“Well, I’m not the sort of fellow to let the grass grow under my feet when there’s any danger,” snapped Snape. “You remember what Zafar said yesterday.”
“He’s like yourself, mon cher,—always apprehensive of some horrible calamity,” muttered the Belgian, blowing a cloud of smoke from his lips.
“This time, I tell you, it’s no mere imagination,” the Englishman went on. “Last night, after the dua, I left secretly, so as not to arouse any misgivings, and rode due east until the dawn, when I discovered, encamped among the aghrad, a whole troop of Soudanese soldiers. I got near enough to ascertain that the officers were Englishmen.”
“Well?”
“They’ve got word somehow that we are passing through,” he said. “And now, if you don’t stir yourself, you’ll never see Brussels again—you understand?”
“I have no wish to see Bruxelles, mon cher,” the elder man replied, quite undisturbed. “If I did, it would only be to see the inside of a prison. No; I prefer Africa to the pleasures of the miniature Paris. Here, if one has a little ivory, one is a king. Life is very pleasant.”
“I admit that,” his companion said. “But do, for Heaven’s sake, get up and let us decide what to do. There’s danger, and we can’t afford to be trapped, especially with all those niggers tied in a string. The evidence is a bit too strong against us, and the officers are English. There’s no bribing them, you know.”
The Belgian stirred himself lazily at last, and asked—
“Are they at a well?”
“No. They are without water.”