ad not stocked up yet
with new things, and probably he did not know our old ones were at the
bottom of the sea.) He was a lion-hearted rascal though, at all events
at the first rush, for poverty on the surface did not trouble him.

---------------
* Jambo, good day.
---------------

"You send for me? You want a good guide?"

The Haroun-al-Raschid look had disappeared. Now he was the
jack-of-all-trades, wondering which end of the jack to push in first.

"When I need a guide I'll get a licensed one," said Fred, sitting down
and turning partly away from him. (It never pays to let those gentry
think they have impressed you.) "What is your business, Johnson?"

"My name Hassan, sah. You send for me? You want a headman. I'm
formerly headman for Tippoo Tib, knowing all roads, and how to manage
wapagazi,* safari,** all things!"

---------------
* Wapagazi, plural of pagazi, porter.
** Safari, journey, and, by inference, outfit for a journey.
---------------

"Any papers to prove it?" asked Fred.

"No, sir. Reference to Tippoo Tib himself sufficient! He my
part-uncle."

"Ready to tell any kind of a lie for you, eh?"

"No, sir, always telling truth! You got a cook yet?"

"Can you cook?" Fred answered guardedly.

"Yes, sah. Was cook formerly for Master Stanley, go with him on
expedition. Later his boy. Later his headman. You want to go on
expedition, I getting you good cook. Where you want to go?"

"Are you looking for a job?" asked Fred.

"What you after? Ivory?"

"Maybe."

"I know all about ivory--I shoot, trade ivory along o' Tippoo Tib an'
Stanley. You engage my services, all very well."

"Go and tell Tippoo Tib we want to see him. If he confirms what you
say, perhaps we'll take you on," said Fred.

"Tell Tippoo Tib? Ha-ha! You want to find his buried ivory--that it?
All white men wanting that! All right, I go tell him! I come again!"

"Come back here, you fat rascal!" ordered Fred. "What do you mean
about buried ivory? What buried ivory?"

Hassan's face lost some of its transcendent cheek. Even the dyed beard
seemed to wilt.

"What you wanting?" he asked. "Hunt, trade, travel--what your
business?"

"Fish!" Fred answered genially.

"Samaki?"

"Yes--samaki--fish!"

Having no experience of Arabs, and part-Arabs, I wondered what on earth
Fred could be driving at. But Hassan wondered still more, and that was
the whole point. He stood agape, looking from one to the othe