kopje and find out whether the enemy is still there. Then we must
wait for daylight. If the place is clear, it will be all easy going; if
the Boers are still there we must have a hasty ride round, if we can,
before we are discovered."

"Very well," said Dickenson slowly as they walked on to the lines where
the ponies were tethered, mounted, and went off at a walk, the sergeant
and Dickenson side by side and the two men close behind; while the
slight, cob-like Bechuana ponies upon which they were mounted seemed to
need no guiding, but kept to the track which brought them again upon
outposts, where their riders were challenged, gave the word, and then
went steadily on at a walk right away across the open veldt.

"Ponies know their way, sir," said the sergeant after they had ridden
about a mile. "I'll be bound to say, if we let them, they'll take us
right by that patch of scrub where the enemy had his surprise, and then
go straight away for the kopje."

"So much the better, sergeant," said Dickenson, who spoke unwillingly,
his body full of pain as his mind was of thought.

"Will you give the order for us to load?"

"Load?" said Dickenson in a tone expressing his surprise. "Oh! of
course;" and he gave the necessary command, taking the rifle handed to
him by one of the men as they rode on. "I was thinking of our chances
of finding the Boers out scouting. I suppose it is quite possible that
we may run against a patrol."

"More than likely, sir. They'll be eager enough to find out some way of
paying back what we gave them to-day."

"Of course, and--What does this mean?" whispered Dickenson, for his pony
stopped short, as did the others, the sergeant's mount uttering a sharp,
challenging neigh and beginning to fidget.

"Means danger, sir," whispered the sergeant. "We loaded none too soon."

There was nothing for it but to sit fast, peering into the wall of
darkness that surrounded them, trying vainly to make out the approaching
danger, every man listening intently. Fully ten minutes elapsed, and
not a sound was heard. The ponies, well-trained by the Boers to stand,
remained for a time perfectly motionless, till all at once, just as
Dickenson was about to whisper to the sergeant that their mounts had
probably only been startled by some wild animal of the desert, one of
them impatiently stretched out its neck (drawing the hand holding the
reins forward), snuffed at the earth, and began to crop at the stunted