IT WAS HALF-WAY through my third season that a grave crisis flared up in the Kurt Hansen around ’Mlangeni.
We had started the season with a fresh crew, only myself, Leif, Gorgeous, the bosun, Nils Ruud and ’Mlangeni left of the old. Among the new members was a young Norwegian called Harald Foyn. He had done only one season whaling on our station before, consequently nobody among us knew anything about him. However, from the start it was clear that he had picked up both what was negative about life at sea and many of the prejudices that white people had against Africans.
I was the first to see him come on board, a duffle bag on his shoulder, our first Saturday evening of the season. Gorgeous, ’Mlangeni, Leif and I, who had just met after many months, had been exchanging news in our favourite place by the hatch in a lively manner. ’Mlangeni had just stood up and turned to go below when this youth came up the gang-plank from the quay. Seeing ’Mlangeni go down to the forecastle, he stood for a moment as if still with shock. He was tall, thin, with a long neck and a huge Adam’s apple, and bits of thin pale yellow hair stuck out from under the brim of his hat.
He stood like that for a moment while we all stopped talking to give him a chance of announcing himself. But instead of doing that he merely hurled a question at us. “Was that a Kaffir who just went down the ladder?”
We were all three so amazed by his tone that we did not at once answer.
Instantly the youth dropped his duffle bag on deck and, legs apart, said aggressively: “If he’s a member of the crew I tell you straight I won’t stand for it.”
“In that case,” Leif answered him with quiet deliberation: “In that case you’d better start looking for another ship right now. He is a respected member of this crew and his name is not ‘Kaffir’ but ’Mlangeni. If ever I hear you even refer to him as that ‘Kaffir’, I’ll report you right away to the Captain.”
Taken aback, the youth gulped hard, his Adam’s apple going like a snooker ball up and down his throat.
“And who are you to tell me what to do?” he asked, at last getting over his surprise.
“Who I am is not the question,” Leif said cool as ever. “This is our ship. The point is who are you to walk on board and start cross-examining us?”
That finally deflated him and he answered almost meekly: “I’m Harald Foyn, come to join the Kurt Hansen.” He paused, looked round as if hoping he was in the wrong ship after all and asked, “This is the Kurt Hansen, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Leif replied. “I’ve been expecting you. The Captain told me to look out for you. You follow me and I’ll show you your bunk and the place to stow your gear.”
As the two of them left I heard Leif break into Norwegian. Talking, he led the way down into the forecastle where ’Mlangeni was. I had enough of a smattering of Norwegian by then and knew Leif so well that I had no doubt the newcomer was being told in the most meticulous terms possible how he was expected to behave towards ’Mlangeni in future.
“You know, Pete,” Gorgeous commented sententiously on what was clearly a disagreeable fact of life to him. “It takes all sorts to make a world. So I expect we’ve just got to endure that old ‘Adam’s apple’.”
Despite my distaste for what had just happened, I couldn’t help laughing. ’Mlangeni himself, whose people all have a genius for nicknaming, could not have done it better. From then on Harald Foyn was destined to be known among the four of us as ‘Adam’s apple’.
Harald Foyn, however, bad as his first impression on us had been, was not without a certain indefatigable cunning. From that moment, he was on his best behaviour. He was particularly nice to Leif, and the more influential the person in the ship, the more ingratiating he became. It made me feel quite embarrassed to see how obsequious he was to the bosun and above all to the Captain. Hitherto, however moody, domineering and difficult our Captain, the exercise of authority and the hierarchy of discipline in our ship, as in all other Norwegian whalers, had had the feeling of being a kind of enlarged family system. Foyn’s way was utterly different and so full of special design and secret calculation that he subtly spoilt the atmosphere in the ship. It is astonishing how one negative factor, even in so ungracious and obvious a form as that of Foyn, can have a good run in the small world of a ship before it is recognised for what it is.
