e stamp. I think
it's threepence. I'll pay you when we meet again--that is, if we ever
do meet again. I'm beginning to think that this siege will go on for all
eternity. There, good-bye, my dear! God bless you! When you get out of
it, mind you write to the _Times_, in London, you know. There, don't
cry. I am sure I should not cry if I were going to get out of this
place;" for at this point Jess took the opportunity of Mrs. Neville's
fervent embrace to burst out into a sob or two.

In another minute they were in the cart, and Mouti was scrambling up
behind.

"Don't cry, old girl," said John, laying his hand upon her shoulder.
"What can't be cured must be endured."

"Yes, John," she answered, and dried her tears.

At the headquarter camp John went in and explained the circumstances of
his departure. At first the officer who was temporarily in command--the
Commandant having been wounded at the same time that John was
hit--rather demurred to his going, especially when he learned that he
had passed his word not to carry despatches. Presently, however, he
thought better of it, and said he supposed that it was all right, as
he could not see that their departure could do the garrison any harm:
"rather the reverse, in fact, because you can tell people how we are
getting on in this God-forsaken hole. I only wish that somebody would
give me a pass, that's all." So John shook hands with him and left, to
find an eager crowd gathered outside.

The news of their good luck had gone abroad, and everybody was running
down to hear the truth of it. Such an event as a departure out of
Pretoria had not happened for a couple of months and more, and the
excitement was proportionate to its novelty.

"I say, Niel, is it true you are going?" halloed a burly farmer.

"How the deuce did you get a pass?" put in another man with a face like
a weasel. He was what is known as a _Boer vernuker_ (literally a "Boer
cheater"), that is, a travelling trader whose business it is to beguile
the simple-minded Dutchman by selling him worthless goods at five times
their value. "I have loads of friends among the Boers. There is hardly
a Boer in the Transvaal who does not know me"--("To his cost," put in
a bystander with a grunt)--"and yet I have tried all I know"--("And you
know a good deal," said the same rude man)--"and _I_ can't get a pass."

"You don't suppose those poor Boers are going to let you out once they
have got you in?" went on the tormentor.