The innocent may wonder how such a man would dare to sleep—dare to enter that dark country so close to the frontier of death. But what should the innocent know of a Berselius, who was yet a living man and walked the earth but a few years ago, and whose prototype is alive to-day. Alive and powerful and lustful, great in mind, body, and estate.
Before sunrise next morning the expedition was marshalled in the courtyard for the start.
A great fire burned in the space just before the house, and by its light the stores and tents were taken from the go-down. The red light of the fire lit up the black glistening skins of the porters as they loaded themselves with the chop boxes and tents and guns; lit up the red fez caps of the onlooking “soldiers,” their glittering white teeth, their white eyeballs, and the barrels of their rifles.
Beyond and below the fort the forest stretched in the living starlight like an infinite white sea. The tree-tops were roofed with a faint mist, no breath of wind disturbed it, and in contrast to the deathly stillness of all that dead-white world the sky, filled with leaping stars, seemed alive and vocal.
It was chill up here just before dawn. Hence the fire. Food had been served out to the porters, and they ate it whilst getting things ready and loading up. Berselius and his companions were breakfasting in the guest house and the light of the paraffin lamp lay on the veranda yellow as topaz in contrast with the red light of the fire in the yard.
Everything was ready for the start. They were waiting now for the sun.
Then, away to the east, as though a vague azure wind had blown up under the canopy of darkness, the sky, right down to the roof of the forest, became translucent and filled with distance.
A reef of cloud like a vermilion pencil-line materialized itself, became a rose-red feather tipped with dazzling gold, and dissolved as if washed away by the rising sea of light.
A great bustle spread through the courtyard. The remaining stores were loaded up, and under the direction of Félix, the porters formed in a long line, their loads on their heads.