"Well?" said Meredith, following the glance of his friend's eye as he surveyed his men.

Oscard took his pipe from his lips and looked gravely at him.

"Don't half like it, you know," he said in a low voice; for Durnovo was talking with a head porter a few yards away.

"Don't half like what?—the flavour of that pipe? It looks a little strong."

"No, leaving you here," replied Oscard.

"Oh, that's all right, old chap! You can't take me with you, you know. I intended to stick to it when I came away from home, and I am not going to turn back now."

Oscard gave a queer little upward jerk of the head, as if he had just collected further evidence in support of a theory which chronically surprised him. Then he turned away and looked down over the vast untrodden tract of Africa that lay beneath them. He kept his eyes fixed there, after the manner of a man who has no fluency in personal comment.

"You know," he said jerkily, "I didn't think—I mean you're not the sort of chap I took you for. When I first saw you I thought you were a bit of a dandy and—all that. Not the sort of man for this work. I thought that the thing was bound to be a failure. I knew Durnovo, and had no faith in him. You've got a gentle way about you, and your clothes are so confoundedly neat. But—" Here he paused and pulled down the folds of his Norfolk jacket. "But I liked the way you shot that leopard the day we first met."

"Beastly fluke," put in Meredith, with his pleasant laugh.

Oscard contented himself with a denying shake of the head.

"Of course," he continued, with obvious determination to get it all off his mind, "I know as well as you do that you are the chief of this concern—have been chief since we left Msala—and I never want to work under a better man."

He put his pipe back between his lips and turned round with a contented smile, as much as to say, "There, that is the sort of man I am! When I want to say that sort of thing I can say it with the best of you."

"We have pulled along very comfortably, haven't we?" said Meredith; "thanks to your angelic temper. And you'll deliver that packet of letters to the governor, won't you? I have sent them in one packet, addressed to him, as it is easier to carry. I will let you hear of us somehow within the next six months. Do not go and get married before I get home. I want to be your best man."

Oscard laughed and gave the signal for the men to start, and the long caravan defiled before them. The porters nodded to Meredith with a great display of white teeth, while the head men, the captains of tens, stepped out of the ranks and shook hands. Before they had disappeared over the edge of the plateau, Joseph came forward to say good-bye to Oscard.

"And it is understood," said the latter, "that I pay in to your account at Lloyd's Bank your share of the proceeds?"

Joseph grinned. "Yes, sir, if you please, presumin' it's a safe bank."

"Safe as houses."

"'Cos it's a tolerable big amount," settling himself into his boots in the manner of a millionaire.

"Lot of money—about four hundred pounds! But you can trust me to see to it all right."

"No fear, sir," replied Joseph grandly. "I'm quite content, I'm sure, that you should have the—fingering o' the dibs."

As he finished—somewhat lamely perhaps—his rounded periods, he looked very deliberately over Oscard's shoulder towards Durnovo, who was approaching them.

Meredith walked a little way down the slope with Oscard.

"Good-bye, old chap!" he said when the parting came. "Good luck, and all that. Hope you will find all right at home. By the way," he shouted after him, "give my kind regards to the Gordons at Loango."

And so the first consignment of Simiacine was sent from the Plateau to the coast.

Guy Oscard was one of those deceptive men who only do a few things, and do those few very well. In forty-three days he deposited the twenty precious cases in Gordon's godowns at Loango, and paid off the porters, of whom he had not lost one. These duties performed, he turned his steps towards the bungalow. He had refused Gordon's invitation to stay with him until the next day, when the coasting steamer was expected. To tell the truth, he was not very much prepossessed in Maurice's favour, and it was with a doubtful mind that he turned his steps towards the little house in the forest between Loango and the sea.

The room was the first surprise that awaited him, its youthful mistress the second. Guy Oscard was rather afraid of most women. He did not understand them, and probably he despised them. Men who are afraid or ignorant often do.

"And when did you leave them?" asked Jocelyn, after her visitor had explained who he was. He was rather taken aback by so much dainty refinement in remote Africa, and explained rather badly. But she helped him out by intimating that she knew all about him.

"I left them forty-four days ago," he replied.

"And were they well?"

"She is very much interested," reflected Oscard, upon whom her eagerness of manner had not been lost. "Surely, it cannot be that fellow Durnovo?"

"Oh, yes," he replied with unconscious curtness.

"Mr. Durnovo cannot ever remain inland for long without feeling the effect of the climate."

Guy Oscard, with the perspicacity of his sex, gobbled up the bait. "It IS Durnovo," he reflected.

"Oh, he is all right," he said; "wonderfully well, and so are the others—Joseph and Meredith. You know Meredith?"

Jocelyn was busy with a vase of flowers standing on the table at her elbow. One of the flowers had fallen half out, and she was replacing it—very carefully.

"Oh, yes," she said, without ceasing her occupation, "we know Mr. Meredith."

The visitor did not speak at once, and she looked up at him, over the flowers, with grave politeness.

"Meredith," he said, "is one of the most remarkable men I have ever met."

It was evident that this ordinarily taciturn man wanted to unburthen his mind. He was desirous of talking to some one of Jack Meredith; and perhaps Jocelyn reflected that she was as good a listener as he would find in Loango.

"Really," she replied with a kindly interest. "How?"

He paused, not because he found it difficult to talk to this woman, but because he was thinking of something.

"I have read or heard somewhere of a steel gauntlet beneath a velvet glove."

"Yes."

"That describes Meredith. He is not the man I took him for. He is so wonderfully polite and gentle and pleasant. Not the qualities that make a good leader for an African exploring expedition—eh?"

Jocelyn gave a strange little laugh, which included, among other things, a subtle intimation that she rather liked Guy Oscard. Women do convey these small meanings sometimes, but one finds that they do not intend them to be acted upon.

"And he has kept well all the time?" she asked softly. "He did not look strong."

"Oh, yes. He is much stronger than he looks."

"And you—you have been all right?"

"Yes, thanks."

"Are you going back to—them?"

"No, I leave to-morrow morning early by the Portuguese boat. I am going home to be married."

"Indeed! Then I suppose you will wash your hands of Africa for ever?"

"Not quite," he replied. "I told Meredith that I would be prepared to go up to him in case of emergency, but not otherwise. I shall, of course, still be interested in the scheme. I take home the first consignment of Simiacine; we have been very successful, you know. I shall have to stay in London to sell that. I have a house there."

"Are you to be married at once?" inquired Jocelyn, with that frank interest which makes it so much easier for a man to talk of his own affairs to a woman than to one of his own sex.

"As soon as I can arrange it," he answered with a little laugh. "There is nothing to wait for. We are both orphans, and, fortunately, we are fairly well off."

He was fumbling in his breast-pocket, and presently he rose, crossed the room, and handed her, quite without afterthought or self-consciousness, a photograph in a morocco case.

Explanation was unnecessary, and Jocelyn Gordon looked smilingly upon a smiling, bright young face.

"She is very pretty," she said honestly.

Whereupon Guy Oscard grunted unintelligibly.

"Millicent," he said after a little pause—"Millicent is her name."

"Millicent?" repeated Jocelyn—"Millicent WHAT?"

"Millicent Chyne."

Jocelyn folded the morocco case together and handed it back to him.

"She is very pretty," she repeated slowly, as if her mind could only reproduce—it was incapable of creation.

Oscard looked puzzled. Having risen he did not sit down again, and presently he took his leave, feeling convinced that Jocelyn was about to faint.

When he was gone the girl sat wearily down.

"Millicent Chyne," she whispered. "What is to be done?"

"Nothing," she answered to herself after a while. "Nothing. It is not my business. I can do nothing."

She sat there—alone, as she had been all her life—until the short tropical twilight fell over the forest. Quite suddenly she burst into tears.

"It IS my business," she sobbed. "It is no good pretending otherwise; but I can do nothing."



CHAPTER XXII. THE SECOND CONSIGNMENT



Who has lost all hope has also lost all fear.

Among others, it was a strange thing that Jocelyn felt no surprise at meeting the name of Millicent Chyne on the lips of another man. Women understand these things better than we do. They understand each other, and they seem to have a practical way of accepting human nature as it is which we never learn to apply to our fellowmen. They never bluster as we do, nor expect impossibilities from the frail.

Another somewhat singular residue left, as it were, in Jocelyn's mind when the storm of emotion had subsided was a certain indefinite tenderness for Millicent Chyne. She felt sure that Jack Meredith's feeling for her was that feeling vaguely called the right one, and, as such, unalterable. To this knowledge the subtle sympathy for Millicent was perhaps attributable. But navigation with pen and thought among the shoals and depths of a woman's heart is hazardous and uncertain.

