Then with an equal doggedness he thrust all these things from his mind, and resolutely clamped down his thoughts to Tin Hill and the details of its working. No news had reached him of the importance which the freakish British public had placed upon his little arrangement about that detail of the human sacrifices. He saw himself merely as an unknown business man who in the near future would be able to sway a thing which at present he knew nothing about, and that was the tin market. The idea unconsciously fascinated him. He had no enmity against the present producers of tin, did not know indeed who they were, but he smiled grimly as he thought of the way in which presently he would govern them. It was the lust for power, which is latent in so many men, leaping up into life. The brilliant stars shone down on him from overhead, and the cool Trade carried to him salt odors of the sea, but they got from him no attention. His mind was journeying away in the African bush, on spouting river-bars, in offices, on metal exchanges.... He was roused from these dreams with much suddenness. In his up country journeying in Africa he had developed that animal instinct for the nearness of danger which is present in us all, but in nine hundred and ninety-nine men out of the thousand becomes atrophied for want of use. In the river villages the natives had given him a name which means Man-with-eyes-at-the-back-of-his-head. It was this slightly abnormal sense that sprang into quick activity, and Carter made so sudden a stoop that his face smacked against the shabby cushions on the opposite side of the tartana. But simultaneously he turned and clutched through the night, and seized a wrist, and held it with all his iron force. A moment later he found with his other hand that the wrist was connected with a long bright-bladed knife, so he twisted it savagely till that weapon fell onto the dirty carpet on the floor. And all the time, be it well understood, no sounds had been uttered, and the mouse-colored mule jogged steadily on with the tartana through the dust and the night. Then Carter began to haul in on the wrist, and the man to whom it was attached came over into the body of the vehicle, bumping his knees shrewdly against the wheel-spokes en route. "Ah, Cascaes, that's you, is it? And I thought once you claimed to be a gentleman, and agreed not to go at me from behind? Well, I'm afraid there's only one kind of medicine that will suit you, and that's the kind one gives to dogs that turn treacherous. Have you got any suggestions to make?" The Portuguese held his tongue. "Ready to take your gruel, are you? Well, I propose to give you a full dose. Hi there, driver, pull up. Wake, you sleepy head! What is it? Why, I've picked up a passenger whilst you've been nodding, and now we want to get down for a minute. Here, give me your whip." * * * * *