"Barring storms and other little pleasantries," laughed one of the passengers. "Well, I shall be glad. I have had my run ashore and want to be moving on."
On the following day, when Jack Simpson and Owen dropped into one of the boats, only a dozen other passengers made their appearance, for it was very hot ashore, and there was little to do but ramble along the coast. Our young friends, however, had managed to borrow a gun apiece, and were intent on obtaining a[Pg 56] little sport. Indeed, an hour later found them a couple of miles inland, threading their way through a forest of small proportions which had attracted them as being a likely place for game. Mulha accompanied them, for Owen had asked permission of the captain, much to the native's delight.
"There will be pig here, sahibs," he said, as they entered the forest. "And we shall find it cooler. If my masters will take my advice they will take their station at the end of the first open glade, and let me beat the forest on either side. Then if there is any beast within it may run to the clearing."
A little later they struck upon a long narrow clearing, where the ground was somewhat rocky, and where a tiny stream trickled through the stones.
"Plenty of beasts come here," Mulha pronounced, as he stepped along the glade. "You can see their marks between the stones. If the sahibs take post here they should have sport. I will go to the right first, and afterwards to the left. Thus you will know my position, and will not fire in my direction when the beasts bolt."
It took but a few moments to arrange their positions; then Mulha disappeared. Owen threw himself down behind a huge boulder, over which a cool shade was thrown by a tree near at hand. Jack posted himself behind another boulder, on a level with the one where his friend was stationed. Both looked up the full length of the grove, with their guns turned to that side to which the game, should there prove to be any, would[Pg 57] be driven, and away from the forest where Mulha was beating.
Crash! They heard his stick as he beat the underwood in the distance, and waited expectantly, their hearts pulsating a trifle faster, for neither had had an opportunity of shooting before. There was another crash in the distance, a streak of brown bounded into the grove from the trees, alighted on all four feet, and leaped high again with such swiftness and with such momentum that it was across the glade before either could have thought it possible. Owen's gun went to his shoulder with the rapidity of lightning. His training with the pistol helped him to sight the disappearing mark, and long before Jack had gathered his wits, or had awakened to the fact that an antelope of large proportions was on the point of disappearing, the weapon cracked, and the animal fell huddled up at the very edge of the clearing. Owen turned to his friend with a gleam of excitement and triumph in his eye, while he hastily rammed down another charge, ran a wad upon it, and dropped in his bullet.
"One," he said quietly. "Look out for others."
"My word!" gasped Jack, "that was a lightning shot."
"Look out!" shouted Owen.