Page:Travels in West Africa, Congo Français, Corisco and Cameroons (IA travelsinwestafr00kingrich).pdf/227

 But although there are plenty of doors, as four enter the saloon from the deck, I do not see my way to doing this performance aimlessly, and what in this world they are both after I cannot think. So I confine myself to woman's true sphere, and assist in a humble way by catching the wine and Vichy water bottles, glasses, and plates of food, which at every performance are jeopardised by the members of the nobler sex starting off with a considerable quantity of the ample table-cloth wrapped round their legs. At last I can stand it no longer, so ask the captain point-blank what is the matter. "Nothing," says he, bounding out of his chair and flying out of his doorway; but on his return he tells me he has got a bet on of two bottles of champagne with Woermann's agent for Njole, as to who shall reach Lembarene first, and the German agent has started off some time before the Éclaireur in his little steam launch.

During the afternoon we run smoothly along; the free pulsations of the engines telling what a very different thing coming down the Ogowé is to going up against its terrific current. Every now and again we stop to pick up cargo, or discharge over-carried cargo, and the captain's mind becomes lulled by getting no news of the Woermann's launch having passed down. He communicates this to the engineer; it is impossible she could have passed the Éclaireur since they started, therefore she must be somewhere behind at a subfactory, ''"N'est-ce pas?" "Oui, oui, certainement,"'' says the engineer. The engineer is, by these considerations, also lulled, and feels he may do something else but scan the river à la sister Ann. What that something is puzzles me; it evidently requires secrecy, and he shrinks from detection. First he looks down one side of the deck, no one there; then he looks down the other, no one there; good so far. I then see he has put his head through one of the saloon port-holes; no one there; he hesitates a few seconds until I begin to wonder whether his head will suddenly appear through my port; but he regards this as an unnecessary precaution, and I hear him enter his cabin which abuts on mine and there is silence for some minutes. Writing home to his mother, think I, as I go on putting a new braid round the bottom of a worn