Despite disquieting rumours, the expedition was allowed to depart from the river-camp unmolested. For two days they marched through the gloomy forest with all speed. On the third day one of the men of Durnovo's division captured a native who had been prowling on their heels in the line of march. Victor Durnovo sent captor and prisoner to the front of the column, with a message to Oscard that he would come presently and see what information was to be abstracted from the captive. At the midday halt Durnovo accordingly joined Oscard, and the man was brought before them. He was hardly worthy of the name, so disease-stricken, so miserable and half-starved was he. At first Durnovo and he did not seem to be able to get to an understanding at all; but presently they hit upon a dialect in which they possessed a small common knowledge. His news was not reassuring. In dealing with numbers he rarely condescended to the use of less than four figures, and his conception of a distance was very vague. “Ask him,” said Oscard, “whether he knows that there is an Englishman with a large force on the top of a mountain far to the east.” Durnovo translated, and the man answered with a smile. In reply to some further question the negro launched into a detailed narrative, to which Durnovo listened eagerly. “He says,” said the latter to Oscard, “that the Plateau is in possession of the Masais. It was taken two months ago. The blacks were sold as slaves; the two Englishmen were tortured to death and their bodies burnt.” Oscard never moved a muscle. “Ask him if he is quite sure about it.” “Quite,” replied Durnovo, after questioning. “By God! Oscard; what a pity! But I always knew it. I knew it was quite hopeless from the first.” He passed his brown hand nervously over his face, where the perspiration stood in beads. “Yes,” said Oscard slowly; “but I think we will go on all the same.” “What!” cried Durnovo. “Go on?” “Yes,” replied Guy Oscard; “we will go on, and if I find you trying to desert I'll shoot you down like a rat.” CHAPTER XXVI. IN PERIL He made no sign; the fires of Hell were round him, The Pit of Hell below. “About as bad as they can be, sir. That's how things is.” Joseph set down his master's breakfast on the rough table that stood in front of his tent and looked at Jack Meredith. Meredith had a way of performing most of his toilet outside his tent, and while Joseph made his discouraging report he was engaged in buttoning his waistcoat. He nodded gravely, but his manner was not that of a man who fully realised his position of imminent danger. Some men are like this--they die without getting at all flustered. “There's not more nor two or three out of the whole lot that I can put any trust in,” continued Joseph. Jack Meredith was putting on his coat. “I know what a barrack-room mutiny is. I've felt it in the hatmosphere, so to speak, before now, sir.”