The young ladies and Biddy quickly climbed up, and Percy placed them at intervals, with muskets on their shoulders, and told them to walk about like sentinels.
“Now, Biddy, flourish your sword, and make it flash in the sun. That will do famously. They’ll see it in the distance, and suppose that we have a dozen men with bayonets, at least.”
The girls, forgetting any alarm they might at first have felt, laughed heartily at Biddy’s vehement gestures, as she carried out Percy’s directions to the full. Now she rushed to one end of the platform, now to the other, giving vent to her feelings by various war shouts in her native Celtic.
“You, Helen, keep a look-out on Crawford, and tell me how he gets on,” said Percy, handing her the glass, having first taken a glance through it himself.
“Yes, I can see him clearly,” said Helen. “He is galloping along at a tremendous rate, and I fancy that I can make out Rupert and the waggon in the distance.”
Helen, who had put down her musket, showed no inclination to take her eye from the telescope.
“Hurrah!” cried Percy, “here come the herdsmen with the cattle. I thought they would not be long after they heard the signal. They will help us to defend the walls. Perhaps Crawford will fall in with some settlers, and we shall soon have a sufficient number of men to dispense with your services, girls.”
“But we don’t wish to have our services dispensed with,” cried Rose. “We want to make ourselves useful.”
“But I don’t want you to get killed or wounded,” said Percy. “Some of the Zulus may have firearms, or they may venture near enough to hurl their assegais. You will have done all that is necessary by showing yourselves as at present in martial array, and I feel very sure that the enemy, when they see you, will defer their attack until they come up under cover of the darkness to try and take us by surprise.”
Percy allowed Helen to keep the glass while he was employed in loading the swivels, and pointing them in the direction the Zulus would probably attempt to approach the gate. She in the meantime was watching Crawford’s progress; though he and his horse looked no larger than an ant crossing over a large field, she still kept her eye upon him until she could report that he had joined Rupert. The latter was riding ahead of the waggon till Crawford got up to him, when she saw both of them, followed by the two Kaffir hunters, come galloping at headlong speed towards the farm, while the waggon still kept moving on as before, though at a faster rate.