A nod or a grunt was all the reply he looked
for. Fortunately, he loathed interruptions. I think I could almost have
gone to sleep under his very nose; perhaps I did sleep for a brief
interval.
Then it all came about so quickly, and the tragedy of it was so
unexpected and painful, throwing our peaceful camp into momentary
confusion, that now it all seems to have happened with the uncanny
swiftness of a dream.
First, there was the abrupt ceasing of the droning voice, and then the
running of quick little steps over the pine needles, and the confusion
of men's voices; and the next instant the professor's wife was at the
tent door, hatless, her face white, her hunting bloomers bagging at the
wrong places, a rifle in her hand, and her words running into one
another anyhow.
"Quick, Harry! It's Rushton. I was asleep and it woke me. Something's
happened. You must deal with it!"
In a second we were outside the tent with our rifles.
"My God!" I heard the professor exclaim, as if he had first made the
discovery. "It _is_ Rushton!"
I saw the guides helping--dragging--a man out of a canoe.
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