for embezzling," he 
said. "I assume he put forth a proposition to you?" 
     "That he did." 
     His eyes narrowed slightly. "I hope you were not so impetuous 
as to enter into any business agreement with him." 
     "Caution is my middle name, brother," I said. "I'm still 
mulling over his offer."
     "Good!" he said. "You had a very narrow escape, Doctor Jones. 
You cannot begin to know the nature of the man with whom you were 
speaking." 
     "True," I agreed. "On the other hand, I _do_ know his name." 
     "Forgive me," he said, wiping his head again. "I am known as 
the Dutchman." 
     "Just the Dutchman?" 
     He nodded. "I do have a large variety of business names," he 
added helpfully, "if using one of them would make you more 
comfortable." 
     "Not at all," I said, pouring another cup of coffee. Then I 
looked up at him quickly. "You wouldn't happen to be a slave 
trader, would you?" 
     He sat up erect and said, "I prefer to think of myself as the 
director of an international occupational placement service." 
     I signaled to the waiter. "Won't you join me for breakfast, 
Dutchman? I have a feeling that we've got a lot to talk about." 
     "Just coffee, thank you," he said. The waiter brought a large 
pot and left it on the table. The Dutchman poured himself half a 
cup, waved away my offer of cream and sugar, and withdrew a small 
flask from his coat pocket, pouring a generous amount into the cup 
and stirring it vigorously. 
     "Doctor Jones," he said after taking a man-sized swallow and 
screwing up his face, "may I speak frankly with you?" 
     "Well, it might make a pleasant change," I answered. 
     "I am in need of a certain amount of venture capital: 
fourteen hundred pounds, to be exact. You won considerably more 
than that last night. I would like to arrange a short-term loan." 
     "Have you considered a bank?" I asked. 
     "Yes, I have," he replied. "But the bank at Dar-es-Salaam is 
well fortified, and would be most difficult to break into." 
     "I assume that your credit rating would make a more 
forthright approach out of the question?" 
     He nodded vigorously. "There must be a prejudice against 
Hollanders in Tanganyika. I can conceive of no other reason for 
it. At any rate, will you consider such a transaction?" 
     "Jesus only threw the money-lenders out of the Temple," I 
said with a smile. "I don't recall the Good Book making any 
reference to throwing them out of Dar-es-Salaam." 
     "Then may I assume that we have a deal?" said the Dutchman. 
     "Well, now, that's putting the cart just a little bit ahead 
of the horse," I said. "What interest would you be expecting to 
pay?" 
     "Shall we say one thousand percent for ten days?" 
     "Well, that's a right round number," I said. "All them zeroes 
and everything. A very pretty number indeed." 
     "Good!" exclaimed the Dutchman. "Shall we draw up a contract 
right away?" 
     "Of course, fifteen hundred is just as pretty," I continued. 
"I think there ought to be a five in there somewhere. Always liked 
fives, ever since I was a toddler. And I suppose two zeroes is 
just as good as three. Reminds me more of one of Solomon's wives 
that way." 
     "Such a figure is out of the question!" snapped the Dutchman. 
"I know that our mutual friend couldn't have offered you that 
much." 
     "What he offered me, Dutchman," I said, "is a matter known 
only to him, me, and the Lord." 
     "I shall have to speak to my investors," said the Dutchman. 
     "That's perfectly understandable," I replied. "I think a 
short session of prayer might help you to come to a decision." 
     "I will meet again with you tonight," he said, finishing his
coffee and rising. 
     "I'll be at Maurice's most of the evening," I said. "I'm 
meeting Major Dobbins there for dinner." 
     "Make no commitment until you hear from me," said the 
Dutchman. "And remember that I sell merchandise of _all_ colors." 
     Well, I didn't know if that was a threat or an offer, so I 
just smiled at him and watched him waddle away. Then I dug into 
breakfast with a vengeance, after which I walked to the harbor. I 
figured the goods would be in a rust-covered seedy-looking scow, 
but there were so many of them there that I knew right away that 
I'd never be able to spot the one that had brought Saint Luke's 
Tabernacle this little windfall. 
     As I was walking back to my hotel I noticed a small, olive-
colored man following me. He was sneaking in and out of shadows 
just like a real-life spy, except that he was so clumsy about it 
that he damned near went through a couple of plate-glass windows 
trying to jump out of my line of vision. Just to make certain it 
was me he was after, I took a walk through the Arab quarter, and 
sure enough, he was still about two hundred feet behind me half an 
hour later. 
     It being a hot day and the air being as thick as salt water, 
I finally took pity on him, turned in my tracks, and walked right 
up to him. As I approached, he looked so scared that I thought he 
was going to faint dead away, hut he settled for gulping twice and 
sweating a lot. 
     "Good afternoon, brother," I said cheerfully. "Would it be 
easier on you if I just found a nice shady bench and sat down on 
it?" 
     He nodded. 
     "Cat got your tongue?" I asked. 
     "Most assuredly not," he said in a high nasal voice. "Or is 
that an American colloquialism?" 
     "No, it's just slang," I said. "Let's rid ourselves of the 
formalities. The Right Reverend Doctor Jones at your service." I 
extended my hand, and he looked so startled that I thought he was 
going to jump clear up to the moon. 
     "And I am Henri Pasquard," he said when he'd stopped shaking. 
     "Can't say that I've ever heard of you, brother," I said. 
     "Oh, nobody has," he said solemnly. "That is essential to my 
business. But possibly you have heard of Le Rongeur?" 
     "Nope." 
     He looked disappointed. 
     "What does it mean?" I asked. 
     "Oh, nothing much. It's just my professional name, sort of 
like a stage name for an actor." 
     I was about to pat him on the shoulder and tell him not to 
look so unhappy, but I didn't want him to start shaking again, so 
l settled for offering him a cigar. 
     "Oh, I don't smoke," he said. "The smell makes me ill."
     "Then I won't inflict the stench of my tobacco on you," I 
said, putting the one I had chosen for myself back into my pocket. 
His hair was all slicked down with grease, and the grease and 
sweat were starting to run down his forehead into his eyes, so I 
offered him a handkerchief. He accepted it with a brief murmur of 
thanks. 
     "Would you care to tell me why you were following me, Brother 
Rongeur?" I said, hoping the use of his professional name would 
put him more at ease. 
     "I meant to approach you sooner or later," he said, staring 
down at his two-toned shoes, "but is it not reasonable that I 
should first see if I could determine where you might have hidden 
the money?" 
     "Reasonable as all get-out," I agreed. "And now that you know 
it's not on me and that I'm not going to lead you to it, what 
next?" 
     "Why, I should like to propose a partnership, of course," he 
said. "Major Dobbins is a thief of the lowest type, and the 
Dutchman is even worse. I should think that dealing with such 
people would be repugnant to a man of your character." 
     "Whereas dealing with a man like yourself . . . ?" 
     "Please do not think that I offer you only honesty and 
integrity," he said quickly. "On the contrary, l will return your 
money threefold in a week's time." 
     "I've already had better offers than that," I said. 
     "I have no doubt of it," said the little man, almost
apologetically. "But what good are their offers once they have 
their hands on the material? I, without false modesty, can give 
you a list of references which will satisfy even a man of the 
cloth. I can--" He broke off suddenly. "Excuse me," he said, 
withdrawing an impressive-looking pistol from a shoulder holster 
and tucking it into his belt. "I tend to sweat under my arms, and 
moisture ruins the mechanism. Where were we?" 
     "I believe you were about to list your references," I said. 
     "That would perhaps be indiscreet, until such time as I know 
you are interested in a partnership," he said. 
     "Perfectly understandable," I said. "Just out of curiosity, 
Brother Rongeur, what exactly do you do when you're not striking 
up partnerships?" 
     "Oh, I try to keep busy at one thing or another," he said, 
lowering his eyes again. 
     "And what does Le Rongeur mean?" 
     "The Rodent," he said, blushing under his olive skin. 
"Originally I was the Weasel, but there is no masculine form of it 
in French. It is always La Belette. It became very embarrassing, 
and attracted an inferior sort of person, if you understand my 
meaning." 
     "But why rodent or weasel or any kind of animal at all?" I 
asked. 
     "It's kind of a private joke," he said, still blushing 
furiously. 
     "Care to let me in on it, Brother Rongeur?" 
     "Then it wouldn't be private any longer, would it?" he 
replied. "Besides, it really has very little to do with the 
business at hand. Have you reached a decision?" 
     "I'll have to spend some time weighing all my offers very 
carefully," I said. "I should be able to come to a decision by 
tonight. I can meet you at--"
     "Oh, we needn't make any arrangements, Doctor Jones," he 
interrupted. "I don't intend to let you out of my sight for the 
rest of the day." 
     "Oh?" 
     "I don't mean to disturb you, but you must understand my 
position. Just go on about your business as if I weren't here. I 
shall try to be as unobtrusive as possible." 
     I thanked him and began walking back to the hotel. Every now 
and again I'd turn back and, sure enough, there he'd be, ducking 
in and out of shadows about fifty feet behind me. He was such a 
skinny little man and I got to feeling so sorry for him that once 
or twice, when I got too far ahead of him, I'd browse at a 
vendor's table and give him a chance to catch up, for which he 
shot me a couple of very grateful smiles. 
     I finally got to my room, relaxed in the cast-iron tub for an 
hour, shaved, and lay down for a little nap. When I woke up it was 
getting on toward sunset, so I changed into my Sunday preaching 
clothes and decided it was time to stroll over to Maurice's. The 
Rodent was waiting for me on the hotel veranda, and began 
following me at a respectful distance. 
     Maurice's was exotic and dirty, with about a three-to-one 
ratio in favor of the dirt. There were a number of rooms with 
pretty farfetched doorframes, all separated by rows of hanging 
beads. The lighting throughout the place was dim, the air was 
circulated by a couple of very large and slow-turning overhead 
fans, and the walls were covered with animal heads, tapestries, 
and paintings of very naked ladies. I paused in the bar just long 
enough to stuff a couple of bills in the brassiere of a belly 
dancer and then walked into one of the smaller back rooms, where I 
found Major Dobbins, late of His Majesty's armed forces, sitting 
at a table and puffing away at his cigarette holder. 
     "Ah!" he exclaimed as his gaze fell upon me. "My dear Doctor 
Jones! l trust your day went well." 
     "So far, so good," I assured him. "Of course, it ain't over 
yet." 
     "True," he said, his eyes twinkling. "But any day that begins 
with a visit from the Dutchman can't fail but to get better, eh?" 
He chortled and poured half a flask of gin into his water glass. 
Then, stirring it up a little with a dirty coffee spoon, he drank 
it down in a single swallow. "I know it irritates Maurice," he 
confided, "but I simply cannot tolerate his bar stock. And as for 
his wine cellar . . ." He gave a man-of-the-world shrug, and I 
nodded in my most sophisticated manner. 
     At this moment the Rodent walked into our room and sat down 
at an adjoining table. He gave us a nervous little smile and 
immediately buried his nose in the menu, which was kind of strange 
since the only thing Maurice ever served was impala steak. 
     "You know him, I presume?" said the Major, nodding in the 
Rodent's direction. 
     "Met him this afternoon," I said. 
     "He made you an offer?" 
     "He did." 
     "You turned him down, naturally," said the Major. 
     "Why naturally?" 
     "Anyone could tell just by looking at him that he's a man of 
weak moral character," said the Major. "Hardly the kind of person 
you'd care to enter into business with. See how he keeps peeking 
at us over the top of his menu. No, my dear sir, we Englishmen 
have to stick together." 
     "I'm an American," I pointed out. 
     "Same thing," he said. "Shall we get down to details now?" 
     At just that moment the Dutchman walked in and came over to 
our table. "I'm sure you don't mind if I join you," he said, 
pulling up a chair. He had a different white suit on, but it was, 
if anything, even more soiled than the last one. 
     "Personally, I have no objections whatsoever," said the 
Major. "However, my good friend Doctor Jones is in a hurry to 
conclude our business. It might be best if you returned in an hour 
or so." 
     The Dutchman cracked his knuckles and sank even deeper into 
the tiny wooden chair. "My friend Doctor Jones seems to have 
fallen into a pit of vipers," he said at last. "Once I extricate 
him, he will know who his real friends are." He paused to light a 
very bent cigarette. "By the way, what is Le Rongeur doing at the 
next table?" 
     "I am trying to decide what to order," said the little man 
with some haughtiness. 
     "Well, that takes care of _him_ for the next forty-five 
minutes," said the Dutchman. "What has this phony offered you, 
Doctor Jones?" he said, jerking a thumb in the Major's face. 
     I thought the Major might take a swing at him, but instead he 
just laughed jovially and turned to me. "You've spoken to both of 
us, my good sir," he said. "I put it to you: Which of us is the 
more trustworthy?" 
     I looked from one to the other, and to tell the truth, I had 
considerable difficulty making up my mind. Then, suddenly, the 
Rodent hissed between his teeth, and all eyes turned to the 
doorway, through which stepped a tall, well-groomed white man 
wearing a police uniform. 
     "Well, well, what have we here?" he said with a smile. "I 
really should get a photograph of this, and title it _Thieves' 
Carnival_." He turned to me. "You wouldn't happen to be Lucifer 
Jones, would you?" 
     "The Right Reverend Doctor Jones," I replied. 
     "I thought as much," he said. "I am Captain Peter Clarke, at 
your service, sir -- and the biggest service I can offer you is to 
urge you not to enter into any transactions with your current 
companions." 
     "What makes you think I was considering such a thing, Brother 
Clarke?" I asked. 
     "When you're out in the bush and you see vultures circling in 
the sky, what makes you think there's a carcass on the ground?" he 
replied with a smile. "I assure you, Doctor Jones, that the mere 
presence of these three swindlers is ample proof to anyone who 
knows them that you are in possession of a tidy piece of change. I 
can only urge you to hang on to it for dear life." 
     "I did not come here to have my character impugned," said the 
Major. 
     "I can do more than impugn it," laughed Captain Clarke. "I 
can document it. Major Theodore Dobbins, age forty-six, 
dishonorably discharged for embezzlement, served three terms for 
fraud in England, one for robbery in Australia. Currently on 
probation from Johannesburg. Wanted in Ethiopia, Morocco, and 
Egypt for drug dealing."
     He turned to the Dutchman. "And this one's another treasure: 
Caesare Tobur, alias Winston Riles, alias Hans Gerber, alias Horst 
Brokow, alias the Dutchman. Wanted in seven countries for slave 
trading and in three more for the illegal sale of firearms." 
     "Then why haven't you arrested them?" I asked, more out of 
politeness than a fervent desire to see any potential meal tickets 
locked away. 
     "Inefficient extradition laws," said Captain Clarke. 
"Tanganyika was a German protectorate until a few years ago. It 
still takes an enormous amount of paperwork to get things done 
here. Besides, we don't know which ship is carrying the opium, but 
we do know that someone is going to have to make a move in the 
next day or so. I hope you'll forgive my frankness, Doctor Jones, 
but I'd hate to see you get mixed up with these characters. And 
that little weasel sitting at the next table is the worst of the 
lot." 
     "I beg your pardon!" said the Rodent, rising to his feet. 
     "Worst butcher in all of British East," said Captain Clarke. 
"He's killed something like thirty-five men." 
     "That's a lie!" screamed the Rodent. He turned to me. "I put 
it to you, my dear friend. I have killed only sixteen men, all in 
self-defense. I have never been convicted of murder. There are no 
warrants for my arrest anywhere in Africa. And yet this ... this 
_fou_ tries to make me sound like a mad-dog killer. Me, Le 
Rongeur, who wouldn't harm a fly unless provoked!" He sneered at 
Clarke. "Thirty-five men indeed!" 
     "Well, what do you say, Doctor Jones?" said Captain Clarke. 
"Would you care to have me escort you back to your hotel, or 
possibly put you into protective custody until the deadline for 
the deal has passed?" 
     "I thank you for your concern, Brother Clarke," I said, "but 
surrounded as I am by the scum of the earth, what better place 
could I find to do the Lord's bidding? Why don't you check back in 
on me in a couple of hours?" 
     "If you're still alive," said Clarke grimly. 
     "I'll have 'em singing hosannahs in half that time," I said 
with a confident smile. 
     "Well, I can't _force_ you to use your brain," said Captain 
Clarke with a shrug. He turned and left the room. 
     "I hope you will accept what he said with a grain of salt," 
said the Major. 
     "Obviously misinformed," said the Dutchman. 
     "I wonder who killed the other nineteen men?" mused the 
Rodent. 
     A waiter approached us just then, and we all ordered impala,
except the Rodent, who insisted on having fish. The waiter, after 
some argument, finally agreed, provided that the Rodent wouldn't 
object if his fish looked and tasted like impala. The little man 
finally nodded, the waiter left, and I was alone with my 
confederates once again. 
     "As I was saying," began the Major, "you must by now realize 
what kind of social untouchables have joined us in our repast. We 
have a demented dwarf who can't remember how many men he's killed, 
and a slave trader called the Dutchman who's probably never been 
within two hundred miles of Holland." 
     "Hah!" snapped the Dutchman. "I grew up in Rakovnik!" 
     "Which happens to be in Czechoslovakia," said the Rodent 
softly from the next table. 
     "Amsterdam!" amended the Dutchman quickly. "I grew up in 
Amsterdam. It's been such a long time that I get confused." 
     "And what about yourself, Major?" I asked. "Did you really 
serve time in all those prisons?" 
     "A series of unfortunate misunderstandings," he said 
smoothly. "But let us come back to the point, sir. I have made you 
a very generous proposition. Are we to be partners?" 
     "And I have made him an even better one!" said the Dutchman. 
     "At any rate," said the Major. "I feel certain that we may at 
least eliminate Le Rongeur from consideration. You cannot possibly 
entertain the notion of entering into an agreement with such a 
man." 
     As the Major finished speaking, the Rodent made a sudden move 
with his right hand, and I found myself alone at the table, both 
my companions having dropped to the floor with a swiftness born of 
terror. The Rodent merely smiled, picked his napkin from his lap, 
and dabbed himself about the lips. 
     "That was a thoroughly uncivil thing to do," complained the 
Major, getting back onto his chair.
     "You would prefer that I let my wine trickle down my chin?" 
asked the Rodent gently. 
     "We would prefer that you not make any sudden movements in 
the direction of your belt," said the Dutchman, huffing and 
puffing as he regained his feet. 
     "My apologies, gentlemen," said the Rodent. "Next time I feel 
the need to reach for anything below the line of your vision, I 
shall first announce what I am reaching for." 
     The Major nodded vigorously. "It's only good manners." 
     "I must add," said the Rodent, "that if you make any further 
attempt to convince my good friend Doctor Jones that I am unable 
to fulfill my word as an independent businessman, the next thing I 
reach for will not be my napkin. I wish you no ill will, but..." 
He let the sentence die with an apologetic little smile. 
     "Back to business," said the Dutchman. "Doctor Jones, I am 
prepared to offer you double anything the Major offers." 
     "Rubbish!" said the Major. "I'll match whatever that gross 
peddler of human flesh offers. We Englishmen must stick together." 
     "And you, Rongeur?" I asked, turning to the little man. "What 
do you have to say?" 
     "My offer is unchanged since this morning," said the Rodent. 
"But there is one thing I must add to it." 
     "Please do so," I said. 
     "I am willing to guarantee that none of my rivals will take, 
shall we say, unsavory means to show you his displeasure at not 
becoming your partner. I do not think they can make the same 
guarantee." 
     I must confess that it was a contract stipulation that hadn't 
occurred to me, and the more I thought about it, the better the 
Rodent's offer began to look. Founding the Tabernacle of Saint 
Luke was all well and good, but not if the founder was to be 
buried beneath a cornerstone. I suppose I wasn't upholding my 
poker face very well, because the Major laid a reassuring hand on 
my shoulder. 
     "My dear Doctor Jones," he said, "I assure you that my 
principals will not allow any harm to come to you, if that's all 
that is worrying you." 
     "I make you the same guarantee," said the Dutchman, "with the 
further stipulation that should my guarantee not, for some 
unforeseen reason, be fulfilled, you will be brutally and 
thoroughly avenged." 
     "Brother Dutchman," I said, "as much as I appreciate the 
sentiments behind your statement, I find it a mighty small 
comfort. Let us leave such dismal considerations aside for the 
moment and start talking cold hard cash." 
     "Excellent," said the Dutchman. "You know my terms. I will 
give you a thousand percent return within ten days." 
     "How will I find you ten days from now?" I asked. 
     "You might ask the local constabulary," said the Major 
nastily. "He spends more time in jail than out of it." 
     "You are hardly the one to make such a statement!" said the 
Dutchman haughtily. 
     "Brethren," I said, "I repeat: My prime concern is making 
sure that I have some way of collecting all these wondrous profits 
that are being spoken of. I couldn't love and trust you more if 
you were my own flesh and blood -- but then, my own flesh-and-
blood brother is currently serving time in Arizona for trying to 
rob a restaurant. Therefore, I feel that I need more than verbal 
assurances, no matter how comforting they may be." (Actually, my 
brother was in jail in Montana for doing vile things with a 
painted woman and her twelve-year-old twin daughters, but I saw no 
reason to bring his sordid misdeeds to light just to prove a 
point.) 
     "I appreciate your concern, my dear sir," said the Major, 
"but you must understand that time is of the essence. If the money 
is not presented by noon tomorrow, the boat will leave for 
Madagascar, where the goods will be offered to Erich Van Horst." 
     "And who is this Von Horst?" I asked. 
     "A black-hearted scoundrel," said the Dutchman. "A totally 
unprincipled swine." 
     "But smart," interposed the Rodent. 
     "Yes, smart," said the Dutchman. "No one even knows what he 
looks like, or if Von Horst is his real name. But he has made 
enormous inroads on this segment of our business." 
     "In other words," I said, "he is a competitor." 
     "An understatement," said the Major. "The man is a 
monopolist. Far from being a competitor, he tries to beat down 
competition at every opportunity. In short, he is an enemy of the 
free-enterprise system." 
     "Well, brothers," I said, "I certainly agree that we can't 
allow a man like that to blacken his soul still further. He sounds 
like he's pretty nearly past redemption right now, and I've 
certainly got no intention of helping old Satan get his infernal 
claws on another brother through any action of mine. No, indeed, 
we certainly can't be the cause of poor Brother Von Horst's 
downfall." 
     "Excellent, my dear Doctor Jones," said the Major. "We shall 
at least, so to speak, keep it within the family. Now, with whom 
do you choose to associate yourself?" 
     "Brothers," I said, "I know I said I would announce my 
decision at dinner tonight, but certain factors have been brought 
to light by our frank discussion. If each of you will meet me for 
breakfast at my hotel tomorrow morning and tell me how you intend 
to protect both my investment and my health, I will choose one of 
you in ample time for you to purchase your goods before noon." I 
paused to borrow a swig of the Major's liquor. "You understand 
that it's not myself I'm concerned about. But to rob me is to rob 
the Lord of His tabernacle, and that is just too sinful to 
contemplate." 
     Well, none of them looked too happy about it, but I guess 
they all saw the wisdom of my position, for they finally agreed, 
though the Rodent kept playing with his napkin and shooting 
regretful but meaningful glances at the Major and the Dutchman. 
     We kept drinking and talking about one thing and another for 
an hour or so, and then Captain Peter Clarke came back in. I 
hadn't wanted to offend any of my friends, but the truth of the 
matter is that I had been waiting for him, just to make sure I got 
back to the hotel safe and sound, so bidding them all adieu until 
morning, I began walking back to my hotel in his company. 
     "How'd you make out with that pack of thieves?" said Captain 
Clarke. "Still got your wallet?" 
     "So far so good, Brother Clarke," I said. "But there is 
something I've been meaning to discuss with you." I turned quickly 
and saw three different but distinctive figures darting in and out 
amongst the shadows. 
     "And what might that be, Doctor Jones?" asked Captain Clarke. 
     "I have a certain amount of cash on hand," I said. 
     "I know," said Captain Clarke. 
     "And being a God-fearing and moral man, I would never harm my 
fellow man, so I carry no weapons. Now, you made a statement 
earlier this evening about protective custody..." 
     "True," he said. "But the situation has changed in the past 
hour. Our prison has only four cells, and thanks to a drunken 
brawl at the waterfront, I regret to inform you that all four of 
our accommodations are currently occupied." 
     "I wasn't referring to myself, Brother Clarke," I said 
quickly. "As a man of the cloth, I have naturally never spent so 
much as a minute in a jail cell, and I think such an experience 
would be spiritually shattering." 
     "Then what did you have in mind, Doctor Jones?" he said. 
     "I have a certain amount of cash on hand," I began. 
     "So you said." 
     "I wonder if I might put _it_ in protective custody until, 
shall we say, ten o'clock tomorrow morning?" 
     "Well, it's highly irregular..." he said. 
     "I'd rest much easier knowing it's free from attack by 
vicious night-prowling bandits and other foul denizens of the 
city," I said. 
     "You'd pick it up no later than ten o'clock?" said Captain 
Clarke. 
     "My word as a man of God," I said, raising my right hand and 
shooting a glance up toward Heaven. 
     "And you're willing to trust me?" 
     "You're a sworn defender of the law, ain't you?" I said. 
     "All right, Doctor Jones," he said. "If this is truly your 
desire, I suppose the city of Dar-es-Salaam can keep your money in 
custody overnight. Where is it?" 
     "I'll lead you to it," I said, "just as soon as we manage to 
elude my dinner companions." 
     "Oh, so you noticed them too?" he said with a smile. "It 
shouldn't be too difficult to get rid of them." 
     We speeded up our pace and began turning this way and that, 
and within half an hour even the Rodent must have been wondering 
where we had gone to. Then we doubled back to Maurice's, where we 
crept around to the back of the building and I removed my money 
from beneath a large concrete block where I had hidden it the 
night before. 
     Captain Clarke counted it briskly, then put it in his pocket 
and withdrew a pencil and a small notebook. 
     "Let me give you a receipt for it," he said, and scrawled 
laboriously that the Police Department of the city of Dar-es-
Salaam owed the Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones the sum of two 
thousand and forty British pounds, payable upon presentation of 
this note. 
     "All nice and official," he said, signing his name with a 
flourish. "See you tomorrow morning, Doctor Jones." 
     I made my way back to the hotel, where I found Major Dobbins, 
the Dutchman, and the Rodent waiting for me in the lobby. I bade 
them all goodnight, and went up to my room. 
     I was awakened by a pounding at the door. I looked out the 
window and saw that it was still dark. Using the Lord's name for 
purposes other than it was intended, I pulled on my pants and 
walked across the room. When I opened the door all three of them 
practically fell through it. 
     "Gentlemen!" I said harshly. "I thought we were to meet at 
breakfast." 
     "Quickly!" said the Major. "What have you done with the 
money?" 
     "I hardly consider that a proper request," I said, pushing my 
hair back out of my eyes. 
     The Rodent pulled out his pistol and pushed it into my belly. 
"Where is the money?" he shrieked. 
     "Brothers," I said, "I am truly shocked. I thought we had an 
understanding." 
     "The money!" screamed the Rodent. "Who did you give it to?" 
     "To Captain Peter Clarke of the Dar-es-Salaam police force," 
I replied angrily. "It'll be kept there in safety and security 
until I make my decision. Although," I added, "based on this 
unwarranted intrusion, I wonder if the Lord would wish me to enter 
into financial dealings with any of you." 
     "Fool!" yelled the Dutchman, and the Rodent began crying. 
     "What's going on here?" I said to the Major, who seemed to be 
the only one who had retained his composure. 
     "After you evaded us," he said, "we got to discussing 
matters, when suddenly it dawned upon me that all of British East 
has extradition treaties with its neighboring nations. So we sent 
Le Rongeur to check with the police, and found that they had no 
record of a Captain Peter Clarke." 
     "I don't understand," I said with a sinking feeling in the 
pit of my stomach. 
     "You damned imbecile!" shrieked the Rodent, wiping the tears 
from his face. "You turned the money over to Erich Von Horst!" 
     I was struck dumb for a minute. Then I raced out the door and 
ran for the waterfront with the Major, the Rodent, and the 
Dutchman close on my heels. When we arrived the Dutchman pointed 
out the pier where the ship was docked, and we got there just in 
time to see it putting out to sea. 
     Von Horst, still dressed in his British police uniform, was 
standing on the deck, and as his eyes fell upon us a broad smile 
spread over his face. Then he bowed deeply, straightened up, and 
gave us a snappy German military salute just before the fog 
obscured him and the boat (and the Tabernacle of Saint Luke) from 
my vision. 
     I left my companions weeping and cursing on the pier, 
silently promised the Lord never to offer my pearls to swine 
again, gathered up my few worldly possessions, and left quietly so 
as not to disturb the desk clerk. Then, pausing only long enough 
to refresh my spirit at Maurice's, I left the sinful city of Dar-
es-Salaam behind me and set forth once again to do the Good Lord's 
bidding.

