“That is rather absurd,” he said; “I am accustomed to being left. I have always lived alone. You will do me a favour if you will go now and take your passage out to Africa.” “Now--this evening?” “Yes--at once. These offices close about half-past six, I believe. You will just have time to do it before dinner.” Jack rose and went towards the door. He went slowly, almost reluctantly. “Do not trouble about me,” said Sir John, “I am accustomed to being left.” He repeated it when the door had closed behind his son. The fire was low again. It was almost dying. The daylight was fading every moment. The cinders fell together with a crumbling sound, and a greyness crept into their glowing depths. The old man sitting there made no attempt to add fresh fuel. “I am accustomed,” he said, with a half-cynical smile, “to being left.” CHAPTER XLV. THE TELEGRAM How could it end in any other way? You called me, and I came home to your heart. “They tell me, sir, that Missis Marie--that is, Missis Durnovo--has gone back to her people at Sierra Leone.” Thus spoke Joseph to his master one afternoon in March, not so many years ago. They were on board the steamer Bogamayo, which good vessel was pounding down the West Coast of Africa at her best speed. The captain reckoned that he would be anchored at Loango by half-past seven or eight o'clock that evening. There were only seven passengers on board, and dinner had been ordered an hour earlier for the convenience of all concerned. Joseph was packing his master's clothes in the spacious cabin allotted to him. The owners of the steamer had thought it worth their while to make the finder of the Simiacine as comfortable as circumstances allowed. The noise of that great drug had directed towards the West Coast of Africa that floating scum of ne'er-do-welldom which is ever on the alert for some new land of promise. “Who told you that?” asked Jack, drying his hands on a towel. “One of the stewards, sir--a man that was laid up at Sierra Leone in the hospital.” Jack Meredith paused for a moment before going on deck. He looked out through the open porthole towards the blue shadow on the horizon which was Africa--a country that he had never seen three years before, and which had all along been destined to influence his whole life. “It was the best thing she could do,” he said. “It is to be hoped that she will be happy.” “Yes, sir, it is. She deserves it, if that goes for anything in the heavenly reckonin'. She's a fine woman--a good woman that, sir.” “Yes.” Joseph was folding a shirt very carefully. “A bit dusky,” he said, smoothing out the linen folds reflectively, “but I shouldn't have minded that if I had been a marryin' man, but--but I'm not.” He laid the shirt in the portmanteau and looked up. Jack Meredith had gone on deck.