the bow of the _Zaire_ down
stream.

* * * * *

Thus said Wafa, the half-breed, for he was neither foreign Arab nor
native N'gombi, yet combined the cunning of both--

"Soon we shall see the puc-a-puc of Government turn from the
crookedness of the river, and I will go out and speak to our lord
Tibbetti, who is a very simple man, and like a child."

"O Wafa," said one of the group of armed men which stood shivering on
the beach in the cold hours of dawn, "may this be a good palaver! As for
me, my stomach is filled with fearfulness. Let us all drink this magic
water, for it gives us men courage."

"That you shall do when you have carried out all our master's works,"
said Wafa, and added with confidence: "Have no fear, for soon you shall
see great wonders."

They heard the deep boom of the _Zaire's_ siren signalling a solitary
and venturesome fisherman to quit the narrow fair-way, and presently she
came round the bend of the river, a dazzling white craft, showering
sparks from her two slender smoke-stacks and leaving behind her twin
cornucopias of grey smoke.

Wafa stepped into a canoe, and, seeing that the others were preparing to
follow him, he struck out swiftly, man[oe]uvring his ironwood boat to
the very waters from whence a scared fisherman was frantically paddling.

"Go not there, foreigner," wailed the Isisi Stabber-of-Waters, "for it
is our lord Sandi, and his puc-a-puc has bellowed terribly."

"Die you!" roared Wafa. "On the river bottom your body, son of a fish
and father of snakes!"

"O foreign frog!" came the shrill retort. "O poor man with two men's
wives! O goatless----"

Wafa was too intent upon his business to heed the rest. He struck the
water strongly with his broad paddles, and reached the centre of the
channel.

Bones of the Houssas put up his hand and jerked the rope of the siren.

_Whoo-o-o--woo-o-op!_

"Bless his silly old head," said Bones fretfully, "the dashed fellow
will be run down!"

The girl was dusting Bones's cabin, and looked round. "What is it?" she
asked.

Bones made no reply. He gripped the telegraph handle and rung the
engines astern as Yoka, the steersman, spun the wheel.

Bump! Bump! Bumpity bump!

The steamer slowed and stopped, and the girl came out to the bridge in
alarm. The _Zaire_ had struck a sandbank, and was stranded high, if not
dry.

"Bring that man on board," said the wrathful Bones. And they hauled to
his presence