"Where is he now?"
"He has got to Lukati—and I am worried"; and Sanders looked it.
The Houssa captain nodded, for all manner of reports had come down from Lukati country. There had been good crops, and good crops mean idleness, and idleness means mischief. Also there had been devil dances, and the mild people of the Bokari district, which lies contiguous to Lukati, had lost women.
"I've got a free hand to nip rebellion in the bud," Sanders reflected moodily; "and the chances point to rebellion——What do you say? Shall we make a report and wait for reinforcements, or shall we chance our luck?"
"It's your funeral," said the Houssa captain, "and I hate to advise you. If things go wrong you'll get the kicks; but if it were mine I'd go, like a shot—naturally."
"A hundred and forty men," mused Sanders.
"And two Maxims," suggested the other.
"We'll go," said Sanders; and half an hour later a bugle blared through the Houssas' lines, and Sanders was writing a report to his chief in far-away Lagos.
The Hon. George, it may be said, had no idea that he was anything but welcome in the village of Lukati.
Olari the chief had greeted him pleasantly, and told him stories of Sanders' brutality—stories which, as George wrote, "if true, must of necessity sound the death-knell of British integrity in our native possessions."