e crowd were
kept posted up in every step, until finally a great sigh of relief arose
from them as Dick concluded his task and rose to his feet.

But the young doctor had not yet finished with his patient, by any
means; he intended to see him safely into his own home before he left
him, and this he did, a half-dozen of the soldiers fetching the man's
bed from his house, carefully lifting him thereon, and carrying him in,
under Dick's watchful care, aided by Grosvenor as interpreter. This
done, he administered a soothing and fever-allaying draught; after
which, upon being informed by the young officer that he would probably
have no opportunity of seeing his patient again, he hypnotised the man
and subjected him to a powerful mental suggestion that all danger was
now past, that no complications of any kind would arise, and that he
would rapidly get well without further attention. This done, he and
Grosvenor rejoined the wagon and resumed their march.

The delay occasioned by this incident of the buffalo so retarded their
progress that it was close upon noon before they arrived at the margin
of the lake; and here they were curtly informed that they were about to
be conveyed to the island, and that as it was not proposed to take the
wagon or any of the animals with them, they must indicate what few
articles they thought they might require during the next few days, and
those articles would be conveyed across with them. There was a certain
indefinable, sinister suggestiveness in the character of this
communication that seemed to imply a doubt in the mind of the official
who made it whether the individuals to whom it was made would require
anything at all after "the next few days"; but Dick and Grosvenor,
acting as usual upon the general principle of taking an optimistic view
of everything, gave no sign that they detected anything of a covert
character in the intimation, and calmly indicated the trunks containing
their clothing, the medicine chest, their rifles and revolvers, and a
case of ammunition for the same, all of which were duly placed in a
large craft, in shape something between a canoe and a lighter, which
they afterward discovered was propelled by sixty paddles. At the last
moment it transpired that their black attendants, Mafuta, Jantje, and
'Nkuku were to be left behind on the mainland--which arrangement also
appeared to bear a certain sinister significance--whereupon Grosvenor
suggested the extreme importanc