Achmed Abdullah

“ Death is the best argument in the world—at times. There is no contradicting it, no challenging its judgment. It is final. It is not a mere, weak-spined theorem which demands a yawning, bore some volume of proof, but it contains this proof in itself—at times. ”

“ M'ganu was dead. The sheep were without a wether to bell and lead the way. Assurance of it came within a few days. The rebellion was spluttering out, hopelessly, rather pitifully as such things happen in Africa. The colony saved; the white men were saved: and the cable buzzed the good news to London where the newspapers began their hoary paean: “Typically British! We always muddle through—somehow!”
There was a reaction of lassitude, too, at the American club.
“Well—” said Wesley Jones—“it was Allen who saved us after all; Allen—the drunkard—the drug fiend—the white who had gone fantee....” ”

“ But there was other news, from the hinterland, that M'ganu and his warriors were on the march. And who would be first to reach the goal; and suppose M'ganu got there first and conquered; even suppose that he did not massacre the white inhabitants, how could the British ships regain the town without exposing their own countrymen to a bombardment?
The governor did not know what to do, he explained one night to the members of the American club who had invited him to dinner. ”

“ Wesley Jones shrugged his shoulders. “You know how news travels in Africa by the drums booming the gossip from kraal to kraal......”
“Looks mighty dangerous to me. That fellow doesn't bluff—ever.....”
“Dangerous is right.”
“You bet!”
“And the British—?”
“Seem helpless,” commented Laughton. “I had a talk last night with the governor. He admits it.”
“But they sent soldiers—”
“Sure enough. What good though? The man is like a phantom.”
“They say he's a white man.”
“He is.” Peter inclined his head. “I know.”
“Sure of it?”
“Positive. I saw him last month when I was in the hinterland.” ”

“ Punitive expeditions were sent both by the British and the French. But they had no results except foot-sore Haussa soldiers and white officers down with black-water fever and cursing their luck. For M'ganu was as elusive as smoke. Even the harassed European colonial officials admitted that he was a genius at jungle warfare. The punitive expeditions grew in size, horse, foot, the guns, and aircraft ”

“ Ashantis and Kroos, were squatting and chattering about their cook pots, neither saw nor sensed Africa's potent and sensuous lure.
Illustration: “There you are, my boy. You're not the sort to quit under fire. Not you! Nor ... any of you!”
There was George Carter, originally from Chicago, the president of the club and, too, of the great Afro-American Trading Corporation; Thomas W. Laughton, Virginian, engineer in the employ of the British colonial administration who had harnessed the enormous waterfalls of the Niger river seven hundred miles up the hinterland ”