“I shall never make a hand at either,” said Frank. “A fellow must be born to it, to knock things over as these Basutos do. Well, I agree with you, I don’t think I can stand this much longer, without going stark crazy.”
“Suppose we don’t stand it, Frank,” suggested Gilbert. “It quite rests with ourselves. No one can compel us.”
“I don’t quite understand you,” said Wilmore. “How can we help ourselves?”
“By taking ourselves off,” answered the other.
“Look here. They say we ought to remain until the messengers return that were sent to Cape Town, and that it would be hard upon Lavie, if he were to come here and find us gone. Very good. But De Walden and Warley both mean to remain with Queen Laura; so that whenever he may come (if he does come) he will find them, and that will answer every purpose. But you and I may go our way, and leave them to go theirs.”
“What! you propose that we two should set off for Cape Town alone, hey? Could we find our way, think you?”
“I don’t see why we shouldn’t. We know the exact position of Cape Town, and the pocket compass, which Lavie gave me, will enable us to go at all events in the right direction. It will take a long time, no doubt—”
“Three or four months, at least,” said Wilmore.
“About that, I judge,” rejoined Gilbert. “But then we shall be tolerably sure to fall in with some Dutch village or farm before we have got half-way; and the Dutch are hospitable, though not civil to the English. They couldn’t turn us out into the wilderness, anyhow.”
“No, I suppose not,” said Frank, “particularly as we have got money to pay for what we want. But then, Nick, how are we to subsist till we reach one of these villages or farms. The nearest, I believe, are fully two hundred miles off, if we went ever so straight. With only six charges in our guns—”