sheer
exhaustion.

It was broad daylight when I awoke, and my first thought was of my
message, when, thrusting my hand into my breast, a curious sensation of
misery came over me as my hand came in contact with a piece of wood, and
it seemed that I had been dreaming and the dog had not come.

I drew out the flat piece of white wood, but it was not mine. The
doctor, probably having no paper, had hit upon the same plan as I.

His words were few.

"Be on the alert. We shall come some night."

I thrust the wooden label beneath the dust of the floor, scraped some
more earth over it, and already saw myself at liberty, and in the joy of
my heart I uttered a long parrot-like whistle, but it was not answered.

I whistled again, but there was no reply; and though I kept on making
signals for quite an hour no response came, and the joyousness began to
fade out of my breast.

Twice over that morning I saw the tall savage who was so diabolically
painted and tattooed go by, and once I thought he looked very hard at my
hut; but he soon passed out of my sight, leaving me wondering whether he
was the chief, from his being so much alone, and the curious way in
which all the people seemed to get out of his path.

Once or twice he came near enough for me to see him better, and I
noticed that he walked with his eyes fixed upon the ground in a dreamy
way, full of dignity, and I felt certain now that he must be the king of
these people.

The next day came and I saw him again in the midst of quite a crowd, who
had borne one of their number into the middle of the inclosure of huts,
and this time I saw the tall strange-looking savage go slowly down upon
his knees, and soon after rise and motion with his hands, when everyone
but the boy fell back. He alone knelt down on one side of what was
evidently an injured man.

The blacks kept their distance religiously till the painted savage
signed to them once more, when they ran forward and four of their number
lifted the prostrate figure carefully and carried it into a hut.

"I was right," I said to myself with a feeling of satisfaction. "I was
right the first time. It is the doctor, and he ought to have come to my
help when I was so bad."

Two days, three days passed, during which I lay and watched the birds
that flitted by, saw the people as they came and went, and from time to
time uttered a signal whistle; but this had to be stopped, for on the
afternoon of the third day a very