SOME MODERN GLADIATORS
folks. And he was the fay we were taking chances of not meeting. Why, say, I reckon the dust on his conscience was seven inches thick. I told Tib it was bad enough to get chummy with various disagreeable forms of deaths in just trying to catch wild life for a show, without skiving our margin down another degree by inviting the acquaintance of that highbinder. But he simply laughed, and reminded me of the innumerable times I had not been killed, and kept on his way.
"But when we reached the Uganda border almost all our porters threw down their packs and demonstrated they possessed about as much sand as an invalid meadow-lark. It did no good to twit them of the deficit, however, and although Tib's reproaches were about as sweet as a wormwood factory they remained firm, stifled their pride, and insisted they would have naught to do with Feeney Scraws and his children. They would wait on the border until they had read our obituary notice, but cross the line they would not. Several eight-bore rifles as bribes finally resulted in a handful of Zulu boys sticking by us, but we left most of the baggage behind with the scared ones.
"Thus with a very slim entourage we drew near Mr. Scraws's boma, as the native village is called, and began hunting the fever-laden marsh for white leopards.
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