I reflected to myself that I had not often heard the doctrine of the Church better or more concisely put, but I only said:
“That is true, Hans, and I thank you for the lesson, the second you have taught me to-day. But where are we to go to, Hans? Remember, it must be elephants.”
He suggested some places; indeed he seemed to have come provided with a list of them, and I sat silent making no comment. At length he finished and squatted there before me, chewing a bit of tobacco I had given him, and looking up at me interrogatively with his head on one side, for all the world like a dilapidated and inquisitive bird.
“Hans,” I said, “do you remember a story I told you when you came to see me a year or more ago, about a tribe called the Kendah in whose country there is said to be a great cemetery of elephants which travel there to die from all the land about? A country that lies somewhere to the north-east of the lake island on which the Pongo used to dwell?”
“Yes, Baas.”
“And you said, I think, that you had never heard of such a people.”
“No, Baas, I never said anything at all. I have heard a good deal about them.”
“Then why did you not tell me so before, you little idiot?” I asked indignantly.
“What was the good, Baas? You were hunting gold then, not ivory. Why should I make you unhappy, and waste my own breath by talking about beautiful things which were far beyond the reach of either of us, far as that sky?”
“Don’t ask fool’s questions but tell me what you know, Hans. Tell me at once.”