“Flies,” he said, “in the sunlight!”

He was silent for a time and then he repeated the same words.

Then suddenly he began to declaim.  “Oh!  Brutes together.  Apes.  Apes with knives.  Have they no lord, no master, to save them from such things?  This is the life of men when no man rules. . . .  When no man rules. . . .  Not even himself. . . .  It is because we are idle, because we keep our wits slack and our wills weak that these poor devils live in hell.  These things happen here and everywhere when the hand that rules grows weak.  Away in China now they are happening.  Persia.  Africa. . . .  Russia staggers.  And I who should serve the law, I who should keep order, wander and make love. . . .  My God! may I never forget!  May I never forget!  Flies in the sunlight!  That man’s face.  And those six men!

“Grip the savage by the throat.

“The weak savage in the foreign office, the weak savage at the party headquarters, feud and indolence and folly.  It is all one world.  This and that are all one thing.  The spites of London and the mutilations of Macedonia.  The maggots that eat men’s faces and the maggots that rot their minds.  Rot their minds.  Rot their minds.  Rot their minds. . . .”

To Amanda it sounded like delirium.

“Cheetah!” she said suddenly between remonstrance and a cry of terror.

The darkness suddenly became quite still.  He did not move.

She was afraid.  “Cheetah!” she said again.

“What is it, Amanda?”

“I thought—.  Are you all right?”

“Quite.”

“But do you feel well?”

“I’ve got this cold I caught in Ochrida.  I suppose I’m feverish. 
But—­yes, I’m well.”

“You were talking.”

Silence for a time.

“I was thinking,” he said.

“You talked.”

“I’m sorry,” he said after another long pause.

10

The next morning Benham had a pink spot on either cheek, his eyes were feverishly bright, he would touch no food and instead of coffee he wanted water.  “In Monastir there will be a doctor,” he said.  “Monastir is a big place.  In Monastir I will see a doctor.  I want a doctor.”

They rode out of the village in the freshness before sunrise and up long hills, and sometimes they went in the shade of woods and sometimes in a flooding sunshine.  Benham now rode in front, preoccupied, intent, regardless of Amanda, a stranger, and she rode close behind him wondering.

“When you get to Monastir, young man,” she told him, inaudibly, “you will go straight to bed and we’ll see what has to be done with you.”

“AMMALATO,” said Giorgio confidentially, coming abreast of her.

“Medico in Monastir,” said Amanda.

“Si,—­MOLTI Medici, Monastir,” Giorgio agreed.

Then came the inevitable dogs, big white brutes, three in full cry charging hard at Benham and a younger less enterprising beast running along the high bank above yapping and making feints to descend.