168	JOURNEY WITHOUT MAPS
way of the compound. He had with him a little olc
man with a white goatee beard who wanted us to buy
some crude leather pouch. Tes'm/ and 'No'm/ the
fat man said at intervals. "And this devil," I said, "why
can't I see him?" He laughed evasively and Laminah
plucked at my sleeve. He knew who die fat man was
and he was scared. The fat man turned and saw him,
He became boisterously funny, but without any
humour showing in his little sunk eyes. He said,
"You want to see devil, eh?" gripping Laminah's arm,
and he began to talk to him in his own tongue.
When Laminah got away he was stammering with
his fear. The fat man, he said, was the devil's head-
man and the old man with the goatee beard his
medicine man. The headman had frightened him
badly in revenge for his bargaining over the sword;
he had told him that he would be carried away into
the bush for seven years and forcibly initiated into
the Bush Society. The thunder rumbled round the
hills and the clouds broke up. Amedoo joined us. He
said, "England good place. You have one God and
no devils. I have one God too but plenty devils."
He was a Mohammedan. He began all over again the
story about the English B.C. He wanted to prove
that it wasn't safe to laugh in private at a Big
Bush Devil. They could make themselves invisible;
they could hear everything.
Then the rain came washing down, a vertical wall
of water, while the thunder rumbled. We ran for
shelter. Mark met us on the verandah, anxious to
impress us, too, with how bad a place it was. The
D.C., Amedoo began to tell us all over again, had
having dinner. "Mrs. D,C. sat here, Mr. Trout