HAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.

OF THE BUSH ROAD.

An advance guard of twenty men was thrown forward; Ben Halse's trap and
that containing the other storekeeper's family being in the middle of
the main body, which was ready to close up around both at a moment's
warning. Scouts were thrown out, but there were places in which the
thick bush rendered the services of such entirely useless.

The prospectors especially were inclined to treat the whole thing as a
picnic; indeed, there was hardly a man there present who was not
spoiling for a fight--and would have been intensely disappointed if no
such were put up. The women and children were certainly a drawback;
stray bullets have an uncomfortable knack of splattering in anywhere.
That the escort might be overwhelmed by weight of numbers and utterly
wiped out never occurred to them. Nearly a hundred police in full
fighting kit, and the dozen or so of extra rifles, ought to be able to
hold their own against all Zululand. Isandhlwana? Oh yes; but that was
out of date; out-of-date weapons and out-of-date men. With quick-firing
rifles, and an abundance of ammunition, they could hold out for ever
against a mob of ricksha pullers and kitchen boys, for such were the
sorry substitutes for the old-time splendid legionaries of the last
king. The civilian element, in view of its victory that morning, was
inclined to treat the whole situation as a joke.

Denham, however, formed an exception to this spirit, so, too, did Ben
Halse, for the same reason. Inspector Bray, an experienced officer, who
was in command of the Force, felt not a little anxious; he would not
have felt anything of the kind but for his charges; and there was a very
critical bit of the road just beyond the Gilwana drift--several miles of
thickly bushed country. If they were attacked at all it would be there,
he prophesied to Denham, who was riding beside him.

It was a lovely afternoon, the air brisk, fresh and crisp, the sky
cloudless. The scattered thorn-bushes were alive with bird voices, but
that dark hang of forest on the rugged hills, now on the right hand, now
on the left, there it was that the element of menace lay.

"It's the devil," he said, "to have women to look after. I beg your
pardon, Denham, but I'm talking generally. You see, any tumble-down
shanty of a brick building will stop a bullet, but nothing will here.
You can make 'em lie down in the bottom of a trap, for instance, but
that's not bullet-