Coupled with this—as only a woman could couple contradictions—was an unpardoning abhorrence for the deceit practised. But Jocelyn knew the world well enough to suspect that, if she were ever brought face to face with her meanness, Millicent would be able to bring about her own forgiveness. It is the knowledge of this lamentable fact that undermines the feminine sense of honour.

Lastly, there was a calm acceptance of the fact that Guy Oscard must and would inevitably go to the wall. There could be no comparison between the two men. Millicent Chyne could scarcely hesitate for a moment. That she herself must likewise suffer uncomplainingly, inevitably, seemed to be an equally natural consequence in Jocelyn Gordon's mind.

She could not go to Jack Meredith and say:

"This woman is deceiving you, but I love you, and my love is a nobler, grander thing than hers. It is no passing fancy of a giddy, dazzled girl, but the deep strong passion of a woman almost in the middle of her life. It is a love so complete, so sufficing, that I know I could make you forget this girl. I could so envelop you with love, so watch over you and care for you, and tend you and understand you, that you MUST be happy. I feel that I could make you happier than any other woman in the world could make you."

Jocelyn Gordon could not do this; and all the advanced females in the world, all the blue stockings and divided skirts, all the wild women and those who pant for burdens other than children, will never bring it to pass that women can say such things.

And precisely because she could not say this, Jocelyn felt hot and sick at the very thought that Jack Meredith should learn aught of Millicent Chyne from her. Her own inner motive in divulging what she had learnt from Guy Oscard could never for a moment be hidden behind a wish, however sincere, to act for the happiness of two honourable gentlemen.

Jocelyn had no one to consult—no one to whom she could turn, in the maddening difficulty of her position, for advice or sympathy. She had to work it out by herself, steering through the quicksands by that compass that knows no deviation—the compass of her own honour and maidenly reserve.

Just because she was so sure of her own love she felt that she could never betray the falseness of Millicent Chyne. She felt somehow that Millicent's fall in Jack Meredith's estimation would drag down with it the whole of her sex, and consequently herself. She did not dare to betray Millicent, because the honour of her sex must be held up by an exaggerated honour in herself. Thus her love for Jack Meredith tied her hands, while she stood idly by to see him wreck his own life by what could only be a miserable union.

With the clear sight of the onlooker, Jocelyn Gordon now saw that, by Jack Meredith's own showing, Millicent was quite unworthy of him. But she also remembered words, silences, and hints which demonstrated with lamentable plainness the fact that he loved her. She was old enough and sufficiently experienced to avoid the futile speculation as to what had attracted this love. She knew that men marry women who in the estimation of onlooking relatives are unworthy of them, and live happily ever afterwards, without deeming it necessary to explain to those relatives how it comes about.

Now it happened that this woman—Jocelyn Gordon—was not one of those who gracefully betray themselves at the right moment and are immediately covered with a most becoming confusion. She was strong to hold to her purpose, to subdue herself, to keep silent. And this task she set herself, having thought it all carefully out in the little flower-scented verandah, so full of pathetic association. But it must be remembered that she in no wise seemed to see the pathos in her own life. She was unconscious of romance. It was all plain fact, and the plainest was her love for Jack Meredith.

Her daily life was in no perceptible way changed. Maurice Gordon saw no difference. She had never been an hilarious person. Now she went about her household, her kindnesses, and unobtrusive good works with a quieter mien; but, when occasion or social duty demanded, she seemed perhaps a little readier than before to talk of indifferent topics, to laugh at indifferent wit. Those who have ears to hear and eyes wherewith to see learn to distrust the laugh that is too ready, the sympathy that flows in too broad a stream. Happiness is self-absorbed.

Four months elapsed, and the excitement created in the small world of Western Africa by the first dazzling success of the Simiacine Expedition began to subside. The thing took its usual course. At first the experts disbelieved, and then they prophesied that it could not last. Finally, the active period of envy, hatred, and malice gave way to a sullen tolerance not unmixed with an indefinite grudge towards Fortune who had favoured the brave once more.

Maurice Gordon was in daily expectation of news from that far-off favoured spot they vaguely called the Plateau. And Jocelyn did not pretend to conceal from herself the hope that filled her whole being—the hope that Jack Meredith might bring the news in person.

Instead, came Victor Durnovo.

He came upon her one evening when she was walking slowly home from a mild tea-party at the house of a missionary. Hearing footsteps on the sandy soil, she turned, and found herself face to face with Durnovo.

"Ah!" she exclaimed, and her voice thrilled with some emotion which he did not understand. "Ah, it is you!"

"Yes," he said, holding her hand a little longer than was necessary. "It is I."

His journey from Msala through the more civilised reaches of the lower river, his voyage in the coasting boat, and his arrival at Loango, had partaken of the nature of a triumphal progress. Victor Durnovo was elated—like a girl in a new dress.

"I was coming along to see you," he said, and there was a subtle offence in his tone.

She did not trouble to tell him that Maurice was away for ten days. She felt that he knew that. There was a certain truculence in his walk which annoyed her; but she was wonderingly conscious of the fact that she was no longer afraid of him. This feeling had as yet taken no definite shape. She did not know what she felt, but she knew that there was no fear in her mind.

"Have you been successful?" she asked, with a certain negative kindness of tone bred of this new self-confidence.

"I should think we had! Why, the lot that Oscard brought down was a fortune in itself. But you saw Oscard, of course. Did he stay at the bungalow?"

"No; he stayed at the hotel."

"Did you like him?"

The question was accompanied by a momentary glance of the dark, jealous eyes.

"Yes, very much."

"He is a nice fellow, first-rate fellow. Of course, he has his faults, but he and I got on splendidly. He's—engaged, you know."

"So he told me."

Durnovo glanced at her again searchingly, and looked relieved. He gave an awkward little laugh.

"And I understand," he said, "that Meredith is in the same enviable position."

"Indeed!"

Durnovo indulged in a meaning silence.

"When do you go back?" she asked carelessly.

"Almost at once," in a tone that apologised for causing her necessary pain. "I must leave to-morrow or the next day. I do not like the idea of Meredith being left too long alone up there with a reduced number of men. Of course, I had to bring a pretty large escort. I brought down sixty thousand pounds worth of Simiacine."

"Yes," she said; "and you take all the men back to-morrow?"

He did not remember having stated for certain that he was leaving the next day.

"Or the day after," he amended.

"Have you had any more sickness among the men?" she asked at once, in a tone of irony which made him wince.

"No," he answered, "they have been quite all right."

"What time do you start?" she asked. "There are letters for Mr. Meredith at the office. Maurice's head clerk will give them to you."

She knew that these letters were from Millicent. She had actually had them in her hand. She had inhaled the faint, refined scent of the paper and envelopes.

"You will be careful that they are not lost, won't you?" she said, tearing at her own heart with a strange love of the pain. "They may be important."

"Oh, I will deliver them sharp enough," he answered. "I suppose I had better start to-morrow."

"I should think so," she replied quietly, with that gentle mendacity which can scarcely be grudged to women, because they are so poorly armed. "I should think so. You know what these men are. Every hour they have in Loango demoralises them more and more."

They had reached the gate of the bungalow garden. She turned and held out her hand in an undeniable manner. He bade her good-bye and went his way, wondering vaguely what had happened to them both. The conversation had taken quite a different turn to what he had expected and intended. But somehow it had got beyond his control. He had looked forward to a very different ending to the interview. And now he found himself returning somewhat disconsolately to the wretched hotel in Loango—dismissed—sent back.

The next day he actually left the little West African coast town, turning his face northward with bad grace. Even at that distance, he feared Jack Meredith's half-veiled sarcasm. He knew that nothing could be hidden for long from the Englishman's suavely persistent inquiry and deduction. Besides, the natives were no longer safe. Meredith, with the quickness of a cultured linguist, had picked up enough of their language to understand them, while Joseph talked freely with them in that singular mixture of slang and vernacular which follows the redcoat all over the world. Durnovo had only been allowed to come down to the coast under a promise, gracefully veiled, but distinct enough, that he should only remain twenty-four hours in Loango.

Jocelyn avoided seeing him again. She was forced to forego the opportunity of hearing much that she wanted to learn because Durnovo, the source of the desired knowledge, was unsafe. But the relief from the suspense of the last few months was in itself a consolation. All seemed to be going on well at the Plateau. Danger is always discounted at sight; and Jocelyn felt comparatively easy respecting the present welfare of Jack Meredith, living as she did on the edge of danger.

Four days later she was riding through the native town of Loango, accompanied by a lady-friend, when she met Victor Durnovo. The sight of him gave her a distinct shock. She knew that he had left Loango three days before with all his men. There was no doubt about that. Moreover, his air was distinctly furtive—almost scared. It was evident that the chance meeting was as undesired by him as it was surprising to her.

"I thought you had left," she said shortly, pulling up her horse with undeniable decision.

"Yes... but I have come back—for—for more men."

