But no word was spoken on either side, white and black standing motionless in their attitudes of menace, eye fixed on eye, as if each were ready to shoot or hurl spear at the slightest movement made by the other.
The situation at last became so irksome that Nic could bear it no longer, and in a hoarse voice he cried:
“Now then, be off, and I won’t shoot.”
To his surprise the black shouldered his spear, and then obeyed a sign Nic made with the barrel of his gun, turning round and beginning to march away, slowly followed by the boy, who felt that if driven to extremities he could easily hit the broad, shiny back before him, with the muscles playing elastically at every step the man took.
“He understood the sign I made,” thought Nic, who determined to keep near the black for fear of treachery,
as the man strode on in and out among the trees, while a fresh idea now struck Nic. Suppose the man was going on to join his companions who had cooeyed to him. It was like walking into additional danger. Still the boy did not flinch, for fear of receiving a spear in the back if he turned away.
But he was master for the moment; and growing more and more confident, he strode on behind the black, heedless of the direction in which they went, and leaving the end of the case to fate. All he hoped was that, sooner or later, the savage would suddenly make a dash for his liberty, when the boy fully determined to scare him by firing over his head, to make him run the harder.
Nic had some idea that they were bearing toward his home, but he could see nothing but park-like trees and low wattle bushes; and after this strange procession had continued for some time he began to grow uneasy, and to think of taking out his pocket compass to try and make out his bearings, before stopping short in the first open place to let the black go on out of sight, covered meanwhile by the gun, when, just as the sufficiently open place was reached, there came a hoarse cooey from somewhere close at hand.
Nic stopped short, feeling that he had walked right into the lion’s mouth; and standing ready, with his eyes wandering round, waiting for the enemy, he listened to the black’s reply.