Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 1.djvu/391

 pushed back into the center of Africa, towards the trackless deserts.

"We must halt," said he, "and come down to the earth; for Joe's sake, before everything, we must return above the lake; but first we must find a current in the opposite direction."

For a quarter of an hour they searched at different altitudes. The "Victoria" always drifted over the land. But fortunately, at 1,000 feet, a very violent wind carried them to the northwest.

It was scarcely possible that Joe had remained on one of the islands, else he would have found some means to make his presence known. Perhaps he had reached terra firma. Thus the doctor reasoned when he regained the north side of the lake.

As to fancy Joe drowned was ridiculous. A terrible idea had occurred to both Kennedy and Ferguson, viz., the number of alligators existing in these places. But neither had the courage to give vent to their supposition. At length it was impossible not to refer to the ever-present thought, and the doctor said boldly:

"Crocodiles are only met with upon the banks or islands of the lake. Joe has skill enough to avoid them; besides, they are not dangerous, and the Africans bathe fearlessly and with impunity."

Kennedy did not reply; he preferred silence to the discussion of such a terrible eventuality.

The doctor perceived the town of Lari about five o'clock in the afternoon. The inhabitants were gathering their cotton crops before their huts of plaited straw, in the midst of their own well-kept enclosures. This assemblage of fifty houses occupied a small depression in the valley, which extended between the bases of the mountains. The violence of the wind carried the doctor too far, but it again changed, and he descended at the exact point of departure in the little island of hard ground where they had passed the previous night. The grapnel, instead of being fastened to a tree, was secured to the reeds mixed with the thick mud of the marsh, which gave a good holding ground. The doctor had considerable trouble to control the balloon, but at length the wind fell and the two friends kept watch together, almost despairing.