“Now,” said the doctor, “how do you feel?”
“As if my face would be scorched if I stopped here.”
“Nothing more?”
“Oh, yes,” said Mark; “I feel quite a cool wind blowing into my neck.”
“Exactly,” said the doctor. “As the heated air rises from the fire the cool air from the veldt rushes in to take its place. Why, don’t you remember when the haystack was on fire at the farm at home how we went to see it, walked close up, and felt the cold wind rushing towards the flames so that you had a stiff neck the next day?”
“Of course! I had forgotten that,” said Mark, laughing. “Well, we must put up with the fire, I suppose.”
The watch was set that night, and fell to the lot of Sir James, who took up his post near the fire, rifle in hand, while every man lay down with his piece by his side, for three times by sounds much nearer, the animals were made uneasy. The bullocks couched close to the trek-tow and the ponies stamped restlessly again and again from where they were haltered to one of the wheels inside the enclosure and close up to the granite wall.
But in one case a deep growl from Buck Denham seemed to comfort the great sleek beasts, and a word or two in his highly pitched voice from Dunn Brown turned the ponies’ stamping into a gentle whinny.
At last the only sounds within the walls of the kraal were the low whispering of the two boys.
“How far is it to black Mak’s big stones, do you think?” said Mark.