She knew he was lying, and he felt that she knew.

"Indeed!" she said. "You are not a good starter."

She turned her horse's head, nodded to her friend, bowed coldly to Durnovo, and trotted towards home. When she had reached the corner of the rambling, ill-paved street, she touched her horse. The animal responded. She broke into a gentle canter, which made the little children cease their play and stare. In the forest she applied the spurs, and beneath the whispering trees, over the silent sand, the girl galloped home as fast as her horse could lay legs to the ground.

Jocelyn Gordon was one of those women who rise slowly to the occasion, and the limit of their power seems at times to be only defined by the greatness of the need.



CHAPTER XXIII. MERCURY



So cowards never use their might But against such that will not fight.

On nearing the bungalow, Jocelyn turned aside into the forest where a little colony of huts nestled in a hollow of the sand-dunes.

"Nala," she cried, "the paddle-maker. Ask him to come to me."

She spoke in the dialect of the coast to some women who sat together before one of the huts.

"Nala—yes," they answered. And they raised their strident voices.

In a few moments a man emerged from a shed of banana-leaves. He was a scraggy man—very lightly clad—and a violent squint handicapped him seriously in the matter of first impressions. When he saw Jocelyn he dropped his burden of wood and ran towards her. The African negro does not cringe. He is a proud man in his way. If he is properly handled, he is not only trustworthy—he is something stronger. Nala grinned as he ran towards Jocelyn.

"Nala," she said, "will you go a journey for me?"

"I will go at once."

"I came to you," said Jocelyn, "because I know that you are an intelligent man and a great traveller."

"I have travelled much," he answered, "when I was younger."

"Before you were married?" said the English girl. "Before little Nala came?"

The man grinned.

He looked back over his shoulder towards one of the huts, where a scraggy infant with a violent squint lay on its diaphragm on the sand.

"Where do you wish me to go?" asked the proud father.

"To Msala on the Ogowe river."

"I know the Ogowe. I have been at Msala," with the grave nod of a great traveller.

"When can you leave?"

He shrugged his shoulders.

"Now."

Jocelyn had her purse in her hand.

"You can hire a dhow," she said; "and on the river you may have as many rowers as you like. You must go very quickly to Msala. There you must ask about the Englishman's Expedition. You have heard of it?"

"Yes: the Englishman, Durnovo, and the soldier who laughs."

"Yes. Some of the men are at Msala now. They were going up-country to join the other Englishman far away—near the mountains. They have stopped at Msala. Find out why they have not gone on, and come back very quickly to tell me. You understand, Nala?"

"Yes."

"And I can trust you?"

"Yes: because you cured the little one when he had an evil spirit. Yes, you can trust me."

She gave him money and rode on home. Before she reached the bungalow the paddle-maker passed her at a trot, going towards the sea.

She waited for three days, and then Victor Durnovo came again. Maurice was still away. There was an awful sense of impending danger in the very air in the loneliness of her position. Yet she was not afraid of Durnovo. She had left that fear behind. She went to the drawing-room to see him, full of resolution.

"I could not go away," he said, after relinquishing her hand, "without coming to see you."

Jocelyn said nothing. The scared look which she had last seen in his face was no longer there; but the eyes were full of lies.

"Jocelyn," the man went on, "I suppose you know that I love you? It must have been plain to you for a long time."

"No," she answered, with a little catch in her breath. "No, it has not. And I am sorry to hear it now."

"Why?" he asked, with a dull gleam which could not be dignified by the name of love.

"Because it can only lead to trouble."

Victor Durnovo was standing with his back to the window, while Jocelyn, in the full light of the afternoon, stood before him. He looked her slowly up and down with a glance of approval which alarmed and disquieted her.

"Will you marry me?" he asked.

"No!"

His black moustache was pushed forward by some motion of the hidden lips.

"Why?"

"Do you want the real reason?" asked Jocelyn.

Victor Durnovo paused for a moment.

"Yes," he said.

"Because I not only do not care for you, but I despise and distrust you."

"You are candid," he said, with an unpleasant little laugh.

"Yes."

He moved a little to one side and drew a chair towards him, half-leaning, half-sitting on the back of it.

"Then," he said, "I will be candid with you. I intend you to marry me; I have intended it for a long time. I am not going down on my knees to ask you to do it: that is not my way. But, if you drive me to it, I will make your brother Maurice go down on his knees and beg you to marry me."

"I don't think you will do that," answered the girl steadily. "Whatever your power over Maurice may be, it is not strong enough for that; you overrate it."

"You think so?" he sneered.

"I am sure of it."

Durnovo glanced hastily round the room in order to make sure that they were not overheard.

"Suppose," he said, in a low, hissing voice, "that I possess knowledge that I have only to mention to one or two people to make this place too hot for Maurice Gordon. If he escaped the fury of the natives, it would be difficult to know where he could go to. England would be too hot for him. They wouldn't have him there; I could see to that. He would be a ruined man—an outcast—execrated by all the civilised world."

He was watching her face all the while. He saw the colour leave even her lips, but they were steady and firm. A strange wonder crept into his heart. This woman never flinched. There was some reserved strength within herself upon which she was now drawing. His dealings had all been with half-castes—with impure blood and doubtful descendants of a mixed ancestry. He had never fairly roused a pure-bred English man or woman, and suddenly he began to feel out of his depth.

"What is your knowledge?" asked Jocelyn in a coldly measured voice.

"I think you had better not ask that; you will be sorry afterwards. I would rather that you thought quietly over what I have told you. Perhaps, on second thoughts, you will see your way to give me some—slight hope. I should really advise it."

"I did not ask your advice. What is your knowledge?"

"You will have it?" he hissed.

"Yes."

He leant forward, craning his neck, pushing his yellow face and hungering black eyes close into hers.

"Then, if you will have it, your brother—Maurice Gordon—is a slave-owner."

She drew back as she might have done from some unclean animal. She knew that he was telling the truth. There might be extenuating circumstances. The real truth might have quite a different sound, spoken in different words; but there was enough of the truth in it, as Victor Durnovo placed it before her, to condemn Maurice before the world.

"Now will you marry me?" he sneered.

"No!"

Quick as thought she had seen the only loophole—the only possible way of meeting this terrible accusation.

He laughed; but there was a faint jangle of uneasiness in his laughter.

"Indeed!"

"Supposing," said Jocelyn, "for one moment that there was a grain of truth in your fabrication, who would believe you? Who on this coast would take your word against the word of an English gentleman? Even if the whole story were true, which it is not, could you prove it? You are a liar, as well as a coward and a traitor! Do you think that the very servants in the stable would believe you? Do you think that the incident of the small-pox at Msala is forgotten? Do you think that all Loango, even to the boatmen on the beach, ignores the fact that you are here in Loango now because you are afraid to go through a savage country to the Simiacine Plateau as you are pledged to do? You were afraid of the small-pox once; there is something else that you are afraid of now. I do not know what it is, but I will find out. Coward! Go! Leave the house at once, before I call in the stable-boys to turn you out, and never dare to speak to me again!"

Victor Durnovo recoiled before her, conscious all the while that she had never been so beautiful as at that moment. But she was something far above him—a different creation altogether. He never knew what drove him from that room. It was the fear of something that he did not understand.

He heard her close the window after him as he walked away beneath the trees.

She stood watching him—proud, cold, terrible in her womanly anger. Then she turned, and suddenly sank down upon the sofa, sobbing.

But fortune decreed that she should have neither time to weep nor think. She heard the approaching footsteps of her old servant, and when the door was opened Jocelyn Gordon was reading a book, with her back turned towards the window.

"That man Nala, miss, the paddle-maker, wants to see you."

"Tell him to go round to the verandah."

Jocelyn went out by the open window, and presently Nala came grinning towards her. He was evidently very much pleased with himself—held himself erect, and squinted more violently than usual.

"I have been to Msala," he said, with considerable dignity of manner.

"Yes, and what news have you?"

Nala squatted down on the chunam floor, and proceeded to unfold a leaf. The operation took some time. Within the outer covering there was a second envelope of paper, likewise secured by a string. Finally, the man produced a small note, which showed signs of having been read more than once. This he handed to Jocelyn with an absurd air of importance.

She opened the paper and read:

"To MARIE AT MSALA,—Send at once to Mr. Durnovo, informing him that the tribes have risen and are rapidly surrounding the Plateau. He must return here at once with as large an armed force as he can raise. But the most important consideration is time. He must not wait for men from elsewhere, but must pick up as many as he can in Loango and on the way up to Msala. I reckon that we can hold out for four months without outside assistance, but after that period we shall be forced to surrender or to try and cut our way through WITHOUT the Simiacine. With a larger force we could beat back the tribes, and establish our hold on the Plateau by force of arms. This must be forwarded to Mr. Durnovo at once, wherever he is. The letter is in duplicate, sent by two good messengers, who go by different routes.

