uld
find `The Home of the Serpents' again?"

"Why, of course," was the unhesitating reply. The old Kafir grinned.

"Do you mean to say you don't believe we could?" said Hoste, in
amazement.

"Yes, _amakosi_. I do not believe you could," was the unhesitating
rejoinder.

"What--when we have only just come out of it?"

The old Gcaleka grinned harder than ever.

"I do not believe you could light on the exact way in from either side,"
he repeated.

"Well, by Jove! I believe he's right," said Hoste dubiously, as he went
over in his mind the inexplicable way in which both entrances were
concealed, and that by the hand of Nature.

"Right about what?" said another voice, whose owner rejoined the circle
at that moment.

"Why, what do you think Josane is trying to cram us with, Milne? He
swears we couldn't find the entrance of, that infernal hole again."

"Well, I don't believe we could," said Eustace quietly. "But that's no
great disadvantage, for I suppose none of us will ever be smitten with
the remotest inclination to try."

"Not I, for one," assented Hoste. "I wouldn't go through those awful,
beastly heaps of snakes again--faugh!--not for a thousand pounds.
Hallo! It's coming!"

A roll of thunder--longer, louder, nearer--caused them to look upward.
The whole heavens were shrouded in masses of black, angry clouds,
sweeping slowly onward.

Then, as their glances sought the earth again, a quick whistle of
amazement escaped Shelton. It found a ready echo in a startled
ejaculation from the others.

"Where is he?"

For the place occupied by the unfortunate lunatic knew him no more. He
had disappeared.

For a second they stared blankly into each others' faces, then all four
moved forward instinctively.

He had been sitting idly, vacantly, perfectly quietly staring into
space. In the height of their conversation they had given little heed
to his presence. Well, he could not go far, for his legs were so
secured as to preclude him making steps of ordinary length.

The place was bushy, but not very thickly so. Spreading out they
entered the scrub by the only side on which he could have disappeared.

"There he is!" cried Hoste suddenly, when they had gone about fifty
yards.

Slinking along in a crouching attitude, slipping from bush to bush, they
spied the poor fellow. That was all right. There would be no
difficulty now.

No difficulty? Was there not? As soon as he saw that he was discovered