e farther out into the
darkness, smoking cigars and drinking some rather wonderful coffee. The
doctor had gone off to see a patient, and Von Ragastein was thoughtful.
Their guest, on the other hand, continued to be reminiscently
discursive.

"Our meeting," he observed, lazily stretching out his hand for his
glass, "should be full of interest to the psychologist. Here we are,
brought together by some miraculous chance to spend one night of our
lives in an African jungle, two human beings of the same age, brought
up together thousands of miles away, jogging on towards the eternal
blackness along lines as far apart as the mind can conceive."

"Your eyes are fixed," Von Ragastein murmured, "upon that very blackness
behind which the sun will rise at dawn. You will see it come up from
behind the mountains in that precise spot, like a new and blazing
world."

"Don't put me off with allegories," his companion objected petulantly.
"The eternal blackness exists surely enough, even if my metaphor is
faulty. I am disposed to be philosophical. Let me ramble on. Here am I,
an idler in my boyhood, a harmless pleasure-seeker in my youth till
I ran up against tragedy, and since then a drifter, a drifter with a
slowly growing vice, lolling through life with no definite purpose, with
no definite hope or wish, except," he went on a little drowsily, "that I
think I'd like to be buried somewhere near the base of those mountains,
on the other side of the river, from behind which you say the sun comes
up every morning like a world on fire."

"You talk foolishly," Von Ragastein protested. "If there has been
tragedy in your life, you have time to get over it. You are not yet
forty years old."

"Then I turn and consider you," Dominey continued, ignoring altogether
his friend's remark. "You are only my age, and you look ten years
younger. Your muscles are hard, your eyes are as bright as they were in
your school days. You carry yourself like a man with a purpose. You rise
at five every morning, the doctor tells me, and you return here, worn
out, at dusk. You spend every moment of your time drilling those filthy
blacks. When you are not doing that, you are prospecting, supervising
reports home, trying to make the best of your few millions of acres of
fever swamps. The doctor worships you but who else knows? What do you do
it for, my friend?"

"Because it is my duty," was the calm reply.

"Duty! But why can't you do your duty in your own co