“I say,” cried Gedge; “keep shying a hye back now and then to see if the gents is all right.”
“No need,” said the man on his left. “We should know fast enough.”
Meanwhile the three officers had settled down behind to a steady double, and kept on their conversation as if in contemptuous disregard of the enemy hidden high among the patches of wood to their left.
“Thought they were better shots,” said Bracy. “Nothing has come near us yet.”
“Quite near enough,” growled Roberts.
“Don’t you holloa till you’re out of the wood,” said Drummond; “they can make splendid practice at a mark not moving; but it’s not easy work to hit a running man.”
“So it seems,” said Bracy coolly.
“Here, I’ve been thinking that we must have passed a lot of these fellows as we came along,” said Roberts.
“Not a doubt of it,” said Bracy; “fresh ones keep taking up the firing. We’re regularly running the gauntlet. Surely they’ll soon hear this firing at, the fort.”
“Hope so,” said Roberts. “We ought to have known that, the beggars had advanced like this.”