"I will take care of that," replied Delange, quickly.
"I thought we should come to that," replied M. de Morin, laughing. "Only—take care of Miss Poles! You are reinstated in her good graces; are you going to forfeit them once more?"
"My dear fellow," said Delange, "do not be alarmed. As soon as the new caravan appeared on the scene I was laid on the shelf. Just watch the look she bestows on Pommerelle, and observe the elaborate toilet she has made in his honour."
"For goodness sake, gentlemen, let us arrange about starting," said Dr. Desrioux, joining his three friends. "It is already three o'clock in the afternoon, and in the common interest we ought, this very night, to pitch our tent some twenty feet above this place."
CHAPTER XXX.
The departure was not effected quite so easily as might have been anticipated. The de Guéran caravan, whilst the Europeans were laying their plans, had been making some of its own, and these plans consisted in resting until the evening, and then joining the Monbuttoos for the purpose of celebrating a united orgie on a gigantic scale in honour of the victory. As an exceptional case, and contrary to all their habits, the negroes were taking thought of the future, and had come to the conclusion that their chiefs intended to indulge them with a long spell of idleness. Had they not found the white man they had been seeking for so long? Had not the object of the journey been attained, and, before retracing their steps along the road by which they had come, were not both soldiers and porters entitled to make a long stay in the conquered country, the country of lovely women whose charms had been vaunted to arouse their zeal? These women were terrible in battle—that they had found out to their cost, but now that they were conquered and disarmed, they might possibly be found to possess an amount of amiability hitherto unsuspected.
Consequently, when an attempt was made to rouse the Nubians from their day-dreams, and warn them to be ready to start at once, some very significant murmuring was heard. Although, owing to the mingled firmness and tact of M. de Morin, the soldiers had learnt discipline, though for more than a year they had proved themselves to be faithful and devoted servants, and had become almost civilized by contact with the Europeans, as soon as a disposition was shown to rob them of the fruits of their victory and to restrain them from the indulgence of their ruling passion, they became what they were before — unreasonable, unmanageable and mutinous.
Their leaders had, in the long run, gained too great an ascendancy over them not to be able to overcome this resistance, which, after all, was more a matter of instinct than of reason. They made them understand that the hour for repose was not yet come, and that the Walindis might yet collect their scattered forces and attack them again. They showed them the heaps of dead bodies lying all around, and hinted that they too were still liable to share the fate of their friends. But, as soon as they comprehended that, instead of regaining the road to the north and going back to their own country, they were to scale the mountain range and go on southwards, they made fresh objections. It was all over with them! They would never more set eyes on the Dinka land, or their beloved Nubia, or the dear old Nile! When the Europeans arrived at the end of their journey, so far, far away, they would leave them to their fate, and how were they to get back to Khartoum?
These complaints were reasonable enough up to a certain point. The bearers and soldiers, it is true, had been engaged to follow their leaders whithersoever it might please the latter to go, but nobody then foresaw so long a journey. The return, indeed, would be a matter of considerable diflficulty for everybody, if these men were taken as far as Zanzibar.
"Why should we go there at all?" M. de Pommerelle was the first to suggest. "The journey is a long one, and it took us more than six months to accomplish it. How are we to get across Lake Albert again on our rafts? They did very well for us, because the current took us from east to west, but when it becomes a question of going against the current, what are our means of transport? Can we rely upon the inhabitants of Magungo, who saluted our departure with flights of arrows, sending their canoes to bring us over to the eastern side?"