Had been easily penetrated by
the sharp ivory of so powerful an animal.
When the diahbeeah was re-launched, I had her thoroughly painted inside
and out. In the mean time, I had formed a Robinson-Crusoe-like house,
comprising two small rooms, open on the river-side, but secured at night
and morning by simple Venetian blinds. The three sides were closed with
planks. I had paved the floor with the cast-iron plates of the steamer's
engine room, thus it was both level and proof against the white ants.
The two rooms were separated by a partition with a doorway, but no door.
I had not resided in a house since I first occupied the diahbeeah, ten
months ago, as the vessel was more convenient.
On the 29th November, at about four A.M., I was awakened by a noise in
the adjoining room. My bedstead was exactly opposite the partition
doorway; that of my wife was on the other side of the room. At first I
thought the sound proceeded from rats scampering over the tin boxes; but
upon listening attentively, I distinctly heard the lid of a metal box
opened by some person, and again carefully closed.
After a few moments, I heard another box open, and a sound as though
some one was searching among the contents.
Unfortunately my bedstead was the most horrible creaker, in which it was
impossible to turn without producing a noise that would create an alarm,
should a thief be on the alert.
I always slept with a pistol under my pillow, therefore, I gently
grasped the revolver in my hand, and endeavoured quietly to get out of
my noisy bed.
The wretched piece of furniture gave the most alarming creak; this was
immediately succeeded by a sound in the next room of the sudden closing
of a box, and the movement of some person. I could not be sure that it
was not Lady Baker, who had perhaps required something from a box, and
did not wish to disturb me. This was not likely, and I felt that no time
must be lost, as my bedstead had given the alarm. I therefore sprang out
of bed and rushed through the open doorway, just in time to see some
person jump through the Venetian blinds on the river side of the house.
To cry out "Who's there?" and to fire a shot was the work of an instant,
and jumping after him in pursuit I found myself in darkness, and no one
visible outside my house. Where was the sentry? Nowhere!
At the cry of "Guard!" not a soul appeared; the sentry was not to be
found. At length, after a search, he turned up in the wrong place,
looking confused, and confessed that he had been asleep, but awakened by
the sound of a shot.
