Black took the bundle of notes, counted them with practised finger and thumb, nodded, and handed a receipt to Fernie. The queer pair then shook hands, grinned at each other sheepishly, and thanked me for settling their little difference.
The three of us had lunch together, and during the meal Fernie told me as much of their story as he thought fit.
It appears that on their way up to the Zambesi friction arose between them; nothing serious, but just enough to make them feel a little tired of one another's company. Fernie considered that he should boss the outfit; Black wanted a say in matters, too. In Black's opinion Fernie was too dictatorial. Fernie thought that Black butted in too much and always unnecessarily—fatuously. So they sat down one day and discussed the situation calmly and decided that Fernie should buy Black's share and that Black should become a passenger, paying Fernie so much weekly.
This arrangement was so simple and complete that I wondered why it was necessary to bring me into the matter at all. I suspect it was the ex-clerk's passion for regularity and record, for immediately after the sale he had drawn up a formal statement of dissolution of partnership. When he and Fernie had signed this document, they asked me to countersign it.
After luncheon we sat for a while discussing guns and rifles. By we, I mean Fernie and I, for Black possessed no firearms of any sort and appeared to take little interest in them.
Fernie set so much store by the Martini-Henry rifle and the old hammer shot-gun that I correctly guessed these made up his battery. Presently he produced the weapons for my opinion.
The shot-gun had been a good one in its far-off day, but the spring of the right-hand lock had gone, so only the left barrel was serviceable. The Martini was so old and the rifling so worn that I wondered how Fernie ever hit anything at which he aimed. But he did. He said he had got to know the old gas-pipe.
That evening the pair left me and went North.
From time to time I came across these men; now and again one or the other wrote to me; later, their waggon boys told me much; I gathered more from the natives of the district in which they aimlessly wandered; finally, Black's sister entrusted her brother's diary to me. The entries in this book were made in shorthand. I had the whole transcribed. I told her I had lost the book; I lied. I have the book still. She died peacefully without an inkling of its contents.
From these various sources of information I have put together a few yarns, which I now tell for the first time. For instance, there was a curious adventure with a lion.