er," Will asked, "be shot in the dark with a run for
your money, or fed to the crocks in the doctor's pond?" And he told
him about the crocodiles to encourage him.

"They'll have to let me out of jail at the end of the month," Brown
argued.

"Don't you believe it! In less than a week from now we'll all be in on
one and the same charge of filibustering! They'll not let you go back
to British East to tell tales about their treatment of the rest of us,"
Will assured him.

But Brown proved tinged with a little streak of yellow somewhere. It
was not until the afternoon march that Fred and Will, one on either
side of him, by appeals to his racial instinct and recalling the
methods of the military court, induced him to do his part. Once having
promised he vowed he would see the thing through to the end; but he
was the weak link; he was afraid; and he disbelieved in the wisdom of
the attempt.

It was Kazimoto in the end who kept Brown up to the mark, and shamed
him into action by superior courage. Fred found a chance to speak to
him as the long string rested al noon under the narrow shade of a
cactus hedge, and warned him in about fifty words of what was intended.
(The askaris, almost as leg-weary as the gang, were sprawling at the
far end of the line, gambling at pitch-and-toss.)

"Be sure you sleep as near to the partition as you can. Get details of
the plan from Mr. Brown, and then drill the porters one by one! Don't
let them tell one another. You tell each one of them yourself!"

Then he walked down the line and ordered the porters in a loud voice to
obey the askaris implicitly, and to work harder in return for the good
food and care they were getting, winking at the same time very
emphatically, with the eye the askaris could not see.

The night work was the hardest, because, although we were quite sure
about direction, even in the dark, it was another matter to feel our
way and carry unaccustomed loads. By day we decided what to take and
what to leave behind, and we cut down what to take with us to the
irreducible, dangerous minimum. Then we broke that up into thirty- or
forty-pound packages, so that when we all three made the trip to the
dhow the most we took at one time was about a hundred pounds' weight.
In the condition I was in I could take not more than one trip to the
others' two; after the first it was agreed that I would better stay
behind and keep an eye on the askari. The minute he showed sym