"Well, then, I will recommend that you be gazetted to the 9th Lancers. The colonel will be glad to have you; what with casualties and illness he is short of subalterns. You have been very favourably reported before for your expedition from De Aar across the Orange River, and there can be no doubt that my recommendation will be acceded to at once."
"May I ask what I am to do with the twenty Kaffir scouts who have been working under me?"
"You had better hand them over to Major Rimington. He will know how to employ them."
"Will you see, general, that Mr. Harberton is put in orders as provisionally appointed second lieutenant in the 9th Lancers, but detailed for special duty as extra aide-de-camp to General Pole-Carew?"
"Thank you," that officer said. "I shall be very glad to have him, for I am one short already. Mr. Lucas is down with fever of some sort, and the doctor says that if he does not get better he must send him off to the base hospital. I think Mr. Harberton would be much more useful with me than he could be with his regiment. I will ride over with him to the Lancer Camp and introduce him to the colonel."
"Thank you; that would be best. When telegraphing home to-day, will you say that Mr. Harberton, second lieutenant in the Cape Town Riflemen, has been provisionally appointed second lieutenant 9th Lancers for very distinguished services in carrying despatches into and out of Kimberley and upon other occasions? That will settle the matter at once, and we shall have an answer in two or three days?"
"Have you a horse, Mr. Harberton?" General Pole-Carew asked as they left the house.
"Yes, a very good one; but it is at Rimington's camp."
The general turned to the orderly who was holding his horse and his own. "Hand your horse to this gentleman; he will return it to you in half an hour. Wait here till he does so."
The Lancers were encamped a mile away to the north. Some of the tents had now come up. From one of these the colonel came out, and the sentry at the door told him that the general was approaching.