“Bah! Well, here’s Mark’s pouch. Take it and load.”
“Yes, uncle,” replied the boy hastily. “Why, Mark, I only heard one shot. Did you fire both barrels?”
“Eh? I don’t know. Perhaps I did.”
“Well,” said the doctor, a few minutes later, as he stood with Sir James and Dean, “I don’t think that there is any occasion to be uneasy about Mark. He can’t be injured, or he wouldn’t be so calm. The animals seem to be settling down again, and that’s a sure sign that there is nothing near to alarm them. What I wonder at is that we heard no sign from the bullocks—”
“Or from the ponies,” said Sir James.
”—Before Mark fired.”
“Then I suppose,” said Sir James, “that we may all go and lie down till you rouse us up again, doctor.”
“Which I certainly shall if there is any cause.”
The alarm had not proved serious enough to interfere with the sleep of the camp, with one exception, and Mark formed that exception, for during the second watch either Dean or Mark’s father went to the waggon as quietly as possible to look after the injured lad, and oddly enough had the same report to give, that Mark was sleeping easily and well, while as soon as each visit had been paid the boy turned over, exclaiming, “Bother! Anyone would think the lion had half eaten me. I wish they would not make such a fuss.”
The last time, when Dean was coming off duty, it was to find his cousin’s eyes wide open.