"JOHN MEREDITH."

When Jocelyn looked up, dry-lipped, breathless, Nala was standing before her, beaming with self-importance.

"Who gave you this?"

"Marie at Msala."

"Who is she?"

"Oh—Mr. Durnovo's woman at Msala. She keeps his house."

"But this letter is for Mr. Durnovo," cried Jocelyn, whose fear made her unreasonably angry. "Why has he not had it?"

Nala came nearer, with upraised forefinger and explanatory palm.

"Marie tell me," he said, "that Mr. Meredith send two letters. Marie give Mr. Durnovo one. This—other letter."

There was a strange glitter in the girl's blue eyes—something steely and unpleasant.

"You are sure of that? You are quite sure that Mr. Durnovo has had a letter like this?" she asked slowly and carefully, so that there could be no mistake.

"That is true," answered the man.

"Have you any more news from Msala?"

Nala looked slightly hurt. He evidently thought that he had brought as much news as one man could be expected to carry.

"Marie has heard," he said, "that there is much fighting up in the country."

"She has heard no particulars—nothing more than that?"

"No: nothing."

Jocelyn Gordon rose to this occasion also.

"Can you go," she said, after a moment's thought, "to St. Paul de Loanda for me?"

The man laughed.

"Yes," he answered simply.

"At once—now?"

"Oh, yes," with a sigh.

Already Jocelyn was writing something on a sheet of paper.

"Take this," she said, "to the telegraph office at St. Paul de Loanda, and send it off at once. Here is money. You understand? I will pay you when you bring back the receipt. If you have been very quick, I will pay you well."

That same evening a second messenger started northward after Maurice Gordon with a letter telling him to come back at once to Loango.



CHAPTER XXIV. NEMESIS



Take heed of still waters.

Despite his assertion to Lady Cantourne, Guy Oscard stayed on in the gloomy house in Russell Square. He had naturally gone thither on his return from Africa, and during the months that followed he did not find time to think much of his own affairs. Millicent Chyne occupied all his thoughts—all his waking moments. It is marvellous how busily employed an active-minded young lady can keep a man.

In the ill-lighted study rendered famous by the great history which had emanated in the manuscript therefrom, Guy Oscard had interviewed sundry great commercial experts, and a cheque for forty-eight thousand pounds had been handed to him across the table polished bright by his father's studious elbow. The Simiacine was sold, and the first portion of it spent went to buy a diamond aigrette for the dainty head of Miss Millicent Chyne.

Guy Oscard was in the midst of the London season. His wealth and a certain restricted renown had soon made him popular. He had only to choose his society, and the selection was not difficult. Wherever Millicent Chyne went he went also, and to the lady's credit it must be recorded that no one beyond herself and Guy Oscard had hitherto noticed this fact. Millicent was nothing if not discreet. It was more or less generally known that she was engaged to Jack Meredith, who, although absent on some vaguely romantic quest of a fortune, was not yet forgotten. No word, however, was popularly whispered connecting her name with that of any other swain nearer home. Miss Chyne was too much of a woman of the world to allow that. But, in the meantime, she rather liked diamond aigrettes and the suppressed devotion of Guy Oscard.

It was the evening of a great ball, and Guy Oscard, having received his orders and instructions, was dining alone in Russell Square, when a telegram was handed to him. He opened it and spread the thin paper out upon the table-cloth. A word from that far, wild country, which seemed so much fitter a background to his simple bulk and strength than the cramped ways of London society—a message from the very heart of the dark continent—to him:

"Meredith surrounded and in danger Durnovo false come at once Jocelyn Gordon."

Guy Oscard pushed back his chair and rose at once, as if there were somebody waiting in the hall to see him.

"I do not want any more dinner," he said, "I am going to Africa. Come and help me to pack my things."

He studied Bradshaw and wrote a note to Millicent Chyne. To her he said the same as he had said to the butler, "I am going to Africa."

There was something refreshingly direct and simple about this man. He did not enter into long explanations. He simply bore on in the line he had marked out. He rose from the table and never looked back. His attitude seemed to say, "I am going to Africa; kindly get out of my way."

At three minutes to nine—that is to say, in one hour and a half—Guy Oscard took his seat in the Plymouth express. He had ascertained that a Madeira boat was timed to sail from Dartmouth at eight o'clock that evening. He was preceded by a telegram to Lloyd's agent at Plymouth:

"Have fastest craft available, steam up ready to put to sea to catch the Banyan African steamer four o'clock to-morrow morning. Expense not to be considered."

As the train crept out into the night, the butler of the gloomy house in Russell Square, who had finished the port, and was beginning to feel resigned, received a second shock. This came in the form of a carriage and pair, followed by a ring at the bell.

The man opened the door, and his fellow servitor of an eccentric class and generation stepped back on the door-step to let a young lady pass into the hall.

"Mr. Oscard?" she said curtly.

"Left 'ome, miss," replied the butler, stiffly conscious of walnut-peel on his waistcoat.

"How long ago?"

"A matter of half an hour, miss."

Millicent Chyne, whose face was drawn and white, moved farther into the hall. Seeing the dining-room door ajar, she passed into that stately apartment, followed by the butler.

"Mr. Oscard sent me this note," she said, showing a crumpled paper, "saying that he was leaving for Africa to-night. He gives no explanation. Why has he gone to Africa?"

"He received a telegram while he was at dinner, miss," replied the butler, whose knowledge of the world indicated the approach of at least a sovereign. "He rose and threw down his napkin, miss. 'I'm goin' to Africa,' he says. 'Come and help me pack.'"

"Did you see the telegram—by any chance?" asked Miss Chyne.

"Well, miss, I didn't rightly read it."

Millicent had given way to a sudden panic on the receipt of Guy's note. A telegram calling him to Africa—calling with a voice which he obeyed with such alacrity that he had not paused to finish his dinner—could only mean that some disaster had happened—some disaster to Jack Meredith. And quite suddenly Millicent Chyne's world was emptied of all else but Jack Meredith. For a moment she forgot herself. She ran to the room where Lady Cantourne was affixing the family jewelry on her dress, and, showing the letter, said breathlessly that she must see Guy Oscard at once. Lady Cantourne, wise woman of the world that she was, said nothing. She merely finished her toilet, and, when the carriage was ready, they drove round by Russell Square.

"Who was it from?" asked Millicent.

"From a person named Gordon, miss."

"And what did it say?"

"Well, miss, as I said before, I did not rightly see. But it seems that it said, 'Come at once.' I saw that."

"And what else? Be quick, please."

"I think there was mention of somebody bein' surrounded, miss. Some name like Denver, I think. No! Wait a bit; it wasn't that; it was somebody else."

Finishing off the port had also meant beginning it, and the worthy butler's mind was not particularly clear.

"Was there any mention of Mr. Oscard's partner, Mr.—eh—Meredith?" asked Millicent, glancing at the clock.

"Yes, miss, there was that name, but I don't rightly remember in what connection."

"It didn't say that he—" Millicent paused and drew in her breath with a jerk—"was dead, or anything like that?"

"Oh, no, miss."

"Thank you. I—am sorry we missed Mr. Oscard."

She turned and went back to Lady Cantourne, who was sitting in the carriage. And while she was dancing the second extra with the first comer at four o'clock the next morning, Guy Oscard was racing out of Plymouth Sound into the teeth of a fine, driving rain. On the bridge of the trembling tug-boat, by Oscard's side, stood a keen-eyed Channel pilot, who knew the tracks of the steamers up and down Channel as a gamekeeper knows the hare-tracks across a stubble-field. Moreover, the tug-boat caught the big steamer pounding down into the grey of the Atlantic Ocean, and in due time Guy Oscard landed on the beach at Loango.

He had the telegram still in his pocket, and he went, not to Maurice Gordon's office, but to the bungalow.

Jocelyn greeted him with a little inarticulate cry of joy.

"I did not think that you could possibly be here so soon," she said.

"What news have you?" he asked, without pausing to explain. He was one of those men who are silenced by an unlimited capacity for prompt action.

"That," she replied, handing him the note written by Jack Meredith to Marie at Msala.

Guy Oscard read it carefully.

"Dated seven weeks last Monday—nearly two months ago," he muttered, half to himself.

He raised his head and looked out of the window. There were lines of anxiety round his eyes. Jocelyn never took her glance from his face.

"Nearly two months ago," he repeated.

"But you will go?" she said—and something in her voice startled him.

"Of course I will go," he replied. He looked down into her face with a vague question in his quiet eyes; and who knows what he saw there? Perhaps she was off her guard. Perhaps she read this man aright and did not care.

With a certain slow hesitation he laid his hand on her arm. There was something almost paternal in his manner which was in keeping with his stature.

