could lift it a dozen other dark figures rose beside the sentry and
covered him with their weapons. To resist would have been madness, and
a minute later Jack and his friend were disarmed and being taken back
towards the Boer camp at Magersfontein, Riley still mounted on his pony.

"What hard luck!" cried the latter bitterly. "We were within a couple
of miles of our friends, and after all the trouble we had taken we
deserved to get in safely."

"Yes, it was rough luck," Jack agreed cheerfully. "But it is the
fortune of war, and there is no use worrying about it. I should not
have minded so much if I had had a fight for it. To be taken without
firing a shot is humiliating. But now we have nothing to do but to
escape. I've managed that once before, and I'll do it again if the
chance comes."

"Then I hope you'll take me with you," said Riley eagerly. "I've no
special wish to spend my days a prisoner in Pretoria."

Soon after sunrise that morning the two prisoners were brought into the
enemy's camp, and Riley was at once taken to the hospital and placed in
charge of a Scotch surgeon who had been commandeered by the Boers. Jack
was taken across to a large bell-tent, standing apart from the others in
an open space, and ushered into it. It was most elaborately furnished.
The floor was carpeted, and there was a handsome brass bedstead and a
writing-table, seated behind which was a short, shabby, and
vindictive-looking man, with iron-grey beard and whiskers, unkempt and
undipped, and almost concealing a powerful-looking mouth, and eyes which
flashed fiercely at the stranger Englishman. It was General Cronje, a
man who had taken a prominent part in the first Boer war, and who had
earned for himself the contempt of all Englishmen for his treacherous
behaviour.

"Who are you?" he demanded, looking searchingly at Jack's face.

"I am Jack Somerton, a despatch-rider, and now a prisoner in your
hands," Jack answered coolly. "Where are your despatches?"

"I don't know, general," was Jack's calm reply, for, sharp of wit, he
had torn and scattered his papers on the veldt the instant after being
taken prisoner.

"Search him!" cried General Cronje. And then, as soon as Jack's clothes
had been thoroughly examined, he ordered him to be taken away.

Careless of the black looks with which the general favoured him, Jack
swept his hat off and stalked unconcernedly out of the tent. He was
then taken across to a large wagon