"Oh, that's all right," said the major, in response to Tom's warm expression of thanks. "You owe it to my old father-in-law, you know--Mr. Barkworth."
"Indeed!"
"Yes: he took a fancy to you on the boat. Dear old man! His heart's as young as it was when I first met him in Uganda twenty years ago--when I was about your age. He was mightily perturbed about you when we got word that the mad dog had broken loose. Wrote off at once to Reinecke, whom he knew long ago, asking him to pass you across the border with a safe-conduct, and became quite ill when Reinecke replied that you had been accidentally killed. He gave a very circumstantial account of your accident, by the way."
"He was a good liar," said Tom.
"Was?"
"Yes, he's dead--horribly. He came to attack me, and I collared him and put him on the island in the lake. I suppose he grew impatient when he heard the firing, couldn't wait for the end, and got his fellow-prisoners to make a sort of a raft. Our sentry deserted his post, with the most praiseworthy intentions, and Reinecke took advantage of his absence to launch the raft. He was attacked by crocodiles; Reinecke lunged at one, and toppled over. I saw the whole thing: the recollection makes me sick."
"Poor devil! He was a tricky sort of fellow, according to Mr. Barkworth."
Tom related the incidents that had led to his occupation of the nullah.
"He deserved no better fate," remarked Major Burnaby at the close of the story. "Fellows like him make one unjust, perhaps--I mean, one would rather not regard him as a typical German. Unhappily his countrymen are doing their best to make the name of Germany odious."
"What are they doing, sir? What's the war about? Of course I've heard nothing."