"Moreover," he went on, "I will get there in time. I have an immense respect for Meredith. If he said that he could hold out for four months, I should say that he could hold out for six. There is no one like Meredith, once he makes up his mind to take things seriously."

It was not very well done, and she probably saw through it. She probably knew that he was as anxious as she was herself. But his very presence was full of comfort. It somehow brought a change to the moral atmosphere—a sense of purposeful direct simplicity which was new to the West African Coast.

"I will send over to the factory for Maurice," said the girl. "He has been hard at work getting together your men. If your telegram had not come he was going up to the Plateau himself."

Oscard looked slightly surprised. That did not sound like Maurice Gordon.

"I believe you are almost capable of going yourself," said the big man with a slow smile.

"If I had been a man I should have been half-way there by this time."

"Where is Durnovo?" he asked suddenly.

"I believe he is in Loango. He has not been to this house for more than a fortnight; but Maurice has heard that he is still somewhere in Loango."

Jocelyn paused. There was an expression on Guy Oscard's face which she rather liked, while it alarmed her.

"It is not likely," she went on, "that he will come here. I—I rather lost my temper with him, and said things which I imagine hurt his feelings."

Oscard nodded gravely.

"I'm rather afraid of doing that myself," he said; "only it will not be his feelings."

"I do not think," she replied, "that it would be at all expedient to say or do anything at present. He must go with you to the Plateau. Afterwards—perhaps."

Oscard laughed quietly.

"Ah," he said, "that sounds like one of Meredith's propositions. But he does not mean it any more than you do."

"I do mean it," replied Jocelyn quietly. There is no hatred so complete, so merciless, as the hatred of a woman for one who has wronged the man she loves. At such times women do not pause to give fair play. They make no allowance.

Jocelyn Gordon found a sort of fearful joy in the anger of this self-contained Englishman. It was an unfathomed mine of possible punishment over which she could in thought hold Victor Durnovo.

"Nothing," she went on, "could be too mean—nothing could be mean enough—to mete out to him in payment of his own treachery and cowardice."

She went to a drawer in her writing-table and took from it an almanac.

"The letter you have in your hand," she said, "was handed to Mr. Durnovo exactly a month ago by the woman at Msala. From that time to this he has done nothing. He has simply abandoned Mr. Meredith."

"He is in Loango?" inquired Oscard, with a premonitory sense of enjoyment in his voice.

"Yes."

"Does he know that you have sent for me?"

"No," replied Jocelyn.

Guy Oscard smiled.

"I think I will go and look for him," he said.

At dusk that same evening there was a singular incident in the bar-room of the only hotel in Loango.

Victor Durnovo was there, surrounded by a few friends of antecedents and blood similar to his own. They were having a convivial time of it, and the consumption of whisky was greater than might be deemed discreet in such a climate as that of Loango.

Durnovo was in the act of raising his glass to his lips when the open doorway was darkened, and Guy Oscard stood before him. The half-breed's jaw dropped; the glass was set down again rather unsteadily on the zinc-covered counter.

"I want you," said Oscard.

There was a little pause, an ominous silence, and Victor Durnovo slowly followed Oscard out of the room, leaving that ominous silence behind.

"I leave for Msala to-night," said Oscard, when they were outside, "and you are coming with me."

"I'll see you damned first!" replied Durnovo, with a courage born of Irish whisky.

Guy Oscard said nothing, but he stretched out his right hand suddenly. His fingers closed in the collar of Victor Durnovo's coat, and that parti-coloured scion of two races found himself feebly trotting through the one street of Loango.

"Le' go!" he gasped.

But the hand at his neck neither relinquished nor contracted. When they reached the beach the embarkation of the little army was going forward under Maurice Gordon's supervision. Victor looked at Gordon. He reflected over the trump card held in his hand, but he was too skilful to play it then.



CHAPTER XXV. TO THE RESCUE



I must mix myself with action lest I wither by despair.

Jocelyn had not conveyed to her brother by word or hint the accusation brought against him by Victor Durnovo. But when he returned home it almost seemed as if he were conscious of the knowledge that was hers. She thought she detected a subtle difference in his manner towards herself—something apologetic and humble. This was really the result of Victor Durnovo's threat made in the office of the factory long before.

Maurice Gordon was not the sort of man to carry through the burden of a half-discovered secret. It needs a special temperament for this—one that is able to inspire fear in whomsoever it may be necessary to hold in check—a temperament with sufficient self-reliance and strength to play an open game steadily through to the end. Since Durnovo's plain-spoken threat had been uttered Gordon had thought of little else, and it was well known that Jocelyn's influence was all that prevented him from taking hopelessly to drink. When away from her at the sub-factories it is to be feared that he gave way to the temptation. There is nothing so wearing as a constant suspense, a never-resting fear; and if a man knows that both may be relieved by a slight over-indulgence he must be a strong man indeed if he can turn aside.

Gordon betrayed himself to Jocelyn in a thousand little ways. He consulted her wishes, deferred to her opinion, and sought her advice in a way which never had been his hitherto; and while both were conscious of this difference, both were alike afraid of seeking to explain it.

Jocelyn knew that her repulse of Victor Durnovo was only a temporary advantage; the position could not remain long undecided. Victor Durnovo would have to be met sooner or later. Each day increased the strength of her conviction that her brother was in the power of this man. Whether he had really allowed himself to be dragged into the horrors of even a slight connection with the slave-trade she could not tell; but she knew the world well enough to recognise the fact that Durnovo had only to make the accusation for it to be believed by the million sensation-mongers who are always on the alert for some new horror. She knew that should Durnovo breathe a word of this in the right quarter—that is to say, into the eager journalistic ear—there would hardly be a civilised country in the world where Maurice Gordon of Loango could dwell under his own name. She felt that they were all living on a slumbering volcano. It was one of those rare cases where human life seems no longer sacred; and this refined, educated, gentle English lady found herself face to face with the fact that Victor Durnovo's life would be cheap at the price of her own.

At this moment Providence, with the wisdom of which we sometimes catch a glimpse, laid another trouble upon her shoulders. While she was half distracted with the thought of her brother's danger, the news was put into her hand by the grinning Nala that Jack Meredith—the man she openly in her own heart loved—was in an even greater strait.

Here, at all events, was a peril that could be met, however heavy might be the odds. Her own danger, the horror of Maurice's crime, the hatred for Victor Durnovo, were all swallowed up in the sudden call to help Jack Meredith. And Jocelyn found at least a saving excitement in working night and day for the rescue of the man who was to be Millicent Chyne's husband.

Maurice aided her loyally. His influence with the natives was great; his knowledge of the country second only to Durnovo's. During the fortnight that elapsed between the despatch of the telegram to Guy Oscard and the arrival of that resourceful individual at Loango, the whole coast was astir with preparation and excitement. Thus it came about that Guy Oscard found a little army awaiting him, and to Maurice Gordon was the credit given. Victor Durnovo simply kept out of the way. The news that an expedition was being got together to go to the relief of Jack Meredith never reached him in his retreat. But after a fortnight spent in idleness in the neighbouring interior, he could stand the suspense no longer, and came down into the town, to be pounced upon at once by Guy Oscard.

As he stood on the beach near to Oscard, watching the embarkation of the men, his feelings were decidedly mixed. There was an immense relief from the anxiety of the last few weeks. He had stood on the verge of many crimes, and had been forcibly dragged back therefrom by the strong arm of Guy Oscard. It had been Victor Durnovo's intention not only to abandon Jack Meredith to his certain fate, but to appropriate to his own use the consignment of Simiacine, valued at sixty thousand pounds, which he had brought down to the coast. The end of it all was, of course, the possession of Jocelyn Gordon. The programme was simple; but, racked as he was by anxiety, weakened by incipient disease, and paralysed by chronic fear, the difficulties were too great to be overcome. To be a thorough villain one must possess, first of all, good health; secondly, untiring energy; and thirdly, a certain enthusiasm for wrong-doing for its own sake. Criminals of the first standard have always loved crime. Victor Durnovo was not like that. He only made use of crime, and had no desire to cultivate it for its own sake. To be forcibly dragged back, therefore, into the paths of virtue was in some ways a great relief. The presence of Guy Oscard, also, was in itself a comfort. Durnovo felt that no responsibility attached itself to him; he had entire faith in Oscard, and had only to obey.

Durnovo was not a person who suffered from too delicate a susceptibility. The shame of his present position did not affect him deeply. Indeed, he was one of those men who have no sense of shame before certain persons; and Guy Oscard was one of those. The position was not in itself one to be proud of, but the half-breed accepted it with wonderful equanimity, and presently he began to assist in the embarkation.

It was nearly dark when the little coast steamer secured by Maurice Gordon for the service turned her prow northward and steamed away.

