been shamed into
relenting, either by Wyvern's words or demeanour, why the notion may
immediately be classed among popular delusions. What was behind it was
this. It had suddenly been borne in upon him, that to have Wyvern for a
friend would render the allotted task of "taking care" of him infinitely
easier than if he should sheer off, and hold himself in a state of
suspicious and therefore watchful aloofness. Under his own eyes his
opportunities would be greater: whereas his intended victim away, and
thoroughly on his guard--why, then the matter was not so easy. And,
even then, there flashed through his evil brain a hell-sent idea. The
wood-cutting place. There would be a royal opportunity there; and with
the hideous thought he had blossomed forth into a rugged geniality
again. He could not afford to scare away his bird.

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

WARREN'S OPPORTUNITY.

The Kunaga river was "down"; which is to say that the heavy rains of the
last three days, especially among the foot-hills wherein it took its
source, had converted it into a red, rolling, turbid torrent, of
inconceivable swiftness and power. A comparative trickle at ordinary
times, now the great raging flood surged within a few feet of
overlapping its ample bed, submerging the lower of the trees fringing
its banks well-nigh to their tops. A grand spectacle those seething red
waves, hissing and rearing as they encountered some obstacle, then the
crash as this gave way, and the mighty current, unchecked, poured onward
with a savage roar. Great tree-trunks rolled over and over in the
flood, and now and then, bodies of drowned animals, sheep, cattle,
horses, swept helplessly down.

"Someone's the poorer for the loss of his whole span," remarked Warren,
as a number of drowned oxen were whirled by. "Likely the river first
came down in a wall--it does sometimes--and caught the whole lot bang in
the middle of a drift."

"Most likely," assented Lalante. "But I've never seen the river as full
as this. Isn't it grand?"

The two were standing on a high, scaur-like bank where the Kunaga swept
round one side of Le Sage's farm, and just below the krantz above which
its owner and Wyvern had held their somewhat inharmonious discussion.
They had strolled down to look at the river. The two youngsters had
accompanied them, but now had wandered away on their own account.

The rain had ceased but the sky was veiled in an opaque curtain; the
high _rand_ b