s; thrown upon his
own resources, alone, in the then scarcely known wilds of northern
Zululand. Birds began to flit from spray to spray, balancing themselves
on swaying twig, and chirruping and twittering just over the sleeper's
head. Little lizards, creeping along the face of the rocky boulder,
dropped upon the sleeping form and ran tentatively over it, and a
bush-buck, stepping gingerly through the hollow, turned its full bright
eye upon the prostrate figure, and resumed its way as though finding no
cause for alarm.

Hour followed hour, and now the sun's rays began to decline, to slant
more and more horizontally upon the green sprays of the foliage. Gerard
stirred uneasily in his sleep, for with the approach of the waking hour
he was beginning to dream again. Once more he was in the Igazipuza
kraal with Dawes, discussing the seriousness of the situation. He had
made the attempt to escape, and was being brought back--had been brought
back. And then into his dreams there stole a vague sense of danger,
strange, indefinable, but none the less present. It was fearful. Some
weight was upon him, boding, terrible. He could neither straggle nor
call out. Then breaking the spell with a mighty effort, he started up
from his sleep--awoke to a reality more fearsome, more formidable than
the nightmarish delusion. For, as he started up into a sitting posture,
he nearly brought his face into contact with a dark grim visage which
was peering into it, and a cry of surprise, dismay, despair escaped him.
He was surrounded by a crowd of armed Zulus!

CHAPTER TWENTY.

AN ERROR OF JUDGMENT.

Never in the whole course of his hard, chequered, adventurous life,
could John Dawes recall a day spent in such wearing, intolerable
suspense, as that following the night of his young companion's escape.
That it was an escape he now entertained no doubt. The hours wore on,
and still no return of a triumphant band bringing with it the recaptured
fugitive. This augured well as regarded Gerard.

As regarded himself the trader knew that any hour might be his last.
There was an ominous stillness brooding over the Igazipuza kraal
following on the night of furious revelry. None of its denizens came
near him; but for all that he knew that every one of his movements was
intently watched. Try as he would he could not altogether conceal his
anxiety from his own people. The Swazis cowered beneath the waggons in
terror, and even the sturdie