“Yours?” he asked.

I nodded.

“A close call!  I have seen closer!  I have stood so close to the brink of death that the width of an eyelash would have damned me!”

“Piffle!” I answered rudely.  “How can the already damned be damned again?”

He laughed.

“You are sick still.  You are petulant.  Never mind.  I was coming to call on you.  I watched you leave the camp from the top of that hill behind you, and followed.  It is better.  We can talk here without being overheard.  Send those natives away!”

“Certainly not!” I answered, but I reckoned without the professor and the fear his hairy presence instilled in them.

“Go!” he said simply in the native tongue; and although I ordered them at once to stay by me they ran back to the camp as fast as their legs could carry them.

“How do you feel now?” the professor asked.

I stared at him, wondering just what he meant.

“I mean, without a pistol!”

I saw the point.  The rest-camp was not far away, but as far as I could judge we were quite out of sight from it, and unless there should happen to be some one hiding among the rocks at the foot of the hill behind me we were quite alone, unless, as was probable, he had placed one or two of his own hangers-on in hiding within call.

“This grave should be a lesson to you!” he grinned.

“It has been,” I answered.

“An illustration,” he suggested.

“A period,” said I.

“To your youth?” he asked maliciously.  “To the age of folly?”

“To the time,” I said, “when any man could blackmail me.  I would go into that grave ten times rather than tell you what you want to know!”

“There are worse places than the grave!” he said, beginning to leer savagely.  His eyes glittered.  He could scarcely find patience for argument.  The thin veneer of his first mock-friendliness was gone utterly.

“I imagine that German colonial life is far worse than death,” said I.

“German will be the only rule in Africa,” he answered.  “You fools of English have set your hopes on the Christian missionary.  No weaker-backed camel could exist!  The German Michael is wiser!  Islam is the key to the native mind—­Islam and the lash—­they understand that!  In a few years there will be nothing in Africa that is not German from core to epidermis!  As to whether you shall live to see that day or not depends on yourself, my young friend!”

Being quite sure that he had a plan in mind that nothing would prevent him from unfolding, I did not waste effort or words on prompting him, but sat still.  My silence and apparent lack of curiosity disturbed him; there is nothing your bully likes better than to force his victim into a war of words.