"I can't fathom the mystery," he said. "McMasters will be down to-morrow, to look at some sick men. We'll take him up, and examine the boy."

It was a subdued little party that boarded the _Zaire_ the following morning, and Patricia Hamilton, who came to see them off, watched their departure with a sense of impending trouble.

Dr. McMasters alone was cheerful, for this excursion represented a break in a somewhat monotonous routine.

"It may be the sun," he suggested. "I have known several fellows who have gone a little nutty from that cause. I remember a man at Grand Ba.s.sam who shot----"

"Oh, shut up, Mac, you grisly devil!" snapped Hamilton. "Talk about b.u.t.terflies."

The _Zaire_ swung round the bend of the river that hid Ranabini's village from view, but had scarcely come into sight when--

"Ping!"

Sanders saw the bullet strike the river ahead of the boat, and send a spiral column of water shooting into the air. He put up his gla.s.ses and focussed them on the village beach.

"Bones!" he said grimly. "Take her in, Abiboo."

As the steersman spun the wheel--

"Ping!"

This time the shot fell to the right.

The three white men looked at one another.

"Let every man take cover," said Sanders quietly. "We're going to that beach even if Bones has a battery of 75's!"

An exclamation from Hamilton arrested him.

"He's signalling," said the Houssa Captain, and Sanders put up his gla.s.ses again.

Bones's long arms were waving at ungainly angles as he semaph.o.r.ed his warning.

Hamilton opened his notebook and jotted down the message--

"Awfully sorry, dear old officer," he spelt, and grinned at the unnecessary exertion of this fine preliminary flourish, "but must keep you away. Bad outbreak of virulent smallpox----"

Sanders whistled, and pulled back the handle of the engine-room telegraph to "stop."

"My G.o.d!" said Hamilton through his teeth, for he had seen such an outbreak once, and knew something of its horrors. Whole districts had been devastated in a night. One tribe had been wiped out, and the rotting frames of their houses still showed amidst the tangle of elephant gra.s.s which had grown up through the ruins.

He wiped his forehead and read the message a little unsteadily, for his mind was on his sister--

"Had devil of fight, and lost twenty men, but got it under. Come and get me in three weeks. Had to stay here for fear careless devils spreading disease."

Sanders looked at Hamilton, and McMasters chuckled.

"This is where I get a swift vacation," he said, and called his servant.

Hamilton leapt on to the rail, and steadying himself against a stanchion, waved a reply--

"We are sending you a doctor."

Back came the reply in agitated sweeps of arm--

"Doctor be blowed! What am I?"

"What shall I say, sir?" asked Hamilton after he had delivered the message.

"Just say 'a hero,'" said Sanders huskily.

CHAPTER VII

BONES, KING-MAKER

Patricia Hamilton, an observant young lady, had not failed to notice that every day, at a certain hour, Bones disappeared from view. It was not for a long time that she sought an explanation.

"Where is Bones?" she asked one morning, when the absence of her cavalier was unusually protracted.

"With his baby," said her brother.

"Please don't be comic, dear. Where is Bones? I thought I saw him with the ship's doctor."

The mail had come in that morning, and the captain and surgeon of the s.s. _Boma Queen_ had been their guests at breakfast.

Hamilton looked up from his book and removed his pipe.

"Do you mean to tell me that Bones has kept his guilty secret all this time?" he asked anxiously.

She sat down by his side.

"Please tell me the joke. This isn't the first time you have ragged Bones about 'the baby'; even Mr. Sanders has done it."

She looked across at the Commissioner with a reproving shake of her pretty head.

"Have _I_ ragged Bones?" asked Sanders, in surprise. "I never thought I was capable of ragging anybody."

"The truth is, Pat," said her brother, "there isn't any rag about the matter. Bones adopted a piccanin."

"A child?"

"A baby about a month old. Its mother died, and some old bird of a witch-doctor was 'chopping' it when Bones appeared on the scene."

Patricia gave a little gurgle of delight and clapped her hands. "Oh, please tell me everything about it."