Tom limped along, anxious to reach the nullah before night. On the way Mwesa told him more about the morning’s scene at the plantation. Reinecke had boasted that the English were to be driven into the sea. All their possessions would become the booty of the Germans, and the Wahehe, if they served him faithfully, should share in it. They had once been great warriors; now they would learn how to be askaris, and under German leadership do great deeds and amass great riches. The negroes had listened to him in silence; and only when he had left them did their sullen discontent find expression. They remembered that they had always fought against the Germans, not for them; and some of the elder men said they would rather fight against them again. But there was no open revolt; cowed by years of oppression, devoid of leadership, they could only accept their destiny. With great difficulty Tom managed to drag himself along for two or three miles; then he declared that he could go no farther. It was already late in the afternoon. Mwesa at once constructed a temporary hut, and there they passed the night. Next morning, after again covering their tracks as completely as possible, they set off again. Even with Mwesa’s support, Tom could only crawl along at the rate of little more than a mile an hour. The almost disused hunter’s path was sometimes hard to find: here and there it was overgrown with thorns through which Mwesa had to cleave a way; and in the middle hours of the day the humid heat was so oppressive that Tom had to take long rests. Towards evening, however, they came suddenly upon a dip in the ground which Tom thought he recognised. "Run ahead," he said to Mwesa, "and see if the nullah is in that direction." The boy sprinted away, returning in a few minutes. "All right, sah!" he cried. "All right ober dah." They went on. Emerging from the forest, they crossed an expanse of scrub and came to the mouth of the nullah, which was like a deep cutting in the hills. A thin stream trickled down the middle: Tom could not doubt that the lake must be only a few hundred yards farther, and, in spite of his fatigue, he struggled on to make sure that he had reached his destination. There at last was the lake, still, not a breath of air bending the rushes on its banks, or stirring the trees on the island in the centre. Mwesa had just time to rig up a slight shelter of branches near the margin of the lake before darkness fell. He cooked some manioc for Tom and himself; and when Tom sank into heavy sleep, the boy kept watch all night by the fire.