The storm lantern stood on the ground between the two hammocks, which, in their white sheaths of mosquito net, looked like the cocoons of gigantic silkworms. It was eight o’clock, two hours after sundown; river and forest were already deep in night. The howler monkeys were silent but tree-frogs near at hand set up a continuous, hoarse chorus; birds were awake, calling and whistling, and far in the depths about them came the occasional rending and reverberation of dead wood falling among the trees.

The six black boys who manned the boat squatted at a distance round their fire. They had collected some cobs of maize, three days back in a part of the bush, deserted now, choked and overrun with wild growth, that had once been a farm. (The rank second growth at that place had been full of alien plants, fruit and cereals, all gross now, and reverting to earlier type.) The boys were roasting their cobs in the embers.

Fire and storm lantern together shed little light; enough only to suggest the dilapidated roof over their heads, the heap of stores, disembarked and overrun by ants and, beyond, the undergrowth that had invaded the clearing and the vast columns of tree-trunks that rose above it, disappearing out of sight in the darkness.

Bats like blighted fruit hung in clusters from the thatch and great spiders rode across it astride their shadows. This place had once been a balata station. It was the farthest point of commercial penetration from the coast. Dr Messinger marked it on his map with a triangle and named it in red ‘First Base Camp’.

The first stage of the journey was over. For ten days they had been chugging upstream in a broad, shallow boat. Once or twice they had passed rapids (there the outboard engine had been reinforced by paddles; the men strained in time to the captain’s count; the bo’sun stood in the bows with a long pole warding off the rocks). They had camped at sundown on patches of sandbank or in clearings cut from the surrounding bush. Once or twice they came to a ‘house’ left behind by balata bleeders or gold washers.

All day Tony and Dr Messinger sprawled amidships among their stores, under an improvised canopy of palm thatch; sometimes in the hot hours of the early afternoon they fell asleep. They ate in the boat, out of tins, and drank rum mixed with the water of the river, which was mahogany brown but quite clear. The nights seemed interminable to Tony; twelve hours of darkness, noisier than a city square with the squealing and croaking and trumpeting of the bush denizens. Dr Messinger could tell the hours by the succession of sounds. It was not possible to read by the light of the storm lantern. Sleep was irregular and brief after the days of lassitude and torpor. There was little to talk about; everything had been said during the day, in the warm shade among the stores. Tony lay awake, scratching.

Since they had left Georgetown there had not been any part of his body that was ever wholly at ease. His face and neck were burned by the sun reflected from the water; the skin was flaking off them so that he was unable to shave. The stiff growth of beard pricked him between chin and throat. Every exposed part of his skin was bitten by cabouri fly. They had found a way into the buttonholes of his shirt and the laces of his breeches; mosquitoes had got him at the ankles when he changed into slacks for the evening. He had picked up bêtes rouges in the bush and they were crawling and burrowing under his skin; the bitter oil which Dr Messinger had given him as protection had set up a rash of its own wherever he had applied it. Every evening after washing he had burned off a few ticks with a cigarette-end but they had left irritable little scars behind them; so had the djiggas which one of the black boys had dug out from under his toenails and the horny skin on his heels and the balls of his feet. A marabunta had left a painful swelling on his left hand.

As Tony scratched, he shook the framework from which the hammocks hung. Dr Messinger turned over and said, ‘Oh, for God’s sake.’ He tried not to scratch; then he tried to scratch quietly; then in a frenzy he scratched as hard as he could, breaking the skin in a dozen places. ‘Oh, for God’s sake,’ said Dr Messinger.