Chapter 3

                            THE VAMPIRE

     How I met Herbie Miller and made eighteen thousand dollars in 
twenty-seven days came about like this: 
     Shortly after I took my leave of Dar-es-Salaam I did a little 
computing and figured out that fifty British pounds, which was all 
I had in my pocket, wasn't quite enough to start building my 
tabernacle. So I went out into the wilderness (of which there was 
an awful lot back in those days) and had a little conference with 
my Silent Partner, Who advised me that if I was to properly carry 
on His work I'd need considerably more in the way of a grubstake. 
It was about this time that Karamojo Bell and Deaf Banks and
Pondoro Taylor and John Alfred Jordan were making big names and 
even bigger fortunes for themselves by the killing of elephants, 
and I figured that with God to guide my bullets, knocking off a 
few tons of ivory shouldn't be so very difficult. 
     Of course, I did have a couple of minor problems. For one 
thing, I didn't know the first thing about tracking or killing 
elephants, and in fact had never even held a rifle in my hands. 
For another, elephant licenses were very expensive, though since 
the Tabernacle of Saint Luke was to be a nonprofit enterprise I 
felt certain that the purchasing of licenses didn't really apply 
to me. Just the same, Kenya and Tanganyika were pretty well 
patrolled by game wardens and various other gendarmes who might 
view the license situation more narrowly, which meant that I would 
have to go to the Interior to find my fortune. I had heard tell of 
huge herds of elephants in the Lado Enclave, a large and savage 
area just west of Uganda. This wasn't officially in Africa's dark 
Interior, but it was Interior enough for me, since I didn't know 
where to begin looking for it. 
     I took the East African Railway to the railhead in Uganda, a 
long and arduous trip which left me barely enough money to buy an 
old military rifle. I spent my last couple of pounds buying 
bullets, and then asked the local constabulary to direct me to the 
Enclave. He waved his hand in a northerly direction which covered 
approximately three-quarters of Uganda, and so, armed only with my 
rifle and a copy of the Good Book, I began my career as an ivory 
hunter. 
     I had walked about fifteen miles when night fell, and I spent 
a chilly few hours communing with God and Nature out in the 
African bush. I awoke stiff and hungry, especially hungry, and 
decided to hone my aim while shooting down a little something for 
breakfast. 
     I began walking through the grasslands and came upon an old 
waterbuck grazing alone. Seventeen shots later he was still 
grazing, and I began to realize that there was more to hunting 
than I had been led to believe. After my first two shots thudded 
home into a tree some fifty feet from him, he didn't even bother 
to run away, but just stared at me for a moment and then went back 
to his grazing. 
     I kept walking north for the better part of a week, living on 
a diet of fruits and berries, and wondering how I was going to 
kill an entire herd of elephants unless they stood in a nice long 
nose-to-tail line so that my bullets were bound to hit _some_thing. 
The vegetation was getting pretty lush, which meant that the ticks 
and flies and spiders and mosquitoes were out in force. Then one 
afternoon I saw a native village in the distance, and remembering 
my experience with Kitunga's friends and relations, I decided to 
give it a wide berth. As I was doing so I came to an undersized 
and undernourished white man staked out in the sun. 
     "Good day to you, brother," I said, walking up to him. 
     "Good afternoon, friend," he replied, turning his head to get 
a better look at me. 
     "Lovely day," I said, wondering what to say or do next. 
     "Think it may rain, though," he said. 
     I looked up at the sky. "Not enough clouds. The rainy season 
is just about over. By the way, brother, are you trussed up on the 
ground for any particular reason?" 
     "None that I happen to agree with, friend," he said. "It was 
done to me by a vile and barbarous tribe called the Ankole. I 
wonder if you, being a God-fearing Christian and a white man to 
boot, would mind cutting me loose of these here stakes?" 
     "Well, brother," I said, "it does seem the Christian thing to 
do. On the other hand, I passed an Ankole village not too far from 
here, and they might not understand a gesture of Christian 
charity." I sat down beside him to mull it over in my mind. "What 
did you do that set them against you?" 
     "They objected to some of my personal tastes and habits," he 
said, blinking his eyes to get some of the sweat out. 
     "You're not some kind of moral degenerate, are you?" I said, 
my good pious blood starting to boil about the edges. 
     "Perish the thought, neighbor!" he said vigorously. "It was a 
simple misunderstanding. Now won't you be a gentleman and cut a 
fellow white man free?" 
     "I've got to weigh the question carefully," I said, shooting 
a glance in the direction of the village to see if any of them 
were approaching us. 
     "Well, in the meantime," he said, his skin kind of twitching, 
"you wouldn't have any insect repellent with you, would you, 
friend?" 
     "Sorry," I said. "You must be right uncomfortable." 
     "Well, it's getting kind of warm, what with the sun beating 
down on me and insects crawling all over me," he admitted. "How 
about some gin? Being staked out like this is mighty dry work." A 
tsetse fly landed on his face and began crawling up his nose. 
     "What's your name, brother?" I asked, shooing the fly away. 
     "Miller," he said. "Herbie Miller, from Amarillo, Texas. " 
     "Well, I'm pleased to make your acquaintance, Brother 
Miller," I said, extending my hand and then quickly withdrawing it 
when I realized that he was in no position to respond in kind. 
"And I'm the Honorable Doctor Lucifer Jones, pastor of the 
Tabernacle of Saint Luke. " 
     "Pleased to meet you," said Herbie. "I'd get up, but . . ." 
     "I quite understand, Brother Miller. What's a fellow like you 
doing out here in the wilderness anyway?" 
     "I was fighting as a mercenary for the British against the 
Germans in Tanganyika during the Great War, but they threw me out, 
and I've been wandering around Africa ever since." 
     "Why did they throw you out?" I asked. 
     "Personality conflict," he said. 
     "With the whole British army?" 
     "I'd like to go into the matter in greater detail," said 
Herbie, "but there's a poisonous scorpion crawling up my leg, and 
I fear that my story may come to an abrupt and painful end if you 
don't do something about him, Doctor Jones, sir." 
     I flicked the scorpion away and stomped on it. Then the Good 
Lord took a hand in the proceedings and hit me with another of His 
revelations. 
     "When you were in the army, did you ever have occasion to 
fire a rifle?" I asked. 
     "I most certainly did," said Herbie. "You know, I'd even 
settle for a little taste of vodka." 
     "How good a shot were you?" 
     "A crackerjack shot, sir," said Herbie. "But you needn't 
worry, Doctor Jones. I'd never turn on the man who set me free, 
and besides, I don't have any weapons with me." 
     "You ever shoot an elephant?" I asked. 
     "On occasion," he said. Then his face tensed up. "Don't tell 
me there's an elephant about to charge us!" 
     "Wouldn't think of it," I said, pulling out a jackknife and 
cutting his bonds. 
     "Thank you, Doctor Jones," he said, rising to his feet and 
rubbing some circulation back into his extremities. 
     I threw a friendly arm around his shoulders. "Think nothing 
of it, Brother Miller. After all, what are partners for?" 
     "Partners?" he said. 
     I nodded. 
     We left the area right quick, not wishing to run into any 
Ankole tribesmen who might not understand the fact that I couldn't 
leave a fellow white man to the mercies of the elements, and 
headed on up to the outpost of Arua, just a handful of miles from 
the Uganda-Congo border. 
     "How much money do you have?" I asked Herbie. 
     "Maybe five pounds," he said, pulling out some faded, 
miscolored bills and a handful of coins. 
     "Give it to me," I said, "and wait for me about a mile west 
of town." 
     "That's all the money I have in the world," he protested. 
"How do I know you'll come back?" 
     I tossed the rifle to him. "Keep this as security." 
     He began walking to the west, and I entered the outpost and 
sought out the local bar. I waited for the better part of an hour, 
until a pair of men dressed in British military uniforms came in. 
Inside of five minutes everyone else had left and I walked up to 
the bar, announcing in a loud voice that I'd like to buy a drink 
for everyone in the house. They looked around, figured out that I 
meant them, and invited me to join them at their table. 
     "Pleased to meet you, brothers," I said. "I'm the Honorable 
Right Reverend Doctor Jones, preaching my way across this savage 
continent." 
     "Pleased to make your acquaintance," said the older of the 
two men. "I'm Captain Michael Holmes, and this is Lieutenant 
Richard Thorpe. Where are you heading for?" 
     "Wherever I can bring peace and contentment to my fellow 
man," I said devoutly. "I'll go anyplace where the spirit of these 
godless savages needs uplifting." 
     "That's highly commendable," said Lieutenant Thorpe. "I wish 
there were more people like you, Padre." 
     "Why, thank you kindly, Brother Thorpe," I said, signaling 
the bartender to bring the bottle. "Have another drink." 
     We got to talking for a while then, and drinking pretty hard, 
and before long we were all loosened up and pretty good friends. 
     "I just think it's wonderful," said Captain Holmes after a 
long silence. 
     "What is?" I asked.
     "A man of God going fearlessly through the bush, bringing the 
Word and the Spirit to the savages."
     "There's no resisting the call once it comes to rest on you, 
brother," I said modestly. "However, I'd be Iying if I didn't tell 
you that I'm far from fearless." 
     "Certainly you are," objected Captain Holmes. "How could you 
be a coward, rubbing shoulders with cannibals and pygmies and 
the like?"
     "I'll tell you, Brother Holmes," I said. "Not all of us are 
afraid of the same things. Now, as for me, I know that all men are 
God's children, so I don't have no fear when I walk into a native 
village. But that don't mean I ain't afraid of other things." 
     "Such as?" 
     "Such as elephants, Brother Holmes," I said with a shudder. 
"Creatures of Satan they are, with them incredible proboscises and 
little red eyes, and able to crush the life out of a man so easy-
like." I downed another drink emphatically. 
     "Nothing to worry about, Padre," said Thorpe. "There's no 
elephants within twenty miles of here." 
     "A comfort," I said. "A definite comfort. But my call has 
been made clear to me, brothers. I got to go through some place 
called the Conclave or something like that, and I'm told that it's 
absolutely rife with bloodthirsty pachyderms."        
     "You mean the Lado Enclave?" asked Holmes. 
     "The very spot!" I said. "The very spot indeed. I don't 
suppose I could, as one good Christian to another, ask one of you 
gentlemen to escort me safely through there so's I don't fall prey 
to some elephant's dark and bloodthirsty desires?" 
     "I'm afraid not, Padre," said Thorpe. "We're on duty here. 
But elephants are a pretty peaceful lot, by and large. If you see 
any, just give them a wide berth." 
     "Do one of you gentlemen have a map of the area?" I asked, 
pouring them each another drink. 
     Holmes pulled a map out of his vest pocket and unfolded it. 
"Here you are, Reverend Jones," he said. 
     I found the Lado Enclave right quick, and estimated it to be 
a day-and-a-half march to the north and west. Then I picked a 
pencil out of my pocket and handed it to Thorpe. 
     "I wonder, Brother Thorpe," I said, "if you could mark the 
areas of the Enclave I'll most want to avoid?" 
     "You mean places with..." 
     I nodded and gulped in terror. "Right. With elephants." 
     He looked at the map, then drew seven or eight circles at 
various parts of the Enclave. "Okay, Reverend Jones," he said at 
last. "These represent the greatest concentrations of the herds. 
If you just walk around these areas you should be okay. You may 
run into a stray elephant now and then, but you'll avoid most of 
them." 
     "I don't know how to thank you, brothers," I said, folding up 
the map and sticking it inside my shirt. "You can't begin to know 
what a service you've done for the Lord this day." 
     "Always happy to help a man of the cloth," said Thorpe. "As 
for thanking us, it's not necessary -- though if you run across 
any ivory poachers, you might report them to us on your next swing 
through here." 
     "I certainly will," I said, "though I can't understand why 
anyone would kill elephants." 
     "I would have thought you'd approve," said Holmes. 
     "For vengeance, yes," I said. "But for profit? That's 
breaking the Second and Ninth Commandments." 
     I took my leave of them then, and wandered off to meet 
Herbie. 
     "What have you been doing?" he demanded when I got there. 
     "Securing our fortune," I said, throwing the map down in 
front of him. "I supply the brainpower, you supply the 
marksmanship, and we split the take." 
     "Fifty-fifty?" he asked. 
     "One-third, one-third, one-third," I corrected him. 
     "Come again?" said Herbie. 
     "One-third for you, one-third for me, and one-third for the 
Lord." 
     He kept insisting that this was really a two-to-one split for 
me, so after some further haggling we finally decided on fifty-
five percent of the first ten thousand pounds for me, forty-five 
percent for Herbie, and the Lord had an option on the next three 
thousand pounds. 
     We decided that we'd better be up and on the trail bright and 
early the next morning, so we turned in almost immediately. During 
the middle of the night I felt a sharp pain in the side of my 
neck, and, figuring it was some small lizard or beetle, I tried to 
flick it off with my hand, and wound up poking Herbie in the eye. 
     "Goddamnit!" he screamed, rubbing his eye vigorously. "What 
did you want to go and do that for, Lucifer?" 
     "Why don't you tell me just what you were doing bending over 
my neck?" I snapped. 
     "It's personal," moaned Herbie, still holding his hand over 
his eye. 
     "It's more than personal," I said. "It's perverted! Kissing a 
man's neck when he's sleeping!" 
     "I wasn't kissing you, Lucifer," he whined. "Honest I 
wasn't." 
     "Just see that it don't happen again," I said, and lay back 
down on my blanket. 
     And not ten minutes later I felt this pain in my neck again. 
     "Herbie!" I yelled, and he must have jumped five feet into 
the air. "What the hell is going on?" 
     "Well, Lucifer," he sighed, "you might as well know the 
truth." 
     "That you're some kind of moral degenerate?" 
     "No." 
     "Then what?" 
     "I'm a vampire," he said. 
     "You mean like goes around sucking blood and such?" I said. 
     He nodded sadly. "I wish I wasn't. I mean, you have no idea 
the strain it puts me under, but I am and that's all there is to 
it." 
     "How long have you been a vampire?" 
     "Oh, about ten years now. Maybe eleven. You know, Lucifer, I 
don't think there's any group anywhere in the world that's more 
misunderstood than us vampires. I mean, I hope you don't think I 
_like_ nabbing people in the neck and drinking their blood." He 
shuddered. "It's disgusting!" 
     "Then why do you do it?" 
     "I'm compelled to, just like you're compelled to drink 
water," he answered. "It's not a matter of choice." 
     "But I've seen you in the sunlight," I said. "I thought 
vampires couldn't do that." 
     "European vampires can't," said Herbie. "It's like a whole 
different union." 
     "I've seen you eat meat," I said. 
     "I've seen you eat meat, too," he shot back. "Doesn't stop 
you from needing water, does it?" 
     "Is this why you were kicked out of the army?" I asked. 
     He nodded. 
     "And why the Ankole had you staked out?" 
     "Yes," he said. "Believe me, Lucifer, I'm a better person for 
being able to talk about it. I'm not like this all the time, 
really I'm not. Most of the time I'm just as normal as you are. 
It's just that sometimes I...well, I get this _craving_." 
     "Do you have it now?" I asked. 
     He stared long and hard at my neck. "No," he said with a 
relieved sigh. "I think it's gone now." He paused for a moment, 
then nodded vigorously. "Yes, I'm sure it's gone." 
     "Good," I said, walking over and tying him to a tree. "I'll 
let you loose in the morning." I went back to my blanket and lay 
down. "I think I'll probably be tying you up every night. Nothing 
personal, you understand." 
     "I understand. You've no idea how comforting it is to be able 
to talk about this with someone," he said, just as I was drifting 
off to sleep. "You know, some missionaries have set up a hospital 
over in Masindi, and they probably have a fair supply of blood 
there. I don't suppose we could--" 
     "No, we couldn't!" I said, and fell asleep. 
     We spent the next day foot-slogging, and by mid-morning of
the second day we had reached the outskirts of the Lado Enclave. 
We made camp early and fell to studying Captain Michael Holmes'  
map, trying to figure out the quickest way to get to the nearest 
of the herds. Finally we bedded down, and were up about an hour 
before sunrise.                  
      We began finding piles of fresh elephant dung about noon, 
and within about two hours had snuck to within a quarter mile of a 
herd of maybe two hundred of the beasts. Herbie lay down on his 
belly, tested the wind with a handful of dry dirt, and began 
inching forward. I looked at him for a minute, then did the same. 
     Since I was bigger than Herbie I began getting a little ahead 
of him, and I stopped when we were about eighty yards away from a 
huge bull with enormous tusks. Then, just as I was about to 
suggest that we were close enough for a shot, Herbie sank his 
teeth into the side of my neck. 
     I let out a yell, and all hell broke loose. The elephants 
stood in a circle, trunks extended, trying to figure out where the 
noise had come from, and then three or four of them started 
running straight at us. 
     I jumped up, more mad at Herbie than scared of the elephants, 
and pointed down at the little vampire, who was nibbling on my 
Achilles tendon. 
     "He's the one!" I screamed at the oncoming elephants. "Just 
run right by me and flatten that little bloodsucker!" 
     The elephants wheeled around like quarter horses and raced 
off in the other direction the second they saw and heard me, and a 
moment later there wasn't an animal to be seen anywhere, except 
for the one who was slowly getting up next to me. 
     "I don't know what happened, Lucifer," he said. "I've never 
done that in the daytime before." 
     "You damned fool!" I screamed. "You could have gotten us both 
killed!" 
     He just hung his head and looked so sad that all the anger 
evaporated right out of me. 
     "All right," I said, patting him on the shoulder. "Just try 
to give me a little warning next time we're sneaking up on a herd 
of elephants, okay?" 
     Well, the next time didn't come for almost a week, during 
which time Herbie tried marching to his different drummer more and 
more often, especially if I would nick myself while shaving. But 
finally one morning we found about a dozen young males and one 
real old one with huge tusks lolling in a small wooded glen. 
     This time I made sure Herbie went ahead of me, and when he 
got within about forty yards of them he cut loose with a couple of 
shots and dropped the old tusker. I ran up to look at the corpse, 
and discovered that Herbie was nowhere to be seen. 
     "Herbie!" I called. 
     "Up here, Lucifer," he replied, and I looked up and found him 
perched in a tree about twenty-five feet above the ground. 
     "What are you doing up there?" I said. 
     "There's always a chance that one of the others will come 
back," he said, "and you've got all the rest of the bullets." 
     "That shows a lot of foresight," I said. 
     "Thank you, Lucifer." 
     "What am _I_ supposed to do if one of them comes back?" 
     He paused thoughtfully, then asked, "How good are you at 
climbing trees?" 
     "Not very," I said. 
     "Oh," he said. "Well, do you know any real fast prayers?" 
     "Knock off the comedy and come down here," I said. 
     "That wasn't a rhetorical question, Lucifer," he said. 
"There's an elephant about fifty feet behind you, and he looks 
very unhappy." 
     Which was how I found out that I could climb trees after all. 
     We stayed on our branches for an hour or two after the 
elephant had left, then climbed cautiously down and examined our 
ivory. 
     "Looks like about one hundred and thirty pounds a tusk," I 
said. 
     "At least," said Herbie. Then, "Lucifer, I've got a 
question." 
     "What is it, Herbie?" 
     "How are we going to get the tusks off the elephant?"  
     It was a right smart question at that. We spent the better 
part of the afternoon hunting up long sharp stones, and all of the 
next day chopping away at the tusks. Herbie got thirsty in his 
unique way toward late morning, and I damned near flattened his 
head with my stone, after which he was well behaved for the rest 
of the day. By nightfall we had managed to chop off the tusks, and 
not a moment too soon, since our elephant wasn't turning into any 
nosegay and the vultures were getting dangerously low in the sky. 
     "Now what?" asked Herbie. 
     "Now we carry them back to camp," I said. 
     "I don't know about you, Lucifer," said Herbie, "but I don't 
think I can lift my tusk." 
     "Of course you can," I said. 
     "I only weigh about a hundred and ten pounds," said Herbie. 
     "Try dragging it," I said. 
     So he tried. He got it about forty feet away from the carcass 
and collapsed. 
     "Okay," I said. "I'll tell you what we'll do. Grab the front 
end of my tusk, I'll take the rear end, and we'll cart it to camp 
like that and then come back for the other one." 
     He agreed, and we started off through the bush. It was two 
hours later when we staggered into camp, and we decided not to go 
back for the other tusk until the next morning. Poor Herbie was so 
exhausted that he didn't even try to nab me in the neck that night 
before I tied him up, and I literally had to kick him awake the 
next morning. Then, stiff and sore and aching in every muscle, we 
set out for our other tusk. 
     We never did find it. All them bushes and trees and rivers 
and trails got to looking alike, and after about seven or eight 
hours we had to admit we were as lost as two people were ever 
likely to get. 
     We wandered for another day or two and couldn't even find our 
original camp. Finally, on our third day of searching, we came to 
a Wanderobo village, where we were given a red-carpet treatment 
and feted like visiting ambassadors. 
     The chief was a nice old boy called Nmumba, and he had picked 
up a smattering of English from various hunters and traders over 
the years. He sat us by his campfire, surrounded us with his naked 
daughters, and served us a native brew that was even more potent 
than Kitunga's. Every now and then he'd make a joke. The way we 
knew this was he'd goose one of his daughters and she'd shriek 
like all get-out, and this was our signal to laugh. 
     I was wondering what to do with Herbie, because it was 
getting near bedtime, and it somehow didn't seem proper to truss 
him up while we were in Nmumba's village. I mentioned this to him, 
and he looked downright serious as he answered me. 
     "l really think you'd better tie me up tonight, Lucifer ", he 
said. "I've been getting the craving real bad. I suppose it's all 
them naked necks." 
     If you say so," I said. "Also, I have a feeling that he'd be 
something less than a gentleman if he didn't offer us a couple of 
his daughters for the night. 
     "I'll never be able to make it!" said Herbie. "I'm getting 
thirsty just thinking about them!"             
     I made our excuses and took Herbie off to a hut where I tied 
him up to one of the support poles.
     "If he offers us his daughters, I'll accept both of them just 
as a matter of good manners," I said as I was securing the knots. 
"But don't you worry none, Brother Herbie: It's my Christian duty 
to keep them away from you."
     Which it was, and which I did. 
     When I got up in the morning Nmumba decided to show me around 
the village, being careful to explain that it was only a temporary 
dwelling place since the Wanderobo are basically nomads, but that 
it was ours as long as his tribe remained there. Finally we walked 
over to a huge hut that had to be holding a good ten tons of 
ivory. 
     "That's a mighty impressive-looking collection, Brother 
Nmumba," I said, figuring out its worth down to the nearest 
shilling. 
     He looked pleased as punch. "The Wanderobo are mighty 
hunters," he said. 
     "No question about that," I replied. "Did you kill them all 
with spears?" 
     "Yes," said Nmumba proudly.
     "So tell me, Brother Nmumba," I said, "if the hunting is so 
good here, why are you moving your people out of the Enclave?" 
     "Need new _juju_ man." 
     "You mean a witch doctor?" 
     He nodded. "Our _juju_ man died four moons ago, and we fear 
for our children's health." 
     "They all looked pretty healthy to me," I said. 
     "Our last _juju_ man made strong _juju_," said Nmumba. "But 
soon it will wear off, and we must find another before my people 
sicken and die." 
     "It's nothing catching, is it?" I asked, backing off a bit 
just out of good manners. 
     "No. It is...I have not words for it." 
     Well, we got to using sign language, and just the merest bit 
of Swahili I had picked up, and it turned out that this particular 
_juju_ was a form of preventative medicine. I knew they didn't 
have no vaccinations out in the wilderness, so I questioned him 
about the nature of it. 
     "Cut veins," said Nmumba. 
     "I'm not sure I follow you, Brother Nmumba," I said. 
     "Cut like so," he said, pointing to a recently healed knife 
scar just between his earlobe and his jawbone. "Bad blood goes 
out. Devils go out." 
     "You mean the old _juju_ man _bled_ you?" 
     He nodded. "Very strong medicine." 
     It wasn't the first time I'd heard of bleeding as a disease 
preventive. In fact, it had been all the rage in the courts of 
Europe for centuries. But it was kind of surprising to find it 
being practiced out here in the bush. 
     And then I realized that it was more than surprising -- it 
was Providential. 
     "Brother Nmumba," I said, "I think this may be your lucky 
day. My friend is a _juju_ man, one of the greatest in all 
Africa." 
     "Too small," said Nmumba doubtfully. 
     "Big things come in small packages, Brother Nmumba," I said. 
"Not only can Brother Herbie bleed your people, but he will take 
all the devils into his own body so they can never harm you 
again." 
     "Truly?" said Nmumba. 
     "Do I look like the kind of man who would lie to you?" I 
said. "Brother Nmumba, you cut me to the quick!" 
     Nmumba lowered his head in thought for a moment. "Would he 
agree to be our _juju_ man?" 
     "Nothing would please him more," I said truthfully. 
     "Good!" said Nmumba. "Then it is settled, and the Wanderobo 
can remain here for many moons." 
     "Well, there is one little problem," I said. 
     "Oh?" 
     "It would mean that my own people would be without a _juju_ 
man, and in exchange for this they would probably want some 
compensation. Not for myself, you understand; I'm happy just to be 
able to do my good friend Nmumba a favor. But they will probably 
have to go out and hire another _juju_ man." 
     He didn't understand many of the words, but the message came 
across loud and clear. We sat down for some hard bargaining, and 
half an hour later I had traded Herbie Miller to the Wanderobo for 
twelve thousand pounds af ivory and porters to carry it down to 
Mombasa for me. 
     Which is how I made my first fortune, and how Herbie Miller 
became the happiest witch doctor on the entire Dark Continent.

Chapter 4

                           SLAVE TRADING

     It was with a certain feeling of quiet pride and 
accomplishment that I led my seventy porters eastward toward 
civilization, carrying a modest fortune of ivory on their broad, 
sweat-streaked backs. We marched for about three days, and headed 
north toward the Sudan just to make sure that we didn't bother any 
game wardens or British officers who might have been in the area, 
which is how I lost my fortune before I had a chance to build my 
tabernacle. 
     One night we were lying down by the campfire, totally 
exhausted -- them from toting all that ivory, and me from 
converting it into dollars inside my head -- when a bunch of shots 
rang out and pretty soon we were surrounded by a dozen Arabs in 
full desert regalia. Now, I know that on the surface it seems kind 
of hard to envision twelve men surrounding seventy-one, but it's a 
lot easier than you might think when the twelve men have rifles 
and the seventy-one don't.
     Anyway, they motioned me to step aside, and herded the 
porters into a tight little circle, making them kneel down and 
raise their hands above their heads, a gesture I was not 
unacquainted with, but had previously seen only on Sunday mornings 
and in games of chance involving little white cubes with spots 
painted on them. 
     "Not a bad haul," said a familiar voice. "And ivory, too! Not 
bad at all, my friends." 
     Then a fat man in a soiled white suit stepped out of the 
shadows and nodded to me. 
     "Dutchman!" I exclaimed. 
     "Doctor Jones," he replied with a smile. "What a pleasant 
surprise to see you once again, my good friend." 
     "What the hell is going on here?" I demanded. 
     "I am afraid that _you_ are responsible for my presence here, 
my dear Doctor Jones," smiled the Dutchman, pulling out a 
handkerchief and wiping the sweat from his pudgy face. 
     "Me?" 
     "Indeed. You see, when Herr Von Horst made off with a certain 
shipment of, shall we say, perishable goods, purchasing them with 
funds that you freely gave to him, I found that I had to expand my 
primary business to make up for the income you had cost me. 
Regrettable, to be sure, but fitting in a way, would you not 
agree?" 
     "I most certainly would not!" I snapped. "That ivory and them 
porters are mine! Though, of course, if you want to rent them from 
me once they deliver the tusks, I'm sure we can do a little 
business." 
     "Oh, no, my friend," laughed the Dutchman. "I'm doing my 
business right now. You wouldn't happen to know your wrist and 
ankle sizes, would you?" 
     "Surely you're not thinking about putting shackles and chains 
on a fellow white man, Brother Dutchman?" I said in horror. 
     "What guarantee have I that you won't try to run away before 
we reach our destination?" he asked, putting a pudgy hand to his 
chin and eyeing me warily. 
     "You've got my word as a Christian gentleman and a man of 
honor," I replied. 
     "Get the chains!" he called to one of his Arabs. 
     "Brother Dutchman!" I cried. "It's inhuman to chain me like I 
was some black heathen on the way to market. Surely we can work 
out some accommodation that would be mutually acceptable." 
     "Oh, it's just for a little while, Doctor Jones," he said. 
"Once we get into the desert, I'll be happy to release you." 
     "You will?" 
     "Certainly. After all, I'll have the only water for hundreds 
of miles in any direction." 
     And so I was chained, hand and foot and neck, to my seventy 
porters. Out of deference to my race and my position, the Dutchman 
chained me first in line, which struck me as only just and 
fitting, until I figured out that the first man in line was also 
the first to step on snakes and scorpions and other foul denizens 
of the desert. And, of course, anytime one of the porters tripped 
or even slowed down, I usually found out about it in an 
exceptionally painful and undignified way. 
     Then there was the matter of the ivory. The Dutchman didn't 
want to leave it behind, but it was kind of hard for the porters   
to carry, shackled up as they were, so we had to stop every half 
hour or so for them to shift the weight. 
     Finally, on the second evening of my captivity, after our 
neck chains were unhooked for the night, I moseyed over to where 
the Dutchman was sitting alone by his fire. 
     "Mind if I join you?" I asked, sitting down next to him as 
gracefully as my chains would allow. 
     "As a matter of fact, I do," he replied, taking a swig from a 
half-empty flask of something that sure didn't smell much like 
water. "After all, how will it look to the hired help? I don't 
even let _them_ share my fire or my liquid refreshments." 
     He gestured to the twelve rifle-toting Arabs, who were eyeing 
me with open hostility. 
     "Besides," he continued, "I try never to mix business with 
pleasure. If we got to talking and drinking and swapping lies, I'd 
feel absolutely miserable about what I'm going to be doing to you 
in a week." 
     "Oh?" I said. 
     "Yes, Doctor Jones. It would fair break my heart. On the 
whole, I think it would be best if you were to quickly take leave 
of me and return to your porters." 
     "Well, actually I didn't come over here to swap lies with 
you, Brother Dutchman," I said. 
     "Well, if we're speaking business, that's a whole different 
matter," said the Dutchman, suddenly alert. He offered the flask 
to me. "Have a drink, Doctor Jones." 
     "Don't mind if I do," I said, taking a long sip and then 
another. "How much ivory do you suppose I've got here with me, 
Brother Dutchman?" 
     "None," he replied with a smile. "But if I understand the 
thrust of your question, I've got about eighteen thousand dollars' 
worth." 
     "There's a lot more where that came from," I said softly, 
which was technically true, since it had originally come from 
elephants, and as far as I knew there wasn't any current and 
severe shortage of them. 
     "You're suggesting that if I release you you'll lead me to 
all this ivory?" asked the Dutchman with a sly grin. 
     I nodded, returning his grin. 
     "Well, I do wish I could accommodate you, Doctor Jones," he 
said, still smiling, "but the porters can hardly carry what we've 
got now. Besides, ivory is very difficult to sell in Egypt, 
whereas... But I think you get the point." 
     "Say no more, Brother Dutchman," I said confidently. "If it's 
more black heathen you want, I can round 'em up and have 'em here 
in no time." 
     "You still don't seem to understand," said the Dutchman. 
"Everyone sells natives. Natives are a drug on the market. It is 
you, Doctor Jones, who constitutes the _piece de resistance_ of my 
current consignment." 
     "Me?" I repeated. 
     "You," he said, nodding sadly. "And because I have nothing 
against you personally, other than the fact that you cost me a 
modest fortune back in Dar-es-Salaam, and are a scoundrel and liar 
to boot, I must confess to you that it grieves me more deeply than 
you can imagine to have to sell you to Ali ben Ishak, no matter 
how much he pays me." 
     "Ali ben Ishak?" 
     He nodded again. 
     "Nasty fellow, is he?" I asked as a small knot formed in my 
belly and began to grow. 
     "Under other circumstances I wouldn't wish your fate on my 
worst enemy," said the Dutchman gravely. 
     "Tell me about him," I said.
     "Please, my friend," said the Dutchman, holding up a hand for 
silence. "I wish to speak no further on the subject. It would only 
depress me." 
     "If it upsets you all that much, Dutchman," I suggested, 
"perhaps it might be better not to sell me to this Ishak person 
after all." 
     "My dear fellow," he said severely, "this is _business_. I'll 
just have to learn to live with the guilt." 
     That being settled, he had another swallow from his flask and 
ambled off to his tent. His Arabs shooed me away from the fire, 
and I rejoined my porters, thinking that maybe they weren't such 
unfortunate souls after all, at least compared to some people I 
could name, like me for instance. 
     The next three days passed pretty uneventfully, unless you 
think trudging across a desert with your hands and feet chained 
together qualifies as an event. At that point, which was five days 
into our little sojourn, the Dutchman had one of his Arabs 
unshackle me after first explaining that we were at least a four-
day march from water of any kind. 
     Now, I could find a lot of fault with the Dutchman's ethics 
and morals and appearance and even his personal hygiene, but I'd 
never noticed much wrong with his business sense, so when he told 
me that I took him at his word and made no attempt to sneak off 
from the caravan. Besides, he still had my ivory, and without it 
the Tabernacle of Saint Luke wasn't likely to get itself built in 
the real near future. 
     Every day I'd ask the Dutchman about this Ali ben Ishak 
character, and every day he'd tell me that he was too fond of me 
to discuss the matter. The only thing he'd say was that Ali ben 
Ishak was one of the five wealthiest Arabs in the world, and that 
he {the Dutchman) felt just terrible about this whole situation. I 
must confess that the more I tried to talk about it, the more he 
wasn't the only one who felt terrible. Finally I decided to put 
the entire thing in the hands of the Lord, after explaining the 
problem to Him and making certain recommendations of my own. 
Thereafter I spoke no more about it, and concentrated mostly on 
not dying of heat stroke, a considerable task in its own right. 
     It was a week to the day since we'd been captured that I 
looked ahead of me and saw a huge cloud of sand out near the 
horizon. It came closer, and finally I could make out a batch of 
Arab sheikhs and warriors mounted on horseback and camels, all 
wearing colorful robes and headgear and sporting expensive-looking 
rifles. The Dutchman signaled us to stop and then had us walk in a 
circle, just like the old-time pioneers did whenever Indians drew 
near. Then he had his dozen men brandish their weapons and 
position themselves around our close-knit little group. 
     The leader of the mounted Arabs signaled his own men to stop 
about twenty yards away. Then he rode his horse slowly toward me 
and the Wanderobo, circled us twice, and turned to the Dutchman. 
     "Slaves?" he asked, cocking an eyebrow. 
     "Friends and relations," said the Dutchman hastily. 
     "In chains?" asked the old sheikh. 
     "I don't get along with them very well," answered the 
Dutchman. 
     "Where are you going?" asked the sheikh 
     "Nairobi," said the Dutchman. 
     "You're heading in the wrong direction," said the sheikh. 
     "We thought we'd get a little exercise along the way," said 
the Dutchman. 
     "And who are you?" asked the Arab. 
     "Colonel T. E. Lawrence," replied the Dutchman. "But my 
friends call me El Aurens." 
     Suddenly the old sheikh's attitude changed, and he became 
positively servile. After offering Allah's blessings on the 
Dutchman and his friends and relations, he rejoined his men and 
beat a hasty path around us. 
     "That was close!" sighed the Dutchman, wiping some sweat from 
his forehead. 
     "How did you know they'd leave you alone if you told them you 
were Lawrence of Arabia?" I asked. 
     "Trial and error. One batch almost tore me apart when I told 
them I was Chinese Gordon. I guess they don't view the fall of 
Khartoum quite the same way you and I do. Anyway, after a number 
of confrontations, I found that Lawrence's name worked best." 
     "And what will happen if the real Lawrence ever shows up?" I 
asked. 
     "I imagine they'll think he's Chinese Gordon and tear him to 
pieces," replied the Dutchman with a chuckle. 
     He walked over to me and attached me to the porters again. "I 
hate to do this to you, my friend," he grated as he was attaching 
the chains, "but we reach Cairo in two more days and I wouldn't 
want you to do anything unwise." 
     I promptly asked the Lord to strike him down and set me free, 
but evidently my Silent Partner was otherwise occupied at the 
time, for I spent the next two days in chains, walking north to 
Cairo. 
     It was dark when we got to the outskirts of the city. We made 
camp about three miles from one of the poorer sections, of which 
there were an awful lot, lit a campfire, and allowed the Arabs to 
ply us with a number of bottles of native beer. When I remarked 
upon the Dutchman's generosity, he replied that while it was 
undoubtedly true that he was the very soul of generosity, it would 
also serve to make us look a little fatter on the auction block 
the next morning. 
     "And now, Doctor Jones," he added with a strange glint in his 
eye, "I think it is time for my men to unshackle you and bring you 
over here for a bath." 
     They did so, and I must confess that the Dutchman prepared 
the bath of my life for me. It was sweet-smelling and filled with 
all kinds of soaps and oils. Then, after I dried myself off, the 
Dutchman himself gave me a haircut and a shave, after which two of 
the Arabs gave me a rubdown and poured more oils onto me. 
     When all this was done the Dutchman handed me back my 
clothes, which had been washed while all this other preparation 
was going on. I got into them, and then he stood back, hands on 
hips, and just kind of stared at me. 
     "Oh, yes," he said at last. "Eighty thousand Maria Theresa 
dollars, at the very least." 
     Well, this made absolutely no sense to me, because as far as 
I could see the whole damned lot of us _plus_ the ivory wasn't 
going to bring anything near eighty thousand dollars. And while 
Ali ben Ishak may very well have been one of the richest men in 
the world, rich folk didn't get that way by overtipping, or 
remembering the cook's birthday, or bidding eighty thousand 
dollars for a slave in a bear market. 
     Still, if it made the Dutchman happy to think otherwise, it 
was no skin off my back -- and keeping my skin on my back had 
suddenly become pretty imperative to me. 
     Pretty soon the Dutchman and the Arabs began drinking the 
leftover beer, and since I was still unchained I kind of helped 
them a bit. It must have been a lot stronger than I thought, 
because in about half an hour only the Dutchman was still awake, 
and he and I got to talking about old times and sipping generously 
from his flask, and within another ten minutes or so he was out 
cold. 
     I gave serious consideration to trying to free the porters, 
but I didn't want to chance waking up any of the Arabs while 
searching for the keys to their chains, and besides, _some_one had 
to stick around to carry all that ivory back to Mombasa, so I just 
gave them a brief but friendly smile and raced off toward the 
city. 
     Being in my usual marvelous condition, and a fine figure of a 
man as well, it took me only a couple of hours to negotiate the 
intervening three miles, and I arrived in Cairo hardly panting at 
all. I must have come in the back way or something, because while 
there were a lot of huge palaces at the far end of town, I was in 
an area of twisting streets and little white shacks. I asked two or 
three locals for directions but they kept speaking some foreign 
tongue so I just kept on walking past the bazaars and the 
ramshackle housing and such until I suddenly found myself on what 
seemed to be a main road. 
     I hopped on the back of a slow-moving double-decker bus, rode 
about a mile, and slipped off without distracting the conductor 
from his appointed duties. Finally I saw a white man in a white 
suit just like the Dutchman's, only not so soiled, and wearing a 
straw hat, and I walked up to him. 
     "Good evening, brother," I said. 
     "No handouts," he grunted, and kept walking. 
     "Now, brother," I said, falling into step beside him, "do I 
look like a man in need of a handout? I happen to be the Right 
Reverend Doctor Jones, pastor of the Tabernacle of Saint Luke from 
down south of here." 
     "Must be a mighty small church," he grated. "There's nothing 
but sand south of here." 
     "What direction are we walking?" I said quickly. 
     "North, you numbskull," he said with some distaste. 
     "Well, that explains it," I said. "My church is to the east 
of here. I just got turned around a little." 
     He stopped, hands on hips, and glared at me. "Just what the 
hell is it that you want?" he demanded. 
     "Nothing much, brother," I replied. "I just need some 
directions." 
     "Well?" he persisted. 
     "If you were looking for a slave market in Cairo, just where 
do you suppose you'd find it?" I asked at last. 
     "I don't traffic in slaves," he said coldly. 
     "Neither do I," I assured him quickly. "In fact, it's my 
intention to buy a batch of them poor lost souls and set them 
free." 
     "A noble sentiment," he said, still looking a mite 
suspicious. "However, I still can't help you. Now, if you'll just 
stop following me, I'll--"
     "Just a minute!" I said, suddenly smitten by another 
revelation. "Where would I find Ali ben Ishak?" 
     "What would someone like _you_ want with someone like _him_?" 
he demanded. 
     "He's my partner," I replied. "The two of us plan to 
crisscross the countryside buying slaves and setting them adrift 
on a sea of freedom." 
     "Not that I believe a word of all this," he said, "but Ali 
ben Ishak lives in that huge domed building up ahead." 
     I looked ahead in the direction he indicated, and saw an 
enormous building, about the size of the White House, at the top 
of a mild incline. "That one?" I asked, pointing to it. 
     "No," he answered. "That's just the governmental palace. 
Ishak lives in the _big_ one over toward the left."
     I looked again, and saw a gold-spired building that 
completely dwarfed the government palace. Each of my porters could 
have had two rooms and a bath and would probably only have taken 
up the first floor of the guest wing. 
     "Thank you, brother," I said, heading off toward Ali ben 
Ishak's abode. "May the Good Lord look after you." It was a 
sincere blessing, especially since the Lord hadn't done such an 
all-fired good job of looking after him so far this evening, what 
with me having removed his wallet while he was pointing out the 
government palace to me. 
     I reached Ali ben Ishak's door in about fifteen minutes. I 
could tell right off that I wasn't going to have to spend a lot of 
time searching for a doorbell and wondering how to introduce 
myself, because two huge Egyptians wearing fancy headdresses and 
baggy pants and not much else withdrew their wicked-looking swords 
when I tried to enter. 
     "What is your business here?" asked one of them in a much 
higher voice than fit his body. 
     "Oh, nothing special," I said quickly. "I just stopped by to 
see if your boss would like to make a friendly little contribution 
to the Tabernacle of Saint Luke." 
     "The Master supports no charities," said the other, in an 
equally falsetto voice. 
     "Who's talking charity?" I said. "The Tabernacle of Saint 
Luke is perfectly willing to make an equally friendly contribution 
to Ali ben Ishak. Why don't one of you boys run off and bring your 
Master down here?" 
     The two conferred in low whispers for a moment. Then one of 
them put two fingers into his mouth and let loose with a shrill 
whistle, and a minute later another half-naked muscleman in baggy 
pants and a turban showed up. There was some more whispering, a 
few gestures, a whole lot of staring at me, and then the new 
arrival told me to follow him. 
     And let me tell you, that was some house I followed him 
through. All the draperies were made of spun gold, and more jewels 
than you could shake a stick at sat in glass cases along the walls 
of the main gallery, each being guarded by a swarthy-looking 
Egyptian with a curved sword. We walked through a dining room that 
would comfortably have sat twelve or thirteen hundred close 
friends and admirers, circled a tiled pool that was only a little 
bit smaller than Lake Victoria, and finally we came to a halt in 
what sure as blazes seemed like a throne room. At any rate, it was 
a huge room filled with ornate Persian rugs, and there was only 
one chair in it, a big, luxurious, cushioned thing that sat 
smackdab in the middle of the floor.
     "I will tell the Master that you are here," said my guide, 
vanishing through a doorway that was pretty much hidden by some 
hanging tapestries. Since I found myself alone with a few minutes 
on my hands, I decided to take a look at some of Ali ben Ishak's 
trinkets and doodads that were sitting on shelves all over the 
room, and discovered, with some dismay, that they were all 
carvings and paintings and other renderings of naked white men, 
with an occasional white boy thrown in for good measure. 
     Suddenly it occurred to me why the Dutchman was so sure I'd 
bring all that money, and I lost no time in heading back the way 
I'd come in, but as I got to the door two more of those damned 
Egyptian heathens appeared from nowhere and crossed their swords 
right in my path. I considered stooping down and walking under the 
blades but thought better of it and went back to the interior of 
the throne room, looking vainly for a little dirt to rub onto my 
skin. 
     Then a silk-and-satin-clad figure, kind of old and skinny but 
wearing enough jewelry to make him look twenty and handsome in the 
eyes of most women, entered from behind the tapestries. I smelled 
him about three seconds before I saw him, and I stopped worrying 
about all the scents that the Dutchman had rubbed onto me. They 
were drowned out by his perfume the moment he entered the room. 
     "Ali ben Ishak?" I said, extending my hand and thanking the 
Lord that none of the Arabs had thought to give me a manicure. 
     "Yes," he purred. "And you are Mister...?" 
     "_Doctor_," I corrected him. "The Right Reverend Doctor 
Lucifer Jones at your service. In a manner of speaking," I added 
hastily. 
     "And to what do I owe the extreme pleasure of this visit, 
Doctor Jones?" he asked, staring at me through half-lowered lids, 
which gave him a sort of cockeyed look. 
     "I believe we have a little business to transact," I said. 
     "Have we indeed?" he giggled, easing himself onto the chair. 
     "Ali ben, my friend, I ain't going to mince words with you," 
I began. "I have a certain commodity to sell that I just know is 
going to meet with your approval." 
     "It already has," he said. 
     "How can it?" I asked. "You don't even know what I'm talking 
about." 
     "I understand perfectly," he simpered. 
     "Don't go understanding me so all-fired fast," I said 
quickly. "As I was saying, I've brought this particular commodity 
all the way from the Lado Enclave at enormous personal expense 
and hardship, knowing that a man of your taste and status would 
properly appreciate it." 
     "I'm sure I will," he breathed. 
     "You can search the whole of Africa and you won't find none 
better," I said. 
     "What an absolutely charming notion!" said Ali ben Ishak, 
closing his eyes and smiling a very strange smile. 
     "Well, then," I said, "I suppose we'd better get down to 
talking price. Brother Ali ben, for anyone else I'd charge thirty 
or thirty-five thousand dollars, but for you the price is a 
dirt cheap twenty grand." 
     "That's more than I'm accustomed to paying," he said 
petulantly. 
     "You're getting six tons," I pointed out. "That comes to less 
than two dollars a pound." 
     "Six tons?" he screamed. "What are you talking about?" 
     "Ivory," I said. "What are you talking about?" 
     "Oh, nothing," he muttered, blushing the prettiest shade of 
pink I ever did see. 
     "Have we got a deal?" I asked. 
     Well, we got to haggling and bargaining, and finally I sold 
him the ivory for sixteen thousand dollars, which was less than I 
wanted but also sixteen thousand dollars more than I had, so I 
guess we were both pretty pleased about it. 
     "You going to be sending your servants out after it?" I 
asked. 
     "Immediately," he replied. "And I trust you will remain as my 
guest until they return with the ivory." 
     "It'll be my pleasure, Brother Ali ben," I said, since I 
could see I didn't have much choice in the matter. 
     He summoned a pair of his major-domos, and I told them 
exactly where the goods were. "While you fellows are out there," I 
added, "I've got eighty-three items for tomorrow's slave auction. 
Would you be good enough to bring them back and clean 'em up a 
little for me?" 
     They looked at Ali ben Ishak, who nodded his approval, and 
then took their leave. 
     "Nice fellows," I said. 
     "They used to be," he answered through pursed lips. 
     "I read about fellows like that in the Good Book," I said. 
"They were Enochians or something like that, weren't they?" 
     He didn't answer but just looked kind of wistful, and I could 
see that he wasn't in a mood to talk to me anymore, so I ambled 
off, found myself a goose-feather mattress covered with satin 
sheets and a fur blanket, and plunked myself down for the night. 
     One of those squeaky-voiced Enochians woke me in the morning, 
and I didn't even have time to scrounge up a little something to 
eat before Ali ben Ishak's whole entourage, including me, were out 
the door and headed toward the slave market. 
     It was a grungy, grimy little place just west and a bit south 
of town, but it was crammed to overflowing with sheikhs and 
sultans and potentates who were all dressed to the nines. When we 
got there they were auctioning off an East Indian woman who I 
wouldn't have minded bidding on myself, and I followed Ali ben 
Ishak to a row of chairs that seemed to have been set aside 
especially for him and his retainers. 
     Next the twelve bleary-eyed Arabs came on as a single unit, 
and I spent a goodly amount of time rummaging on the floor looking 
for diamonds and other trinkets that my neighbors might have 
dropped until they were knocked down for ten thousand dollars and 
led out of sight and earshot. 
     And then, cursing so loud we could hear him while he was 
still outside the building, the Dutchman was dragged up onto the 
auction block. 
     "Lot Number 27," announced the auctioneer. He tried to show 
the Dutchman's teeth to the crowd and almost got his finger bitten 
off for his trouble. 
     "There he is!" screamed the Dutchman, catching sight of me. 
"There's the son of a pig who's responsible for this!" 
     I stood up and waved to the crowd, who cheered raucously and 
threw a few coins in my direction. 
     "You don't understand!" bellowed the Dutchman. "_He's_ 
supposed to be up here being sold! _I'm_ supposed to be down 
there!" 
     "The man's obviously gone off the deep end, Lord protect 
him," I said somberly. "I ask you, brothers, to compare our 
appearances. Do I look like a man who's been dragged through the 
desert to stand on the block? Or, better still, ask my host and 
good friend Ali ben Ishak." 
     That quieted everyone down for a while, and the auctioneer 
went back to telling the crowd how much work the Dutchman would be 
happy to do in a thirty-hour day. But Ali ben Ishak paid no 
attention; instead, he just stared long and hard at me. 
     "Is something troubling you, Brother Ali ben?" I asked at 
last. 
     "I'm just wondering how you did it," he purred. 
     "Did what?"            
     "Managed to trade places with the Dutchman. I know who he is, 
of course." 
     "I don't suppose you'd like to let that little tidbit of 
knowledge remain our personal secret, would you?" I said. 
     "If I tell what I know, you will be put on the auction 
block," he said, more to himself than to me. "And if I were to bid 
on you..." His voice trailed off and he looked thoughtfully at 
me. 
     "Brother Ali ben, I know what you're thinking, and while it's 
immoral and disgusting and unChristian as all get-out, I just 
can't bring myself to hold it against you, given that I'm 
doubtless the handsomest young buck you've ever run across. But a 
lot of these other guys have been looking at me just the way you 
have, and it's only fair to warn you that if I go on the block 
I'll probably cost you a million dollars or more. I have it on 
good authority that the Sultan of Graustark himself has authorized 
his agents to go that high for me." 
     "Oh?" he said, knitting his brows. 
     "Whereas a rum-soaked, foul-mouthed old sex fiend like the 
Dutchman ought to go for five thousand dollars tops." 
     "But he's so...so..." Ali ben Ishak searched for the 
right word. 
     "I know," I said. "But dry him out for a month, starve him 
for a couple more, and buy him a wig, and you'll be surprised at 
the change in him. I mean, he'll never look as good as me, Lord 
knows, but you can make yourself one hell of a bargain."
     He lowered his head, lost in thought, for about three 
minutes. When he rejoined the land of the living, the price on the 
Dutchman was eight hundred dollars and rising by ten-dollar 
increments. Ali ben Ishak put in a bid of three thousand, and got 
him before the opposition could muster a rally. 
     Then they marched out my seventy porters, and while they were 
showing off each one's teeth in turn, a big one on the end 
gestured to me to come up to the platform. I did so, and he leaned 
over and whispered in my ear. 
     "It is not commonly known that I speak English," he said. 
     "It ain't even uncommonly known," I replied in surprise. "Why 
in tarnation didn't you ever speak to me during that whole 
goddamned long trek through the desert?" 
     "I never had anything to say," he replied. 
     "And now you do?" I asked. 
     "Oh, yes," he said with a grim smile. "And if you do not find 
a way to free me and my fellow tribesmen, I am going to say it to 
everyone in this room. I am sure the auctioneer would like to know 
that since the Dutchman is in no position to make any claims, he 
can keep one hundred percent of the proceeds he could realize from 
your sale, rather than merely his commission." 
     The auctioneer walked over and gave me an inquiring look, 
which I answered with a sick little grin. Then I returned to my 
seat. 
     "The bidding is open!" announced the auctioneer. 
     "Four thousand for the lot," said one potentate. 
     "Five," said another. 
     "Seven," offered a bejeweled rajah. 
     "Eight thousand," I said, wondering if my remaining eight 
thousand was enough to start my tabernacle. 
     "Nine," said the rajah. 
     "Ten," I said. "And that's all those lazy bastards are 
worth!" 
     "Eleven," said the rajah. 
     "I told you ten was all they were worth!" I shouted. "You got 
wax in your ears or something? Twelve, and that's my last bid." 
     "Thirteen," said the rajah. 
     "Fourteen," I said. "Maybe I can get that much out of them 
before the law discovers I own 'em." 
     "The law?" asked one of the potentates. 
     "They ate their chief," I answered. 
     The rajah walked up to the platform and looked them over long 
and hard. "They really ate their chief?" 
     "Would I lie to you?" I said.               
     "Fifteen," he said after much hesitation. 
     "Sixteen," I said. "They're also homosexual rapists." 
     Ali Ben Ishak jumped to his feet to make a bid, but I stomped 
on his toe and he sat back down, cursing. The rajah took another 
long hard look, shook his head, and walked back to his seat. 
     "Sold, for sixteen thousand dollars," cried the auctioneer. 
     I looked at my English-speaking porter, who just grinned at 
me. 
     "Turn 'em loose and point 'em south," I said. "I changed my 
mind. They're just too dangerous to keep." 
     The auctioneer shrugged, and I heard a voice in the back of 
the room say, "Well, you know those big-shot American 
millionaires: easy come, easy go." 
     The auction ended in another hour, and, once again penniless, 
I took my leave, more than willing to let Ali ben Ishak keep the 
auction money I should have been paid for the Arabs and the 
Dutchman in exchange for his silence. 
     Well, not quite penniless. He did pay me two hundred dollars 
for presiding at the ceremony that wed him, once and forever, to 
Caesare Tobur, alias Winston Riles, alias Hans Gerber, alias Horst 
Brokow, alias the Dutchman. It may have been a little irregular, 
but I did my usual heart-rending job. At least, I don't recall 
ever seeing any bride cry and carry on quite as much as the 
Dutchman did.

