Out of some tall water-plants, whose long, bluish-grey leaves looked very cool in the glare of heat, came flies. They came to the attack with a whirling fierceness like clegs. They were small, brown, insignificant flies. They were tsetse flies. The boat pulled out into the open to avoid them. After a few more minutes Roger called upon the rowers to stop rowing.
He was in the middle of the broad, looking at the left bank, where a trodden path led to the water's edge. For many centuries men and beasts had watered there. The path had worn a deep rut into the bank. What struck Roger about it was its narrowness. It was the narrow track of savages. The people who made it had used it fearfully, one at a time, full of suspicion, like drinking deer. Their fear had had a kind of idealism about it. It might truly be said of those nervous drinkers that when they drank, they drank to the good health of their State. Even in his fever, the sight of the path shocked Roger with a sense of the danger of life in this place. What was the danger? What was the life?
Beyond the track, at a little distance from the river, was a thick thorn hedge surrounding a village. From the midst of the village a single stream of smoke arose. It went up straight for a foot or two, behind the shelter of the hedge. Then it blew down gustily, in wavering puffs. There was no other sign of life in the village. A few hens were picking food in the open. A cow, standing with drooped head above the corpse of her calf, awaited death. Her bones were coming through her skin, poor beast. There were black patches of flies upon her. Three vultures waited for her. One of them was stretching his wings with the air of a man yawning. Vultures were busy about a dead cow in the middle distance. Dark heaps, further off, had still something of the appearance of cows. The men, looking earnestly about from the tops of the boxes, jabbered excitedly, pointing. Roger unslung his binoculars and stared at the silent place. He could see no one. There were dead cows, a dying cow, and those few clucking hens. He wondered if there could be an ambush. The grass was tall enough, in the clumps, to shelter an enemy; but the wild birds passed from clump to clump without fear. In a bare patch two scarlet-headed birds were even fighting together. Their neck feathers were ruffled erect. They struck and tugged. They rose, flapping, to cuff each other with their wings. Leaping aloft they thrust with their spurs. A hen, less brilliantly coloured, watched the battle. But for these birds the place was peaceful. The wind ruffled the grass; the smoke was gusty; one of the poultry crooned with a long gurgling cluck.
Something made Roger look from the village to the hill like a Roman camp. It glistened grey in the sun-blaze. The dance of the air above it was queer, almost like smoke. He stared at it through his glasses. After a long look he turned to stare into the water to rest his eyes. "I am mad," he said to himself. "I am dreaming this. Presently I shall wake up." He looked again. There could be no doubt of it. The hill was covered with a grey stone wall at least thirty feet high. There, about three-quarters of a mile away, was the ruin of an ancient town, as old, perhaps, as the Pharaohs. There was no doubt that it was old. Parts of it, undermined by burrowing things, or thrust out by growing things, were fallen in heaps. Other parts were overgrown twelve feet thick, with vegetation. Trees grew out of it. A few cacti upon the wall-top were sharply outlined against the sky. On the further end of the wall there was a fire-coloured blaze, where some poisonous weed, having stifled down all weaker life, triumphed in sprawling yellow blossoms, spotted and smeared with drowsy juice. There were dense swarms of flies above it as Roger could guess from the movements of the birds across the path. He watched the ruin. There was no trace of human occupation there. No smoke shewed there. Apparently the place had become a possession for the bittern. Wild beasts of the forests lay there, owls dwelt there, and satyrs danced there. It was as desolate as Babylon at the end of Isaiah xiii.
He looked at the men to see what effect the ruin had upon them. They did not look at it. They had the limited primitive intelligence, which cannot see beyond the facts of physical life. They were looking at the village, jabbering as they looked.
"What are we stopping for?" said Lionel.
"There's a village," said Roger. "It seems to have cattle plague." Lionel struggled weakly to a sitting position, and looked out with vacant eyes.
"There's a ruin on the hill, there," said Roger.
"Plague and ruin are the products of this land," said Lionel. "Don't stand there doddering, Naldrett. Find out what's happening here."
"Look here, you rest," said Roger with an effort. "Just lie back on the blankets here, and rest."