“None,” I answered.  “Search us if you will.”

“Your word is sufficient,” he replied with the grave courtesy of his people.  “If you are unarmed we have orders to let you go where you wish however you may be dressed.  Yet, Lord,” he whispered to me, “I pray you do not enter the cave, since One lives there who strikes and does not miss, One whose kiss is death.  I pray it for your own sakes, also for ours who need you.”

“We shall not wake him who sleeps in the cave,” I answered enigmatically, as we departed rejoicing, for now we had learned that the Kendah did not yet know of the death of the serpent.

An hour’s walk up the hill, guided by Hans, brought us to the mouth of the tunnel.  To tell the truth I could have wished it had been longer, for as we drew near all sorts of doubts assailed me.  What if Hans really had been drinking and invented this story to account for his absence?  What if the snake had recovered from a merely temporary indisposition?  What if it had a wife and family living in that cave, every one of them thirsting for vengeance?

Well, it was too late to hesitate now, but secretly I hoped that one of the others would prefer to lead the way.  We reached the place and listened.  It was silent as a tomb.  Then that brave fellow Hans lit the lantern and said: 

“Do you stop here, Baases, while I go to look.  If you hear anything happen to me, you will have time to run away,” words that made me feel somewhat ashamed of myself.

However, knowing that he was quick as a weasel and silent as a cat, we let him go.  A minute or two later suddenly he reappeared out of the darkness, for he had turned the metal shield over the bull’s-eye of the lantern, and even in that light I could see that he was grinning.

“It is all right, Baas,” he said.  “The Father of Serpents has really gone to that land whither he sent Bena, where no doubt he is now roasting in the fires of hell, and I don’t see any others.  Come and look at him.”

So in we went and there, true enough, upon the floor of the cave lay the huge reptile stone dead and already much swollen.  I don’t know how long it was, for part of its body was twisted into coils, so I will only say that it was by far the most enormous snake that I have ever seen.  It is true that I have heard of such reptiles in different parts of Africa, but hitherto I had always put them down as fabulous creatures transformed into and worshipped as local gods.  Also this particular specimen was, I presume, of a new variety, since, according to Ragnall, it both struck like the cobra or the adder, and crushed like the boa-constrictor.  It is possible, however, that he was mistaken on this point; I do not know, since I had no time, or indeed inclination, to examine its head for the poison fangs, and when next I passed that way it was gone.