“There,” he said, “you know what you have got to do—to fire if there is any cause for anxiety.”
“And I suppose I had better not go too near the river?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said the doctor. “It’s a mere stream just about here, though I daresay it’s pretty big after rain. Good-night. You will wake up your cousin at about two. Good-night.”
“Good-night,” replied Mark, and he felt that his words must have sounded short to the doctor and full of annoyance, for somehow he thought that it was not fair for him to go away and leave such a boy as he was; and besides, it seemed unkind after he had made such a plain allusion to the river, for the doctor to treat it so lightly. Of course he knew that it was only a little river, a mere stream; but then it was big lower down, and what was to prevent any dangerous beast or reptile from crawling up to lie in wait for anyone that was near?
“Never mind,” muttered the boy, “I suppose it’s natural to feel a bit nervous; but I am not going to show the white feather.”
He stood still, listening and trying to make out the doctor’s step, but he could not hear a sound.
It was very dark, not a star showing, for a faint mist hung above the trees, and for a long time the only thing he heard was a stamp that sounded startling until he made up his mind that it must have been a fidgety movement on the part of one of the ponies, and shouldering his rifle, he stepped out slowly so as to pass right round the little camp.
But even that was difficult, for it was not until he was close upon the waggons that he could make them out, and as he went on the big bullocks were only represented to him by what seemed to be so many clumps of bush or heaps of soil.
He walked as slowly as he could so as to make his rounds take up as much time as possible, and as he came to the end of each traverse he tried to think out how many minutes it must have taken. This slow march was completed four times, and then he came to the conclusion that about an hour of his watch must have passed away, but only to alter his mind after a little thought and mentally see more clearly, that it could not be a quarter or even an eighth of what he realised now was going to be a very long and dreary watch.
“Well, it’s no use to be impatient,” he thought. “It’s no worse for me than it will be for all the rest. One doesn’t like it, but then the pleasure of the travelling and what we shall see right up in the hilly part where the great kopjes rise must make up for a bit of trouble.”