Mwesa did not understand the word, but he tried to look as if he did. Tom, however, did not expect from him any explanation of Reinecke’s movements: he was trying to puzzle out one for himself. The sides of the nullah were too precipitous to afford an entrance: and though the enemy might do a little damage by firing from the top down into the camp, that could easily be defeated by moving the people to well-covered places where shots could not reach them. As a means of capturing the position such a course was absurd. Yet Reinecke could hardly intend a mere reconnoitring expedition: his men were equipped as for fighting, and it appeared from the amount of baggage carried by the porters that he expected to camp for at least one night. Unable to guess at the German’s design, Tom came to the conclusion that, even at the cost of a certain uneasiness among his people, he had better follow up the enemy, and see for himself the direction of their march: that might throw some light on their object. With Mwesa he set off in their tracks, keeping a good look-out ahead for laggards, and stopping frequently to listen. It was just after one o’clock. Tom was both tired and hungry. His clothes were sodden, and the atmosphere was like that of a Turkish bath. The track wound in and out through the scrub, and presently among forest trees; and it had evidently been traversed before, for no one absolutely strange to the country could have found so well the easiest passage through the scrub. After walking for nearly two hours, at so slow a pace that no more than four miles could have been covered, Tom found that the track led through the middle of a wooded ravine, which trended, as nearly as he could judge, to the north-east. The ground sloped gradually upwards, and in the distance Tom detected the march of the enemy by the swaying of the bushes and tall grass through which they passed. He advanced with still greater caution, and well it was that he did so, for in a few minutes the path emerged into a narrow rocky defile, only sparsely covered with vegetation, and here two askaris were posted as sentries. A little beyond them the porters had laid down their loads. Looking out from behind a screen of bushes, Tom saw the askaris and their German officers marching ahead. Avoiding the sentries by plunging into the bush that skirted the defile, Tom and the negro lad hurried on after the enemy. Well screened by the foliage, they could afford to quicken their pace until they overtook them, and thenceforward kept pace with them. After about ten minutes they discovered that the party had again halted. The men were sitting on boulders and slabs of rock: the German lieutenant sat a little apart. Reinecke and the Arab had disappeared.