've served against the wily
Matabele. I don't know whether you have."

"Er--perhaps not. Still you can't want so many men. We've none too
many left for the defence of the town."

"Oh, damn the defence of the town! These two helpless women are in the
heart of the country. They ought never to have been allowed to move
from here. Fullerton's a bigger fool than even I took him for."

"How about Ancram?" struck in Peters, anxious to avert a breeze. "Shall
we take him?"

Ancram the while had dropped on a couch the moment he had done
breakfast, and had gone fast asleep, thoroughly worn out with
exhaustion. He was there still.

"No. He's no use. Leave him to help in `the defence of the town,'"
sneered Lamont. "Hallo, Jim Steele. We haven't had that scrap yet, but
it'll keep a little longer. I want you now to come and help fight
someone else. The whole country's in a blaze! Fullerton's outfit's
along the Buluwayo road, and Peters and I saw a big impi making straight
in that direction this morning."

"I'll go, Lamont," said the big fellow, who had just come in to see what
all the row was about. "Oh, this is nuts! We'll make those black swine
spit. How many cartridges shall I take?"

"Just as many as ever you can carry. The same applies to all hands."

There was a trampling of horses outside. Already the men were beginning
to roll up, and soon Lamont found himself at the head of some two dozen,
well-armed and fairly well mounted, all alert and willing, and
chock-full of eagerness for a fight.

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO.

A GRIM RUNNING FIGHT.

Once clear of Gandela, Lamont had subsided into moody silence. Only the
eager glow in his eyes, as he sent his horse along at a brisk pace at
the head of his troop, told how his thoughts were working. At present
they held but two considerations--a vivid picture of the horror he had
witnessed and the torturing fear lest he should be too late to prevent a
repetition of it. No, that contingency would not bear contemplation,
and all unconsciously he urged his horse on to greater speed, till at
last something of a murmur arose from one or two of his followers.

"We shall bust our horses if we stretch them out like this at the
start."

He looked round.

"Oh no, we shan't. And every moment may make all the difference."

What was it that rendered his every thought a keen torture? Had it been
a case of rescuing from horrible danger any other two women in the