Part 33 (1/2)

I did not wait to hear any more, and did not try to force my way through the dense pack of our men, but worked hard to get back to the spot where I had been lying down; and upon reaching it, with the satisfactory feeling that there was to be no more fighting that night, I dropped into my old place, after s.h.i.+fting hilt and belt so as not to lie upon them again. Then, in spite of hunger and pain, a comfortable and exhilarating sensation stole over me, which I did not know to be the approach of sleep till I was roused by the reveille, and sprang up in a sitting posture, when the first man my eyes fell on was Denham, who was peering about among the troopers as if for something he had lost.

”Oh, there you are!” he cried as he caught sight of me; and the next minute we were standing together, hand grasping hand.

”Denham, old fellow,” I said huskily, ”I thought you were either a prisoner or dead.”

”Not a bit of it,” he replied; ”but it wasn't the Boers' fault. Just look at my head.”

”I was looking,” I said, for a closely-folded handkerchief was tied diagonally across his forehead. ”Is the cut deep?”

”Deep? No,” he replied. ”Deep as the beast could make it-that is, to the bone. I say, what a blessing it is to have a thick skull! My old schoolmaster used to tell me I was a blockhead, and I thought he was wrong; but he was right enough, or I shouldn't be here.”

”The loss is bad enough without that,” I replied.

”Horrible; but they've paid dearly for it,” he said. ”But I say, what about rations? We can't starve.”

I told him what I had overheard during the officers' talk with the Sergeant.

”Yes,” said Denham peevishly; ”but that means waiting till to-morrow morning. We must make a sally and get something.”

”I wish we could,” I said, for now that my mind was at rest I felt ravenously hungry. ”Hullo! what's going on there?”

Denham turned sharply, and, to our astonishment, Sergeant Briggs was coming from the gate leading half-a-dozen men stripped to s.h.i.+rt and breeches, carrying in half-quarters of some newly-killed animal.

”Why, hullo!” I cried, ”what luck! They've found and been slaughtering an ox.”

”Yes,” said Denham dryly, ”and there's more meat out yonder. We shan't starve. I'd forgotten.”

”Forgotten! Forgotten what?”

”It isn't beef,” he said quietly. ”It's big antelope.”

”What! eland?” I cried joyously.

”No; the big, solid-hoofed antelope that eats like nylghau or quagga.”

”What do you mean?” I said wonderingly, as I mentally ran over all the varieties of antelope I had seen away on the veldt.

”The big sort with iron soles to their hoofs. Two poor brutes, bleeding to death, dropped about a hundred yards away as we came in last night.”

”Horse!” I exclaimed. ”Ugh!”

”Oh yes, it's all very well to say 'Ugh!' old proud stomach; but I feel ready to sit down to equine sirloin and enjoy it. Why shouldn't horse be as good as ox or any of the antelopes of the veldt? You wouldn't turn up your nose at any of them.”

”But horse!” I said. ”It seems so-so-so-”

”So what? Oh, my grandmother! There isn't a more dainty feeder than a horse. Why, he won't even drink dirty water unless he's pretty well choking with thirst. Horse? Why, I wouldn't refuse a well-cooked bit of the toughest old moke that ever dragged a cart.”

”But what about fire?” I said.