Still, he reflected, if the country was as peaceable and quiet as the scientist declared it to be, that revolver had flashed out with marvellous promptitude.
Professor Helmuth had been on the ground nearly two weeks, and had made things ready generally against the doctor's arrival, with the assistance of a few mission-boys.
The Kiswahili, it seemed, had refused to leave their fields to work for a woman, even at the urging of the district commissioner; but Krausz had easily procured two hundred of them, who would dig trenches and bring in food supplies for the whole camp.
Now that he was here, he confidently predicted that things would go forward with a rush; but whether it was the champagne, served abundantly with dinner, or whether the remembrance of that flourished revolver still stuck in Hammer's crop, he did not exactly like the way in which the archaeologist referred to his assistant.
He learned that the lady professor kept strictly to herself after working hours, even to taking her meals apart; and this did not raise her in the American's estimation.
In her position, he considered, she should frankly accept such things and not be so stuck on conventions. None the less, when he expressed himself in such wise f Dr. Krausz took it as a huge joke and poked Jenson familiarly in the ribs, upon which another bottle of champagne was opened.
Hammer, who had absorbed his full share in his bitterness of spirit, suddenly felt out of humour with the Teutonic attitude of mind toward women in general. Spectacles or no spectacles, if the lady hailed from California then she ought to have more sense, and probably these Germans had handled her coarsely. So he leaned over the table and said as much with the innate earnestness of his convictions.
"Nein," returned the doctor good-humouredly; "I am not German, but Saxon, yess! So you think she wass not asked rightly, Mr. Hammer? Perhaps if you asked her then she might come, no?"
"By Godfrey, if she's American I'd take a gamble on it!" blurted out Hammer, and wagged a long forefinger under the nose of Krausz. "I'll bet you that I could get her over quick enough! I'll bet a million dollars I could do it!"
"So?" The archaeologist turned and leered heavily at the others. "You hear, gentlemen? Then it iss a bet—a bet of one million dollars, yess! The fräulein, she does not like to eat with you, Jenson, hein!"