wn hand she could hold him against Bessie in all her beauty, however
far things had gone between them; and she believed, as a jealous woman
is prone to do, that they had gone much farther than was the case.

But by-and-by, as she pursued that weary march, her better self rose up,
and mastered the promptings of her heart. Bessie loved him, and Bessie
was weaker than she, and less suited to bear pain, and she had sworn to
her dying mother--for Bessie had been her mother's darling--to promote
her happiness, and, come what would, to comfort and protect her by every
means in her power. It was a wide oath, and she was only a child when
she took it, but it bound her conscience none the less, and surely it
covered this. Besides, she dearly loved her--far, far more than she
loved herself. No, Bessie should have her lover, and she should never
know what it had cost her to give him up; and as for herself, well, she
must go away like a wounded buck, and hide till she got well--or died.

She laughed a drear little laugh, and stayed to brush her hair just as
the broad lights of the dawn came streaming across the misty veldt. But
she did not look at her face again in the glass; she cared no more
about it now. Then she threw herself down to sleep the sleep of utter
exhaustion before it was time to go out again and face the world and her
new sorrow.

Poor Jess! Love's young dream had not overshadowed her for long. It had
tarried just three hours. But it had left other dreams behind.

"Uncle," said Jess that morning to old Silas Croft as he stood by the
kraal-gate, where he had been counting out the sheep--an operation
requiring much quickness of eye, and on the accurate performance of
which he greatly prided himself.

"Yes, yes, my dear, I know what you are going to say. It was very neatly
done; it isn't everybody who can count out six hundred running hungry
sheep without a mistake. But then, I oughtn't to say too much, for you
see I have been at it for fifty years, in the old colony and here. Now,
many a man would get fifty sheep wrong. There's Niel for instance----"

"Uncle," said she, wincing a little at the name, as a horse with a sore
back winces at the touch of the saddle, "it wasn't about the sheep that
I was going to speak to you. I want you to do me a favour."

"A favour? Why, God bless the girl, how pale you look!--not but what you
are always pale. Well, what is it now?"

"I want to go up to Pretoria by the post-car