"Glad we didn't know," said Compton, thoughtfully.
Muata went off on his self-appointed task, and the white men felt, as they saw him disappear, how impossible it was for them to cope with the mystery of the forest. They were even more helpless than castaways at sea without a compass; for at sea in the day there is the clear sweep to the horizon miles away, while in the forest all they could be certain of was a little circle with a radius of less than fifty yards. Beyond that was the unknown, because unseen—a vague blur of trees that might be sheltering wild animals or savage men. And what made their helplessness the more felt, was the knowledge that Muata knew so much, and that others—the mysterious pigmies—knew still more. If there had been open glades, stretches of greensward, rippling brooks, or even a hard clean carpet such as is found under a pine forest, they would have been undismayed; but this gloomy, shrouded fastness, without glimpse of sunbeams, was becoming a nightmare.
Yet it would never do to become a prey to depression, for there is no danger so fatal to the explorer as low spirits, the forerunner of sickness.
By common consent they fought against a strong fit of the blues. Mr. Hume and Compton held a consultation over Venning, examined him, doctored him, and put him through the ordeal of a Turkish bath roughly made with the aid of the oil-sheets. After that he was rolled up in blankets and left to slumber. Compton was next treated in the same way, and then Mr. Hume busied himself with his note- book.
When the boys woke up in the afternoon, much refreshed, Muata had returned.
"Fall in, lads."
"Has he found them?" and the boys were up and glancing round for the pigmies.
"Yes; we are to go 'upstairs' at once."
"But where are they?"
"The little people have gone on," said Muata. "They will spy out on the man-eaters."