In the distance we could hear the native drumming then just as suddenly it ceased. Night fell and with it an uneasy silence broken only by the insidious humming of grasshoppers,and the raucous braying of a herd of Nederhiwi Wild Boar. All around us lit torches materialised, and with them the native occupants of the outpost, who did not acknowledge our presence, but did make sure that the area in which we were camped was exceeding well-lit.
“Wallee ici! Wallee na hutu ici!” jabbered one of the splay footed natives pointing enthusiastically towards the wide open gates. The excitement rippled through that alien horde until as one they cried “Wallee ici! Wallee ici” turning their faces and bodies as one towards the din being made by the sound of approaching drums. Had Professor Powell prevailed victoriously over the Kon-Kon-Safwo-Redwoods? We would soon know!
“Wallee ici!!! Umtargatie victoreee!”
Umtargatie victory indeed! For even as Professor Powell led his triumphal procession in through the Ivory festooned gates, the Wahiri Hiri were conquering the Umbongoan Countryside and sweeping all before them!How long would it be before they reached this Ivory outpost?
“Umtargatie victoree! Victoree!” more cries of triumph and celebration as the Nederhiwi clamoured to meet their alabaster skinned saviour. Glancing feverishly upon his enthralled flock whose wildly impassioned joy was infant like in its expression, Professor Powell let himself be passed from hand to hand overhead, till at length he came to rest upon a huge intricately carved Ebony Wood stool.
“My dear children!” cried he waving an imperious hand over us all “The battle was joined and won, the Kon-Kon-Safwo’s have conceded their defeat and it is as Emperor of Nederhiwi that I now address you!”
“Conceded their defeat?” said I turning to Captain Dunrudy who stood close by scratching his his head and looking perplexed “What does he mean by that?” in reply Captain Dunrudy discretely tapped the butt of his Maxim “Not what he thinks! Them Kon-Kon-Safwo’s don’t like being crossed, they gets their livelihood from delivering cargoes of Ivory, Ivory which he won’t let them have they may have departed, but they won’t have gone far I wager!”
More exultant whoops of pleasure followed and with it a degree of frenzied dancing so far divorced from the region of moral decency that I shudder even to describe it.
“Twerk it my children! Twerk it! Twerk it!” cried he whose spiritual faculties were now so weak that moral decency even in dance eluded him,”Twerk it!”.
“Declared isself Emperor of Nederhiwi?!” muttered Captain Dunrudy wiggling his hips discretely in time to the the beat of the Tom-Tom Drums “The Imperial administrators won’t like that!”
“Y’all-ah!” muttered Pasher Arshad “Had he been in the service of the Sultan Abu Dekallah he would have been whipped severely, tied to a dozen horses and torn limb from limb for his treacherous infamy!”
Dear devout reader, t’was as if we had descended into the very fires of hell with the good professor as our guide! No importunate sinner found chained midst the smouldering embers of Gehenna could have known such despair, such horror! The dreams of empire had borne us aloft from the emerald isle we called home, to this place of boundless savagery. The Professor Powell I knew had entered Africa as a highly civilised British Anthropologist, but like an infatuated, sultry eyed lover, darkest Africa had lured him deep into the nihilistic bowels of the Nederhiwi, and the savagery, the utter savagery of it all had closed around him.
Above us the pure white stars sparkled innocently, and the pale moon hung luminously in their midst, looked down with a cold eye upon the tawdry goings-on to which we found our good Christian selves reluctantly made privy. Ah! How the torches scattered around the camp glimmered, their unrelenting glare casting light and shadow upon the nefarious twerkings of Professor Powell and the heathen Nederhiwi. Oh! The plenteous tears shed by us all as we witnessed the frightening depths of degradation to which the Professor had succumbed! With a look of primal ecstasy he arched his back and shimmied till the Palm Fronds tied to his thick waist swished to and fro rustling audibly, and all the while, rapt with horror, we watched him, watched him and prayed!
“Twerk it! Twerk it! Twerk it!” cried Captain Dunrudy wiggling his hips and joining arms with the bemused Chief Porter who snickered loudly and declared “Umbwaaga na butu! Moribundus tee tee!”. Dear reader, how many morally decent supplications can be offered up in circumstances such as this and to whom? I must confess that I could think of no appropriate bible scriptures that could touch on matters such as this save one,
“It is not the sound of victory,
it is not the sound of defeat;
it is the sound of twerking that I hear.”
To be continued…….
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