day."

Now for the first time the man at the head of the grave turned. Lifting
his hand, he pointed to me, whereon the other two men turned also.

"God above us!" he said in a choked voice, "at last I am quite mad.
Look! there stands the spook of young Allan, the son of the English
predicant who lived near Cradock."

As soon as I heard the voice I knew the speaker.

"Oh, Mynheer Marais!" I cried, "I am no ghost, I am Allan himself come
to save you."

Marais made no answer; he seemed bewildered. But one of the men cried
out crazily:

"How can you save us, youngster, unless you are ready to be eaten? Don't
you see, we starve, we starve!"

"I have wagons and food," I answered.

"Allemachte! Henri," exclaimed the man, with a wild laugh, "do you hear
what your English spook says? He says that he has wagons and _food,
food, food!_"

Then Marais burst into tears and flung himself upon my breast, nearly
knocking me down. I wrenched myself free of him and ran to Marie, who
was lying face upwards on the ground. She seemed to hear my step, for
her eyes opened and she struggled to a sitting posture.

"Is it really you, Allan, or do I dream?" she murmured.

"It is I, it is I," I answered, lifting her to her feet, for she seemed
to weigh no more than a child. Her head fell upon my shoulder, and she
too began to weep.

Still holding her, I turned to the men and said:

"Why do you starve when there is game all about?" and I pointed to two
fat elands strolling among the trees not more than a hundred and fifty
yards away.

"Can we kill game with stones?" asked one of them, "we whose powder was
all burnt a month ago. Those buck," he added, with a wild laugh, "come
here to mock us every morning; but they will not walk into our pitfalls.
They know them too well, and we have no strength to dig others."

Now when I left my wagons I had brought with me that same Purdey rifle
with which I had shot the geese in the match against Pereira, choosing
it because it was so light to carry. I held up my hand for silence,
set Marie gently on the ground, and began to steal towards the elands.
Taking what shelter I could, I got within a hundred yards of them, when
suddenly they took alarm, being frightened, in fact, by my two Zulu
servants, who were now arriving.

Off they galloped, the big bull leading, and vanished behind some trees.
I saw their line, and that they would appear again between two clumps of
bush about two hundred and f