Compton had found his father’s book.  When the woman gave it to him he sat down for an hour turning over the leaves, closely filled with neatly written handwriting interspersed with many sketches.  To him it was a message from the dead—­a priceless treasure; and as he read and saw how valuable it was as a record of close and intelligent observation in a new field, he was seized with an eagerness to be off with it out of the wilderness.  He hurried to the cave, but, of course, there was no one there.  Then, still carrying the priceless book, he ran on to the gorge, where the warriors whose task it was to guard that part were gathering.  Some of them were examining the broken lengths of cotton, and drew his attention to them.

“It is medicine,” he said briefly.  “Have ye seen Ngonyama?”

They had not seen him since in the early morning one had noticed the great chief and the Spider enter the gorge.

“And it is not meet,” they added, “that we should seek to find out where the chiefs had gone, since the place below was taboo.”

“It is well,” said Compton; and he returned to the cave to wait with as much patience as he could summon, under the impression that his friends had, of course, gone down to the pool in search of the missing boat.

The afternoon, however, passed quickly, for he was poring over the Journal, and it was almost dark when a step without attracted his attention.

“I say,” he shouted, “come and see.”

But it was not Venning who entered, but the chiefs mother.  She looked tired, and her short skirt was stained with mud and moss.

“Halloa, it’s you, is it?”

She squatted before the fire with her eyes on the book.  “Ye will make medicine now, son of the wise man.  Ye will teach our men how to build swift boats, and how to make the ’fire that kills.”

“You are wet; you have been in the water.”

“Oh! it is a little thing.”

“I thought you were the great one, or the Spider.  I have not seen them since the morning.”

“Maybe they have gone a journey.  What says the medicine?”

“It says that until they return safe as when they went, it will not speak,” said Compton, with a chill suspicion growing in his mind.

She laughed.  “Look again, son of my friend.  Maybe they will not return except the things be done that must be done.”

“What things?”

“I have said.  The things that will make our people strong for the going out—­the swift canoes and the shooting fire.  That is my word.”

“And this is my word.  If any injury befall them, the medicine that is here”—­and he tapped the book—­“will work against yon and yours.”

He looked at her very sternly, attempting to carry the matter with a high hand, for he judged from her words that something had happened to his friends.

“Wow!  Are my people so few that a boy can talk to me in this way?” She snapped her fingers.