ind him.

"I rushed, or rather sprang and rolled down to the edge of the stream to
where a point of shingle ran out into the water. Along this I clambered,
and beyond it up to my middle. Now Magepa was being swept past me. I
caught his outstretched hand and pulled him ashore.

"'The boy!' he gasped; 'the boy! Is he dead?'

"I severed the lashings of the mat that had cut right into the old
fellow's shoulders. Inside of it was little Sinala, spluttering out
water, but very evidently alive and unhurt, for presently he set up a
yell.

"'No,' I said, 'he lives, and will live.'

"'Then all is well, Macumazahn.' (_A pause_.) 'It _was_ a spy in the
bush, not a buck. He overheard our talk. The King's slayers came. Gita
held the door of the hut while I took the child, cut a hole through the
straw with my assegai, and crept out at the back. She was full of spears
before she died, but I got away with the boy. Till your Kaffirs found
me I lay hid in the bush, hoping to escape to Natal. Then I ran for the
river, and saw you on the farther bank. _I_ might have got away, but
that child is heavy.' (_A pause_.) 'Give him food, Macumazahn, he must
be hungry.' (_A pause_.) 'Farewell. That was a good saying of yours--the
swift runner is outrun at last. Ah! yet I did not run in vain.'
(_Another pause, the last_.) Then he lifted himself upon one arm and
with the other saluted, first the boy Sinala and next me, muttering,
'Remember your promise, Macumazahn.'

"That is how Magepa the Buck died. I never saw anyone carrying weight
who could run quite so well as he," and Quatermain turned his head away
as though the memory of this incident affected him somewhat.

"What became of the child Sinala?" I asked presently.

"Oh! I sent him to an institution in Natal, and afterwards was able
to get some of his property back for him. I believe that he is being
trained as an interpreter."

THE BLUE CURTAINS

I

In his regiment familiarly they called him "Bottles," nobody quite knew
why. It was, however, rumoured that he had been called "Bottles" at
Harrow on account of the shape of his nose. Not that his nose was
particularly like a bottle, but at the end of it was round and large and
thick. In reality, however, the sobriquet was more ancient than that,
for it had belonged to the hero of this story from babyhood. Now, when
a man has a nickname, it generally implies two things: first, that he is
good-tempered, and, secondly, that he