"It will be a hazardous journey, Mr. Harberton, and I admire your spirit in undertaking such a mission. I understand that you speak Taal well, but as you are going in uniform that will be no great advantage to you. If you succeed, I need not say that you will have rendered us a very great service, which will not be forgotten."
"It is just the service that I had hoped I should find an opportunity of performing, sir, when I volunteered to undertake the work of scouting and obtaining information, instead of enlisting in one of the regiments at Cape Town."
"Yes, I hear you rendered valuable service to the officer in command at De Aar by going in disguise to Fauresmith, and discovering that the Boers had no intention of attacking our base, for it was thus unnecessary to draw bodies of men from other points to aid in the defence of the place. I should not advise you to endeavour to return by the road by which you came, although you will be the best judge as to that; but it seems to me that it would be easier to get out by the other side and make a detour across the river somewhere near Douglas, and then make for Honeynest Kloof, and so here. Above all, tell Colonel Kekewich privately that it is by no means certain that we shall be able to force our way past Spytfontein. Lord Methuen will try to do so, but after what we have seen of the Boer style of fighting here there is no assurance that he will succeed, for the position by all accounts is a very strong one.
"Of course it will be impossible for you now to travel far by the road from here; the Boer position extends across it. Your best chance is to strike across the country and come on the road from Jacobsdal. Whether they are posted on that line or not I cannot say. It certainly lies beyond their main position, but they will hardly have neglected it altogether."
"Yes, sir, that is the route I propose taking."
"Well, I wish you good fortune and a safe return;" and he shook hands with Yorke.
At eight o'clock Yorke started. The horse's hoofs had been effectually muffled and he had been provided with the countersign, and, passing through the pickets, he rode off, the Kaffirs trotting by his side. He had told the officer in command of the pickets that one of them would return with the horse in the course of an hour. After proceeding about four miles a glow of light could be seen here and there on Scholtz Kop, a short distance to the left of the road they were following, and also away farther over on the same side on the hill of Spytfontein. These were but the reflection of the fires in the trenches where the Boers were cooking their suppers and smoking their pipes. No flame betrayed the positions held by them, but the hills seemed lit up by a faint glow.
"It is time to turn off, Peter," Yorke said, reining in his horse. "They may have outposts on the road, and as they would be keeping quiet, we might get in among them before we noticed them."
Although they were still nearly two miles from the Boer position they could distinctly hear in the stillness of the night a faint continuous murmur, such as might be made by a waterfall or a stream running among rocks. This they knew to be the talk of thousands of the enemy. They had been conscious of it even before they reached the turn in the road whence they saw the lights, for their own advance had been almost noiseless. The Kaffirs were running barefoot, and the horse's hoofs had been so well muffled that its footstep was no more audible than those of the natives.
It was now time to dismount and send the horse back, and Yorke handed the animal over to the native who was to return to camp.