Their hands met in a strenuous grasp, and with a hoarse "Good luck!" following him, Maxwell strode out through the gate. Dane watched him descend the slope to the river, while all the camp boys capable of motion clustered about the one who stayed, and Monday squatted at his feet. They were all very silent until a murmur went up as the white man, halting on the edge of the forest, turned toward them. He raised his shapeless sun-hat high above his head, answering Dane's salute; and long afterward the latter sighed each time that lonely figure rose out of the blurred memories.
A horrible sense of loneliness oppressed the man left behind, and there came upon him an irrepressible desire for speech.
"He has gone, Monday," he said, patting the naked shoulder of the big dark-skinned alien, who looked up at him sympathetically; "but if he lives he will certainly come back; and you and I in the meantime are going to keep his place warm for him. You don't understand? Well, you probably will when several hundred yelling devils come round this way at midnight wanting to get in. Still, I don't think we'll make a bad show between us, even then."
The dusky man caught a glimpse of his meaning, for he grinned and nodded when Dane continued:
"You don't feel quite sure what I'm saying yet. I don't care, so long as you sit up and listen patiently. I'm feeling very low and lonely this morning, Monday."
The listener appeared to consider, and then rose upright, saying solemnly:
"Cappy Maxwell, say we lib for this place, then we dam well lib. Cappy Maxwell fine white man too much. Suppose them low bushmen come we dam well go chop him."
CHAPTER XV
THE BOARDING OF THE KABUNDA
It was a hot and steamy night when trader Redmond sat with his comrade Gilby in an upper room of their factory perched above a beach swept by smoking surf, which was even heavier than usual that night. The factory was not a desirable residence, even for West Africa, where there are not many places where a fastidious white man would care to live; but neither Redmond nor his comrade was particular, and so long as they could make a good percentage on the factory's turnover, they disregarded the dirt, smells, and insect legions. Redmond was pale and round-shouldered; Gilby lank and tall; and their speech was usually vivid and their tempers quick.