It seems to have arisen."
"I know he did," I answered, "but I cannot make up my mind which
is the more dangerous, Marnham or the Basutos. I rather think
that he set them on to us."
"It is impossible to solve problems at this hour of the morning,
Quatermain, and there is no time to toss. So I vote for the
Temple."
"It seems our best chance. At any rate that's your choice, so
let's go."
Then I sang out to the Kaffirs, "The Basutos are on us. We go to
Tampel for refuge. Run!"
My word! they did run. I never saw athletes make better time
over the first quarter of a mile. We ran, too, or at least the
horse did, I hanging on to the stirrup and Anscombe holding both
the rifles beneath his arm. But the beast was tired, also blown
out with that morning feed of mealies, so our progress was not
very fast. When we were about two hundred yards from the wagon I
looked back and saw the Basutos beginning to arrive. They saw us
also, and uttering a sort of whistling war cry, started in
pursuit.
After this we had quite an interesting time. I scrambled on to
the horse behind Anscombe, whereon that intelligent animal,
feeling the double weight, reduced its pace proportionately, to a
slow tripple, indeed, out of which it could not be persuaded to
move. So I slipped off again over its tail and we went on as
before. Meanwhile the Basutos, very active fellows, were coming
up. By this time the yellow-wood grove in the swamp, of which I
have already written, was close to us, and it became quite a
question which of us would get there first (I may mention that
Footsack & Co.
Pages:
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69