Foyn soon was in the good books of most of the crew, particularly those of Nils Ruud. Ruud was not a bad fellow at all, merely rather unimaginative, insensitive and somewhat dim. On the whole he meant well, but he was the perfect prey for a person like Foyn. I had seen this kind of alliance of cunning and simplicity so often at school that I could not fail to recognise it at once for what it was. It all started, of course, when Foyn discovered how curious if not suspicious Ruud was of ’Mlangeni, as well as jealous of his relationship with the three of us. From that moment he flattered Ruud and paid so much attention to him that they were soon fast friends. Since Ruud, if not the most popular, was regarded as one of the steadiest members of the crew, the ship was inclined to take it for granted that the newcomer must be a good man too.
The one thing that comforted me as I watched Foyn enlarge his establishment in the opinion of the ship was that the Captain clearly could hardly stand the sight of him. The more he fawned and jumped to the Captain’s orders, the more Thor Larsen seemed to be put off by him. Cunning as he was, Foyn was not intelligent enough to change his tactics. His lack of success made him re-double his efforts until it was quite painful to watch.
One evening we saw Larsen abruptly and pointedly turn his back on Foyn who had jumped forward to offer him some matches the moment the Captain took out his cigarette case.
“That’s quite something for even ‘Adam’s apple’ to swallow,” said Gorgeous quietly.
“He’ll swallow it and more,” Leif told him.
The way Leif had spoken sounded rather ominous, so I asked: “What d’you think of him really, Leif?”
“I wouldn’t underrate him,” Leif replied obliquely. “Ruud seems to like him, too.”
Gorgeous had strong feelings about Ruud. “No accounting for tastes,” he shrugged. “As the Frenchies say, everyone to his own taste.”
“Well, don’t underrate the Foyn-Ruud combination,” Leif replied quietly.
“We’ve nothing to fear from them,” I interrupted. “What could they possibly do to us?”
“Not us perhaps—” Leif began.
He stopped at the sight of ’Mlangeni stepping out on deck and stretching himself in the evening sun before coming to join us. With a sickening realisation I knew then what Leif meant. I also knew better than any of them what the Captain felt in his secret heart about his Zulu stoker. I resolved there and then that I would watch Foyn with all possible vigilance, for I recognised that, with the strange cunning of an obsessional character, he had fixed on the one combination of persons and purpose that could prosper.
“When Idungandhlu joins with ’ndhlebe-ka-zizua,” ’Mlangeni said to me in Zulu as he sat down just as Ruud and Foyn went by, “it is time to stand guard on the cattle even in the kraal.”
“What did he say?” both Leif and Gorgeous asked.
I looked at ’Mlangeni first before replying. “He called Foyn a name meaning ‘a stirrer-up-of-strife-in-the-house’,” I replied, “and said that one should be on one’s guard all the time.”
Leif and Gorgeous exchanged glances and then Leif gave ’Mlangeni a warm glance of respect for this evidence of natural intelligence.
Patting the empty space beside him, he said: “Come and join us, ’Mlangeni. I’m certain Gorgeous would love you to smoke one of his cigarettes with him.”
As regards Foyn, he never again to my knowledge called ’Mlangeni “Kaffir”. But neither did he ever use his name as everyone else did. ’Mlangeni, of course, did not fail to notice this, though he was too proud to mention it, and in any case he was so disdainful of what his instinctive appraisal told him of Foyn’s character that he would not let it trouble him.
Once, as we watched Foyn and Ruud leaning close in conversation over the rail opposite us, he said: “You know, ’Nkosan, the ‘stirrer-up-of-strife-in-the-house’ is a man whose shadow has left him.”
In Sindakwena it was a great compliment to say of someone that he “threw a shadow”: to say of someone that his “shadow had left him” meant either that he was dead, or else so unreal that he might as well have been.
But why Leif’s warning and this nickname of ‘stirrer-up-of-strife’ for Foyn? This was the question that was increasingly on my mind.
Often as I came down from my position in the fore-top to see ’Mlangeni come on deck to eat his breakfast, propped against the hatch in the morning sun, his legs well apart and munching his food with relish, a vague though vivid apprehension would seize me. Yet what could anyone have against that warm-hearted person, that great, natural being, so good at his work and so loyal and entertaining a friend? Yet there was not just a person, but a movement, on foot against ’Mlangeni in the ship. The attitude of the whole crew had subtly changed towards him; they were not as natural and free with him as they themselves had been in the beginning.
