At nine o'clock the key grated in the lock, and, the door opening, the two Boers on guard told him to follow them. He was conducted to a small room, where the landdrost and two or three of his friends were seated.
"So you brought this man here prisoner; you caught him trying to get out of Kimberley? I hear you have a letter for me?"
"Yes, mynheer, here it is!"
He read it through and then passed it to his companions.
"A young chap trying to carry a despatch," he said, "walked right into the arms of Odental's men. He had no time to make resistance—not that it would have done him any good. There is evidently nothing to do but to send him to Pretoria."
"You feel sure that he is not a spy, landdrost?"
"As if people would send out a lad like that as a spy! He is evidently just fresh from England. What could he want to spy about? The people in Kimberley can see for themselves where our forts are; if they wanted to send out a spy they would have chosen somebody who could speak Dutch. Besides, he has got his uniform on, the first Dutchman he met would have made him prisoner. You need not wait any longer," he went on to the men who had brought Yorke in, "I will give you a letter in the morning to my brother. Now, sit down, young fellow, and tell us who you are, and how you came to undertake this business. How long have you been out from England?"
"Seven or eight months."
"I suppose you were with your regiment at Cape Town?"
"I joined it there," Yorke said, "but I did not come up the country with it. I am a good runner and a fair rider, so I volunteered to come up to Kimberley. As the war seemed likely to last some time, and I wanted to join my regiment, I got leave from the commandant there to make off, and, as Field Cornet Odental no doubt told you, he entrusted me with a despatch; this I gave to the field cornet, as I knew that I should be searched; besides, it was necessary to show that I was going out on military business, and not as a spy. But it contained only a number of figures, which may have referred to certain words in a book, or been a military cipher, that no one but the writer could understand."