They did not wake until the train slowed down and came to a standstill at Tabora Station. Wynyard was no longer there; while the chums were sleeping soundly he had alighted at a place ninety miles away. Of Londray they saw no sign. He had discreetly betaken himself off to another compartment.
Colonel Narfield was waiting for them. He greeted them warm-heartedly and with unconcealed pleasure.
"We'll have grub before we start," he said, after he had superintended the efforts of four muscular blacks to carry the new arrivals' trunks and packing-cases from the train.
"Bring your suit-cases. They'll go in the car. The heavier stuff will have to go up by the bullock waggon. Well, how's everybody at Stockmere?"
The meal over, Herbert Narfield, having given final instructions to the black servants in charge of the bullock waggon, brought round the car, which, Colin noticed, was of an American make similar to those he had seen in Dar-es-Salaam.
"Hop in," said the Colonel. "Colin, you can sit alongside me; you, Desmond, in the back with McFrazer. That rifle's loaded, but the safety-catch is set."
With a gentle reminder that one has to be prepared for such slight occasions when a lion or a leopard puts in an appearance, Colonel Narfield set the car in motion.
McFrazer was the colonel's former batman, an alert soldier of the old school, who had come through the Great War with the Mons Medal and Star, the Military Medal, three wound stripes, and an inexhaustible fund of dry humour. Like most Scots, he was a born engineer, and on that account was indispensable during the numerous encounters between Colonel Narfield and the Yankee motor-car.
There was no mistaking the fact, Herbert Narfield could drive. He was somewhat inclined to be reckless, and he did not spare the engine. The latter he regarded as a mere automatic machine, that, once started, ran on "for ever" or until it "konked out." Sometimes the "konking-out" function was postponed by the well-meant action of McFrazer, who, leaning forward, would prod his master in the back and roar:
"Eh, mon; you'm daen' fine. But jist a wee bit back on the ignition. Weel, let her bide a' that."