and we accounted for them all. Perhaps that chap who is
prisoner can tell you where to find the captain. It's a bad job,
indeed, if he has escaped."

"Is the man recovering his senses?"

"Yes, sir, he's just coming round."

Reuben stepped into the hut. The escape of Thorne destroyed all the
satisfaction which his success would have given him. He had good
reason to know the fiendish malignity of the man and, in spite of
the warnings he had given Kate Ellison, and his strict orders to
the police on guard, he felt a thrill of anxiety, now that he was
aware her enemy was still at large.

The prisoner was sitting up, in a corner of the hut; a policeman,
with drawn sword, standing near him.

"Where is your leader?" Reuben asked sternly. "The man you call
Fothergill."

"He went away yesterday morning," the man said, with a grin of
satisfaction. "You haven't caught him yet; and you will hear more
of him, before you do."

"Where was he going?" Reuben demanded.

"You won't get nothing out of me," the fellow said. "He's been a
good mate, and a true, and I ain't going to put you bloodhounds on
his scent. He's gone a-wooing, that's where he's gone, and that
won't help you much."

Reuben at once went outside, and called the settlers round him.

"I am sorry to say," he said, "that the leader of the party has got
away. He rode off yesterday morning, and although the prisoner we
have taken did not say where he has gone, I have not the least
doubt he has ridden back to the Donalds, to try and carry out his
threat to return for Miss Ellison.

"Therefore, gentlemen, may I ask you to start homeward, at once.
The horses have only done a few miles and, if we press forward, we
may manage to get to our camp of the evening before last. We have
no more to do here, except to see if there are any valuables hidden
in the huts, and set fire to them.

"I expect that we shall have fighting with the blacks, on our way
back. Those parties the two fellows who got away went to fetch
will, likely enough, bar our way. If it were not for that, I should
ride on by myself; but my duty is to stop with my men until, at any
rate, we have passed the place where the blacks are likely to
attack us. That done, I shall push on. It is annoying, indeed, to
think that that fellow must have passed us somewhere on the way,
yesterday."

The settlers agreed, at once. They all sympathized with Reuben, in
his disappointment at the escape of the leader of the