Apparently, he himself was unaware of the change and of any possibility of threat or danger against him. Often he looked so vulnerable that I wanted to go and sit beside him to show him that at least I had not changed and still enjoyed the warmth of the ancient fire of life burning so vividly in him. But my duties as look-out stopped me. Angry, resentful, puzzled over it all, I just had to go on searching the Indian Ocean for whales.
I had no doubt that it all had something to do with ’Mlangeni’s blackness. I have already described how his colour affected all crews, even Thor Larsen. But what on this occasion had made this reaction so negative if not downright hostile?
I was soon to know.
One Sunday evening when I boarded the Kurt Hansen after one of the loveliest days I had ever spent beside the sea, I found Leif alone pacing the deck in an oddly restless manner.
“Hallo, Pete,” he exclaimed. “Glad you’ve come. I’ve been wanting a word with you all day!”
There and then he told me with unusual haste what was on his mind.
I probably didn’t know, he said, but recently every weekend when the crew returned to port they’d found on fetching their money to go ashore that some of it was missing. The missing sums were never large, but added together these bits and pieces amounted to quite a tidy bit of spending money ashore. Indeed the sums at first had been so small that the men thought they themselves had made a mistake. But then one mentioned his suspicion of loss to another and soon it became quite clear that there was a petty thief at work in the ship.
My heart went cold at the news. Of all crimes, petty thieving at sea was one of the worst, since in those days sailors had no defence against it. Living as they did all together without keys or lockers, they were forced to trust one another if only because the opportunities for stealing from one another were endless and easy. Our Norwegians were a self-respecting crew to an exceptional degree, and this discovery was provoking the most violent reactions.
“But, Leif,” I exclaimed, distressed, “who’d do such a thing?”
He looked at me before answering and then said in his measured, precise way: “I don’t know for certain. But I know who is coming more and more under suspicion.”
“Who?”
“’Mlangeni,” he replied, watching me intently.
“’Mlangeni!” I exclaimed, jumping up enraged. “What nonsense! It’s not true. ’Mlangeni could murder, yes, but steal from anybody, no, never!”
Passionately I went on to tell Leif how both Amangtakwena and Zulu deeply were men of honour and would rather die than steal from those to whom they had pledged themselves, as ’Mlangeni had pledged himself to the Kurt Hansen.
Leif stopped me saying gently: “Look, Pete, I know it’s not ’Mlangeni. But unfortunately there’s some evidence that it could have been him.”
“What?” I asked disdainfully.
“Well,” Leif answered, “he never comes on deck as we all do when there’s a kill. And several times now when the whole crew’s been absorbed on deck he’s been seen away from his fire, prowling round the ship.”
At that my heart sank, for had not I myself once encountered ’Mlangeni away from his fire, coming from the direction of the saloon and being curiously evasive?
I observed aggressively: “Someone else can’t have been too absorbed either, to be able to spy on ’Mlangeni at such a time. Who was it, in any case, who started this rumour?” Then in a flash I knew. I burst out: “It was Harald Foyn, I bet!”
“Possibly, originally,” Leif answered quietly, hoping to calm me by example. But it’s not as simple as all that. The person who has been most active rousing suspicion against ’Mlangeni is our old friend Ruud. He first hinted it could be ’Mlangeni and then revealed that it was Foyn who had found ’Mlangeni prowling around below.”
“And what was Foyn doing below when he should’ve been on deck doing a job of work?” I asked angrily.
“Going to the head—or so he says.”
Leif’s tone was ironical and for the first time I felt reassured.
“But, Leif,” I went on, “isn’t it strange that Foyn has to go to the head every time we strike a whale?”
“It takes some of us like that,” said Leif gravely, “including ‘Papa’ bosun.”
“So it’s gone to the bosun already,” I remarked soberly, realising from that how grave the situation had become. “And what was the explanation?”
“Ruud said,” Leif replied, “Foyn had done it on his insistence, once the first thefts were discovered. Ruud said ’Mlangeni had never been seen in the act but time and again was observed near places where he should not have been. Moreover, Ruud pointed out, ’Mlangeni, so far, was the only member of the crew who had not complained of being robbed. All this has come from Ruud. But I am sure Ruud is too stupid and lethargic a fellow to have worked up such an atmosphere by himself. I’m certain Foyn’s prompting him.”
