“Aha!  You play with words!  You are not—­but you will!  I am no fool, my Lord!  I understand!  Not for nothing did I make a friend again of that pig Hassan!  Not for nothing have I waited all these months in this stinking Zanzibar until a man should come in search of that ivory whom I could trust!  Not for nothing did Juma, the lazaretto attendant tell Hassan you desired to see him!  You seek the ivory, but you wish to keep it all!  To share none of it with me!” He stood up, and made another bow, much curter than his former one.  “I am Georges Coutlass!  My courage is known!  No man can rob me and get away with it!”

“My good man,” drawled Monty, raising his eyebrows in the comfortless way he has when there seems need of facing an inferior antagonist. (He hates to “lord it” as thoroughly as he loves to risk his neck.) “I would not rob you if you owned the earth!  If you have valuable information I’ll pay for it cheerfully after it’s tested.”

“Ah!  Now you talk!”

“Observe—­I said after it’s tested!”

“I don’t think he knows anything,” said Fred.  “I think he guessed a lot, and wants to look, and can’t afford to pay his own expenses.  Isn’t that it?”

“What do you mean?” demanded Coutlass.

“I can’t talk Greek,” said Fred.  “Shall I say it again in English?”

“You may name any reasonable price,” said Monty, “for real information.  Put it in writing.  When we’re agreed on the price, put that in writing too.  Then, if we find the information is even approximately right, why, we’ll pay for it.”

“Ah-h-h!  You intend to play a trick on me!  You use my information!  You find the ivory!  You go out by the Congo River and the other coast, and I kiss myself good-by to you and ivory and money!  I am to be what d’you call it?—­a milk-pigeon!”

“Being that must be some sensation!” nodded Yerkes.

“I warn you I can not be tampered with!” snarled the Greek, putting on his hat with a flourish.  “I leave you, for you to think it over!  But I tell you this—­I promise you—­I swear!  Any expedition in search of that ivory that does not include Georges Coutlass on his own terms is a delusion—­a busted flush—­smashed—­exploded—­pfff !—­so—­evanesced before the start!  My address is Zanzibar!  Every street child knows me!  When you wish to know my terms, tell the first man or child you meet to lead you to the house where Georges Coutlass lives!  Good morning, Lord Skirtsshubrish!  We will no doubt meet again!”

He turned his back on us and strode from the room—­a man out of the middle ages, soldierly of bearing, unquestionably bold, and not one bit more venial or lawless than ninety per cent. of history’s gallants, if the truth were told.

“Let’s hope that’s the last of him!” said Monty.  “Can’t say I like him, but I’d hate to have to spoil his chances.”

“Last of him be sugared!” said Yerkes.  “That’s only the first of him!  He’ll find seven devils worse than himself and camp on our trail, if I know anything of Greeks—­that’s to say, if our trail leads after that ivory.  Does it?”