Part 24 (1/2)
”You mean Hassan?”
”He'd had no breakfast He'd had no supper He had no money The Greeks took ahat little ht buy a return ticket and desert thehta bite fro lot The Arab spat in his eye! I offered to buy him eats but he didn't dare come in here for fear the Greeks 'ud thrash hiratefulest fat black man you ever set eyes on You bet it takes food and lots of it to keep that belly of his in shape There's a back door to this joint He slipped round behind and bribed the babu to feed hiuard at the corner to keep Greeks at bay He's back in the car now, playing possuested Fred genially ”Call hi! I tell you the ain Let him be, and the next tiht to us in hope we'll show him kindness”
”S your tea quickly, Solooes the whistle!”
It was fresh tea, just thatstuff and had to be thu to Fred
With eyes filled ater he did not see what I did, and Fred was too busy guarding against counter-blows The most public place and the very lasthorse
”Thought you said Johnson was asleep,” said I
”Possu sleep to fool the Greeks”
”Possu, no doubt,” I answered, ”but the Greeks are on He has just co out of Lady Saffren Waldon's compartment The Greeks watched him and made no comment!”
We piled into our own appointed place and sat for a while in silence
”All right,” said Will at last, lighting his pipe ”I own I felt like quitting once I'll see it through now if there's no ivory and nothing but trouble! That da rinned Fred ”Keep it up! They'll hunt us so carefully that they'll save us the trouble of watching the to think we do knohere the ivory is,” said I ”I believe it's on Mount Elgon and theyit”
”If that turns out true, we'll have to give theot out his concertina Just as Monty always played chess when his brain was busy, Fred likes to think to the strains of his infernal instru about, but the orld kneas perplexed, and Lady Saffren Waldon in the next compartmentout the tunes of co chanced on one that soan to sing In tenaccompaniments for a full train chorus and the scared zebra and iht and left, pursued by Tarara-booes that in those days were dying an all-too-lingering death
It was to the tune of After the Ball that the engine dipped head-foreht the train to a jaw-jarring halt The tune went on, and the song grew louder, for nobody was killed and the English-speaking races have a code, containing rules of conduct ent than the Law of the Medes and Persians So way off, who needed fuel to cook a meal--had chopped out the hard-wood plate on which the bearavity and luck had done the rest It was a case thereafter of walk or wait
”Didn't I tell you?” moaned Brown of Lumbwa ”Didn't I say walkin' 'ud be only justway ahead of Coutlass and his gang, whose shoes, a other matters, pinched them; and ere comfortably quartered in the one hotel several hours before the arrival of Lady Saffren Waldon and those folk who elected to wait for the breakdown gang and the relief train
It was a tired hotel, conducted by a tired once- townshi+p of sated iron, with oneand perhaps a dozen side-streets varying in length from fifty feet to half a mile
He must have been a very tired surveyor who pitched on that site and one on and found within five htlier, healthier spots
But doubtless the day'sone, and perhaps he had fever, and was cross At any rate, there stood Nairobi, with its ”tin-town” for the railway underlings, its ”tin” sheds for the repair shops, its big ”tin” station buildings, and its string of pleasant-looking bungalows on the only high ground, where the government nabobs lived
The hotel was in thewith a veranda in front and its laundry hanging out behind Nairobi being a young place, with all Africa in which to spread, town plots were large, and as ain a wilderness--until we considered the board partition
Having marched fastest we obtained the best roohbors could hear our conversation as easily as if there had been no division at all However, as it happened, neither Coutlass and his gang nor Lady Saffren Waldon and her ht were three Poles, to our left a Jew and a German, and we carried on a whispered conversation without rowing dusk We had already seen what there was to see of the town We had been to the post-office on the white man's habitual hunt, for mail that we kneas non-existent And I had had the first adventure
I walked away fro to puzzle out byof Lady Saffren Waldon's pursuit of us, and of her friendshi+p with the Geres Coutlass and his riff-raff I had not gone far either on my stroll or with the problerassy track that they had told , not a sound, not a sround, caused me to look up My foot was raised for a forward step, but what I saw then ht front, less than ten yards aas a hillock about twice ht To htly higher; and the track passed between theht-hand hillock stood a s well apart and the dark tuft on the end of his tail appearing every instant to one side or the other as he switched it cat-fashi+on He was staring down atwhatever forand a jump and I was his meat To run was cowardice as well as foolishness, the one because the other And without pretending to be able to read a lion's thoughts I dare risk the assertion that he was puzzled what to do within and out of their sheaths, and ith that, and the switching tail, and the sense of impotence I could not take my eyes off him So I did not look at the other hillock at first
But a sound like that a cat nified, lance to the left in a hurry I think that up to that oose-flesh broke out all overhelplessness
On the left-hand hillock a lioness stood looking doith much intenser and more curious interest She looked froain with indecision that was no rowl