“But what are we to do?” I asked.
Leif paused. “First I want you to talk to ’Mlangeni and warn him what’s afoot.”
“Warn him?” I exclaimed aghast. “Do you realise he’ll want to murder anyone who could insult him with such suspicions?”
“There must be a way in which it can be done without hurting him,” Leif insisted confidently. “But only you can know it. There’s no time to be lost either, because I am certain ‘Papa’ bosun won’t be long now before he goes to the Captain.”
That decided the issue for me and I promised to speak to ’Mlangeni at once.
I had my opportunity that very evening, for Leif saw to it that he and Gorgeous left the two of us alone.
“’Mlangeni, you’ve been like a brother to me since I came into this ship as a boy three seasons ago and I thank you,” I told him as I took him by the arm and walked him to the stern of the Kurt Hansen where I knew we would not be interrupted.
We leant side by side over and looked deep into the darkened water, before I went on. “I want to ask you something tonight like a brother: and you must answer like a brother. Why do you never come on deck as all the others do when we kill?”
My tone had alarmed him but my question relieved him, for he laughed and said: “Auck, ’Nkosan, when you have been as long at sea as I have been, you too will lose interest in watching the killing. They are all the same. Beside, ’Nkosan, I have a hungry fire to feed. That fire of mine . . .”
“No, ’Mlangeni,” I told him quietly. “It is not your fire. Remember one day when the killing was on I found you below far away from your fire? I asked you then and you avoided answering me. You are not answering me like a brother. Where were you coming from that day?”
A look of extreme wariness if not apprehension was visible in the starlight on his massive face.
“Why do you want to know, ’Nkosan?” he asked.
There was no more room for manoeuvre. Although I knew that with ’Takwena and Zulu the indirect way was always the shortest way to arrive at a fruitful conclusion, I had already reached the end of my zig-zag course.
So I just said: “Look, ’Mlangeni, in the past few weeks every time there’s been a killing, the crew have gone back afterwards to find some of their money missing. For the first time in the ship there is a thief at work and I want you to help me find him.”
“You mean, ’Nkosan,” he said, drawing himself up to his full height and his voice leaden with the weight of emotion, “there are men in the ship who think I might be the thief?”
“No,” I lied, perhaps too quickly to be altogether convincing. “But Leif, Gorgeous and I want to work together in this with you to find out who it can be. And first we must know what we all do at the time when the thieving is supposed to take place.”
He did not altogether believe my answer, and the fact that he could even be remotely connected with suspicion of this kind rankled profoundly. The only thing that prevented him from walking away in great anger was that he liked and trusted me in all else. He stood there as still as a monument of black marble beside me, with the nostalgic harbour and sea sounds around us, and at last he spoke.
“’Nkosan, if I tell you what I was doing that day, you give me your word you will mention it to no one, not even Leif. You know our ways. Leif and the others do not.”
“I promise, ’Mlangeni,” I answered.
“Well, ’Nkosan,” he went on, his voice low and full of apprehension, “I was coming from the saloon.”
“But why the saloon?” I asked amazed.
“Please come with me quickly, ’Nkosan, before the others come on board,” was his strange reply as he swung about and made for the forecastle.
I followed him below to find he already had a small tin trunk, brightly painted with a tribal design on his bunk and was opening it. Quickly he took out a bundle in a cloth I recognised as similar to the ones I had often seen him undo before those strange congregations on so many Sunday mornings by the sea.
He undid it and, pointing to the contents, said: “I went to gather that, ’Nkosan. Surely there was no harm?”
Understanding came to me with such a rush that I almost laughed with relief. The bundle contained nothing but nail clippings, hair from the Captain’s brushes and combs, discarded buttons and bits of string and clothing of no practical use, even down to cigarette ends. Anything Thor Larsen had handled personally was of value.
“I see and I understand, ’Mlangeni,” I told him. “Body-matter! Matter for the medicine you and Nkomi-dhl’ilale sell on Sundays by the sea!”
