"Come along," cried Shanter, as they reached the house. "Shut fa.s.s.

Black fellow baal come along. Big white Mary gib mine damper now."

Five minutes later he was eating some bread with a contented smile on his countenance, while Tim and Norman kept watch, and the others busied themselves closing the shutters and carrying in blocks and slabs of wood, reserved for such an emergency, and now used as barricades for windows and loop-holed doors.

All worked vigorously, provisions were rolled in from the storehouse, though that was so near that its door could be commanded if a fresh supply was required. Fence gates were closed and fastened, the water-supply augmented, and at last the captain turned to the pale-faced women who had been helping with all their strength, and said:

"There, we need not fear blacks a hundred strong. All we have to do now is to come in, shut and bar the door, roll two or three of the casks against it, and laugh at them."

"But I don't feel happy about my kitchen," said Aunt Georgie.

"No: that is our weakest place," said the captain; "but I'll soon set that right.--See anything of them, boys?" he cried to the sentries.

"No, not a sign."

"Metancoly black fellow all along a trees," said Shanter, jumping up, for he had finished his damper.

"Can you see them?" cried the captain.

"Baal see black fellow. Plenty hide."

He ill.u.s.trated his meaning by darting behind a barrel and peering at the captain, so that only one eye was visible.

"Yes, I see," cried the captain. "Get up.--Now, good folks, some dinner. I'm hungry. Cheer up. We can beat them off if they attack, which I hope they will not."

"So do I," said Norman in a whisper to Rifle; "but if they do come, we must fight."

"Yes," said Rifle; "but they will not come fair. I'm afraid they'll try to take us by surprise."

"Let 'em," said Tim, scornfully. "If they do, we must try and surprise them."

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

"THINK YOU CAN HIT A BLACK?"

A long anxious afternoon of watching, but the blacks made no sign, and upon Shanter being referred to, he replied coolly: "Plenty come along when piggi jump down, all no see."

Tim shuddered at the black's coolness.

"Make shoot bang. Black fellow run along holler--ow!"

"He doesn't seem to mind a bit," whispered Tim.

"Don't know the danger, I suppose," said Norman. "I say, boys, how long could we hold out?"

"Always," said Rifle. "Or till we had eaten all the cattle."

"If the blacks don't spear them and drive them away."

As the afternoon wore on the conversation grew less frequent, and all waited, wondering whether the blacks would attack them or try to drive off the cattle. Guns were laid ready; ammunition was to hand, and the captain seemed to have quite thrown aside his suspicions of the black, who, on his side, had apparently forgotten the cut across his shoulder, though a great weal was plainly to be seen.

In spite of bad appet.i.tes there had been two meals prepared.

"Men can't fight on nothing, wife," the captain said; and then seeing the frightened looks of Mrs Bedford and the girls, he added with a merry laugh: "If they have to fight. Bah! if the black scoundrels come on, it only means a few charges of swan-shot to scatter them, and give them a lesson they will never forget."

Soon after this the captain and Uncle Jack went outside with the gla.s.s to sweep the edge of the scrub and the ridge, as well as every patch of trees, leaving the boys alone in the back part of the house to keep watch there.

"I say," said Rifle, in a low tone, "it's all very well for father to talk like that to them, but he doesn't think a charge of swan-shot will scatter the blacks, or else he wouldn't have the bullets ready."

"No," replied Norman, quietly. "He looks very serious about it all."

"Enough to make him," said Tim; "after getting all this place so beautiful, to have a pack of savages coming and interfering.--I say, Shanter, think the savages are gone?"

"Mine no pidney," said Shanter, starting up from where he had been squatting in one corner.

"Are the black fellows gone?"

"Baal black fellow gone along. Wait till piggi jump down and can't see."

"Think so? Come along all dark?" said Rifle. "Yohi. Come along, get flour, numkull chicken fellow. Make big fight."

Norman frowned.

"Mine glad Marmi Rifle. Mine like plenty stop along here."

"Well, I don't," grumbled Rifle. "I don't like it at all. I say, Man, don't you wish we were all safe somewhere else?"

"Yes. No," said Norman, shortly; "we mustn't be cowards now."

"'Tisn't cowardly not to want to fight like this," grumbled Rifle. "If I shoot, perhaps I shall kill a black fellow. I don't want to kill a black fellow."

Shanter nodded admiringly, for he did not quite grasp the speech.

"Kill a black fellow," he said. "Mumkull. Go bong."

"Oh, bother; I wish he wouldn't muddle what a fellow means. I say, Tim, feel frightened?"

"Horribly," replied Tim. "I say, I hope they will not come."

"Perhaps they will not," said Norman. "If they do, it may only mean to drive away some of the cattle."

"Well, father don't want his cattle driven away, does he?"

"Don't talk so," said Norman, who was standing with his face to a small square window, which he reached by standing on a case. "I say, come here, Tim."

The boy went and stood by him.