Harden was frowning in the direction of the valley. His fingers tugged at the end of his moustache. He was a man of few words, as we know.
"Dynamite," said he.
"I think so, too," said Crouch. "I wonder what his game is!"
In their immediate neighbourhood was a narrow stretch of grass--the coarse, thin grass that is usually to be met with on the lower slopes of mountains. It was at this moment that Crouch's eye became fixed in the centre of this. He remained motionless for some seconds, and then on a sudden grasped Edward by the arm.
"There's a man there!" said he. "Look out!"
Simultaneously a black form sprang out of the grass and ran up the hill in the direction of the village. Crouch whipped round upon M'Wané and his Fans.
"After him!" he cried. "A reward if you catch him alive."
The four Fans set off as fast as they could go. The race lasted no longer than five minutes at the most. The fugitive seemed possessed of the agility of an antelope when startled from its midday slumber; he sprang over boulders, he dodged right and left like a snipe. But the Fans were fleeter of foot than he; at every stride they gained upon him, and in the end he was overtaken.
They brought him back to Crouch--a woeful, terrified object who had not the courage to lift his head. Crouch tried him with five languages, but he seemed not to understand, and only gave utterance to a few incoherent grunts. Then Crouch tried the "blood-bond," and this is not pleasant to describe. He took a knife from his pocket, opened a vein in his hand, and the native licked the wound. At that Crouch gave his knife to the man, who in turn inflicted a wound upon himself, and Crouch went through his part of the business with a heroism that Max was bound to admire. They were now "blood-brothers," and that is a bond which is inviolable in the region of the Congo. Crouch made the man understand him by means of signs, in the art of which he was a master.
"I have one heart," said he, by which he conveyed the fact that he was no traitor, that his word could be relied on. "I wish to speak with the people of your village."