Surprise made ’Mlangeni exclaim in his old spontaneous way. “So! You know even that, ’Nkosan! I always knew you were a great trickster but you are even greater than I knew!”
Understanding was not difficult for me because I had been brought up among the Amangtakwena, so close in language, history and custom to the Zulus. I knew their implicit faith that in possessing the body-matter, or personal belongings, of the powerful, they could make mighty magic for themselves to use against their own difficulties which, of course, is precisely what ’Mlangeni and Jack wanted for their people. Since Thor Larsen was not only the most powerful personality in the ship, but also the most successful in the fleet, and on any count a most unusual and forceful character in his own right, he was for a person like ’Mlangeni the obvious source of supply of magic material of the highest potential.
“Yes, I understand, ’Mlangeni,” I repeated, certain I knew the whole truth now, and in my youth confident that armed with the truth I could defeat anything. “But you must promise me that you’ll never leave your fire again while a killing takes place. And I promise you I’ll gather for you every day all the body-matter in the Captain’s cabin and saloon and give it to you each week in port.”
“You’ll do that for me?” ’Mlangeni answered, overjoyed. “’Nkosan, you will never see me away from my fire again!”
It all went off thus far more easily and naturally than I had ever expected, though I feared the dangerous resentment that might return to ’Mlangeni on reflection. On reflection he would not fail to realise the general suspicion which must have provoked my request. We must, therefore, uncover the thief soon, as I told Leif that night when I reported ’Mlangeni’s promise to me. The matter of culling the body-matter from the Captain’s quarters I kept to myself.
“If ’Mlangeni keeps faith,” Leif answered, “we should know within a week.”
“He’ll keep faith all right,” I replied confidently.
However, the very next Monday night something happened to alarm me and to test my faith in ’Mlangeni as it had not been tested yet.
We had had a good day behind us, having killed two enormous sperm whales, and were making for the harbour with Thor Larsen and the crew all in great good humour. When I went below early to go to bed, as I often did on Mondays because we always left harbour in the night after the weekend and I would be tired for lack of sleep, I found Thor Larsen already in the saloon. He was obviously impatient, looking for something, picking up the few cushions, looking underneath them, throwing them down, feeling in all the crevices and was about to go down on his hands and knees on the floor when he heard me come in, straightened, and turned about.
“Ah, it’s you, Eyes,” he said curtly. “Have you seen my sperm tooth? I look everywhere and not find him.”
“No, sir,” I answered. “But I expect it’s somewhere here. Let me look.”
Without waiting for his answer, I went down on my hands and knees to search for the missing paper-weight. I found nothing. I went all over the ground the Captain had covered. I even took the manuals, Bibles and other books out of their case to look behind them. It was all in vain; the tooth had vanished. I had no need to look at the Captain’s grim face to realise how badly he took the loss.
“It’s one god-damn funny thing,” he exclaimed out of his odd intuitive self. “Last night before we sail, the tooth he was there at the head of the table. Tonight he is gone. Something god-damn strange is happening in my ship.”
“It can’t be gone, sir,” I pleaded. “I’ll look again in the morning and we’ll find it for you.”
“No. Eyes,” he answered grimly. “You the best eyes I know, but not even you will find him. That tooth, he won’t walk by himself. Somebody’s took him for a walk, not?”
And there it was in my mind too: suspicion that ’Mlangeni had found too much the temptation to take what clearly would be for him the mightiest of the Captain’s charms to add to his collection of body-matter. I found the feeling so intolerable that I just had to go and find him and speak to him.
He was alone in the engine room, the pistons clanking at half speed around him, standing there crooning to his fire. He looked so innocent that I was ashamed of my suspicion, yet it was nagging at my heart.
“’Mlangeni,” I said. “You did stay by your fire today when the killing was on?”
“Indeed I did, my ’Nkosan,” he replied with an affectionate laugh. “I never left the engine room all the time. But why do you ask, when I promised.”
“No reason at all, ’Mlangeni,” I told him. Then on sudden inspiration I added, “I really came to ask you to let me have your bundle of body-matter to keep until the weekend. I have a feeling that the forecastle might be searched sometime and you’d rather no one else find those things with you, wouldn’t you?”
