140 JOURNEY WITHOUT MAPS

a pail of rice as if they had been exacted from hhu
by force. The missionary ruled him. When, thinking
of the wasted chop and the trouble he had taken the
night before, I prepared to dash him five shillings in
return, the missionary caught my hand. He said he
couldn't allow it; there was no need to give the chief
anything; I was the guest of .the country. At last he
allowed two shillings to pass to the chief, who stood
by with a beaten smouldering air like an honest man
who watches, without the power to intervene, two
racketeers squabbling over his property.

The missionary calculated that Duogobmai was
still six hours away. That was disquieting, for we had
already marched for more than two hours, but
nothing would induce me to stay. It wasn't only the
unfriendly chief and the bugs in the hut; I was still
planning my journey by European time: the listless-
ness, the laissez-faire of Africa hadn't caught me. I
had planned to reach Duogobmai that night and to
fail to reach it seemed to put back everything, I
wasn't confident enough to see the journey as more
than a smash-and-grab raid into the primitive, . ..
There was a dream of a witch I used to have almost
every night when I was small. I would be walking
along a dark passage to the nursery door. Just before
the door there was a linen-cupboard and there the
witch waited, like the devil in Kpangblamai, feminine,
inhuman. In the nursery was safety, but I couldn't
pass. I would fling myself face downwards on the
ground and the witch would jump. At last, after
many years, I evaded her, running blindly by into
sanctuary, and I never had the dream again. Now I
seemed to be back in the dark passage: I had to see