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Updated: June 9, 2025
From this point of vantage Trent could trace backwards their day's march for many miles, the white posts left by the surveyor even were visible, and in the background rose the mountains of Bekwando. It had been a hard week's work for Trent. He had found chaos, discontent, despair.
If he had not been engrossed by his care lest any one might over-hear their conversation, he would have been astonished at the change in her face. "You are talking in enigmas surely," she said. "Nothing of that sort could possibly happen to you. They tell me that the Bekwando Land shares are priceless, and that you must make millions."
Stanley Cathcart, what the devil you and your assistant are doing shacking here in the cool of the day when you are the servants of the Bekwando Company and there's work to be done of the utmost importance? The whole place seems to be asleep. Where's your labour? There's not a soul at work. We planned exactly when to start the road. What the mischief do you mean by wasting a fortnight?"
He stood in safety near the door, and as he leaned forward, speaking now in a hoarse whisper, he reminded Trent momentarily of one of those hideous fetish gods in the sacred grove at Bekwando. "Your partner was no corpse when you left him," he hissed out. "You were a fool and a bungler not to make sure of it.
"The document," Trent said, "is signed by the King and witnessed by Captain Francis, who is Agent-General out here, or something of the sort, for the English Government. It was no gift and don't you think it, but a piece of hard bartering. Forty bearers carried our presents to Bekwando and it took us three months to get through. There is enough in it to make us both millionaires.
He spoke of their ultimate success, of the granting of the concession which had laid the foundation of his fortunes, and then of that terrible journey back through the bush, followed by the natives who had already repented of their action, and who dogged their footsteps hour after hour, waiting for them only to sleep or rest to seize upon them and haul them back to Bekwando, prisoners for the sacrifice.
"It is very slowly here," Oom Sam said, "that progress is made! The climate is too horrible. It makes dead sheep of men." "You seem to hang on pretty well," Trent remarked carelessly. "Been up country lately?" "I was trading with the King of Bekwando a month ago," Oom Sam answered. "Palm-oil and mahogany for vile rum I suppose," Trent said. The man extended his hands and shrugged his shoulders.
The general public did not understand the situation, even those who were in a measure behind the scenes found it hard to believe that the attack upon the Bekwando Gold and Land shares was purely a personal one.
"Never heard of it," he said; "but there's trouble ahead for you. They are dancing the war-dance at Bekwando, and the King has been shut up for three days with the priest and never opened his mouth. We were on our way from the interior, and relied upon them for food and drink. They've always been friendly, but this time we barely escaped with our lives." Trent's face grew serious.
Now he was on his way back from a tour almost to Bekwando itself by the route of the proposed road. Already the work of preparation had begun. Hundreds of natives left in their track were sawing down palm-trees, cutting away the bush, digging and making ready everywhere for that straight, wide thoroughfare which was to lead from Bekwando village to the sea-coast.
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