"And to Abyssinia?" Stas asked.
"That is also about the same distance away. Yet you must bear in mind that the Mahdi is waging war against the whole world and, therefore, against Abyssinia. I know also from the prisoners that along the western and southern frontiers greater or smaller hordes of dervishes are prowling and you might therefore easily fall into their hands. Abyssinia indeed is a Christian empire, but the savage southern tribes are either pagan or profess Islam and for that reason secretly favor the Mahdi,—No, you will not get through that way."
"Well, what am I to do, and where shall I go with Nell?" Stas asked.
"I told you that your situation is extremely difficult," Linde said.
Saying this he put both hands to his head and for a long time lay in silence.
"The ocean," he finally said, "is over five hundred and sixty miles from here; you would have to cross mountains, go among savage peoples, and even pass over deserts, for it is probable that there are waterless localities. But the country nominally belongs to England. You might chance upon transports of ivory to Kismayu, to Lamu and Mombasa—perhaps upon missionary expeditions. Realizing that on account of the dervishes I would not be able to explore the course of this river because it turns to the Nile, I, too, wanted to go eastward to the ocean."
"Then we shall return together," Stas exclaimed.
"I shall never return. The wart-hog has so badly torn my muscles and veins that an infection of the blood must set in. Only a surgeon could save me by amputating my leg. Now everything has coagulated and become numb, but during the first days I bit my hands from pain—"
"You surely will get well."
"No, my brave lad, I surely will die and you will cover me well with stones, so that the hyenas cannot dig me out. To the dead it may be all the same, but during life it is unpleasant to think of it. It is hard to die so far away from your own—"