King Smith himself announced that all was now ready for the drive to his house in the interior. There were two light, well-built buggies, with island ponies harnessed to them. Hilda and her two attendants went in the first vehicle, followed by the King and Mr Lechworthy. The luggage had already gone on, borne on the heads of natives. The drive was along a wide, white-powdered road, bordered on either side by groves of palms. Glorious bougainvilleas made streams and splashes of colour. The tall utu scattered its graceful plumes of rose and white. Sheltered though the road was, the travellers could hear the roar of the wind, and now and then a soft thud, as a nut heavily-husked thumped to the ground.
As they went, the King told Lechworthy all that he wished to know about the Exiles’ Club.
“But how can you permit it, sir—this lazar-house, this refuge for the worst scum of Europe polluting your beautiful kingdom?”
“I have not only permitted it, I have even—in vain—tried to become a member of the club. I have done even worse. My friend, if a man wishes to escape from a prison, he will use good tools, if he has them, to break through the walls. And if he has not good tools, he will use anything that comes to his hand—rusty iron, old nails, anything. And he will use them even if they hurt his hand and put a festering wound in it.”
“Yes, sir, I see what you mean. I will not judge hastily. To-night, I think you said—”
“To-night I tell you everything. You will find much to condemn, much that is hateful to you. But you love liberty and you will help my people in spite of all. Then I shall no longer need the bad tools, and I shall put them down. And as for the festering wound in my hand, I shall burn it with a little gunpowder and in time it will be made whole again.”
Lechworthy, watching him as he spoke, was conscious that he had found here a master among men, clear in purpose, indomitable in pursuit of it. But where was the man’s Christianity? What were his political purposes? Was there no danger in being drawn into them? Well, that night he would see. He had already found that the King could be inexorable, and that it seemed impossible to procure postponement of the execution of Bassett even by one single hour.
Bassett himself was horribly frightened, but he did not believe that the sentence of death would be carried out. For the moment King Smith was angry; later in the day Bassett would see him again, or would get Sir John to do it for him. He would persist, of course, that the shot was accidental. Besides, King Smith might be pleased to say that he did not speak as a trader, but he still was a trader, and on the trader the members of the Exiles’ Club could bring very stringent and serious pressure to bear. If the King still persisted—well, it was easy enough for him to pronounce sentence, but he would find it impossible to carry it out.
In the hall of the club Mr Bassett found the Rev. Cyril Mast and Lord Charles Baringstoke. The latter was shivering in pale blue pyjamas and an ulster; he had not yet bathed, neither had he brushed his yellow hair. The two men were getting on well with a bottle of doubtful champagne.