It was a slow and toilsome march; but the party were in the highest of spirits, and, in the hope of seeing the lights at Groenfontein at the end of an hour or so, they kept on, only pausing now and again to listen for danger and to rearrange Lennox, whose silence began to alarm his friend. But the sergeant assured him that the poor fellow was sleeping heavily, and they went on again with a dark mental cloud coming over Dickenson's exhilaration as he thought of the unpleasant news that awaited his friend. "But a word from him will set that right," he said to himself. "Poor fellow! He must be done up to sleep like that. Why, he never even asked how we got on after the fight." CHAPTER TWENTY NINE. IN DIFFICULTIES. On and on at the ponies' slow walk through the short scrub or over the bare plain, with the clever little animals seeming to instinctively avoid every stone that was invisible to the riders in the intense darkness. Every now and then a halt was made, one of which their steeds immediately took advantage by beginning to browse on such tender shoots as took their fancy, and again and again the whispered questions were asked: "How does he seem, sergeant?" "Fast asleep, sir." "Hadn't you better let one of the men take your place?" "Oh no, sir; I'm all right, and so's he." "Can either of you hear anything?" "No, sir; only the ponies cropping the bush." Then a faint, "We ought to be getting near home, sergeant." "Yes, sir." "Can we do anything more?" "No, sir; only wish for a row of gas-lamps along a straight road, and it ain't any good to wish for that." "I can see nothing, sergeant, and the sky seems blacker than the earth." "Both about the same, sir, I think." "It is so unfortunate, sergeant, just at a time like this." "Oh, I don't know, sir; one ought to make the best of things, and weigh one against another." "What do you mean?" "Well, sir, we're bothered a good deal with the darkness, and we're obliged to do what a human man don't like to do--trust to a dumb animal instead of himself. Of course that's bad; but then, on the other side, we're not running up against any of the enemy, and instead of hunting for hours after a long ride and then not finding what we come for, here we are not having a long dangerous ride at all, and him we wanted to find tumbling right atop of us and in a way of speaking, saying, `Looking for me, my lads? Here I am!'" "Yes, we have been very fortunate," said Dickenson. "Fortunate, sir? I call it downright lucky." "Of course--it is. But can we do no more?" "Not that I see, sir--feel, I mean. We might camp down and let the horses feed till daylight." "Oh no; let us keep on." "Very well, sir; then there really is nothing we can do but trust to the ponies. They somehow seem to see in the dark." "Forward, then!"