"The truth is," Durnovo took an early opportunity of saying to Oscard, "that my nerve is no longer up to this work. I should not care to undertake this business alone, despite my reputation on the coast. It is a wonderful thing how closely the nerves are allied to the state of one's health."

"Wonderful!" acquiesced Guy Oscard, with a lack of irony which only made the irony keener.

"I've been too long in this d——d country," exclaimed Durnovo, "that's the fact. I'm not the man I was."

Guy Oscard smoked for some moments in silence; then he took his pipe from his lips.

"The only pity is," he said judicially, "that you ever undertook to look for the Simiacine if you were going to funk it when the first difficulty arose."

Without further comment he walked away, and entered into conversation with the captain of the steamer.

"All right," muttered Durnovo between his teeth—"all right, my sarcastic grand gentleman. I'll be even with you yet."

The strange part of it was that Guy Oscard never attempted to degrade Durnovo from his post of joint commander. This puzzled the half-breed sorely. It may have been that Oscard knew men better than his indifferent manner would have led the observer to believe. Durnovo's was just one of those natures which in good hands might have been turned to good account. Too much solitude, too much dealing with negro peoples, and, chiefly, too long a sojourn in the demoralising atmosphere of West Africa, had made a worse man of Victor Durnovo than Nature originally intended. He was not wholly bad. Badness is, after all, a matter of comparison, and, in order to draw correctly such a comparison, every allowance must be made for a difference in standard. Victor Durnovo's standard was not a high one; that was all. And in continuing to treat him as an equal, and trust him as such, Guy Oscard only showed that he was a cleverer man than the world took him to be.

In due time Msala was reached. As the canoes suitable for up-river traffic were by no means sufficient to transport the whole of the expeditionary force in one journey, a division was made. Durnovo took charge of the advance column, journeying up to the camp from which the long march through the forest was to begin, and sending back the canoes for Oscard and the remainder of the force. With these canoes he sent back word that the hostile tribes were within a few days' march, and that he was fortifying his camp.

This news seemed to furnish Guy Oscard with food for considerable thought, and after some space of time he called Marie.

She came, and, standing before him with her patient dignity of mien, awaited his communications. She never took her eyes off the letter in his hand. Oscard noticed the persistency of her gaze at the time, and remembered it again afterwards.

"Marie," he said, "I have had rather serious news from Mr. Durnovo."

"Yes?" rather breathlessly.

"It will not be safe for you to stay at Msala—you must take the children down to Loango."

"Does he say that?" she asked, in her rapid, indistinct English.

"Who?"

"Vic—Mr. Durnovo."

"No," replied Oscard, wondering at the question.

"He does not say anything about me or the children?" persisted Marie.

"No."

"And yet he says there is danger?"

There was a strange, angry look in her great dark eyes which Oscard did not understand.

"He says that the tribes are within two days' march of his camp."

She gave an unpleasant little laugh.

"He does not seem to have thought of us at Msala."

"I suppose," said Oscard, folding the letter and putting it in his pocket, "that he thinks it is my duty to do what is best for Msala. That is why I asked you to speak to me."

Mario did not seem to be listening. She was looking over his head up the river, in the direction from whence the message had come, and there was a singular hopelessness in her eyes.

"I cannot leave until he tells me to," she said doggedly.

Guy Oscard took the pipe from his lips and examined the bowl of it attentively for a moment.

"Excuse me," he said gently, "but I insist on your leaving with the children to-morrow. I will send two men down with you, and will give you a letter to Miss Gordon, who will see to your wants at Loango."

She looked at him with a sort of wonder.

"You insist?" she said.

He raised his eyes to meet hers.

"Yes," he answered.

She bowed her head in grave submission, and made a little movement as if to go.

"It is chiefly on account of the children," he added.

Quite suddenly she smiled, and seemed to check a sob in her throat.

"Yes," said she softly, "I know." And she went into the house.

The next morning brought further rumours of approaching danger, and it seemed certain that this news must have filtered through Durnovo's fortified camp further up the river. This time the report was more definite. There were Arabs leading the tribes, and rumour further stated that an organised descent on Msala was intended. And yet there was no word from Durnovo—no sign to suggest that he had even thought of securing the safety of his housekeeper and the few aged negroes in charge of Msala. This news only strengthened Oscard's determination to send Marie down to the coast, and he personally superintended their departure before taking his seat in the canoe for the up-river voyage. The men of his division had all preceded him, and no one except his own boatmen knew that Msala was to be abandoned.

There was in Guy Oscard a dogged sense of justice which sometimes amounted to a cruel mercilessness. When he reached the camp he deliberately withheld from Durnovo the news that the Msala household had left the river station. Moreover, he allowed Victor Durnovo to further inculpate himself. He led him on to discuss the position of affairs, and the half-breed displayed an intimate knowledge of the enemy's doings. There was only one inference to be drawn, namely, that Victor Durnovo had abandoned his people at Msala with the same deliberation which had characterised his cowardly faithlessness to Jack Meredith.

Guy Oscard was a slow thinking man, although quick in action. He pieced all these things together. The pieces did not seem to fit just then—the construction was decidedly chaotic in its architecture. But later on the corner-stone of knowledge propped up the edifice, and everything slipped into its place.

Despite disquieting rumours, the expedition was allowed to depart from the river-camp unmolested. For two days they marched through the gloomy forest with all speed. On the third day one of the men of Durnovo's division captured a native who had been prowling on their heels in the line of march. Victor Durnovo sent captor and prisoner to the front of the column, with a message to Oscard that he would come presently and see what information was to be abstracted from the captive. At the midday halt Durnovo accordingly joined Oscard, and the man was brought before them. He was hardly worthy of the name, so disease-stricken, so miserable and half-starved was he.

At first Durnovo and he did not seem to be able to get to an understanding at all; but presently they hit upon a dialect in which they possessed a small common knowledge.

His news was not reassuring. In dealing with numbers he rarely condescended to the use of less than four figures, and his conception of a distance was very vague.

"Ask him," said Oscard, "whether he knows that there is an Englishman with a large force on the top of a mountain far to the east."

Durnovo translated, and the man answered with a smile. In reply to some further question the negro launched into a detailed narrative, to which Durnovo listened eagerly.

"He says," said the latter to Oscard, "that the Plateau is in possession of the Masais. It was taken two months ago. The blacks were sold as slaves; the two Englishmen were tortured to death and their bodies burnt."

Oscard never moved a muscle.

"Ask him if he is quite sure about it."

"Quite," replied Durnovo, after questioning. "By God! Oscard; what a pity! But I always knew it. I knew it was quite hopeless from the first."

He passed his brown hand nervously over his face, where the perspiration stood in beads.

"Yes," said Oscard slowly; "but I think we will go on all the same."

"What!" cried Durnovo. "Go on?"

"Yes," replied Guy Oscard; "we will go on, and if I find you trying to desert I'll shoot you down like a rat."



CHAPTER XXVI. IN PERIL



He made no sign; the fires of Hell were round him, The Pit of Hell below.

"About as bad as they can be, sir. That's how things is." Joseph set down his master's breakfast on the rough table that stood in front of his tent and looked at Jack Meredith.

Meredith had a way of performing most of his toilet outside his tent, and while Joseph made his discouraging report he was engaged in buttoning his waistcoat. He nodded gravely, but his manner was not that of a man who fully realised his position of imminent danger. Some men are like this—they die without getting at all flustered.

"There's not more nor two or three out of the whole lot that I can put any trust in," continued Joseph.

Jack Meredith was putting on his coat.

"I know what a barrack-room mutiny is. I've felt it in the hatmosphere, so to speak, before now, sir."

"And what does it feel like?" inquired Jack Meredith, lightly arranging his watch-chain.

But Joseph did not answer. He stepped backwards into the tent and brought two rifles. There was no need of answer; for this came in the sound of many voices, the clang and clatter of varied arms.

"Here they come, sir," said the soldier-servant—respectful, mindful of his place even at this moment.

Jack Meredith merely sat down behind the little table where his breakfast stood untouched. He leant his elbow on the table and watched the approach of the disorderly band of blacks. Some ran, some hung back, but all were armed.

In front walked a small, truculent-looking man with broad shoulders and an aggressive head.

He planted himself before Meredith, and turning, with a wave of the hand, to indicate his followers, said in English:

"These men—these friends of me—say they are tired of you. You no good leader. They make me their leader."

He shrugged his shoulders with a hideous grin of deprecation.

"I not want. They make me. We go to join our friends in the valley."

He pointed down into the valley where the enemy was encamped.

