y man here and burned their huts over their
heads. Pick up the knife, old chap, quick. I think those fellows mean
mischief."

The two warriors who had stood by the priest were approaching, but when
they came within a few yards of Trent's revolver they dropped on their
knees. It was their token of submission. Trent nodded, and a moment
afterwards the reason for their non-resistance was made evident. The
remainder of the expedition came filing into the little enclosure.

Trent lit a cigar and sat down on a block of wood to consider what
further was best to be done. In the meantime the natives were bringing
yams to the white men with timid gestures. After a brief rest Trent
called them to follow him. He walked across to the dwelling of the
fetish man and tore down the curtain of dried grass which hung before
the opening. Even then it was so dark inside that they had to light a
torch before they could see the walls, and the stench was horrible.

A little chorus of murmurs escaped the lips of the Europeans as the
interior became revealed to them. Opposite the door was a life-size
and hideous effigy of a grinning god, made of wood and painted in many
colours. By its side were other more horrible images and a row of human
skulls hung from the roof. The hand of a white man, blackened with age,
was stuck to the wall by a spear-head, the stench and filth of the whole
place were pestilential. Yet outside a number of women and several of
the men were on their knees hoping still against hope for aid from
their ancient gods. There was a cry of horror when Trent unceremoniously
kicked over the nearest idol--a yell of panic when the boy, with a gleam
of mischief in his eyes, threw out amongst them a worm-eaten, hideous
effigy and with a hearty kick stove in its hollow side. It lay there
bald and ugly in the streaming sunshine, a block of misshapen wood
ill-painted in flaring daubs, the thing which they had worshipped in
gloom and secret, they and a generation before them--all the mystery of
its shrouded existence, the terrible fetish words of the dead priest,
the reverence which an all-powerful and inherited superstition had kept
alive within them, came into their minds as they stood there trembling,
and then fled away to be out of the reach of the empty, staring
eyes--out of reach of the vengeance which must surely fall from the
skies upon these white savages. So they watched, the women beating their
bosoms and uttering strange crie