Outa Karel's Stories Part 13

"Ach! how glad was the little Red Tortoise! But he only said in a small little voice, 'Yes, n.o.ble Blue One, I belong to the nation whom it is the custom to swallow. Please swallow me!'

"Oubaas Giraffe picked him up and gave a little gulp, and the little Red Tortoise slipped half-way down his long throat. But oje! here a strange thing happened. The little Red One would go no further. Instead of drawing in his head and legs and slipping down like a stone, like all the other tortoises had done, he wanted to see where he was going, so he stuck out his head, and fastened his sharp little nails into Oubaas Giraffe's gullet, and there he hung like a bat on a wall.

"'Go down, go down, little Tortoise! You choke me!' The Old Blue One could hardly speak; his throat was so full of tortoise.

"'Peep! peep!' said the little Red One, and held on more tightly than ever.

"'Come up, come up, little Tortoise! You kill me!' The Old Blue One was stamping and gurgling now.

"'Peep! peep!' said the little Red One, and hung on with his hard bent beak as well. He thought, 'No! too many of my nation have sailed down this red sloot. I won't let go.'

"I tell you, baasjes, Oubaas Giraffe danced and pranced over the veld; he screamed and bellowed; he gurgled and swallowed; he tried to get the little Red Tortoise down, and he tried to get him up; but it was no use. The little Red One clung fast to him till he was quite choked, and sank down in the sand and died.

"Then the little Red Tortoise crawled out, and went home to tell his Mam-ma that he had killed Oubaas Giraffe and that his nation could have peace again. Ach! but she was proud of him!

"'It's not for nothing you were born red,' she said. 'Come here, my little Crab, that I may put buchu under your arm. Come, my crooked-legged little one, let your mother sprinkle you with buchu!'

"When she had sprinkled him with buchu, they went and told their friends, and all the Tortoise nation rejoiced and went and had a great feast off Oubaas Giraffe as he lay dead in the veld.

"And they thought more of the little Red Tortoise than ever. Even the Young Ones, who had been angry with him, said, 'He is wiser than we are. We will listen to what he says. P'r'aps, after all, there is something in being born a certain colour.'"

XV.

THE OSTRICH HUNT.

The next day all the time that was not given to lessons and meals was spent by the little boys in scouring the veld for a red tortoise. Disappointment at their fruitless search found vent in no measured terms when Outa Karel appeared in the dining-room at his usual hour.

"Ach, to hear them now!" he said, regarding them with his wide-mouthed smile of amused tolerance. "Does it then rain red tortoises? And how can the baasjes think they will find at the first shot a thing that only comes once in a thousand years?"

"Well," said Willem, stoutly, "it might just have been the time for one. How were we to know?"

"Outa," asked little Jan, earnestly, "do you know when it will be red tortoise time again?"

"Aja, baasjes," said Outa readily, "it won't be long now. Let Outa think." He performed a tattoo on the red kopdoek--a sure sign that he was in the thick of mental gymnastics. "What comes just before a thousand, my baasjes?"

"Nine hundred and ninety-nine," answered Pietie, who was good at arithmetic.

"Now, yes," said Outa, triumphantly, "I knew it must be nearly time. It is nine hundred and ninety-nine years since there was a red tortoise, so next year this time baasjes can begin to look for one. Only begin, my baasjes, because it will only be creeping out of the egg then. And p'r'aps it won't be in this veld. It might be far, far away where people don't know about a red tortoise, and so no one will look for him. Must Outa tell another story about him?"

The sly old man had taken the best way of escaping more questions. The little boys gathered round and listened wide-eyed as he told the story of the Tortoises hunting the Ostriches.

"After Oubaas Giraffe was dead, the Tortoises had a nice life for a long time, and then there came into their veld Old Three Sticks, the Ostrich, with his mam-ma and pap-pa, and his wives, and uncles, and aunties, and children, and friends. Alla! there were a lot of Ostriches! The whole veld was full of them, and they all began eating tortoises wherever they could find them. It was just the same like when Oubaas Giraffe used to go about. And the tortoises thought and thought, and they talked and talked, but they couldn't make a plan that would drive the Ostriches away.

