Part of the night he pushed forward, and part of it he rested and slept.
"It's a ghastly long journey when one does it on foot," thought the lost bimbashi. "However, I shall be in camp by breakfast time;" and his mouth watered over imaginary repasts of tinned meats and tea and other delights.
Morning came, and the sun, and still there were no signs of the camp. Jones was very hungry, but the tinned delicacies were still the fair offspring of imagination, which filleth not the stomach.
He travelled on, in despite of the sun, for the camp could not now be far off; and he would have continued to plod forward until he dropped, but that he received before noon a terrible fright, which sent him into cover for many hours of dangerous daylight.
There were sounds of hoofs, and the soul of the bimbashi rejoiced. "It is some of our fellows doing a cavalry reconnoitre," he reflected; and when they came, as he judged by the sound, within earshot, he treated them to a "coo-ee," and stood up to look out for a view and to hear their reply.
Presently the troop passed across an open patch between mimosa bushes, and Jones saw, not hussars or lancers, but a number of Bagghara horsemen pushing rapidly upstream, and evidently looking about for the owner of the voice lately upraised.
Down bobbed Jones behind a mimosa bush, his heart beating loudly. He drew his revolver in case of accidents. Would they see him? if so—
There were ten men, dirty, savage-looking fellows. They wore white, patched, linen garments, which fluttered behind them, and carried spears. They passed within twenty paces, peering about, and repassed again fifty yards away, talking together and arguing; then they disappeared.
"Thank God for that!" thought the bimbashi. "One wouldn't care to be chewed up by a set of such forsaken-looking fellows at close quarters!"
So he lay low till dark, and then pushed on once more—desperately hungry now, nearly starving. Would that breakfast never come? Could he have made some mistake? Ought he to have gone downstream?