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down. They showed plainly their affection for their young masters and the boys were equally pleased to see them - these fine, stalwart fellows who had been their partners in so many adventures, capturing live animals of every sort for the world’s zoos and circuses.
    The tents of the safari team were erected behind the row of bandas. The kitchen boys of the lodge set up a long table in the open air and loaded it with food.
    The men ate hungrily but hastily because they were eager to get on with the job that they had come to do.
    Warden Crosby addressed them. He told them of the poachers’ camp that he and the boys had seen from the aeroplane seven miles to the west. He told them of the terrible slaughter of animals. He stirred them until they could hardly wait to get at the poachers.
    There were cries of ‘Let’s go,’ ‘Break out the guns,’ ‘We’ll murder them.’
    Crosby held up his hand to quieten the men. I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘but that’s the one thing you cannot do. You can’t kill them. You will take no guns with you.’
    ‘But they will have poisoned arrows, and spears,’ objected big Joro, chief tracker. ‘They will try to kill us.’
    ‘Exactly,’ agreed Crosby. ‘And that’s going to make your job dangerous and difficult. You see, there’s a law against killing poachers. They have to be arrested and taken to court. They are tried and the judge fines them or puts them in prison. I know it doesn’t seem fair - they will be well armed and you will not. You must not kill them - you must take them alive. You have had experience in taking animals alive. All right, these are animals -and you must capture them alive just as you would any other savage beast’
    The men were not smiling now. This was going to be worse than they had thought.
    Hal spoke. ‘Men,’ he said, ‘let’s get one thing clear. This is not a part of your regular job. You were not hired for this. If you don’t want to do it, you don’t have to. Anyone who doesn’t wish to take part has a perfect right to stay here in camp.’
    When the cars started off a few minutes later not one man stayed behind. Hal was very proud of his crew.
    In addition to his men there were five of Crosby’s rangers. The other five were absent, looking for poachers in sections of the park more than a hundred miles away.
    But there was one poacher-hunter perhaps as good as all of the five missing men. This one was not a man, but a dog - Zulu, the big Alsatian belonging to the safari man Mali.
    Zulu had something that no other member of the party had - savage teeth. There was a law against guns. But there was no law against teeth. Zulu didn’t know what this was all about, but he knew it was something great, and he barked excitedly.
    Zulu’s teeth would not be enough to win the battle. Crosby and the boys, sharing the same Land-Rover, discussed the problem as the cars bounced their way westward over the rough trail.
    “There is a chance,’ said Crosby, ‘that they will take fright and run away when they see these fourteen iron monsters roaring in on them.’
    ‘But you don’t want them to run away,’ Hal said. ‘You want to arrest them.’
    ‘Perhaps we can catch the ones who don’t run fast enough. We may not be able to do all we want to do. We will just do what we can. I don’t want to place your men in unnecessary danger.’
    ‘Our men are used to danger,’ Hal said. ‘But do you really think the poachers will run?’
    ‘It all depends. If they have no leader, they will run. If Blackbeard is with them, he will make them stand and fight.’
    Hal had forgotten about Blackbeard, the man of mystery, whose real name was unknown.
    ‘If we could nab him,’ the warden said, ‘that would probably end wholesale poaching in Tsavo.’
    But how to do it? Deadly weapons were not allowed. What weapons could be used that were not deadly? Hal reviewed in his mind the contents of the supply van.
    ‘How about sleep?’ he said suddenly. ‘Does