Slowly the preparations went on all around. Then the great day came at last, and King Khatsua set forth on his mighty campaign, to the sound of big drums and the blare of native trumpets.
When the warriors had marched out of the villages on their way northward to the war, Guy saw the two prisoners’ chance of escape had arrived in earnest. They were guarded as usual, of course; but not so strictly as before; and during the night, in particular, Guy noticed with pleasure, little watch was now kept upon them. The savage, indeed, can’t hold two ideas in his head at once. If he’s making war on his neighbour on one side, he has no room left to think of guarding his prisoners on the other.
“To-night,” Guy said, one evening, as they sat together in their hut, over their native supper of mealie cakes and springbok venison, “we must make a bold stroke. We must creep out of the kraal as well as we can, and go for the sea westward, through Namaqua land to Angra Pequena.”
“Westward?” Granville answered, very dubiously. “But why westward, Waring? Surely our shortest way to the coast is down to Kimberley and so on to the Cape. It’ll take us weeks and weeks to reach the sea, won’t it, by way of Namaqua land?”
“No matter for that,” Guy replied, with confidence. He knew the map pretty well, and had thought it all over. “As soon as the Barolong miss us in the morning, they’ll naturally think we’ve gone south, as you say, towards our own people. So they’ll pursue us in that direction and try to take us; and if they were to catch us after we’d once run away, you may be sure they’d kill us as soon as look at us. But it would never occur to them, don’t you see, we were going away west. They won’t follow us that way. So west we’ll go, and strike out for the sea, as I say, at Angra Pequena.”
They sat up through the night discussing plans low to themselves in the dark, till nearly two in the morning. Then, when all was silent around, and the Barolong slept, they stole quietly out, and began their long march across the country to westward. Each man had his diamonds tied tightly round his waist, and his revolver at his belt. They were prepared to face every unknown danger.
Crawling past the native huts with very cautious steps, they made for the open, and emerged from the village on to the heights that bounded the valley of the Lugura. They had proceeded in this direction for more than an hour, walking as hard as their legs would carry them, when the sound of a man running fast, but barefoot, fell on their ears from behind in a regular pit-a-pat. Guy looked back in dismay, and saw a naked Barolong just silhouetted against the pale sky on the top of a long low ridge they had lately crossed over. At the very same instant Granville raised his revolver and pointed it at the man, who evidently had not yet perceived them. With a sudden gesture of horror, Guy knocked down his hand and prevented his taking aim.
“Don’t shoot,” he cried, in a voice of surprised dismay and disapproval. “We mustn’t take his life. How do we know he’s an enemy at all? He mayn’t be pursuing us.”
“Best shoot on spec, anyway,” Granville answered, somewhat discomposed. “All’s fair in war. The fellow’s after us no doubt. And, at any rate, if he sees us he may go and report our whereabouts to the village.”
“What? shoot an unarmed man who shows no signs of hostility! Why, it would be sheer murder,” Guy cried, with some horror. “We mustn’t make our retreat on THOSE principles, Kelmscott; it’d be quite indefensible. I decline to fire except when we’re attacked. I won’t be any party, myself, to needless bloodshed.”