"Why, she's nothing but a crazy old tub," he said to himself ruefully. "Planks half-rotten, rudder stiff, and looks as though she hadn't seen paint for an age. Lucky this isn't open sea, for anything like dirty weather would just about finish her ramshackle engines. Well, let's hope for the best."
He returned to the bungalow, where with Mbutu's assistance he made his final preparations. These were not elaborate. The padre had advised him to travel as light as possible, taking merely a few articles of underclothing and other necessaries, with the addition of a couple of hundred beads and some yards of calico, the common articles of barter and sale in the interior, in case he had to purchase food from the natives during the final stage of his journey. Luckily there was a fair stock of these in the bungalow. Tom had of course discarded his straw hat long before, and now wore a white solah helmet, which could be relied on to protect him from the mid-day sun. He had found an old rifle of his uncle's, and a case of cartridges, which he thought it advisable to take. He ate a light breakfast of fried fowl capitally prepared by the Indian, gravely acknowledged his salaam, and then, giving Mbutu the baggage to carry, started for the quay.
The missionary was already on board, and steam was up, but there was no sign of Mr. Barkworth. Tom wondered whether he had forgotten his promise to see him off. Just as he was about to go on board, his genial friend appeared in the distance, hurrying at a great pace towards the quay, flourishing a red bandana. Tom was surprised, and secretly not a little pleased, to see that Lilian was with her father.
"Here we are," cried the old gentleman, puffing and gasping as he came up. "All on board, h'm? Got everything you want? Now, whatever you do, don't get your feet wet! And look here, here's something I warrant you've forgotten. Writing-paper, eh? Ink too. Let us know how you get on. Any black 'll carry a letter for you for a few beads. My girl will have dragged me off to the ends of the earth long before you get back, but remember we're always home for Christmas. Glad to see you at the Orchard, Winterslow, any time. Now, then, good luck to you, and God save the King!"
Mr. Barkworth shoved a folding writing-case into Tom's left hand, gripped his right heartily, and waggled it up and down till he was tired.
"Good-bye, Mr. Burnaby!" said Lilian, "and I do hope you will succeed."
Tom shook hands, lifted his hat, and stepped on board. The crazy engine made a great fluster as it sent the screw round; the launch sheered off, and Tom stood side by side with the padre, watching Mr. Barkworth waving his hat and Lilian her handkerchief until they were out of sight. After seeing that Mbutu was safe in the company of the native stoker, who formed the whole crew of the little vessel, Tom placed a camp-stool under the awning by the side of the missionary's deck-chair near the steering-wheel, and looked about him.
The launch was cutting its way slowly through the brown sluggish waters of Kavirondo Bay. The shore was flat and uninteresting, part bare rock, part rank marsh, spotted here and there with sacred ibises in their beautiful black-and-white plumage. At several points along the bank Tom saw a huge plant like an overgrown cabbage run to stalk, or rather to many stalks, sticking out of a short swollen stem, like the arms of a candelabra. This, the padre told him, was the candelabra euphorbia, a plant of which the natives stood very much in dread, because its juice was highly poisonous, and because it was so top-heavy and so loosely rooted that in a high wind it frequently toppled over, with damaging effect to anything that might be within its shade.
As they emerged from the bay into the open lake, the water changed its brown to a deep and beautiful blue, and the shore became more interesting. The lake here was fringed with a thick growth of rushes--long smooth green stems crowned by a mop-head of countless green filaments becoming ever finer and more silky towards the end. Amid the vegetation appeared the forms of whale-headed storks with yellow eyes, and gold-brown otters with white bellies darted in and out among the rushes. There was a light wind off-shore, and Tom had a distant view of many wild denizens of the lake country, which would otherwise have been alarmed by the throb of the engines. His companion lent him a field-glass, and for hours he revelled in the panorama of tropical life that passed before his eyes. At one point he saw an antelope come down a wooded slope to the edge of the water. What seemed to be a green moss-covered log of wood lay almost hidden from the animal by the bulging bank. The antelope had just put his fore-feet into the water when the log moved, one end of it parted into two yawning jaws, and for the first time in his life Tom saw a crocodile in its native element. The trembling antelope started back, just escaped the snap of the huge hungry jaws, and bounded back into the forest.
Tom could not resist the temptation to try a shot at the slimy reptile. He took careful aim and fired. The crocodile slid off the half-submerged sand-bank on which it was basking, and disappeared in the water.