“Indeed, ’Nkosan,” he replied quietly, realising from my request that the weight of suspicion was still in the ship.
“Could you fetch it now and give it to me?”
Without a word he left me and a few minutes later brought me his bundle.
“Did anybody see you?” I asked anxiously as I took it.
“No,” he said. “They all asleep like young children below and I make no sound to wake them.”
“I’ll take good care of this, ’Mlangeni,” I told him, “but you must promise me you’ll never leave your fire for the saloon again.”
“I promise already,” he corrected me and resumed his position by the fire.
I went down to my own bunk. The Captain was already in his, but instead of being asleep as he normally was after such a day of kills, I could tell from his restlessness that he was wide awake, his mind no doubt obsessed with the disappearance of his whale’s tooth. Hours later, after I had at last fallen asleep, I woke for a moment to hear him dress and go on deck, where he stayed all night.
I was about to leave the saloon myself early the next morning when Leif came in, sat down and broke the bad news to me.
Apparently in the night the Captain, relieving his bosun-mate, had told him of the vanished paper-weight. The bosun then felt in duty bound to tell the Captain about the petty thieving since he felt the two things might not be unconnected. More, he told the Captain of the crew’s suspicions about ’Mlangeni. “By God,” Thor Larsen had exclaimed, “I always thought something strange about that black stoker!”
The Captain had paused then for quite a while before uttering, as if the matter was already decided in his quick resolute mind. “It’s a pity because he was best-damn stoker in fleet!”
“You notice the was,” Leif pointed out, unnecessarily, to me.
“Oh, Leif, what can we do?” I blurted out.
“Persuade the Captain not to act or say anything until the weekend,” Leif answered. “We must concentrate all we’ve got to that end. But careful, here he comes.”
At that, Larsen, as tense as I had ever seen him, walked in.
“Ah, Fügelsang!” he exclaimed. “My breakfast quick! We’ll be at harbour entrance within hour, not?”
“Yes, Captain,” Leif answered, vanished and in a few minutes had our breakfast on the table, the coffee steaming in front of Thor Larsen who meanwhile had not uttered a word to me.
Then, instead of going away, Leif began speaking to the Captain in Norwegian. I gathered it was about the thieving, the vanished tooth, ’Mlangeni, and postponing action until the weekend. It made Thor Larsen very impatient and he interrupted many times, but in the main listened carefully because, as I said before, Leif always acted as spokesman for the men.
“And you, Eyes,” he turned to me at the end. “Fügelsang tells you too believe this black stoker innocent. I tell you, Eyes, I trust your eyes in everything but not with this black stoker. Always you blind how black a man he is inside.”
“No, sir, you’re wrong,” I spoke up with spirit. “I’m not blind. I trust him because I know his people. They will kill and murder when they are hurt, sir, but steal, never. Have you in all the years he has worked for you ever found anything missing? Why should he suddenly begin now?”
That last point had a marked effect on the Captain. He had it in him to be moved by loyalty, having perhaps had too little of it himself from men and life.
He watched me intently, his expression softening somewhat, turned to Leif and said in his decisive, irrevocable way: “All right, Fügelsang, I wait till Saturday night.” When I went out later to see Leif in his galley, he commented: “It’s a strange coincidence about that tooth, Pete. I can’t believe Foyn is behind that tooth’s disappearance. Money yes, but a paper-weight, no. You’re certain ’Mlangeni was at his fire all day?”
“Of course,” I answered quickly, wondering the while if I was really as certain as I sounded, for nothing I knew could have tempted ’Mlangeni more than that tooth.
There followed one of the longest weeks that I had yet known at sea. The atmosphere in the ship would have been intolerable had we not had one of our busiest periods and been hard at work. The only two people in the ship who really seemed to be enjoying themselves were Ruud and Foyn, who whenever possible were together, the winchman often in laughter at Foyn’s sly remarks. Gorgeous too hated the suspicion in the ship as keenly as I did. But he was luckier than I, since he was free of the secret cause I had for doubting ’Mlangeni. He and Leif were like rocks in their faith in ’Mlangeni, and that helped me considerably.
I was almost relieved when Saturday afternoon came and we tied up at the head of the line right alongside the main quay.