‘Half-past eight,’ thought Tony. ‘In London they are just beginning to collect for dinner.’ It was the time of year in London when there were parties every night. (Once, when he was trying to get engaged to Brenda, he had gone to them all. If they had dined in different houses, he would search the crowd for Brenda and hang about by the stairs waiting for her to arrive. Later he would hang about to take her home. Lady St Cloud had done everything to make it easy for him. Later, after they were married, in the two years they had spent in London before Tony’s father died, they had been to fewer parties, one or two a week at the most, except for one very gay month, when Brenda was well again after John Andrew’s birth.) Tony began to imagine a dinner party assembling at that moment in London, with Brenda there and the surprised look with which she greeted each new arrival. If there was a fire she would be as near it as she could get. Would there be a fire at the end of May? He could not remember. There were nearly always fires at Hetton in the evening, whatever the season.

Then, after another bout of scratching, it occurred to Tony that it was not half-past eight in England. There was five hours’ difference in time. They had altered their watches daily on the voyage out. Which way? It ought to be easy to work out. The sun rose in the east. England was east of America so he and Dr Messinger got the sun later. It came to them at second-hand and slightly soiled after Polly Cockpurse and Mrs Beaver and Princess Abdul Akbar had finished with it ... Like Polly’s dresses which Brenda used to buy for ten or fifteen pounds each ... he fell asleep.

He woke an hour later to hear Dr Messinger cursing, and to see him sitting astride his hammock working with bandages and iodine at his great toe.

‘A vampire bat got it. I must have gone to sleep with my foot against the netting. God knows how long he had been at it, before I woke up. That lamp ought to keep them off but it doesn’t seem to.’

The black boys were still awake, munching over the fire. ‘Vampires plenty bad this side, Chief,’ they said. ‘Dat for why us no leave de fire.’

‘It’s just the way to get sick, blast it,’ said Dr Messinger. ‘I may have lost pints of blood.’



Brenda and Jock were dancing together at Anchorage House. It was late, the party was thinning, and now, for the first time that evening, it was possible to dance with pleasure. The ballroom was hung with tapestry and lit by candles. Lady Anchorage had lately curtsied her farewell to the last royalty.

‘How I hate staying up late,’ Brenda said, ‘but it seems a shame to take my Mr Beaver away. He’s so thrilled to be here, bless him, and it was a great effort to get him asked ... Come to think of it,’ she added later, ‘I suppose that this is the last year I shall be able to go to this kind of party.’

‘You’re going through with the divorce?’

‘I don’t know, Jock. It doesn’t really depend on me. It’s all a matter of holding down Mr Beaver. He’s getting very restive. I have to feed him a bit of high-life every week or so, and I suppose that’ll all stop if there’s a divorce. Any news of Tony?’

‘Not for some time now. I got a cable when he landed. He’s gone off on some expedition with a crook doctor.’

‘Is it absolutely safe?’

‘Oh, I imagine so. The whole world is civilized now, isn’t it—charabancs and Cook’s offices everywhere.’

‘Yes, I suppose it is ... I hope he’s not brooding . I shouldn’t like to think of him being unhappy.’

‘I expect he’s getting used to things.’

‘I do hope so. I’m very fond of Tony, you know, in spite of the monstrous way he behaved.’



There was an Indian village a mile or two distant from the camp. It was here that Tony and Dr Messinger proposed to recruit porters for the two-hundred-mile march that lay between them and the Pie-wie country. The niggers were river men and could not be taken into Indian territory. They would go back with the boat.

At dawn Tony and Dr Messinger drank a mug each of hot cocoa and ate some biscuits and what was left over from the bully beef opened the night before. Then they set out for the village. One of the blacks went in front with a cutlass to clear the trail. Dr Messinger and Tony followed, one behind the other; another black came behind them carrying samples of trade goods—a twenty-dollar Belgian gun, some rolls of printed cotton, hand-mirrors in coloured celluloid frames, some bottles of highly scented pomade.

It was a rough, unfrequented trail, encumbered by numerous fallen trunks; they waded knee-deep through two streams that ran to feed the big river; underfoot there was sometimes a hard network of bare root, sometimes damp and slippery leaf-mould.

