“I dunno, sir. These here black chaps as is guiding us will show us right enough.”
“Hist! Hist!” whispered Murray. “Can’t you understand? We’re the rear-guard of the column, Tom May and I, and the enemy is somewhere close behind. Haven’t you got your men with you, and some blacks?”
“We had,” replied Roberts, “but somehow we’ve got separated from them, or they’ve got separated from us; I don’t know how it is. It’s all through my wound, I suppose. Here, Murray, old chap, you’d better put us right again.”
“Will you hold your stupid tongue, Dick?” whispered Murray excitedly. “Here, both you and Titely follow me. Get behind them, Tom May, and look sharp, or we shall be too late.”
“Ay, ay, sir!” replied the big sailor; and Murray heard him throw his musket from one shoulder to the other before seeming to loosen his cutlass in the scabbard, which the lad could only interpret as putting himself in readiness for an immediate encounter.
“Listen again, Tom,” whispered Murray.
There was a pause, and for a few minutes nothing broke the strange silence which reigned.
“Well?” whispered the middy impatiently.
“Well, sir, I can’t make nothing of it,” replied the sailor.
“Not so loud, Tom.”