Spurred on by fear, the carriers quickened their pace. The Tubus, uttering fierce yells, dashed on, firing their guns aimlessly. Tense with anxiety, Royce measured with his eye the distances between his party, the woodland, and the horsemen, and it was with a gasp of relief that he gained the trees while the Tubus were still a hundred yards away.
The two bands of horsemen closed in, and rode towards the woodland. At the edge of the belt Royce had drawn up his little party of riflemen. They fired two volleys in quick succession at the charging crowd. Remembering what they had suffered in the previous attacks, the Tubus, seeing several of their numbers fall, checked their horses and withdrew a short distance.
"Goruba isn't with them," said Royce.
But at that moment the tall negro came galloping from the rear, and, brandishing a huge scimitar, began to harangue his hesitating men.
"Come!" said Royce quietly.
Without waiting to see the inevitable result of Goruba's furious words, he withdrew his men quickly through the wood, splashed through the little stream that bathed the foot of the hillock, and climbed up to the fort. The carriers had already disappeared within the walls.
"Only by the skin of our teeth!" panted Challis, as he stumbled into the entrance.
"And this is only the beginning of things!" returned Royce. "What is to follow?"