Suddenly he roused himself and said in a low whisper: “Englishman, I do not love your countrymen, but I cannot forget that once you helped me when wounded. You ran the risk of imprisonment so that I might not die like a poor deserted dog in the bush. It is hard that I should repay you in this way. It would have been better had I entered this room an hour later. But I will show my gratitude at all costs. Escape now, before I change my mind, for in doing this I too shall risk my life. Escape! Leave me! I will lie upon the floor, and so disarrange the room that, when my comrades find me there in the morning, they will think that you have attacked me. Go, Englishman; you deserve a reward for your noble act!”
Jack was simply astounded, and could scarcely believe his ears. “Was it true that he was free to escape after all?” he wondered vaguely, “or was this merely some sly ruse?”
A second later he dismissed the thought as ungrateful, for a glance at the Boer’s face told him that here at least was one man with honest intentions. Then he wrung his hand, blurted out his thanks, and a minute later was climbing through the window.
Creeping close to the wall once he had dropped outside, Jack paused for a few moments and listened. There was a light in a room at the side, and from the open window sounds of voices proceeded. Stealing along to it Jack lifted his head cautiously and peeped in, to find that the field-cornet and his five men were seated on some benches in a cloud of tobacco smoke.
It was clear that they had no fear that the Englishman in their care would escape, and, thankful for the fact, for the longer his absence remained undiscovered the better, Jack hurried away in the darkness, and a quarter of an hour later entered the streets of Pretoria.
When he reached the neighbourhood of the hospital in which Guy was living, he slipped off his boots, and, carrying them, walked along till he was close to the guard-house opposite the government buildings.
“It will be much better for me to get those rifles now,” he thought. “Perhaps someone might give the alarm as Guy is leaving the hospital, and then we could never hope to get possession of any weapons, and to pass as Englishmen on the Boer side we must have them. I’ll wait here till the sentries are changed. The hour for that is ten o’clock, and it is not far from that now.”
Seating himself in the darkest corner, but well in sight of the guard-house, Jack waited patiently, and soon had the satisfaction of seeing two men emerge from it and relieve their comrades. It was quite an informal matter, and performed in a very different manner from that practised by English troops. Smoking their pipes, the two men stepped out of the hut and called to the others to come to them. Then each took a bandolier and a rifle from one of the sentries, and, still smoking, strolled across to their posts and stopped in front of the big building to continue a conversation which they had broken off in the hut.
Now was Jack’s chance, and he seized it. Slipping along close to the wall, he crossed the road noiselessly, peeped into the guard-house to see that all was quiet, and then, with his eyes upon the careless sentries, slipped two of the bandoliers across his shoulder, and carefully lifted two rifles from the rack. A moment later he was gone, and, hurrying back to his former hiding-place, deposited his possessions on the ground. A few minutes passed, and as all was still quiet, he slipped up to the window of the hospital close to which Guy’s bed was placed, and gently tapped on the window-frame. It was an intensely hot night, and fortunately the window stood wide open. A second later Guy was leaning through it.
“Is that you, Jack, old boy?” he whispered.