Waterbury evening Democrat., 1906-10-08
CHAPTER VI.

-. .5=a #I "~ URsE this country! Curse 1t! Curse it!' The man spoke
 : aloud, but there was no one
 N near to hear. He shook his skinny yellow fist out over the broad river that crept greasily down to the equatorial sea.
 All around him the vegetable king dom had asserted its sovereignty. At his back loomed dense forest, i'm penetrable to the foot of man, defying his puny hand armed with ax or saw. The trees were not high, few of them being above twenty feet, but from their branches creepers and parasites hung in tangled profusion, interlaced, join- ing tree to tree for acres-nay, for miles.
 As far as the eye could reach either bank of the slow river was thus GOV cred with rank vegetation-mile after mile without variety, without hope. The glassy surface of the water was broken here and there by certain black forms floating like logs half hidden be- heath the wave. These were croco- diles. The river was the Ogowe, and the man who cursed it was Victor Durnovo, employee of the Loango Trading association, whose business it was at that season to travel into the interior of Africa to buy, barter or steal ivory for his masters.
 He was a small faced man, with a squarely aquiline nose and q black mustache which hung like a valance over his mouth. From the growth of that curtain-like mustache Victor Durnovo's worldly prosperity might have been said to date. No one seeing his mouth had before that time been prevailed upon to trust him. Nature has a way of hanging out signs and then covering them up so that the casual fail to see. He was a man of medium height with abnormally long arms and somewhat truculent way of walking, as if his foot was ever ready to kick anything or any person who might come in his way.
 Victor Durnovo had senr his boatmen into the forest to find a few dates. few handfuls of firewood, and while they were absent he gave vent to that wild unreasoning passion which is in- haled into the white mans lungs with the air of equatoral Africa.
 Curse this country!' he shouted. "Curse it, curse it-river and tree, man and beastr'
 Presently a peacefulness seemed to come over him. for his eyes lost their glitter and his heavy lids dropped. His arms were crossed behind his head Before him lay the river.
 Suddenly he sat upright, all eager ness and attention. Not leaf stirred It was about o'clock in the evening. the stillest hour of the twenty-four. In such silence the least sound would travel almos; any distance. and there was a sound travelling over the water 10 him. It was nothing but thud re- peated with singular regularity. but to his practiced ears it conveyed much. Ue knew that a boat was approaching. as yet hidden by some distant curve in the river. The thud was caused by the contact of six paddles with the gun vale of the canoe as the paddlers with drew them from the water.
 Victor Durnovo rose again and brought from the boat second rife. which he laid beside the double bar reled Reilly which was never more than a yard away from him. waking or sleeping. Then he waited. He knew that no boat could reach the bank without his full permission, for all the rowers could be killed before they got within hundred yards of his rife. He was probably the best rife shot but one in that country, and the other. the very best. happened to be in the approaching canoe.
 After the space of ten minutes the boat came in sight-a long. black form on the still waters It was too far away for him to distinguish anything beyond the fact that 1t was a native boat
 Flight hundred yards.- muttered Durnovo over the sight of his rife.
 He looked upon this river as his own. and be knew the native of equatorial AfrIca- Therefore he dropped bullet into the water. under the bow of the caDoe. at spo yards
 A moment later there was a sound which can only b-e written ~P-ttt- be- tween his legs. and he had to wipe shower of dnSt from his eyes. A pun of blue smoke rose slowly over the boat and a sharp report broke the silence q seno1d time.
 Tl5r7 victor Dur8OTo Ieaped to his feet and vaveI his hat ia the air From tfle canpe there was an answer ing er-etl1g. and the nan on the bank vent tO the waters etge. stIIl cary- irz the rife from vhSch he ras never parted
 D1rog~o was fhe first to speak when the boat c1me within h1fl
 -vc-J >rTT.- be sioz.ed -Thozzkt ycu uEeNa a1t7re t-ost Must estsb- Ii<h q fgk-set Ia the fst sbot y0u