“Boss Val got rifle gun,” he said sharply.
“Where? No; I have only my knife.”
Joeboy laughed, and ran to the side of the rift, where he began to scratch in the sand, and a few inches down laid bare the muzzle of my rifle, gave it a tug, and it came out with the well-filled bandolier attached.
I caught at it with a cry of eager joy, and began to carefully dust away every particle of sand that clung to it before slipping on the belt, forgetting the aching pains in my wrists and left leg, as something like a glow of confidence ran through me. Then came back the thought of home, with its smiling fields, orchard, and garden around the house we had raised upon the land won from the wilderness; and the thought that I was to be exiled from it all in consequence of this war; and the injustice of the Boers raised a spirit of anger against them which helped me to pull myself together and frowningly resolve to prove myself a man.
“Action, action,” I muttered. “I should have liked to go back and see them all again; but I must begin at once, before I am taken. What would they do with me?” I said aloud; and a glance at Joeboy’s face showed me that, awkward though he was at speaking, he comprehended every word I had said.
“Big Boss Boer,” he said, nodding, “say Boss Val come fight. No Boss Val fight? Whish, whish, whish, crack, cruck!”
He went through the movement of one wielding a bullock-lash, and imitated the sound it made through the air and the loud cracking when it struck home upon quivering flesh. Then he went on, “Boss Val no fight now! Bang, bang!”
“Flog me the first time I refuse, Joeboy, and shoot me the next time.”
“Um.”
“Well, then, we will not give them the chance.”