"I have explicit orders from Inspector Egerton not
to allow any communication between these people here and the other
branches of the tribe."

"Why not?" asked Colina.

Plaskett shrugged deprecatingly. "Not for me to say. I can guess,
perhaps. It's not possible to lock them all up, but these people are
under arrest just the same. I must keep the disaffected from mingling
with the loyal."

"That's all right," said Colina, "but you can give me a policeman to go
up the river with me and make a search."

He shook his head regretfully but firmly. "Inspector Egerton ordered
me to leave the up-river people alone," he said. "The coming of a
policeman would throw them into excitement. No one can say what they
might do. I can't take the responsibility."

Colina shrugged. "Then the Grampierres and I must go by ourselves,"
she said.

Plaskett became even stiffer and more uncomfortable. "Germain
Grampierre and his brother had no business to leave home," he said.

"By their own confessions they are implicated in the raid on the
Company's flour-mill. They were told that if they remained at home
they would not be molested. But if they attempted to escape they would
immediately be arrested."

"They're not trying to escape!" cried Colina.

"I don't believe they are," said Plaskett. "But I've got to send them
home. Orders are orders."

But this was not the kind of argument to use with a young woman whose
blood is up.

"Don't you recognize anything but orders?" she cried. "Inspector
Egerton is hundreds of miles away by this time. Are you going to wait
for his orders before you act?"

Plaskett's position was not an enviable one. "When anything new comes
up I have to act for myself," he explained stiffly. "The story about
this girl is not new. During the past week I have examined every
principal man in the tribe and many of the women.

"I have not found any clue to the existence of such a person.
Moreover, every man has testified in unmistakable signs that Ambrose
Doane was not only at large while he was with them, but that he
directed all their movements."

"They have been told that by saying this they can save themselves,"
said Colina.

"Possibly," said Plaskett, "but I cannot believe that among so many
there is not one who would betray himself."

For half an hour they had it out, back and forth, without making any
progress. Plaskett used all of a man's arguments to persuade her to
return to Enter