“Nothing I’d like better,” said Fred, and I felt too pleased with the prospect to say anything at all.  Growing old is a foolish and unnecessary business, but there is no need to forego while young the thrills of unashamed hero-worship; in fact, that is one of the ways of continuing young.  It is only the disillusioned (poor deceived ones) and the cynics, who grow old ungracefully.

We went upstreet, through the shadow of the great grim fort.  The trolley-car trundled down among the din, smells and colors of the business-end of town.  Looking over my shoulder I saw Courtney talking to the collector.

“We’re getting absolution, Fred!” said I.

“I’m not sure we need it,” Fred answered.  “I hope Courtney won’t tell too much!” So quickly does a man jump from praying for friends at court to fearing them!

“Courtney looked to me,” said Will, “like a man who would give no games away.”

Glad you think that of him” said Fred.

“Why?”

“Tell you later, maybe.”

But he did not tell until after dinner. (It was a good dinner for East Africa.  Shark steak figured in it, under a more respectable name; and there was zebu hump, guinea-fowl, and more different kinds of fruit than a man could well remember.) When it was over we sat in deep armchairs on the long wide veranda that fronts the whole hotel.  The evening sea-breeze came and wafted in on us the very scents of Araby; the night sounds that whisper of wilderness gave the lie to a tinkling guitar that somewhere in the distance spoke of civilized delights.  The surf crooned on coral half a mile away, and very good cigar smoke (from a box that Monty had sent ashore with our belongings) supplemented coffee and the other aids to physical contentment.  Then, limping between the armchairs, and ashamed that we should rise to greet him—­motioning us down again with a little nervous laugh—­Courtney came to us.  Within five minutes of his coming the world, and the clock, and the laws of men might have all reversed themselves for aught we cared.  Without really being conscious he was doing it Courtney plunged into our problem, grasped it, sized it up, advised us, flooded us with priceless, wonderful advice, and did it with such almost feminine sympathy that I believe we would have been telling him our love-affairs at last, if a glance at the watch he wore in a case at his belt had not told him it was three A. M.

“There’s trouble” he began when he had filled his pipe.  “You boys are in trouble.  What is it?” he asked, shifting and twitching in his seat—­refusing an armchair—­refusing a drink.

“Tell us first what’s the matter with you,” said Fred.

“Oh, nothing.  An old wound.  A lion once dragged me by this shoulder half a mile or so.  At this time of year I get pains.  They last a day or two, then pass—­Go on, tell me!”

He never sat really still once that whole evening, yet never once complained or made a gesture of impatience.