after, sitting beside
a stove in the hotel at Bergen, where we were waiting for our boat.

He climbed on the roof and shinned down the broken bricks of the outer
wall. The outbuilding we were lodged in abutted on a road, and was
outside the proper _enceinte_ of the house. At ordinary times I have
no doubt there were sentries, but Sandy and Hussin had probably managed
to clear them off this end for a little. Anyhow he saw nobody as he
crossed the road and dived into the snowy fields.

He knew very well that he must do the job in the twelve hours of
darkness ahead of him. The immediate front of a battle is a bit too
public for anyone to lie hidden in by day, especially when two or three
feet of snow make everything kenspeckle. Now hurry in a job of this
kind was abhorrent to Peter's soul, for, like all Boers, his tastes
were for slowness and sureness, though he could hustle fast enough when
haste was needed. As he pushed through the winter fields he reckoned
up the things in his favour, and found the only one the dirty weather.
There was a high, gusty wind, blowing scuds of snow but never coming to
any great fall. The frost had gone, and the lying snow was as soft as
butter. That was all to the good, he thought, for a clear, hard night
would have been the devil.

The first bit was through farmlands, which were seamed with little
snow-filled water-furrows. Now and then would come a house and a patch
of fruit trees, but there was nobody abroad. The roads were crowded
enough, but Peter had no use for roads. I can picture him swinging
along with his bent back, stopping every now and then to sniff and
listen, alert for the foreknowledge of danger. When he chose he could
cover country like an antelope.

Soon he struck a big road full of transport. It was the road from
Erzerum to the Palantuken pass, and he waited his chance and crossed
it. After that the ground grew rough with boulders and patches of
thorn-trees, splendid cover where he could move fast without worrying.
Then he was pulled up suddenly on the bank of a river. The map had
warned him of it, but not that it would be so big.

It was a torrent swollen with melting snow and rains in the hills, and
it was running fifty yards wide. Peter thought he could have swum it,
but he was very averse to a drenching. 'A wet man makes too much
noise,' he said, and besides, there was the off-chance that the current
would be too much for him. So he moved up str