Mollified, the Arab told how he had brought the news to Solomon, and how that individual had at once set out after Jenson, taking him for guide.
Miss Helmuth had gone with them, with enough boys from the plantation to make a respectable safari. As they had failed to come up with Jenson by nightfall, in the morning Solomon had despatched the Arab to bring up Hammer.
"Then it's time we started," growled the latter, angry at Solomon, Omar, himself, and everyone else. "If we had only got the authorities after the fellow," he thought, "it would have been all over by this time. Confound Solomon! It's too late now."
He questioned Omar about the two Afghans, but the latter knew nothing of them. Neither did he have any inclination to hurry forth into the jungle again, and said so plainly as he sipped his coffee.
Hammer, exasperated by the coolness and almost contempt of the man, could restrain himself no longer. Starting from his seat, he grasped the arm of Omar with a wrench that sent the man to his back on the rug.
"Now," and he glared at the angry Arab with his grey eyes hard and cold, "I've had enough of your insolence, my friend, and I don't give a hang whether you're a Hajj or a Hazrami or Mohammed himself. You're going to lead me to John Solomon, and do it on the jump—understand?"
This was exactly the action required. Omar looked up at him for a moment, then his dark face cleared, and he stated that he understood and would do exactly as the effendi ordered, though he was dying for lack of food.
"That's all right," and Hammer released him. "Do all the dying you want to but not until you have led me to Solomon Effendi. Now, get out and see that you have some boys ready to start within an hour, else I go alone and spread the story of your shame through all the coast. Jump!"
Omar jumped, and, with the four Arab soldiers to help him, he speedily raised a force of twenty boys from the plantation quarters.
As Hammer knew where Solomon's stores of chop-boxes and supplies were located, he broke into the storehouse without scruple and left Omar getting the loads ready.