"Why do you tell me all this?" he asked at length.
"I want you to know. And I am so glad!" The lilt had crept back into her voice.
"I congratulate you," he replied drily.
"Stupid! Oh, stupid!" she cried. "Do you not see why I am glad? It is you! Now you shall not sit forever in the darkness. You shall go back to your doctor, who will arrange your eyes."
"Why?" asked Kingozi.
"Why!" she repeated, astonished. "But it is 'why not!' Listen! Have you thought? Winkleman is now but a week's march from M'tela. And here, where we stand, it is perhaps twenty days, perhaps more. Winkleman would arrive nearly two weeks ahead of you. Tell me, how long would it take you to win M'tela's friendship so it would not be shaken?"
Kingozi's face lit with a grim smile.
"A week," he promised confidently.
"You see! And Herr Winkleman is equal to you; you have said so yourself. Is not it so?"
"It's so, all right."