Chapter 5

                             THE MUMMY

     There are worse things than being in Cairo in the summer. 
     You can, for example, be in Cairo in the summer with no 
money, no food, no friends, one suit of clothes, and a crazy 
Dutchman spreading vile and terrible lies about you to anyone who 
will listen. 
     Or you can be in Cairo in the summer with no money, no food, 
no friends, one suit of clothes, a crazy Dutchman spreading vile 
and terrible lies about you to anyone who will listen, and be 
stalked down a lonely alleyway by a tall dark figure that keeps 
just out of sight. 
     Which I was. 
     In point of fact, the street, which was pretty well lit, was 
just a few short yards away, but it was presently populated by a 
trio of young men with whom I had recently indulged in certain 
games of chance involving laminated cardboard rectangles with 
interesting and intricate markings on _both_ sides. Not wishing to 
bring up bitter memories, I felt it wise to remain off the beaten 
track, so to speak, when it suddenly came to my attention that my 
particular track wasn't quite so unbeaten as I might have wished. 
     Every time I took a step so did this shadow behind me, and 
every time I stopped it stopped too. At first I didn't pay it much 
attention, since I had nothing anyone could possibly want, but 
then I got to thinking, and decided that any civilized man might 
well have something some of these Egyptians might want, if only 
his shoes. 
     Well, this cat-and-mouse business went on for the better part 
of twenty minutes, at the end of which time I would have traded my 
soul for a cold bottle of beer, inasmuch as being stalked through 
the slums of Cairo is mighty thirsty work, when finally this 
figure stepped out of the shadows holding a wicked-looking dagger 
in its hand. 
     "It's all a mistake!" I hollered, throwing my hands up over 
my head. "This resemblance between me and Rudolph Valentino is 
purely superficial! I ain't made away with no Egyptian women that 
I can recall." 
     "Aw, goddamnit, it's you!" muttered a deep voice. "What the 
hell are you doing here at this time of night, Lucifer?" 
     I edged closer to get a better look. It turned out to be the 
English-speaking porter. 
     "Why ain't you back with your tribesmen, hightailing it for 
Uganda?" I asked when I'd finally recognized him. 
     "I decided to stay here and seek fame and fortune," he 
replied, lowering his dagger. 
     "You expect to find them in an alley at four in the morning?" 
I asked. 
     "This wasn't my first choice," he admitted sheepishly. "But 
did you ever try to rob a bank with only a knife?" 
     "So why didn't you buy a gun?" I asked with a certain 
detached curiosity. 
     "With what?" he demanded. "All I have is this damned 
loincloth. Lucifer, I'm freezing to death!" 
     "Well, brother," I told him, "freezing to death is one thing 
I don't have to worry about." 
     "No?" he said skeptically. 
     "No," I assured him. "I'm gonna starve to death long before 
that." 
     "Well, sorry to have bothered you," he said, walking off. 
     "Hold on!" I called after him. "Maybe we ought to pool our 
resources and form a partnership." 
     "I don't know about that," he said after some thought. "Your 
last partner is probably drinking my wife's blood at this very 
moment." 
     "But he's happy and well-fed," I pointed out. "You gotta 
consider exactly who and what my last partner was." 
     "True," he said slowly. "But none of this poor black heathen 
crap. We're equal partners or the whole thing's off and I'll 
probably rob you of your clothes." 
     "Brother," I said sincerely, "you got me all wrong. The Good 
Lord explicitly forbids me to take advantage of partners of any 
race, especially when they got me beat by six inches and a good 
fifty pounds. By the bye, what's your name?" 
     "You couldn't pronounce it," he said haughtily. 
     "Try me," I said. 
     "Kanchupja," he said. 
     "That being the case, I will call you Friday," I told him. 
     He shrugged in assent. 
     "Friday it is, then," I said. "And now, Friday, my partner 
and cherished friend, I don't suppose you've got any foodstuffs to 
toss into our mutual pool of resources?" 
     He held his naked arms above his near-naked body and turned 
once around. "Just where do you suppose I'd be hiding them, 
Lucifer?" he asked. 
     "Just curious," I said. 
     "I see that you've got an undershirt and a top shirt on," 
said Friday. "I don't suppose you'd care to turn one of them over 
to me?" 
     "Ain't no sense both of us freezing," I replied. "You ain't 
using your head at all tonight, Friday. It occurs to me that just 
based on brainpower alone, a fifty-fifty partnership may not be 
the most equitable arrangement ever to come down the pike." 
     "You can be an equal partner or a naked victim," said Friday 
seriously "I don't recall offering you a third alternative." He 
placed his hand meaningfully on the hilt of his dagger. 
     "Well, partner, as long as you put it that way, I guess 
everything is settled," I said quickly. 
     We decided to set off in search of food and clothing. By 
sunrise we still weren't exactly the best-dressed or fattest men 
in town, so when a crowd began forming on one of the main 
thoroughfares, we just naturally followed them, hoping for a 
handout or two, or at least a couple of bulging and unprotected 
pockets. 
     What we found was a caravan filled to the brim with golden 
statues and other baubles, all of them worth a pretty penny or 
two. Some fellow in khaki shorts and shirt and an oversized pith 
helmet was standing next to all this stuff, answering questions 
that a bunch of reporters was tossing up at him. 
     "What seems to be causing all the commotion, brother?" I 
asked a European who was standing on the outskirts of the crowd, 
trying to get a peek of the goings-on. 
     "Why, don't you ever read a newspaper, friend?" he replied. 
"This is the first load of treasure to be removed from King Tut's 
tomb." 
     "And where might I find this King Tut?" I asked, figuring 
that any king who gave away gold in such quantities ought to have 
a little food and a couple of suits left over for a young and 
modest Christian gentleman who had just undergone months of 
privation on the Dark Continent. 
     "I guess you don't read the papers at that!" laughed the 
European. "King Tutankhamen has been dead for more than three 
thousand years." 
     "Just settling the estate now, are they?" I asked, not 
wishing to appear unduly ignorant. 
     My companion shook his head with a smile. "King Tut's tomb 
was discovered on December 1 of last year by an Englishman named 
Lord Carnarvon and an American named Carter. It's the greatest 
archaeological find in history." 
     "Yeah?" I replied. "What all did they find?" 
     "All kinds of antiques: gilt couches and alabaster vases 
covered with hieroglyphics. And of course they found Tut himself, 
the boy king who had been buried with all these marvels millennia 
ago." 
     "So now that they found all this stuff, who are they going to 
sell it to?" I asked. 
     "Sell it?" He looked horrified. "My good man, all of these 
fabulous items from antiquity will be put on public display." He 
looked long and hard at me, and then added: "Under extremely heavy 
guard, of course." 
     "Of course," I agreed, nodding my head thoughtfully. "And 
what about old Tut himself? They gonna finally give him a decent 
Christian burial?" 
     "You must be mad!" thundered the European. "Tut is the 
greatest find of all! They'll be displaying his mummy all over the 
world." 
     "You mean to tell me, brother, that they're going to take 
this dead little boy all wrapped up in bandages and put him on 
display?" I exclaimed. "Why, it's uncivilized!" 
     "They're considering bids from various countries right this 
moment," said my companion. 
     "Bids? Why would a country pay good coin of the realm to put 
a mummy on display?" 
     "They'll charge tourists and recoup their money, never fear," 
he replied. "But they'll be doing it for the prestige. The profits 
will be merely incidental." 
     I thanked him for all this information and moseyed on back to 
Friday, who had been busy relieving onlookers of their excess 
change while they were watching the caravan. 
     "Look, Lucifer," he said, holding up a wad of pound notes. 
"At least we won't freeze or starve." 
     "The possibility ain't never crossed my mind," I said, 
looking around for a store that sold notions and similar goods. 
"But better still, I think I have hit upon our first business 
venture." 
     "First let me get something to wear," said Friday, heading 
off toward a nearby haberdashery. 
     I grabbed his arm, hooking it in my own, and kept walking. 
"Coals to Newcastle," I said. "I'm going to dress you from head to 
toe." 
     "What are you talking about?" demanded Friday, with a 
suspicious look on his face. 
     "Brother Friday, just put yourself and your economic future 
in my hands," I said reassuringly. "I promise that by nightfall 
you'll be the warmest man in all Egypt." 
     "This isn't going to hurt, is it?" he asked warily. 
     "Not a bit, Brother Friday." 
     "You're sure?" he persisted. 
     "Brother, the only thing that's getting hurt around here is 
my feelings when I see this lack of trust on your face," I told 
him. "Now let's get to work." 
     We began by hunting up a notions shop and buying a couple of 
hundred feet of bright white bandages. Then we found a little 
storefront smack-dab in the middle of the Avenue of the Pharaohs 
and plunked down a pound for a week's rent. 
     "Now what?" asked Friday as we unloaded our bandages into the 
empty store. 
     "Now you take a few shillings," I said, "and go out shopping 
for a couple of pieces of white cardboard and a can of paint." 
     "And what will you be doing?" 
     "Friday, you are the most suspicious partner a mortal man 
ever did have!" I complained. "I'm just going out to do a little 
serious thinking. I keep feeling that we need a little something 
else, but I can't quite put my finger on what it is." 
     He muttered some gibberish in Swahili and stalked off to make 
his purchases, while I, deciding that I could think better on my 
feet than sitting in the store, began walking up and down the 
winding streets of Cairo. I guess I had gone about half a mile 
when a small but very rounded figure shot out of a doorway and 
grabbed me by the hand. 
     "I have lost my heart to you, noble sir!" she breathed, her 
dark eyes shimmering above the veil that obscured the rest of her 
face -- and suddenly it dawned on me exactly what our little 
business venture was lacking. 
     "It ain't nothing to be ashamed of," I admitted, smiling down 
at her. "Lots of ladies have felt even stronger emotions on less 
notice, me being a Christian and a gentleman, and an American to 
boot." 
     "I am overcome by an all-pervading desire to give of myself 
freely to you!" she whispered. 
     "Freely, you say?" I repeated, as she began leading me into 
the doorway from which she had emerged. 
     "Well," she said, modestly dropping her gaze, "there is a 
small handling and cover charge. as well as an entertainment tax." 
     "Sister," I said, still smiling at her, "I have a feeling 
that you and me were meant for each other." 
     "Good," she said, and from the way her eyes kind of crinkled 
up at the corners I knew she was returning my grin. "Shall we get 
the crass commercial details over with?" 
     "Suits me fine," I agreed. "Of course, I ain't got any money, 
but..." 
     "Oh, damn!" she snapped, stamping her little foot in rage. 
"Not another one!" 
     "I do have a counter-offer to make, though," I said. 
     "Forget it," she said. "Why don't you go back to sweeping 
them off their feet in Peoria or Biloxi or some other backwater 
where paupers can--" 
     "Where'd you ever hear of them places?" I interrupted. 
     "Where do you suppose?" she said, ripping the veil from her 
face. 
     "Why, you're a white woman!" I exclaimed. "What in blazes are 
you doing here?" 
     "I'm an entertainer." 
     "I can see that," I said admiringly. 
     "I mean a nightclub entertainer." 
     "Then how--?" I began. 
     "There are only two nightclubs in town," she explained. "I 
played for a week in each. That made me about a tenth of what I 
need to get back home. And now," she added, putting her veil back 
over her face, "if you'll excuse me, I've got to get back to 
work." 
     "You sure you wouldn't like me to take you away from all 
this?" I asked. 
     "What are you talking about?" 
     "I told you: I've got a little business proposition to make," 
I said. 
     "Listen, mister," she said, putting her hands on her hips, "I 
may not be the most expensive girl in Cairo, but on the other 
hand you've already admitted that you don't have a penny to your 
name. What do you intend to pay me with?" 
     "One-third," I said smiling. 
     "One-third of what?" she demanded. 
     "One-third of the stock, of course." 
     "What stock are you talking about?" she said. 
     "The stock in our little company," I replied. "Think it over. 
It's nice, safe, indoor work, and you can keep on your feet." 
     "Just what kind of scam do you have going?" she asked 
suddenly, with just a trace of professional curiosity. 
     "That's a word I am unfamiliar with," I said, "but I have the 
distinct impression that if I understood it I would be very sorry 
that I had opened my heart to you, Miss . . . ah, I didn't quite 
catch your name?" 
     "Rosepetal," she said. "Rosepetal Schultz. And no 
snickering." 
     "The thought never crossed my mind," I replied. "And I am the 
Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones, pastor of the Tabernacle of 
Saint Luke." 
     "Really?" she said dubiously. "You're not just some religious 
nut who's going to dress me up like a nun and then make vile 
suggestions?" 
     "Of course not!" I said. "This is strictly business. Let us 
proceed to our corporate headquarters on the Avenue of the 
Pharaohs, where I shall introduce you to our silent partner." 
     "We have a silent partner?" asked Rosepetal. 
     "Not at the moment," I admitted. "But by tonight he will be." 
     We kept walking, talking about this and that and the next 
thing, and before too long we arrived at the store just as Friday 
was returning with his purchases. 
     "Well, hello!" he said, his face lighting up. 
     "Friday, this is Rosepetal, our new partner," I told him. 
     "I don't know what Lucifer has in mind for you, but I'm all 
for it!" he enthused. Then he turned to me. "What do you want me 
to do with all this stuff I bought?" 
     "Start painting signs," I said. 
     "What kind of signs?" he asked. 
     "Oh, signs that tell all and sundry that the mummy of... 
Rosepetal, name a Pharaoh." 
     "How about Tutankhamen?" she suggested. 
     "No. He's been used," I said. "Try a different one." 
     "Amenophis III is the only other one I know," she said. 
"Although I suppose there must have been an Amenophis I and II." 
     I turned back to Friday. "Have the signs say that the mummy 
of Amenophis III will be on display from six in the evening until 
midnight at, oh, three shillings per customer." 
     "I'll have to get a paintbrush," said Friday. 
     "Do that," I said. "And buy yourself a big dinner. Charge it 
to the company. And Friday..." 
     He stopped in the doorway. "Yes?" 
     "I wouldn't drink too much coffee if I were you," I said. 
     "Lucifer," he said, "I hope you don't think that I'm going to 
let you wrap me up as a mummy!" 
     "Perish the thought," I said reassuringly. 
     He stared long and hard at me again and then left. 
     "If he's not going to be the mummy, who is?" asked Rosepetal. 
     "Who says he's not going to be the mummy?" 
     "But you told him...." she began. 
     "I told him not to think about it," I replied. "Good advice, 
too: It would only depress him. And now, if you'll excuse me for 
an hour or so, I have to do a little shopping. Why don't you make 
yourself at home and sort of tidy things up a bit?" 
     Within the next hour I had bought a dilapidated wooden coffin 
and a batch of gold foil paper and had them both sent right to the 
store. I picked up a couple of things for Rosepetal and then 
returned. Friday had finished painting the signs, and was already 
at work coating the coffin with the gold foil. I had Rosepetal 
help me hang the signs, and then we settled back to await late 
afternoon. There being nothing better to do to pass the time of 
day, I spent our remaining pound on three bottles of inexpensive 
but explosive vodka, and saw to it that most of the contents were 
poured down Friday's massive and eager gullet. 
     When he was properly mummylike in demeanor, which is to say 
stiff as a board, I carried him to the back room and wrapped him 
in the bandages, doing his arms and legs separately so he'd be 
more comfortable, and leaving just a trio of tiny holes for his 
nostrils and eyes. Then, since his condition hadn't changed 
appreciably, I had Rosepetal help me heft him over to the coffin, 
which was standing upright against a wall. We maneuvered him into 
it and then turned it away from the front window so passersby 
couldn't get any free looks. 
     "Thanks!" I panted. "I couldn't have done it without you." 
     "That's the whole of it?" she said dubiously. "That's all I 
have to do for a third of the profits?" 
     "Almost all," I said. "The rest should be a piece of cake." 
     "The rest?" she said quickly. "What rest?" 
     "Here," I said, withdrawing a small package I had kept in my 
pocket since returning. "Why don't you go into the back room and 
change into this?" 
     "What is it?" she asked. 
     "Your costume," I said. 
     "What costume are you talking about?" 
     "Look," I said calmly. "Friday's going to bring in all the 
mummy buffs in the city, but let's be honest: How the hell many of 
them can there be? Your job is to attract those customers who have 
absolutely no interest in mummies." 
     She looked into the bag. "But there's nothing here!" she 
protested. "Just a necklace and a tiny little G-string!" 
     "What do you mean, nothing?" I said sharply. "I'll have you 
know that necklace alone cost me four shillings." 
     "But Lucifer, I can't wear this! It's indecent!" 
     "A third of the profits," I said. 
     "Never! I just couldn't!" 
     "Must be seven, eight thousand people pass here every night," 
I said. "At three shillings a head." 
     "Be quiet!" 
     "We'll each get a shilling apiece for every man, woman, and 
child who walks through the door." 
     She grabbed the bag and stalked off to the back room. "But I 
think you're a low, despicable con man!" she yelled back over her 
shoulder. 
     I looked out the window, checked the sun, and reckoned that 
it was about a quarter to six, so I set up a table with a little 
cardboard cash box right by the doorway, pulled a chair over to 
it, and got ready to unlock the door. 
     "Is anyone out there with you?" called Rosepetal. 
     "I'm all alone," I said. 
     "You're sure?" 
     "Positive." 
     She walked out hesitantly, an absolutely gorgeous vision of a 
full-breasted, narrow-waisted, hot-blooded Egyptian princess. She 
had her hands crossed modestly in front of her, and kept peeking 
around to make sure I hadn't lied to her about being alone. 
     "I feel not unlike a fool in this getup," she said. 
     "Nonsense!" I said enthusiastically. "You'll outdraw Friday 
fifty to one."
     "You bought the G-string in sort of a hurry, didn't you?" 
said Rosepetal. 
     "I didn't spend long hours agonizing over which one to 
purchase, if that's what you mean," I replied, staring in rapt 
attention as she inhaled and kind of fluttered all at the same 
time. 
     "That's what I mean," she said. "You know, Lucifer, even if 
the queens and princesses of ancient Egypt walked around in G-
strings, which I for one am inclined to doubt, I nonetheless think 
it very unlikely that their G-strings possessed emblems of Buster 
Brown and his dog Tyge!" 
     She spread her hands, revealing the problem. 
     "So we'll say it's young King Tut and his pet dog," I said 
quickly. "Who'll know the difference?" 
     "It's bad enough that I'm out here being a bare-breasted and 
bare-assed and bare-whatevered shill for you!" she snapped. "I 
don't intend to be an object of ridicule as well!" 
     "You just keep on breathing and making muscles like that and 
I guarantee there ain't nobody going to be laughing at you," I 
said devoutly. "Now get in the window and start attracting 
attention. It's time to open for business." 
     "Couldn't you at least have gotten one with Teddy Roosevelt?" 
she said, taking her place and starting to gyrate for the 
pedestrians. "And what about a headdress? Egyptian queens wore 
headdresses." 
     "They also didn't chew gum," I said, gesturing for her to 
empty her mouth. "Now let's just concentrate on business." 
     So we did, and business concentrated right back on Rosepetal 
and Friday -- mostly Rosepetal -- and by seven o'clock we had 
taken in almost five hundred shillings, and Rosepetal was so tired 
from shimmying that she forgot all about being embarrassed. Her 
body glistened with sweat, but I decided not to give her a towel, 
since it looked for all the world like she had anointed herself 
with various kinds of ancient Egyptian oils and love potions and 
stuff like that, and I even added that fact to my spiel. 
     We kept up our little show for hours, Rosepetal wiggling and 
wriggling, me telling the customers what remarkable curiosities 
they were looking at, and Friday mummying it up like he'd been 
doing it all his life. In fact, I was giving serious thought to 
franchising the operation when a small, skinny little Englishman 
with a daintily manicured mustache walked up to me, hat in hand, 
and cleared his throat. 
     I stopped my complicated explanation of the Dance of Sublime 
Surrender, which Rosepetal was right in the middle of, and turned 
to him. 
     "Yes, brother," I said, putting on my best Sunday smile. 
"What can I do for you?" 
     "I don't mean to interrupt your show," he said 
apologetically, "or to intrude in matters that are none of my 
business, but..." 
     "Just spit it right out, brother," I told him. "Don't mind 
interrupting Queen Cleopatra here; she'll just put everything into 
a holding pattern until we can get back to her." 
     "Well, I was looking at the mummy of Amenophis here," said 
the Englishman, "when the strangest thing happened." 
     "Oh?" I said. "And what was that?" 
     "It winked at me." 
     A woman in the audience screamed. 
     "I thought it distinctly odd myself," agreed the Englishman, 
turning to her. 
     "It must be your imagination," I said smoothly. "Mummies 
don't wink. And even if they did, a vigorous, manly mummy like 
this one would wink at _her_ " -- I gestured toward Rosepetal -- 
"long before he'd think of winking at you." 
     Suddenly Friday grunted, and three women fainted. 
     "My God, he's coming to life!" cried an Egyptian. 
     Friday shook his head, trying to get the tape off his mouth, 
and stared at me blearily. 
     _"Frmmx fblimm!"_ he said through the bandage. 
     "He's speaking in the ancient tongue!" cried a woman. 
     The Egyptians in the crowd started muttering quick little 
prayers to Amen-Ra, just to be on the safe side. Then Friday 
gingerly moved a hand to his head, and a couple of pistols 
appeared. 
     "Don't waste your bullets, men!" I cried hastily. "He's 
_already_ dead!" 
     With that, two-thirds of our customers raced for the door. 
The rest just lay quiet and peaceful on the floor where they had 
fallen. 
     Friday must have been nursing a pretty large hangover. 
because he just stood there in his coffin moaning and gently 
rubbing his eyes. Finally he saw me, took a step out of the wooden 
box, and tripped over a couple of bodies, falling smack-dab on his 
head with a thud so loud it sounded like unto a gunshot. Rosepetal 
ran over to him, knelt down on the floor beside him, and cradled 
his head in her lap, stroking it gently. I got a knife and cut a 
little tape away from his mouth so he could breathe a mite easier, 
without cutting so much that he couldn't go back to work once we 
got him back into his box. 
     It took him about ten minutes to open his eyes. Then he 
stared straight up at Rosepetal's breasts for another five minutes 
before he turned his head to me, blinked a couple of times, and 
struggled to his feet. 
     "How are you feeling?" I asked, offering him a cup of vodka. 
"Ready to go back into your tomb?" 
     He slapped the cup out of my hand and glowered at me -- as 
much as a mummy _can_ glower, anyway. 
     "Who are you that dares address Amenophis?" he rumbled. "I 
have lain in my crypt for centuries. I will not return to it!" 
     "If you think acting like this is going to get you out of 
playing the mummy, Friday, you got another think coming!" I 
snapped. "Now get on back into the coffin before some of these 
people littering the floor start waking up!" 
     I grabbed his arm to lead him back, but he threw me against 
the wall with no apparent effort. 
     "Rash mortal!" he bellowed. "The person of Amenophis is 
sacrosanct!" He reached a bandaged hand out for Rosepetal. "Come, 
my princess." 
     "Lucifer, do something!" she whispered as he approached her. 
     "I'll do something, all right!" I snapped, getting up and 
dusting myself off. "I'll fire the son of a bitch!" 
     "Look at his head!" she said, backing away from him. "It's 
all bloody. Maybe he really does think he's Amenophis!" 
     Friday caught her and hoisted her over his shoulder. 
     _"Lucifer!"_ she screamed. 
     I noticed that she wasn't so all-fired terror-stricken that 
she didn't think to grab the money and stuff it into her G-string 
as Friday carried her through the doorway and off into the night, 
so I had no choice but to follow them, though at a respectful 
distance. We made an interesting sight, what with Friday wandering 
aimlessly with his half-naked princess slung over his shoulder, 
Rosepetal frightening everyone away with her screaming, and me 
tagging along in their wake, trying to figure out how to stop him, 
if not permanently then at least long enough to get the money 
back. 
     He made a couple of quick turns and I momentarily lost sight 
of him, so I increased my pace. As I rounded the second corner I 
ran headfirst into a policeman. 
     "Excuse me, officer," I said. 
     "Quite all right," he replied. 
     "Beautiful night, isn't it?" I said. 
     "Could be a tad cooler, though," he responded thoughtfully. 
     "By the way, I know it may sound a little peculiar," I said, 
"but did a half-crazed mummy carrying a naked girl happen to pass 
by here recently?" 
     "As a matter of fact, he did," said the officer. "It was most 
amusing." 
     "Well, it might have been a lot of things," I said, "but 
somehow I never thought of amusing as one of them. Didn't you hear 
her calling for help?" 
     "Indeed," he said, smiling. "And most convincing it was, 
too." 
     "Then why didn't you help her?" 
     "I just assumed they were advertising a new restaurant or 
nightclub or something," said the policeman. 
     "I'm afraid not," I said. 
     "A new movie, then?" 
     "No." 
     "You _will_ tell me when I'm getting warm, won't you?" he 
asked. 
     "I know it sounds a bit odd," I said, "but they were exactly 
what they seemed to be." 
     "You P.R. types have a marvelous sense of humor!" he 
guffawed. "Tell the truth now: Was it a new Turkish bathhouse?" 
     I told him he was right, bade him goodnight, and continued my 
search alone. I must have walked four miles up and down Cairo's 
winding streets and back alleys when I finally saw this bandaged 
figure sitting morosely on the sidewalk, his head buried in his 
hands. I approached him kind of cautiously, inasmuch as he hadn't 
been all that friendly since falling on his head. 
     He looked up when I got within & few yards of him, but made 
no attempt to rise to his feet. 
     "Well?" I said. 
     "What do you want, mortal?" he said glumly. 
     "Where is she?" I demanded. 
     "Gone," he moaned. 
     "What the hell do you mean, gone?" I exploded. "She's got all 
our money." 
     "Money?" he said dazedly. "What is money?" 
     "Money is what's ours that she's run off with!" I yelled. 
"Now where the hell is she?" 
     "She's all alone, her lithe, youthful body exposed to the 
elements." 
     "Her lithe, youthful body can damned well take care of itself 
just fine!" I snapped. "What direction did it run off in?" 
     He belched. "You wouldn't know where I could get a fatted 
calf or something like that, would you?" he asked apologetically. 
"Ordinarily I would not ask favors of a mere mortal, but I haven't 
eaten in more than three thousand years, and I'm hungry."
     "First the girl, then the food," I said. 
     "She started pounding on my head," he said, "and when I set 
her down for a moment she ran into the alleyway." He pointed to a 
narrow channel between two buildings. 
     "Then I'd better get after her right quick," I said, starting 
off. 
     "Wait!" he cried. "You're not going to leave me here, are 
you? I mean, everything's changed so much in three thousand years. 
I have dim, distant memories of sitting around a campfire eating 
antelope and gallivanting with Nubian maidens. I'm having serious 
problems adjusting to present-day Egypt." 
     He looked so unhappy that I finally agreed to let him tag 
along, and off we went in pursuit of his lost love and my lost 
money. Gradually the alley turned into a minor street and then a 
major thoroughfare, but it remained just as empty, probably 
because when people got a gander at Friday they just naturally 
remembered that they had urgent business elsewhere. 
     We finally came to one house that was all lit up like a 
Christmas tree, and since no one answered when we knocked at the 
door, we moseyed around back and found ourselves in the midst of a 
garden party. I could see that Friday was likely to prove a 
considerable social hazard, because the second he rounded the 
corner of the house everyone lit out for the hills except for two 
bearded men who immediately fell to arguing amongst themselves as 
to whether he was from the Ninth or the Eleventh Dynasty. When 
Friday helpfully put in that he was Amenophis III, they both 
turned on him and told him not to interrupt in matters that he 
knew nothing about. 
     "But I _am_ Amenophis!" he protested. 
     "What the hell do you know about it?" demanded the smaller of 
the two men. "That would date you much too late. From the style of 
your leg bandages, you're much more likely to be Userkaf or 
perhaps Sahura." 
     "No," said Friday firmly. "I'm confused about a lot of 
things, but if there is one thing I know with absolute certainty, 
it's that I'm Amenophis III." 
     "You are, are you?" said the taller one nastily. "Then how 
come you don't know that Amenophis is merely an Anglicization of 
Amen-hetep?" 
     "That's what I said," interjected Friday hastily. "I'm Amen-
hetep III. I just used Amenophis to make it easier for you 
gentlemen." 
     "So you think the Colossi were set up in your honor, do you?" 
snarled the smaller man. "You think you're the guy who's credited 
with building the Temple of Amen-Ra at Karnak?" 
     "How do I know what I've been credited with?" said Friday. 
"I've been away." 
     "Piffle!" snapped the larger of the two men. "Do you hear me? 
I say _piffle!_ You're Ninth Dynasty, and that's all there is to 
it!" 
     "Eleventh!" protested the smaller man. "Look at the 
eyeholes!" 
     "Age could do that," said his companion. "After all, he's at 
least four thousand years old." 
     "Three thousand," said Friday petulantly. 
     "Keep out of this!" they snapped in unison. 
     "Excuse me, gentlemen," I said, stepping forward, "but may I 
interrupt you for just a moment?" 
     "Are you with the mummy?" asked the smaller man suspiciously. 
     "In a manner of speaking," I replied. 
     "Is he Ninth or Eleventh Dynasty?" he asked me. 
     "Brother, I never discuss politics, religion, or Egyptian 
dynasties," I said firmly. 
     "My God!" said the taller man in shocked amazement. "What 
else is there?" 
     "Well, for one thing, there's naked white women," I said. 
     "He's right," nodded the smaller man thoughtfully. "There 
_is_ that." 
     "Have you happened to see any this evening?" I persisted. 
     "Any what?" 
     "Any naked white women." 
     "I'm afraid not," said the taller man. 
     "Damn!" muttered Friday. 
     "I'm terribly sorry," continued the taller man, "but it's 
really not the sort of thing one might expect to see at a cocktail 
party for Egyptologists." 
     "More's the pity," added the smaller man. "But why do you 
ask?" 
     "We seem to have misplaced one," I said. 
     "l didn't know they were that easy to misplace," remarked the 
taller one thoughtfully. 
     "She was my beloved," said Friday mournfully. 
     "Ah!" said the smaller man. "That would be Thi, daughter of 
Kallimma-Sin." 
     "Only if you accept his cock-and-bull story about being Amen-
hetep," pointed out the taller one. "Otherwise, she's probably 
Nitaqert." 
     "Nitaqert!" screamed his colleague. "Impossible! You've got 
the wrong dynasty, the wrong wife, and the wrong color!" 
     Well, their tempers got to flaring up then, so Friday and I 
just kind of walked back around to the street and continued on our 
quest. Friday was about as happy as a lovelorn mummy can be, since 
he had finally found out his lost love's name, but I was getting 
more depressed with every passing minute, because the longer it 
took to hunt Rosepetal down, the more likely it was that she'd be 
able to find some clothing -- and if we couldn't find a naked 
white woman on the streets of Cairo, our chances of finding a 
particular clothed one didn't seem all that promising. 
     "Think, Friday!" I said as we walked up and down the avenues. 
"Where would she be likely to go?" 
     "I have no idea," he replied, "and I'll thank you to call me 
Amen-hetep or else risk bringing my godly wrath down upon 
yourself." 
     And then it came to me in a flash: If _I_ were in Rosepetal's 
britches (figuratively speaking, you understand) and I had as much 
dishonestly-come-by money as she did, the first thing I'd want to 
do would be to leave the country. And, being a white woman, it 
made sense that she'd wait for the next ship out of here where all 
the white folks did: at Shepheard's Hotel. 
     I conveyed this line of insightful reasoning to Friday, who, 
having nothing better to offer by way of suggestions, decided to 
accompany me. We reached Shepheard's, which had become a jumping-
off place for no end of wealthy tourists, just as the sun was 
starting to rise, and walked up to the registration desk. 
     "I don't mean to unduly alarm you, sir," said the concierge, 
"but are you aware of the fact that there is a rather large mummy 
following you?" 
     "Yes, I am," I said. "I wonder if I might see your guest 
register?" 
     "It doesn't bother you?" he asked. 
     "What doesn't?" I asked. 
     "The mummy." 
     "Not a bit," I said. "If it disturbs you, I'll have it wait 
outside." 
     "That won't be necessary," he said in a resigned tone of 
voice. "When you've worked this desk as long as I have, a mummy 
can be a pretty trivial thing, if you know what I mean." 
     I assured him that I knew exactly what he meant, and began 
reading the guest book. "I don't find the name I'm looking for 
here," I said at last, "but the party in question may very well 
have been traveling incognito. Has anyone checked in during the 
past two or three hours?" 
     "Would you have in mind a young lady who gave every 
appearance of having dressed in rather a hurry?" he asked, raising 
an eyebrow. 
     "The very person!" I exclaimed. 
     "I must say, she has a peculiar notion of incognito," he 
remarked. 
     "I'd sort of like to surprise her," I said with a knowing 
smile. "What room is she in?" 
     "I'm afraid that releasing room numbers is against the rules 
of the hotel," he replied stiffly. 
     "That's a pity," I said, stepping aside as Friday walked 
forward and grabbed him around the neck. "It seems that strangling 
concierges isn't against any particular rules that govern the 
behavior of mummies." 
     "207!" he gurgled. Friday released him and he slid to the 
floor behind the counter as we raced to the stairs. A moment later 
we were standing in front of the door to Room 207. I knocked 
twice, and heard a familiar voice ask who was there. 
     "Room service," I said. 
     Rosepetal opened the door, and I stepped in. 
     "Why, Lucifer!" she exclaimed, startled. "What a pleasant 
surprise!" 
     She was wearing a sporty brown suit with matching shoes, all 
of which looked mighty expensive. I let out a curse the second I 
saw them. 
     "Just how the hell much did those duds cost you?" I demanded. 
     "Not that much," she said, backing away and shoving a small 
table between us. "I still had enough left to buy a suitcase and 
to book passage out of this stupid country." 
     "You spent it all?" I screamed. "All of it?" 
     "Well, I _am_ fleeing for my life, you know," she said. "I 
have no intention of being here when--" She let out a little 
shriek as Friday entered the room. "Oh my God!" she cried. "He's 
back!" 
     "My beloved Thi!" he intoned, extending his arms and walking 
slowly toward her. "I shall take you to wife and together we shall 
rule my kingdom, bring order out of chaos, and produce many 
heirs." 
     "He still thinks he's Amenophis!" she wailed. 
     "Oh, no, my love," said Friday. "I know now that I am Amen-
hetep." 
     "Your name is Friday!" she said, practically crying. "Now 
leave me alone or I'll miss my boat!" 
     "But my beloved Thi!" he said, confused. "Can it be that the 
passing of the eons has dimmed your memory? I am the Pharaoh of 
all Egypt!" 
     "You're not even an Egyptian!" she said desperately. "You're 
a...a Nubian!" 
     "Impossible!" he scoffed. 
     "You think not?" she said, walking up to him and avoiding his 
hand. "Let me try to bring you back to your senses once and for 
all!" 
     I positioned myself behind him, ready to race out the door if 
he got violent, while Rosepetal grabbed the end of a bandage that 
was coming loose at Friday's waist and began unraveling it. Pretty 
soon she got the most curious expression on her face, and by the 
time she had unwrapped the tape down to his thighbones she just 
quit altogether, staring kind of strangely at what she had 
uncovered thus far. 
     "Amen-hetep, dear," she sort of crooned, "can you ever 
forgive me for doubting you?" 
     "It is forgotten," he intoned graciously. "And you are still 
my beloved Thi?" 
     She took one last look and nodded vigorously. 
     He reached out and embraced her. 
     "Lucifer," she said, "you'll find my ticket lying on the 
nightstand. Take it and leave." 
     "I'll do no such thing!" I said. 
     "Lucifer," she said sweetly but firmly, "if you're still in 
this room in ten seconds I shall ask Amen-hetep, Pharaoh of all 
Egypt, to execute you as slowly and painfully as possible." 
     I was on my way down the hall in eight seconds flat, and I 
heard the door to Room 207 slam shut just as I reached the 
stairway. 
     That was the last I ever saw of Rosepetal Schultz or Friday, 
though she did write me after I had finally established my 
tabernacle to assure me that there were no hard feelings and that 
Amen-hetep had certain virtues that were well worth waiting a mere 
three thousand years for. 
     As for me, I wound up in Morocco, which was as far as 
Rosepetal could afford a ticket for, and within a mere fortnight I 
was holding one of the world's rarest and most valuable treasures 
in my hand. 
     It was not, as you shall see, quite as simple as it sounds.