"We have agreed to take two hundred pounds for you. Price given by our friends in valley—"

The man stopped suddenly. He was looking into the muzzle of a revolver with a fixed fascination. Jack Meredith exhibited no haste. He did not seem yet to have realised the gravity of the situation. He took very careful aim and pulled the trigger. A little puff of white smoke floated over their heads. The broad-shouldered man with the aggressive head looked stupidly surprised. He turned towards his supporters with a pained look of inquiry, as if there was something he did not quite understand, and then he fell on his face and lay quite still.

Jack Meredith looked on the blank faces with a glance of urbane inquiry.

"Has anybody else anything to say to me?" he asked.

There was a dead silence. Some one laughed rather feebly in the background.

"Then I think I will go on with my breakfast."

Which he accordingly proceeded to do.

One or two of the mutineers dropped away and went back to their own quarters.

"Take it away," said Meredith, indicating the body of the dead man with his teaspoon.

"And look here," he cried out after them, "do not let us have any more of this nonsense! It will only lead to unpleasantness."

Some of the men grinned. They were not particularly respectful in their manner of bearing away the mortal remains of their late leader. The feeling had already turned.

Joseph thought fit to clench matters later on in the day by a few remarks of his own.

"That's the sort o' man," he said, more in resignation than in anger, "that the guv'nor is. He's quiet like and smooth-spoken, but when he does 'it he 'its 'ard, and when he shoots he shoots mortal straight. Now, what I says to you Christy Minstrels is this; we're all in the same box and we all want the same thing, although I admit there's a bit of a difference in our complexions. Some o' you jokers have got a fine richness of colour on your physiognimies that I don't pretend to emulate. But no matter. What you wants is to get out of this confounded old Platter, quick time, ain't it now?—to get down to Loango and go out on the bust, eh?"

The Christy Minstrels acquiesced.

"Then," said Joseph, "obey orders and be hanged to yer."

It had been apparent to Meredith for some weeks past that the man Nattoo, whom he had just shot, was bent on making trouble. His prompt action had not, therefore, been the result of panic, but the deliberate execution of a fore-ordained sentence. The only question was how to make the necessary execution most awe-inspiring and exemplary. The moment was well chosen, and served to strengthen, for the time being, the waning authority of these two Englishmen thus thrown upon their own resources in the heart of Africa.

The position was not a pleasant one. For three months the Plateau had been surrounded by hostile tribes, who made desultory raids from time to time. These, the little force on the summit was able to repulse; but a combined attack from, say, two sides at once would certainly have been successful. Meredith had no reason to suppose that his appeal for help had reached Msala, infested as the intervening forests were by cannibal tribes. Provisions were at a low ebb. There seemed to be no hope of outside aid, and disaffection was rife in his small force. Jack Meredith, who was no soldier, found himself called upon to defend a weak position, with unreliable men, for an indefinite period.

Joseph had a rough knowledge of soldiering and a very rudimentary notion of fortification. But he had that which served as well—the unerring eye for covert of a marksman. He was a dead shot at any range, and knowing what he could hit he also knew how to screen himself from the rifle of an enemy.

Above all, perhaps, was the quiet influence of a man who never flinched from danger nor seemed to be in the least disconcerted by its presence.

"It seems, sir," said Joseph to his master later in the day, "that you've kinder stumped them. They don't understand you."

"They must be kept in check by fear. There is no other way," replied Meredith rather wearily. Of late he had felt less and less inclined to exert himself.

"Yes, sir. Those sort o' men."

Meredith made no answer, and after a little pause Joseph repeated the words significantly, if ungrammatically.

"Those sort o' men."

"What do you mean?"

"Slaves," replied Joseph sharply, touching his hat without knowing why.

"Slaves! What the devil are you talking about?"

The man came a little nearer.

"Those forty men—leastwise thirty-four men—that we brought from Msala—Mr. Durnovo's men, that cultivate this 'ere Simiacine as they call it—they're different from the rest, sir."

"Yes, of course they are. We do not hire them direct—we hire them from Mr. Durnovo and pay their wages to him. They are of a different tribe from the others—not fighting men but agriculturists."

"Ah—" Joseph paused. "Strange thing, sir, but I've not seen 'em handling any of their pay yet."

"Well, that is their affair."

"Yessir."

Having unburthened himself of his suspicion, the servant retired, shaking his head ominously. At any other time the words just recorded would have aroused Jack Meredith's attention, but the singular slothfulness that seemed to be creeping over his intellect was already acting as a clog on his mental energy.

The next morning he was unable to leave his bed, and lay all day in a state of semi-somnolence. Joseph explained to the men that the leader was so disgusted with their ungrateful conduct that he would not leave the tent. In the evening there was a slight attack made from the southern side. This Joseph was able to repulse, chiefly by his own long-range firing, assisted by a few picked rifles. But the situation was extremely critical. The roll of the big war-drum could be heard almost incessantly, rising with weird melancholy from the forest land beneath them.

Despite difficulties the new crop of Simiacine—the second within twelve months—had been picked, dried, and stored in cases. Without, on the Plateau, stood the bare trees, affording no covert for savage warfare—no screen against the deadly bullet. The camp was placed near one edge of the tableland, and on this exposed side the stockade was wisely constructed of double strength. The attacks had hitherto been made only from this side, but Joseph knew that anything in the nature of a combined assault would carry his defence before it. In his rough-and-ready way he doctored his master, making for him such soups and strength-giving food as he could. Once, very late in the night, when it almost seemed that the shadow of death lay over the little tent, he pounded up some of the magic Simiacine leaves and mixed them in the brandy which he administered from time to time.

Before sunrise the next morning the alarm was given again, and the little garrison was called to arms.

When Joseph left his master's tent he was convinced that neither of them had long to live; but he was of that hard material which is found in its very best form in the ranks and on the forecastle—men who die swearing. It may be very reprehensible—no doubt it is—but it is very difficult for a plain-going man to withhold his admiration for such as these. It shows, at all events, that Thomas Atkins and Jack are alike unafraid of meeting their Maker. It is their duty to fight either a living enemy or a cruel sea, and if a little profanity helps them to their duty, who are we that we may condemn them?

So Joseph went out with a rifle in each hand and a fine selection of epithets on his tongue.

"Now, you devils," he said, "we're just going to fight like hell."

And what else he said it booteth little.

He took his station on the roof of a hut in the centre of the little stockade, and from thence he directed the fire of his men. Crouching beneath him he had a disabled native who loaded each rifle in turn; and just by way of encouraging the others he picked off the prominent men outside the stockade with a deadly steadiness. By way of relieving the tension he indulged in an occasional pleasantry at the expense of the enemy.

"Now," he would say, "there's a man lookin' over that bush with a green feather on his nut. It's a mistake to wear green feathers; it makes a body so conspicuous."

And the wearer of the obnoxious feather would throw up his arms and topple backwards, down the hill.

If Joseph detected anything like cowardice or carelessness he pointed his rifle with a threatening frown towards the culprit, with instant effect. Presently, however, things began to get more serious. This was not the sudden assault of a single chief, but an organised attack. Before long Joseph ceased to smile. By sunrise he was off the roof, running from one weak point to another, encouraging, threatening, fighting, and swearing very hard. More than once the enemy reached the stockade, and—ominous sign—one or two of their dead lay inside the defence.

"Fight, yer devils—fight!" he cried in a hoarse whisper, for his voice had given way. "Hell—give 'em hell!"

He was everywhere at once, urging on his men, kicking them, pushing them, forcing them up to the stockade. But he saw the end. Half-dazed, the blacks fought on in silence. The grim African sun leapt up above the distant line of forest and shone upon one of the finest sights to be seen on earth—a soldier wounded, driven, desperate, and not afraid.

In the midst of it a hand was laid on Joseph's shoulder.

"There," cried a voice, "THAT corner. See to it."

Without looking round, Joseph obeyed, and the breached corner was saved. He only knew that his master, who was almost dead, had come to life again. There was no time for anything else.

For half an hour it was a question of any moment. Master and man were for the time being nothing better than madmen, and the fighting frenzy is wildly infectious.

At last there was a pause. The enemy fell back, and in the momentary silence the sound of distant firing reached the ears of the little band of defenders.

"What's that?" asked Meredith sharply. He looked like one risen from the dead.

"Fighting among themselves," replied Joseph, who was wiping blood and grime from his eyes.

"Then one of them is fighting with an Express rifle."

Joseph listened.

"By God!" he shouted, "by God, Mer—sir, we're saved!"

The enemy had apparently heard the firing too. Perhaps they also recognised the peculiar sharp "smack" of the Express rifle amidst the others. There was a fresh attack—an ugly rush of reckless men. But the news soon spread that there was firing in the valley and the sound of a white man's rifle. The little garrison plucked up heart, and the rifles, almost too hot to hold, dealt death around.

They held back the savages until the sound of the firing behind them was quite audible even amidst the heavy rattle of the musketry.

