"I'm not sure we need it," Fred answered. "I hope Courtney won't tell
too much!" So quickly does a man jump from praying for friends at
court to fearing them!

"Courtney looked to me," said Will, "like a man who would give no games
away."

Glad you think that of him" said Fred.

"Why?"

"Tell you later, maybe."

But he did not tell until after dinner. (It was a good dinner for East
Africa. Shark steak figured in it, under a more respectable name; and
there was zebu hump, guinea-fowl, and more different kinds of fruit
than a man could well remember.) When it was over we sat in deep
armchairs on the long wide veranda that fronts the whole hotel. The
evening sea-breeze came and wafted in on us the very scents of Araby;
the night sounds that whisper of wilderness gave the lie to a tinkling
guitar that somewhere in the distance spoke of civilized delights. The
surf crooned on coral half a mile away, and very good cigar smoke (from
a box that Monty had sent ashore with our belongings) supplemented
coffee and the other aids to physical contentment. Then, limping
between the armchairs, and ashamed that we should rise to greet
him--motioning us down again with a little nervous laugh--Courtney came
to us. Within five minutes of his coming the world, and the clock, and
the laws of men might have all reversed themselves for aught we cared.
Without really being conscious he was doing it Courtney plunged into
our problem, grasped it, sized it up, advised us, flooded us with