Towards two o'clock in the morning, whilst the doctor, who had now entire confidence in his prisoner, was fast asleep and reposing after the fatigues of the day, Walinda took hold of a hunting knife which M. Delange had left close to her, looked carefully round about her, and, when she had satisfied herself that everything was quiet in the camp, and that the sentries themselves, reassured by the proximity of Gondokoro, had left their posts, she glided stealthily in the darkness towards the tents of the Europeans.
There she halted and peered about for the flag which marked the tend occupied by Madame de Guéran. She saw it, and now sure of not making a mistake, she crept to the tent, noiselessly raised one of the curtains, glided inside, and then suddenly standing upright she bounded to the side of the bed, and buried her knife in the breast of the sleeper.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
At day-break on the following morning the drums and horns joyfully sounded the reveille. Neither soldiers nor bearers needed, as was their wont, any rousing to make them leave their couches of dried leaves or straw; they, like everybody else, were in a hurry to make their triumphal entry into Gondokoro. Walinda even, usually so unconcerned and apparently insensible to every noise and every incident of the journey, left her shelter. With her eyes fixed on the tents, she seemed impatiently to await the moment when the Europeans would appear and give the order to start.
M. de Morin was the first person she saw; then, a moment afterwards, M. de Pommerelle, M. Périères, and the two doctors, Delange and Desrioux. A moment afterwards Miss Poles emerged from her sleeping place, having got up before everybody else in order to devote more time to a toilet intended to create a sensation in Gondokoro.
Two tents alone gave no signs of life, those of Madame de Guéran and her husband, separated one from the other by ten yards.
At last, the door of the tent without the flag was seen to move, and at the moment when the rising sun was shedding on all around his earliest rays, and tingeing them with his rosy hues, the Baroness de Guéran stepped forth, smiling, charming as ever, into the light of day.
Walinda, on seeing her, uttered a terrible cry, a cry of mingled rage and terror.
Other cries were heard. They proceeded from Joseph, who, by order of M. de Morin, had entered M. de Guéran's tent to see whether he could do anything for him, and at the same time to tell him that all was in readiness for the march.
He found the unhappy man covered with blood, dead, and cold. The knife, with which the blow had been struck, was still in his heart.