Then suddenly the firing ceased—the enemy had divided and fled. For a few moments there was a strange, tense silence. Then a voice—an English voice—cried:

"Come on!"

The next moment Guy Oscard stood on the edge of the Plateau. He held up both arms as a signal to those within the stockade to cease firing, and then he came forward, followed by a number of blacks and Durnovo.

The gate was rapidly disencumbered of its rough supports and thrown open.

Jack Meredith stood in the aperture, holding out his hand.

"It's all right; it's—all right," he said.

Oscard did not seem to take so cheerful a view of matters. He scrutinised Meredith's face with visible anxiety.

Then suddenly Jack lurched up against his rescuer, grabbing at him vaguely.

In a minute Oscard was supporting him back towards his tent.

"It's all right, you know," explained Jack Meredith very gravely; "I am a bit weak—that is all. I am hungry—haven't had anything to eat for some time, you know."

"Oh, yes," said Oscard shortly; "I know all about it."



CHAPTER XXVII. OFF DUTY



Chacun de vous peut-etre en son coeur solitaire Sous des ris passagers etouffe un long regret.

"Good-bye to that damned old Platter—may it be for ever!" With this valedictory remark Joseph shook his fist once more at the unmoved mountain and resumed his march.

"William," he continued gravely to a native porter who walked at his side and knew no word of English, "there is some money that is not worth the making."

The man grinned from ear to ear and nodded with a vast appreciation of what experience taught him to take as a joke.

"Remember that, my black diamond, and just mind the corner of your mouth don't get hitched over yer ear," said Joseph, patting him with friendly cheerfulness.

Then he made his way forward to walk by the side of his master's litter and encourage the carriers with that mixture of light badinage and heavy swearing which composed his method of dealing with the natives.

Three days after the arrival of the rescuing force at the Plateau, Guy Oscard had organised a retreating party, commanded by Joseph, to convey Jack Meredith down to the coast. He knew enough of medicine to recognise the fact that this was no passing indisposition, but a thorough breakdown in health. The work and anxiety of the last year, added to the strange disquieting breath of the Simiacine grove, had brought about a serious collapse in the system which only months of rest and freedom from care could repair.

Before the retreating column was ready to march it was discovered that the hostile tribes had finally evacuated the country; which deliverance was brought about not by Oscard's blood-stained track through the forest, not by the desperate defence of the Plateau, but by the whisper that Victor Durnovo was with them. Truly a man's reputation is a strange thing.

And this man—the mighty warrior whose name was as good as an army in Central Africa—went down on his knees one night to Guy Oscard, imploring him to abandon the Simiacine Plateau, or at all events to allow him to go down to Loango with Meredith and Joseph.

"No," said Oscard; "Meredith held this place for us when he could have left it safely. He has held it for a year. It is our turn now. We will hold it for him. I am going to stay, and you have to stay with me."

For Jack Meredith, life was at this time nothing but a constant, never-ceasing fatigue. When Oscard helped him into the rough litter they had constructed for his comfort, he laid his head on the pillow, overcome with a dead sleep.

"Good-bye, old chap," said Oscard, patting him on the shoulder.

"G'bye;" and Jack Meredith turned over on his side as if he were in bed, drew up the blanket, and closed his eyes. He did not seem to know where he was, and, what was worse, he did not seem to care. Oscard gave the signal to the bearers, and the march began. There is something in the spring of human muscles unlike any other motive power; the power of thought may be felt even on the pole of a litter, and one thing that modern invention can never equal is the comfort of being carried on the human shoulder. The slow swinging movement came to be a part of Jack Meredith's life—indeed, life itself seemed to be nothing but a huge journey thus peacefully accomplished. Through the flapping curtains an endless procession of trees passed before his half-closed eyes. The unintelligible gabble of the light-hearted bearers of his litter was all that reached his ears. And ever at his side was Joseph—cheerful, indefatigable, resourceful. There was in his mind one of the greatest happinesses of life—the sense of something satisfactorily accomplished—the peacefulness that comes when the necessity for effort is past and left behind—that lying down to rest which must surely be something like Death in its kindest form.

The awe inspired by Victor Durnovo's name went before the little caravan like a moral convoy and cleared their path. Thus guarded by the name of a man whom he hated, Jack Meredith was enabled to pass through a savage country literally cast upon a bed of sickness.

In due course the river was reached, and the gentle swing of the litter was changed for the smoother motion of the canoe. And it was at this period of the journey—in the forced restfulness of body entailed—that Joseph's mind soared to higher things, and he determined to write a letter to Sir John.

He was, he admitted even to himself, no great penman, and his epistolary style tended, perhaps, more to the forcible than to the finished.

"Somethin'," he reflected, "that'll just curl his back hair for 'im; that's what I'll write 'im."

Msala had been devastated, and it was within the roofless walls of Durnovo's house that Joseph finally wrote out laboriously the projected capillary invigorator.

"HONOURED SIR" (he wrote),—"Trusting you will excuse the liberty, I take up my pen to advise you respectfully"—while writing this word Joseph closed his left eye—"that my master is taken seriously worse. Having been on the sick-list now for a matter of five weeks, he just lies on his bed as weak as a new-born babe, as the sayin' is, and doesn't take no notice of nothing. I have succeeded in bringing him down to the coast, which we hope to reach to-morrow, and when we get to Loango—a poor sort of place—I shall at once obtain the best advice obtainable—that is to be had. Howsoever, I may have to send for it; but money being no object to either master or me, respectfully I beg to say that every care will be took. Master having kind friends at Loango, I have no anxiety as to the future, but, honoured sir, it has been a near touch in the past—just touch and go, so to speak. Not being in a position to form a estimate of what is the matter with master, I can only respectfully mention that I take it to be a general kerlapse of the system, brought on, no doubt, by too long a living in the unhealthy platters of Central Africa. When I gets him to Loango I shall go straight to the house of Mr. and Miss Gordon, where we stayed before, and with no fear but what we will be received with every kindness and the greatest hospitality. Thank God, honoured sir, I've kept my health and strength wonderful, and am therefore more able to look after master. When we reach Loango I shall ask Miss Gordon kindly to write to you, sir, seeing as I have no great facility with my pen.—I am, honoured sir, your respectful servant to command,

"JOSEPH ATKINSON, "Late Corporal 217th Regt."

There were one or two round splashes on the paper suggestive, perhaps, of tears, but not indicative of those useless tributes. The truth was that it was a hot evening, and Joseph had, as he confessed, but little facility with the pen.

"There," said the scribe, with a smile of intense satisfaction. "That will give the old 'un beans. Not that I don't respect him—oh no."

He paused, and gazed thoughtfully at the evening star.

"Strange thing—life," he muttered, "uncommon strange. Perhaps the old 'un is right; there's no knowin'. The ways o' Providence ARE mysterious—onnecessarily mysterious to my thinkin'."

And he shook his head at the evening star, as if he was not quite pleased with it.

With a feeling of considerable satisfaction, Joseph approached the Bungalow at Loango three days later. The short sea voyage had somewhat revived Meredith, who had been desirous of walking up from the beach, but after a short attempt had been compelled to enter the spring cart which Joseph had secured.

Joseph walked by the side of this cart with an erect carriage, and a suppressed importance suggestive of ambulance duty in the old days.

As the somewhat melancholy cortege approached the house, Meredith drew back the dusky brown holland curtain and looked anxiously out. Nor were Joseph's eyes devoid of expectation. He thought that Jocelyn would presently emerge from the flower-hung trellis of the verandah; and he had rehearsed over and over again a neat, respectful speech, explanatory of his action in bringing a sick man to the house.

But the hanging fronds of flowers and leaf remained motionless, and the cart drove, unchallenged, round to the principal door.

A black servant—a stranger—held the handle, and stood back invitingly. Supported by Joseph's arm, Jack Meredith entered. The servant threw open the drawing-room door; they passed in. The room was empty. On the table lay two letters, one addressed to Guy Oscard, the other to Jack Meredith. Meredith felt suddenly how weak he was, and sat wearily down on the sofa.

"Give me that letter," he said.

Joseph looked at him keenly. There was something forlorn and cold about the room—about the whole house—with the silent, smiling, black servants and the shaded windows.

Joseph handed the letter as desired, and then, with quick practised hands, he poured a small quantity of brandy into the cup of his flask. "Drink this first, sir," he said.

Jack Meredith fumbled rather feebly at the letter. It was distinctly an effort to him to tear the paper.

"MY DEAR MEREDITH" (he read),—"Just a line to tell you that the Bungalow and its contents are at your service. Jocelyn and I are off home for two months' change of air. I have been a bit seedy. I leave this at the Bungalow, and we shall feel hurt if you do not make the house your home whenever you happen to come down to Loango. I have left a similar note for Oscard, in whose expedition to your relief I have all faith.—Yours ever,