ut unmistakable.
It was the sound of voices, of native voices, singing. From far down on
the plains beyond the river it came, and it was drawing nearer and
nearer.

The watcher's nerves thrilled to the sound. The voices were pitched
low; purposely so he knew, none better. Knew also that they proceeded
from a moving mass of men. Would the dawn never come?

It would, and it did. The world had grown perceptibly lighter. The
loom of the hills was now distinct, but the depth of the plain was in
darkness. Still the moving sound drew nearer, and now in the tense
stillness the listener could even distinguish the tenour of the words.
It was a song of war.

None but a large and strongly armed band would have ventured thus to
advertise its presence. The inference was clear. The body now marching
from the Gcaleka country was the expected incursion. If he had been in
any doubt before, Harley Greenoak had now already decided to himself
that his information was accurate.

The darkness faded still more, and now upon the fast lightening plain he
was able to make out the moving mass. Lighter still! Hundreds of armed
savages were advancing to the drift. He could make out detail, and took
in the fact that many of them had guns, and now even that indescribable
rattle of assegai hafts--curiously unlike any other sound--was borne
upward to his ears. But the identity of any in the band he could not
arrive at.

The war-song had ceased. They descended to the drift in silence, and
without a moment's hesitation waded into the swirling current, their
weapons held high above their heads. This was breast deep, and as they
gained the middle of the stream many linked hands in order to steady
themselves against its strength. More than once a deep-toned, smothered
laugh and a splash told that an odd warrior here and there had slipped
and got a ducking. Finally, the last had disappeared. He could not see
them land, his own side of the river being shut from view by the
tree-tops; but he knew exactly where they would land, and the line they
would take for Matanzima's kraal. Harley Greenoak's work here was done.

The next phase of it was that of warning. Listening intently, he left
his hiding-place. There was no sound of life along the river bank, the
invading party had gone in an almost contrary direction. He struck into
an old path, which followed the downward course of the river, and for
some distance was able to travel with