mons to
them to stand or be shot seemed only to have the effect of causing them
to redouble their efforts--winding in and out among the grass and
thorn-bushes with the rapidity of serpents.

The pursuers were gaining. Rough and tangled as the ground now became,
the speed of horses was bound to tell in the race. A few moments more
and the spoil would be theirs. Suddenly, but very quietly, Eustace
said:

"I say, you fellows--don't look round, but--turn your horses' heads and
ride like the devil! _We are in a trap_!"

The amazed, the startled look that came upon the faces of those three
would have been entertaining in the extreme, but for the seriousness of
the occasion. However, they were men accustomed to critical situations.
Accordingly, they slackened, as directed, and suddenly headed round
their horses as if they had decided to abandon the pursuit.

Not a minute too soon had come Eustace's discovery and warning. Like
the passing movement of a sudden gust, the grass and bushes rustled and
waved, as a long line of ambushed savages sprang up on either side, and
with a wild and deafening yell charged forward upon the thoroughly
disconcerted and now sadly demoralised four.

The Kafirs had been lying hidden in horseshoe formation. Had our
friends advanced a hundred yards further their doom would have been
sealed. They would have been hemmed in completely. Happily, however,
when Eustace uttered his warning, they had not quite got between the
extremities of the "shoe."

As it stood, however, the situation was appalling to the last degree.
Terrified to madness, the horses became almost unmanageable, rearing and
plunging in a perfect frenzy, of fear, and it was all that their riders
could do to steer them through the bristling thorn-bushes, a single
plunge into one of which would, at the rate they were going, hurl both
steed and rider to the earth. And, again, the wild war-cry pealed
through the valley, and every bush and tussock of grass seemed to _grow_
enemies--seemed to swarm with dark, sinuous forms, to blaze with the
gleam of assegai blades and rolling eyeballs. The race for spoil had
become a race for life.

There had been barely a hundred yards between them and their assailants
when the latter first sprang up, and this distance had alarmingly
decreased, for the nature of the ground, rough and overgrown with long,
tangled grass, and the fact that they were being forced up-hill, tended
to neutralise wh