The girl obeyed; Brandow went to the open door and gazed across the dark court-yard towards the stables. The rain beat into his face, and with it came the sickly odor of native tobacco. On the left, directly under him, before the stone bench glowed a red spot, and a harsh voice asked:
"Well, what about harnessing the horses?"
It was the man for whom he had just been looking, upon whom he had depended for the execution of the plan of vengeance brooding darkly in his soul, nay the man, as he now imagined, who had implanted its first germ. So it was to be.
"He won't want to go away now, if it were only on account of the bad weather."
"The others must go too."
"They have stayed here often enough."
"Send them away."
Brandow reflected a moment. "If I win a few hundred more, they will go of their own accord," he murmured. "But you must give him a thorough soaking, Hinrich--a thorough one, mind."
"Where there is no bottom," said Hinrich.
The words quivered through Brandow's soul like a flash of lightning across a midnight sky. That was the very thing.