Presently they reached the village. They came into sight of it quite suddenly, emerging from the bush into a wide clearing. There were eight or nine circular huts of mud and palm thatch. No one was visible, but two or three columns of smoke, rising straight and thin into the morning air, told them that the place was inhabited.

‘Dey people all afeared,’ said the black boy.

‘Go and find someone to speak to us,’ said Dr Messinger.

The nigger went to the low door of the nearest house and peered in.

‘Dere ain’t no one but women dere,’ he reported. ‘Dey dressing deirselves. Come on out dere,’ he shouted into the gloom. ‘De chief want talk to you.’

At last, very shyly, a little old woman emerged, clad in the filthy calico gown that was kept for use in the presence of strangers. She waddled towards them on bandy legs. Her ankles were tightly bound with blue beads. Her hair was lank and ragged; her eyes were fixed on the earthenware bowl of liquid which she carried. When she was a few feet from Tony and Dr Messinger she set the bowl on the ground, and, still with downcast eyes, shook hands with them. Then she stopped, picked up the bowl once more and held it to Dr Messinger.

‘Gassiri,’ he explained, ‘the local drink made of fermented cassava.’

He drank some and handed the bowl to Tony. It contained a thick, purplish liquid. When Tony had drunk a little, Dr Messinger explained, ‘It is made in an interesting way. The women chew the root up and spit it into a hollow tree-trunk.’

He then addressed the woman in Wapishiana. She looked at him for the first time. Her brown, Mongol face was perfectly blank, devoid alike of comprehension and curiosity. Dr Messinger repeated and amplified his question. The woman took the bowl from Tony and set it on the ground.

Meanwhile other faces were appearing at the doors of the huts. Only one woman ventured out. She was very stout and she smiled confidently at the visitors.

‘Good morning,’ she said. ‘How do you do? I am Rosa. I speak English good. I live bottom-side two years with Mr Forbes. You give me cigarette.’

‘Why doesn’t this woman answer?’

‘She no speak English.’

‘But I was speaking Wapishiana.’

‘She Macushi woman. All these people Macushi people.’

‘Oh. I didn’t know. Where are the men?’

‘Men all go hunting three days.’

‘When will they be back?’

‘They go after bush-pig.’

‘When will they be back?’

‘No, bush-pig. Plenty bush-pig. Men all go hunting. You give me cigarette.’

‘Listen, Rosa, I want to go to the Pie-wie country.’

‘No, this Macushi. All the people Macushi.’

‘But we want to go Pie-wie.’

‘No, all Macushi. You give me cigarette.’

‘It’s hopeless,’ said Dr Messinger. ‘We shall have to wait till the men come back.’ He took a packet of cigarettes from his pocket. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘cigarettes.’

‘Give me.’

‘When men come back from hunting you come to river and tell me. Understand?’

‘No, men hunting bush-pig. You give me cigarettes.’

Dr Messinger gave her the cigarettes.

‘What else you got?’ she said.

Dr Messinger pointed to the load which the second nigger had laid on the ground.

‘Give me,’ she said.

‘When men come back, I give you plenty things if men come with me to Pie-wies.’

‘No, all Macushi here.’

‘We aren’t doing any good,’ said Dr Messinger. ‘We’d better go back to camp and wait. The men have been away three days. It’s not likely they will be much longer ... I wish I could speak Macushi.’

They turned about, the four of them, and left the village. It was ten o’clock by Tony’s wrist watch when they reached their camp.

Ten o’clock on the river Waurupang was question time at Westminster. For a long time now Jock had had a question which his constituents wanted him to ask. It came up that afternoon.

‘Number twenty,’ he said.

A few members turned to the order paper.

No. 20.

