He came every morning to my shelter, often before I was awake, and when at last I stirred and turned over, there he would be, sitting quietly by the side of my couch, looking yearningly into my face with his steady, thoughtful eyes, and holding his tiny hands together in his “lap.” Always he greeted my look with a strange, quiet smile, which made his wee, homely face the very next thing to divine. I got to carrying the little chap about, as I went from place to place. I found that I missed him, when resting out in the jungle, after a hunt with my fellows. It also gave me a most unreasonable pleasure to talk to the tiny mite, who would answer with a faint, half-crooning sound of pleasure. I called him frequently my “Little Man.” At intervals, sometimes of days, he would repeat the word “Man” in a way that caused me to feel a peculiar thrill whenever it came from his lips.

As before, my attitude of comparative passivity begot more or less of the symptoms of familiarity on the part of several Links. This did no little in the way of deciding me anew to quit the place, if possible. I was doubtful in my mind as to which method would be preferable, that of attempting to find and utilise the outlet of the lake in my boat, or to endeavour to induce about fifty of the fighters to escort me across the country to the sea. But one day which we spent in the jungle decided me without further mental debate.

We were stalking a pair of hogs, which were unusually clever at evading the flanking Links and at penetrating far into the jungle, when suddenly the great, dark form of a genuine elephant loomed up, as he smashed his way through a thicket. Instantly every Link in the party screamed out an imitation “trumpet” of alarm and fled incontinently, as they had on the former occasion. This time I had no intention of being left behind, nor of giving battle to the brute with my fists and knife. I joined the running fellows, endeavouring to make them halt and retire in at least decent order, but this effort was utterly futile; their panic was complete and not to be overcome.

Thankful thus to be reminded of the former incident, which I had been too near to forgetting, I decided, even as we hastened away from the monarch of the jungle, that the attempt to perform any long and hazardous march with such a cowardly “army” as this at my heels would be madness. I must launch the boat and proceed alone.

CHAPTER XXVI
SPORT AT THE LAKE

It was not a difficult operation to bore some holes in the gunwale of my boat and to hammer in four stout pegs for row-locks, and then I put in a seat, constructed of thin bamboo strips, and all was ready. The craft was more than sixteen feet long, three feet in the beam and hollowed out to a depth of about eighteen inches. The launch was not effected until after I had secured a long, stout painter to the bow, the rope being made of creeper-fibre, twisted and braided. This was pliable and quite as enduring as hemp.

Although the Links were manifestly afraid of the lake, they were intensely interested when the craft upon which we had worked so hard and long, went splashing into the water. She righted herself in a second and floated high above the surface. But when I hauled her in with the rope and jumped inside, sat down and got out my sweeps, to row, the astonishment of the fellows was unbounded. They were frightened for my safety, uneasy to the verge of whining, as they ran up and down the beach, and still were all so fascinated that not one could look at anything else. Old Fatty acted precisely like one of those dogs who is crazy to join his master and yet dreads the water so greatly as to fear even wetting his feet. He lifted either foot, and half squatted and gave little jumps, as if about to plunge in and make a bold swim for the boat, till he appeared too ridiculous for words. Then he ran down the shore and back again and stood with his comical head on one side making me laugh uproariously.

The boat was great! She was inclined to roll a trifle, owing to the fact that she was the same size from stem to stern, and therefore minus the broad beam which makes a craft steady, but she was remarkably light to row and easily steered. Moreover I found, by throwing my weight to either side, that she had a powerful tendency to return to an even keel, which rendered her almost impossible to turn bottom upward. This I attributed to the fact that while her sides were comparatively thin, the bottom was at least eight inches thick, which made her light on top and heavy below, an excellent arrangement when to give her a larger belly was out of the question. I am bound to admit that she had no “lines,” that indeed she looked like the log she was, clumsy and quite ungraceful. Nevertheless I was prouder as I sat in her hold than is any captain of the noblest ship afloat.

I rowed her this way and that, across to a nearby point and then straight away down the middle of the lake for half a mile. When I turned I made out a floating thing a score of yards from the shore on the left—one of my alligator acquaintances, swimming about. I was not afraid of any attack in so large a boat, especially as my nature could not have been so readily surmised by the hungry saurians, while I was rowing. I should not have minded a race anyway, for I felt secure on my own stamping ground and as saucy as a boy with a toy pistol.

Before starting back, I noted particularly the outline against the sky which our hill and its neighbours formed, thinking I might be much in need of some such guide when I came to go further from home. Then I drove my craft with all the speed I could force. Her prow was slightly above the glass-like surface and the water swashed backward from her keel with a sound that stirred me to immoderate delight in this my supreme achievement.