"Abiboo," he said, "by my way of thinking, I have been a good master to you."
"That is so, lord," said Abiboo.
"Now I will trust you to go amongst my crew discovering their gods. If I ask them myself, they will lie to me out of politeness, inventing this god and that, thinking they please me."
Abiboo chose the meal hour, when the sun had gone out and the world was grey and the trees motionless. He came back with the information as Sanders was drinking his second cup of coffee in the loneliness of the tiny deck-house.
"Master," he reported, "three men worship no god whatever, three more have especial family fetishes, and two are Christians more or less, and the four Houssas are with me in faith."
"And you?"
Abiboo, the Kano boy, smiled at Sanders' assumption of innocence.
"Lord," he said, "I follow the Prophet, believing only in the one God, beneficent and merciful."
"That is good," said Sanders. "Now let the men load wood, and Yoka shall have steam against moonrise, and all shall be ready for slipping."
At ten o'clock by his watch he fell-in his four Houssas, serving out to each a short carbine and a bandoleer. Then the party went ashore.