Sanders swore volubly for five minutes; then he went off to interview the chief of the village. The interview was short and to the point. Sanders knew this native very well, and made no mistakes. "Chief," he said at the end of the palaver, "two things I may do; one is to punish you for your disobedience, and the other is to go on my way." "Master," said the other earnestly, "if you give my village to the fire, yet I would not take the woman M'Lino." "So much I realise," said Sanders; "therefore I will go on my way." He marched at dawn on the following day, the woman a little ahead of the column, and under his eye. Halting for a "chop" and rest at mid-day, a man of the Houssas came to him and said there was a dead man hanging from a tree in the wood. Sanders went immediately with the man to the place of the hanging, for he was responsible for the peace of the district. "Where?" he asked, and the man pointed to a straight gum-tree that stood by itself in a clearing. "Where?" asked Sanders again, for there was no evidence of tragedy. The man still pointed at the tree, and Sanders frowned. "Go forward and touch his foot," said the Commissioner, and, after a little hesitation, the soldier walked slowly to the tree and put out his hand. But he touched nothing but air, as far as Sanders could see. "You are mad," he said, and whistled for the sergeant. "What do you see there?" asked Sanders, and the sergeant replied instantly: "Beyond the hanging man----" "There is no hanging man," said Sanders coolly--for he began to appreciate the need for calm reasoning--"nothing but a tree and some shadows." The Houssa looked puzzled, and turned a grave face to his. "Master, there is a man hanging," he said. "That is so," said Sanders quietly; "we must investigate this matter." And he signed for the party to return to the camp. On the way he asked carelessly if the sergeant had spoken with the woman M'Lino. "I saw her, but she did not speak, except with her eyes." Sanders nodded. "Tell me," he said, "where did you bury Tembeli, the son of Sekambano?" "Master, we left him, in accordance with our custom, on the ground at the foot of a tree." Sanders nodded again, for this is not the custom of the Houssas. "We will go back on our tracks to the camping place where the woman came to us," he said. They marched until sundown, and whilst two men pitched his tent Sanders strolled round the little camp. The men were sitting about their cooking-pots, but the woman M'Lino sat apart, her elbows on her knees, her face between her hands. "M'Lino," he said to her, halting suddenly before her, "how many men have you killed in your life?" She looked at him long and fixedly, and he returned the stare; then she dropped her eyes. "Many men," she said. "So I think," said Sanders. He was eating his dinner when Abiboo came slowly toward him. "Master, the man has died," he said. Sanders looked at him narrowly. "Which man?"