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The next morning, William Aldershot said his day’s prayers and read Psalm ninety-one from his Authorized Version Bible. While he got dressed three knocks pounded against his cabin door where he spent the night.
‘Excuse me, sire. Dem’ men wait you on deck,’ Richardson spoke through.
‘Alright, have my word to them that I will be out in a jiffy.’
Aldershot got dressed in a linen osnaburg shirt ruffled at the neck and wrist, and tucked into black skin-tight breeches. His pair of knee length white stockings held with garters fitted into black shoes fastened by big square buckles. He donned a nevernois hat over his cascading blonde hair. Just before he stepped out a table mirror revealed the doubt in his oblong face and firm square jaw.
Above deck Aldershot climbed to the quarter deck to stand beside Richardson. He muttered, ‘For the last time, are you sure this place is a good idea? Or shall we go to Quidah or Badagry where we can speak to Caucasians like ourselves?’
‘No, sire. White agents place too much Guineas on dem’ niggers over there. Here we have intercourse with nigger agents direct, no middle men. Don’t take much. Reckon a few casks and some tobacco done the trick.’ Richardson winked.
Aldershot beamed at Richardson’s wits. ‘My faithful assistant. I thee form a fine correspondence.’ He turned to the crew assembled on the main deck and grinned. ‘I am sure today will be much peaceful after last night’s scrap, right boys?’
‘Yes, master Aldershot,’ they dragged a reply.
‘I now hand you over to Mr. Richardson for the day’s briefing.’
Richardson cleared his throat and bellowed, ‘Under command of captain Cole, a number of fifty men have come to this God forsaken place called Africa. As you know, good rewards await you boys if this voyage is prosperous. Just to remember you that why we here is to catch two hundred Negroes. In between that number we expect fifty and one hundred bondmen and the rest, wenches. Need I remember you that they animals, strong as mules, quick as gazelles. As part of thy devoirs, you shall do all that is in thy power to keep all of em’ slaves alive. You shall suppress any act of rebellion and dismiss all unholy whispers. A good whip should do but if push becomes shove, one shat in the leg, preferably a nigger left. The time we gat here is four weeks. Four weeks and we sail again.’ He squinted around and said, ‘Where in nigger hell is Johnson?’
‘Johnson coming, massa. Johnson rye’ here, massa. Johnson rye’ here.’ A huge black man made his way out of the clump of white men. He wore a Phrygian cap, an armless shirt that exposed his wavy arm muscles and a pair of frayed three-quarter trousers over his tattered shoes.
‘That’s a good nigger,’ Richardson commended. ‘Johnson here is one of dem’ niggers I gat for meself here some years ago. He now talks English but he still remembers his dirty tongue. Ain’t that right, Jonny boy?’
A slave smile showed on Johnson’s face. ‘Massa never wrong. Massa always right. Thank you, massa.’
Everyone chuckled.
‘Alas, they sell their kind for a living,’ Aldershot broke in. ‘Black men with black brains. Nevertheless Mr. Richardson sold Johnson to me and I am happy to say he has been a good boy over the years. He loves America so I have promised quid pro quo to manumit him after this voyage.’
Richardson sniggered and said loud enough to be heard by all, ‘Quite a huge reward for a nigger. I’d rather have him back if you have no need of him any longer.’
Aldershot found the statement spiteful and gave Richardson an abhorring glance. ‘Keep your tongue from speaking cant, Gabriel. I will welcome no such impertinence.’ He maintained calm.
Richardson cocked his head in a defiant manner and continued, ‘Now here is we plan. Johnson shall interpret we demands to any slave agent we cross.’ The overseer stared at the far coast. ‘Must say I’s a bit surprised we ain’t seen none of them yet. This coast seen much business last time I’s been here. Dutch company even pitched dem’s tents there with us. Anyway, the nigger shall speak to his people. Today, nine and twenty of us shall go with Johnson. A score shall remain behind to pitch we tent ashore and look after the ship with captain Cole. Understood?’
‘Yes, Mr. Richardson,’ the crew chorused.
‘You are dismissed.’
Betimes afternoon, thirty men trudged the footpath trailing the dense Mondah rainforest as Johnson led them in the trek to his native village, Elohosa. Croaking of birds and frogs cut across themselves in the most irksome pattern and the men waved away a host of butterflies that pollinated the undergrowth. Next they trod an area of marsh, dipping their boots in and out of mud. After walking for over almost an hour the tropical heat got everyone breaking sweat.
Aldershot panted, ‘We are yet to find any of your agents, Richardson. Thought you said they’d be here in the trees.’
‘We gon’ find them, sire,’ Richardson replied ahead, slashing his way through a tangle of mossy twigs. ‘We just gat to keeps advance in direction of the village. Take ‘bout fifteen furlang from coast.’
