Niger

For once Mungo was roused to a white heat of
rage. He ran to All’s tent and found the evil old
man squatting at breakfast in the sunlight. Mungo
told him that Demba was not a slave, had com¬
mitted no crime, and could not be enslaved in
Ludamar. Surely both he and his master, who also
had committed no crime, had suffered enough
already ?
For answer Ali replied with a malignant smile
that if Mungo did not mount his horse immediately
he also would be sent back to Bubaker a slave.
Mungo stared at him a moment, his hands itching
to grip the shrivelled brown throat, regicide riding
his mind in a white heat. . . . Then his hands
dropped and he turned away to bid goodbye to
Demba.
They had journeyed together from Pisania,
through all the dangers and discomforts of the
negro kingdoms, through Woolli, Kasson, Kaarta,
endured the torments of captivity, drank the last
drops of water from a waterskin together. Demba
had penetrated through the cold reserves of the
young white man to that clear-eyed, if dark-souled
self that lay beneath ; Mungo had found the young
negro cheerful and happy and kind. ... For once
he broke down and wept in front of the sneering
Africans. Then swearing to Demba that somehow
he would procure his freedom, Mungo mounted his
horse and rode south and never saw Demba again.
On the southwards road in the next three days
Ali gradually mustered his levies. Finally, on the
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