Chapter 6

                        A RED-LETTER SCHEME

     Casablanca wasn't real popular with tourists and sightseers 
back in the old days, and I was the only passenger to climb down 
the gangplank when we docked there. It was so hot and dirty and 
grubby-looking that I could tell right off why it didn't rank way 
up there with the Riviera and New Orleans and other places of 
worldwide renown. 
     There was a very worried-looking little man waiting on the 
pier, pacing up and down and working himself into a nervous 
frenzy. I nodded pleasantly and walked past him, but a minute 
later he raced after me and grabbed me by the shoulder. 
     "I beg your pardon, _monsieur_," he said apologetically, "but 
was there not perhaps a lovely young lady on the ship with you who 
also planned to disembark at Casablanca?" 
     "None that I know of, brother," I replied. 
     "But this is terrible!" he cried. 
     I shared his sentiments, especially since I could have used a 
little company during the voyage, but I merely smiled at him and 
kept walking. 
     He was back beside me a moment later. 
     "Her name was Mademoiselle Rosepetal Schultz," he said. "Are 
you sure you did not meet her on the boat?" 
     "Rosepetal?" I repeated. "Why didn't you say so in the first 
place, brother?" 
     "Then she is on the ship after all?" he asked, looking mighty 
relieved. 
     "No," I told him. "As a matter of fact, I used her ticket to 
get here." 
     "But this is dreadful!" he wailed. "She wired me yesterday 
that she would be arriving this afternoon!" 
     "Something came up very unexpectedly," I told him truthfully. 
"These things happen." 
     "But why must they always happen to _me_?" he moaned.
     "Try reading a couple of chapters from the Book of David," I 
said soothingly. "I find it usually settles me down when I've had 
some bad news." 
     He raised an eyebrow. "You know a lot about the Bible?" he 
asked. 
     "The Right Reverend Honorable Doctor Lucifer Jones at your 
service," I said, extending my hand. 
     "Would I be correct in assuming that you have no place to 
stay?" he asked. 
     "I've temporarily fallen upon hard times, brother," I 
admitted. "But I've never lost my faith in the Good Lord, Who I 
know will provide for me." I stared at him curiously. "What did 
you have in mind?" 
     "Room, board, and fifty francs a week," he said. 
     "Done, brother!" I cried. "By the way, how much is that in 
real money?" 
     Well, it came to about ten dollars, which isn't a hell of a 
lot unless the economy happens to be in the midst of a 
depression -- and since that was exactly the state my personal 
economy was in, I decided to take it unless and until something 
better turned up. 
     My employer's name was Andre Peugeot, and in all my born days 
I never saw a man with more nervous tics and gestures. All he 
would tell me about his place of business was that it was called 
Bousbir, and he seemed absolutely flabbergasted when I told him 
I'd never heard of it. 
     When we arrived, I was pretty flabbergasted myself to find 
that something like the Bousbir had escaped my attention, because 
what it was was the biggest whorehouse in the whole wide world. At 
least, that's what Andre told me. All I knew for sure is that it 
was the biggest one I had ever seen, and took up about twice as 
much space as the Banque de Casablanca, which was right across the 
street from it.
     We walked through a series of lobbies and lounges, each 
covered with plush carpets and velvet wallpaper and containing as 
tasty an assortment of fine-looking ladies as ever I did see, 
until we finally reached a small room with a single bed and a sink 
and toilet in the corner. 
     "Your room," said Andre. 
     "Brother Andre," I said, "we'd better get a couple of things 
straight right off the bat. I'm pretty liberal as men of the cloth 
go..." 
     "So I noticed," he said dryly. 
     "Neverthegoddamless," I continued, "there are some things 
that are specifically frowned upon by the Good Book, the law, and 
various other official governing bodies, most of them pertaining 
to your male customers, that I am not prepared to do even for 
money, and especially not for a lousy fifty francs a week." 
     "I quite understand," said Andre. "It is for your unique 
qualities as a man of God that I have hired you." 
     "I reckon you could use one around here, at that," I allowed. 
     "Indeed," he agreed. "It has been one of our greatest needs 
up to now." 
     "Well, Brother Andre," I said, "I'll certainly be glad to 
bring such comfort as I can to your poor wayward girls in any way 
that I think will help and uplift them the most." 
     "I appreciate your offer," he replied, "but I think you 
misunderstand me. It is not my girls who need your spiritual 
expertise. Rather, it is my customers." 
     "Your customers?" I repeated. "Why don't they just go to 
church?" 
     "We sell many things here, my friend," said Andre. "But 
perhaps our most precious commodity is fantasy. Do you begin to 
understand?" 
     "Not really," I answered.
     "Some of our little pageants need -- how shall I put it? -- 
a technical adviser." 
     "Brother Andre, the light is beginning to dawn," I said, 
shooting him a great big grin. 
     "Can you do it?" 
     "Like shooting fish in a barrel," I assured him. "After all. 
you're asking me to combine my two favorite vocations. Just leave 
everything to me and the Good Lord, and I'm sure we'll manage to 
work things out betwixt us." 
     Which we did, at least for a few days. But within a week the 
customers and even the girls were getting a little jaded and began 
demanding new material, and I took to wandering through the 
bazaars during the afternoons, searching for ideas that had 
nothing to do with cardinals and nuns, or black masses, or 
maniacal rabbis, or secret Chinese fertility ceremonies, or any of 
the other similarly pedestrian productions I had been directing 
and coaching. 
     It was during one such sojourn through the marketplace that I 
saw a white man who looked vaguely familiar. He had his back to 
me, and was browsing at a table about fifty feet away, but I 
couldn't get the thought out of my mind that I knew him from 
somewhere. I stayed right where I was, pretending to examine some 
old pottery, until at last he paid for the dates he was munching 
on and I finally got a look at his face. 
     It was Erich Von Horst! 
     Not wishing to cause a scene in public, especially since I 
didn't speak French or Arabic and I had the feeling that no one 
around there spoke anything else, I continued to browse until he 
left the bazaar. Then, being careful to keep out of sight, I 
followed him for almost a mile until he entered an old, dusty, 
run-down hotel. 
     I waited five minutes, then entered it. There was no desk 
clerk on duty, so I reached over the counter, grabbed hold of the 
registration book, and began looking at it. There was no Von Horst 
listed, nor even a Captain Peter Clarke, but it didn't matter: a 
gentleman named Fritz Wallensack was the only guest currently in 
residence. I tiptoed up to his room, threw the door open, and 
walked in. 
     "Von Horst!" I bellowed. "You owe me two thousand and forty 
English pounds!" 
     "Why, Doctor Jones," he said, looking up from his bed, where 
he was lying with his head propped up against the moldy wall. "How 
very nice to see you again. Have you been in Casablanca long?" 
     "Don't give me that crap, Von Horst!" I snapped. "I want my 
money!" 
     "I don't doubt it," he chuckled. 
     "Well?" I demanded. 
     "If I had your money, or indeed if I had _anybody's_ money, 
do you think I'd be staying in a place like this?" he said calmly. 
"You're welcome to search the premises, of course, but I can 
guarantee that you won't find anything except an exceptionally 
dirty shirt and a pair of socks with holes in them." 
     "What about my money?" 
     "It was well spent," he assured me with a smile. "You'd have 
enjoyed every shilling of it had you been in my place." 
     "I wasn't in your goddamned place!" 
     "Well, yes, I was rather afraid you'd look at it that way," 
he sighed. 
     "Just how soon do you intend to make restitution, realizing 
of course that I'm going to be your constant companion until that 
happy moment occurs?" I said. 
     "As soon as I can work out a few unpleasant details I'll be 
happy to pay you back, and with interest," said Von Horst. 
     "What details?" I demanded. 
     "My dear fellow, I hope you don't think I'm in Casablanca for 
my health!" 
     "Just what _are_ you doing here?" I asked suspiciously. 
     "I've been here for two months, working on the biggest deal 
of my life," he said, lowering his voice. "But the Casablanca 
police know who I am, and I haven't been able to make a move 
without being watched. So here I sit, slowly going broke in this 
grubby hotel, less than half a mile away from a fortune that I 
could retire on. And the worst part of it is, there's a time limit 
on the damned operation! But sooner or later they'll have to relax 
their vigil, and then . . ." His voice trailed off.
     "Just how much is this deal worth?" I asked with as much lack 
of interest as I could muster on the spur of the moment. 
     "At least fifty thousand pounds," he said without hesitation. 
     "That much?" 
     He nodded -- and then he stared at me kind of funny-like for a 
very long minute. 
     "I wonder . . ." he said softly, still looking at me. 
     "About what?" I said. 
     "You know," he said, more to himself than to me, "it just 
might work." 
     "What might?" 
     "Jones," he said suddenly, "forget about what I owe you. How 
would you like to make some _real_ money?" 
     "I imagine I could be coerced into it," I admitted. 
     "Good," he said. "But we'll have to move fast. Can you be 
ready to leave the country in two or three hours?" 
     "Ain't nothing around to stop me," I replied. 
     "Well, Jones," he said, all businesslike, "I'm afraid we're 
going to have to trust each other, much as I dislike the thought 
of it. But unfortunately there is no way to avoid giving you the 
details of the plan. All I can do is assure you that such 
knowledge will do you absolutely no good without me." 
     "Shoot," I said. 
     "Three short blocks from here is a small Christian mission, 
run by two elderly German sisters and their middle-aged nephew. 
Inside the mission is a speaker's podium. On a shelf inside the 
podium is a copy of the Bible." He paused for effect. "Jones, that 
Bible is a Jacobean Red Letter edition!" 
     "That's something special?" I asked. 
     "There were only six printed," he said. "The sisters don't 
know what it is, so stealing it should present no great 
difficulty. But the moment I try to leave the country, or even the 
city, I'm going to be searched six ways to Sunday, and since I am 
not known as a religious man, sooner or later one of the gendarmes 
is going to send some telegrams to various religious organizations 
or antiquarian bookdealers, and then the shit will hit the fan." 
He smiled. "However, no one will question a man of God who carries 
a Bible with him. You can walk out with it right under their 
noses!" 
     "Sounds good to me, Brother Von Horst," I said. 
     "You are probably thinking that once I turn the Bible over to 
you, there is nothing to stop you from selling it and reaping the 
entire profits for yourself," he continued.
     "Such a notion never crossed my mind!" I protested vigorously 
while crossing my fingers behind my back. 
     "Well, just in case it does, let me tell you that forty-eight 
hours from now I intend to send a letter to the Moroccan 
government telling them what the Jacobean Red Letter Bible is, and 
grossly exaggerating how much it is worth. They will promptly put 
out a reward for its return worth considerably more than the book 
itself, and nine dealers out of ten will be more likely to turn 
you in for the reward than buy the book from you." 
     "So where are we going to sell it?" I asked. 
     "There is an American collector who will be in Algiers 
exactly seven days from now," said Von Horst. "He knows he'll be 
purchasing stolen goods, and is willing to run the risk that 
entails in exchange for getting possession of the Bible. You do 
not know his name, and he does not know yours. He will buy only 
from me. Have we got a deal?" 
     I nodded, and shook his hand on it. 
     "Good," he said. "I will meet you ten minutes after dark." 
     "Here?" I asked. 
     "No. They'll be watching this place." He lowered his head in 
thought for a moment, then looked up. "Do you know where the 
Bousbir is?" 
     "I'm sure I can find it," I replied earnestly. 
     "First lounge to the right, ten minutes after dark," he said. 
     I returned to the Bousbir, gave a couple of the girls one 
last strenuous coaching session, and waited for dark. Von Horst 
showed up on schedule, panting like he'd been running full speed 
for a while, and thrust a Bible into my hands. 
     "That's it!" he said. "Don't try to hide it. Just carry it 
out in the open and act like it was any other book. I'll be 
creating a diversion while you escape with it." 
     "Fine," I said, tucking it under my arm. "When and where do 
we meet?" 
     "On the waterfront in Algiers is a tavern known as the 
Fisherman's Reward. Today is the ninth of August. You must meet me 
there on the sixteenth of August at precisely one-fifteen p.m. If 
you come early, you may attract undue attention, and if you're 
even five minutes late our buyer may lose his nerve and depart. 
Have you a reliable watch?" 
     "Not since a little card game I got into in Johannesburg," I 
admitted. 
     He pulled a beat-up gold watch out of his pocket and handed 
it to me. "Take mine," he said. "And try not to gamble it away." 
     "What's that little thing dangling from the chain?" I asked. 
     "A rabbit's foot," he answered. "For luck." 
     "Well, I hope it brings me more luck than it brought the 
rabbit," I said. "I guess I might as well get started now.' 
     He stuck his head out into the hall, then nodded and gestured 
that it was clear. A few minutes later I was on the main road out 
of town, heading toward Algeria. 
     Just as I reached the outskirts of Casablanca I heard a lot 
of shooting and sirens and things behind me, but no one bothered 
me, so I kept right on walking. I stopped in the city of Fez long 
enough to buy another Bible that looked for all the world just 
like the Jacobean Red Letter edition, and made it to the Algerian 
border on the evening of the eleventh. The Moroccan and Algerian 
border patrols and customs officials searched me up and down and 
sideways, and spent the better part of an hour jabbering about the 
tooth of a lion or leopard or something, which made absolutely no 
sense to me, but they finally let me pass and I bedded down in 
Algeria. 
     I hitched a ride on an oxcart into Ouahran and spent a 
considerable portion of the day exploring the scenic wonders of 
that exotic city, which didn't look a whole lot different from 
Casablanca except that it didn't have nothing to compare to the 
Bousbir. I stopped at the local library just before closing time, 
found the dustiest, most unused bookshelf in the place, stuck the 
Jacobean Red Letter Bible up against the wall behind a set of 
books about French civil law where no one would be able to see it, 
and continued on my way. 
     I did a little vigorous preaching the next morning, and so 
amused a tribe of Berbers that they fed me and let me ride on 
horseback with them to the outskirts of Algiers, where they 
pitched their tents. Since I didn't want to show up too early, I 
spent the next couple of days in the Berbers' camp teaching them a 
somewhat sporting form of rudimentary statistical analysis having 
to do with the number twenty-one, and when I finally took my leave 
of them I took certain fond gold and paper remembrances with me. 
     I arrived on the waterfront just before noon on the appointed 
day and quickly spotted the Fisherman's Reward, a seedy-looking 
dive with a clientele more in need of salvation than most. I spent 
the next hour walking around the area, checking Von Horst's watch 
every few minutes, and practically beating off a steady stream of 
street urchins who all seemed to be business agents for their 
older sisters. 
     Finally, at exactly one-fourteen, I walked into the tavern 
and took a seat at an empty table in the back. Von Horst arrived 
about a minute later and joined me. 
     "Have a good trip?" he asked in low tones. 
     "No problems," I said. "Where's our buyer?" 
     "He should be here any second," said Von Horst. "He's already 
put down some earnest money with a confederate of mine." 
     We ordered a couple of beers and waited in silence. When no 
one else had walked in by one-thirty, Von Horst went over to the 
bar and made a quick phone call. He came back to the table looking 
very upset.
     "Louis Blaine has been arrested," he said grimly. 
     "Our buyer?" 
     He nodded. "The stupid son of a bitch got drunk last night 
and took a punch at the Prefect of Police." 
     "What do we do now?" I asked, starting to feel kind of uneasy 
around the edges. 
     "We wait," said Von Horst. "He ought to be out in a couple of 
weeks, and we'll try to set up another meeting with him. In the 
meantime, we'll live on his down payment. Have you got the book 
with you?" 
     Well, as you can imagine, I wasn't in any hurry to let Von 
Horst spend two weeks examining the particular Bible I was toting 
around, so me and the Lord held a quick pow-wow to devise a course 
of action. 
     "I don't want to wait," I announced at last. "You know what 
these jerkwater countries are like. He could be in jail for 
years." 
     "There's really no alternative," Von Horst replied. "I wasn't 
kidding about writing the Moroccan government. Right now that 
book's too hot to try to sell elsewhere." 
     "Well, it just don't seem fair that I should be stuck in this 
hellhole because your buyer went and did something stupid," I 
said. "After all, I fulfilled _my_ part of the bargain." 
     "I don't know what you expect _me_ to do about it," he 
replied irritably. "I'd pay you if I could, but I don't have the 
money." 
     "You've got the down payment," I said. "How much was that?" 
     "Five thousand pounds," he answered kind of grudgingly.
     "That's more than twice what you stole from me back in Dar-
es-Salaam," I said. "Give it to me and we'll call things square. I 
just want to get the hell out. 
     "It's a deal!" he said enthusiastically. "Let me have the 
Bible." 
     "Let me have the money first," I said. 
     He shrugged, pulled an envelope out of his pocket, and handed 
it over to me. I opened it, thumbed through the wad of bills, 
nodded, and stuck it inside my shirt. 
     "Here it is," I said, pulling the Bible out of my shirt and 
giving it to him. I held my breath as he gave it a brief look, but 
it was too dark in the bar for him to notice that it wasn't the 
Red Letter edition. 
     "You're crazy, Jones," he said, placing the Bible on the 
table next to his glass. "Within two weeks, three at the most, 
he'll be out and you could have had twenty-five thousand pounds." 
     "The Good Lord frowns on greed," I said piously. 
     "Oh, I almost forgot," he said. "Could I borrow some money 
from you, to get me through to...ah...?"
     "Why not?" I said with a smile, giving him some of my Berber 
money. "Keep the change." 
     "Thanks," he said. "It's a pleasure to do business with you, 
Doctor Jones." 
     "Same here," I said, rising and shaking his hand. 
     "By the way," he added, "do you suppose a rich man like    
yourself would mind giving me my watch back?"
     I chuckled, handed it to him, and left the tavern. The second 
I got out the door I took off like a bat out of hell for the 
nearest ticket office, booked passage on a boat that was leaving 
Algiers in ten minutes, paid for it with my Berber winnings so as 
not to flash the five thousand pounds Von Horst had given me, and 
raced up the gangplank without being seen. 
     As soon as we were safely out to sea I hunted up a deckhand 
and found out that I was aboard _The Dying Quail_, bound for the 
Cape after going through Gibraltar. It wasn't exactly my first 
choice of destinations, but with five thousand pounds in my pocket 
I wasn't too upset about it. And, along with the money, I still 
had the Red Letter edition of the Bible, which I figured on 
returning for in a year or two, when the gendarmes were a little 
less sensitive about such things. 
     After spending a few minutes walking around the deck 
convincing everyone that I was perfectly calm and had nothing to 
hide, I went back to my cabin, locked the door, and pulled out the 
envelope. As I removed the money prior to putting it in orderly 
stacks and admiring it a little before dinnertime, a small folded 
piece of paper fluttered down to the floor. 
     I picked it up, opened it, and read it as follows: 

         _11th August, 1923 
          My Dear Doctor Jones: 
          As you may very well have guessed by now, there is of
     course no such thing as a Jacobean Bible, let alone a Red
     Letter edition of it. I apologize for having fooled you, but
     since you have doubtless hidden it somewhere and substituted
     another totally worthless Bible in its place, I must confess
     that I don't feel quite as guilty as I otherwise might.
          This entire affair began when I first saw you back in 
     Casablanca. I was under constant surveillance by the local
     police -- that much, at least, was true -- and I needed an 
     accomplice who could take something out of the country for
     me. You really are not the most observant person I have ever
     encountered; I must have wasted five afternoons in that
     incredibly boring marketplace before you finally recognized
     me -- and even then I almost lost you a couple of times while
     you were shadowing me back to my hotel.
          If you have read this far you have doubtless figured out
     that there never was a Louis Blaine. He is, of course, one of
     my professional identities, and I hereby will him to you, to
     use whenever you wish. He was, however, absolutely essential
     to the success of this operation, for without him you would
     have had no reason to show up at precisely one-fifteen, and
     thus I would have had no reason to give you my watch. Hidden
     in the rabbit's foot is the Lion's Tooth, the largest and
     most valuable diamond in Africa. I thank you for delivering
     it in such excellent condition.
          If you are reading this for the first time, I must
     assume that you have not yet spent any of the five thousand
     pounds I allowed you to swindle me out of. My advice to you
     is that if you must spend them you do so very carefully, as
     the print job is of an inferior grade and they are worth, if
     anything, even less than the Bible.
                                     Your obedient servant,
                                     Erich Von Horst_

     About ten seconds after I put the letter down I got violently 
seasick for the first time in my life.

