othing. It is good you came first to me. You would better stand that
rifle over here in the corner of my tent. To walk back to the hotel
with it over your shoulder would be dangerous."

"I've taken bigger chances than that," said I.

"If you have shot nothing, then it is not so serious," he said,
disappearing behind a curtain into the recesses of his tent.

He stayed in there for about ten minutes. I had about made up my mind
to walk away when four of his boys approached the tent from behind, and
one of them cried "Hodi!" The boy to whom he had given directions
across my shoulder was not among them.

They threw the buck down near my feet, and he came out from the gloomy
interior and stared at it. He asked them questions rapidly in the
native tongue, and they answered, pointing at me.

"They say you shot it," he told me, stroking his great beard
alternately with either hand.

"Then they lie!" I answered.

"Let me see that rifle!" he said, reaching out an enormous freckled
fist to take it.

I saw through his game at last. It would have been the easiest thing
in the world to extract a cartridge from the clip in the magazine and
claim afterward that I had fired it away. Evidently he proposed to get
me in his power, though for just what reason he was so determined to
make use of me rather than any one else was not so clear.

"So I shot the buck, did I?" I asked.

"Those four natives say they saw you shoot it."

"Then it's mine?"

He nodded.

"It's heavy," I said, "but I expect I can carry it."

I took the buck by the hind legs and swung myself under it. It weighed
more than a hundred pounds, but the African climate had not had time
enough to sap my strength or destroy sheer pleasure in muscular effort.

"What's mine's my own!" I laughed. "You gave me something to eat after
all! Good day, and good riddance!"

The boys tried to prevent my carrying the buck away.

"Come back!" growled the professor. "I will take responsibility for
that buck and save you from punishment. Bring it back! Lay it down!"

But I continued to walk away, so he ordered his boys to take the
carcass from me. I laid it down and threatened them with my butt end.
He brought his own rifle out and threatened me with that. I laughed at
him, bade him shoot if he dared, offered him three shots for a penny,
and ended by shouldering the buck again and walking off.

Meat was cheap in Nairobi in those days, so the owner of the hot