_Crack, cracky crack, crack, crack, crack_, half-a-dozen flashes and puffs of smoke came from over the ridge of the low earthwork in front, emptying four saddles, while one horse went down headlong, pierced from chest to haunch by a bullet, and the fleeing pair saw the rest of their pursuers open out right and left, to swing round and gallop away back, pursued by a crackling fire which brought down six more before they were out of range.

Meanwhile twice over the big gun from its earthwork far away sent a couple of sh.e.l.ls right over the fugitives' heads on their way to the beleaguered town, and a few seconds later a cheery English voice had shouted: "Cease firing!" Then a dozen men came hurrying out of the rifle-pit where they had lain low, to surround the exhausted pair.

"Hands up!" shouted their leader loudly. "Who are you--deserters?"

"Deserters!" cried West hoa.r.s.ely, as he pressed his left hand upon his breast and let his rifle fall to the ground. "Despatch--Kimberley-- Water--for Heaven's sake--help!"

He sank upon his knees, for everything seemed to be swimming round him before he became quite blind.

But he could hear still as he swooned away, and what he heard was a hearty British cheer.

CHAPTER THIRTY.

AT THE GOAL.

"It has more than paid for it all!" said West that night, when they lay down to rest after a wildly-exciting day.

"Yes," replied Ingleborough, laughing. "I felt quite jealous!"

"I don't believe you!" said West sharply. "You couldn't; they all made as much fuss over you as they did over me, from the chief downward!"

"Well, I suppose they did; but I began to have the horrors once!"

"Horrors?"

"Yes; knowing as I did that they must be short of food, I began to think that they were welcoming us so warmly because we were something good to eat, and all the feasting was the beginning of fattening us up."

"Of course you did!" said West drily.

"I say though," continued Ingleborough; "if it is not a state secret, what was it the chief said to you when he took you aside?"

"Oh, it's no secret from you!" replied West.

"Let's have it then!"

"Well, first of all, it was a lot of flattery."

"Flattery?"

"Yes, about being so brave, and bringing the Kimberley despatch through the Boer lines."

"That was not flattery. You did bring the despatch to its destination very bravely."

"So did you!" said West sharply.

"Oh, very well, so did I then! It was _we_ if you like! Being b.u.t.tered is not an unpleasant sensation when you can honestly believe that you deserve it; and, without being vain, I suppose we can feel that our consciences are at rest."

"Never mind that!" said West hurriedly. "I don't like being b.u.t.tered, as you call it. The chief said then that he should have to send another despatch back to Kimberley, and that he should ask us to take it."

"What a cracker!" cried Ingleborough.

"Cracker--lie? I declare he did!"

"I don't believe you."

"Very well!" said West stiffly.

"No; it is not very well! Come now, he didn't say anything about _us_.

He said you. Confess: the truth!"

West began to hesitate.

"He--well--perhaps not exactly in the words I said."

"That will do, sir!" cried Ingleborough. "You are convicted of cramming--of making up a fict.i.tious account of the interview. He did not allude to me."

"But he meant to include you, of course!"

"No, he did not, Noll; he meant you."

"I say he meant both of us. If he did not, I shan't go!"

"What!"

"I shall not go a step out of the way without my comrade!"

"What!" cried Ingleborough, holding out his hand. "Well, come, I like that, lad, if you mean it."

"If I mean it, Ingle!" said West reproachfully.

"All right, old chap! You always were a trump! There, _we'll_ take the despatch back! And now no more b.u.t.ter! We're very brave fellows, of course, and there's an end of it. I say, I wonder how Anson is getting on."

"The miserable renegade!" cried West. "I should like to see the scoundrel punished!"

"Well, have patience!" said Ingleborough, laughing. "It's a very laudable desire, which I live in hopes of seeing gratified. But don't you think we might as well go to sleep and make up for all we have gone through?"

"Yes, but who is to sleep with all this terrible bombarding going on?"

"I for one!" said Ingleborough. "I'm getting quite used to it! But I say, I can see a better way of making a fortune than keeping in the diamond business."

"What is it?" said West carelessly. He was listening to the roar of the enemy's guns and the crash of sh.e.l.ls, for the Boers were keeping up their bombardment right into the night.

"I mean to go into the gunpowder trade, and--oh dear, how--"

West waited for the words that should have followed a long-drawn yawn, but none came, for the simple reason that Ingleborough was fast asleep.

Ten minutes later, in the face of his suggestions to the contrary, and in spite of the steady regular discharge of artillery, sending huge sh.e.l.ls into the place, West was just as fast asleep, and dreaming of Anson sitting gibbering at him as he played the part of a monkey filling his cheeks with nuts till the pouches were bulged out as if he were suffering from a very bad attack of mumps. The odd part of it was that when he took out and tried to crack one of the nuts in his teeth he could not, from the simple fact that they were diamonds.