"Ju-ju no fit for touch dem ribber," said White-Man's-Trouble, taking the question literally. "But dem ribber run into dem squidge-squidge, an' lib for die!"
"Runs into a swamp and gets lost! My great Christopher, the odds are you're right. But why in the name of thunder didn't you tell me that before?"
"I no savvy," said the Krooboy simply, "where you come. O Carter, I come after you from Mokki because I think you no fit for carry dem bag."
Carter swung round and picked up White-Man's-Trouble's hand and shook it heartily. "You've got a very white inside to you," he said.
But the African was not flattered. He pulled away his limp hand as soon as it was set free, and rubbed his abdomen nervously. "O Carter, I no fit for white inside. I no ju-ju boy. I dam common Krooboy."
Thence onwards there was impressed on Carter's mind these three great facts—One: He had found a mine of immense potential value. Two: He could never turn his minerals into cash unless he could find a water channel down to the Coast. And three: If he couldn't discover that channel himself no one else would, at any rate for his benefit.
He thought these matters over during one torrid night, and resolved to devote the next day to exploration. He had had predecessors on the place, house building predecessors who had left a series of rust-streaks which he translated into mining tools. Presumably they were Europeans. How did they propose to deal with this ore? Smelt it on the spot, or bag it and get it to the Coast?
If they were West African Portuguese of the olden time, he was fully aware that they would be using slave labor for everything, and he tried to figure out if it was possible, even with slave porters, to carry concentrates down to the Coast and leave a sufficient margin for profit. Even with the most liberal estimates he could not make it so, taking into account the slow-sailing ships, the crude smelting methods, and the lower prices of the old days. Remained then the passage of the creek and river channels, and if these old Portuguese had found a waterway, why, then, so could he.
So next day he set out to hunt for a quay, or any other traces of shipping ore, or perhaps some evidences of boat-building, and he pressed his way through vine and bush, and over crag and scree, till the scorching heat had drained his lean body of moisture, and his knees zigzagged beneath him through sheer weakness and weariness.
Then he made a discovery, and sat down, and for the moment felt faint and discouraged.