The Essential W. Somerset Maugham Collection. W. Somerset Maugham

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СКАЧАТЬ that any of them was alive, and they had all a curious, light-headed feeling from the narrowness of the escape. They had been fighting, with their backs to the wall, and each one had shown what he was made of. A few hours before things had been so serious that now, in the first moment of relief, they sought refuge instinctively in banter. But Dr. Adamson was a solid man, and he wanted to talk the matter out.

      'If the Arabs hadn't hesitated to attack us just those ten minutes, we would have been simply wiped out.'

      'MacKenzie was all there, wasn't he?'

      Walker had the shyness of his nationality in the exhibition of enthusiasm, and he could only express his admiration for the commander of the party in terms of slang.

      'He was, my son,' answered Adamson, drily. 'My own impression is, he thought we were done for.'

      'What makes you think that?'

      'Well, you see, I know him pretty well. When things are going smoothly and everything's flourishing, he's apt to be a bit irritable. He keeps rather to himself, and he doesn't say much unless you do something he don't approve of.'

      'And then, by Jove, he comes down on you like a thousand of bricks,' Walker agreed heartily. He remembered observations which Alec on more than one occasion had made to recall him to a sense of his great insignificance. 'It's not for nothing the natives call him _Thunder and Lightning_.'

      'But when things look black, his spirits go up like one o'clock,' proceeded the doctor. 'And the worse they are the more cheerful he is.'

      'I know. When you're starving with hunger, dead tired and soaked to the skin, and wish you could just lie down and die, MacKenzie simply bubbles over with good humour. It's a hateful characteristic. When I'm in a bad temper, I much prefer everyone else to be in a bad temper, too.'

      'These last three days he's been positively hilarious. Yesterday he was cracking jokes with the natives.'

      'Scotch jokes,' said Walker. 'I daresay they sound funny in an African dialect.'

      'I've never seen him more cheerful,' continued the other, sturdily ignoring the gibe. 'By the Lord Harry, said I to myself, the chief thinks we're in a devil of a bad way.'

      Walker stood up and stretched himself lazily.

      'Thank heavens, it's all over now. We've none of us had any sleep for three days, and when I once get off I don't mean to wake up for a week.'

      'I must go and see the rest of my patients. Perkins has got a bad dose of fever this time. He was quite delirious a little while ago.'

      'By Jove, I'd almost forgotten.'

      People changed in Africa. Walker was inclined to be surprised that he was fairly happy, inclined to make a little jest when it occurred to him; and it had nearly slipped his memory that one of the whites had been killed the day before, while another was lying unconscious with a bullet in his skull. A score of natives were dead, and the rest of them had escaped by the skin of their teeth.

      'Poor Richardson,' he said.

      'We couldn't spare him,' answered the doctor slowly. 'The fates never choose the right man.'

      Walker looked at the brawny doctor, and his placid face was clouded. He knew to what the Scot referred and shrugged his shoulders. But the doctor went on.

      'If we had to lose someone it would have been a damned sight better if that young cub Allerton had got the bullet which killed poor Richardson.'

      'He wouldn't have been much loss, would he?' said Walker, after a silence.

      'MacKenzie has been very patient with him. If I'd been in his shoes I'd have sent him back to the coast when he sacked Macinnery.'

      Walker did not answer, and the doctor proceeded to moralise.

      'It seems to me that some men have natures so crooked that with every chance in the world to go straight, they can't manage it. The only thing is to let them go to the devil as best they may.'

      At that moment Alec MacKenzie came in. He was dripping with rain and threw off his macintosh. His face lit up when he saw Walker and the doctor. Adamson was an old and trusted friend, and he knew that on him he could rely always.

      'I've been going the round of the outlying sentries,' he said.

      It was unlike him to volunteer even so trivial a piece of information, and Adamson looked up at him.

      'All serene?' he asked.

      'Yes.'

      Alec's eyes rested on the doctor as though he were considering something strange about him. The doctor knew him well enough to suspect that something very grave had happened, but also he knew him too well to hazard an inquiry. Presently Alec spoke again.

      'I've just seen a native messenger that Mindabi sent me.'

      'Anything important?'

      'Yes.'

      Alec's answer was so curt that it was impossible to question him further. He turned to Walker.

      'How's the arm?'

      'Oh, that's nothing. It's only a scratch.'

      'You'd better not make too light of it. The smallest wound has a way of being troublesome in this country.'

      'He'll be all right in a day or two,' said the doctor.

      Alec sat down. For a minute he did not speak, but seemed plunged in thought. He passed his fingers through his beard, ragged now and longer than when he was in England.

      'How are the others?' he asked suddenly, looking at Adamson.

      'I don't think Thompson can last till the morning.'

      'I've just been in to see him.'

      Thompson was the man who had been shot through the head and had lain unconscious since the day before. He was an old gold-prospector, who had thrown in his lot with the expedition against the slavers.

      'Perkins of course will be down for several days longer. And some of the natives are rather badly hurt. Those devils have got explosive bullets.'

      'Is there anyone in great danger?'

      'No, I don't think so. There are two men who are in a bad way, but I think they'll pull through with rest.'

      'I see,' said Alec, laconically.

      He stared intently at the table, absently passing his hand across the gun which Walker had left there.

      'I say, have you had anything to eat lately?' asked Walker, presently.

      Alec shook himself out of his meditation and СКАЧАТЬ