Isabel's reports came every morning. A force of four hundred men was now following in the expedition's tracks. The Daughters of Al-Manat were making daily attacks against them but nine more of her followers had been killed and the distance was closing between the two groups.
“If we can just make it to Kazeh before they catch up,” Burton told his friends. “The Arabians there are well disposed toward me—they will loan us men and weapons.”
They trudged on.
Plains. Hills. Forests. Swamps. Jungle. The land challenged their every step.
Sagesera. Tunda. Dege la Mhora. Madege Madogo. Kidunda. Mgeta. The villages passed one after the other, each demanding hongo, each whittling away at their supplies.
Desertions. Theft. Accidents. Fatigue. The safari became ever more frayed and difficult to control.
One night, they heard distant gunshots.
They were camped at Kiruru, a small and semi-derelict village located deep in a plantation of holcus, whose tall, stiff canes almost completely hid the ragged beehive huts and slumping bandani.
Herbert Spencer, freshly wound up, had been explaining to them some of his First Principles of Philosophy when the crackle and pops of rifle fire echoed faintly through the air.
They looked at each other.
“How far away?” Thomas Honesty asked.
“Not far enough,” Maneesh Krishnamurthy grunted.
“It's from somewhere ahead of us, not behind,” Burton noted.
“Lardy flab!” Pox added.
“Sleep with your weapons beside you,” the explorer ordered. “Herbert, I want you to patrol the camp tonight.”
“Actually, Boss, I patrol the camp every blinkin' night,” the philosopher answered.
“Well, with extra vigilance tonight, please, and I think Tom, William, Maneesh, Algy, and I will stand shifts with you.”
Burton turned to Saíd. “Wilt thou see to it that we are packed and on the move well before sunrise?”
Saíd bowed an acknowledgement.
The night passed without incident but the march the following morning was one of the worst they'd so far experienced.
They found themselves fighting through thick razor-edged grass, which towered over their heads and dripped dew onto them. The black earth was greasy and slippery and interlaced with roots that caught at their feet. The mules brayed in distress, refused to be ridden, and had to be forced along with swipes of the bakur, not moving until the cat had raised welts on their hindquarters.
Pox, who'd been sent to Isabel earlier, returned and shrieked: “Message from Isabel Big Nose Arundell. We have reduced their cretinous number by a quarter but they are less than a day behind you. Move faster, Dick. Message bleeding well ends.”
“We're moving as fast as we bleeding well can!” Burton grumbled.
The grass gave way to a multitude of distorted palms, then to a savannah which promised easier going but immediately disappointed by blocking their progress with a sequence of steep nullahs—watercourses whose near-vertical banks dropped into stinking morasses that sucked them in right up to their thighs.
“I suspect this plain is always water-laden,” Burton panted, as he and Krishnamurthy tried to haul one of the mules through the mire. “The water runs down from Usagara and this area is like a basin—there's no way for it to quickly drain. Were we not in such a confounded hurry, I would have gone around it. The ridge to the north is the best route, but it would've taken too long to get there. Bismillah! I hope they don't catch us here. This is a bad place for armed conflict!”
Krishnamurthy pointed ahead, westward, at plum-coloured hills. “Higher ground there,” he said. “Hopefully it'll be easier going. The height would give us an advantage, too.”
Burton nodded an agreement and said, “Those are the hills of Dut'humi.”
They finally reached the slopes.
Burton guided his expedition along a well-trodden path, up through thick vegetation, over a summit, and down the other side. They waded through a swamp that sent up noxious bubbles of hydrogen sulphide with their every step. The rotting carcass of a rhinoceros lay at the far edge of the morass, and beyond it a long, sparsely forested incline led them to an area of tightly packed foliage. Monkeys and parrots squabbled and hooted in the branches around them.
They forced their way along the overgrown trail until they suddenly came to a clearing, where seven elderly warriors stood, each holding a bow with a trembling arrow levelled at them. The old men were plainly terrified and tears were streaming down their cheeks. They were no threat and they knew it.
Saíd called for the porters to halt, then stepped forward to speak to the old men, but one suddenly let loose a cry of surprise, dropped his weapon, pushed the Arab aside, and ran over to Burton.
“Wewe! Wewe! Thou art Murungwana Sana of Many Tongues!” he cried. “Thou wert here long long days ago, and helped our people to fight the p'hazi whose name is Manda, who had plundered our village!”
“I remember thee, Mwene Goha,” Burton said, giving the man his title. “Thy name is Máví ya Gnombe. Manda was of a neighbouring district, and we punished him right and good, did we not? Surely he has not been raiding thy village again?”
“No, not him! The slavers have come!” The man loosed a wail of despair. “They have taken all but the old!”
“When did this happen?”
“In the night. It is Tippu Tip, and he is still here, camped beyond the trees, in our fields.”
A murmur of consternation rose from the nearest of the porters and rippled away down the line. Burton turned to Saíd. “See to the men. Bring them into this clearing. Do not allow them to flee.”
The ras kafilah signalled to his bully boys and they started to herd the porters into the glade.
The king's agent instructed Trounce, Honesty, Krishnamurthy, Spencer, Isabella Mayson, and Sister Raghavendra to help the Arab guard the men and supplies. He gestured for Swinburne to join him, then addressed Mávi ya Gnombe: “Mwene Goha, I wouldst look upon the slavers' camp, but I do not wish the slavers to see me.”
“Follow, I shall show thee,” the elder said. He and his companions, who'd put away their arrows, led Burton and Swinburne to the far side of the clearing where the path continued.
Between the glade and the cultivated fields beyond there was a thick band of forest. The trail led halfway through this, then veered sharply to the left. The African stopped at the bend and pointed down the path.
“It is the way to the village,” he said.
“I remember,” Burton replied. “The houses and bandani are in another clearing some way along. I had arranged for a forward party of Wanyamwezi porters to meet us at thy village with supplies, but the plan went awry.”
“Had they come, they would now be slaves, so it is good the plan did not work. Murungwana Sana, this is one of three paths from the village clearing. Another leads from it down to the plain and is better trodden than this.”
“I was wondering why this one is so overgrown,” said Burton. “The last time I was here, it was the main route.”
“We changed it after Manda attacked us.”
“And the third path?”
“Goes from the village, through the forest, to the fields. All these paths are now guarded by old men, as this one was. But let us not follow this way. Instead, we shall go through the trees here, and we will come to the fields at a place where the slavers would not expect to see a man, and will therefore not be looking. My brothers will meanwhile return to the village, for the grandmothers of those taken are sorely afraid.”