‘ To ask the Minister of Agriculture whether in view of the dumping in this country of Japanese pork pies, the right honourable member is prepared to consider a modification of the eight-and-a-half-score basic pig from two and a half inches of thickness round the belly as originally specified, to two inches. ’

Replying for the Minister, the under-secretary said: ‘The matter is receiving the closest attention. As the honourable member is no doubt aware, the question of the importation of pork pies is a matter for the Board of Trade, not for the Board of Agriculture. With regard to the specifications of the basic pig, I must remind the honourable member that, as he is doubtless aware, the eight-and-a-half-score pig is modelled on the requirements of the bacon curers and has no direct relation to pig meat for sale in pies. That is being dealt with by a separate committee who have not yet made their report.’

‘Would the honourable member consider an increase of the specified maximum of fatness on the shoulders?’

‘I must have notice of that question.’

Jock left the House that afternoon with the comfortable feeling that he had at last done something tangible in the interest of his constituents.



Two days later the Indians returned from hunting. It was tedious waiting. Dr Messinger put in some hours daily in checking the stores. Tony went into the bush with his gun, but the game had all migrated from that part of the river bank. One of the black boys was badly injured in the foot and calf by a sting-ray; after that they stopped bathing and washed in a zinc pail. When the news of the Indians’ return reached camp, Tony and Dr Messinger went to the village to see them, but a feast had already started and everyone in the place was drunk. The men lay in their hammocks and the women trotted between them carrying calabashes of cassiri. Everything reeked of roast pork.

‘It will take them a week to get sober,’ said Dr Messinger.

All that week the black boys lounged in camp; sometimes they washed their clothes and hung them out on the gunwales of the boat to dry in the sun; sometimes they went fishing and came back with a massive catch, speared on a stick (the flesh was tasteless and rubbery); usually in the evenings they sang songs round the fire. The fellow who had been stung kept to his hammock, groaning loudly and constantly asking for medicine.

On the sixth day the Indians began to appear. They shook hands all round and then retired to the margin of the bush where they stood gazing at the camp equipment. Tony tried to photograph them but they ran away giggling like schoolgirls. Dr Messinger spread out on the ground the goods he had bought for barter.

They retired at sundown but on the seventh day they came again, greatly reinforced. The entire population of the village was there. Rosa sat down on Tony’s hammock under the thatch roof.

‘Give me cigarettes,’ she said.

‘You tell them I want men to go Pie-wie country,’ said Dr Messinger.

‘Pie-wie bad people. Macushi people no go with Pie-wie people.’

‘You say I want ten men. I give them guns.’

‘You give me cigarettes ...’

Negotiations lasted for two days. Eventually twelve men agreed to come; seven of them insisted on bringing their wives with them. One of these was Rosa. When everything was arranged there was a party in the village and all the Indians got drunk again. This time, however, it was a shorter business as the women had not had time to prepare much cassiri. In three days the caravan was able to set out.

One of the men had a long, single-barrelled, muzzle-loading gun; several others carried bows and arrows; they were naked except for red cotton cloths round their loins. The women wore grubby calico dresses—they had been issued to them years back by an itinerant preacher and kept for occasions of this kind; they had wicker panniers on their shoulders, supported by a band across the forehead. All the heaviest luggage was carried by the women in these panniers, including the rations for themselves and their men. Rosa had, in addition, an umbrella with a dented, silver crook, a relic of her association with Mr Forbes.

The Negroes returned downstream to the coast. A dump of provisions, in substantial tin casing, was left in the ruinous shelter by the bank.

‘There’s no one to touch it. We can send back for it in case of emergency from the Pie-wie country,’ said Dr Messinger.

Tony and Dr Messinger walked immediately behind the man with the gun who was acting as guide; behind them the file straggled out for half a mile or more through the forest.

‘From now onwards the map is valueless to us,’ said Dr Messinger with relish.

(Roll up the map—you will not need it again for how many years, said William Pitt ... memories of Tony’s private school came back to him at Dr Messinger’s words, of inky little desks and a coloured picture of a Viking raid, of Mr Trotter who had taught him history and wore very vivid ties.)