“Pete!” Leif called out as I was about to go below. “I’d like you to come down with us all to the forecastle for a moment. We’re having a meeting you should attend. And don’t worry. I told you, I have a plan.”
He added this last bit to reassure me.
We found the whole crew below, bosun and all, standing beside their bunks, solemn and taut as if at a funeral. The moment Leif stepped in, ‘Papa’ bosun addressed him briefly in Norwegian.
“I am going to speak to you in English,” Leif began then, in his most deliberate way, “because not all of us understand Norwegian. ‘Papa’ bosun has ordered me to take over and explain why we are here.”
Briefly he went over the history of the petty thieving as I have already described it, and ended up by asking if every man there had counted his cash. Before they could reply Foyn spoke up, politely but with deadly intent.
“Mr. Fügelsang, that is not the whole story. You’ve left out the most important part, you’ve not mentioned what I’ve seen these past weeks—”
I knew he was going to tell about ’Mlangeni and straight away rouse the gathering against our stoker.
Leif knew it too and silenced him at once. “Foyn,” he told him sternly, “you are not to interrupt. You’ll get your turn to speak soon enough. Now have you all counted your money and have any of you found yourselves short?”
Every man there declared what he possessed and the amount that he was short, which added up to £2 17s. od. Only ’Mlangeni stood there upright and silent.
“What about you, ’Mlangeni,” Leif asked.
“I have not thought to look,” ’Mlangeni replied in a manner that would have shamed anyone that had not been subtly conditioned for suspicion.
“Please look at once, now,” Leif told him, his tone less detached than before.
Everyone watched in silence while ’Mlangeni produced his unlocked tin chest, placed it on his bunk, opened it and took out of it some soiled bank-notes rolled round some loose coin.
Slowly he counted it up and then announced quietly, “I have five pounds seven shillings and fourpence. No, it is all here.”
At that, first Foyn and then Ruud looked meaningfully at one another and the rest of the crew silently followed their example.
“Well!” Leif announced, now solemn as a judge. “The bosun and I have decided there is only one thing to do in the circumstances. We are going to search everyone’s gear here, openly, with you all to witness it.”
I saw Foyn go pale with shock, whisper something to Ruud and almost in one voice, the two of them protested: “We refuse and so should everyone—we know who’s guilty—”
“Another word from you, Foyn,” Leif retorted, “and I’ll ask the Captain to take over.”
Foyn obviously did not like this although I knew Leif was bluffing and had no intention of going to the Captain.
Without giving Foyn another chance to argue, Leif addressed the rest of the crew: “It’s only fair to all of us. Until this matter is cleared up one of us will be under suspicion. Already the atmosphere and distrust is worse than I have ever encountered in any Norwegian ship. So, to show how serious this is, we’ll first inspect ‘Papa’ bosun’s gear and pockets.”
After that no one could object.
‘Papa’ bosun promptly laid his gear on his bunk and spread his cash on top of it.
As I watched the bosun’s gear being searched minutely I was thankful ’Mlangeni’s bundle was under my bunk. Finally the bosun had to hold up his arms above his head for Leif to feel his pockets. Everything of course was just as the bosun had declared. Then Leif instructed the bosun to search him and again the result was favourable.
“Now, ’Mlangeni,” Leif announced with no trace of mistrust in his tone: “We will, if you do not mind, search you next.”
The search if anything was more thorough than the previous two had been, so thorough in fact that I saw the rush of heat to ’Mlangeni’s cheeks beneath his black face. But again the result was favourable and nothing was found.
At that quite a new kind of look appeared on the faces of the silent, solemn crew.
So it went on with a heightening sense of drama, until only Ruud and Foyn were left.
Nils Ruud, considering his initial protest, submitted to the search calmly enough and when he too was proved honest in his declaration looked round smugly.
But Foyn was as restless as a wild animal caught in a net.
“I will not be searched,” he shouted almost at Leif. “I have never been so insulted and I’ll leave a ship where a man is treated like a criminal!”
But he could not avoid inspection since public opinion had turned completely against him.
