“You are just in time for lunch,” I said, “and as luck will have it there is a good rock cod and a leg of oribé buck for you to eat. Boy, set two more places.”
“One more place, if you please, sir,” said Savage. “I should prefer to take my food afterwards.”
“You will have to get over that in Africa,” I muttered. Still I let him have his way, with the result that presently the strange sight was seen of the magnificent English majordomo standing behind my chair in the little room and handing round the square-face as though it were champagne. It was a spectacle that excited the greatest interest in my primitive establishment and caused Hans with some native hangers-on to gather at the window. However, Lord Ragnall took it as a matter of course and I thought it better not to interfere.
When we had finished we went on to the stoep to smoke, leaving Savage to eat his dinner, and I asked Lord Ragnall where his luggage was. He replied that he had left it at the Customs. “Then,” I said, “I will send a native with Savage to arrange about getting it up here. If you do not mind my rough accommodation there is a room for you, and your man can pitch a tent in the garden.”
After some demur he accepted with gratitude, and a little later Savage and the native were sent off with a note to a man who hired out a mule-cart.
“Now,” I said when the gate had shut behind them, “will you tell me why you have come to Africa?”
“Disaster,” he replied. “Disaster of the worst sort.”
“Is your wife dead, Lord Ragnall?”
“I do not know. I almost hope that she is. At any rate she is lost to me.”
An idea leapt to my mind to the effect that she might have run away with somebody else, a thing which often happens in the world. But fortunately I kept it to myself and only said,