They got to a narrow stream sided with shrubs and waded its serpentine course, tall evergreen trees of about forty metres high casting a heavy shade on them. Richardson picked something from the stream and without turning his back said, ‘Sire, I’s wonder if you done notice gold all over this place. You might want to invest in gold collection on we next trip. Only matter of time before someone else seen this place, that for sure.’
Aldershot ignored him. Then at a fresh glance he saw the gold nuggets that lay beneath the stream. He picked one up. These, he earlier mistook for brown stones. I am walking on gold, his eyes sparkled.
At a three-path junction in the forest, they sighted two village girls walking up a pathway. The girls, wrapped with colored clothing, were having a chat and over their heads perched baskets heaped with oranges. The girls froze to the spot when they saw the clump of white men ahead of them. Richardson did not complete a word before they threw away their baskets and sprinted into the bush.
‘C’mon, let’s go after them,’ a man said.
‘No,’ Aldershot snapped, his patience wearing thin. ‘We did not come here for two.’
They emerged out of the bush that skirted the village. Aldershot was immediately taken aback by the ominous silence that gave the vast area of land the desolate mood of a churchyard. All he saw were mud huts with straw-roofs close to each other and interspersed with isolated trees. Roosters picked slow steps, pecking the red earth for food. A mother goat was sighted chewing cord along with its kids. ‘Where are the people?’ he asked.
Richardson hesitated before he responded. ‘I fancy they attend a village ceremony somewhere, sire.’ His voice faltered as if he were surprised as well.
Ceremony! Aldershot felt a shiver grip his spine. He remembered a report once published in the Virginia Gazette on how Africans ate themselves, and that they preferred to eat white people in ceremonial times.
‘Let’s go further so we finds them,’ said Richardson.
‘No way! If you think I am following you to be slaughtered like a sacrificial lamb, think again. You said we’d find the agents in the trees not at a damned ceremony.’
‘Yes. I apologize we ain’t finds them there, sire. You never know with dem’ niggers. Alright I shall have Johnson go look for them.’
‘You better do that now.’ Aldershot stood gnashing his teeth as Johnson jogged off. He considered what he would do should Johnson return without any agent and he wasn’t able to get slaves here. This whole adventure to find cheap slaves would be a shame on his intelligence and person. He should have trusted his instinct and gone to Badagry like everyone else, after all that was the biggest slave market in the west of Africa. Instead he had placed his faith in the judgment of an illiterate.
No sooner than Johnson left, an ambush of locals appeared in a vicious rush out of the surrounding bushes. Aldershot’s heart doubled in size and he staggered two steps back. These people, all men, wielded fatal weapons such as spears, jagged-edge machetes, spiky cudgel, flaming charms and mouth-dart tubes. These had to be the ceremonial locals, Aldershot assumed under a flush of panic.
They besieged the white men in a circle and chanted Bamtoo chefoto…bamtoo chefoto as they jabbed their weapons forward, meaning to kill.
Aldershot’s heart pumped cold blood through his arteries. His men reacted by drawing out their weapons – Brown Besses affixed with bayonets, flintlocks and blades. Aldershot too, grabbed the musket slung across his back and joined them in the aim. The gun flailed in his tensioned arms as they leaned back to back into each other. He wished he didn’t have to shoot because he didn’t know how to shoot. Death seemed very close and for a second an image of his family appeared in his mind. Perhaps he would never see them again. He wondered in stupefaction why their guns didn’t deter the locals. Don’t they have any clue of what it can do? The cold ran through every part of his body.
Out of nowhere Johnson ran into the moment, shouting in his local tongue, seemingly entreating for peace and brandishing his hands before the people.
Richardson snarled over the hubbub, ‘C’mon, Jonny boy, speak to em’ monkeys lest we speak to them with slugs.’
The rest of the men gritted their teeth, aimed their weapons sturdy and looked likely to pull triggers.
Still, the locals continued to close in with their spears, leaving the Americans almost entering themselves. These people kept bawling Bamtoo chefoto...bamtoo chefoto. The tension subdued when Johnson seemed to get their attention. They finally heard him and lowered their weapons to speak with him in their native dialect, more like interrogate him going by the way he replied the torrent of talks they unleashed upon him.
Aldershot heaved a sigh, bending in half and clasping his knees. The power of communication, he thought. He thanked God they brought Johnson along or else he would have been meat here in Africa. He watched on in mystery at how the natives welcomed Johnson back to his land. One at a time they dabbed their hands to Johnson’s cheeks as if giving him quick slaps. Africans! When the locals were done with Johnson, Aldershot called him and asked what he had told them that calmed their aggression.
Johnson had said the Americans were friends of the king and that the king would be displeased at anyone who hurts them.
‘The king!’ A new idea brightened Aldershot’s mind. He asked Johnson if they could see the king at the ceremony. Johnson said there was no ceremony. Aldershot revealed a little surprise. What does bamtoo chefoto mean? Aldershot asked, just for the fun of it. Johnson enlightened him that bamtoo means white man, and chefoto means go away.
I am bamtoo! Aldershot staggered. Not a bad name for a white man.

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