"Mombasa?"
"And then on. She has drafts on a German merchant in Nairobi."
From that moment until we were safely in our quarters on the steamer Monty's attitude became one of rigid indifference toward her or anything to do with her. The British officers went out to the steamer with us, but all the way Monty only talked of the climate, trade conditions, and the other subjects to which polite conversation of Africa's east coast is limited. Fred kept nudging him, but Monty took no notice. Yerkes whispered to Fred. Then I heard Fred whisper to Monty in one of those raucous asides that he perfectly well knows can be heard by everybody.
"Why don't you ask 'em about her, you ass?"
But Monty refused to rise. He talked of the bowed and ancient slaves of Zanzibar, who refused in those days to be set free and afforded prolific ground for attack on British public morals by people whose business it is to abuse England for her peccadillos and forget her virtues.*
———————- * In 1914 there were still thousands of slaves in German East, although the German press and public were ever loudest in their condemnation of British conditions. ———————-
We reached the ship, and were watching our piles of luggage arrive up the accommodation ladder when the solution of Lady Isobel Saffren Waldon's problem appeared. She arrived alongside in the official boat of the German consulate, a German officer in white uniform on either hand, and the German ensign at the stern.
"Pretty fair impudence, paying official honors to our undesirables, yet
I don't see what we can do," said the senior from the Residency.
Yerkes drew me aside.
"Did you ever see anything more stupidly British?" he demanded.