My Uncle Oswald(7)

Things were made more difficult for me during this encounter by the fact that all the way between Marseilles and Naples, the ship seemed to be battling against a terrible storm. It pitched and rolled in the most alarming manner and more than once I thought we were going to capsize. When at last we were safely anchored in the Bay of Naples, and I was leaving the cabin, I said, “Well by gosh, I’m glad we made it. That was some storm we went through.”

“My dear boy,” she said, hanging another cluster of jewellery round her neck, “the sea has been calm as glass all the way.”

“Oh no, madame,” I said. “It was a tremendous storm.”

“That was no storm,” she said. “It was me.”

I was learning fast. I had learned above all--and I have confirmed this many times since--that to tangle with a Turk is like running fifty miles before breakfast. You have to be fit.

I spent the rest of the voyage getting my wind back and by the time we docked at Alexandria four days later, I was feeling quite bouncy again. From Alexandria I took a train to Cairo. There I changed trains and went on to Khartoum.

By God, it was hot in the Sudan. I was not dressed for the tropics but I refused to waste money on clothes that I would be wearing only for a day or two. In Khartoum, I got a room at a large hotel where the foyer was filled with Englishmen wearing khaki shorts and topis. They all had moustaches and magenta cheeks like Major Grout, and every one of them had a drink in his hand. There was a Sudanese hall porter of sorts lounging by the entrance. He was a splendid handsome fellow in a white robe with a red tarboosh on his head, and I went up to him.

“I wonder if you could help me?” I said, taking some French banknotes from my pocket and riffling them casually.

He looked at the money and grinned.

“Blister Beetles,” I said. “You know about Blister Beetles?”

Here it was, then. This was le moment critique. I had come all the way from Paris to Khartoum to ask one question, and now I watched the man’s face anxiously. It was certainly possible that Major Grout’s story had been nothing more than an entertaining hoax.

The Sudanese hail porter’s grin became wider still. “Everyone knows about Blister Beetles, sahib,” he said. “What you want?”

“I want you to tell me where I can go out and catch one thousand of them.”

He stopped grinning and stared at me as though I’d gone balmy. “You mean live beetles?” he exclaimed. “You want to go out and catch yourself one thousand live Blister Beetles?”

“I do, yes.”

“What you want live beetles for, sahib? They no good to you at all, those old live beetles.”

Oh my God, I thought. The Major has been pulling our legs.

The hail porter moved closer to me and placed an almost jet-black hand on my arm. “You want jig-a-jig, right? You want stuff to make you go jig-a-jig?”

“That’s about it,” I said. “More or less.”

“Then you don’t want to bother with them live beetles, sahib. All you want is powdered beetles.”

“I had an idea I might take the beetles home and breed them,” I said. “That way I’d have a permanent supply.”

“In England?” he said.

“England or France. Somewhere like that.”

“No good,” he said, shaking his head. “This little Blister Beetle he live only here in the Sudan. He needs very hot sun. Beetles will all die in your country. Why you not take the powder?”

I could see I was going to have to make a slight ad justment in my plans. “How much does the powder cost?” I asked him.

“How much you want?”

“A lot.”

“You have to be very, very careful with that powder, sahib. All you take is the littlest pinch; otherwise you get into very serious trouble.”

“I know that.”

“Over here, we Sudanese men measure up one dose by pouring the powder over the head of a pin and what stays on the pinhead is one dose exactly. And that is not very much. So you better be careful, young sahib.”

“I know all about that,” I said. “Just tell me how I go about getting hold of a large quantity.”

“What you mean by large quantity?”

“Well, say ten pounds in weight.”

“Ten pounds!” he cried. “That would take care of all the people in the whole of Africa put together!”

“Five pounds then.”

“What in the world you going to do with five pounds of Blister Beetle powder, sahib? Just a few ounces is a lifetime supply even for a big strong man like me.”

“Never mind what I’m going to do with it,” I said. “How much would it cost?”