Clare.

"Excuse me--no. That can't be done, Miss Vidal. It's quite impossible.
Not a man would volunteer on those terms."

She thought a moment. "You are right, Mr Peters. Yes. I see that.
For me there is nothing for it but to--wait. To wait!" she repeated
bitterly.

"And--hope," supplemented Peters. "If any man is going to find out
what's become of Lamont, I'm that man. He almost threw away his life
once to save mine, and now I'll either return with him if he's above
ground or I won't return at all."

This conversation had taken place within the living-room of Grunberger's
house, and now Clare's self-possession utterly gave way. She sank into
a chair, and sobbed.

"Cheer up, Miss Vidal, cheer up," said Peters briskly. "If it's in the
power of mortal man to find Lamont, I'm going to be that man. There's
more'n one could tell you I'm not easy put off a job I once make up my
mind to bring through. I'm not saying it to brag. Now I'm going to
collect as many as I can, and we'll start at dark."

"God will bless you," was all she could say, as she wrung the hard,
gnarled hand of the honest pioneer.

"This is a devilish sad, romantic sort of business," said the officer of
Scouts; for the circumstances of the engagement, thus tragically broken,
were pretty well known now all over the camp. "Lovely girl, too, by
Jove!" Peters nodded. "Good, too," he said. "Good and plucky. She's
the only girl I've ever clapped eyes on good enough for Lamont."

The other smiled half-heartedly. This was a piece of hero worship that
he, naturally, could not enthuse over.

Peters was as good as his word--and that night he, with over twenty men,
well-armed and rationed, started on their quest. The following morning
the Fullertons and Clare Vidal, and the men who had been wounded in the
fight, started in the other direction, that of Gandela to wit, under a
strong escort of Scouts. With them, too, went the storekeeper's family.
Grunberger himself refused to budge, and as it was decided that the
Kezane Store would form a very good base for supplies, and something of
a garrison was left there for the present, there was no need for him to
do so.

"_Ach! so_. We shall haf Zeederberg's coaches outspanning here again
before de month is out," he declared, as he bade them a hearty good-bye.

No obstacles met them on the return trek, but to one at least the scenes
of the former terror and strife were as holy ground as they pas