ey could be manned. The white men on
the steamer were running away; they were frightened; there was spoil and
revenge to be got for the taking. And from unseen villages on the
islands and on the bank other canoes shot out to get their share.

In the mean while Kettle consolidated his defences. Frantically he
worked, and like Trojans Clay and the negroes labored under him. All
that drunken doctor's limp _laissez faire_ was gone now. The blood of
some fighting ancestor had warmed up inside him. He might be physically
weak and unhandy, but the lust of battle filled him up like new drink,
and he forgot his disgraceful past, and lived only for the thrill of the
present moment.

The log barricades had to be lashed and strutted so that no collision
could unship them, and all hands sweated and strained in that tropical
heat, till the job could not be bettered. And at the after part of the
lower deck, Commandant Balliot, driven on also by the strong-willed man
whom nobody on board could resist, tended the engines with all his brain
and nerve, and did his best to make the fighting machine perfect.

"Now," said Kettle at last, "as we have got those fool Tommies nicely
tailed out about the river, we'll quit this running-away game, and get
to business. Mr. Chief Engineer, open that throttle all it'll go, and
let her rip, and mind you're standing by for my next order. Doc, you
keep your musketry class well in hand. Don't waste shots. But when you
see me going to run down a canoe, stand by to give them eternal ginger
when they're ten yards from the stern. I'll whistle when you're
to fire."

Captain Kettle went on to the upper deck and took over the wheel, and
screwed it over hard-a-port. The little top-heavy steamer swung round in
a quick circle, lurching over dangerously to the outside edge. She ran
for half a mile up stream, and then turned again and came back at the
top of her gait. She was aiming at one particular canoe, which for a
while came on pluckily enough to meet her.

But African nerve has its limits, and the sight of this strange uncouth
steamer, which followed so unflinchingly their every movement, was too
much for the sweating paddlers. They turned their ponderous dug-out's
head, and tried to escape.

Kettle watched them like a cat. He had the whistle string in his teeth,
so as to leave him both hands free for the steering wheel, and when the
moment came he threw back his head, and drew the string. The scream of