"Now we shall have it!" and the pom-pom captain turns to the squadron commander. "I advise you to make your men lie down again. I'm going to man-handle my gun down the slope." "_Click-clock, click-clock, click-clock!_" go the Mausers. The Boers are on the top of the kopje. It is to be their turn now. No; there is a roar behind the farm, then another, and another. Then three little white cloud-balls open out on the lip of the kopje. "Good little Freddy!" soliloquises the pom-pom captain as he snaps his glasses into their case. "He was watching them. I must get my beauty to the end of this rise, to catch them as they leave."--"Pom-pom, limber up!" _Boom-boom-boom._ Three more little puffs of white over the kopje. _Click-clock_ once, and the brush was over. What was it worth? Four mangled rebels on the veldt, and one stalwart dragoon, with white drawn face and sightless eyes turned to the beautiful blue of heaven! The brigadier cantered up to the rise. A section of Horse Artillery rumbled up after him. "Look here," he said to the squadron leader, "you must get your men on to that kopje: they are not worth pursuing--there are not more than twenty of them. If I were you I should open out, divide and gallop round both flanks of the kopje; it's open veldt beyond, and we'll look after you from this ridge. You won't see any more of them than their tails. Don't pursue beyond 3000 yards. My orders are to go to Britstown, not to wear my horses out over scallywag snipers!" * * * * * "We must push on and get touch with our loose squadron to-night," said the brigadier, as he and his staff made a hasty midday meal off tinned sausages and eggs cooked by the terrified women of the farmhouse. "I wonder what has happened to that poor little subaltern boy that I sent on this morning. Ah! here's Mr Intelligence direct from the bloodstained field; now we shall know the damage!" _Brigadier._ "Any Boer wounded?" _Intelligence Officer._ "Yes, sir; two, and two killed." _B._ "Are the wounded talkative?" _I. O._ "One is too far gone, sir; the other is quite communicative." _B._ "Well, what has he got to say?" _I. O._ "He lies about himself. Swears that he is a Free Stater; but as a matter of fact his name is Pretorius, and he is a son of the farmer from whose wife we got our guides last night. By the merest chance we took a photograph of the farmer's two sons out of an album we found at the farm. And here is one of them wounded to-day. From his account it appears that a man called Lotter is here with a commando, and that he and his have just brought off rather a bad thing. Lotter's commando only joined the rebels returning from Nieuwjaarsfontein about an hour ago. The rebels knew that our advance squadron was at this farm last night, and when they saw us here, they mistook us for Major Twine, and knowing his strength attacked in good heart."