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Then a foundation was laid of saplings; the walls were also lined with tough wood, and the Okapi, lightened of her cargo and steel deck, was bodily dragged up, and, after a long effort, safely lowered into the dry dock. Everything was made trim, a layer of branches placed over all, then the leaf-mould restored, and all leveled down.
Maybe we will learn from it how to make tools for the building of boats." "I will search, O son of my white man." She sat awhile, then produced a cob-pipe, and, after getting a fill of tobacco, went off smoking with the bowl against her cheek. "Humph!" said Venning. "Wants to keep us as boat-builders. I bet she's taken the Okapi as the first of the fleet for the great exodus."
Next the boys smacked each other on the back. "Was it by accident or design, Compton, that you led them into the shallows?" "I saw we could not reach the shelter of the island, and was feeling bad, when I caught a ripple on the water to the right. I edged the Okapi on after the first ball shot was fired, and as we drew nearer I was sure there was a long sandbank.
He was even pleased to crack a few jokes over the novel machinery for working the screw of the Okapi by levers, and in the evening he invited Mr. Hume to a friendly game of cards, thoughtfully including in his invitation a bottle of brandy and a box of cigars, for, said he, he wished to wash out the execrable taste of the everlasting manioc.
Mr. Hume, however, kept him off with a "not so fast" and a hand against his breast. "Talk to him, Muata. Ask him what he wants, who he is, and all the rest." Muata stepped into the canoe, caught up the paddle, and sat down to palaver. A line was made fast to the canoe, and it drifted astern of the Okapi, which kept on her course.
"Pull her through the screen," whispered the hunter, as he caught up his rifle, "but make no noise;" and he took up another position ashore, this time facing the other end of the channel. With great caution the boys coaxed the Okapi through the trailing branches, so that she would be hidden from view if the natives looked up the channel.
The oars were drawn in as the Okapi, caught in a current, was borne right into the bank at a spot where the trees came down to the brink. Mr. Hume caught a branch, and the stern swung round. Before them, about a quarter of a mile off perhaps, was the great fire they had first seen, still fed by natives, whose dark figures stood out and disappeared as they moved about.
And as they feasted their eyes were on the move, and their ears on the stretch. Their manoeuvre had apparently succeeded, for the canoes were all beating up towards the fires under the belief that the Okapi had kept on, and there was no suspicious movement by the people on the shore. So they remained where they were, keeping themselves in position by holding on to the branches.
Muata replied in the same fashion, and called out. Back from the shadows came a quavering answer. Muata called again, and out from under the roof of leaves, formed by the overhanging branches, shot a tiny craft, with two men in her. The Okapi slowed down, and the little canoe, with many a halt, timidly drew near till the occupants could be clearly seen.
Compton put the wheel over, and the Okapi slid away from that dangerous screen. Then they slowed up and looked, but there was no sound and no sign from the hidden enemy. Doubtless, fierce eyes were glaring out upon them, but they could see nothing, and with a long uneasy look all around they kept on for a mile or so, when they came upon a clearing that spoke of man.
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