All night long, between the visits which Bones had been making from the moored _Wiggle_ to the village (feeling the patient's pulse with a profound and professional air and prescribing brandy and milk), Bosambo had been busy. "Stand you at the door, Secundi," he said to his headman, "and let one of your men go to the shore to warn me of my lord Tibbetti's coming, for I have work to do. It seems this Maker of Storms were better with Sandi than with me." "Tibbetti is a fool, I think," suggested Secundi. Bosambo, kneeling on a rush mat, busy with a native chisel and a pot of clay paint, looked up. "I have beaten older men than you with a stick until they have wept," he said, "and all for less than you say. For this is the truth, Secundi, that a child cannot be a fool, though an old man may be a shame. This is the word of the blessed prophet. As for Tibbetti, he has a clean and loving heart." There was a rustle at the door and a whispered voice. The box and the tools were thrust under a skin rug and Bosambo again became the interesting invalid. In the morning Bosambo had said farewell, and a blushing Bones listened with unconcealed pleasure to the extravagant praise of his patient. "And this I tell you, Tibbetti," said Bosambo, standing thigh-deep in the river by the launch's side, "that knowing you are wise man who gathers wisdom, I have sent to the end of my country for some rare and beautiful thing that you may carry it with you." He signalled to a man on the bank, and his servant brought him a curious object. It was, Bones noted, a square box apparently of native make, for it was fantastically carved and painted. There were crude heads and hideous forms which never were on land or sea. The paint was brilliant; red, yellow and green indiscriminately splashed. "This is very ancient and was brought to my country by certain forest people. It is a Maker of Storms, and is a powerful ju-ju for good and evil." Bones, already a collector of native work, was delighted. His delight soothed him for his failure in other respects. He returned to headquarters empty-handed and sat the centre of a chilling group--if we except Patricia Hamilton--and endeavoured, as so many successful advocates have done, to hide his short-comings behind a screen of rhetoric. He came to the part of his narrative where Bosambo was taken ill without creating any notable sensation, save that Sanders's grey eyes narrowed a little and he paid greater heed to the rest of the story. "There was poor old Bosambo knocked out, sir--ab-so-lutely done for--fortunately I did not lose my nerve. You know what I am, dear old officer, in moments of crisis?" "I know," said Hamilton grimly, "something between a Welsh revivalist and a dancing dervish." "Please go on, Bones," begged the girl, not the least interested of the audience.