“Bosh,” said Kettle.  “If it was me that talked about getting poisoned, there’d be some sense in it.  I know I’m not popular here.  But you’re a man that’s liked.  You hit it off with these Belgian brutes, and you make the niggers laugh.  Who wants to poison you?”

“All right,” said Nilssen; “you’ve been piloting on the Congo some six months now, and so of course you know all about it.  But let me know a bit better.  I’ve watched the tricks of the niggers here-away for a good many years now, and I’ve got a big respect for their powers when they mean mischief.”

“Have you been getting their backs up, then?”

“Yes.  You’ve seen that big ju-ju in my room?”

“That foul-looking wooden god with the looking-glass eyes?”

“Just that.  I don’t know where the preciousness comes in, but it’s a thing of great value.”

“How did you get hold of it?”

“Well, I suppose if you want to be told flatly, I scoffed it.  You see, it was in charge of a passenger boy, who brought it aboard the M’poso at Matadi.  He landed across by canoe from Vivi, and wanted steamer passage down to Boma by the M’poso.  I was piloting her, and I got my eye on that ju-ju[1] from the very first.  Captain Image and that thief of a purser Balgarnie were after it, too, but as it was a bit of a race between us as to who should get it first, one couldn’t wait to be too particular.”

[Footnote 1:  A ju-ju in West African parlance may be a large carved idol, or merely a piece of rag, or skin, or anything else that the native is pleased to set up as a charm.  Ju-ju also means witchcraft.  If you poison a man, you put ju-ju on him.  If you see anything you do not understand, you promptly set it down as ju-ju.  Similarly chop is food, and also the act of feeding.  “One-time” is immediately.]

“What did you want it for?  Did you know it was valuable then?”

“Oh, no!  I thought it was merely a whitewashed carved wood god, and I wanted it just to dash to some steamer skipper who had dashed me a case of fizz or something.  You know?”

“Yes, I see.  Go on.  How did you get hold of it?”

“Why, just went and tackled the passenger-boy and dashed him a case of gin; and when he sobered up again, where was the ju-ju?  I got it ashore right enough to the pilotage here in Banana, and for the next two weeks thought it was my ju-ju without further palaver.

“Then up comes a nigger to explain.  The passenger-boy who had guzzled the gin was no end of a big duke—­witch-doctor, and all that, with a record of about three hundred murders to his tally—­and he had the cheek to send a blooming ambassador to say things, and threaten, to try and get the ju-ju back.  Of course, if the original sportsman had come himself to make his ugly remarks, I’d soon have stopped his fun.  That’s the best of the Congo Free State.  If a nigger down here is awkward, you can always get him shipped off as a slave—­soldier,