Chapter 7

                              MUTINY

     _The Dying Quail_ didn't have much in the way of a passenger 
list, but on the other hand _The Dying Quail_ wasn't all that much 
of a ship, so things kind of worked out even. I had heard that 
shipboard romances could be really memorable occurrences, but the 
only person who I could find on deck at night was a wrinkled old  
dermatologist from Korea who spent the better part of a week 
trying to convince me that contrary to popular belief the earth 
was really flat, or at the very least built along the lines of a 
gently pitched roof. 
     The food was okay if you liked tuna. It was absolutely 
terrible if you didn't. I didn't, and by the third or fourth day 
out of port, I don't think anybody else did either. 
     There was an elderly English couple who had just bought a 
cattle farm in the Transvaal area and spent most of their time 
fighting about whether to butcher them all on the spot or maybe 
get a little milk from them first. There was a scrawny blond Swede 
who never left his cabin except to eat tuna and then get rid of it 
over the side of the boat. There was a trio of German girls, round 
and firm and much too fully packed, who didn't speak a word of any 
civilized tongue and spent all their time taking pictures, not 
that the water off the Ivory Coast looked all that different from 
the water next to Liberia. There were a couple of East Indian men 
who would strip off all their clothes every morning, sit in the 
blazing sun all day with their legs crossed kind of painful-like, 
tell everybody not to eat hamburgers, and then go back to their 
rooms as soon as it was dark. We had a down-on-his-luck actor from 
Canada who kept reciting the more obscure soliloquies from 
_Troilus and Cressida_, and a writer from Paraguay who drank in 
most of his local color from a bottle of Scotch. And, finally, we 
had a stunningly beautiful belly dancer from Greece who apologized 
for distracting us but explained that she had to sunbathe in the 
nude because her audiences didn't like to see different shadings 
where various straps had been. Watching her body get an even tan 
was about as quick-moving a spectator sport as watching paint dry, 
but it did hold certain advantages over paint-watching when viewed 
in all of its many aspects, and it provided me with just about my 
only form of diversion during the first week of the voyage. 
     The captain and the crew were nominally British, but I don't 
think more than half of them had ever gotten to within five 
hundred miles of London or Liverpool. The rest were swarthy, 
unwashed seamen who swore in Slavic tongues and spent a lot of 
time glaring sullenly at the passengers, who either ignored them 
or lectured them on the evils of eating beef. The captain himself 
was a jovial, balding little man with a red mustache, white knee-
length shorts, a huge belly, and a driving urge for perfection 
that caused him to tell a joke thirty or forty times until he got 
it right. 
     It was on our eighth day out of Algiers that the captain, 
whose name was Roberts, announced that he was sick and tired of 
talking to the crew and would be interested in picking up the 
gauntlet of any passenger who might care to challenge him to a 
game or two of chance. Well, the Indians probably couldn't have 
uncrossed their legs even if they'd wanted to, and the belly 
dancer was busy soaking up the sun, and the writer was too drunk, 
and the German girls couldn't understand him, and most of the 
other passengers were otherwise occupied, which meant that a few 
minutes later Captain Roberts and I were sitting across a table 
from one another, _mano a mano_, preparing for a little contest of 
skill involving a small stack of colorful pasteboards. 
     The Good Lord must have had His attention diverted 
elsewhere -- probably He was making sure that the belly dancer got 
tan everywhere she wanted to, for which I couldn't blame Him none 
-- because He wasn't breathing hard over my shoulder. I lost 
almost three thousand pounds, the only saving grace being that the 
money itself probably wasn't worth a whole lot more than the 
cards. 
     Captain Roberts didn't seem to notice the difference in the 
notes, though, or else he may have decided that it was simply a 
normal variation, because he pocketed the money and announced to 
passengers and crew alike that he was now at peace with the world 
and would be breaking out a case of his second-finest drinking 
stuff for dinner at no extra cost, or at most a very nominal one. 
     I think it would be a fair assessment to say that we all 
enjoyed the evening meal. Everyone partook heavily of the 
captain's liquor, it being the only alternative to eating still 
more tuna. After the last bottle was drained, and the belly dancer 
had gone off with the actor, and the three German girls were 
getting kind of chummy with the crew, and the writer and the 
Korean dermatologist were coming close to blows about whether the 
world was flat or merely slanted, those of us who remained finally 
bade each other a fond goodnight and went off to our various 
cabins.         
     I woke up with a start a couple of hours later when I heard a 
scream and a splash in quick succession. It took me just a minute 
to climb into my duds and get out on deck, where I found a couple 
of the English crewmen looking over the side of the boat. 
     "Good evening, brothers," I said. "Either of you two hear 
something sort of unusual in the last couple of minutes?" 
     "Can't say as to how we have, sir," said one of them. 
     _"Help!_" cried a voice that seemed to be coming from a 
considerable distance away. 
     "There it is again!" I said. "You _sure_ you don't hear 
something strange?" 
     "That's just Captain Roberts hollering for help, sir," said 
the second crewman soothingly. "Nothing peculiar about that at 
all, seeing as how we dumped him overboard and left him in our 
wake." 
     "Do you fellows have any special reason for what, on the 
surface of it, seems an act sadly lacking in Christian charity?" I 
asked them. 
     "Reason enough!" snapped the first crewman. "We all got 
together for a little game of cards after the party broke up, and 
he wound up the big loser." 
     "So?" I asked. 
     "The blighter paid us off with bogus money!" said the 
crewman. 
     "No!" I exclaimed. "And he seemed like such a nice, friendly 
fellow when I played with him this afternoon." 
     "Did you win or lose, sir?" 
     "Oh, I won a couple of thousand pounds," I said, pulling out 
the last of Von Horst's money and handing it over to them. "Is it 
any good?" 
     "Maybe for lighting cigars with," said one of them 
disgustedly. "Certainly not for spending. I'm sorry to be the one 
to tell you, sir."
     "Dangblast it!" I swore bitterly. "And he appeared to be such 
a decent, Christian sort of man, if you know what I mean. Seems a 
shame to drown him." 
     "Oh, he isn't going to drown, sir," said one of the crewmen. 
     "He ain't?" I said, startled. "Why the hell not?" 
     "We tossed him a couple of life preservers, and we're only a 
mile off the coast. He'll make it ashore, all right."
     "But he definitely won't be coming back aboard ship?" I 
asked. 
     "No, sir." 
     "Serves you right, you scoundrel!" I cried, shaking my fist 
over the side of the ship. "That'll teach you to cheat a man of 
God!" 
     "Being as how you're a man of God and all, sir," said one of 
the crewmen, "I wonder if you could help us with a slight moral 
dilemma in which we find ourselves." 
     "Certainly, my good man," I said. "What seems to be the 
problem?" 
     "While we don't feel particularly mutinous," he began, "what 
we done _could_ be misconstrued as mutiny by certain admiralty 
courts and various other powers of the high seas." 
     "And you'd like me to testify on your behalf, is that it?" I 
asked. 
     "Oh, no, sir," said the other. "We wouldn't dream of imposing 
upon you like that." 
     "What exactly do you want me to do, then?" I asked. 
     "Well, sir," said the first crewman, "it would go very hard 
with us, very hard indeed, sir, if it looked like we tossed old 
Captain Roberts overboard so that we could wrest control of the 
ship from him, to seize power as it were." 
     "Yeah, I can see where that might put a little crimp or two 
in your defense," I agreed. 
     "So we was wondering, sir, if you'd be good enough to take 
over as captain until we get to the Cape?" 
     "Me?" I exclaimed. 
     "Not to worry, sir," he said. "We'll run the ship for you, 
and do the navigation, and feed the customers (provided they like 
tuna) and keep the decks scrubbed down, and make sure everything 
is ship-shape. But what with you being a man of God and all, it 
won't go so hard on us when Captain Roberts finally reaches 
civilization and institutes legal action against us." 
     "Which he may never do," added the other. "It being such a 
dark and moonless night, he could hardly be sure who it was that 
pushed him overboard. Or he could die of pneumonia, or of being et 
by sharks, or any one of a number of similar tragedies could 
befall him, sir." 
     "Sad," agreed the first crewman, nodding his head. 
     "Indeed," said the second. 
     "I'll do it!" I said at last. "After all, while I been 
captain of my own soul on its long and heartrending journey 
through life, I ain't never been captain of a ship before. I might 
just learn something." 
     "Also," noted the first crewman, "the captain gets to eat 
steak." 
     "That little fact ain't exactly escaped my attention," I said 
with a smile. "Well, as long as I got you two to thank, I guess 
you'll be serving as my executive officers. What are your names?" 
     "Call me Ishmael," said the first. "Ishmael Bledsoe." 
     "And I'm Luthor Christian." replied the second. 
     "Fine," I said. "And you can call me Captain Jones." 
     "We'll be happy to, Captain Jones, sir," said Ishmael. "But 
there may be some amongst our crew -- the rowdier elements, you 
understand -- who may not be so inclined." 
     "We'll incline 'em against the mainmast for a few days," I 
said. "That ought to assuage their doubts." 
     "I regret to point out that we don't have a mainmast, Captain 
Jones," said Luthor apologetically. 
     "Some of them," continued lshmael, "might even wonder what 
right we had to throw Captain Roberts overboard, them not being 
acquainted with the concept of personal honor and paying one's 
debts with legal tender and other such rarefied philosophic 
points." 
     "No problem at all," I said after a moment's thought. "Mr. 
Christian?" 
     "Yes, sir?" 
     "Give the signal to abandon ship," I said. 
     "You're the captain," he shrugged, and went off to the 
bridge. A moment later a loud, raucous siren had awakened everyone 
on board. 
     "Why don't you go make sure everyone has a life preserver?" I 
suggested to Ishmael. "And, in keeping with our personal code of 
honor, we three will go down with the ship." 
     He started passing out a batch of little white inner tubes, 
and within ten minutes everyone except Ishmael, Luthor, and me was 
in the water. 
     I picked up a megaphone and held it just in front of my lips. 
     "Good evening!" I called out. "This is your new captain, 
Lucifer Jones, speaking. I just want you all to know that this has 
been one of the better abandon-ship drills that it has ever been 
my privilege to witness." 
     I waited for the screams of outrage to die down a little, and 
then continued. 
     "I am afraid that poor Captain Roberts found it necessary to 
abrogate his command. His last wish was that I take over and make 
sure that _The Dying Quail_ completed its voyage in perfect 
safety. He felt that, as a man of God, I was unquestionably the 
best qualified among all of us to deal with such problems as might 
arise. Those of you who share his opinion will be allowed back on 
board; the rest of you are advised not to splash too violently, as 
that constitutes just the kind of motion that attracts sharks." 
     A couple of sharks providentially appeared just then, and 
within less than three minutes everyone was back on board and I 
was unanimously acknowledged as the one and only lawful captain, 
by grace of God and His denizens of the deep. 
     Well, things went pretty smoothly for the next couple of 
days, much to my surprise. Nobody seemed to care who was captain 
as long as they all got to where they were going, and when they 
heard about how Captain Roberts had reneged on his debts of honor, 
they actually gave Ishmael and Luthor a standing ovation. 
     We passed Nigeria and Cameroon without any untoward 
incidents. Then one morning I strolled out on deck at about noon, 
having arisen early, and got the shock of my life. Usually we 
traveled about a mile off the coast to avoid reefs and other 
menaces to navigation, but now there was a forest about sixty 
yards off to the left -- and as if that weren't enough, there was 
another one half a mile away on the right. 
     "Mr. Christian!" I bellowed. 
     "Sir?" said Luthor, arriving a few seconds later. 
     "Mr. Christian," I said, "unless the ocean has gotten an 
awful lot narrower or the ship has gotten an awful lot wider, I am 
forced to the conclusion that we are no longer on course." 
     "You noticed, sir," said Luthor noncommittally. 
     "Of course I noticed!" I yelled. "Little things like losing 
the Atlantic Ocean don't easily escape my attention. Now where the 
hell are we?" 
     "I should have thought that would be obvious, Captain Jones," 
replied Luthor. "We're on the Congo River." 
     "What the hell are we doing here?" I persisted. 
     "Some of our crew members threatened to go on a sit-down 
strike if they had to keep eating tuna," said Luthor. "Mostly the 
Slavs, sir; very few of the blueblooded Englishmen."  
     "Is that all?" I said, relieved. "Just flog 'em and let's get 
back on course." 
     "My very thought," said Luthor. "But we do have one little 
problem, sir." 
     "Don't worry about legalities, my good man," I said. "A 
captain's word is law onboard ship." 
     "That goes without saying," agreed Luthor. 
     "Oh? Then what's the problem?" I asked him. 
     "There are a lot more of them than there are of us, and 
they're bigger." 
     "Yeah, I can see where that does pose a bit of a problem," I 
agreed. 
     "Also, no one who's been eating the tuna right along is in 
any condition for so strenuous an activity as flogging people, 
even if the crewmen would stand still for it." 
     "That being the case, Mr. Christian," I said, "it is my firm 
conclusion that we should seek out a river and put the ship into 
it." 
     "We've done that, sir," he said. 
     "Good!" I said. "Next, equip a party of Slavic crewmen and 
send them out to hunt up some meat." 
     "They're doing that right now, sir," he said. 
     I couldn't think of any more executive orders, so I dismissed 
him and took a couple of minutes to examine our surroundings. We 
had veered a bit closer to the shore, and I could see that it was 
all covered by trees and vines. It looked hot and full of bugs, 
and I sure didn't envy the poor men who had to go hunting in 
there. Everything looked green and damp, which kind of matched the 
color and texture of the hundred or so crocodiles that were 
milling around casting hungry glances up toward the boat. Every 
now and then they'd swim a little too close to a hippo, which sort 
of reminded me of the Dutchman except that it didn't wear a soiled 
white suit, and the hippo would just bite one of the crocs in 
half. It didn't seem to bother the crocodile's friends and 
relations none, but I noticed that whenever this happened they all 
kind of moved downstream a little. 
     Anyway, I got a little tired of looking at all these reptiles 
and river horses after a while, so I took out Captain Roberts's 
fishing rod and decided to bag a couple of trout or whatever, but 
all I kept hooking was crocodiles, so I finally gave it up and 
went back to my cabin to wait for the hunting party to return, 
which they did toward late afternoon, and on the run. 
     I burst out of my door as soon as I heard the rifle shots. 
Ten crew members were racing for _The Dying Quail_ as fast as 
their lifeboat could go, and behind them, in hot pursuit, were 
half a dozen war canoes filled with black savages who were waving 
spears and shooting arrows in their wake. 
     Ishmael raced to the bridge and saluted. 
     "What do you want us to do, Captain Jones, sir?" he said. 
     "I haven't made up my mind yet," I said, squinting at the 
lifeboat. "Can you see if they actually caught any meat?" 
     "Too hard to tell from here," said Ishmael. 
     "Well, I suppose it's our duty to protect 'em," I said. "Fire 
a broadside at the canoes." 
     "I'm afraid that's quite impossible, sir," said Ishmael. 
     "What the hell's the good of being captain if I can't fire a 
broadside into an enemy every now and then as the mood takes me?" 
I said, ducking as a couple of arrows flew overhead. 
     "First of all, we're facing the wrong way to fire a 
broadside," said Ishmael. 
     "Then turn us around!" I commanded. 
     "And second of all," he continued, unperturbed, "we don't 
have any weapons." 
     "Why the hell not?" I demanded. 
     "This is a passenger ship, not a destroyer," he replied, 
ducking another arrow. "There were only four rifles on board, and 
all of them are with the hunting party." 
     "Well, just what _have_ we got?" I asked, sidestepping a 
colorful spear that just missed beheading me. 
     "There's a rather wicked-looking butcher's knife in the 
kitchen," he suggested. "And I've heard the actor bragging about 
his skill at fisticuffs." 
     "And that's our total offensive and defensive weaponry?" I 
asked. 
     He nodded. 
     "Then wait until our party is back on the ship and let's get 
make tracks out of here," I said. 
     The hunting party was on deck within thirty seconds, and 
Ishmael gave the order to turn the ship 180 degrees and then 
proceed at full speed. The natives increased the intensity of 
their attack, and began making very rude sounds when they saw we 
were hightailing it for the open sea. 
     "Shoal ahead, sir!" cried Luthor. 
     Ishmael stood at the wheel, which had about a dozen arrows 
embedded in it, and steered. 
     "Shoal to starborad, sir!" cried Luthor. 
     Ishmael ducked a spear and two more arrows and kept steering. 
Suddenly there was a terrible crunching sound. 
     "Shoal beneath, sir!" said Luthor. 
     "I don't suppose we're prepared to repel boarders?" I asked 
as Ishmael tried to steer the ship and found out that the wheel 
wouldn't move. 
     "We're mostly a pleasure ship, sir," he said sadly. 
     "Maybe if we threw some beads at them, or offered them the 
belly dancer..." 
     "Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute!" I 
bellowed, mostly because beads hadn't accomplished all that much 
good with the last few tribes I had encountered, and I had other 
plans in mind for the belly dancer. 
     "Oh, very well said, sir!" cried Ishmael. "Words to die for!" 
     "Who said anything about dying?" I replied. "Have we at least 
got a flare gun aboard, so we can see them better?" 
     He walked to a nearby cabinet and pulled one out. I took it 
from him and fired it, illuminating the sky with red-gold streaks 
of light. Suddenly all the savages started screaming in terror, 
and a minute later they were prostrating themselves in their 
boats, a difficult feat of balance even if there hadn't been a 
couple hundred crocodiles in the water. 
     "I think the flares have convinced them we're some kind of 
gods, sir," said Ishmael. 
     "_We_?" I repeated. "I don't recollect anyone else firing the 
flares." 
     "I think the flares have convinced them that you're some kind 
of god, sir," amended Ishmael. 
     "I think you may have something there," I said. "Why don't 
you and Luthor figure out how to get us off this damned shoal 
while they're busy worshiping me?" 
     He and Luthor hopped to it, and after about an hour of 
rocking and lurching, I heard another crunch and suddenly we were 
moving through the water again. The cheer let out by the crew and 
passengers was drowned out by the cheer from the savages, who 
began paddling along in our wake. They were still following us 
when we hit the ocean and turned left. From time to time one of 
them would spear a fish and throw it onto our deck as a small 
tribute, but for the most part they were content to worship me 
from afar. 
     The hunting party hadn't managed to bring back any fresh 
meat. In fact, their first shot had winged one of the natives and 
precipitated the whole affair of the previous evening. It didn't 
matter much anyhow; they were so bitten up by bugs that they 
probably wouldn't have had much stomach for good red meat any time 
before we hit the Cape. 
     I posted a new Ship's Regulation to the effect that 
sunbathing was now allowed only on the captain's private deck. 
Unfortunately, the belly dancer decided that she was tan enough, 
and I kept stumbling over the two East Indians every time I went 
into and out of my cabin until I rescinded the order a couple of 
days later. 
     We had no more serious problems until we were almost south of 
Portuguese West Africa, at which point our Korean dermatologist 
borrowed one of the rifles, lashed himself to the wheel, and 
explained that while he had nothing against us personally, we 
nonetheless had to turn the ship around before we sailed over the 
edge of the world. 
     I signaled Luthor and Ishmael to leave me alone on the bridge 
with him, and the two of us got to talking about one thing and 
another, and had a friendly little drink to pass the time of day, 
and I finally convinced him that the edge of the world was 
somewhere around Brussels, and actually we were going uphill and 
toward safety. He was one very happy Korean for the rest of the 
trip, and hardly bothered anyone at all, except for our drunken 
writer, who was convinced that the edge of the world was more 
in the neighborhood of Lincoln, Nebraska.
     One day, when we had gotten to within a couple of hundred 
miles of the Cape, the savages who were still behind us and still 
tossing us an occasional fish or eel began screaming at the tops 
of their lungs. 
     "What's the problem now?" I said, coming out of my cabin, 
where I had been thinking of ways to convince the belly dancer 
that her tan was fading. 
     "Whales off the starboard bow, sir," said Luthor. 
     I looked, and sure enough, there were about twenty of the 
beasts making toward the ship, flopping and splashing and 
spraying up huge geysers of water from the tops of their noses,
and otherwise looking very ominous. 
     "Does this kind of thing happen very often, Mr. Christian?" I 
asked him, looking about for the nearest life preserver. 
     "Well, that all depends, Captain Jones, sir," he said. 
     "On what?" I asked. 
     "On whether we're in port or not, sir," he replied. 
     "We're on the high seas!" I pointed out to him.
     "Well, that does make it more likely, sir," he agreed. 
     "What do you do when they attack the ship?" I asked. 
     "Personally, I close my eyes very tightly and pray that 
they'll go away," said Luthor with obvious sincerity. 
     "I suppose rifle bullets would just enrage them?" I asked. 
     "I really have no idea," said Luthor. "You can certainly try 
rifle bullets if you wish. Personally, I think I'm going to go 
below and grab a little nap." He raced off before I could order 
him to remain on duty. 
     The whales got to within two hundred yards, and our faithful 
natives suddenly unconverted and headed back toward the mouth of 
the Congo River, some two thousand miles north of us. The whales 
ignored them and drew even closer. 
     "They look hungry," said Ishmael, who had suddenly appeared 
at my side. 
     "You ever seen a whale that didn't?" I asked out of 
curiosity. 
     "Once," he admitted. "Of course, it was dead." 
     "Of course," I said. One of the whales got to within about 
twenty yards and I threw a sextant at it. It bounced off its nose 
without causing any injury that I could see. 
     "Do whales eat people?" I asked. 
     "I imagine whales eat pretty much what they want to," said 
Ishmael, drawing closer as if for comfort. 
     "I mean, maybe they'll go away and leave us alone," I said 
hopefully. 
     "Maybe," he said doubtfully. 
     "And maybe," I said, struck by a sudden flash of inspiration, 
"they're just here to beg at the table." 
     "What are you talking about, Captain Jones?" said Ishmael. 
     "Go down to the kitchen and bring up some of our tuna," I 
said urgently. "Maybe if we give 'em some scraps they'll leave us 
alone." 
     He shrugged, raced down to the kitchen, and came up with a 
couple of kegs of tuna, one under each arm. We waited until two of 
the whales were so close we could have reached out and touched 
them, then threw the tuna into their gaping mouths. 
     Then we stood back to see if we had guessed right -- and the 
strangest thing happened. Their eyes went wide and began watering, 
one of them started coughing and heaving, and the other just 
rolled right on its back, belly-up, which certainly agreed with my 
own assessment of the tuna in the first place. 
     The other whales took one look at their companions, then left 
as soon as Ishmael got some more tuna and began throwing it at 
them. 
     Not too much happened after that, at least so far as whales 
and savages were concerned. Ishmael told me that the Slavs were 
getting ready to take over the ship if we didn't start feeding 
them meat, but I figured that we were only a few days out of port 
and there wasn't much sense stopping to find a source of meat this 
close to the end of our little voyage. 
     Then, when we were just one day out of Cape Horn, the belly 
dancer approached me and asked if, in my dual capacity as captain 
of _The Dying Quail_ and a man of the cloth, I could perform 
marriages onboard the ship. 
     There was a little confusion just then, since I began 
explaining that I could consummate marriages with the best of 
them, but we finally got things straightened out, and that evening 
after dinner I pronounced her and the actor man and wife, the 
sentences to run concurrently. 
     "That was very well done, sir," said Luthor, stopping by my 
table after the ceremony. 
     "Oh, indeed it was, sir," agreed Ishmael, joining him. 
     "Well, thank you very much, brothers," I said. "Always happy 
to oblige young love in bloom." 
     "We were rather hoping you'd feel that way about it, sir," 
said Luthor. 
     "I'm not sure I follow you," I said. 
     "You may not have noticed it, sir," said Ishmael, "but young 
love has been blooming all over the whole ruddy boat." 
     "Another marriage?" I said. "Bring 'em up here in front of me 
and I'll have 'em hitched in no time." 
     "Well, this one is a bit irregular," said Ishmael, leaning 
over and whispering in my ear. 
     I agreed as how it was a mite out of the ordinary, but once 
we got to haggling in earnest I found that fifty pounds was more 
than enough to assuage my conscience and eliminate any hint of 
irregularity, and an hour after the first ceremony, I married the 
three German girls to Ishmael, Luthor, and three of their 
shipmates. 
     The man on watch called out that Cape Horn was within sight, 
and yet another couple decided that if they were ever going to get 
married, they would probably find less social opposition here than 
elsewhere. Fifty more pounds changed hands, and a few moments 
later I joined Kim Li Sang, the Korean dermatologist, to Eduardo 
Duarte, the Paraguayan writer. 
     I made sure that there were no more weddings in the near 
offing, then called Ishmael and Luthor up from their rather 
crowded bridal bower. Luthor had a black eye, and Ishmael was 
missing a tooth. 
     "What the hell happened?" I asked. 
     "We had our first lovers' tiff," said Ishmael, spitting a 
little blood over the railing. 
     "You ought to see the other six!" added Luthor. 
     "Later, perhaps," I said. "I've called you here for something 
a little more important." 
     "And what might that be, sir?" asked Luthor. 
     "Do the Slavs still want to take over the ship?" 
     "Indeed they do, sir," said Ishmael. 
     "Good," I said. "Why don't you give me just enough time to 
move my gear out of Captain Roberts's quarters, and then tell them 
the ship is all theirs." 
     When the ship docked the next morning, there was a welcoming 
committee waiting for us, led by Captain Roberts himself. 
Evidently he had been fished out of the ocean by a passing cargo 
ship, which, not bothering to explore the Congo River and its 
environs, had beaten us to the Cape by almost a full day. 
     The Slavs, who by this time had moved lock, stock, and barrel 
into the captain's quarters, were jailed as mutineers pending the 
outcome of an admiralty inquiry, while Ishmael Bledsoe and Luthor 
Christian were given citations of commendation for getting _The 
Dying Quail_ into port only a day late, and were exonerated of all 
wrongdoing not directly connected with their wedding. The last I 
saw of them, they were sneaking off to parts unknown with the rest 
of their newly-made little family just as a Slavic translator 
arrived on the scene. 
     As for me, I had one hundred crisp British pounds in my 
pocket, and having had my fill of the sea, I set off once again in 
search of the fortune that would finally result in the building of 
the Tabernacle of Saint Luke.

Chapter 8

                       AN AFFAIR OF THE HEART

     Cape Town didn't appear all that promising a place for the 
ex-captain of _The Dying Quail_ to settle down, especially once 
Captain Roberts figured out why he'd been tossed overboard and 
started looking for me with a gun, so I took my leave one fine 
morning at about two o'clock and headed on up the eastern 
coastline. My money held out just fine until I got to Durban, 
which had a mule track, horses being too expensive for that part 
of the country. I picked out a likely-looking one named Saint 
Andrew, placed my money down. and watched him go into the final 
turn leading by two lengths when a pride of lions raced out of the 
veldt and attacked the field. 
     The jockeys, most of whom were faster than their mounts 
anyway, jumped off and raced to safety, but none of the mules made 
it as far as the homestretch. The track, claiming that this was an 
act of God, refused to refund the bets, even though I, 
representing God, pointed out that what it mostly was was an act 
of lions. I could see we were likely to be arguing all day without 
solving anything, so I took the rest of my money and tried to put 
it all on a large black-maned lion who was just finishing off 
Saint Andrew. The track officials explained that it was against 
policy to make book on lions, and besides, they wouldn't give me 
more than three-to-five on the black-maned one. 
     We did some real quick haggling amongst ourselves and finally 
they laid nine-to-ten against my lion, with no place or show 
betting. As soon as I put up my money the lion got up, yawned, 
stretched, and ambled back into the bush. 
     "Off the course! Foul!" cried the steward. "Disqualified and 
placed last." 
     "How come you didn't disqualify him for eating Saint Andrew?" 
I demanded. 
     "My dear sir," said the steward in a patronizing voice, "he 
ran straight and true after Saint Andrew." 
     "I'm afraid I don't follow you, brother," I said. 
     "There is nothing in the rules about one participant eating 
another," he continued. "But it clearly states that leaving the 
course is a foul." 
     "Am I to understand, brother," I said, "that you have no 
intention of refunding either of my bets?" 
     He nodded. 
     "Who's in charge here?" I demanded. "I want to see the 
owner." 
     "The owner is Mrs. Emily Perrison," said the steward, "but 
you won't find her here. She detests gambling." 
     "Then why the hell does she own a racetrack?" I asked.  
     "For the same reason she owns almost everything else in this 
town: Her husband died and left it to her." 
     "A widow, you say. Is she young?" 
     "Old enough to be your mother," replied the steward. "And 
crazy as all get-out. Gives away most of her money to religious 
missions up north of here." 
     "Where in particular?" I asked. 
     "Like I told you: up north." 
     "The whole world's up north," I pointed out. 
     "I don't know: Ethiopia, Chad, the Sudan. Somewhere up 
there." 
     "How would I find this Mrs. Perrison?" I asked. 
     "I can't give out her address," he said, "but if you'll just 
walk north and east you can't miss it." 
     I left both the racetrack and my hundred pounds behind me 
without a second thought. I had a few shiIlings left in my pocket, 
and I spent them on a shave and a little hair grease, after which 
I started walking to the northeast. The steward hadn't been 
kidding about not being able to miss my destination, because I 
soon passed, in rapid succession, Perrison's Dry Goods, Perrison's 
General Store, Perrison's Slaughterhouse and Restaurant, and the 
_Perrison Daily Press_. When I finally reached the long roadway 
leading to the Perrison homestead it was twilight, and it was dark 
by the time I walked up to the huge old wooden farmhouse. 
     I spent a couple of minutes smoothing down my hair, brushing 
the dust off my clothes, and making sure the Good Book was 
prominently displayed, then knocked on the door. It was opened a 
moment later by a fat young man with a sullen face and piggy 
little eyes. 
     "What do you want?" he whined. 
     "Greetings," I said pleasantly. "Is Emily Perrison at home?" 
     "Who wants to know?" he asked, picking on a pimple. 
     "What do you mean, who wants to know?" I said. "_I_ want to 
know." 
     "Who are you?" he asked, rubbing his stubby little nose. 
     "I am Doctor Lucifer Jones," I said, forcing a friendly 
smile. 
     "My mum don't need a doctor," he said sullenly. 
     "I'm not that kind of doctor," I said. "Why not get your 
mother and let her decide?" 
     He grunted, slammed the door in my face, and left me standing 
out there in the cold. A minute passed, then another, and finally 
the door opened again and I found myself facing Mrs. Emily 
Perrison. 
     She was the pinkest woman I ever did see. She wore her hair 
up in a bun, and her face and body looked like someone was trying 
to balance a small balloon atop a bigger one. She had blue eyes, a 
broad nose, and lots of shiny white teeth, and she looked like she 
would never walk when she could mince. 
     She reached out a ruffled arm and took my hand in hers. 
     "Doctor Jones?" 
     "The Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones," I said, stooping 
over and kissing her fingers. They tasted of bread dough, and it 
reminded me that I hadn't eaten all day. "I'm back from your 
mission in Ethiopia to report on all the good work we've been 
doing with the money you so generously sent to us." 
     "But I made no contributions to Ethiopia," she said, looking 
puzzled. 
     "Well, they _told_ me I was in Ethiopia, but it could have 
been Chad." 
     "I _do_ make donations to a number of missions in Chad," she 
said. 
     "And right appreciative we are," I said quickly. "It would 
just melt your heart to see all those little heathen children 
coming to church and singing hymns of a Sunday morning." 
     Her face lit up at that, and she invited me into the living 
room, which had a flock of overstuffed Victorian chairs and 
loveseats covered by hundreds of little doilies. There were a 
batch of paintings on the wall, mostly of flowers and apples and 
stuff like that, but they didn't hold a candle to the painting of 
Nellie Willoughby in the altogether that hung over the bar in the 
New Stanley Hotel. 
     "By the way, who was that who met me at the door?" I asked. 
     "That was my son, Horace," she said apologetically. 
     "A right charming lad he is," I said quickly. 
     "Well, Doctor Jones," she said with a fluttery little sigh, 
"I've heard Horace called a good many things, but that's the very 
first time the word charming has ever been mentioned." 
     "All he needs is a little firm guidance from a God-fearing 
stepfather not unlike myself and he'll be right as rain." 
     "I'm glad you agree," she said. 
     "Agree with who and about what?" I asked. 
     "With me, about Horace. I've recently allowed a certain 
gentleman to come calling, mainly because I too feel that the boy 
needs a father." 
     That wasn't exactly the solution I had in mind, but I just 
smiled and allowed as to how I'd like to meet such a lucky fellow 
before going back into the bush for another couple of quick rounds 
with Satan. 
     She told me that I was in luck because he was coming over for 
dinner that very night. Then she got me some tea and started 
asking about the natives in Chad. I told her whatever sounded 
likely, embellishing a little bit here and there about their 
fertility rites and other such rituals, and explaining that it was 
due to her and her alone that these sinful goings-on had been 
stopped. 
     Suddenly she reached out, grabbed my hand, and held it 
against her bosom, which was considerable when at rest but was 
throbbing to beat the band right then. 
     "It must have been terribly difficult for a cultured 
gentleman like yourself to rub shoulders with such savages!" she 
said. 
     "Somebody had to do it," I said nobly. "And what Christian 
wouldn't gladly accept a little torture and some tropical diseases 
if it enabled him to spread the Word?" I shot her my saddest, most 
tragic smile. "And while I may have missed the companionship of a 
good Christian white woman during all them painful years, I 
couldn't have afforded to keep a wife or raise a family anyway, 
what with donating all my money to various leper colonies." 
     "You poor dear!" she breathed. "You're penniless?" 
     I nodded. "But I ain't complaining, ma'am," I said quickly. 
"I've got spiritual riches, and that's something I wouldn't trade 
with no one." 
     "Where did you plan to spend the night?" she asked. 
     "I saw a real comfortable-looking bench behind the 
slaughterhouse," I said. "And I'm sure in a week or two I can get 
used to the smell." 
     "I won't hear of it!" she exclaimed. "You'll stay right here 
in the house as our guest until you're ready to go out and do the
Lord's work again." 
     "But ma'am," I protested. "It just ain't right. Besides, I 
still get nightmares from the time they strung me up and tried to 
make me renounce Jesus. You wouldn't want to wake up during all 
that screaming. I mean, I know you feel deeply obligated because 
I've undergone all this suffering and privation for your pet 
charities, but..." 
     "You're staying, and that's that!" she said firmly. 
     I explained that it was morally wrong but that I was too weak 
and exhausted to argue with her anymore, so I'd have to abide by 
her decision. She was just reaching out to grab my face and press 
it on her bosom right next to my hand, and I took a deep breath on 
the assumption that there wasn't a lot of extra room there for air 
or anything else, when we were interrupted by a brisk knocking at 
the front door. 
     She stood up, slightly flushed and looking pinker than ever, 
and walked to the door. A moment later she returned with a 
familiar figure who was dressed all in black: shirt, tie, vest, 
suit, socks, shoes, hat, belt, probably even underwear. 
     "Doctor Jones," said Emily, "I'd like to introduce you to my 
gentleman caller, Major Theodore Dobbins, late of His Majesty's 
armed forces." 
     I'm not sure which of us looked more surprised, but he 
recovered first and extended his hand. 
     "My dear Doctor Jones," he said. "How good it is to see you 
again!" 
     "You two know each other?" asked Emily. 
     "We've done a little missionary work together," I said. "In 
fact, I think you could fairly say that the last time we got 
together we prevented a few hundred poor lost souls from becoming 
drug addicts." 
     "Praise God!" she cried, looking all sort of uplifted. 
     "It's been a long time, Doctor Jones," said the Major, 
seating himself on one of the uglier chairs. "I had never expected 
to see you again." 
     "Isn't it a small world?" said Emily. 
     "Crowded is more the word for it," I replied. 
     "Well, I'll leave you two to discuss old times while I check 
on dinner," she said, scurrying out to the kitchen. 
     "What are _you_ doing here?" Major Dobbins hissed as soon as 
she was out of earshot. 
     "Just spreading the word of the Lord," I replied. "And 
yourself?" 
     "You will doubtless find this difficult to comprehend," he 
said, "but I am here because of an earnest affair of the heart." 
     "Difficult ain't exactly the word I'd choose, Brother 
Dobbins," I said. "How much is she worth?" 
     "What makes you think I'd know anything about her financial 
status?" he said with dignity. "I assure you, my friend, that such 
a question has never crossed my mind." 
     "_That_ much?" I said.           
     "My dear Doctor Jones," he said, sitting down opposite me, "I 
think it best that we lay all our cards on the table. After our 
unfortunate meeting with Erich Von Horst in Dar-es-Salaam, certain 
business interests caused me to move my base of operations to 
South Africa in some degree of haste." 
     "They issued another warrant for you?" I asked. 
     "Let us say that my interpretations of the finer points of 
the law differed in various respects from those of the 
authorities," he replied. "Be that as it may, I found that I had 
insufficient capital to continue dealing in those perishable goods 
that had formed the staple of my livelihood for the past decade. 
Indeed, all seemed hopeless until I heard of the good Mrs. 
Perrison from an associate, and immediately moved my base once 
again, this time to Durban. I will confess that she does indeed 
possess a certain amount of wealth, though doubtless far less than 
you hope or suspect. I have been courting her assiduously for the 
past two months, and now stand upon the brink of being able to set 
the time and place for our nuptials." 
     "It certainly beats leaving it all to Horace," I said 
thoughtfully. 
     "I knew you would appreciate my position," he said with a 
smile. 
     "I do more than appreciate it, Major," I replied. "I _envy_ 
it." 
     "And so we come to the crux of the situation," he said. 
"Exactly how much will it take to assuage your envy?" 
     "I sure wouldn't want to appear greedy or nothing," I told 
him. "But I got a feeling that it would take more than you're 
willing to spend." 
     "Two thousand pounds," he offered. 
     "Come on, now, Major," I said. "I walked by all those stores 
on the way up here." 
     "They all have mortgages," he replied. "Two thousand is a 
generous offer, Doctor Jones." 
     "I never denied it," I said. "Of course, it stands to reason 
that if two thousand is a generous offer, ten thousand is five 
times as generous." 
     "That is simply out of the question," he said. "Let's split 
it right down the middle: twenty-five hundred pounds." 
     I shook my head. "Well, Major, it looks like we're going to 
be rivals for that poor lonesome widow lady's hand. May the best 
man win, so long as he ain't an Englishman with a price on his 
head." 
     Emily rejoined us just then to inform us that dinner was on 
the table, and we followed her into the dining room, which, like 
the living room, was furnished with a batch of ugly Victorian 
items, in this case a china cabinet with a matching table and four 
dumpy chairs. Horace was sitting on one of the chairs, picking his 
nose thoughtfully, and the Major and I sat down at the head and 
foot of the table. Emily joined us a few seconds later. 
     "I'm sure you gentlemen had lots to talk about," said Emily. 
     "More than you could imagine," I assured her. 
     "Have you known each other long?" she asked. 
     "Oh, we go way back, ma'am," I said. "Of course, Major 
Dobbins goes a lot farther back than I do, me being a young and 
vital God-fearing Christian gentleman in the very prime of life." 
     "My dear Doctor Jones, you must learn not to feel so self-
conscious about your unworldliness and lack of experience," said 
the Major. "After all, immaturity is nothing to be ashamed of. 
You'll undoubtedly outgrow it at about the same time Horace does." 
     With that, Horace got up from the table and stalked out of 
the room. 
     "Have I said something to offend him?" asked the Major with a 
certain degree of satisfaction. 
     "He's a very sensitive boy," Emily replied. 
     "I could tell that right off the bat," I interjected. 
     "He's still trying to find himself," she confided. 
     "Has he tried looking in the kitchen?" I asked. "I mean, if I 
wanted to find Horace, that's the very first place I'd look for 
him." 
     "You must excuse my friend," said the Major. "I'm sure he 
doesn't mean to appear so boorish, but I must also point out that 
it is this very insensitivity that precludes his ever successfully 
raising a child." 
     "Just because you've been littering Africa with children 
don't give you no monopoly on fatherly wisdom," I shot back. "I 
could raise Horace as well as the next man, especially if the next 
man was you." 
     "I'm afraid I don't follow what all this is about," said 
Emily. 
     "Miss Emily," I said, "I got to declare myself here and now. 
I've lost my heart to the radiance of your beauty, and want 
nothing more than to be a husband to you and a good father to 
Horace, teaching him the manly art of self-defense and taking him 
to rugby games of a Sunday afternoon." 
     "This is so sudden!" she said, blushing. "But what about the 
Major?" 
     "He can go out and preach the Word amongst the heathen like I 
been doing," I said. "It might do him a world of good." 
     "I'll need time to think about this," said Emily. 
     "My dear, I urge you not to listen to him," said the Major. 
"If nothing else, think of Horace. Doctor Jones is probably even 
now wanted in some municipality or another for pederasty." 
     "That's a lie!" I shouted. "I ain't never pretended to be a 
foot doctor in my life! Miss Emily, I put it to you: The only 
person at this table who has ever been arrested is the Major." 
     "Is that true, Theodore?" she asked.		. 
     "It was a very trivial matter, my dear," he said. 
     "That's what all them naked ladies said too."
     Emily Perrison gasped and covered her face with her hands. 
     "By gad, sir, I will not be subjected to any further 
vilifications!" roared the Major. "Honor demands satisfaction!" 
     That brought back memories of a lovely young girl I used to 
know back in the States named Honor Weinburger, but before I could 
share this drollery with them the Major was on his feet, pacing 
back and forth and thumping his fist into his palm. 
     "We'll meet at dawn!" he said at last. "Jones, choose your 
weapon!" 
     "How about silence at five hundred paces?" I suggested when I 
saw he was serious. "You could start now." 
     "Pistols!" said the Major. "Pistols at the count of ten." 
     "This is silly, Major," I said. "I ain't never fired a pistol 
in my life, and you ain't never made close friends with anyone who 
could count all the way up to ten." 
     "Humbug!" cried the Major. "You're trying to make a farce out 
of this just to hide your cowardice!" 
     "And you're trying to make a duel out of it because you know 
you ain't got a chance next to a handsome young buck like me," I 
said. "Begging your pardon for being so immodest and truthful, 
ma'am." 
     "May I say something?" asked Emily, who had been looking more 
and more upset. 
     "I'm afraid not, my dear," said the Major. "This is an 
_affaire d'honneur_ now." 
     "But what if I don't want to marry the winner?" she said. 
     "That's absolutely unheard of!" snapped Major Dobbins. 
     "I got to agree with the Major," I said. "If I actually get 
around to risking my life for your hand, I'd just naturally expect 
the rest of you to come with it. 
     "It's _my_ hand," she pointed out.
     "But it's _our_ duel," replied the Major. "Women simply don't 
understand these things." 
     "Now just a minute!" said Emily hotly. 
     "Madame, I love you with a mad undying passion that admits of 
no doubt or weakness, " said the Major, placing a hand to his 
heart. "And I cannot in good conscience allow this scoundrel to 
turn your head and destroy your chance for happiness, to say 
nothing of the detrimental influence he would have on young 
Horace, of whom I could not be more fond if he were my own son." 
     I must confess that I shared his sentiments about Horace, and 
would have been hard pressed to name a situation that could have 
made me any fonder of him either, especially if he were my own 
son. 
     Well, Miss Emily kind of softened when she heard the Major's 
declaration of love and high purpose, which forced me to make a 
similar one, and she finally agreed as to how sometimes affairs of 
honor were kind of honorable. 
     "But I do have one small request, Theodore," she said. 
     "Whatever you wish, my dear," he replied smoothly. 
     "Could you fight your duel at noon instead of sunrise?" 
     "Certainly," he said. "But why?" 
     "I thought we might hold it at the racetrack and charge a 
little something extra for admission. The missions in Chad and the 
Sudan could surely use the money, and somehow all this won't seem 
so futile if it serves a good purpose." 
     "Ah, what a rare treasure one of us is going to be marrying, 
eh?" smiled the Major. 
     "True," I agreed. "And what a lovely woman comes with it."
     The Major harrumphed a couple of times and then got to his 
feet. "Excuse me, one and all, but I think I'd best be returning 
to my apartments," he announced. 
     "But it's only eight o'clock," protested Emily in hurt tones. 
     "True," he acknowledged. "But I plan to have a hard day of 
butchery and bloodletting tomorrow, and I do that sort of thing 
best after a good night's sleep. Why not come along with me, 
Doctor Jones? We can toast one another's good if brief health a 
few times, and you won't be besmirching our dearly beloved lady's 
reputation by spending the night here without a chaperone." 
     "I'd like to oblige you, Major," I said, "but someone ought 
to stay here to protect our fragile flower from jungle beasts and 
other night critters. Don't feel badly about not thinking of it 
yourself, though; it's the kind of thought that would only occur 
to a decent and dedicated young missionary." 
     He glared at me for a couple of minutes, then turned on his 
heel and left. By the time Emily and I got back to the dining room 
we found Horace sitting at the table, working on his fourth piece 
of pie. 
     "You gonna fight for my mum?" he asked between mouthfuls. 
     "It sure appears that that's the course the Lord has in mind 
for me," I said. "Will you be rooting for me, Horace?" 
     "Don't know," he said, downing a quart of milk in a single 
swallow. "Have to see the morning line first." 
     "Horace!" said Emily. 
     "Just boyish enthusiasm," I said, tousling his hair and 
dislodging a couple of flies in the process. "He'll outgrow it if 
he lives long enough."
     We went out to the parlor and had a sip or two of brandy, and 
then I was shown to my room. It seemed that my head had hardly hit 
the pillow before Horace was shaking me and telling me to hurry up 
or else I'd be late for the duel. 
     "Well, they can't start without me," I muttered, sitting up 
on the bed. 
     "I laid twenty shillings on the Major at one-to-two," said 
Horace, "and I don't win if you forfeit." 
     I thanked the little ghoul for his concern, dressed as 
quickly as I could, and walked down to the kitchen, where Emily 
was frying up some eggs. 
     "No time for eating, Mum!" cried Horace, grabbing my arm and 
dragging me to the door. "We're late!" 
     "But..." said Emily. 
     "We're _late!_" repeated Horace, almost in a panic. 
     She sighed, shrugged, and followed us out to a carriage, 
which Horace had already attached to a couple of horses. We flew 
down the streets of Durban as if we were being pulled by 
Exterminator and Old Rosebud, and within twenty minutes or so we 
pulled up at the racetrack. Major Dobbins was waiting for us at 
the finish line with the track steward. 
     "My dear Doctor Jones," he said, extending his hand as we 
approached him. "I trust you slept well. You know, I have been 
giving the matter considerable thought, and have concluded that 
this is really a rather barbaric way of settling our little 
dispute." 
     "My own sentiments exactly," I said. 
     "Would you consider some other means of so doing?" he asked. 
     "Such as?" 
     "We could cut a deck of cards," he said, producing just such 
a deck. 
     "Now just a minute!" said Emily. "I'm not one to encourage 
bloodshed, Lord knows, but while I can see certain justifications 
for an affair of honor, cutting cards for my hand just doesn't 
qualify as such." 
     "Besides," said the steward, "we have charged all thousand 
spectators an extra shilling per head. We're likely to have a riot 
if you call the thing off." 
     "Well, my friend," said the Major, "it would seem that we 
have no choice." He gestured to a track official, who walked up 
with a mahogany box containing two pistols. 
     I was offered first choice, and since they looked alike to me 
I just grabbed the one that was closer. Evidently I did it with 
such skill and swiftness that the crowd thought I knew what I was 
doing, because a little murmur of approval spread through them. 
The Major took the other one and we stood back-to-back at the 
finish line. 
     "At my signal," said the steward, "you will each take ten 
paces, turn, and fire. Any fouls and/or disqualifications will be 
at the discretion of the track's governing board. Are you ready?" 
     "Yes," said the Major. 
     "I suppose so," I said. 
     "Good," said the steward. "Proceed." 
     The Major must have taken quicker steps than me, because I 
heard two shots before I got to my tenth step. 
     "False start!" cried the steward. 
     "Now what?" I asked, turning around. 
     "You do it again until you get it right," said the steward. 
     So we did it again, and this time we turned and faced each 
other at the same instant. I heard a lot of shots coming from the 
Major's direction, and I just closed my eyes, pointed the gun 
toward him, and kept firing until I was out of bullets. 
     "Halt!" cried the steward. 
     "What now?" demanded the Major.
     "You wounded nine spectators and killed a mule," said the 
steward disgustedly. "Are you sure you want to continue with 
this?" 
     "Absolutely," said the Major. 
     "All right, then," said the steward as we re-loaded our 
weapons. "This time get back to back and only go five paces. Maybe 
_that_ will help." 
     Well, to make a long story short, we each fired off six more 
bullets, and nothing much happened except that we took the head 
off a Guinea hen that had wandered onto the track by mistake. The 
crowd started getting ugly then, and one of them threw a rock that 
grazed the Major's skull. 
     "Foul!" he cried, and fell to the dirt track. 
     "How is he?" I asked, moseying over. 
     "'Tis a far far better thing I do than I have ever done," 
said the Major. 
     "Oh, get up!" snapped the steward. "I've seen fly bites draw 
more blood than that!" 
     The Major got uneasily to his feet and waved a victory sign 
to the crowd, which booed in return. 
     "May I make a suggestion?" said the steward. 
     "Shoot," I said, and the Major hit the ground again. "What's 
the matter now?" I asked, helping him to his feet. 
     "You might select your words a little more carefully," he 
said sternly. 
     "My suggestion?" said the steward impatiently. 
     "Go ahead," I said. 
     "Since you two are not the most skillful marksmen I have ever 
seen, I suggest that we might bring this unhappy affair of honor 
to a conclusion a mite quicker if you switched to swords." 
     "A capital suggestion!" cried the Major enthusiastically. 
     A moment later a couple of military sabers were brought out. 
They had to show me how to hold mine, but the Major grabbed his 
like it was an old friend and started swishing it through the air 
as if he was slicing mosquitoes in half. 
     "Are you ready?" asked the steward. 
     "Not by a long shot," I said, still trying out how to hold it 
without sticking my thumb over the bell. 
     "Too damned bad," said the steward. "Proceed." 
     The Major gave me a great big grin and a great big salute 
with his sword, and I figured that me and the Lord would be 
hobnobbing in person in just a couple more seconds. Then he lunged 
forward at me, and I heard something that sounded like a gunshot, 
only louder. 
     "Owww!" he screamed, and I noticed that he was standing still 
as a statue, which was kind of difficult since he was all 
stretched out, one leg dragging behind him and one arm extended 
toward me. 
     "What happened?" I asked him, putting my sword down and 
staring at him with my hands on my hips. 
     "I must have thrown my back out!" he grated. "I can't move!" 
     Well, me and the steward called time out and tried to 
straighten the Major up, but he sure enough wasn't kidding about 
being stuck in that position. After about ten minutes we gave up 
and I walked over to Emily Perrison. 
     "Miss Emily," I said, "I just don't think I'd feel right 
about killing the Major under these conditions, him being helpless 
and all -- and especially not with so many witnesses." 
     "I understand," she said, patting my hand. "It's your 
Christian goodness rising to the fore." 
     "I'm glad nobody got killed," I said. 
     "So am I," she smiled. 
     "I'm not," said Horace sullenly. 
     "Well, then," I said, "if you'll just name the happy date, 
Miss Emily, I'll announce our nuptials to all and sundry." 
     "I've been giving the matter some serious thought during 
these past few minutes, Lucifer," she said slowly, "and I have 
decided to give myself in marriage to Major Dobbins." 
     "But why?" I said. "I mean, I could go over and slice him up 
a little if that's all that stands in the way of our getting 
hitched." 
     "It's more than that, Lucifer," she said. "You're so good and 
pure and true, such a Christian gentleman, that you'd never be 
happy tied down to a family in a dull little city like Durban when 
you could be off converting cannibals and lepers and the like. 
Whereas Major Dobbins, on the other hand, has a certain weakness 
of the spirit that makes his salvation a real challenge to me." 
     "But Miss Emily, _I_ can be just as weak as _he_ can!" I 
protested. 
     "No, I won't hear of it," she said firmly. "You're too good 
for me, Lucifer. It's the Major who wanted my money, while you 
only wanted to serve our God." 
     "Suppose I wanted your money, too," I said. "Would that make 
a difference to you?" 
     "Don't be silly!" she laughed. "You're too fine and pure to 
think such sordid thoughts." 
     "I am?" I asked unhappily. 
     "Absolutely. Now you and the Major will each get what you 
want, and I'll have made both of you happy." 
     "But..." 
     "Onward Christian Soldier!" she cried with a wild evangelical 
gleam in her eye. 
     I took one last look at Horace and decided that staying 
single might not be the worst of all possible fates, so I took my 
leave of Durban while they were still trying to decide whether to 
take the Major to a doctor or coat him over with paint and use him 
as a lawn statue. 
     I camped north of town that night and had a little heart-to-
heart with my Silent Partner, who pointed out that He had littered 
South Africa with diamonds and other baubles and that, as long as 
I was here anyway, this might not be a bad time to look for them. 
     It sounded good to me, and I headed inland in search of my 
fortune, determined to keep no diamonds under eighteen carats.

