Atlantida

A few days sufficed to convince us that Chatelain's fears as to our

official relations with the new chief were vain. Often I have thought

that by the severity he showed at our first encounter Saint-Avit

wished to create a formal barrier, to show us that he knew how to keep

his head high in spite of the weight of his heavy past. Certain it is

that the day after his arrival, he showed himself in a very different

light, even complimenting the Sergeant on the upkeep of the post and

the instruction of the men. To me he was charming.

"We are of the same class, aren't we?" he said to me. "I don't have

to ask you to dispense with formalities, it is your right."

Vain marks of confidence, alas! False witnesses to a freedom of

spirit, one in face of the other. What more accessible in appearance

than the immense Sahara, open to all those who are willing to be

engulfed by it? Yet what is more secret? After six months of

companionship, of communion of life such as only a Post in the South

offers, I ask myself if the most extraordinary of my adventures is not

to be leaving to-morrow, toward unsounded solitudes, with a man whose

real thoughts are as unknown to me as these same solitudes, for which

he has succeeded in making me long.

The first surprise which was given me by this singular companion was

occasioned by the baggage that followed him.

On his inopportune arrival, alone, from Wargla, he had trusted to the

Mehari he rode only what can be carried without harm by such a

delicate beast,--his arms, sabre and revolver, a heavy carbine, and a

very reduced pack. The rest did not arrive till fifteen days later,

with the convoy which supplied the post.

Three cases of respectable dimensions were carried one after another

to the Captain's room, and the grimaces of the porters said enough as

to their weight.

I discreetly left Saint-Avit to his unpacking and began opening the

mail which the convoy had sent me.

He returned to the office a little later and glanced at the several

reviews which I had just recieved.

"So," he said. "You take these."

He skimmed through, as he spoke, the last number of the Zeitschrift

der Gesellschaft fur Erdkunde in Berlin.

"Yes," I answered. "These gentlemen are kind enough to interest

themselves in my works on the geology of the Wadi Mia and the high

Igharghar."

"That may be useful to me," he murmured, continuing to turn over the

leaves.

"It's at your service."

"Thanks. I am afraid I have nothing to offer you in exchange, except

Pliny, perhaps. And still--you know what he said of Igharghar,

according to King Juba. However, come help me put my traps in place

and you will see if anything appeals to you."