where it hung.
Ten minutes later they had dipped as much fresh water as they required from the barrels that swung beneath, and were seated, knife in hand, eating the provisions they had brought with them, while when the colonel and major came round again it was to find the lanterns out, the Dutchmen in their movable quarters, some smoking, others giving loud announcement that they were asleep, and close at hand and with all well under observation a couple of sentries marching up and down.
“I think they’re honest,” said the colonel as the two officers walked away.
“I’m beginning to think so too,” was the reply.
A short time before, Lennox and his companion had also taken a farewell glance at the bearers of so valuable an adjunct to the military larder, and Dickenson had made a similar remark to that of his chief, but in a more easy-going conversational way.
“Those chaps mean to be square, Drew, old man,” he said.
“Think so?”
“Yes; so do you. What else could they mean?”
“To round upon us.”
“How? What could they do?”
“Get back to their people and speak out, after spying out the weakness of the land.”
“Pooh! What good would that do, you suspicious old scribe? Their account’s right enough; they proved it by the plunder they brought and their eagerness to sack as much tin as they could for it.”
“I don’t know,” said Lennox; “the Boers are very slim.”
“Mentally – granted; but certainly not bodily, old man. Bah! Pitch it over; you suspect every thing and everybody. I know you believe I nobbled those last cigarettes of yours.”
“So you did.”
“Didn’t,” said Dickenson, throwing himself down upon the board which formed his bed, for they had returned to their quarters. “You haven’t a bit of faith in a fellow.”
“Well, the cigarettes were on that shelf the night before last, and the next morning they were gone.”
“In smoke,” said Dickenson, with a yawn.
“There, what did I say?”
“You said I took them, and I didn’t; but I’ve a shrewd suspicion that I know who did smoke them.”
“Who was it?” said Lennox shortly.
“You.”
“I declare I didn’t.”
“Declare away, old man. I believe you went to sleep hungry.”
“Oh yes, you may believe that, and add ‘very’ to it. Well, what then?”
“You went to sleep, began dreaming, and got up and smoked the lot in your sleep.”
“You’re five feet ten of foolishness,” said Lennox testily as he lay down in his greatcoat.
“And you’re an inch in height less of suspicion,” said Dickenson, and he added a yawn.
“Well, hang the cigarettes! I am tired. I say, I’m glad we have no posts to visit to-night.”
“Hubble, bubble, burr,” – said Dickenson indistinctly.
“Bah! what a fellow you are to sleep!” said Lennox peevishly. “I wanted to talk to you about – about – about – ”
Nothing; for in another moment he too was asleep and dreaming that the Boers had bounded out of their wagons, overcome the sentries, seized their rifles, and then gone on from post to post till all were well armed. After that they had crept in single file up the kopje, mastered the men in charge of the captured gun, and then tied the two trek-tows together and carried it off to their friends, though he could not quite settle how it was they got the two spans of oxen up among the rocks ready when required.
Not that this mattered, for when he woke in the morning at the reveille and looked out the oxen were absent certainly, being grazing in the river grass in charge of a guard; but the Boers were present, lighting a fire and getting their morning coffee ready, the pots beginning to send out a fragrant steam.
Chapter Seven.
Friends on the Forage
There were too many “alarums and excursions” at Groenfontein for much more thought to be bestowed upon the friendly Boers, as the party of former prisoners were termed, in the days which ensued. “Nobody can say but what they are quiet, well-behaved chaps,” Bob Dickenson said, “for they do scarcely anything but sit and smoke that horrible nasty-smelling tobacco of theirs all day long. They like to take it easy. They’re safe, and get their rations. They don’t have to fight, and I don’t believe nine-tenths of the others do; but they are spurred on – sjambokked on to it. Pah! what a language! Sjambok! why can’t they call it a whip?”
“But I don’t trust them, all the same,” said Lennox. “I quite hate that smiling field-cornet, who’s always shifting and turning the corn-sacks to give them plenty of air, as he says, to keep the grain from heating.”
“Why, he hasn’t been at it again, has he?” said Dickenson, laughing.
“At it again?” said Lennox. “What do you mean?”
“Did he shout to you to come and look at it?”
“Yes; only this morning, when the colonel was going by. Asked us to go in and look, and shovelled up the yellow corn in one of the sacks. He made the colonel handle some of it, and pointed out that he was holding back the corn tied up with the white strings because it lasted better.”
“What did the old man say?”
“Told him that, as the stock was getting so low, he and his men must make a raid and get some more.”
“And what did Blackbeard say?”
“Grumbled and shook his head, and talked about the danger of being shot by his old friends if they were caught.”
“Dodge, of course, to raise his price.”
“That’s what the colonel said; and he told him that there must be no nonsense – he was fed here and protected so that he should keep up the supply, and that he must start the day after to-morrow at the latest to buy up more and bring it in. Then, in a surly, unwilling way, he consented to go.”
“Buy up some more?” said Dickenson, with a chuckle. “Yes, he’ll buy a lot. Commando it, he’ll call it.”
That very day, growing weary of trying to starve out the garrison, the enemy made an attack from the south, and after a furious cannonading began to fall back in disorder, drawing out the mounted men and two troops of lancers in pursuit.
As they fell back the disorder seemed to become a rout; but Colonel Lindley had grown, through a sharp lesson or two, pretty watchful and ready to meet manoeuvre with manoeuvre. He saw almost directly that the enemy were overdoing their retreat; and he acted accordingly. Suspecting that it was a feint, he held his mounted troops in hand, and then made them fall
