“Hah! It has been a rush, Sam.”
“Rush, sir? It’s wonderful. Seems only yesterday we were packing up, and now here we are—down here on the map. One of the sailors put his finger—here it is, sir, signed Jack Tar, his mark, for it was one of the English sailors, not one of the Lascar chaps. That’s where we are, sir.”
Sam held up a conveniently folded map, surely enough marked by the tip of a perspiring finger.
“He says we shall be in port to-morrow, and have to shift on to the rail again, and in a few hours be in Cairo on the River Nile.”
“That’s quite correct, Sam,” said Frank, smiling; “and then our work will begin.”
“And a good job too, sir; I want to be at it. But my word! it seems wonderful. Me only the other day in my pantry, Wimpole Street, W., and to-morrow in King Pharaoh’s city where there were the plagues and pyramids.”
“And now hotels and electric lights, and the telegraph to communicate with home.”
“Yes, sir, it’s alarming,” said Sam. “Pity it don’t go right up to Khartoum—that’s the place, ain’t it, sir?”
“Yes, Sam.”
“So as we could send a message to Mr Harry: ‘Keep up your spirits; we’re on the way.’”