gh, harsh and long-drawn.
Then silence.

With every drop of blood tingling in his veins, John Ames sprang within
the cave again, for an awful idea had seized him. This thing must have
been, right inside their hiding-place. His hand shook so that he could
hardly get out a match and strike it. He bent down over the sleeping
girl. She still slumbered--breathing softly, peacefully, but with brow
slightly ruffled as though by dreams. He gazed upon her unconscious
face until the match burned out, then turned away, filled with
unutterable relief. No harm had happened to her, at any rate.

Then the first grey of dawn lightened upon the mountains.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

ALONE.

"I think we'll move on a little further to-day, if you feel equal to it,
Nidia."

She looked up in surprise.

"Certainly, if you think it advisable," she answered.

"Well, to tell the truth, I do. It's not a good plan to remain too long
in the same place. My notion is to work our way gradually to the
northern edge of the range, where we can reconnoitre the open country
between it and Bulawayo. It'll be that way we shall be most likely to
strike a patrol."

John Ames was occupied in plucking the guinea-fowls he had brought in
yesterday. Nidia had just lighted the fire and was engaged in making it
burn. The sun had just risen upon a glorious day of cloudlessness, of
coolness too, judging from the keen edge which still ran through the
atmosphere.

"John," she said, looking up suddenly, "is it because of what I told you
yesterday?"

"The proposed move? N-no. Yet, perhaps a little of that too. You
would never feel easy if left alone here again. But I have other
reasons--that smoke, for instance, I saw yesterday. It may mean
natives. There may have been fighting down Sikumbutana way or on the
Umgwane, and they may be taking to the mountains. We had better get
further on."

"Do you know, I am glad you have come to that conclusion. What I told
you yesterday has rather got upon my nerves, and, now we are going to
move, I'll tell you something more. I dreamt of it--dreamt that awful
face was bending over me looking into mine. You know--one of those
dreams that is horribly real, one that remains with you after you wake,
and, in fact, that you remember as though it had actually happened. Are
those birds ready?"

"Yes. Never mind. I'll fix them," he replied; and in a moment, fixed
on a deft arrangement of sticks, they were his