ft, dank cloud enveloped them where they lay, and through it he could
hear faintly uttered orders and the tramp of men apparently gathering
and passing along the shelf-like mule-path.

"And I was longing for the sun to rise!" thought Pen.--"Ah, there's an
officer;" for somewhere just overhead there was the sharp click of an
iron-shod hoof among the rocks. "He must have seen us if it hadn't been
for this mist," thought the lad. "Now if it will only last for half an
hour we may be safe."

The mist did last for quite that space of time--in fact, until Pen Gray
was realising that the east lay right away to his right--for a golden
shaft of light suddenly shot horizontally from a gap in the mountains,
turning the heavy mists it pierced into masses of opalescent hues; and,
there before him, he suddenly caught sight of a cameo-like figure which
stood out from where he knew that the shelf-like mule-path must run.
The great bar of golden light enveloped both rider and horse, and
flashed from the officer's raised sword and the horse's trappings.

Then the rolling cloud of mist swept on and blotted him from sight, and
Pen crouched closer and closer to his sleeping comrade, and lay with
bated breath listening to the tramp, tramp of the passing men not a
hundred feet above his head, and praying now that the wreaths of mist
might screen them, as they did till what seemed to him to be a strong
brigade had gone on in the direction taken by his friends.

But he did not begin to breathe freely till the tramping of hoofs told
to his experienced ears that a strong baggage-train of mules was on its
way. Then came the tramp of men again.

"Rear-guard," he thought; and then his heart sank once more, for the
tramping men swept by in the midst of a dense grey cloud, which looked
like smoke as it rolled right onward, and as if by magic the sun burst
out and filled the valley with a blaze of light.

"They must see us now," groaned Pen; and he closed his eyes in his
despair.

CHAPTER FOUR.

"WATER, OR I SHALL DIE!"

Pen's heart beat heavily as he lay listening to the tramping of feet
upon the rocky shelf, and at last the sounds seemed so close that he
drew himself together ready to spring to his feet and do what he could
to protect his injured comrade. For in his strange position the idea
was strong upon him that their first recognition by the enemy might be
made with the presentation of a bayonet's point.

But his anticipations