At first the news evidently caused the general some excitement, and he rose to his feet and walked restlessly up and down. Then he suddenly sat down, lit his pipe again, and smiled sourly.
“Let them take the laagers,” he said in a rasping voice. “What does it matter? We shall take them back again. These Englishmen are brave, but they are fools, and have no cunning. You shall see. We will turn on him and eat up completely this General French and his men.”
Three other Boer leaders were standing near at hand, and as Cronje finished speaking, two of them nodded sagely and ejaculated: “Ja, Ja! we shall take the English soldiers. They are not wise.”
The third, however, who was a Free State burgher, differed.
“These English are not such fools as you think,” he said shortly. “I tell you, there is a big force advancing on our flank, and unless we do something, and at once, we shall ourselves be captured.”
“Nonsense, nonsense, you are too timid!” exclaimed Cronje fiercely, turning on him and scowling angrily at him.
The Free State commandant was on the point of answering back, and commencing a quarrel with his superior, when two more horsemen galloped up and reported news of the gravest importance. General French, accompanied by a column of some 10,000 mounted men and guns, was pushing straight forward for Kimberley, and the British foot were following, and already threatened the road to Bloemfontein.
Instantly all was confusion in the Boer camp. Valuables were hastily thrown into wagons, and within a very short time Gronje and his forces were in full retreat, a long column streaming across the veldt on the way to Bloemfontein, while a second and smaller one went north. Behind them they left all their stores, and even their dinners, which in the hour of departure they were unable to eat.
Jack was marched between two ruffianly-looking Boers with the first column, and watched with secret satisfaction the confusion that reigned everywhere, and the downcast looks of the men who had boasted only a few hours before that the British were in their hands.
At the head of the column, sullen and dejected, rode Cronje, and on either flank and far behind were Boer skirmishers ready to guard the long line of wagons.