oo
strong.'

'When we came to the station at Munias, and I was laid up with fever,
you and Macinnery took the opportunity to get into an ugly scrape with
some native women. You knew that that was the one thing I would not
stand. I have nothing to do with morality--everyone is free in these
things to do as he chooses--but I do know that nothing causes more
trouble with the natives, and I've made definite rules on the subject.
If the culprits are Swahilis I flog them, and if they're whites I send
them back to the coast. That's what I ought to have done with you, but
it would have broken Lucy's heart.'

'It was Macinnery's fault.'

'It's because I thought Macinnery was chiefly to blame that I sent him
back alone. I determined to give you another chance. It struck me that
the feeling of authority might have some influence on you, and so, when
I had to build a _boma_ to guard the road down to the coast, I put the
chief part of the stores in your care and left you in command. I need
not remind you what happened there.'

George looked down at the floor sulkily, and in default of excuses, kept
silent. He felt a sullen resentment as he remembered Alec's anger. He
had never seen him give way before or since to such a furious wrath, and
he had seen Alec hold himself with all his strength so that he might not
thrash him. Alec remembered too, and his voice once more grew hard and
cold.

'I came to the conclusion that it was hopeless. You seemed to me rotten
through and through.'

'Like my father before me,' sneered George, with a little laugh.

'I couldn't believe a word you said. You were idle and selfish. Above
all you were loathsomely, wantonly cruel. I was aghast when I heard of
the fiendish cruelty with which you'd used the wretched men whom I left
with you. If I hadn't returned in the nick of time, they'd have killed
you and looted all the stores.'

'It would have upset you to lose the stores, wouldn't it?'

'Is that all you've got to say?'

'You always believed their stories rather than mine.'

'It was difficult not to believe when a man showed me his back all torn
and bleeding, and said you'd had him flogged because he didn't cook your
food to your satisfaction.'

'I did it in a moment of temper. A man's not responsible for what he
does when he's got fever.'

'It was too late to send you to the coast then, and I was obliged to
take you on. And now the end has come. Your murder of that woman has
put us all i