"Come along with me," said Horn.
He walked out and the doctor followed him. The natives came after them in a little bunch. They crossed the road and came on to the beach. The doctor saw a group of natives standing round some object at the water's edge. They hurried along, a couple of dozen yards perhaps, and the natives opened out as the doctor came up. The trader pushed him forwards. Then he saw, lying half in the water and half out, a dreadful object, the body of Davidson. Dr Macphail bent down—he was not a man to lose his head in an emergency—and turned the body over. The throat was cut from ear to ear, and in the right hand was still the razor with which the deed was done.
"He's quite cold," said the doctor. "He must have been dead some time."
"One of the boys saw him lying there on his way to work just now and came and told me. Do you think he did it himself?"
"Yes. Someone ought to go for the police."
Horn said something in the native tongue, and two youths started off.
"We must leave him here till they come," said the doctor.
"They mustn't take him into my house. I won't have him in my house."
"You'll do what the authorities say," replied the doctor sharply. "In point of fact I expect they'll take him to the mortuary."
They stood waiting where they were. The trader took a cigarette from a fold in his lava-lava and gave one to Dr Macphail. They smoked while they stared at the corpse. Dr Macphail could not understand.