For an hour or more nothing happened.Trent smoked,and Monty,who had apparently forgotten all about his visitor,plodded away amongst the potato furrows,with every now and then a long,searching look towards the town.Then there came a black speck stealing across the broad rice-field and up the steep hill,a speck which in time took to itself the semblance of a man,a Kru boy,naked as he was born save for a ragged loin-cloth,and clutching something in his hand.He was invisible to Trent until he was close at hand;it was Monty whose changed attitude and deportment indicated the approach of something interesting.He had relinquished his digging and,after a long,stealthy glance towards the house,had advanced to the extreme boundary of the potato patch.His behaviour here for the first time seemed to denote the hopeless lunatic.He swung his long arms backward and forwards,cracking his fingers,and talked unintelligibly to himself,hoarse,guttural murmurings without sense or import.Trent changed his place and for the first time saw the Kru boy.His face darkened and an angry exclamation broke from his lips.It was something like this which he had been expecting.
The Kru boy drew nearer and nearer.Finally he stood upright on the rank,coarse grass and grinned at Monty,whose lean hands were outstretched towards him.He fumbled for a moment in his loin-cloth.
Then he drew out a long bottle and handed it up.Trent stepped out as Monty's nervous fingers were fumbling with the cork.He made a grab at the boy who glided off like an eel.Instantly he whipped out a revolver and covered him.
"Come here,"he cried.
The boy shook his head."No understand.""Who sent you here with that filthy stuff?"he asked sternly."You'd best answer me."The Kru boy,shrinking away from the dark muzzle of that motionless revolver,was spellbound with fear.He shook his head.
"No understand."
There was a flash of light,a puff of smoke,a loud report.The Kru boy fell forward upon his face howling with fear.Monty ran off towards the house mumbling to himself.
"The next time,"Trent said coolly,"I shall fire at you instead of at the tree.Remember I have lived out here and I know all about you and your kind.You can understand me very well if you choose,and you've just got to.Who sends you here with that vile stuff?""Massa,I tell!Massa Oom Sam,he send me!""And what is the stuff?""Hamburgh gin,massa!very good liquor!Please,massa,point him pistol the other way."Trent took up the flask,smelt its contents and threw it away with a little exclamation of disgust.
"How often have you been coming here on this errand?"he asked sternly.
"Most every day,massa -when him Mr.Price away."Trent nodded.
"Very good,"he said."Now listen to me.If ever I catch you round here again or anywhere else on such an errand,I'll shoot you like a dog.Now be off."The boy bounded away with a broad grin of relief.Trent walked up to the house and asked for the missionary's wife.She came to him soon,in what was called the parlour.A frail,anaemic-looking woman with tired eyes and weary expression.
"I'm sorry to trouble you,Mrs.Price,"Trent said,plunging at once into his subject,"but I want to speak to you about this old man,Monty.You've had him some time now,haven't you?""About four years,"she answered."Captain Francis left him with my husband;I believe he found him in one of the villages inland,a prisoner."Trent nodded.
"He left you a little money with him,I believe."The woman smiled faintly.
"It was very little,"she said,"but such as it is,we have never touched it.He eats scarcely anything and we consider that the little work he has done has about paid us for keeping him.""Did you know,"Trent asked bluntly,"that he had been a drunkard?""Captain Francis hinted as much,"the woman answered."That was one reason why he wanted to leave him with us.He knew that we did not allow anything in the house.""It was a pity,"Trent said,"that you could not have watched him a little more out of it.Why,his brain is sodden with drink now!"The woman was obviously honest in her amazement."How can that be?"she exclaimed."He has absolutely no money and he never goes off our land.""He has no need,"Trent answered bitterly."There are men in Attra who want him dead,and they have been doing their best to hurry him off.I caught a Kru boy bringing him gin this afternoon.Evidently it has been a regular thing.""I am very sorry indeed to hear this,"the woman said,"and I am sure my husband will be too.He will feel that,in a certain measure,he has betrayed Captain Francis's trust.At the same time we neither of us had any idea that anything of this sort was to be feared,or we would have kept watch.""You cannot be blamed,"Trent said."I am satisfied that you knew nothing about it.Now I am going to let you into a secret.Monty is a rich man if he had his rights,and I want to help him to them.
I shall take him back to England with me,but I can't leave for a week or so.If you can keep him till then and have some one to watch him day and night,I'll give your husband a hundred pounds for your work here,and build you a church.It's all right!Don't look as though I were mad.I'm a very rich man,that's all,and I shan't miss the money,but I want to feel that Monty is safe till I can start back to England.Will you undertake this?""Yes,"the woman answered promptly,"we will.We'll do our honest best."Trent laid a bank-note upon the table.
"Just to show I'm in earnest,"he remarked,rising."I shall be up-country for about a month.Look after the old chap well and you'll never regret it."Trent went thoughtfully back to the town.He had committed himself now to a definite course of action.He had made up his mind to take Monty back with him to England and face the consequences.