It did not take Leif and ‘Papa’ bosun long to produce from the bottom of Foyn’s duffle bag, tied up in a kerchief, one of the biggest collections of silver coins the Kurt Hansen had ever seen. And that was the last we saw of Foyn, who was dismissed from the ship that very night by the Captain.
Before we finally dispersed, ’Mlangeni turned to me and said scornfully in Zulu: “Tell them if you like, ’Nkosan, we say in Icoco that for a ‘With-ears-that-hear-not’ man, the hissing of a mamba will sound like the song of a bird: and also tell that Stirrer-up-of-strife-in-the-house that even if he lives to be a great grandfather, he will never have a shadow.”
With that he walked out of the forecastle.
“What did he say, Pete?” A dozen or more voices came at me.
I merely told them: “He knows you all suspected him and has been deeply hurt and offended.”
I must add that I never saw a group of honest men look more ashamed of themselves.
As I too left and went to the saloon to face the Captain, I couldn’t help wondering what had happened to the paper-weight. What I was to think about that?”
Profoundly perturbed, I came to the saloon. Thor Larsen was sitting at the head of the table deep in thought. To my utter amazement, for once no tantalus of gin was on the table in front of him.
“Oh, it’s you, Eyes,” he exclaimed, looking rather unhappily at me.
Quickly I told him what had just happened in the forecastle. Among the many obvious reactions he had I need only mention the relevant one.
“But, Eyes, that does not explain tooth, not? I still will have to question black stoker about sperm tooth, for you not find him in Foyn’s gear, not? He is only one, apart from Foyn, who had chance to take him—except you, Eyes, and you could never do such things, not? You’d better to go now and call that stoker at once.”
I knew from his voice that there was no evading the issue any longer. It all was going to end badly. The tooth was gone, and whether ’Mlangeni had taken it or not he would be so offended by what was about to happen that there and then he would leave the ship. In fact, unless I used all I knew of tact and diplomacy, we would be lucky if he did not assault the Captain and land himself in gaol.
Desperate, deeply dismayed, I turned to go but the Captain called me back.
“Eyes,” he ordered me. “Give me first my schnapps and a glass. I have one god-damn thirst.”
I went and picked up the heavy mahogany tantalus from its place under the bracket of books against the ship’s side and placed it and a glass in front of him.
Some instinct made me stand there and watch him unlock it. He had some difficulty in getting the great gin decanter out, it appeared to be jammed in tightly with the two others. He got it out at last and instead of at once pouring out a glass, he remained staring at the place where it had stood as if hypnotised.
“You still there, Eyes,” he called out in a strange voice. “Good! You to come, quick!”
I hurried to his side.
He pointed at the tantalus and said: “Look.”
There, jammed up against the other decanter right at the bottom, was the missing sperm tooth.
“God!” Larsen said at last, looking at me and obviously relieved: “You know what, my Eyes? Thor Larsen himself was thief. He steal from himself, not? You fetch that black stoker here at once. You hear, quick!”
I cannot describe the delight with which I brought ’Mlangeni, puzzled and still on his dignity, into the saloon.
“Langenay,” the Captain said to him, “you one damn good stoker. You best stoker in fleet. No, you best stoker I ever know, so I wish for to give you small present.”
With that he handed ’Mlangeni thirteen packets of cigarillos, in fact at that time his entire stock, as I happened to know. It was typical of him that in this as in all else he knew no limit.
Nothing in that eventful day helped so much to restore ’Mlangeni to his native sense of honour and dignity among his fellow men. And, I am happy to add, right up to the end of the season the crew went out of their way to make amends. At the end of the season there was not one of the crew, not even Nils Ruud, who did not give ’Mlangeni a farewell present.
Only one more thing remains to be said, about all this. Half-way between this season and the next, I woke up one night in a camp in the bush far away in the interior. I heard first a lion roar, and then the sound like a pistol shot of an elephant near by stripping a piece of bark from a tree. The elephant made me think of Thor Larsen: and hard on that I saw him again staring at the missing tooth at the bottom of his tantalus of gin. A strange idea came to me then from my sleep. I thought I would like to design a coat of arms for Thor Larsen. I would do it in four quarters: first a sea with stylised wavelets; then a black elephant; below it a sperm whale and harpoon; and underneath all the motto “I steal from myself.”