rrior. His build was too insignificant, more
suggestive of the Arab than the negro. His hands were like the hands of
an Egyptian mummy, dark of hue and incredibly bony. He wished he could
see the fellow's face. Hassan's description had fired his curiosity.

"So," he said, "you speak English, do you? I am glad to hear it. And you
are the Mullah of Wanda, the man who saved my life?"

He received no reply whatever from the man in the doorway. It was as if
he had not spoken.

Herne frowned. It seemed likely to be an unsatisfactory interview after
all. But just as he was about to launch upon a fresh attempt, the man
spoke, in a slow, deep voice that was not without a certain richness of
tone.

"You came to Wanda--my prisoner," he said. "You left because I do not
kill white men, and they are not good slaves. But if you return to Wanda
you will die. Therefore be wise, and go back to your people, as I go to
mine!"

Herne raised himself to a sitting position. His shoulder was beginning
to hurt him intolerably, but he strove desperately to keep it in the
background of his consciousness.

"Why don't you kill white men?" he said.

But the question was treated with a silence that felt contemptuous.

The glow without was fading swiftly, and the darkness was creeping up
like a curtain over the desert. The weird figure standing upright
against the door-flap seemed to take on a deeper mystery, a silence more
unfathomable.

Herne began to feel as if he were in a dream. If the man had not spoken
he would have wondered if his very presence were but hallucination.

He gathered his wits for another effort.

"Tell me," he said, "do you never use white men as slaves?"

Still that uncompromising silence.

Herne persevered.

"Three years ago, before the Wandis conquered the Zambas, there was a
white man, an Englishman, who placed himself at their head, and taught
them to fight. I am here to seek him. I shall not leave without news of
him."

"The Englishman is dead!" It was as if a mummy uttered the words. The
speaker neither stirred nor looked at Herne. He seemed to be gazing into
space.

Herne waited for more, but none came.

"I want proof of his death," he said, speaking very deliberately. "I
must know beyond all doubt when and how he died."

"The Englishman was burned with the other captives," the slow,
indifferent voice went on. "He died in the fire!"

"What?" said Herne, with violence. "You devil! I don't believe it