"The little Red Tortoise was thinking, too, but he didn't talk till he had his plan ready. Then he called all the Tortoises together. The Old Ones came because they wanted to hear what the wise little Red One had to say, and the Young Ones came because ever since he had killed Oubaas Giraffe they had listened to him. When they were all together he said, 'It now goes on too long, this hunting of the Tortoises by Old Three Sticks and his friends. Let us change places and let us, the Tortoise people, go and hunt Ostriches.'

"'Peep! peep!' cried all the young Tortoises: they were quite ready. But the Old Ones said, 'Is this the wise little Red One? How is it possible for us to hunt Ostriches?'

"'It is possible, because Ostriches never run straight, but always a little in the round, and a little in the round, so that in the end if they run long enough they come again to the place they began from. Now yes, on a certain day let us then go into the veld where the Ostriches like to hunt, and let us make two long rows, not straight out but always in the round; one ring, very large, outside, and the other, smaller, inside. Then when Old Three Sticks and his friends come we will call one to the other and drive them on, and they will flee through the midst of us, round and round and round till they can flee no longer.'

"'Peep! peep!' said the young Tortoises, and the Old Ones joined in. They saw that it was a good plan, so they all went to the hunting veld of Old Three Sticks and his friends and spread themselves out, as the little Red Tortoise had said.

"Soon the Ostriches came, pecking, pecking, as they walked.

"The Tortoises sat very still, waiting, my baasjes, just waiting, till the Ostriches were right in the middle of the two rings. Then the little Red Tortoise gave the signal, 'Peep! Peep!' and at once the calling began.

"'Are you there?' called the first Tortoise.

"'I am here,' said the next, and so it went on all round the circle, one calling to the other.

"'What are you doing?' called the first one.

"Hunting Ostriches,' said the next, and so it went on all round the circle again, one calling to the other.

"The Ostriches could see nothing. They could only hear voices calling. They looked at each other and said, 'What are these voices? It is surely a great army come to hunt us. Let us get away.'

"They were very frightened and began to run, and as far as they ran they heard:--

"'Are you there?'

"'I am here.'

"'What are you doing?'

"'Hunting Ostriches.'

"So it went on, over and over again. The Tortoises never moved, only kept calling out. And the Ostriches ran faster and faster, all in the round, till at last they were so tired they couldn't run any more. First one fell, and then another, and another, and another, till there were heaps of them lying about, and just where they fell they lay quite still. They were too tired to move.

"Then the Tortoises gathered together--they were very many--and they bit Old Three Sticks and all his family and friends on their long necks and killed them.

"Since then the Tortoises have had peace from the Long-necked People--Oubaas Giraffe and old Three Sticks. It is only the Things of the Air, like Crows and Lammervangers, that still hunt them, and baasjes know how they do? They catch a poor Tortoise in their claws and fly away with him, high up over a kopje, and then they drop him on the stones--kabloops!--and there he lies with his sh.e.l.l all broken, and without a sh.e.l.l how can a Tortoise live? And then the Thing of the Air comes and eats him up, and that is the end of the poor Tortoise. But a Red Tortoise they never touch. It is his colour, baasjes, that frightens them. So the Young Tortoises were right when they said, 'There is something, after all, in being born a certain colour.'

"After the Ostrich hunt, the little Red Tortoise was sprinkled with buchu under both arms, and his Mam-ma sang him this song:--

The little crook-legged one! I could sprinkle it, Sprinkle it with buchu under its arms.

The little red crab! The little Wise One!

I sprinkle the buchu under both arms.

For the Long-necks, they that ate us, It has found a way to kill them;

So we sprinkle it, the little Red One, Sprinkle the buchu under both arms."