"I should like to see some of them come," said Jack, with a laugh. "I think we could give a good account of them. Let me see," and the young settler began to count on his fingers; "there's you, Pete, and Saul, Moses, Jethro, Simon, Zacchary, Daniel, Obadiah, and I must not forget Pat, besides my father and self. That makes eleven, doesn't it? With the rifles and ammunition we got from Port Nolloth, and inside our strong walls, we could keep a commando at bay."
Jack's enthusiasm began to rise, and he went on: "I hope some of the beggars do come down upon us. I want to try my rifle upon something better than springbok and hartebeeste. What say you, Pete?"
A broad grin spread over the Kaffir's face, as he replied, "I dunno, Baas Jack. I no want a Mauser bullet through my skin. All de same, baas, if de time eber comes, Pete will be found ready to lay down his life for de baas, missis, little missie, an' you."
"Bravo, Pete! spoken like a man!" cried Jack, who nearly so far forgot himself as to shake hands with the Kaffir. "And now, Pete, let us go round and see what the boys are doing."
Kopje Farm well deserved its appellation, for it stood on the middle spur of a high, flat-topped range of hills. The building had been erected many years before by a Dutch settler, when trouble was rife with the Bantus, and its thick stone walls, loopholed here and there, gave it the appearance of a fort. Around the dwelling-house ran a wall of stone, some six feet in height and correspondingly thick, which had continuations to the ostrich kraal, where the birds were penned at night.
Jack found that the "boys" had finished their task of fastening up the ostriches committed to their charge, and were standing in a group, chattering in their guttural Kaffir tongue. A few yards away was Pat O'Neill, an Irishman hailing from the wilds of Connaught, who had followed the fortunes of the Lovat family as general factotum from the day the Scotch laird had landed in the colony.
Jack's quick eye glanced at the Kaffirs, after which he strode towards the place where Pat was standing contemplatively smoking a short black duddeen. Pat on seeing his young master approach, came instantly to the salute; for the Connemara man, twenty years before, had formed one of the glorious defenders of Rorke's Drift.
"Where is Saul?" inquired Jack of the Irishman.
"He has gone on an errand for the mistress, sorr," answered Pat. "One of Master Butler's children down the valley is laid up wid fever, an' the mistress, who is good to every one, has sent some cooling medicine for the poor thing, which will do it good, please God. Has the master returned from Springbokfontein?"
"He has not arrived yet, Pat," answered Jack.