been very near death, and awe of the experience still overcast his normally open and loquacious manner. It was not until the rope was actually round his neck that he had been inspired to mention the existence of his launch. His face was damp and his voice jerky and subdued.
“What did the Indian dog say?”
“He wanted to sell me a place in the boat for five hundred rupees. Does he know where it is hidden?”
‘Tool that I was, I told him.”
“It is of little consequence. He gave me two hundred rupees to let him past the guard, also some whiskey and a cheroot. There is no need for us to worry about AH. When do we start?”
“There is one point, officers… my wife. There is not room for her in the boat. She must not know of our departure. Where was she when you—when we left the cafe together?”
“She was making a noise. One of the corporals locked her in the loft.”
“She will get out of there.”
“You leave all that to us.”
“Very well, major. I am a just man and a peaceable man. You know that. I only want to be sure that everything will be agreeable for every one.”
Ali finished his packing and sat down to wait. “What’s Major Joab up to?” he wondered. “It is curious his refusing to leave the town. I suppose he thinks he will get a price for Seth in the morning.”
Night and the fear of darkness. In his room at the top of the old fort Seth lay awake and alone, his eyes wild with the inherited terror of the jungle, desperate with the acquired loneliness of civilisa tion. Night was alive with beasts and devils and the spirits of dead enemies; before its power Seth’s an cestors had receded, slid away from its attack, abandoning in retreat all the baggage of Individuality: they had lain six or seven in a hut; between them and night only a wall of mud and a ceiling of thatched grass; warm, naked bodies breathing in the darkness an arm’s reach apart, indivisibly unified so that they ceased to be six or seven scared blacks and became one person of more than human stature less vulnerable to the peril that walked near them. Seth could not expand to meet the onset of fear. He-was alone, dwarfed by the magnitude of the dark ness, insulated from his fellows, strapped down to mean dimensions.
The darkness pulsed with the drumming of the unknown conquerors. In the narrow streets of the city the people were awake—active and apprehensive. Dark figures sped to and fro on furtive errands, hiding from each other in doorways till the way was empty. In the houses they were packing away bundles in secret places, little hoards of coins and jew-elry, pictures and books, ancestral sword hilts of fine workmanship, shoddy trinkets from Birming-ham and Bombay, silk shawls, scent bottles, anything that might attract attention next morning when the city was given over to loot. Huddled groups of women and children were being herded to refuge in the cellars of the old houses or into the open country beyond the walls; goats, sheep, donkeys, livestock and poultry of all kinds jostled with them for precedence in the city gates.
Ali, marching back to the fort under arrest between two soldiers, protested angrily to the captain of the guard.
“You are making a great mistake, captain. I have made all arrangements with the major for my departure.”
“It is the Emperor’s orders that no one leaves the city.”
“When we see the major he will explain everything.”
The captain made no reply. The little party marched on; in front between two other soldiers shambled Ali’s servant, bearing his master’s trunk on his head.
When they reached the guard-room, the captain reported: “Two prisoners, major, arrested at the South Gate attempting to leave the city.”
“You know me, major; the captain has made a mistake. Tell him it is all right for me to go.”
“I know you, secretary: captain, report the arrests to his majesty.”
“But, major, only this evening I gave you two hundred rupees. Do you hear, captain, I gave him two hundred rupees. You can’t treat me like this. I shall tell his majesty everything.”
“We had better search his luggage.”
The trunk was opened and the contents spread over the floor. The two officers turned them over with interest and appropriated the few articles of value it contained. The minor possessions were tossed to the corporals. At the bottom, wrapped in a grubby nightshirt, were two heavy objects which, on investigation, proved to be the massive gold crown of the Azanian Empire and an elegant ivory sceptre presented to Amurath by the President of the French Republic. Major Joab and the captain considered this discovery for some time in silence. Then the major answered the question that was in both their minds. “No,” he said, “I think we had better show these to Seth.”
“Both of them?”
“Well, at any rate, the sceptre. It would not be so easy to dispose of. Two hundred rupees,” said the major bitterly, turning on Ali, “two hundred rupees and you proposed to walk off with the Imperial regalia.”
From the inner room Mr. Youkoumian listened to this conversation in a mood of sublime contentment; the sergeant had given him a cigarette out of a box lifted from the shop at the time of his arrest; the captain had given him brandy—similarly acquired—of his own distillation; a fiery, comforting spirit. The terrors of the gallows were far behind him. And now Ali had been caught red-handed with the crown jewels. Nothing was required to complete Mr. Youkoumian’s happiness, except a calm sea for their crossing to the mainland; and the gentle night air gave promise that this, too, would be vouchsafed him.
It was only a matter of a few words for Major Joab to report the circumstances of Ali’s arrest. The damning evidence of the sceptre and the soiled nightshirt was laid before Seth on the table. The prisoner stood between his captors without visible interest or emotion. When the charge had been made, Seth said, “Well, Ali.”
Until now they had spoken in Sakuyu. Ali answered, as he always spoke to his master, in English. “It is regrettable that this should have happened.
