“We'll endure the heat and keep going,” Burton muttered.
They resumed their journey, shading themselves beneath umbrellas, guiding their horses over hard, dusty ground, watching as herds of impala and zebra scattered at their approach.
The rest of the day passed sluggishly, with the interminable landscape hardly changing. The climate had all four men so stupefied that they frequently slipped into a light sleep, only to be awakened by Spencer shouting: “The bloomin' horses are stoppin' again, Boss!”
Shortly before sunset, they erected their one small tent beside a stony outcrop, ate, then crawled under the canvas to sleep. Sidi Bombay wrapped himself in a blanket and slumbered under the stars. Spencer, having had his key inserted and wound, kept guard.
In the few seconds before exhaustion took him, Swinburne remembered the clockwork philosopher's book, and the phrase: Only equivalence can lead to destruction or a final transcendence.
He wondered how he'd come to forget about it; why he hadn't mentioned it to anyone; then he forgot about it again and went to sleep.
Sir Richard Francis Burton dreamt that he was slumbering alone, in the open, with unfamiliar stars wheeling above him. There was a slight scuffing to his left. He opened his eyes and turned his head and saw a tiny man, less than twelve inches high, with delicate lace-like wings growing from his shoulder blades. His forehead was decorated with an Indian bindi.
“I don't believe in fairies,” the explorer said, “and I've already looked upon your true form, K'k'thyima.”
He sat up, and blinked, and suddenly the fairy was much larger, and reptilian, and it had one or five or seven heads.
“Thou art possessed of a remarkable mind, O human. It perceives truth. It is adaptable. That is why we chose thee.”
Burton was suddenly shaken by a horribly familiar sensation: an awareness that his identity was divided, that there were two of him, ever at odds with each other. For the first time, though, he also sensed that some sort of physical truth lay between these opposing forces.
“Good!” the Naga hissed. “Still we sing, but soon it will end, and already thou hears the echo of our song.”
“What are you suggesting? That I'm sensing the future?”
The priest didn't answer. His head was singular. His head was multiple.
Burton tried to focus on the strange presence, but couldn't.
“I dreamt of you before,” he said. “You were in Kumari Kandam. This, though, is Africa, where the Naga are known as the Chitahurior the Shayturay.”
“I am K'k'thyima. I am here, I am in other places. I am nowhere, soft skin, for my people were made extinct by thine.”
“Yet the essence of you was imprinted on one of the Eyes; you lived on in that black diamond until it was shattered.”
Again, the Naga chose not to respond.
A flash drew Burton's eyes upward. He saw a shooting star, the brightest he'd ever witnessed. It blazed a trail across the sky, then suddenly divided into three streaks of light. They flew apart and faded. When he looked down, the Naga priest was gone.
He lay back and woke up.
“It's dawn, Boss. I can still hear shots from Kazeh.”
Herbert Spencer's head was poking through the entrance to the tent. It was wrapped in a keffiyehbut the scarf was pulled open at the front and the polymethylene suit beneath was visible, as were the three round openings that formed the philosopher's “face.” Through the glass of the uppermost one, Burton could see tiny cogs revolving. Spencer was otherwise motionless.
A moment passed.
“Was there something else, Herbert?”
“No, Boss. I'll help Mr. Bombay to load the horses.”
The philosopher withdrew.
Swinburne sat up. “I think I shall take lunch at the Athenaeum Club today, Richard, followed by a tipple at the Black Toad.”
“Are you awake, Algy?”
The poet peered around at the inside of the tent.
“Oh bugger it,” he said. “I am.”
Burton shook Trounce into consciousness and the three of them crawled into the open, ate a hasty breakfast, packed, and mounted their horses.
Burton groaned. “I'm running a fever.”
“I have some of Sadhvi's medicine,” Swinburne said.
“I'll take it when we next stop. Let's see how far we can get today. Keep your weapons close to hand-we don't know when we might run into Speke.”
They moved off.
Most of the day was spent crossing the savannah.
Vultures circled overhead.
The far-off sounds of battle faded behind them.
They entered a lush valley. Clusters of granite pushed through its slopes, and the grass grew so high that it brushed against the riders' legs.
“Wow! This is the place called Usagari,” Bombay advised. “Soon we will see villages.”
“Everyone move quietly,” Burton ordered. “We have to slip past as many as we can, else the few boxes of beads and coils of wire we're carrying will be gone in an instant.”
After fording a nullah, they rode up onto higher ground and saw plantations laid out on a gentle slope. Bombay led them along the edges of the cultivated fields, through forests and thick vegetation, and thus managed to pass four villages without being spotted. Then their luck ran out, and they were confronted by warriors who leaped about, brandishing their spears and striking grotesque poses that were designed to frighten but which sent Swinburne into fits of giggles.
After much whooping and shouting, Bombay finally established peaceful communication. The Britishers paid three boxes of beads and were given permission to stay at the village overnight. It was called Usenda, and its inhabitants proved much more friendly than their initial greeting had suggested. They shared their food and, to Swinburne's delight, a highly alcoholic beverage made from bananas, and gave over a dwelling for the explorers' use. It was a poor thing constructed of grass, infested with insects, and already claimed by a family of rats. Trounce was too exhausted to care, Swinburne was too drunk to notice, and Burton was so feverish by now that he passed out the moment he set foot in it. They all slept deeply, while Spencer stood sentry duty and Bombay stayed up late gossiping with the village elders.
When they departed the next day, the king's agent was slumped semi-aware in his saddle, so Trounce took the lead. He successfully steered them past seven villages and out of the farmed region onto uninhabited flatlands where gingerbread palms grew in abundance. It was easy going but took two days to traverse, during which time Burton swam in and out of consciousness. His companions, meanwhile, grew thoroughly sick of the unchanging scenery, which offered nothing to suggest that they might be making any progress.
At last, they came to the edge of a jungle and began to work their way through it, with Trounce and Spencer leading the way while Swinburne and Bombay guided the horses behind them. Burton remained mounted and insensible.
For what felt like hours, they fought with the undergrowth, until Spencer pushed a tangle of lianas out of their path and they suddenly found themselves face to face with a rhinoceros. It kicked the ground, snorted, and moved its head from side to side, squinting at them from its small, watery eyes.
They raised their rifles.
“Absolute silence, please, gentlemen,” Trounce whispered. “The slightest noise or movement could cause it to charge us.”
“Up your sooty funnel!” Pox screamed.
“Pig-jobber!” Malady squawked. “Cross-eyed slack-bellied stink trumpet!”
The rhino gave a prodigious belch, turned, and trotted away.
“My hat!” Swinburne exclaimed. “Malady has been learning fast!”
“Humph!” Trounce responded. “Next time we're confronted by a wild beast, I won't bother to unsling my rifle. I'll just throw parakeets.”
It was close to nightfall by the time they broke free of the mess of vegetation and found a place to camp. Burton recovered his wits while the others slept, and he sat with Spencer, listening to the rasping utterances of lions and the chuckles and squeals of hyenas.