they say, there is one thing they are bound to say--unless they are
liars--and that is that I have my ideas of what's what, and I stick to
them."

"Very well, then, Mr Halse. You shall have your way, and I assure you
I am looking forward to an altogether new and delightful experience."

Then they talked on about veldt-craft and forest-craft, eventually
coming round to the record koodoo head, which Denham was dying to see.

"Verna shot it," said Ben Halse, somewhat lowering his voice. "As neat
and clean a shot as ever was delivered."

"No!" in delighted surprise.

"Fact. Verna shot it."

"What did Verna shoot?"

Both started at the voice behind them, and turned their heads. The girl
stood erect, smiling, in every way winsome and attractive.

"You shouldn't talk so loud, father dear. You're giving away our
secrets to any passer-by. It doesn't matter about Mr Denham, of
course, because he's in them: an accomplice, an accessary, both before
and after the fact--isn't that the correct expression?"

Denham was set wondering. "An accessary, both before and after the
fact," he repeated to himself. And this was the girl who had described
herself as "utterly uneducated."

"I'm going for a stroll," she went on. "Will you come, father?"

"I think not, dear. I promised to meet one or two of them at the club
about now."

"All right."

Denham started up, with an abruptness somewhat unusual in him.

"Might I accompany you, Miss Halse?" he said, as she was turning away.

"I shall be delighted," she answered, flashing a smile at him, "We'll go
down through the bush--they've cut out some paths through it, and it's
lovely down there. We can come out again just below the Nongqai
barracks. That'll make just a nice round. So long, father."

Ben Halse sat back in his chair, watching them down the garden path.

"They look well together. A fine pair, by Jove!" Then a sudden thought
seemed to strike him, and again he ejaculated to himself with emphasis,
"A fine pair, by Jove!"

CHAPTER ELEVEN.

DEVELOPMENTS.

The dictum of Ben Halse with regard to his daughter and their new friend
was unconsciously echoed by more than one passer-by, as the two strolled
leisurely along the broad road which constituted the main "street" of
the township, between its lines of foliage, Verna nodding to an
acquaintance here and there. Denham was rather an out-of-the-way kind
of stranger to drop suddenly into their midst, an