on guard over the fallen body of a man.

Another moment and he was beside them.

"My God! Are you hurt?"

He could see nothing but an indistinct and shapeless mass, without form
or color to mark it out from the brooding gloom and from the leaden
earth. But the voice he knew so well answered him with the old love and
fealty in it; eager with fear for him.

"When did you miss me, sir? I didn't mean you to know; I held on as long
as I could; and when I couldn't no longer, I thought you was safe not to
see I'd knocked over, so dark as it was."

"Great Heavens! You are hurt, then?"

"Just finished, sir. Lord! It don't matter. Only you ride on, Mr. Cecil;
ride on, I say. Don't mind me."

"What is it? When were you struck? O Heaven! I never dreamt----"

Cecil hung over him, striving in vain through the shadows to read the
truth from the face on which he felt by instinct the seal of death was
set.

"I never meant you should know, sir. I meant just to drop behind and
die on the quiet. You see, sir, it was just this way; they hit me as we
forced through them. There's the lance-head in my loins now. I pressed
it in hard, and kept the blood from flowing, and thought I should hold
out so till the sun rose. But I couldn't do it so long; I got sick and
faint after a while, and I knew well enough it was death. So I dropped
down while I'd sense left to check the horse and get out of saddle in
silence. I hoped you wouldn't miss me, in the darkness and the noise the
wind was making; and you didn't hear me then, sir. I was glad."

His voice was checked in a quick, gasping breath; his only thought had
been to lie down and die in the solitude so that his master might be
saved.

A great sob shook Cecil as he heard; no false hope came to him; he felt
that this man was lost to him forever, that this was the sole recompense
which the cruelty of Africa would give to a fidelity passing the
fidelity of woman; these throes of dissolution the only payment with
which fate would ever requite a loyalty that had held no travail weary,
no exile pain, and no danger worthy counting, so long as they were
encountered and endured in his own service.

"Don't take on about it, sir," whispered Rake, striving to raise his
head that he might strain his eyes better through the gloom to see
his master's face. "It was sure to come some time; and I ain't in no
pain--to speak of. Do leave me, Mr. Cecil--leave me, for God's sake, and
save yourself!"

"D