Slowly the blue veins beneath the clear olive skin began to beat again. Once more the eyes opened and closed. Hughes was busy sponging away the blood, which flowed rather freely, with a handkerchief. Dom Francisco and Assevedo, kneeling by Isabel's side, were using the cool water of the Shire river; and close beside them, its tusks red with blood, the enormous bulk of the dead elephant; while, fifty paces away--a crushed and unsightly mass--lay the pony. Isabel opened her eyes, and seemed for a moment utterly astonished. "Santa Maria!" she ejaculated, "where am I?" Then suddenly the whole affair seemed to flash on her memory, and, raising herself gently, she smiled. "I was not frightened, only astonished," said the brave girl, as the red blood mantled in her cheeks. "Where is the elephant?" "There," answered her father; "and you may thank the Senhor Capitano Inglesi that it lies there." Isabel de Maxara turned--the dead animal with its gory tusks, and the shapeless mass which had been a horse, met her gaze. For a moment her face flushed, the red blood once more mantling richly under the clear olive skin; the next she grew deadly pale. "I thank you, senhor," she said as she looked full at the soldier and held out her hand, "I thank you for my life." The rest of the party were standing by the elephant. Hughes clasped the long taper fingers, and looked into the black eyes, from which the tears were falling. For a moment they met the gaze, and then fell before his as he kissed the little hand held out to him. "Your ball has shivered his head, Hughes," called out Wyzinski, but the soldier paused a moment to thrust into his bosom a blood-stained pocket-handkerchief before he joined them. The second ball, a heavy conical one, had penetrated the skull before bursting, making a frightful hole, and blowing the head to pieces; a second severe wound, behind the shoulder, showing where the first had struck. The elephant was a very large one, and was the only one out of the seven secured. "And now, gentlemen, let us leave the cutting up to the natives. You can scarcely refuse my late request now, after what has passed, if it is only that Dona Isabel needs rest." "If we comply I must make a condition, namely, that you send a messenger to Quillimane, to warn Captain Weber of the delay, and it must not be for more than twenty-four hours." "Agreed, and now for the boats and my house at Nyangue," cheerfully exclaimed Assevedo. "Senhor Inglesi, I thank you most heartily and sincerely," said the old noble, taking off his hat, bowing, and grasping the soldier's hand warmly in his own. "You have earned our eternal gratitude at the peril of your life." "Don't you think a light infantry movement and a timely retreat would be a brilliant evolution?" whispered the missionary, as he passed Hughes. "I don't mind backing the flavour of the water-melons of Portugal against the custard-apples of India."