Chapter 9

                         THE LOST RACE

     You know, diamonds are a lot harder to find than you might 
think. 
     I must have spent the better part of two weeks looking in 
caves and gorges and riverbeds and valleys and abandoned rock 
quarries without finding a single one. I even checked out a couple 
of exotic-looking orchards, just in case I was dead wrong about 
where diamonds came from, but I finally had to admit that there 
was more to the diamond-prospecting business than met the eye.
     Since I was fresh out of funds (actually, there's wasn't 
nothing _fresh_ about it -- I'd been out of funds for quite a long 
time), I took a job dealing faro when I hit Germiston, a quaint 
little village a few of miles east of Johannesburg. I gave it 
up after a couple of days, though, after I earned enough money to 
buy a second-hand Chautauqua tent. 
     I supplemented my meager preaching income by hosting a few 
friendly games of bingo until I realized that the bingo cards were 
costing me more than I was winning from the natives, since there 
wasn't much of a market for warthogs' teeth and such other trinkets 
as they used for legal tender, and finally I made up my mind to 
light out for Nairobi the next day to see if I couldn't scare up a 
little more money in British East Africa than I was finding in the 
Down Under side of the continent.
     I told my helpers to show up at noon for their severance pay, 
but then I got to thinking about the story of Job and decided that 
a little hardship and disappointment was probably just the kind of 
strengthening and hardening their spirits needed, so I turned in 
early and made up my mind to leave town a bit before daybreak. I 
was snoring away in my hotel room, minding my own business and not 
bothering no one, when I was awakened by the sound of a door 
opening. 
     I sat up, rubbed my eyes, and saw as pretty a little lady as 
I had ever experienced standing in my doorway. She was dressed all 
in blue silks and veils that didn't hide half as much as she 
thought they did, and she had the strangest headdress topping her 
yellow hair.
     "Have you got it?" she whispered, walking into the room and 
closing the door behind her.
     "Ma'am," I said with a smile, "I've got _it_, and to spare. 
To what do I owe the distinct pleasure of this here nocturnal 
visitation?" 
     "The Malaloki armband," she said. "Where is it?"
     "Probably in Malaloki, wherever that may be," I answered. 
"However, you're welcome to search every inch of me, which I'm 
sure you'll agree is a pretty generous offer to make to a total 
stranger." 
     "But you _must_ have it!" she hissed. 
     "I don't know what you're talking about," I answered.
     "You _are_ Lucifer Jones, are you not?"
     "The Right Reverend Lucifer Jones at your service," I said. 
"You _sure_ you don't want to search me for this here armband?"
     "This is not a matter for levity," she said sternly.
     "Neither is breaking and entering," I pointed out. "Though," 
I added, "the Lord does teach us to forgive our brother's 
trespasses. Of course, He don't say much about our sister's 
trespasses, but I'm sure you and me can work something out if we 
just put our heads together."
     "I will ask you one more time: Where is it?"
     "I don't know," I said with a shrug. "On the other hand, I  
sure am glad that you've asked me for the last time. What would
you like to talk about now?"
     She looked at me, frowned, and opened the door, and before I 
knew it two big white guys dressed in leopardskin robes had burst 
into the room and were threatening me with spears. They both had 
on the same kind of headdresses as the girl, kind of feathery with 
a couple of little jewels right at the front hanging down over
their foreheads, but somehow the headdresses didn't look as good 
on them, or maybe it was just that they kept jabbing me in the 
short ribs with the points of their weapons.
     "I must have that armband, Mister Jones," said the girl.
     "_Doctor_ Jones," I corrected her, sucking in my stomach as 
far as I could as the spears kept pressing against it. 
     "Make no mistake about it, Doctor Jones," she said. "Two men 
have already died this evening."
     "I hope it wasn't nothin' catching," I said with as much 
compassion as I could muster, which truth to tell wasn't near as 
much as I might have had under other circumstances.
     "They died because of the Malaloki armband," she said 
meaningfully.
     "What is it -- some kind of rasslin' hold?" I asked.
     "An ancient and sacred ornament of the Malaloki, which may be 
worn only by one of our gods."
     "Well, I hate to disappoint a lovable little lady like 
yourself," I said, "but despite my handsome and clean-cut good 
looks, I ain't no god."
     "The Malaloki armband was stolen two moons past by a disloyal 
subject," she continued impassively. "We traced it to Germiston, 
and here we lost it -- until tonight. The man who had stolen it 
had traded it for food and other worldly goods, the storekeeper 
had sold it to a Boer, the Boer had given it to a black house 
servant, and the servant lost it to you in a game of chance. You 
have it, and now you must give it to us or your life shall be 
forfeit." 
     "But I ain't seen any armbands!" I said as they began 
prodding me a little harder with their spear tips. "Not gold nor 
silver nor brass nor any kind."
     "_Wait!_" she commanded, holding her hand imperiously above 
her head, and suddenly the two guys with the weapons backed off a 
bit. "Possibly you do not as yet know the shape and texture of 
that about which I speak. The Malaloki armband has no commercial 
value, but is made of shells joined together in a mystic design of 
overwhelming power and import."  
     "Well, why didn't you say so in the first place?" I said. "I 
took in what I thought was a little ankle bracelet made of strung-
together shells."
     "The _armband_!" she exclaimed, finally showing some emotion, 
even if not the kind I would have preferred to see from a blonde 
in a see-through blue wraparound. 
     "I think it's worthless, you think it's priceless," I said. 
"How's about we split the difference and I trade it to you for a 
couple of them jewels off your headdresses, unless they got some 
special religious significance too?" 
     "Doctor Jones," she said, "we will trade you your life for 
the armband. That should constitute a considerable profit for 
you." 
     "Considering the alternative, I suppose I could do a mite 
worse," I admitted begrudgingly.
     "Where is it?"
     "I've got a whole bag of junk -- begging your pardon -- over 
at my tent. Wait'll I get my clothes on, and I'll take you there." 
     Which I did, though we must have made a funny-looking sight 
stalking through the narrow streets of Germiston at three in the 
morning. I couldn't see much sense returning to the hotel just to 
wake the desk clerk, so I slipped a deck of cards into my pocket 
and made up my mind to head right off for Nairobi once our 
business was done.
     When we got to the tent it turned out that none of us had any 
matches, so I just started walking around, kind of feeling blindly 
for the bag. After a couple of minutes I stepped on something that 
made a pretty loud crunching sound, and I knew that I had found 
the trinket.
     The girl ran over and started pulling stuff out of the bag, 
and a couple of seconds later she gave out a shriek that would 
have woke such dead as weren't otherwise occupied at the time.
     "What seems to be the problem, ma'am?" I asked out of an 
innate sense of courtesy.
     "It's broken!" she cried, holding up a bunch of busted shells 
that were hanging together by a few torn threads.
     "That's a shame," I said sympathetically. "Maybe you could 
hunt up some clams or oysters or something and stitch up a 
replacement." 
     "You do not understand what this means," she wept.
     "Maybe even lobster shells," I added thoughtfully. "There's a 
pretty good seafood shop over in Johannesburg, and..." 
     "Silence!" roared one of the two men, pointing his spear at 
me.
     I didn't see much sense in making helpful suggestions if that 
was the way they had been taught to respond to an act of Christian 
goodwill, so I just stood there while the three of them went into 
a little pow-wow. Finally they broke it up and the girl walked 
over to me.
     "You will come with us," she announced.
     "I really had other plans," I said, and started telling her 
about how I aimed to build the Tabernacle of Saint Luke. I got 
about three sentences into my story when one of the men started 
jabbing me with his spear again.
     "You will come with us," she repeated. "You will speak to our 
gods and tell them how the armband came to be broken, and possibly 
they will spare our lives."
     I took another close look at all their various jewels, which 
sure seemed pretty common and unimportant to them, and made up my 
mind on the spot. "I'll be happy to come along with you," I said 
with a great big smile. "You may not know it, but speaking to gods 
is one of the very best things I do, me being a man of the cloth 
and all." 
     We stepped out of the tent and began walking to the north. 
After we had gotten a couple of miles out of town, the girl turned 
to me again.
     "I hope you understand, Doctor Jones," she said, "that any 
attempt to escape while we make our way to Malaloki will be dealt 
with severely."
     "I give you my word as a Christian and a gentleman that such 
a thought ain't never crossed my mind," I said truthfully, 
naturally assuming that such a verbal contract expired once we got 
to wherever they kept their jewels.
     Well, we walked and we walked and then we walked some more. I 
kept assuming that Cairo or Marrakech would pop into view any 
second, but she assured me that we were still in South Africa, and 
that we weren't heading no farther than Nyasaland, which I hadn't 
never heard of before, and which I now began picturing as a great 
huge field of grass with a bunch of baby nyasas hopping around on 
it. 
     During our trek I learned that her name was Melora, and that 
she had learned her English from some missionaries, which was kind 
of surprising because it seemed like everyone I had met in Africa 
had learned their English from missionaries and yet I was the only 
bonafide missionary that I knew of wandering around in the bush. 
She surprised me still further by saying that her native tongue 
wasn't French or German or Portugese or anything like that, but 
was the Malaloki dialect, which was the first time I learned that 
they invented languages as well as armbands. 
     We were about ten days into our little journey when we 
crossed into Nyasaland. The landscape started changing, and pretty 
soon the bushland turned into a kind of gently rolling forest 
filled with gently rolling rhinos and leopards and other fearsome 
beasts that looked like they wanted nothing more than a little 
snack made of Christian missionary and maybe a little bit of 
blonde Malaloki for dessert, but our two big spearmen managed to 
bluff all the animals away, which was undoubtedly for the best  
since I couldn't see how they could reload a spear if their first 
fling missed, and we passed through the forest unscathed except 
for tick bites and mosquito bites and fly bites and being bothered 
by some rude maribou storks that kept flying overhead right after 
they'd had lunch, and finally we came to a great big volcanic 
crater stuck right in the middle of a long plateau.
     I figured that we were going to hike around it, but Melora 
walked straight ahead an d started following a narrow little path 
up the side of it. I grabbed hold of her arm and explained that 
while the top of the crater was undoubtedly a good sight closer to 
God and Heaven, she didn't have to do this on my account, as I was 
perfectly content to worship Him from afar, or at least ground 
level, for a few more years, and besides the path disappeared a 
couple of hundred yards ahead of us.
     For a woman with a short little nose, she sure made a 
production of looking down it at me. Finally she yanked her arm 
loose and started climbing again. I called ahead to her that I was 
going to start back down to the base of the volcano and would meet 
her on the other side, but no sooner were the words out of my 
mouth than the two big guys started jabbing me with their spears 
again, so I didn't have no choice but to follow her.
     I did so for maybe a hundred yards when suddenly she just 
upped and vanished. I mean, one second I was following that 
beautiful round bottom up the path, which in truth was all the 
kept me going, and the next second she was gone, beautiful bottom 
and all. I stopped, scratched my head, and looked around, but 
couldn't see hide nor hair of her, which was a considerable amount 
of hide and hair to vanish from the earth all at once. Then I felt 
a hand on my arm, and I was dragged off the path into a narrow 
little tunnel.
     "Where are we?" I whispered.
     "Just follow me," said Melora.
     "Follow you?" I repeated. "I can't even _see_ you."
     "Grab my hand," she said.
     I reached out for it.
     "_That_, Doctor Jones, is _not_ my hand."
     I apologized, and after a little more groping around I 
finally got ahold of what I was supposed to get ahold of, and 
pretty soon we were wending our way through this damp, winding 
tunnel. After about ten minutes of walking into walls and into 
Melora, who may have been softer than the walls but wasn't a whole 
lot friendlier or more understanding, we emerged onto a large 
ledge overlooking a village on the grassy floor of the dead 
volcano. 
     "Malaloki?" I asked.
     She nodded.
     A little river wended its way amongst the thatched huts, then 
went out through a hole it had carved out of one of the walls. 
This crater didn't hold a candle to some of the larger ones I was 
aware of, like for instance the Ngorongoro Crater in Tanganyika, 
but one the other hand the Ngorongoro Crater wasn't awash in 
jewels and blonde women, so I didn't feel no great disappointment 
with my current surroundings.
     Melora waited until the two big guys had joined us, then led 
the way down another winding trail to the base of the wall.
     A bunch of white women wearing even less than Melora raced up 
and jabbered at her in some foreign tongue. She talked right back 
at them, just as quick and incomprehensible, and took me by the 
hand and led me through the village until we came to the biggest 
hut, which was located smack-dab in the center. Then she bowed and 
backed away.
     In front of the hut were two grass hammocks, and in each 
hammock was a grubby-looking white man with a bushy beard. One of 
them must have been close to seven feet tall, and the other 
couldn't have been more than an inch or two over five feet. Both 
of them were wearing khaki pants that had been cut off above the 
knees, and they each had a batch of necklaces made out of emeralds 
and sapphires and rubies and other colorful baubles.
     "Well, look what we got here, brother," said the big one.
     "Sure as hell don't look like no Malaloki I ever seen," said 
the little one.
     "What's your name, stranger?" asked the big one.
     "The Honorable Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones at your 
service," I said, stooping over in a courtly bow. "Begging your 
pardon, but you gents sure don't sound like Malalokis from what 
little I've heard you speak."
     "Neither do you," said the little one.
     "No reason why I should," I said. "I'm an American."
     "So are we," said the big one.
     "Of course," added the little one, "we're also gods, but 
around these here parts the two ain't necessarily incompatible." 
     "In fact," continued the big one, "along with being gods and 
Americans, we're also brothers. I'm Frothingham Schmidt and he's 
Oglethorpe Schmidt, but them who would consider themselves our 
friends, or at least express an interest in ever seeing another 
sunrise, call us Long Schmidt and Short Schmidt."
     "I'm Short Schmidt," said the little one.
     "Well, I'm mighty glad to find a couple of countrymen here," 
I said. "You wouldn't happen to have a little something for a 
thirsty traveler, with maybe just enough alcohol to whip the tar 
out of the germs?"
     "First things first," said Long Schmidt. "We ain't set foot 
outside our little kingdom in six years, and we got some important 
questions to ask about the rest of the world."
     "And well you should," I said. "You'll be pleased and happy 
to know that we won the War to End All Wars."
     "Who gives a damn about that?" said Short Schmidt. "We're 
Pittsburgh boys, Pittsburgh born and bred. Where did the Pirates 
finish last 

year?"
     "Third or fourth, as I recollect," I answered.
     "_Damn_ that John McGraw!" said Long Schmidt. "Tell me, 
Doctor Jones -- who won the Kentucky Derby of 1917?" 
     "Seems to me that it was Omar Khayyam," I said.
     "Yahoo!" cried Short Schmidt, tossing a necklace into the 
air. "If we ever get back to Casey's Bar, old Flathead Mahoney is 
gonna owe me a double sawbuck!"
     "We didn't mean to forget our manners, Doctor Jones," said 
Long Schmidt. "It's just that certain things are very important to 
us. Now we'll join you in that drink." He clapped his hands twice, 
and a couple of ripe young maidens brought us a round of fruit 
drinks, with just a little something extra added.
     "So, Doctor Jones," said Short Schmidt when we had all had a 
couple of long swallows, "what brings you to the kingdom of the 
Malaloki?" 
     "Friendship, curiosity, an adventurous spirit, and mostly a 
woman named Melora," I said.
     "Ah, yes, Melora," said Short Schmidt. "Lovely girl."
     "Our wife," added Long Schmidt.
     "One of 'em, anyway," said Short Schmidt. "Truth to tell, 
Jones, the blasted village is damned near overflowing with 
goddesses-by-marriage." 
     "Easy now, brother," said Long Schmidt. "Doctor Jones is a 
man of the cloth. Perhaps he disapproves."
     "No such a thing," I assured them. "Solomon had a pile of 
wives, and the Good Book never said a word against him." 
     "Doctor Jones," said Short Schmidt with a smile, "you got the 
makings of a right friendly neighbor."
     "Thank you kindly," I said. "You fellers mind if I ask you a 
couple of questions?"
     "Go right ahead," said Short Schmidt.
     "Who are the Malaloki, and how'd you ever get to be gods 
here?" 
     "Well, that's kind of a long story, Doctor Jones," said Long 
Schmidt. "Me and Short came over to Africa seven years ago to 
scare us up some diamonds. Didn't seem that hard when we planned 
it, but I'll be damned if we could find a single one."
     "Diamond mines is well hid in these parts," I agreed. 
     "_Mines?_" exclaimed Short Schmidt. "Son of a bitch! We 
thunk they grew inside oysters!" 
     "That's pearls," I said. "Did you find any of them, at 
least?" 
     "Never even found an oyster," said Short Schmidt. "Came near 
to getting et by crocodiles a couple of times."
     "Oh," I said. "Well, if you ever go oyster hunting again, I 
think you'll have a little more luck in the ocean than in the 
rivers." 
     "We ain't likely to ever see a ocean again," said Long 
Schmidt mournfully. "Let me get back to the main thrust of our 
tragic story, Doctor Jones, so you'll know why we're so happy to 
see you."
     "Be my guest," I said, taking another drink that one of the 
local maidens offered me.
     "Like Short told you, we came here to seek fame and fortune, 
mostly the latter. Matter of fact, we had a little more fame with 
the local constabularies than we could handle, which is how we 
came to take our leave of the civilized portions of Africa and 
head inland."
     "We set up shop as traders," added Short Schmidt. "We'd make 
a round of the Zulus, swapping brass cartridges for goats. Then 
we'd trade the goats for salt, trade the salt for cattle, and sell 
the cattle at market. It was a tidy little business." 
     "So what happened?" I asked.
     "Well, we had a little difference of opinion with a tribe 
called the Shona about whether having a couple of friendly drinks 
and smokes together constitutes a bonafide proposition of 
marriage, and we had to take our leave of them a little more 
quickly than we would have liked."
     "Perfectly understandable," I said.
     "My thoughts precisely," said Long Schmidt. "I just wish the 
Shona could have seen it that way. Anyway, we took off in the 
middle of the night, and since our bushcraft ain't exactly up to 
snuff, especially by Shona standards, we kept on running for two 
days and two nights, just to make sure that we weren't being 
followed too closely."
     "And on the third morning," continued Short Schmidt, "we ran 
up against this here crater. We were both feeling kind of tired 
and out of sorts, what with having been running for our lives all 
that time, so we thought we'd climb up the wall of the crater a 
way and take a little rest once we were out of sight. Well, we 
stumbled onto some tunnel or other, and an hour later here we 
were, surrounded by the lost tribe of the Malaloki."
     "Of course, they ain't so lost as they was," added Long 
Schmidt, "with both of us and now you stumbling across them, but 
they're lost enough. I don't think we'll ever get out of here."
     "Make up your mind," I said. "Are you gods or are you 
prisoners?" 
     "Well, truth to tell," said Short Schmidt, "there seems to be 
a fine and highly technical legal line between the two. Seems that 
their legends told of a couple of gods who would come here 
disguised as white men."
     "Well, you got no problem that I can see," I said
     "Hah!" snorted Long Schmidt.
     "The problem," said Short Schmidt, "is that two _other_ white 
guys wandered in here about fifty years ago, and after they'd got 
all the ladies pregnant and picked up the choicer gemstones, they 
just up and left." 
     "So the Malaloki have decided that as long as we stay here we 
must be gods, and we can do damned near anything we want," 
continued Long Schmidt. "But the second we leave, we've proved 
that we're just men after all, and they've got about twenty beefy 
young men on the other side of that crater wall waiting to make 
pincushions out of us."
     "I can see where that might get to be a nuisance," I agreed. 
     "That's why we sent Melora after you," said Short Schmidt.
     "By the way," I said, "I'm supposed to tell you that Melora 
didn't break the sacred armband. I kind of stomped on it 
accidentally." 
     "'Tain't noways sacred anyhow," said Short Schmidt. "We knew 
that one of the young bucks was going to Germiston for some seeds 
to plant, so we snuck it into his pouch and told Melora that he'd 
went and swiped a sacred object."
     "How come?" I asked.
     "Melora ain't exactly the most humorous critter we've ever 
run into," said Long Schmidt. "We figured she'd move heaven and 
earth to get that armband back, and we were kind of hoping that 
she'd wipe out enough locals so that someone would follow her back 
here, like maybe an army or something big like that." 
     "So while we're delighted to see a fellow countryman, and 
especially one who knows how the Pirates are doing these days," 
said Short Schmidt, "I'd have to say that on the whole you 
represent a considerable disappointment to us, meaning no 
offense."
     "None taken," I said. "Who _are_ the Malaloki, anyway?"
     "As near as we can figure it," said Long Schmidt, "they're 
the descendants of some Roman outpost. Probably been living in the 
crater some fifteen hundred years or so. A few of 'em leave every 
now and then to buy things we can get down here and to learn a 
little English, but they always come back. For a while there we 
and Short really talked up the outside world in the hope that one 
by one they'd all go out and make their way and leave us alone 
here with the jewels, but so far it ain't happened."
     "So here we are," concluded Short Schmidt, "gods of the 
Malaloki, with the power of life and death over our subjects and 
every whim catered to -- so long as we don't walk more than six 
hundred yards from where we are now. We may never see the Pirates 
again!" 
     "Power of life and death, you say?" I asked.
     "We're gods, ain't we?" 
     "Why not kill 'em off and just walk out free as birds?" I 
suggested." 
     "We've thunk it over long and hard," admitted Short Schmidt. 
"But while we don't back off none at a little serious swindling 
and cardsharking, murdering a whole lost tribe would probably put 
us off our feed."
     "Of course, we may eventually get around to killing off all 
the menfolk," added Long Schmidt. "I don't like the way they look 
at us whenever we get married, which is pretty damned often now 
that I come to think of it."
     "Well, now, brothers," I said, "you sound right happy and 
fulfilled as things stand. What in the world would you do if you 
ever got out of here?"
     "Run like hell," said Short Schmidt devoutly.
     "I mean after that," I said.
     "See if we couldn't land us a grubstake and marry us a couple 
of good women and settle down, making sure to buy lifetime season 
tickets to the Pirates. Is old Honus Wagner still playing for 
them?" 
     "He quit five or six years back, as I recollect," I said.
     "Damn!" said Short Schmidt. "No wonder they ain't won any 
pennants to speak of."
     "_Damn_ that John McGraw and his Giants!" added Long Schmidt 
passionately. 
     I could see they were bound and determined to talk about 
baseball for a few hours, so I decided that it was a good time to 
take my leave of them. "Well," I said, "this has been a 
fascinating experience, hobnobbing with a couple of flesh-and-
blood gods and seeing a lost civilization and all, but I think 
maybe the time has come for me to depart."
     "What makes you think _you're_ going anywhere?" demanded Long 
Schmidt. 
     "What reason have you got to keep me?" I said. "I told you 
everything I know about baseball, and nobody's got around to 
declaring me a god yet."
     "First you got to help us get out of here," said Short 
Schmidt. "After all, fair is fair."
     "I don't see nothing fair about it," I said, getting a little 
hot under the collar.
     "Don't look so glum, Jones," said Long Schmidt. "If you 
actually _do_ figure a way to get us out of here, we'll let you 
scoop up a handful of gems on the way out." 
     Which of course put a whole new light on things.
     I let one of their wives lead me to a little hut, and I lay 
down in a hammock and divided my attention between her and the 
problem at hand, spending most of the night tackling first one and 
then the other. And by morning I had the solution.
     I hunted up Melora, who was about as giggly as ever, which is 
to say not at all, and told her that I had hit upon a way to turn 
her gods and husbands into a pair of contented stay-at-homes.
     "Truly?" she said, her eyes widening.
     "Trust me," I said confidently.
     "It is almost too much to ask."
     "It all depends on you, Melora," I told her.
     "What must I do?" she asked.
     "I want you to pick up a couple of rubies or emeralds from 
wherever it is you guys are hiding them, and then go on a little 
shopping trip to Germiston for me."
     I had to explain what I wanted two or three times before she 
finally understood, and I told her to make sure to take a couple 
of husky lads along to haul my purchase back.
     Then, after she left sometime around noon, I brought out the 
Good Book and decided to see if I couldn't bring a little of the 
true religion to these white heathen and get them to cast their 
false gods out into the cold, just in case my other idea didn't 
work. 
     Well, I was at it for the better part of three weeks and no 
one got converted, but we all had a fine old time singing hymns 
and trying to live up to the doings and deeds of all them holy 
men, especially in regard to all the begatting they did.
     The Malaloki were fair to middling cooks, and were the first 
of Roman descent I'd run across who didn't smother everything in 
tomatoes and mozzarella cheese. The Schmidt brother had shown them 
how to make a kind of wine from fermented fruits that didn't taste 
too good but packed one hell of a punch, and between the eating 
and the drinking and the begatting I sure couldn't see why they 
were so all-fired eager to leave. 
     Twenty days after Melora left she returned, with her two 
companions lugging a batch of packages. I had them put the stuff 
into my hut before the brothers saw them, and went to work. When I 
was done assembling everything, I made sure it all worked and then 
called Long Schmidt and Short Schmidt over.
     "What have you got to show us, Jones?" said Long Schmidt, 
ducking his head down to get in through my doorway.
     "Looks kind of like a radio," said Short Schmidt.
     "Shortwave," I said.
     "Should that mean something?" asked Long Schmidt.
     I held the earphones between them and started cranking the 
dynamo. 
     _"The Pirates lead two to nothing in the seventh, and John
McGraw is calling Heinie Groh back and is sending Frankie Frisch
up to pinch-hit with runners on first and--"_
     I pulled a tube out of the set and smashed it on the floor of 
the hut.
     "My God!" wailed Short Schmidt. "What have you done?"
     "Nothing much," I said pleasantly. "I got a spare hidden 
away." 
     "Where?" screamed Long Schmidt in agonized tones.
     "Why, if I told you, it wouldn't be hidden much longer, would 
it?" I asked.
     "Fix it!" screamed Short Schmidt.
     "It's _my_ radio," I said. "I put it together and I attached 
it to the dynamo and I even laid six hundred feet of antenna up 
the side of the crater. I'll fix it when I feel like listening to 
it again. Right now, though, I'm planning on taking a nap." 
     "We'll kill you!" bellowed Long Schmidt, tears streaming down 
his bearded face.
     "That ain't going to get you your tube," I said.
     "What do you want for it?" said Short Schmidt, getting down 
on his knees and sobbing a little.
     "Oh, nothing much," I answered. "Maybe just my freedom and a 
handful of gemstones to tide me over during hard times."
     "That was to be your reward for getting us out of here," said 
Long Schmidt accusingly.
     "Why not think over your position for a minute?" I said. "You 
got more wives than you can shake a stick at, you got a couple of 
cushy lifetime jobs with no heavy lifting, and you got the 
Pittsburgh Pirates just a couple of huts away. You got more 
precious stones than anyone ever thought existed, and nice 
weather, and three squares a day. Are you sure you really _want_ 
to leave?" 
     They put their heads together and muttered under their 
breaths for a while. Then Short Schmidt walked over to his own hut 
and returned a minute later with a big metal box.
     "One handful," he said, opening it up. "No more."
     I reached in and pulled out a fistful of rubies and sapphires 
and other such trinkets and stuffed them into my pockets. Then I 
took them out behind my hut to a little spot I'd marked, dug down 
about five or six inches with my fingers, and handed them the 
tube. 
     "Anything I can do for you two when I reach civilization?" I 
asked, preparing to take my leave of them while they were fiddling 
with the shortwave. "Any messages you want me to deliver?"
     "Just send a note to our folks back in Pittsburgh telling 
them we're okay," said Short Schmidt. "And maybe find a way to 
tell the Pirates they need more left-handed pitching."
     Just then the Giants score three runs in the top of the 
eighth, and I could see that there wasn't much sense in trying to 
talk to them any longer, as they were spending all their energy 
calling down their godly wrath on John McGraw, so I took my leave 
of them.
     Melora shot me the first smile I had ever seen from her and 
walked me to the tunnel and guided me through and didn't even 
holler when I didn't exactly grab her hand again.
     We finally made it to the plateau that the crater sat on. I 
kissed her good-bye real courtly-like and, with a handsome fortune 
in my pockets, I set off for civilization with the happy knowledge 
that me and God would finally be co-landlords of the Tabernacle of 
Saint Luke.


