almost as tired as
they were, and it was necessary to husband them if they were to reach
Mooifontein by dark. At midday they rested for an hour and a half, and
then, feeling almost worn out, continued their journey, reckoning that
they could not be more than sixteen or seventeen miles from Mooifontein.
It was about two hours after this that the catastrophe happened. The
course they were following ran down the side of one land wave, then
across a little swampy _sluit_, and up the opposite slope. They crossed
the marshy ground, walked their horses up to the crest of the opposite
rise, and found themselves face to face with a party of armed and
mounted Boers.

CHAPTER XXXI

JESS FINDS A FRIEND

The Boers swooped down on them with a shout, like hawks on a sparrow.
John pulled up his horse and drew his revolver.

"Don't, don't!" cried Jess; "our only chance is to be civil;" whereon,
thinking better of the matter, he replaced it, and wished the leading
Boer good-day.

"What are you doing here?" asked the Dutchman; whereon Jess explained
that they had a pass--which John promptly produced--and were proceeding
to Mooifontein.

"Ah, _Oom_ Croft's!" said the Boer as he took the pass, "you are likely
to meet a burying party there," but at the time Jess did not understand
what he meant. He eyed the pass suspiciously all over, and then asked
how it came to be stained with water.

Jess, not daring to tell the truth, said that it had been dropped into a
puddle. The Boer was about to return it when suddenly his eye fell upon
Jess's saddle.

"How is it that the girl is riding on a man's saddle?" he asked. "Why,
I know that saddle; let me look at the other side. Yes, there is a
bullet-hole through the flap. That is Swart Dirk's saddle. How did you
get it?"

"I bought it from him," answered Jess without a moment's hesitation. "I
could get nothing to ride on."

The Boer shook his head. "There are plenty of saddles in Pretoria,"
he said, "and these are not the days when a man sells his saddle to an
English girl. Ah! and that other is a Boer saddle too. No Englishman has
a saddle-cloth like that. This pass is not sufficient," he went on in a
cold tone; "it should have been countersigned by the local commandant. I
must arrest you."

Jess began to make further excuses, but he merely repeated, "I must
arrest you," and gave some orders to the men with him.

"We are caught again," she said to John; "and there is nothing for i