“What an extraordinary and horrible thing!” I exclaimed. “Why, it recalls that ghastly yarn of yours about the Aboási cavern.” “I was just thinking the same myself. But come, that villain Aochi will have our coffee ready by now, and we ought to be starting for home presently. It doesn’t do to be overtaken by darkness on the lagoon.” During the return passage across the lagoon the usually loquacious and discursive Pereira preserved an unwonted silence, and I surmised that he was thinking of the old Krepi woman and her son. That this was actually the case appeared later, for after he had wished me “good-night” and was retiring to his room he paused in the doorway and looked back at me. “I can’t help thinking of that poor blind devil, Englefield,” he said. “What fearful sufferings he must have gone through, and what constant terror he must be in lest he should be discovered and dragged back to his slavery. But miserable wretch as he is, he has the advantage of you and me in one thing, if it can be considered an advantage: he holds the key to some of the darkest secrets of this mysterious land.” CHAPTER V. I ENCOUNTER A CURIOUS RELIC. A couple of days after our excursion to Anyáko I received a letter by the land post from Captain Bithery. It was dated from Axím on the Gold Coast, and in it, after giving me sundry items of news concerning the brig and her crew, the Captain went on to say that he proposed to drop down to the leeward coast in about a fortnight to ship some produce that he hoped to obtain. This produce, consisting chiefly of palm oil, kernels and copra, was to be collected for him by a certain Cæsar Olympio--a Portuguese mulatto who lived at the village of Adena or Elmina Chica, a beach village some twelve miles to leeward--_i.e._ to the east--of Quittáh; and he proposed that I should proceed to Adena to conduct the purchase and superintend the storage of the produce, leaving my store in Vanderpuye’s charge. On receiving these instructions I made the necessary arrangements with Pereira, and the same afternoon set out for Adena in a spare hammock which he lent me and which was carried on the heads of four of our labourers. This was my first experience of this mode of travelling, and very pleasant and even luxurious I found it to recline at full length in the springy, swaying hammock as the barefooted carriers trudged over the soft sand. A canopy of painted canvas protected me from the sun during the daylight and from the dew when the night closed in, and by peering underneath it I could look out at the groves of pattering cocoa-nut palms on the one side, and on the other at the ocean which surged up almost at our feet. It was about eight o’clock and bright moonlight when the hammock drew up outside the compound of Olympio’s house, and as I scrambled out on to my feet I was saluted by a little yellow-faced man with bright, beady, black eyes and a most persuasive and conciliatory smile.