he enemy, while a dozen Boers,
springing up from the bowels of the earth, followed hard on their
heels. Ten more took the horses and fell back out of range of the
firing; and the remainder of the squadron stayed in their places and
helped to play out the game.

It was all quite simple, all a matter of course. Instead of the fuss
and fume and chaos of fighting, it had worked itself out like a
problem in mathematics, and Weldon, as he lay on the ground with his
Lee-Enfield cuddled into the curve of his shoulder, felt himself
reducing it to a pair of simultaneous equations: if X Britons equal
Y Boers on the firing line, and Y Britons draw off the fire of W
Boers, then how many Britons--But there came a second flash and a
second spatter, nearer, this time; and he lost his mathematics in a
sudden rush of bad temper which made him long to fly at the
invisible foe and beat him about the head with his clubbed rifle. It
was no especial satisfaction for a man in his position to climb up
on his elbow and help to discharge a volley at an empty landscape.
The war pictures he had been prone to study in his boyhood had been
full of twisty-necked prancing horses and bright-coated swaggering
men, all on their feet, and very hot and earnest. Here the picture
was made up of a row of brown-clothed forms lying flat on their
stomachs and, far before them, a single flat-topped hill and a few
heaps of scattered black rocks. And this was modern war.

There came a third blaze, a third hum of Mauser bullets. Then he
heard a swift intake of the breath, followed by Carew's voice, the
drawling, languid voice which Weldon had learned to associate with
moments of deep excitement.

"Say, Weldon, some beggar has hit me in the shoulder!"

Then of a sudden Weldon realized that at last he knew what it meant
to be under fire.

CHAPTER SEVEN

"Oh, truce! Truce!" Alice Mellen protested. "Don't talk shop,
Cooee."

"It's not shop; it is topics of the day," Ethel responded
tranquilly. "Besides, I want to hear about Mr. Carew. Is he
dangerous?"

Weldon laughed.

"No, for his wound; yes, for his temper. One was only a scratch; the
other way, he was horribly cut up."

"Did he swear?" Alice queried, while she distributed lumps of sugar
among the cups.

"Alice!"

"Don't pretend to be shocked, Cooee. Even if you haven't been out
but one season, you ought to know what happens when a man turns
testy. Frankly, I think it is a healthy sign, if a