thoughts were completely diverted from the loneliness of his position,
and he thought of nothing but the coming dinner as he took from his
pocket a lump of heavy mealie cake which had been brought by way of
lunch.

"Wish I'd brought a bit of salt," he said to himself and a few minutes
later, as he saw the full pound and a half steak beginning to curl up
and shrink on one side, another thought struck him. Wasn't it a pity
that he had not cut a bigger slice, for this one shrank seriously in the
cooking?

But concluding that it would do for the present, he carefully withdrew
the sticks from the sand, and turning them about, replaced them so as to
cook the other side, congratulating himself the while upon the fact that
the meat tightly embraced the pieces of wood, and there was no fear of
the broil falling into the sand.

"Don't want that kind of salt peppered over it," he said in a mixed
metaphorical way, and after a look at Breezy, who was browsing away
contentedly, Dyke smiled happily enough. Then inhaling the delicious
odours of the steak, he knelt there, with the fire glancing upon his
face and the sun upon his back, picking up and dropping into places
where they were needed to keep up the heat, half-burnt pieces of the
short, crisp wood.

It was so pleasant and suggestive an occupation that Dyke forgot all
about danger from wild beasts, or trampling from a startled herd coming
back his way. For one moment he thought of Duke, and how long he would
be before he came back with the cartridge pouch. He thought of Emson,
too, in regard to the steak, wishing he was there to share it, and
determining to have the fire glowing and another cut ready to cook.

Then, springing up, he ran to where Breezy raised his head with a
pleasant whinny of welcome, took the water-bottle he always carried from
where it was strapped to the back of the saddle, and returned to the
cooking.

"Done to a turn," he cried, as he caught up the two pieces of wood which
held the steak, bore his dinner away a few yards from the fire, sat down
holding the skewers ready, and then placing his cake bread in his lap,
he began to cut off pieces of the meat.

"De--licious!" he sighed, "but a trifle hot," and then everything was
resolved into the question of meat--rich, tender, juicy meat--glorious
to one whose fare had been dry, leathery, rather tainted biltong for a
long while past.

Dyke ate as he had never eaten before, till the last fragment w