"He must be from a far-off country," I said to Rogala, "for he seems not to understand any of the languages we have spoken to him."
Our captive was tall, and emaciated from hunger. His teeth were filed sharp to a point, and gave him a very savage appearance. Every part of his body except his legs was tattooed all over. On his stomach was the representation of a crocodile, showing that he must have lived on the shore of a lake or of a river. Upon his cheeks were spots of the size of large peas. His forehead was also tattooed.
"We must be very watchful," said Rogala; "perhaps the man understands some of the languages we spoke to him, after all."
Then he broke the man's bow, and buried his bag of poisoned arrows in the ground, for fear that man or beast would be hurt by them.
Our prisoner was very much frightened when he saw this, and looked at me with imploring eyes. He had divined instinctively that I was the master; his looks seemed to say: "Do not kill me!"
After a pause I said: "Rogala, if our prisoner tries to run away, let us spare his life and not shoot him; every man tries to run away from the people he fears in search of liberty. You would do likewise if Rotembo were not a good master."
[Illustration: "_Suddenly Rogala uttered a terrible war-cry and ran towards the man_."]
Rogala looked at me in blank astonishment, and then said: "Oguizi, I will not try to kill him if he runs away; but," he added, "he must not run away."
We let our prisoner crack more koola nuts, and waited until his appetite was satisfied; then we started for our camp, our captive walking between Rogala, who led, and myself in the rear. Rogala had taken the precaution to tie his hands behind his back before starting. We walked silently, not one of us uttering a word until we came to our palisade. Our captive then showed signs of great fear.
I told Rogala to go over first and tie Andekko, for I was sure the dog would try to bite him. When we were all inside, we gave our prisoner a good warm meal of plantains--a few of which still remained--and a piece of monkey. Rogala washed his body with warm water and then rubbed it with oil, for his skin was dried and parched; he seemed very grateful. Soon he fell asleep on the bare ground.