Warren Murphy: Slave Safari

General William Forsythe Butler came from the tent, sleepy, rubbing his heavied eyes. "Yes, Mr. President?"

"Come on, man, we getting out of here."

Butler shook his head, trying to get a grasp on the morning's events. Obode flew past him into Obode's own tent. Butler looked around the camp. Nothing really unusual there. Except… except there weren't any soldiers to be seen. He followed Obode into his tent

Obode was wrestling his white shirt on.

"What's wrong, Mr. President?" Butler asked.

"I'll tell you what's wrong. We leaving this place."

"Where are the guards?"

"The guards are dead or deserted. All of them," Obode said. "And the elephants. Their ivory been removed. We leaving. We leaving now 'cause I ain't gonna have nothing to do with nobody who can kill my soldiers and cripple my elephants in the night, without a sound, without a trace. Man, we getting out of here."

Obode brushed past Butler before his subordinate had a chance to speak. When Butler got back outside, the sun was beginning its climb into the sky and Obode was behind the wheel of one of the jeeps. He turned the ignition key to start position but nothing happened. He tried again, then with a curse jumped heavily down from the jeep and went to another vehicle.

That one would not start either.

Butler came to the jeep and opened the hood. The in-sides of the engine compartment had been destroyed. The battery-had been broken in half, wires were ripped and wrenched apart, the distributor had been crushed into broken black powder and chips.

Butler inspected the other four jeeps in the clearing. They were all the same.

He shook his head at Obode, sitting disconsolately on the seat in the driver's seat of one of the vehicles.

"Sorry, General," Butler said, although he was not sure he was sorry at all. "If we go anywhere, we walk."

Obode looked up at Butler. "In this land we haven't a chance. Even the Loni could pick us off like flies."

"Then what do we do, Mr. President?"

Obode slammed a ham-sized fist down into the steering wheel of the jeep, cracking the wheel and sending the vehicle rocking back and forth on its wheels.

"Dammit," Obode shouted, "we do what armies should always do. We charge."

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

While Remo slept, Princess Saffah slipped out of his hut and went back to the hut where Hillary Butler slept.

Saffah could not recognize the feeling that gripped her on this day. All her life, she had waited for the legend to come true; now the men of the legend were here; soon the people of the Loni tribe would be restored to power; and yet, she felt a vague feeling of unease.

Legends were never simple. There were many ways for one to come true. Had they not, for instance, thought that Butler might be the Master of the legend? He had given up his former life in America to become the Loni's friend, so one might call him a dead man. And his returning to the Loni might fulfil the prophecy of the Loni children coming home. So she had thought, but that was wrong.

Might not other things be wrong? You are being a fool, child. What of Obode? Do you doubt that he is the evil man of the story? And that Remo must face him today? Yes, yes. And what of the Little Father? Doubt you that he will purify the Loni? No, no, but how? How?

Saffah ducked into the hut where the young American girl slept. She slid down smoothly onto her heels at the side of the small raised cot. The white girl breathed smoothly and evenly, and the faint trace of a smile played at the corners of her mouth. She would be well, Saffah knew, for one who could dream could live.

She put her ebony hand out and rested it on Hillary's pale white arm and looked down at the contrast Hillary did not stir. Why was it so important, all this concern with color? Skin was skin, black or white or yellow as the Little Father's. What counted only was what was under the skin; the spirit, the heart, the soul. She looked at Hillary Butler and thought, might it not also be thus with tribes? Could hatred between Loni and Hausa end if they could only consider each other as people, good and bad, but each different?

She squeezed Hillary Butler's arm gently, reassuringly.

Chum was up early and Remo found him at the pit of fire. The fire had been stoked and allowed to smoulder during the night and now dry weeds and twigs were being thrown upon it.

As Chiun directed, four Loni tribesmen began to cover the unburned wood in the pit with leafy green branches of trees which dripped water, and sizzled and hissed on the white hot stones in the pit. Steam rose and smoke poured out from under the corners of the branches in lazy coils like drunken sated snakes.

"We going to have a cookout?" Remo asked. "Do you need a duck? I'll run to the store for hamburger rolls if you want."

"Need you go out of your way to appear gross?" Chiun asked. "For certainly, you need no assistance, no more than the duck needs help in quacking."

They were interrupted by a roar behind them. Along the trail, around the corner of the huts, striding into the village square came Obode and Butler, Obode leading the way, bellowing like a bull moose taunted by flies and gnats.

"Cowards and washwomen of the Lord tribe, General Obode is here. Come out, fly swatters and mosquito killers."

The village square was deserted as the few Loni men in it seemed to slip away. At one end of the square, near the fire pit, stood Remo and Chiun; at the other end, seventy five feet away, stood Butler and Obode. The four men stood looking at each other.

Out of a hut halfway between the two pairs came Princess Saffah. She stood black and tall, silent and majestic, wearing her almost-Grecian short robe, staring imperiously at Obode who continued to challenge the Loni men to combat, one at a time or all at once.

"Silence your mouth, braying beast," Saffah said finally.

"Who are you?" Obode shouted, after a moment's pause in which, Remo saw, he was stunned by Saffah's beauty.

"I am Saffah, first princess of the Loni Empire, and I order your silence."

"You order? You order? I am General Dada Obode, President of Busati, commander of all this land, and I am the one who orders."

"Perhaps in your brothels and in your pig sty of a capital, but here you can be silent. We are glad you came, General."

"When I am done," Obode said, "Perhaps you will not be so glad."

Saffah clapped her hands, three times, sharply. Slowly, obviously reluctantly, the Loni began to come from their huts, first women and children, and then men.

"We are glad you came nevertheless," she said smiling, as Loni men drew near Obode and Butler. "And you, Butler," she added, "you have done well to get the gross beast into our camp."

Butler gave a slight bow and Obode's head snapped toward him as if on a rubber band. Suddenly, so many things made sense. Butler was his traitor. Obode roared and lunged with both hands for Butler's throat. Butler was surprised by the attack and fell back before Obode's weight until Obode, at a signal from Saffah, was pulled away and restrained by six Loni tribesmen.

Chiun and Remo walked slowly down the length of the plaza toward Obode who still glared at Butler. "Coward, traitor, Loni dog," Obode spat. "Welcome to my people, fat pig," Butler said. "You have not even the courage of the assassin," Obode said. "For you feared to take my life by yourself as you could have many times because I trusted you. Instead, you waited until you could deliver me into the hands of this flock of sheep."

"Discretion, General, discretion."

"Cowardice," Obode roared. "The armies I have known would have shot you like the dog you are."

Into the chaos, above the voices, rose the command of Chiun: "Silence. The Master of Sinanju says stop your tongues of women."

Obode turned toward Chiun who now stood directly in front of him and looked him over, as if he had just noticed him for the first time. The Basuti President towered over the aged Korean by a foot and a half. His weight was three times Chiun's.