hey had abandoned in the wood
nearly a hundred miles away, when they came face to face with Van
Vooren and his riders and turned to begin their long flight for life and
liberty.

CHAPTER XXI

THE VISION OF RALPH AND SUZANNE

"Sihamba," said the chief Sigwe, "this man who was found wandering upon
the outskirts of the town, declares that he is your servant, and that he
comes to seek you. Is it so?"

"It is so, indeed, chief," she answered, "though I scarcely expected to
see him again," and she told how they two and Zinti had parted.

Then Zinti was commanded to tell his tale, and from it it seemed that
after he had rested some hours in the kloof he crept to the mouth of it,
and, hidden behind a stone, saw Swart Piet and his servants pass quite
close to him on their homeward way. A sorry sight they were, for three
of their horses were lame, so that the riders were obliged to walk
and lead them, and the men themselves had been so bruised with the
spear-shafts that they seemed more dead than alive. Swart Piet rode last
of all, and just then he turned, and looking towards the peak shook his
fist as though threatening it, and cursed aloud in Dutch and Kaffir.
Indeed, Zinti said that his head and face were so swollen with blows
that had it not been for his large round eyes he could not have known
him, and Sihamba thought that very good tidings.

Well, when they had gone Zinti took heart, for it was plain that they
had been roughly handled, and had failed to catch his mistress or the
Swallow. So he went back to where he had left his horse eating a little
grass, and since it was too weak to carry him he led it, following Van
Vooren's spoor backwards till in the evening he came to the ford of the
Red River. Here he halted for the night, knee-haltering the horse, and
leaving it loose to graze, though he himself had nothing to eat. At the
first grey of dawn he awoke, and was astonished to see a second animal
feeding with the horse, which proved to be none other than the mule
that, as these creatures sometimes will, had followed the spoor of
his companion, Sihamba's horse, till it found it again. After this he
crossed the drift, riding slowly and leading the mule, till shortly
after sunrise he came to the outskirts of the town, where Sigwe's
watchmen found him and brought him to the chief.

"This man is a servant worth having," said Sigwe when he had heard the
story. "Let food be given to him and to the beasts."

When Z