Chapter 10

                       THE LORD OF THE JUNGLE


     Me and the Lord spent the next couple of weeks walking in a 
northerly direction and discussing just how much of our modest 
fortune should go into the actual building of our tabernacle and 
how much should be held back for the two of us to live on.
     I also learned that having a pocketful of gemstones is a hell 
of a lot different from wanting one. Now that I was a wealthy man, 
I was so worried about highwaymen and other rogues robbing a law-
abiding citizen like myself that I carefully avoided all cities 
and military outposts, and even made a huge detour that took me a 
good forty miles out of my way rather than chance running into a 
safari that I heard up ahead.
     In point of fact, it was all this maneuvering that got me 
lost. I started hitting one forest after another, which I knew 
meant I was having some slight difficulty, since British East 
ain't got no forests, and pretty soon there weren't any gaps at 
all between them, and then it started doing a little serious 
nonstop raining, and I soon got to the point where I would gladly 
have traded the Lord's share of the stones for a raincoat and a 
map. 
     Also, as I walked along I kept getting the feeling that I was 
being watched by unseen eyes, which in my broad experience on the 
Dark Continent are the very worst kind of eyes to be watched by. 
Finally one day I started seeing huge manlike shapes way off in 
the distance, so I figured I was in gorilla country and spent most 
of my waking hours trying to recollect whether or not gorillas ate 
people. I even did a little serious lumbering and grunting in the 
hope that they might think I was one of them, but then I got to 
figuring that I looked pretty feminine as gorillas went and I 
didn't want to have to fight off no impassioned bull gorillas, or 
even bull chimpanzees if push came to shove, so I went back to 
walking like the good-looking God-fearing white man that I am.
     I spent another couple of days in the muck and mire of the 
forest floor and was just about sure I was lost beyond salvation 
when an arrow thudded home about three inches from my head as I 
leaned up against a huge old tree. I looked up just in time to see 
a tall, bronzed white man wearing nothing but a dagger and 
loincloth step out from behind some bushes, with a bow and a 
couple of arrows clutched in his right hand.
     "What are you doing in my jungle?" he demanded in deep, stern 
tones. 
     "Looking for a way out," I told him sincerely.
     "And who are you?" he asked, glaring at me.
     "The Right Reverend Honorable Doctor Lucifer Jones at your 
service," I said, flashing him a big Sunday-morning smile. 
"Preaching and salvation done cheap, with a group rate for 
funerals." 
     "Good!" he said, sighing deeply and looking mightily 
relieved. "I was afraid you might be from Barrow, Phillips, and 
Smythe."
     "Who are they?"
     "My British creditors."
     "You expect them to follow you here?" I asked.
     "You've no idea how firm their resolve can be," he said. 
"Allow me to introduce myself. I am John Caldwell, Lord 
Bloomstoke." 
     "Make up your mind," I said.
     "I beg your pardon?"
     "Which are you: Caldwell or Bloomstoke?"
     "Both. One is a title. Unfortunately, it costs a lot more to 
support a title these days than it ever used to, and finally I had 
to flee the country to avoid my creditors and their solicitors."
     "But why here?" I asked. "I ain't seen naught but grubworms 
and an occasional monkey in days."
     "I thought I was purchasing an up-to-date plantation," he 
admitted. "You can imagine my distress when I found out that what 
I really owned was six square miles of the Ituri Rain Forest."
     "Who'd you buy it from?" I asked, just out of politeness.
     "A realtor with absolutely impeccable credentials," replied 
Bloomstoke. "What was his name now? Ah, yes -- Von Horst."
     "Figgers," I said.
     "You know of him?"
     "In a manner of speaking," I answered. "How long have you 
been out here?"
     "Four years, as near as I can tell." 
     "That's a long time to be stuck in the bush," I remarked. 
"What do you do to keep from going nuts?"
     "Oh, I spend a lot of the time talking to my friends," he 
said.   
     "Friends?" I repeated. "You got friends stashed away around 
here?" 
     "Watch," he said with a smile. Then he put his fingers to his 
lips and let out a weird whistle, and a couple of minutes later a 
pair of gorillas broke into a clearing about thirty yards away. 
Bloomstoke immediately started jabbering at them in some gutteral 
language I hadn't never heard before, and they nodded their heads 
and disappeared back into the forest.
     "Are you telling me they understand you?" I asked.
     "Absolutely," he said. "I studied French at Oxford. There's 
very little difference, except that apes have only the haziest 
understanding of the future imperfect except as it relates to 
hunting for grubworms."
     "You're pulling my leg, right?"
     "Not a bit." He smiled. "If you have any messages for them, 
I'll be happy to translate for you. Of course, you have to be a 
little careful with your idioms. For example, if I were to tell 
them that you thought we were pulling your leg, and I didn't 
remember to drop half a tone on the double _arrrgeth_ sound, they 
would immediately come over and pull your leg off." He paused. 
"But aside from such minor technicalities, we have quite excellent 
conversations. Of course, it's not as if they can discuss Plato's 
_Republic_ with any depth of understanding, but on the other hand 
they also can't discuss Sartre and Decartes at all, which I for 
one consider a definite plus." 
     "And you live with these here gorillas?" I asked.
     "Oh, yes," he said happily. "In fact, I've worked my way up 
into their hierarchy due to my physical prowess. You see, apes 
fight for their various leaderships positions. At this very 
moment," he added with more than a touch of pride, "I am Assistant 
to the Second Vice President."
     "Now, I would have sworn they had a king," I said, shaking my 
head in wonderment.
     "Oh, they used to, before we started discussing the problems 
inherent in constitutional monarchies," replied Bloomstoke. "We 
currently have a very limited republic, but I won't quit until 
we've established a true socialist state."
     "Well, Brother Bloomstoke," I said, "it sure sounds like 
you've accomplished quite a lot in just four years' time."
     "Thank you," he said modestly. "But there's so much to do! My 
God, do you realize that we haven't even taken the first small 
steps toward establishing a group medical plan?"
     "I would imagine that most of your medical emergencies 
consist of being et by lions and leopards and the like, and as 
such would be somewhat beyond the scope of a group plan," I 
opined. 
     "True," he admitted. "But you can't just have a bureaucracy 
and not give it anything to do. That's just plain wasteful. No, 
Doctor Jones, I appreciate your kind words, truly I do, but there 
is so much left undone."
     "Seems to me you've done more than enough," I said 
soothingly. 
     He shook his head sadly. "Even our military establishment 
can't seem to function efficiently."
     "You got a military establishment?" I asked, surprised.
     "Of course," he said. "Our economy was in a shambles. We 
couldn't see any way of bringing it back to life except by gearing 
up for a little war."
     "Who are you going to fight with -- elephants?"
     "That's not an issue at this point," he said. "When we're 
geared up and ready, we'll find an enemy."
     "Have you considered the possibility that maybe you bit off a 
little more than you can chew?" I suggested.
     "Sometimes it feels that way," he admitted with a deep sigh. 
"I mean, I speak to them of Romeo and Juliet, or Arthur and 
Guinevere, and all they want to do is enter into uncomplicated 
relationships with other apes. That's all right; I can accept 
that. I really can. But when I try to discuss welfare statism and 
all they want to do is peel bananas..." His voice trailed off, and 
his handsome face contorted as he fought to hold back a manly 
little sob. 
     "Look at the bright side," I said. "You got your health, you 
ain't sitting in a debtor's prison, and you've actually learned 
their language."
     "I know," he said. "But sometimes I get so frustrated! Do you 
know what the gorilla word for 'moon' is? _Kablooga! You_ try to 
write a poem and see what the hell rhymes with _kablooga_! In a 
way it's an ever sillier language than French." 
     "Of course, there ain't no law that says you got to associate 
with them," I pointed out.
     "With all their faults, they're still preferable to men," he 
replied hotly. "They don't cheat at cards or vote for _laissez-
faire_ capitalism or mix their drinks..."
     "I'm just pointing out alternatives," I said.
     "I know," he said. "I'm inclined to be emotional these days. 
I suspect it all goes back to my troubles with Barrow, Phillips, 
and Smythe."
     I was about to make some comforting remark or other when a 
huge bull gorilla broke cover about two hundred yards away, stared 
balefully at us for a couple of minutes, and walked off into the 
bushes. 
     "That was George," said Bloomstoke. "He's probably trying to 
let me know tactfully that it's time for a meeting of the 
Governing Council."
     Another gorilla came out of the bushes no more than ten feet 
away and walked up to me.
     "It's just George," explained Bloomstoke calmly. "He's come 
to see who you are."
     "But he was a furlong away just a couple of seconds ago!"
     "No, that was a different one," said Bloomstoke.
     "You call them both George?" I asked.
     "I call them _all_ George," he replied. "It helps impart the 
notion that the state is more important than the individual." 
     The George that was examining me put his face about two 
inches from mine and glared into my eyes with his own little 
bloodshot ones. His teeth were sort of rotten, and his breath 
wasn't much better, but as much as I wanted to turn my head away I 
thought it best not to make any real sudden moves.
     At last George turned to Bloomstoke and jabbered something. 
Bloomstoke jabbered back and then turned to me.
     "George wants to know if you're a Whig or a Tory," he said. 
     "I got to admit it ain't a subject over which I've pondered 
many long and burdensome hours," I answered.
     They jabbered back and forth again, and finally George gave 
me a little snarl and went back off into the jungle.
     "I told him you were an anarchist," said Bloomstoke. "It was 
easier than explaining why you choose not to exercise your 
franchise." 
     "Actually, I used to exercise the tar out of it when I was 
back in the States," I said. "I'd vote early and often for 
whichever candidate was quick on the draw with a ten-spot or a 
little pure Kentucky bourban." 
     "An interesting notion," remarked Bloomstoke, "and one I may 
have to introduce very shortly. You see, we've got a sheriff and a 
marshall and a police force, but the concept of lawbreaking is 
totally unknown to them, which makes for more waste than usual 
among our officeholders."
     Well, it was all too complicated for me, and I just walked 
along in silence while Bloomstoke outlined his grandiose plans to 
me. He must have been running off at the mouth for the better part 
of an hour when we heard a gunshot off in the distance.
     "More territorial aggrandizement!" he muttered, his eyes 
gleaming. "I'll have to put a stop to this." He turned to me. "How 
are you at racing through the treeways?"
     "You mean swinging on vines like unto a monkey?" I asked.
     He nodded. 
     "Brother Bloomstoke, I got troubles enough just keeping on 
the trail as it meanders along through the bush, and _that's_ with 
the comforting knowledge that if I slip and fall I'll hit the 
ground in less than twenty or thirty seconds and probably won't 
bounce. Maybe you'd best race off ahead of me." 
     "I'd like to, but I can't leave you alone with the apes," he 
replied. "They've never seen an anarchist before, and there's no 
telling what they might do."
     And with that, he cupped his hands over his mouth and gave a 
scream that would have woke such dead as weren't otherwise 
occupied at the time. I couldn't figure out what was going on 
until about two minutes later, when a huge elephant thundered up 
out of the bush, crushing trees right and left and skidding to a 
halt directly in front of Bloomstoke.
     "Goola, my friend," he said, stepping forward and petting the 
elephant on the trunk while I decided that the whole proceedings 
made a lot more sense when watched from behind a large tree. "Come 
on out, Doctor Jones," he called. "Goola will provide us with 
transportation." 
     "How do I know that I won't provide old Goola here with a 
little snack?" I asked, for to my eyes Goola was looking decidedly 
eleven-o'clockish, an opinion that was strengthened by the loud 
rumbling noises that his belly was making. 
     "Goola will do what I tell him to do," said Bloomstoke 
firmly. "Now come out so that he can see you."
     "I don't know about this," I said from behind my tree. "He 
can't eat what he can't see."
     "Elephants are herbivores," said Bloomstoke.
     "They're also very nearsighted," I pointed out. "Maybe I look 
like a fig tree to him."
     "If you don't come out instantly, I'll simply leave you 
behind," he said.
     I quickly discussed my options with my Silent Partner, and we 
decided that being left behind was -- very minimally -- the less 
desirable of two admittedly depressing alternatives, so I slowly 
left the protection of my tree and edged, a step at a time, over 
toward Goola.
     "Let him smell the back of your hand," said Bloomstoke.
     I held out my hand and Goola took a good whiff, almost 
pulling my arm out of the socket in the process. 
     "Good!" said Bloomstoke vigorously. "Now we're all friends. 
Goola, lift us up!" 
     Goola pawed the ground three times with his right front foot. 
     "No, Goola!" said Bloomstoke. _"Lift!"_
     Goola rolled over on his back and closed his eyes.
     "Idiot!" snapped Bloomstoke. I kept feeling we should throw 
him a fish or something, but my companion stalked off furiously. 
"Come on, Jones, we'll walk!" 
     When we got about a hundred yards away Goola trumpeted six or 
seven times and stood on his head. Then we took a hard left around 
a wait-a-bit thorn tree and I couldn't see him anymore, though we 
could hear him for another ten minutes.
     We followed an old rhino trail in the direction of the 
gunshots, and in about half an hour Bloomstoke held out his arm, 
practically decapitating me as I walked by him, and when I fell to 
the ground, gurgling and gasping for air, he put a forefinger to 
his lips.
     "Silence!" he whispered.
     Well, I would have told him what I thought of his silence, 
but I was a little preoccupied with choking to death, so I merely 
glared at him and quietly urged the Lord to strike him either dead 
or mute, whichever came first.
     I got my breath back and stood up just in time to see 
Bloomstoke stride out of the bushes into a clearing to confront a 
kind of smallish white man dressed all in khaki.
     "Who are you that invades my jungle?" Bloomstoke demanded.
     "I'm Capturing Clyde Calhoun," said the white man, not 
looking the least bit scared or startled. "And you are either the 
strongest white man or the puniest gorilla I've ever laid eyes 
on." 
     "What is your business here?" said Bloomstoke ominously.
     "Business?" laughed Calhoun. "Ain't you never read my books 
or seen my movies? I'm Capturing Clyde! I go out after the most 
dangerous animals in the world -- except for redheads named Thelma 
-- and bring 'em back alive, and put 'em in my circus or turn 'em 
over to zoos or gourmet chefs or other interested parties."
     "What animals do you seek?" 
     "Gorillas," said Calhoun. "Thought I'd bring back fifteen or 
twenty of 'em before they're all extinct."
     "I distinctly heard the reports of a powerful gun," said 
Bloomstoke.  
     "You bet your boots you did," said Calhoun, holding up a Lee-
Enfield .303 military rifle. "Or at least you would if you were 
wearing any boots."
     "I thought you told me that you brought them back alive," 
said Bloomstoke accusingly.
     "Maybe I should reword that a bit," said Calhoun. "Them what 
I bring back _is_ alive. I just take old Betsy here and aim right 
betwixt their eyes and fire away. Anything still breathing gets 
captured and civilized."
     "Where's your camp?" asked Bloomstoke.
     "About eight miles behind me," said Calhoun. "You can't miss 
it. I've got two hundred porters, a dozen trackers, ten cooks, a 
couple of translators, and forty-three veterinarians."
     I stepped out of the clearing next to Bloomstoke.
     "What the hell are you?" demanded Calhoun.
     "The Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones, at your service," I 
said. 
     "You got any good funeral ceremonies for hippos?" he asked,
     "I ain't never tried my hand at one," I admitted.
     "Then you'll have to be at someone else's service, Reverend 
Jones," he said. "I got a little too enthused down by the river 
this morning."
     "You planning on going back to Nairobi anytime in the near 
future?" I asked him.
     "Soon as I pick up my gorillas," he said.
     "Mind if I tag along with you?"
     "Why not?" he said. "What the hell are you doing out here in 
the Congo anyway?"
     "I've mostly been concentrating on being lost," I said.
     "How about you?" he said to Bloomstoke. "You coming back to 
Nairobi too?"
     "This is my jungle," said Bloomstoke, folding his arms across 
his massive chest. "I will not leave it, and you will not hunt in 
it." 
     "Do you know who you're talking to?" roared Calhoun. "I'm 
Capturing Clyde, by God, and I'll hunt where I want!"
     "This jungle belongs to me, and I will not allow you to 
molest my gorillas," reported Bloomstoke.
     "What kind of pervert do you take me for?" said Calhoun. "I 
don't want to molest them! I want to capture them!"
     "No," said Bloomstoke. "Now I want you to leave my jungle.          
     "Who says it's _your_ jungle anyway?" demanded Calhoun.
     Bloomstoke reached inside his loincloth and whipped out a 
pair of folded documents, which he handed to Calhoun.
     "Son of a bitch!" exclaimed Calhoun after he had read them. 
"I didn't know they could sell a jungle."
     "Neither did I," said Bloomstoke morosely.
     "Who'd you buy it from?" asked Calhoun. 
     "A man named Van Horst."
     "Figgers."
     "Why does everyone say that?" asked Bloomstoke. 
     "I'd tell you, but it brings back too many unpleasant 
memories," said Calhoun. "I don't suppose you'd consider renting 
me a little section of your jungle, with maybe an option to buy?" 
     "I could use the money," admitted Bloomstoke. "But I'd have 
to present your proposal to the tribe and get their approval, and 
they're very leery of anything that reeks of capitalism."
     "Tribe?" asked Calhoun. "What tribe? I didn't know there were 
any natives in this region."
     "This tribe is a little more native than most," I said.
     "No," concluded Bloomstoke, shaking his head sadly. "I'll 
never get the Ruling Council to buy it."
     "Would it help if I told them they could retain the mineral 
rights?" asked Calhoun.
     "I doubt it," said Bloomstoke truthfully.
     "All right," said Calhoun. "I've got another proposition. I'm 
being paid four thousand pounds for every gorilla I capture. If 
you'll let me hunt in your jungle and give me a helping hand, I'll 
split the take fifty-fifty with you."
     "How many gorillas do you need?" asked Bloomstoke.
     "About twenty."
     "And I owe Barrow, Phillips, and Smythe thirty-eight thousand 
pounds," he mused. Then he shook his head again. "No! I just 
can't! John D. Rockefeller or J. P. Morgan might have understood, 
but Karl Marx would come back and haunt me."
     "And George would eat you," I added.
     "What the hell are you guys talking about?" asked Calhoun.
     "Let me speak to them about accepting a short-term lease on 
the jungle," said Bloomstoke, grabbing an overhanging branch and 
pulling himself up on it. "Maybe I can show them that Fabian 
socialism doesn't necessarily preclude the validity of certain 
capitalistic principles." He leaped into the air, caught a low-
hanging vine, and was soon racing through the treetops to meet 
with the tribe.
     "Tell me something, Reverend Jones," said Calhoun, leaning 
against a tree and lighting up a pipe. 
     "If I can," I said amicably.
     "When Americans go crazy they beat up their wives and spend 
their life savings on booze, which at least keeps their women on 
their toes and puts a little money back into the economy. And when 
Irishmen go crackers, they go off and join the IRA and help keep 
down the population of a very crowded little island." He paused 
thoughtfully. "So how come whenever Englishmen go nuts they run 
around naked in tropical climates?"
     I allowed as to how I didn't know, but it did seem to be the 
case, at least in my experience. He pulled out a small metal flask 
and offered me a swig, and we got to talking about one thing and 
another, passing the time of day very pleasantly, when suddenly we 
heard a horrible sound away off in the distance.
     "What is it?" asked Calhoun.
     "I can't rightly tell," I answered.
     "Sounds like a bunch of savage voices screaming in fury," he 
said, putting his flask away.
     A moment later we heard a noise overhead, and saw Bloomstoke 
dropping down from one branch to another until he finally landed 
right next to us on the ground.
     "Hurry!" he cried. "We've no time to waste!"
     "What are you talking about, Brother Bloomstoke?" I asked.
     "We've got to get out of here!"
     "But what happened?" I persisted.
     "They decided that I was a closet imperialist and threw me 
out of the party! _Me_, who brought them a fourteen-year 
agricultural recovery plan!"
     "What's he talking about, Reverend?" asked Calhoun.
     "I think he's saying that his visa's been revoked and he is 
in some danger of being deported," I said, falling into step 
behind Bloomstoke as he lit out for the east. "Or worse yet, 
detained without right of counsel."
     "Are you sure we have to run?" panted Calhoun, joining me. 
     "I'm sure _I_ have to run," I replied. "You do whatever you 
think is best."
     We made it to Calhoun's camp in about three hours. The 
gorillas lined up in a huge semi-circle just out of rifle range 
and kept screaming things at us, which Bloomstoke translated as 
"capitalist swine" and "war-mongering imperialists" and "running 
dogs". Every now and then one of them would call us "ugly naked 
apes who didn't have the brains to turn over a rotten log and find 
a handful of succulent grubworms," at which Bloomstoke would smile 
and inform us that obviously the entire tribe was not yet 
radicalized. 
     By dawn the next morning it was apparent that the gorillas 
weren't going to come no closer and that Bloomstoke wasn't going 
to let no one go hunting in his jungle, so Calhoun announced that 
we would be leaving for Nairobi in an hour or so. Bloomstoke gave 
out that peculiar scream of his, and a few minutes later old Goola 
came lumbering out of the jungle.
     "Don't shoot him," ordered Bloomstoke, as Calhoun raised his 
rifle. 
     "But he'll trample us!" said Calhoun.
     "Am I not Master of the Jungle?" said Bloomstoke with a 
confident smile. He raised his hand and Goola came to a sudden 
stop. 
     "Hoes does whatever you tell him to?" asked Calhoun, suddenly 
interested. 
     Bloomstoke nodded.
     "You ever give any serious thought to appearing in the 
circus?" continued Calhoun.
     "I'd need thirty-eight thousand pounds," said Bloomstoke.
     "Out of the question!" said Calhoun.
     "That would include the elephant."
     "Let's see what he can do," said Calhoun, scratching his 
head. 
     Bloomstoke walked up to the pachyderm. "Goola -- sit!" he 
commanded. 
     Goola picked Bloomstoke up with his trunk and deposited the 
jungle lord on the back of his neck.
     "We'll work on that," said Bloomstoke hastily. "Put me down, 
Goola." 
     Goola pawed the ground three times with his right front foot, 
while Calhoun snorted in derision and walked away.
     "I could be an aerielist!" Bloomstoke called after him. "I'm 
really good at swinging from tree to tree."
     "I'll think about it," said Calhoun.
     "Or a sharpshooter!" continued Bloomstoke. "I'm a crack shot 
with a bow and arrow. Damn you, Goola -- put me the hell down!" 
     Well, they spent most of the day dickering, but the upshot of 
it all was that Calhoun already had a flock of aerielists, and 
besides, it would cost too much to lug a bunch of trees and vines 
around the countryside and erect them under the big top. Also, 
people didn't pay top dollar to watch bows-and-arrow marksmen 
unless they were with a Wild West Show, which was one of the kinds 
of shows that Calhoun didn't run.
     "Tell you what I'll do," said Calhoun at last. "You teach 
that elephant five tricks by the time we hit Nairobi and I'll pay 
you thirty-eight thousand pounds to go on tour with my circus for 
two years."
     "And if I don't?" asked Bloomstoke.
     "Then I'll buy him outright for ten thousand, and you can 
hire on as an animal attendant for standard wages."
     "Capitalist pig!" muttered Bloomstoke, but he shook on it.
     Well, I never saw an elephant not learn so many tricks in my 
life as I did during the month it took us to get from the Congo to 
Kenya. Bloomstoke would tell him to stand up, and he'd roll over. 
Bloomstoke would tell him to lie down, and he'd speak. Bloomstoke 
would tell him to speak, and he'd count with his foot. When we 
were two days out of Nairobi it was pretty obvious that Bloomstoke 
was going to come out on the short end of the deal, so I walked 
over to him after everyone else was asleep.
     "You been going about this all wrong, Brother Bloomstoke," I 
said, taking him off to where we wouldn't disturb nobody.
     "What do you mean, Doctor Jones?" he asked. 
     "Look, we all agree that old Goola, if he ain't out-and-out 
retarded, has at least got a serious learning disability, right?" 
I said.
     Bloomstoke nodded.
     "But he's also a good-hearted critter who's eager to please, 
even if he don't know what the hell you're talking about."
     "What are you getting at?" asked Bloomstoke.
     "Why not give him commands in French or ape or some other 
foreign tongue?" I suggested. "Then, no matter what he does next, 
praise him and act like it was just what you had in mind."
     "That's immoral," he said sternly.
     "Well, personally I find it a lot less immoral than poverty," 
I said. "But if you disagree, why, that's your right. Just forget 
I ever suggested it."
     The next morning Bloomstoke called Calhoun over and gave 
Goola a dozen terse commands in apeish, and shortly thereafter 
signed a thirty-eight-thousand-pound contract.
     As for me, I left Bloomstoke and Calhoun and their animals 
behind me and, still loaded down with gemstones, went off to build 
my tabernacle in the fair city of Nairobi.

Chapter 11

                 THE BEST LITTLE TABERNACLE IN NAIROBI

     If you walk through present-day Nairobi and ask around, you 
can probably still find three or four old-timers who remember the 
Tabernacle of Saint Luke, and will be happy to talk to you about 
it. 
     So I think, in all fairness, that you ought to hear _my_ side 
of the story too. 
     I entered town a couple of hours after I'd left Bloomstoke 
and Calhoun, and walked right into the first real estate office I 
could find, not that there were a whole mess of them cluttering up 
the place. In fact, except for the New Stanley and Norfolk hotels, 
there wasn't an awful lot of anything cluttering up the place. 
     Anyway, I told the gent in charge that I wanted to purchase a 
little stretch of land somewhere near the center of town with the 
purpose of building my tabernacle there, and he explained to me 
that while he could certainly sell me the land, there was a lumber 
shortage and construction costs had shot up through the roof -- or 
they would have, if anyone could have afforded a roof for them to 
shoot up through. 
     "I got an awful lot of money," I told him. "Of course, on the 
other hand, the Lord teaches us to be thrifty. It poses quite a 
little problem." 
     "There is an alternative, Doctor Jones," he said.
     "Such as?" 
     "Why not purchase an existing structure?" he suggested. "It 
would certainly be less expensive than erecting a comparable 
building, and you'd have the added advantage of being able to take 
possession and move in immediately." 
     "Well, now, that's right good thinking, brother," I said. 
"And I opine as to how I'll do just that. Why don't you hunt me up 
the biggest building that's for sale?" 
     "Well, Doctor Jones, sir," he said, "I'm thoroughly 
acquainted with all the property currently listed with our agency 
and I don't think the largest building is exactly the one you're 
looking for." 
     "Is the structure sound?" I asked.  
     "Yes."
     "No termites or dry rot?"
     "No, but..."
     "Then I want it," I told him decisively. "Have the papers 
ready to sign, and I'll be back as soon as I convert these here 
jewels and gems into coin of the realm." 
     And, as the Lord is my witness, that was absolutely all that 
got said by anybody to anybody. 
     I mean, how the hell was I to know that the biggest building 
for sale in Nairobi happened to be the Cock and Bull Tavern and 
Lounge, or that the Cock and Bull Tavern and Lounge wasn't exactly 
what it appeared to be? 
     In fact, the first inkling I had was when I moseyed over to 
it after signing the papers and damned near got trampled in a mad 
rush of British civil servants who were stopping off for a little 
refreshment on their way home from a hard day of running the 
country. A couple of ladies in high-necked dresses were standing 
just outside the doorway, passing out pamphlets and singing hymns. 
     "Good day to you, sisters," I said, walking up to them. 
     "It won't be a good day until this sinful palace of depravity 
is closed forever!" said one of them. "Won't you take some of our 
literature, sir?" 
     "No, thank you, sister," I said. "I never read anything 
except the Good Book. But perhaps you might tell me why you've 
singled out this lovely building from amongst all the other 
buildings in Nairobi?" 
     "It's not the building, sir," said the other. "It's what goes 
on inside it: sin and more sin!" 
     She raised her voice a little in her excitement, and as a 
result two men who were walking on the other side of the street 
heard her and made a beeline for the Cock and Bull. 
     "Sinners!" cried the first woman after them. "Vile, depraved 
men!" 
     "Listen, sisters," I said. "Since I'm a man of the cloth, 
maybe I'd best go inside and see if I can put the fear of God into 
some of these sinners. But I want you to keep standing here by the 
door and telling everyone who comes by what a terrible den of 
iniquity this is." 
     "Oh, we will, Reverend!" they cried in unison 
     "Especially the men," I said. 
     They nodded, their eyes aglow with a sense of purpose, and I 
walked through the doorway. The bar looked like any other bar in 
town, with lion and leopard and kudu and buffalo heads hanging 
from the walls, and a bunch of Maasai pots serving as spittoons. 
And being the uncannily sharp observer that I am, I didn't have to 
see more than six or seven ladies walking around in their 
unmentionables before I figured out that either the fans were 
broken or the Cock and Bull sold a little more than just liquid 
refreshments. 
     I wandered around the main floor a little, enjoying the 
smells of perfume and incense that wafted on the air and admiring 
the velvet wallpaper that came with the building. Then I bumped 
into still another young lady who was dressed for extremely warm 
weather. 
     "Good evening, sister," I said. 
     "You're wearing your Sunday go-to-meeting clothes a little 
early in the week, aren't you?" she asked. 
     "Don't let my clothes upset you none," I said pleasantly. 
     "If mine don't upset you, yours sure won't upset me," she 
said. "What can I do for you, Padre -- a little something in the 
missionary position?" 
     "You might tell me how to find whoever's in charge here," I 
said. 
     "You must mean Mademoiselle Markoff," she said, gesturing 
toward a room at the top of a nearby staircase. 
     I thanked her, walked up, and knocked on the door. There was 
no answer, so I opened it and found myself facing a blonde woman 
with a figure that Knute Rockne would have traded all four of 
Notre Dame's horsemen for. Her arms, thighs, shoulders, and neck 
all bore a right startling resemblance to those of Lord 
Bloomstoke's friends and companions. She was dressed, or rather 
wrapped, in a blue satin harem outfit which looked kind of silly 
and would have looked even sillier if she hadn't appeared so 
menacing. She was lying on her side on a fur rug, sipping a tall 
drink through a straw and holding a huge cigar in her free hand. A 
couple of young women, also done up in satin and wearing huge 
feathers in their hair, were standing behind her and waving 
ostrich-feather fans over her sweating body. 
     "What is it?" she said in a very deep voice. 
     "Allow me to introduce myself," I said. "I'm the Right 
Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones. How's the concierge business these 
days?" 
     "Another reformer," she said wearily, looking up from her 
drink. 
     "Begging your pardon, Madam Markoff," I said, "but what I 
mostly am is a landlord." 
     "Call me Mademoiselle Markoff. I'm too young and pretty to be 
a madam -- or don't you agree?" she said ominously. 
     "I agree absolutely, Mademoiselle," I said, taking a step 
backward. 
     "Good," she said, simpering in A below middle C. "Now what's 
all this about being a landlord?" 
     I pulled out the papers and showed them to her. 
     "Oh, shit!" she said, tossing them back to me. "When will you 
want us to clear out of here?" 
     "Mademoiselle Markoff, you cut me to the quick!" I said 
sincerely. "Tossing all them sweet innocent young ladies out into 
the cold would hardly constitute an act of Christian charity, 
especially considering how many customers we got lined up 
downstairs." 
     Her eyebrows shot up for just a second, and then she gave me 
a great big grin that started at one ear and ended just short of 
the other. "Doctor Jones," she said, "it looks like you've bought 
yourself a whorehouse." 
     "I don't think so, Mademoiselle," I said. "It just wouldn't 
appear right, me being a man of the cloth and all." 
     "I don't think I follow you," she said, taking a deep drag on 
her cigar, blowing the smoke out through her nostrils, and sipping 
two-thirds of the drink up through her straw. 
     "What I'm saying is that I just don't think a man in my 
position should own a whorehouse. Of course, as I see it, 
_renting_ a whorehouse to someone else is a whole different kettle 
of fish." 
     "Ah!" she said, her grin getting even bigger, exposing a 
flock of gold molars along the sides. "And what will you be 
wanting?" 
     "Well, I sure wouldn't want to appear greedy or nothing," I 
said. "But first of all, I'11 need a room downstairs for my 
tabernacle." 
     "And what else?" she persisted. 
     "Half," I said. 
     "Damn!" she snapped. "You're no better than the last one! 
Listen to me, Doctor Jones: these are cultured young women here, 
performing a necessary if demeaning social service." 
     "And just what would it take to make them feel less 
demeaned?" I asked. 
     "Sixty percent ought to do it," said Mademoiselle Markoff. 
     "Fifty-five," I said. 
     "Done!" she said. 
     We shook on it. 
     "How much do _you_ get, by the way?" I asked while trying to 
urge a little blood back into my hand. 
     "Half of their take," she said without hatting an eye. 
     "Well, the Good Lord teaches us to practice moderation in 
all things, so I guess that includes generosity for these poor, 
socially downtrodden young ladies," I said. 
     "You're _cute_," said Mademoiselle Markoff, allowing a lock 
of blonde hair to fall provocatively over one beady little red 
eye. 
     "Why, thank you kindly," I said, backing off another step. 
     "Come sit down next to me and have a drink, Doctor Jones," 
she said, patting the rug beside her. "I have a feeling that you 
and I are going to get along just fine." 
     I was about to reply when two gunshots echoed through the 
building. They were followed by a bunch of screams and the sound 
of footsteps running up and down the corridors and stairs, and 
finally a tall, bearded man in a police uniform burst into the 
room. 
     "Mademoiselle Markoff!" he bellowed. "He did it again! It's 
got to stop!" 
     "Beggin' your pardon, brother," I said, "but what seems to be 
the problem?" 
     "Who the hell are you?" he demanded. 
     "The Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones," I said. "l happen 
to be the new landlord." 
     He looked at Mademoiselle Markoff, who nodded. 
     "Pleased to meet you, Doctor Jones," he said, extending his 
hand. "I am Lieutenant Nigel Todd of the Nairobi Police. Are you 
aware of the exact nature of the establishment you have just 
purchased?" 
     "Everyone who works here is just doing what they can to 
uplift the spirit of Man, each in his or her own special way," I 
said, taking his hand. 
     "Not quite everyone," said Todd grimly. 
     "What happened?" I asked. "Surely them two ladies out front 
didn't come in and shoot the place up? I'll have to explain to 
them that the Good Book dwells upon numerous painted women with 
loving care and in considerable detail." 
     "It's your bouncer," said Todd. 
     "What's the matter with him?" I asked. 
     "He keeps shooting the customers." 
     "Not before they've paid, I hope?" I said. 
     "l must tell you, Doctor Jones," continued Todd, "it's 
getting harder and harder to tolerate this kind of thing. I'm as 
liberal as the next man, but he simply can't be allowed to go 
around shooting people whenever he pleases. After all, this isn't 
the frontier anymore, and it is getting very difficult, to say 
nothing of expensive, to keep such unfortunate events quiet." 
     "Expensive?" I said. 
     "Expensive," he replied, putting his hand into his pocket and 
jingling his change, just like a high-class waiter or bellboy. 
     "We'll take care of the expenses later," I said. "In the 
meantime, since it is in both our interests for my only tenant to 
remain in business, I think maybe I'd better have a little chat 
with the bouncer in question." 
     "I'll have him sent right in," said Todd. 
     "Let me ask you something," I said to Mademoiselle Markoff 
after Lieutenant Todd had gone to get the bouncer. "If he's been 
shooting people right along, why didn't you fire him weeks ago?" 
     "I did," said Mademoiselle Markoff. "But he likes it here. 
He's working for free." 
     "Is he a _large_ man?" I asked, suddenly wondering at the 
wisdom of this proposed meeting. "Much of a temper?" 
     "No," she replied. "In point of fact, he's really quite 
small. " 
     "Fine," I said, sitting on the rug beside her and lighting 
one of her cigars. "Then let's solve this little problem once and 
for all." 
     A moment later there was a soft knock at the door. 
     "Come in," said Mademoiselle Markoff. 
     The door opened and an olive-skinned little man with sad 
eyes, a dapper-looking suit, and slicked-down black hair walked 
in. 
     "Rodent!" I exclaimed. "What the hell are you doing here?" 
     "Doctor Jones!" he said in that nasal voice of his. "I might 
ask the very same question of a man of the cloth. It has been 
quite some time since we have seen each other, but I seem to 
recall that the circumstances of our parting were not such that I 
truly wish to continue our relationship." 
     "I'm afraid you ain't got a hell of a lot of choice in the 
matter," I said. "I'm the new landlord. What's all this I hear 
about you shooting up a customer?" 
     "It was an act of self-defense, I assure you," he said. 
     "Again?" snorted Mademoiselle Markoff. 
     "What were the circumstances?" I asked 
     "I was climbing up the stairs and a rather large man was 
coming down, and he wouldn't get out of the way." 
     "So you shot him?" I demanded. 
     "What else was I to do?" asked the Rodent with a shrug. "He 
was much larger than I am." 
     "That's it?" I said. "That's the whole story, and you call 
that self-defense?" 
     "Certainly," said the Rodent. "I view it as _preventive_
self-defense. After all, I would hardly have been in any 
condition to defend myself if he had pushed me down the stairs." 
     "Rodent, you just can't go around doing things like that!" I 
snapped. "You're not even on the payroll!" 
     "The very point I should like to discuss with you," he said 
with an apologetic little smile. 
     "Oh?" said Mademoiselle Markoff and me in unison. 
     "Yes. I have been working for free for the past seven weeks, 
during which time I have had to defend my life on no less than 
five separate occasions. Surely I deserve to go back on the 
payroll after having undergone such privation." 
     "I don't know exactly how to get this through to you, 
Rodent," I said, "but if you don't stop shooting people we ain't 
gonna _have_ no payroll." 
     With no warning at all he reached inside his coat, and I dove 
for cover behind Mademoiselle Markoff. When I didn't hear any 
shots, I cautiously raised my head above her ample flanks to see 
what was going on. 
     The Rodent was carefully dabbing at his face with a delicate 
white handkerchief. 
     "Damn it all, you got to stop making sudden moves like that!" 
I snapped, rising to my feet and brushing myself off. 
     "My deepest apologies," said the Rodent, hiding his face 
behind the handkerchief. "I had no desire to scare or startle you. 
Now, I believe we were talking about my salary?" 
     I was half inclined to argue the point with him, but I 
figured if I did he'd just go reaching into his coat again and 
since no one could ever be quite sure what he'd pull out, it made 
more sense to put him back on the payroll. 
     "But with one stipulation," I told him. 
     "Yes?" he said gently. 
     "You shoot anyone else who doesn't take a shot at you first 
and you're fired. You understand?" 
     "I understand," he said in a way that led me to think that 
there was yet another question to be asked, like did he agree, but 
I decided to let it pass. 
     "Where do you know him from?" asked Mademoiselle Markoff when 
the Rodent had left the room. 
     "Oh, I knew him back in Dar-es-Salaam a couple of years ago," 
I said. "He tried to get me to finance a highly illegal operation, 
but being a man of strong moral character I managed to resist the 
temptation." 
     "How clever of you," she purred, taking another deep drag on 
her cigar. "Wouldn't you care to join me again on the rug?" 
     "I'd sure love to do that, Mademoiselle Markoff," I said, 
crossing my fingers behind my back, "but it really wouldn't look 
too good, me being a man of the cloth and all." 
     "So who's to know?" she whispered, shooting me a wink that 
would have given a lesser man nightmares for a month. 
     "Well, for starters, you got two of your young ladies 
standing right here swiping at your fair body with their fans," I 
said. 
     "That's all right," she said. "Bubbles is totally trustworthy, 
and Zsa Zsa is inattentive to a fault." 
     "I'd still feel bad about it, this being my first night on 
the job, so to speak," I said. "Besides, I still got lots of work 
to do." 
     "Such as?" 
     "Well, first of all, starting tomorrow the Cock and Bull 
signs are all coming down, and this place will be going under the 
name of the Tabernacle of Saint Luke. Then I've got to hunt up 
Lieutenant Nigel Todd and make such arrangements as may be 
necessary to hush up this unfortunate act of self-defense that the 
Rodent was undoubtedly forced into against such meager will as he 
possesses. And finally, I left a couple of little ladies at the 
front door to scare away undesirables and the like, and I want to 
make sure they know they'll be welcome any time they want to come 
around here. So as you can see, I'm just gonna be too busy for any 
romantic entanglements tonight." 
     "Perhaps tomorrow, then," she said, licking her lips with a 
tongue that could have taken the hide off a rhinoceros. 
     "Why not?" I said as I left the room. I was still coming up 
with reasons why not when I got hold of Lieutenant Todd and made 
such restitution as was required to keep the whole unhappy affair 
of the Rodent under his hat. Then I introduced myself to the 
bartender, a cadaverous Armenian named Irving, and told him to get 
a sign painter out the first thing in the morning. 
     I took a room in the New Stanley Hotel, tried unsuccessfully 
to buy the painting of Nellie Willoughby that they had hanging 
over the bar, and finally turned in for a good night's sleep. It 
seemed like a waste of money, since I owned about twenty rooms 
with beds over at my tabernacle, but I just had a feeling that I'd 
be much happier in the New Stanley until me and Mademoiselle 
Markoff came to an understanding betwixt ourselves. 
     When I showed up the next afternoon I saw that the signs were 
already changed. When I went into the bar to tell Irving what a 
good job he had done, Mademoiselle Markoff was waiting for me, 
wearing a red gown that would have been roomy on most Siamese 
triplets, but that fit her so snugly that I could see the huge 
mole on her left thigh right through it. 
     "Good morning, Lucifer," she breathed. 
     "Good day to you," I said. 
     "I was wondering if you'd like to come up to my office for a 
few minutes so we can go over some figures?" she tittered in a 
voice like unto an opera baritone. 
     "Well, I'd like to, I truly would," I said, "but being a man 
of the cloth and all, I think it would be more appropriate for me 
to start setting up my tabernacle now." 
     There wasn't much she could say to that, so she settled for 
offering to help me, and then there wasn't much _I_ could say to 
that, so I just thanked her and we went down the hall to the large 
room that she had put aside for my use. 
     It was kind of dirty, and needed a new coat of paint, and the 
ceiling was caving in, and there were only two chairs, but it 
suited my needs just fine, since I thought it might take the 
preaching business a good four or five years to grow to where I 
needed better quarters, or even more chairs. 
     On the other hand, it seemed to be the one place where I was 
reasonably safe from Mademoiselle Markoff's advances, so I decided 
to throw myself into its remodeling with a vengeance. She and I 
worked side by side replastering the ceiling and staining the 
walls and putting in a parquet floor and building an altar and 
getting some stained glass to replace the old dirty windows and 
building a number of pews so that the room could actually hold 
about thirty people. 
     This took us the better part of two months, during which time 
the Rodent didn't shoot anyone else, and business was booming. 
Lieutenant Todd stopped by for his payoff every other night, and 
the police left us alone, and the two little ladies kept screaming 
in glowing detail about what was going on inside the Tabernacle of 
Saint Luke, and pretty soon the editor of the local paper started 
coming by with Lieutenant Todd and getting an occasional gift of 
one kind or another, and shortly thereafter we were never again 
mentioned in the papers. 
     In fact, everything was going smooth as silk except that I 
was running out of excuses for keeping out of Mademoiselle 
Markoff's room and going over figures with her, so I worked an 
extra week building me a pulpit and when she still kept hanging 
around I took to preaching a good eight or nine hours a day, 
interspersing my lectures with the latest race results from 
Johannesburg and some soccer scores from Cairo so as to appeal to 
a wider audience. I got to admit that we didn't do much off-the-
street business, but most of the girls and some of the customers 
would wander in from time to time and I'd tell 'em what terrible 
sinners they were and how carnal knowledge was old Satan's 
foothold in the world of fast women and shameless men and how 
they'd well better repent right quick, and then they'd go back to 
their rooms feeling all refreshed and cleansed of soul. In fact, 
just so's they'd know the Lord was a forgiving type, I began 
pardoning them for future sins as well as past ones, kind of 
getting a couple of pages ahead in the heavenly ledger, so to 
speak. 
     It got a little difficult to keep finding new subject matter, 
especially after I'd whipped through a three-day lecture on 
Solomon's seven hundred or so wives and what he probably did with 
'em, but every time I'd think of slipping out for a little liquid 
refreshment or some other kind of tension easer, I'd look up and 
there'd be Mademoiselle Markoff sitting in the first pew, staring 
unblinkingly at me. I really don't think she missed a single 
sermon I gave during the whole time the Tabernacle of Saint Luke 
was in business. 
     I'd been there almost seven months and had just polished off 
my two hundredth sermon when Lieutenant Nigel Todd, looking 
agitated as all get-out, stormed into the tabernacle and pulled me 
off toward a corner. 
     "Jones, he's done it again!" he snapped. 
     "Who's done what?" I asked.  
     "Your friend the Rodent seems to have fallen off the wagon, 
so to speak," said Todd. 
     "How did it happen this time?" 
     "He claims it was self-defense as to who was going to use the 
sink in the men's room first," said Todd. 
     "Is the man hurt badly?" I asked. 
     "l don't believe he felt the last five bullets at all," said 
Todd. 
     "Well, at least he ain't suffering unduly," I said. "Why not 
bring him in here and let me run through a little funeral prayer 
or two for him?" 
     "You seem to be missing the point of all this," said Todd. 
"I'm going to have to arrest the Rodent and lock him up for a good 
long time." 
     "Surely we can work something out," I said, putting an arm 
around his shoulder. "It's not as if we want him to keep working 
here or nothing like that. I mean, if he shoots enough customers 
sooner or later we're not going to have any live ones left. But I 
sure hate to see him go to jail, him being an employee and an old 
friend of mine and such." 
     "I'm not a totally unreasonable man," said Lieutenant Todd, 
starting to jingle the coins in his pocket. "What exactly did you 
have in mind for him?" 
     "Well, it just seems a shame that the government will have to 
feed and care for him. Surely there must be something he can do to 
repay his debt to society." 
     "What's he good at?" asked Todd. 
     "Well, now, that's where we got a little problem," I 
admitted. "What he's mostly good at, so far as I can tell, is 
shooting people." 
     "It may have escaped your notice, Doctor Jones," said Todd, 
"but that is the very talent we tend to arrest people for these 
days." 
     "Do you ever hang 'em?" I asked as my Silent Partner smacked 
me right between the eyes with a great big revelation. 
     "From time to time," said Todd. 
     "Any law says you can't shoot 'em instead?" I said. 
     "None that I know of," admitted Todd. 
     "Then why not offer the Rodent a job as your official 
executioner?" I suggested. 
     "I have to admit he'd be pretty efficient," mused Todd. 
     "He'd work cheap too," I said. "Especially once you outlined 
the nature of his job and the alternatives to accepting it." 
     "If he's going to go around shooting people, I suppose it 
does make a certain degree of sense to have him on our side," said 
Todd. "But I just don't know..."  He jingled the coins in his 
pocket a little louder. 
     I pulled out a wad of bills big enough to assuage Lieutenant 
Todd's doubts (and to choke a fair-sized horse into the bargain), 
had a little chat with the Rodent, and saw him off on his way to 
the first honest job he'd had in years. 
     Nothing much of interest happened for the next couple of 
weeks and I fell back into my established routine. Then one day I 
noticed that Mademoiselle Markoff had put aside her satin 
wrappings and was now wearing a conservative business suit. A 
couple of days later she started wearing a severely tailored high-
necked black dress, and all her facial makeup was missing, a fact 
which must have thrown two or three notions shops into bankruptcy 
in one fell swoop. Then, a few days after that, she started 
singing the hymns so loud that the paying customers began 
complaining. 
     I was pleased to see that she was taking my preaching so much 
to heart, but I still kept my distance whenever I was outside of 
the tabernacle. One day though, I passed her in the hall and for 
the first time within my memory she didn't even grab at me. 
     This turn of events made my life just about perfect and I 
determined then and there to check out the performance of some of 
my tenants, just to make sure they weren't being more than 
normally sinful and to offer them dispensation in case they felt a 
little adventurous. 
     So that night, after I had completed my evening sermon 
(which, as I recall, had something to do with the sin of lusting 
after your neighbors' wives when you could be spending your time 
with some pleasant bachelor ladies at the Tabernacle of Saint 
Luke), I wandered up to the second floor and, not wishing to spend 
too much time reforming all these sinful painted women 
individually, decided to invite three of them into a room at once. 
     I was just on the verge of showing them what old Onan was 
missing when suddenly the door burst open and Lieutenant Nigel 
Todd walked in. 
     "You ain't real strong on knocking or announcing yourself, 
are you, Brother Todd?" I said irritably, wrapping a blanket 
around myself while the girls scrambled for cover. 
     "I have no choice, Doctor Jones," he said. "I'm afraid I'm 
going to have to shutter this establishment." 
     "What the hell are you talking about?" I demanded. "And how 
come you ain't jingling your change the way you usually do when we 
get onto this subject?" 
     "Because this isn't something we can work out between 
ourselves," he said. "I've got a court order closing you down." He 
tossed it onto the bed for me to see. 
     "But we got nothing but happy, satisfied customers!" I 
protested. "Who'd be low and dastardly enough to have the judge 
sign something like this?" 
     "I'll take credit for it," said Mademoiselle Markoff, 
appearing in the doorway. 
     "_You?_" I said. "But why?" 
     "You've shown me the light, Lucifer," she said with a strange 
kind of glow on her face. "I've been listening to you preach the 
Word for more than half a year now, and reading the Good Book 
every night, and you've shown me the error of my ways." 
     "What about all these poor innocent girls who ain't quite 
seen the error of _their_ ways yet?" I demanded. "How are they 
gonna make a living if you stop them from selling the one 
commodity they know anything about?" 
     "I'm starting a soup kitchen on the outskirts of town," said 
Mademoiselle Markoff. "I'll be helping poor downtrodden sinners 
and derelicts on both sides of the counter, praise God!" 
     "But what will become of my tabernacle?" I screamed. 
     "You've been blessed with the call, Lucifer," she said. 
"You'll find another tabernacle, one that doesn't lead poor young 
girls and evil lecherous men into a life of sin." 
     "What life of sin?" I protested. "It's only just a couple 
of _hours_ of sin!" 
     "The difference is quantitative, not qualitative," she said. 
"Don't you understand, Lucifer? I'm just doing what you've been 
telling me to do." 
     "I ain't never told no one to shut this place down!" I said. 
"Lieutenant Todd, this is all just some horrible misunderstanding. 
Let me and the Mademoiselle here talk things over for an hour or 
so and everything will be back to normal." 
     "I'm afraid that can't be done, Doctor Jones," said Todd. 
"You've got a ten-thousand-pound levy against your property for 
being a bawdy house, and you're going to have to put up a five-
thousand-pound bond if you want to keep out of jail." 
     "Mademoiselle Markoff!" I pleaded. "Tell him it was all a 
mistake!" 
     "That would be a lie, Lucifer," she said, "and now that 
you've shown me the light I can no longer tell a lie even in a 
good cause, Praise God!" 
     "Well, at least turn over fifteen thousand pounds of my money 
to me so I can take care of these here legal entanglements and 
work things out," I said. 
     "I can't," she said. "I don't have a shilling." 
     "What are you talking about?" I bellowed. "We've took in 
fifty thousand pounds since I been here!" 
     "I gave it all to charity this afternoon, right before I went 
to the courthouse," she said. "The Lord wouldn't have approved of 
my keeping it." 
     "But what am I going to do?" I said. 
     "Well, _I've_ always wanted to own a tavern and hotel," said 
Lieutenant Todd. "I'll be happy to purchase the place from you 
for, shall we say, fifteen thousand pounds." 
     "I paid five times that much for it!" I yelled. 
     "You weren't headed for the hoosegow when you bought it," he 
pointed out. "Think it over, Doctor Jones. Tell you what: I'll 
sweeten the pot by turning my back for twenty-four hours if you're 
of a mood to jump bail and leave the country." 
     Well, I haggled for half an hour or so, but he had me over a 
barrel, and finally I sold him the Tabernacle of Saint Luke for 
fifteen thousand pounds, which left me the shirt on my back 
(though at the time it was crumpled up on the floor) and my copy 
of the Good Book and not much else. 
     "By the way," said Todd as he took his leave of us, "if any 
of the girls don't feel like working in a soup kitchen, 
Mademoiselle Markoff, please tell them for me that my hotel can 
always use maids and waitresses." 
     He gave me a wink and walked on down the stairs. 
     "I hope you'll forgive me, Lucifer," said Mademoiselle 
Markoff when we were alone. 
     "That'll take a heap of doing," I said miserably.
     "But if you were a less convincing preacher, none of this 
would have happened. I spent I don't know how many sleepless 
nights lusting for your body, but now that the Spirit is with me I 
can see that you're hardly worth all the thought I gave you." 
     "Thanks a lot," I grated. 
     "No," she said. "Thank _you_ for showing me the Right and the 
Way." 
     I put on my clothes, tucked my Bible under my arm, and an 
hour later was marching south out of town, wishing that just this 
one time I hadn't been the dynamic, forceful interpreter of the 
Word that I unquestionably am, and making a solemn vow not to 
preach about anything except the racier psalms when I established 
my next tabernacle.

