Their course, as Aylmer was quick to notice, led perpetually upward, but in gradients which almost eluded notice. Gray blue in the haze of distance, the rolling uplands culminated in a range of low hills, but these were a full day's march beyond their powers. Their goal, if it were to be reached within daylight, must be nearer than that. His attention, as the hours went monotonously by, was at last drawn to a gap in the far mapped expanse of vegetation.
A line of green, deeper and of more luxuriant growth than the thickets around them, divided the jungle from east to west. Daoud, turning in his saddle, waved his hand in an important gesture.
"The Gorge of the Bou Djerba, Sidi," he said. "It is my advice that I go forward to reconnoitre—alone."
Aylmer looked at Perinaud. The sergeant shrugged his shoulders.
"Monsieur guarantees this fellow, I understand? Well, let him justify himself. I have no objections."
Rattier interrupted.
"It is well understood that I deal with this M. de Landon if he is there, I alone? Your man, now, if he suddenly confronts him—" He broke off with a meaning gesture. "I do not wish my interview with him anticipated."
In spite of himself, a smile broke the imperturbability of the sergeant's face. With a suggestive jerk of the hand he dismissed Daoud, who cantered on into and was lost in the jungle of mallow. Perinaud turned sympathetic and now perfectly grave features towards the commandant.
"Monsieur may be easy in his mind," he said quietly. "The man we seek, if I have understood his talents rightly, is hardly likely to be subdued without the display of some force and intelligence."
He turned to give the order to dismount. Rattier watched him with an air of baffled exasperation. There had been a gentle emphasis on the last two words which could scarcely be misunderstood, and as the sailor ruminated over them, his taciturnity showed renewed signs of failing before the rising tide of his wrath. A sudden diversion averted an outbreak.