if anyone had crept
out of the waggon and come and spoken to the horses. I'll tell him so."

The boy went cautiously on past the first waggon, then by the kraal,
looking eagerly before him the while but making out nothing.

"Taking a bit of a round, I suppose. The other side of the fire,
perhaps," he said to himself.

Mark went slowly and silently on, pausing once to note that the bright
planet, which seemed to grow larger and larger, was just dipping down
behind the highest kopje near, and then he listened to a distant barking
sound which he knew must proceed from a baboon prowling about, possibly
on the watch for the approach of one of its greatest enemies--a leopard.

"Everything seems to have its enemy," thought the boy, "and the blacks
are ours; but I don't think they will come near us any--"

Mark stopped short, a feeling of rage and bitterness running through
him, for as he was walking slowly on, cautiously so as not to startle
his cousin, he felt ready to choke with indignant rage.

"Oh, I wouldn't have thought he could have been so untrustworthy," he
said to himself, for there, just before him, seated upon one of the many
loose stones, his chin upon his breast, was his cousin, sleeping
profoundly.

At this Mark's first idea was to awaken the overcome boy by snatching
his rifle from him and ordering him to go off to bed.

"And I will too," he said, half aloud, "and shame him in his disgrace."

He was in the act of stooping over to seize the rifle, but there was no
rifle to seize.

"He has stood it up somewhere," thought the boy. "Oh, who could have
believed it! And at a time like this when we might be surprised and
speared before the alarm could have spread. I'll go and tell the--no, I
won't. It shall be our secret; but I'll say words to him that shall
make him too much ashamed ever to take the watch again. Oh, where has
he stood that rifle?"

Mark was trying to penetrate the darkness as he stepped cautiously
along, looking here and there for the missing weapon, when he felt as if
a hand had been pressed upon his throat to check his breathing, for
there, dimly-seen, standing pressed close up to the rock which ascended
behind their camp, was the figure of an armed black, motionless as a
statue, and with his spear, which looked somehow distorted, resting
against his arm.

For a few moments the boy could not breathe, but his heart beat with a
heavy throb against his breast, while his lips part