Chapter 12

                    THE ELEPHANTS' GRAVEYARD

     It didn't take me all that long to find another parish. 
     I spent a couple of weeks getting clear of British East and 
found myself in Portuguese East Africa, which was just on the 
verge of changing its name to Mozambique, partially in honor of 
its capital city and partially because the Portuguese didn't like 
swamps and deserts and savages and mosquitoes and snakes and 
tsetse flies any more than most reasonable people and were pretty 
busy packing up and moving back to Portugal, where the worst thing 
they had to worry about was a Viking raid, of which there hadn't 
been none in about nine hundred years, give or take a decade. 
     Anyway, I had gotten about two-thirds of the way through 
Portuguese East, and was planning on heading down to South Africa 
to see if I couldn't borrow a little mission money from Emily 
Perrison, who was probably Emily Dobbins by now. I made it as far 
as the Zambezi River, which may not look like the Mississippi or 
the Amazon on the maps, but was just as hard to cross, especially 
considering that it had no bridges and about a million crocodiles, 
all of which had a lean and hungry look. 
     I was standing on the bank trying to figure out what to do 
next when a huge canoe loaded with black warriors pulled up just 
like a taxicab, and one of these painted savages gave me a big 
grin and gestured for me to climb in and take a ride with them. 
     "Thank you kindly, brothers," I said, hopping in and grabbing 
a seat. "I must say this is downright neighborly of you. I was 
afraid that I was going to have to start rasslin' crocodiles for 
a living." 
     "We were happy to help a man of God," said the big fellow who 
had done most of the smiling. "You are a missionary, are you not?" 
     "Funny you should mention it," I said. "I happen to be the 
Reverend Doctor Jones, come to spread the Word of the Lord and 
otherwise brighten your dull, lackluster lives. What's for lunch?" 
     "We shall eat when we return to our village," said the big 
guy. "And after that, we would be very happy to learn about your 
god." 
     "You sure seem friendly as all get-out," I said, lighting up 
a cigar and offering him one, which he took. "Are you guys Zanake 
or Makonde?" 
     "Neither," he said. "We're Mangbetu." 
     "Mangbetu?" I said. "I thought you folks lived in the Congo." 
     "There was a food shortage, so some of us migrated down 
here." 
     "How'd you learn to speak English so good?" 
     "We've had some anthropologists come to live with us from 
time to time," he said. "They never stay very long, but we've 
picked up a smattering of French and English from them." 
     "I don't mean no insult," I said, "but you look pretty much 
like any other godless black heathens to me. Why would they single 
you out for serious observing and note-taking?" 
     "Beats me," he shrugged. "It probably has something to do 
with our dietary customs." 
     "Yeah?" I said. "What do you do that the rest of the tribes 
around don't do?" 
     "We eat people." he said. 
     "People?" I repeated. "Such as comes equipped with two arms 
and two legs and like that?" 
     He nodded. 
     "What's your philosophical and gustatory feelings about white 
meat?" I asked kind of nervously. 
     "You're our guest, Doctor Jones," he laughed. "Don't look so 
upset. We only eat our enemies."                          
     Viewed that way, I could see where it could save a pile of 
money that would otherwise be spent on grave diggers, and would 
also lengthen the lives of a few innocent goats and fish, and as 
long as sauteed missionary wasn't one of their favorites I figured 
that I was just a guest and didn't want to upset no applecarts, at 
least not until I knew their bellies were full. 
     I found out that the big guy's name was Samjeba, and that he 
didn't mind my calling him Sam, especially when I explained that 
the original Samuel was Esther's cousin or manservant or chauffeur 
or something, and we spent a lot of time exchanging a batch of 
upside-down handshakes and swapping dirty stories, during which 
time I learned a whole lot of new Swahili words that just don't 
tend to crop up in the course of a normal conversation. 
     We arrived at the Mangbetu village a couple of hours before 
nightfall. The womenfolk were busy cooking up some mighty tender-
looking spareribs, but in the light of our recent conversations I 
decided to stick to fruits and berries and easily identifiable 
stuff like that. 
     When the meal was over I got up and did a little serious 
preaching from the Song of Solomon, and I got an out-and-out 
standing ovation with a couple of British "hip hip hoorays" tossed 
in for good measure when I got up to Solomon 1:5, which goes: "I 
am black but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem." In fact, it 
took me quite some little time to explain to the more suggestible 
of the young bucks that Jerusalem wasn't some tribe of white women 
over in the next county, but was even farther away than Nairobi. 
     I couldn't get Sam and his people to forsake cannibalism, but 
I did manage to get them to agree to say grace before each meal, 
which was a minor triumph of sorts, especially since most of them 
worshiped a god who had an elephant's tusks, a woman's breasts, a 
lion's claws, and one hell of a cookbook. 
     I remained with the Mangbetus for the better part of three 
months, during which time I lost about twenty pounds due to an 
enforced diet of vegetarianism, because I never could be sure 
quite what kind of steaks they were cooking up at any given time. 
At last I couldn't stand it no more, and asked Sam if he and a 
couple of his better bow-and-arrow men might accompany me on a 
little hunting trip for klipspringer or duiker or some other kind 
of inoffensive and four-legged type of meat. 
     He agreed, and the four of us set off one sunny morning in 
search of a little something to fill the needs of the inner man. 
At least, it started off sunny; but by noontime we ran into some 
mighty fierce thunderstorms, so we wandered off the trail we had 
been following and went deeper into the jungle to get a little 
protection from the rain. Somehow or other we got lost, old Sam's 
bushcraft not quite being the equal of his talent in the kitchen, 
and we stayed lost throughout the rest of the day and all that 
night. On the morning of the next day we saw a clearing and a 
valley up ahead, so we headed toward it, and broke out of the 
forest in about twenty minutes' time. 
     There was some kind of smoke or fog rising, like it was some 
prehistoric place or something, and the first thing I noticed was 
all the skeletons. 
     "What does that look like to you, Sam?" I asked, pointing off 
toward the piles of bones. 
     "Dead elephants," he said. 
     "Lots of 'em," I agreed, walking down to have a closer look. 
     Some of them still had their tusks, and those tusks were as 
big as anything Herbie Miller and I ever tried to bring down back 
in the Lado Enclave. Others didn't have none, but I wrote it off 
to their being cows and pups, or whatever it is that lady 
elephants and their children are called. 
     "You know what this place is?" I said at last, turning to Sam 
and his two companions. 
     "I wish I did," admitted Sam. "Then I wouldn't feel so lost." 
     "This is the lost and fabled Elephants' Burial Ground, as has 
been writ up in song and story!" I exclaimed. 
     "Bad job of burying," said Sam, indicating all the skeletons 
that were above the ground. 
     "No, you got it all wrong," I said. "This is where the 
elephants come to die!" 
     Sam took another look around, and I could tell he was 
wondering why anyone would bother coming to such an out-of-the-way 
spot to die, but when I explained that it probably had something 
to do with their not wanting to be cooked by their enemies it made 
a lot more sense to him. 
     "Do you think you could find your way back here if you had 
to?" I asked. 
     He explained that we'd simply mark the trees on the way back 
to the village and we'd have no trouble, which was true, but it 
turned out that I had asked him the wrong question, a better one 
being if he knew how to find his way back to the village in the 
first place, but finally we got there after three or four days of 
hard searching. 
     I figured that the very first thing I had to do was stake a 
claim to the land that held the graveyard, and to this end I 
had Sam and a couple of the boys accompany me to the city of 
Beira on the coast, since I was sure I'd never find Sam's village 
again without help, let alone lead anyone to the graveyard, and 
while the government knew the village existed Sam kept moving it 
around due to various disagreements with the local constabularies 
concerning the finer points of his dietary laws. 
     Beria wasn't the most modern city on the continent, but it 
was a seaport, and this brought enough money in so that the 
government could afford to erect a couple of solid-looking brick 
and mud buildings from which they ran the affairs of the nation, 
which meant they made sure that the ships arrived and left pretty 
much on schedule. 
     One of the nice things about waterfronts is that they imply 
the existence of waterfront dives, and one of the nice things 
about waterfront dives is that if you strike up enough 
acquaintances and supply enough free drinks you can eventually get 
a line on who is the man most likely to do you some good. In this 
case it turned out to be Colonel Philippe Carcosa, who had risen 
to his imposing high rank by the simple expedient of avoiding any 
form of combat whatsoever while his countrymen were off dying in 
foreign wars or personal duels of honor. 
     Colonel Carcosa, so I was told, was a man who was quick to 
evaluate all the pros and cons of a business proposal, and who 
could be counted upon to act with satisfying swiftness when 
convinced that a handsome return on his investment could be had by 
so doing. 
     I made an appointment with the Colonel, and got an audience 
with him the next morning. 
     "Good morning," I said, walking into his luxuriously 
appointed office in my best Sunday preaching clothes. "I am the 
Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones." 
     "Pleased to meet you, Doctor Jones," he said, rising from his 
polished mahogany desk and taking my hand. "May I offer you a 
brandy?" 
     "Oh, it's a little early in the day for brandy, me being a 
man of the cloth and all," I told him. "I think I'll settle for a 
double Scotch." 
     He grinned and had an orderly bring us each a drink. 
     "What can I do for you, Doctor Jones?" he asked. 
     "Not a hell of a lot more than I can do for you, Colonel 
Carcosa," I said, lighting up a cigar and offering him one, which 
he took. 
     "It's not often that I entertain the clergy in my offices," 
he said. "Is this in reference to a church or chapel, perhaps?" 
     "Close," I said. "The property I have in mind happens to be a 
cemetery." 
     "Catholic or Protestant?" he asked. 
     "Well, that's kind of difficult to say," I answered 
truthfully. 
     "Where is this cemetery, and what seems to he the problem?" 
he asked. 
     "I can't actually tell you where it is, and the problem is 
that you and me don't own it," I said. "Yet." 
     "And why should you and I ever wish to own a cemetery?" he 
asked, suddenly alert. 
     "Because you and me can't see no reason whatsoever why we 
shouldn't be millionaires," I told him. 
     "That is true," he said, nodding thoughtfully. "No matter how 
earnestly I search my heart, I simply cannot come up with an 
acceptable reason. Now, my friend, perhaps you might be willing to 
explain why the possession of this particular cemetery will 
substantially alter our financial situation." 
     "Certainly," I said, taking another sip of my drink. "Colonel 
Carcosa, I have discovered the lost burial ground of the 
elephants!" 
     "I didn't even know it was missing," he said. 
     "This is the place where all the elephants go to die," I 
said. "It's just chock full of skeletons, most of them loaded down 
with ivory, and it just stands to reason that as long as elephants 
keep feeling the need to die they'll keep going to the burial 
ground and adding to the treasure that awaits us there." 
     Colonel Carcosa signaled for his aide. "No more liquor for 
Doctor Jones," he said. "He doesn't seem to be able to handle it." 
     "But it's true!" I said. "I saw it with my own eyes!" 
     "This is the silliest story I have ever heard in a long 
lifetime of hearing silly stories," he said. "I'm afraid I must 
ask you to leave." 
     "Wait!" I cried. "If I take you there and let you see it 
yourself, are we partners?" 
     "What are you talking about?" he said. 
     "We got to buy that graveyard before anyone else stakes a 
claim!" I said. "I ain't got no money, but I know where it is; you 
don't know where it is, but you can put up the money. If I can 
convince you it really exists, do we have a deal?"
     "How far is it from here?" he asked suspiciously. 
     "About six days' march," I said. 
     He pulled a map out of his desk. "Mark its location," he 
said. 
     "I can't," I said. 
     "Then how are we to find this mythical graveyard?" he 
demanded. 
     "I got three Mangbetus waiting for me outside of town," I 
said. "They were with me when I discovered it. They can show us 
the way." 
     "Mangbetus?" he said, his eyebrows raised. 
     "Right," I said. "And a God-fearing race they are, except in 
matters of diet." 
     "You know, I could arrest you for coming to me with a hare-
brained scheme like this," he said. 
     "True, Brother Carcosa," I said. "But then I'd just have to 
go out and find another partner once you set me free, and I truly 
don't see how that could possibly benefit either of us." 
     "All right," he said. "Come back here tomorrow morning and I 
will be ready to leave with you. But if this graveyard does not 
exist, it is going to go very hard with you, Doctor Jones. Very 
hard indeed." 
     "Brother Carcosa," I said, rising and shaking his hand, "you 
got yourself a deal." 
     I picked him up the next morning, and we were joined by Sam 
and the boys when we got a couple of miles west of the city 
limits. I knew he wasn't all that thrilled with the Mangbetu 
tribe, but I warned him to keep it under his hat, because the very 
last thing anyone in his right mind would want was to be viewed as 
an enemy by the Mangbetus, especially if they had a little mustard 
and onions handy. He took it under advisement, and the following 
six days were kind of routine. 
     Colonel Carcosa had a big map folded up in his backpack, and 
every couple of hours he'd pull it out and make certain notations 
on it. When we finally got to Sam's village he made us spend an 
extra day there while he checked out various landmarks to make 
sure he had the place spotted on the map. Then we spent a couple 
more days hunting up the graveyard, but we finally found it 
despite Sam's deficiencies at bushcraft. 
     "By God, Doctor Jones!" exclaimed Colonel Carcosa. "I must 
confess that until this minute I really didn't believe you!" 
     "Then why did you come along?" I asked as we moseyed down 
into the valley. 
     "If nothing else, I could always have turned the Mangbetus in 
for the reward," he said. Sam kind of tensed at that, and started 
looking at the Colonel the way a chef looks at a choice piece of 
tenderloin, but the Colonel simply smiled back and said, "Of 
course, that won't be necessary now, especially in view of the 
fact that we're going to need a nonstop stream of highly-paid 
porters." 
     That soothed Sam down a bit, and after a while he looked like 
he might settle for maybe only cutting off two or three of the 
Colonel's toes to flavor up a stew or something. 
     We walked down to the skeletons, and started counting, and 
came up with seven elephants. 
     "But that's just what's on the surface," said the Colonel. 
"There's no telling how many have sunk under the soft moist 
ground. Possibly thousands." 
     "Not only that," I pointed out, "but we might not even be 
safe standing right here. I mean, for all we know there's a couple 
of dozen elephants making their way here right now just to die on 
this very spot." 
     He thought about that for a moment and then walked a few feet 
away. I nodded my approval and told him he looked much safer in 
his new location. 
     "Well, Doctor Jones," he said after a few minutes, "I've seen 
enough. Let's get back to Beria and stake a claim to this place 
before anybody else stumbles onto it." 
     That made a lot of sense to me, especially since there were a 
few million army ants discussing combat strategy and logistics a 
couple of hundred feet away. So we went back to the Mangbetu 
village very slowly, with the Colonel marking things down on his 
map every half mile or so. We rested up for a day and then, 
accompanied only by Sam, who came along mainly to guide me back 
after we'd claimed the place, we returned to Beria. 
     I took a room in a local hostelry, Sam hung around a nearby 
restaurant getting hints on different ways to soften meat, and 
Colonel Carcosa went to the proper authorities to purchase the 
tract of land that contained the burial ground. He was in a real 
good mood when we met for dinner. 
     "Did you get it?" I asked as soon as he had pulled up a 
chair. 
     "Of course," he said. 
     "No problems?" I said. "Nobody suspects nothing?" 
     "Doctor Jones, you're not dealing with an amateur," he 
replied smugly. "The graveyard was in the middle of a privately 
owned two-hundred-thousand-acre tract of land. I purchased the 
whole thing at five British shillings an acre." 
     "The whole thing?" I said. "But why?"  
     "Because if it were known that I had bought one hundred acres 
or so in the interior of Portuguese East Africa, it would arouse 
curiosity. But two hundred thousand acres? It might seem peculiar, 
but no one is going to race out to search every square centimeter 
of the land to find out what I want with it." 
     I opined as to how it made a bit of sense at that, and we 
spent the rest of the evening toasting each other's good health 
and success in the world of high finance. 
     The next morning Sam and I set out for the graveyard, armed 
with saws and such other equipment as we might need to separate 
the various tusks from their skeletons. We stopped off at the 
Mangbetu village long enough to recruit a little help and for Sam 
to refresh Missus Sam, and then we headed off for the burial 
ground. Four of the skeletons had tusks, and we removed them and 
toted them all the way back to Mozambique. 
     "Excellent," said Colonel Carcosa, when the tusks averaged 
out at one hundred thirty pounds apiece. "I've ordered some earth-
moving equipment which should be here in about four months, at 
which time we can begin digging up all the skeletons that have 
sunk into the muck and mire." 
     It made sense to me, and I prepared to spend the next four 
months loafing and sleeping and enjoying the company of the local 
ladies, but Colonel Carcosa started getting itchy a few days later 
and sent me and Sam off to pick up the tusks from any new corpses. 
     I got back to Beria two weeks later with the news that there 
weren't any new corpses. 
     "That's very odd," said the Colonel. "After all, it's been 
almost a month since I was there. You would think some elephants 
would have died since then." 
     "Maybe this ain't the season for it," I suggested. 
     "And maybe you are being less than honest with me," he said 
accusingly. 
     "Brother Carcosa," I said. "I been telling you nothing but 
God's own truth. If you don't believe me, come on right now and 
we'll march out there together." 
     He stared long and hard at me, as if he was making up his 
mind. "I'll trust you for the moment," he announced at last, "but 
if I should ever find out that you were stealing ivory from our 
property, Doctor Jones, I have the power to make the rest of your 
life very unpleasant, to say nothing of brief." 
     Getting threatened by your partner can be pretty thirsty 
work, so after he finished talking I moseyed on over to the local 
pub, where I ordered a bottle of beer, and started carrying it to 
a table in the corner. 
     "Well, if it ain't the Reverend Lucifer Jones!" hollered a 
familiar voice. 
     I turned and saw Capturing Clyde Calhoun sitting at the bar. 
     "I sure didn't expect to see you here, Clyde," I said, 
walking over and joining him. "I figured your circus would be 
taking you to Bucharest and Rotterdam and all them other 
glittering exotic capitals of Europe." 
     "I'll be joining the circus in a couple of days," said 
Calhoun, pouring himself a glass of rye whiskey and offering one 
to me. "I'm just here to ship some survivors back to various zoos 
in the States." 
     "Well, it sure is good to see a friendly face," I said. 
"How's Lord Bloomstoke getting along?" 
     "Just fine," replied Calhoun. "Of course, I've had to land on 
him a couple of times about organizing the monkeys, but other than 
that he's doing a right creditable job. And how about yourself, 
Reverend? You ever get that tabernacle?" 
     I told him the sad story of the Tabernacle of Saint Luke, and 
then he told me the sad story of how he figured out that he had a 
career waiting for him in the Dark Continent on the day he 
accidentally shot the mayor's horse back in Billings, Montana, and 
then I told him the sad story of losing the affections of Miss 
Emily Perrison to Major Theodore Dobbins, late of His Majesty's 
armed forces, and then he told me the sad story of his first five
wives. 
     "We've sure had our share of bad luck, ain't we, Clyde?" I 
said, starting to feel downright weepy. 
     "We sure have," he agreed. 
     "I don't mean to butt in, gents," said the bartender. "But I 
got a hard-luck story to match anything you've got. I used to be a 
hunter like Mister Calhoun here." 
     "What happened?" I asked, ordering another beer and pouring 
two shots of rye into it, just to bring out the subtle nuances of 
its flavor. 
     "I got flim-flammed so bad I had to take this here bartending 
job to climb out from under a mountain of debts that I had taken 
on in good faith," said the bartender. "Seems this fellow hired me 
to go to some valley out in the middle of nowhere, right next to 
some cannibal sanctuary about five or six days' march from here, 
and offered me a thousand pounds for every elephant I could lure 
there and shoot. Then, after I'd spent a couple of weeks fighting 
off mosquitoes and hornets and tsetse flies and black mambas and 
the like and had actually shot a batch of elephants, I came back 
to town here and wrote notes against the money I was owed, but the 
son of a bitch took off and I never saw him or heard from him 
again." 
     "How much did he owe you?" I asked with a sinking feeling in 
the pit of my stomach. 
     "Seven thousand pounds!" said the bartender. "And of course 
we were so far out in the middle of the bush he knew there was no 
way for me and my one gun bearer to bring any of that ivory back 
to civilization." 
     "Did he say why he wanted you to shoot the elephants?" asked 
Calhoun. 
     "I gather he'd just bought a couple hundred thousand acres at 
a penny an acre or some such ridiculous price, and he seemed to 
think that leaving a bunch of dead elephants at this particular 
spot would make his real estate appreciate. I told him and told 
him that ivory ain't like flowers and that you can't just leave it 
on the ground and hope it'll take root and multiply, but he just 
kind of chuckled and said he was a patient man and that sooner or 
later someone would be impressed by the fact that I'd killed all 
them elephants. I dunno; I guess he thought shooting elephants in 
that stupid little valley would make it a national historic shrine 
or something." 
     "This feller's name didn't happen to have a Germanic sound to 
it, did it?" I asked, feeling kind of weak about the knees. 
     "Sure as hell did," said the bartender. 
     "What was it?" I asked. 
     "Von Horst," he replied. 
     "Damn!" I moaned. "I _knew_ it!" 
     "Yep. Erich Von Horst it was," continued the bartender. "I'll 
remember that name to my dying day." 
     "You got lots of company," I said. 
     I explained to Capturing Clyde that I suddenly remembered 
that I had urgent business elsewhere, and made a beeline toward 
Sam's favorite restaurant, where I told him that we should give 
serious thought to leaving the country at the earliest possible 
opportunity, like right that moment. 
     He told me that we'd be better off stopping by his village 
one last time so he could pick up some warriors to defend us 
against the denizens of the jungle and take along enough women to 
keep us all happy. I told him that I appreciated the thought, but 
right now I was a little more concerned with one particular 
denizen of the Portuguese East African government. He told me that 
he'd like to accommodate me, but it wouldn't be fair to the 
Mangbetu tribe as a whole for him to leave the country without 
sharing his newfound cooking knowledge with them. 
     Well, I could see I wasn't going to talk him out of it, and 
it made more sense to start walking toward the village right away 
than to spend all night standing in the street arguing, so I fell 
into step and we reached the village some six days later. 
     Sam conducted a three-hour graduate cooking seminar, gathered 
the people he thought we'd be most in need of, and headed off 
toward Tanganyika. We must have been within two miles of the 
border when a group of about twenty Portuguese soldiers, all armed 
to the teeth, intercepted us. 
     Sam was willing to fight to the death, but I explained to him 
that I had a feeling that the soldiers weren't really after the 
Mangbetus. The soldier nearest to us nodded, so I wished Sam and 
his people _bon appetit_ as they retreated into the bush. My hands 
were chained behind me and I was marched all the way back to
Beria, where I spent nine days in jail and was then brought 
to the office of an elderly gentleman named Alfredo Montenegro, 
who happened to hold the position of Chief Justice. 
     "Ah, Doctor Jones," he said. "I have been wondering exactly 
what you looked like. Now at long last I have the pleasure of 
making your acquaintance." 
     "It's a pleasure you could have had eight and a half days 
sooner as far as I'm concerned," I told him. 
     "You led us a merry little chase," he noted pleasantly. 
"There were times when I despaired of ever capturing you." 
     "Come to think of it, how _did_ you know we'd be where we 
were?" I asked. 
     "Most armies travel on their stomachs, Doctor Jones," he 
said. "Let us say that a cannibalistic army is just a tad easier 
to trace than certain others might be." 
     "Poor heathen must of backslid," I said. "Sam promised me 
they were only going to practice it as a ritual." 
     "Eating can be as ritualistic as most things," noted 
Montenegro. "But here you are safe and sound in Beria, so why 
bother yourself with how you came to be here?" 
     "True enough," I said. "But perhaps you might tell me why a 
man of the cloth who never meant no harm to nobody should have 
been held in durance vile for lo these many days?" 
     "My dear Doctor Jones," he said, "we may be an old colonial 
power, but we are not yet senile. When we discovered that a block 
of two hundred thousand acres had changed hands we started 
piercing through the corporate veil and came up with your friend 
Colonel Carcosa. We discovered, in tracing back over his actions, 
that he had spent a considerable amount of time in your company, 
and began reconstructing what you two had been up to. It all fell 
into place after we had a little chat with a fellow countryman of 
yours, a circus owner who thought he was helping your cause and 
incriminating a gentleman with a Germanic name who is of no 
importance to this case." 
     "Well, if you know all about it," I replied, "then you know 
that we were flim-flammed ourselves, and that there ain't no such 
thing as an elephants' graveyard. So that ought to let us off the 
hook, right?" 
     _"Wrong!"_ he thundered. "Doctor Jones, conspiracy with intent 
to defraud is every bit as much a criminal offense as fraud 
itself, and is punishable under very stringent laws, as your 
friend the former officer is currently finding out." 
     "You mean you're going to lock me up for a deal that cost me 
and my partner a million shillings?" I demanded, 
     "We would prefer not to," he said. "After all, you are an 
American citizen, and we don't wish to cause your government any 
distress or embarrassment." 
     "Well, then, just let me go and we'll let bygones be bygones 
and I'll forget the whole thing ever happened," I said 
magnanimously. 
     "It's not as easy as all that," said Montenegro. "Your 
presence is no longer desired in Portuguese East Africa." 
     "Never fear," I said. "I'll just take my copy of the Good 
Book and such members of my Mangbetu flock as remain loyal to me 
in my hour of need and clear out lock, stock, and barrel." 
     "I'm afraid that's out of the question," he said, shaking his 
head slowly. 
     "What's the problem?" I said. "There's lots of other 
countries around that'd be proud to have a missionary preaching 
the Word to the poor uneducated heathen." 
     "Doctor Jones," he said slowly, "while you were our...ah... 
guest, we made certain inquiries of our neighboring nations 
concerning their reaction should we decide to expel you." 
     "And?" I said. 
     "You are wanted in South Africa, Bechuanaland, and the 
Transvaal for selling fraudulent treasure maps. There is a warrant 
out for your arrest in Egypt for slave trading and certain illegal 
practices involving a mummy. You are wanted in Morocco and Algeria 
for grand larceny involving the theft of a diamond known as the 
Lion's Tooth." 
     "But I didn't steal it!" I protested. "Hell, I didn't even 
know I _had_ it!" 
     "Please don't interrupt. You are wanted in the Lado Enclave 
and Uganda for ivory poaching. You are wanted for removing certain 
national treasures in the form of precious stones from Nyasaland. 
The nation of Southwest Africa has issued a warrant for your 
arrest for killing whales without a license." 
     "A series of misunderstandings, nothing more," I said. 
     "Let me continue," he said. "You are wanted in Kenya for 
operating a bawdy house. The Congo has issued a warrant for your 
arrest for possible complicity in the disappearance of a gentleman 
named Burley Rourke. The Sudan wishes to speak to you about slave 
trading and impersonating a British officer and war hero, and 
Tanganyika is after you for consorting with known criminals." He 
paused and stared at me. "Frankly, Doctor Jones, I wonder where 
you find the energy to get through the day." 
     "How about Rhodesia?" I said. "I ain't never been there." 
     "Both Rhodesias have extradition treaties with all of the 
nations I have mentioned." 
     "Then what are you going to do with me?" I asked. 
     "It is my opinion that the entire continent of Africa will be 
better off without your particular brand of salvation," he said 
slowly. "Therefore, if you will agree to accept passage out of 
here tomorrow morning, I'll see to it that you are placed aboard a 
ship before any other African government can officially request 
that we detain you." 
     "I don't see as to how I've got much of a choice," I said. 
"As long as I've got to go, Brother Montenegro, how about getting 
me on a boat today so's I don't have to spend another night in 
jail?" 
     "Nothing would make me happier than getting you out of 
Beria today," he said, "but the only passenger ship currently in 
port is _The Dying Quail_, and for reasons I can only guess at, 
they refuse to allow you aboard." 
     So I spent my last night in Africa pretty much the same way I 
had spent some of my first ones. 
     My spirits were at an all-time low when they took me to the 
ship the next afternoon. I'd made three or four quick fortunes, 
only to be gulled out of them by sinful, godless men, and I had 
even had my beloved tabernacle ripped from my hands by a cruel and 
unfeeling Fate. 
     _"Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?"_ I muttered as I started 
climbing up the gangplank without a penny to my name and carrying 
no luggage except my well-worn copy of the Good Book. 
     I paused halfway between shore and ship and turned to take a 
last look at the Dark Continent. I'd met a lot of interesting folk 
there, and done most of them more good than they had done me. If 
it hadn't been for me and me alone, Herbie Miller and the Rodent 
would still be looking for jobs, and the Dutchman, Ali ben Ishak, 
Major Theodore Dobbins, Ishmael Bledsoe, and Luthor Christian 
would all still be hunting for spouses. Rosepetal Schultz would 
still be selling her dubious services in the back alleys of Cairo, 
Friday would be wearing a loincloth and living out in the bush, 
Lord Bloomstoke would still be hiding from his creditors, 
Capturing Clyde Calhoun would have lowered the world's gorilla 
population by half, and Mademoiselle Markoff wouldn't have seen 
the Glory and the Light. 
     All in all, I decided, it wasn't a bad four years' work at 
that. I'd left my mark on a whole bunch of previously worthless 
lives, and I was still young and vigorous and with my whole life 
ahead of me. 
     "You can keep this damned hellhole, Von Horst!" I hollered 
into the wind. "I'm going off to strange new lands where a God-
fearing Christian can still make an honest living!" 
     I climbed up the rest of the gangplank and was about to hunt 
up my cabin when my eyes fell on one of the passengers, a vision 
of loveliness who looked like a redheaded version of Rosepetal 
Schultz, and the human spirit, glorious and unquenchable thing 
that it is, began to soar within me once again, especially after I 
saw the size of the diamonds on her necklace. I stopped to 
introduce myself and offer her any form of spiritual comfort or 
uplifting that might appeal to her. She giggled and agreed to 
discuss the matter more fully over dinner, and by the time the 
voyage was over we had become fast friends. In fact, truth to 
tell, it was occasionally a race between us to see just which of 
us was the faster. 
     We landed in the far exotic Orient, where sinful and 
mysterious cities like Hong Kong and Macao and Singapore and 
Shanghai, all filled with godless men and women and dens of vice 
and rebel armies and the like, were just waiting for a handsome 
young buck like myself to come and bring the Word to them, a task 
to which I dedicated the next few years of my life with 
considerable success. 
     But that, of course, is another story. 

                             -The End-