J. Farjeon - Little God Ben

Vaguely he saw the figures of his companions. Four were stationary. Three were running. Whether towards him or away from him he could not say, and he certainly did not care. The drum was now shouting in his ear, and other sounds came out of the forest. Murmurs. Chanting. Tramping. He felt like a caught mouse, and waited for huge heads to peer and leer at him.

Then suddenly out of the chaos came to him his mad, insane idea. He acted upon it before he knew that he had got it. He leapt on to the vacant pedestal and, staring heavenwards, struck a godlike attitude.

The murmurs increased. The chanting rose. The tramping thudded. The drum beat with the force of a sledge-hammer. Then, all at once, every sound ceased. The world seemed to have stopped rotating.

‘Wot’s ’appenin’?’ wondered Ben, his eyes still fixed glassily on the tree-tops.

The next instant a great voice rose, a voice charged with stupendous emotion.

‘Oomoo! Oomoo! Oomoo!’

There was a sound as of an army crashing. A hundred natives fell flat on their faces before the human representation of their Little God.

The success of Ben’s ruse was not merely startling. It was terrifying. For the moment he had duped these natives and was being taken for the God of Storms. The dusky, prostrate backs glimpsed out of the corners of his motionless eyes, the strange chorus of awed murmurings that rose from the ground, and the constant repetition of the word ‘Oomoo,’ proved that. He was receiving the island’s worship! But what would happen when the moment passed? When it was discovered that he was not a god but a miserable scared-stiff mortal? When he sneezed, say—he felt the desire rising as the alarming thought occurred—or when his knees gave way and he wobbled from the pedestal?

Then the worship would be transformed to wrath! He would be seized and torn to bits, and these humble murmurings would change to howls of primitive rage! Ben pictured himself being torn to bits and, in his too lively imagination, watched his limbs being tossed high into the air.

‘Well, wot’s goin’ ter ’appen is goin’ ter ’appen,’ he thought, ‘on’y I ’opes it ’appens quick!’

In spite of the hope, he did nothing to expedite the happening, but continued earnestly to emulate a Madame Tussaud waxwork.

The moments slipped by. The murmurings continued. The dawning sneeze was wrestled with and temporarily conquered. But Ben’s limbs began to ache. His pose, not unlike that of Eros, was difficult to hold.

‘’Ow long’s this goin’ on?’ he wondered.

Then the native nearest to him rose to his feet. His head, large and perspiring and not in the least attractive, loomed up into view from a black hell. Two arms, also large, rose above the head, and two black thick lips spoke.

‘Vooloo? Vooloo, Oomoo? Vooloo?’

‘Wot the ’ell does that mean?’ thought Ben.

‘’Ad I better answer ’im, or pertend I ain’t int’rested?’

He pretended he wasn’t interested, and while the native waited for the answer that did not come, the unresponsive god noticed another figure edging quietly towards him. It was Oakley.

Now the native, evidently a man of some authority, turned his body, and waved his arms towards Ben’s companions. Four of them—Ruth, Haines, Cooling and Medworth—had not moved since the appearance of the natives, and were awaiting the end of the astonishing episode with tense curiosity. The other three, having failed in their unheroic attempt to escape, were being closely watched by half a dozen giants with spears.

‘Holalulala?’ cried the native spokesman.

Only by the upward inflexion did Ben gather that this was not a statement but a question. Hadn’t he heard the word before? Memory stirred uneasily.

‘Moose?’

He knew he hadn’t heard that one.

‘Lungoo?’

Ben remembered Lungoo. Oakley had mentioned that it meant ‘Fried knuckles.’ Was this fellow inquiring whether Ben, alias Oomoo, would like his companions’ knuckles to be fried? ‘Lumme, I can’t git away from knuckles!’ thought Ben. Then, in a sudden flash, he remembered Oakley’s interpretation of Holalulala: ‘Take his eyes out.’

‘Nah, then, I must do somethink!’ reflected Ben, hoping that gods were permitted to perspire. ‘Orl I gotter decide is, wot?’

Oakley evidently shared Ben’s opinion that something must be done. He had been quietly edging closer and closer, and now he stood only a few feet away. His lips moved softly, as though still urged by prayer, and the prayer ran:

‘Waa—lala, Make-a-sign lala,

Holdi-tongue, li,

Waa—lala.’

If this was the strangest injunction Ben had ever received, it was also the most welcome. It was, in fact, exactly what he needed, providing him with a method of postponing further the dreaded moment of discovery. Yes, of course, that was it! Make a sign! Gods didn’t speak—not, anyway, in Ben’s voice—but they did make signs, and Ben knew a lot of signs. Which one should he choose? A slow, solemn wink? One of these new-fangled continental salutes? Something in the thumb line? Or could he kill two birds with one stone by bringing his nose into it and settling a tickle?

While these alternatives were flashing through Ben’s mind, the decision was taken out of his hands by the spokesman.

‘Chehaka!’ he roared, like a despairing animal, and his great arms once more shot upwards.

Startled into activity, and misinterpreting the intention of the arms, Ben raised his own arms to ward off an expected blow. The effect was instantaneous. Instead of attacking Ben, the spokesman clasped his fingers together and bellowed seraphically:

‘Oomoo poopoo! Oomoo poopoo!’

‘I’ve pooped,’ thought Ben.

Then another silence fell, faintly broken a second later by Oakley’s low chanting again:

‘Waa—lala, Wave-your-arms lala,

Hurry O li,

Waa—lala!’

Ben waved his arms. He waved them slowly and solemnly, like a windmill in a gentle breeze. His impulse was for quicker motion, which would have been more in keeping with the beating of his heart, but the intelligence of Oakley was having an effect upon him, and he was doing his best to emulate it. Oakley’s mind working to save Ben’s skin supplied the one faint ray of hope.

The spokesman—he was, as Ben learned later, the Chief of the tribe, though not the actual ruling spirit—stared intently at the godly motions, trying to interpret them. Failing, he turned to Oakley and muttered:

‘Kwee? Kwee?’

It was the moment Oakley had played for. He realised before Ben did that immediate danger was past, and with the realisation came a totally novel sense of power. The sense would have elated another. It might have produced a feeling of drunken joy, but Oakley remained calm. He was beyond joy or misery. He accepted what came with the same passive exterior and almost the same emotion, or lack of it. All he experienced now, as he found the Chief’s inquiring eyes upon him, was a feeling of vague comfort.

The comfort was not shared by the other white folk. The three who had attempted escape were too near six sharp spears, and Ardentino was wondering whether to make a second attempt; while the four who had stood firm were perilously near the snapping point. Ruth’s fingers were gripping Haines’s sleeve, though only he of the two knew it, and Medworth was in ripe condition to shriek. Cooling, unhampered by the altruistic anxiety infused into Haines by the pressure on his sleeve, was the least mentally perturbed. He disliked pain intensely, and was ready to go to considerable lengths to avoid it, but even if his knuckles were destined to be fried, he would not lose his sense of superiority. He even smiled when he found that Oakley was looking towards him.