We
are in these men's power."
Then he remembered and walked away, and presently we marched forward
as though nothing had happened. Only from that moment I do not think
that any of us worried ourselves about the Kalubi and what might
befall him. Still, looking back on the thing, I think that there was
this excuse to be made for the man. He was mad with the fear of death
and knew not what he did.
All that day we travelled on through a rich, flat country that, as we
could tell from various indications, had once been widely cultivated.
Now the fields were few and far between, and bush, for the most part a
kind of bamboo scrub, was reoccupying the land. About midday we halted
by a water-pool to eat and rest, for the sun was hot, and here the
four men who had carried off the boy's body rejoined us and made some
report. Then we went forward once more towards what seemed to be a
curious and precipitous wall of black cliff, beyond which the
volcanic-looking mountain towered in stately grandeur. By three
o'clock we were near enough to this cliff, which ran east and west as
far as the eye could reach, to see a hole in it, apparently where the
road terminated, that appeared to be the mouth of a cave.
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