e away the whole show."

"That's the last sweet word I shall hear from you for a long time to
come, I suppose," said Justin, somewhat comforted. "But you didn't
really mean all you were saying a little while ago? You're not really
sorry?"

"Perhaps not," she answered softly. "Perhaps we shall have good times
again. Only, be careful now. It all depends upon that."

"Oh, then I'll be careful enough, with that to look forward to," he
returned, quite cheered up now. Wherein her object was attained.

To one of the two came a feeling of relief a moment after the new
arrival had dismounted at the stockade, for his greeting was perfectly
easy and natural and pleasant.

"Well, Spence, you're out early," was all he said.

Out early. Justin began to feel mean again. Should he say he had been
there all night? But Hermia saved him the task of deciding by
volunteering that information herself. She was not going to begin
making mysteries.

Well, there was no occasion to. Both forgot that the crucial moment was
not entirely that of the greeting. The last hundred yards or so before
dismounting had told Hilary Blachland all there was to tell. No--not
quite all.

"What have we got here?" said the returned master of the house, as,
after a tub and a change of clothing, he sat at the head of his table.
"Guinea-fowl?" raising the dish-cover.

"Yes, Justin shot five for me yesterday," answered Hermia. "By the way,
I am always calling him Justin. `Mr Spence' is absurdly formal in this
out-of-the-way part, and he is really such a boy. Aren't I right,
Hilary?"

"Oh, certainly," was the reply, but the dry smile accompanying it might
have meant anything. To himself the smiler was thinking, "So this is
the latest, is it? What an actress she is, and that being so, I won't
pay her the bad compliment of saying it's a pity she didn't go on the
stage."

Justin didn't relish that definition of him; however, he recollected
there was everything to console him for the apparent slight. And it was
part of the acting. In fact, he was even conscious of being in a
position to crow over the other, if the other only knew it, and though
he strove hard to dismiss the idea, yet the idea was there.

"By the way, Blachland," he said, "how are things doing in Matabeleland?
Niggers still cheeky?"

"They're getting more out of hand than ever. In fact, you prospectors
had better keep a weather eye open. And, Hermia, I've been thinking