they stretched on the rugs than they were asleep. The yoke had been
slipped over the rudder, and, using the lines, Mr. Hume sailed the
Okapi single-handed, taking her across the lake-like width till he
was under the wooded hills of the south bank, where he beat about
for an hour or so in the hope that Muata might have covered the
distance at the native's trotting-pace. It was, he told himself, not
likely, however, that the chief could have done so, after being for
hours bound to a post; and after a time he beat out again into mid-
stream afar off, so that no village natives should spy upon the
craft. He did not share in the triumph of his young companions. Too
well he knew that they had risked everything by their secret
departure; but he could not see that any other course was open to
them, as if they had remained it would have been difficult for them
to prove that they were not concerned in Muata's escape. He knew,
too, that if he had abandoned the chief, as the price of security,
the boys would have lost all faith in him.

What, however, he did feel was, that the responsibility rested on
him. If a mistake had been made it was his mistake, and if the boys
suffered from it the blame would be his.

So he beat out into mid-stream, where the sail of the low-lying
craft would be but a speck when viewed from the shore, and with a
beam wind laid her on a course which she kept almost dead straight,
with a tack at long intervals only. In the shade of the awning the
boys slept the dreamless sleep of the healthy, and he let them sleep
on till the sun stood almost above the mast, sending down a blaze
that scorched. Then he beached the Okapi on the shelving shore of a
sand-spit, without vegetation of any kind to give shelter to
mosquitoes, and awoke them.