Thinking over the possible way by
which Harry Feversham might have redeemed himself in Willoughby's eyes
from the charge of cowardice, Durrance could only hit upon this recovery
of the letters from the ruined wall in Berber. There had been no
personal danger to the inhabitants of Suakin since the days of that last
reconnaissance. The great troop-ships had steamed between the coral
reefs towards Suez, and no cry for help had ever summoned them back.
Willoughby risked only his health in that white palace on the Red Sea.
There could not have been a moment when Feversham was in a position to
say, "Your life was forfeit but for me, whom you call coward." And
Durrance, turning over in his mind all the news and gossip which had
come to him at Wadi Halfa or during his furloughs, had been brought to
conjecture whether that fugitive from Khartum, who had told him his
story in the glacis of the silent ruined fort of Sinkat during one
drowsy afternoon of May, had not told it again at Suakin within
Feversham's hearing. He was convinced now that his conjecture was
correct.
Willoughby's reticence was in itself a sufficient confirmation.
Willoughby, without doubt, had been instructed by Ethne to keep his
tongue in a leash.
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