The words were cut short, for the young horse, all unbroken as it was, gave a violent shy, which, taking its rider unawares, nearly unseated him, so unexpected was it. And, simultaneously, several red forms rose up amid the bushes three hundred yards in their rear and poured in a rattling volley, but, as usual, firing well over the heads of their destined victims.
“By Jove! there they are,” cried Claverton. “Come along; there’s no turning back now. We must ride like the devil,” and he spurred along the path followed closely by the other two. At least two hundred Kafirs sprang up and started in pursuit, discharging their pieces as they leaped from cover with a fierce shout, and the bullets whistled around the fugitives with a sharp, shrill hiss.
“Come on, Mr Swaysland. Spur up that nag of yours; we shall get a good start here,” cried Claverton, as they reached a comparatively open plateau of about a mile in extent. But it was uphill ground and rough withal, and the pursuers were only too evidently gaining on them.
Pphit! Pphit! A bullet ploughs up the ground almost between the very hoofs of Claverton’s horse, while another splinters itself against a stone just in front.
“The devil! It’s getting lively,” he ejaculated as, without slackening speed, he looked round for a target for his revolver. The missionary was deathly white, and cut a grotesque figure, spurring up his seedy animal, almost holding on round its neck, while the flaps of his long-tailed coat and the ends of his puggaree streamed out behind him. For the life of him Claverton could not repress a laugh.
Suddenly the Dutchman lurches in his saddle and falls headlong to the ground—shot dead by one of the pursuers, whose bullet has entered between the shoulders—probably to the great surprise of the marksman. His horse, terrified, starts off, dragging him in the stirrup for a few paces, then his foot disentangles itself and he lies an inanimate heap. With a wild-beast howl the savages bound forward, and Claverton, glancing over his shoulder, can see a score of assegais flash and gleam blood-red in the sunshine, as the fierce warriors crowd round the ill-fated Boer, literally cutting him to pieces.
Like wolves delayed in the pursuit of a sledge by a forestalment of the prey which must eventually be theirs, the Kafirs halt for a moment, each eager to bury his spear-head in the body of the fallen man; but it is only for a moment. With a wild yell of triumph they press on—thirsting for more blood. A sudden groan from his companion causes Claverton to turn his head. Is he hit, too? The missionary’s face is livid with terror, and following the glance of the staring, dilated eyeballs—dilated with a fear that has almost mania in it—all hope dies within him. A dense swarm of Kafirs is issuing from the bush immediately in front, and the two white men are thus securely caught, as in a trap. For on the only side left open falls a huge precipice, down which nothing breathing can go—and live.
“God help us?” exclaimed the missionary. “We are lost,” and he fell to the ground in a dead faint.
Claverton reins in his horse, and confronts the savages, with a calm brow and revolver in hand. Death has overtaken him at last. He has stared the grim Monarch in the face full oft, but now his time has come. He feels that his lucky star has set; his meeting with Lilian yesterday—only yesterday—was the beginning of the end. What can a man do when his star has set? All this runs through his mind like a lightning-flash.
It is a marvellous picture, that last scene in the awful drama on this lonely mountain top. The sweet golden sunshine falls upon a crowd of bounding shapes, sweeping forward in a fast diminishing semicircle, and the still air is rent with fiendish howls. Eyeballs roll with a merciless gleam, white teeth are bared in grinning triumph, and the pointed blades of the assegais bristle like a forest among the leaping, naked red bodies. And turning to confront this hideous array—calmly awaiting the approach of his destroyers, this one man—cool, fearless, and noble-looking—sits his horse, whose terrified restiveness he can scarcely curb with one hand, while in the other he holds his revolver in a firm, steady grasp. Before him, the spears of the savage host; behind, the awful brow of the cliff. A ghastly choice.