ng left in life to wish
for.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

ANOTHER JOKE.

The village of Komgha was going through lively times. Every day nearly,
levies, on their way to the front, would be passing through, and as it
was the last settlement on the border, rations and other necessaries
would be in demand, which was good for trade. More over, every room and
corner in the place was occupied, not to mention waggons and tents on
the common land; for something of a scare was prevalent. The Gcalekas
beyond the border had been defeated, certainly--or rather had been
chased out of their own country--but there was restlessness among the
Gaika and Ndhlambe tribes within the border, and these were both
numerous and powerful, with a fine war-like reputation in the past. So
many homesteads had been abandoned temporarily, and their owners had
either gone into laager, or into the settlement, or, at any rate, had
sent their wives and families thither. A goodly proportion, on the
other hand, ridiculed the scare, and remained on their farms.

And they seemed justified in doing so. Already more than one of the
burgher forces had withdrawn from the Transkei _en route_ for home. The
country was quiet again, it was reported; luckily the disturbance had
been kept beyond the border, or the inter-Colonial tribes would have
been up in a blaze. But there were always some uncomfortable objectors
who liked to point out that the Paramount Chief had not been captured,
that the rising was only scotched, not killed, and that then we should
see.

The village was the virtual headquarters of the F.A.M. Police--and in
the Artillery barracks crowning an eminence, no less than in the two
troops occupying a permanent camp just outside, a chronic state of
readiness and activity prevailed. A scheme of defence too had been
formed in case of attack--an event of the highest improbability, for
even if the rising were to spread, the Kafirs would refrain from
attacking a strongly defended place, and reserve their energies for the
destruction of outlying farms and the ambush and massacre of small
bodies of travelling whites.

Dick Selmes was growing rather impatient. If he could bear no further
part in the war--and the doctor had again seriously warned him not to
take his wound too lightly--he saw no reason why he should not seek out
Hazel Brandon. His feelings had undergone no diminution, no deadening
by reason of change and excitement and peril. The