g?"

Archie bowed his head, and Peter Pegg went on tiptoe to his observatory,
and drew himself up, holding back as much as possible, to see a Malay,
whom he recognised as the previous night's sentry, standing back at some
little distance, shading his eyes with his hands as he looked upward,
and then changing his position time after time as he seemed to be
sweeping the roof with his eyes, before hurrying away.

"Why, I'd 'most forgotten that," said Peter to himself. "He was looking
up there to see if he could find where that there spear's sticking in
the roof, and," he added, with a chuckle, "it ain't sticking there a
bit. I suppose he's afraid of being hauled over the coals by his
sergeant for losing his weapon. Sarve him right! The beast! Why, he
might have sent it right through me."

This thought seemed to suggest what he had gone through over-night, for
after taking a final glance in the direction of the retiring sentry, he
dropped softly down to where the broad patch of light lay upon the
leaves, drew up the leg of his trouser, and examined an
unpleasant-looking wound.

"Might have been worse," he thought. "Only wants leaving alone. Just a
wash and a dab of old Jollop's sticking-plaister; and it won't get
neither, for it will heal up by itself and be something to show," he
chuckled--"PP's first wound in the Malay Expedition!"

Getting up actively enough, for he fancied he heard a sound, he climbed
to the hole once more, and found he was right, for the Malay sentry was
returning, shouldering a fresh spear.

"Now, where did he get that?" thought the lad. "It's wonderful to me
how quiet everything is here. There must be houses, or huts, or
something, and a fairish lot of men; and, of course, there's
helephant-sheds. Only where are they? Jungle, jungle, jungle, without
so much as a squint of anything else. Wonder what Mister Archie thinks
about it."

The lad dropped down again, after noticing that the sentry was now
leaning on his spear, scanning the roof once more; but as Peter stood
listening and laughing to himself, he muttered:

"He must have thought it was a big monkey!" and he mentally pictured
what had passed in the night, when a smart tap caught his ear which
sounded as if the shaft of the spear had been brought down with a rap
upon the ground. This was followed by a step or two.

"Coming here," thought the lad, and he stepped quickly over the leaves,
to throw himself down close to Archie