"You look as if you hadn"t had a sleep for months," said Hamilton.
Bones shrugged his shoulders.
"Dear old fellow," said he, "it isn"t for nothing that I"m called "the sleepless one"--don"t make sceptical noises, dear old officer, but pursue your inquiries among the indigenous natives, especially Bosambo--an hour is all I want--just a bit of a snooze and a bath and I"m bright an" vigilant."
"Take your hour," said Hamilton briefly. "You"ll need it."
His interview with Bosambo was short and, for Bosambo, painful.
Nevertheless he unbent in the end to give the chief a job after his heart.
Launch and steamer turned their noses down the stream, and at sunset came to the island. In the morning, Hamilton conducted a search which extended from sh.o.r.e to sh.o.r.e and he came upon the cairn unexpectedly after a two hours" search. He uncovered two tons of ivory, wrapped in rotten native cloth.
"There will be trouble over this," he said, thoughtfully, surveying the yellow tusks. "I"ll go downstream to the Isisi and collect information, unless these beggars can establish their claim we will bag this lot for government."
He left Bones and one orderly on the island.
"I shall be gone two days," he said. "I must send the launch to bring Iberi to me; keep your eyes peeled."
"Sir," said Bones, blinking and suppressing a yawn with difficulty, "you can trust the sleepless one."
He had his tent pitched before the cairn, and in the shade of a great gum he seated himself in his canvas chair.... He looked up and struggled to his feet. He was half dead with weariness, for the whole of the previous night, while Bosambo snored in his hut, Bones, pinching himself, had wandered up and down the street of the city qualifying for his t.i.tle.
Now, as he rose unsteadily to his feet, it was to confront Bosambo--Bosambo with four canoes grounded on the sandy beach of the island.
"h.e.l.lo, Bosambo!" yawned Bones.
"O Sleepless One," said Bosambo humbly, "though I came in silence yet you heard me, and your bright eyes saw me in the little-light."
"Little-light" it was, for the sun had gone down.
"Go now, Bosambo," said Bones, "for it is not lawful that you should be here."
He looked around for Ahmet, his orderly, but Ahmet was snoring like a pig.
"Lord, that I know," said Bosambo, "yet I came because my heart is sad and I have sorrow in my stomach. For did I not say that you had married my aunt?"
"Now listen whilst I tell you the full story of my wickedness, and of my aunt who married a white lord----"
Bones sat down in his chair and laid back his head, listening with closed eyes.
"My aunt, O Sleepless One," began Bosambo, and Bones heard the story in fragments. "... Coast woman ... great lord ... fine drier of cloth...."
Bosambo droned on in a monotonous tone, and Bones, open-mouthed, his head rolling from side to side, breathed regularly.
At a gesture from Bosambo, the man who sat in the canoe slipped lightly ash.o.r.e. Bosambo pointed to the cairn, but he himself did not move, nor did he check his fluent narrative.
Working with feverish, fervent energy, the men of Bosambo"s party loaded the great tusks in the canoes. At last all the work was finished and Bosambo rose.
"Wake up, Bones."
Lieutenant Tibbetts stumbled to his feet glaring and grimacing wildly.
"Parade all correct, sir," he said, "the mail boat has just come in, an"
there"s a jolly old salmon for supper."
"Wake up, you dreaming devil," said Hamilton.
Bones looked around. In the bright moonlight he saw the _Zaire_ moored to the shelving beach, saw Hamilton, and turned his head to the empty cairn.
"Good Lord!" he gasped.
"O Sleepless One!" said Hamilton softly, "O bright eyes!"
Bones went blundering to the cairn, made a closer inspection, and came slowly back.
"There"s only one thing for me to do, sir," he said, saluting. "As an officer an" a gentleman, I must blow my brains out."
"Brains!" said Hamilton scornfully.
"As a matter of fact I sent Bosambo to collect the ivory which I shall divide amongst the three chiefs--it"s perished ivory, anyhow; and he had my written authority to take it, but being a born thief he preferred to steal it; you"ll find it stacked in your cabin, Bones."
"In my cabin, sir!" said an indignant Bones; "there isn"t room in my cabin, sir. How the d.i.c.kens am I going to sleep?"
THE END