The heat of noon had just faded, but the eighteen-inch wide road was walled in with dense high bush, and the air down in that narrow cut was breathless and stagnant. When the road curved away from the sun and the high walls threw a shadow, Carter waited for a moment and panted; when the sun teemed rays of molten brass directly down on him from overhead, he hurried; and so moved on at an average gait of three miles to the hour, which is good travelling for West Africa.
It is curious how the brain works in these hours of discomfort and abnormal stress. The one thing that occupied Carter's mind was a rather good specimen of Okky war horn. It had been of ivory, massive, well-carved, and with a mouthpiece of more than usual elaboration. In fact, it was the finest specimen he had come across, and he was a judge. He had purchased it from its native owner to copy for Mr. Balgarnie's markets. But he had seen Kate's eye upon it just before the Frau Pobst took her away, and with the impulse of the moment had given it to her. She took it at once, and thanked him lightly enough, and he told himself, forgot it a moment later. A thousand times he called himself an ass for trying to keep in her memory. What was he, a factory clerk, to Miss O'Neill? And what, indeed, was Miss O'Neill to him—an engaged man?
The bush rustled back at him: "Laura is—well, what you know. Laura's got a lick of the tar brush. Laura is probably the identical person a certain reverend gentleman in Upper Wharfedale especially warned you against. Laura may pass muster in Grand Canary, but she won't do further North. Fancy Laura in Wharfedale!" Good God, in Wharfedale! Now he came to think of it, he had never talked to Laura about home, and the moors, and the grouse, and the roses.
He laughed noisily at his fancies, and a flock of red and gray parrots came on to the tree tops above and cawed at him. Well, after all, there were plenty of Englishmen who lived out of England. He might initiate a new era. He might be one of the first English colonists who looked upon West Africa as a home, not a place of exile. He rubbed the sweat from his face with a long forefinger and plodded on— Why not? He seemed to have the knack of health. Why should not he and Laura become powers in the Oil Rivers? They might well rise to the rule of cities and territories.
Then a voice brought him to earth again. Someone hailed him from the rear. "Carter, O Carter!"
It was the excellent White-Man's-Trouble, who came up sullen, frightened and abusive. His cheek-bones were whitened with lime, in token of some ju-ju charm. He took over the battered Gladstone bag, and balanced it on the centre plot of his own elaborately shaven cranium.
"I no fit for lib at dem factory an' know you carry dem load in dem dam-fool way," said the Krooboy crustily.
They pulled up that night at a small terror-shivering village, and quartered themselves on the headman. He made no secret of his displeasure at their visit. Carter talked of the glories of Mokki, and the advantages of having a steady stream of trade pouring through one's territory. The headman pointed out with peevish annoyance that the King of Okky frowned upon Mokki in particular and trade in general, and that the King's displeasure was generally fatal to those on whom it fell, even though they had the happiness to live beyond his marches. But in spite of his gloomy reception, he set before his guests a portly bowl of kanki, when his women had cooked it, and himself ate a pawful from the calabash as a testimonial to its freedom from poison.
They spread their sleeping mats that night in the dark hut from which the headman's fowls had been driven to make room for them, and next morning Carter collected some wing feathers and some bits of wood, and made a windmill to amuse the children who swarmed about the compound. Presently there arrived the headman, who saw the toy spinning in the breeze, and annexed it. He and White-Man's-Trouble harangued one another with much noise and gesture, and then there was a bustle in the village, and the cooking fires burned strongly. The headman's gloom had dropped from him like a discarded cloth; he wore in its place an air of oily obsequiousness that showed he could be quite the courtier upon occasion.
They breakfasted that morning on no mere kanki.