"That you, Milne?" cried a familiar voice. "All right: keep cool, old man. We shan't hit you by mistake. How many are there?" "I don't know. Better not tackle them in the dark, Hoste. Who is with you?" "Some Police. But where are the niggers?" Where indeed? Savages have no stomach for facing unknown odds. Their late assailants had prudently made themselves scarce. "We seem to be only just in time, anyway?" said Hoste, with a long whistle of consternation as he realised the critical position of affairs. "Is Mrs Carhayes all right?" he added anxiously. "Quite, thanks, Mr Hoste," replied Eanswyth. "But you are, as you say, only just in time." Two of the Police horses were inspanned to the buggy, the men mounting behind comrades, and the party set forth. It would not do to linger. The enemy might return in force at any moment. Their escape had indeed been a narrow one. It was only late in the afternoon that Hoste had, by chance, learned from a trustworthy source that the Gaikas meant to rise that night. Horror-stricken, he had rushed off to the officer in command of the Mounted Police to beg for some troopers as a protective escort in order to bring Eanswyth away from her lonely and perilous situation. An experienced sergeant and twenty-five men had been immediately ordered out--arriving in the very nick of time, as we have seen. "Well, we are all burnt out now, anyway," said Hoste as they journeyed along as rapidly as possible. "Look at my old place, what a flare-up it's making. And the hotel at Draaibosch! It's making a bigger blaze than all." "That's McDonald's `Cape Smoke,'" [An inferior quality of Cape brandy is thus popularly termed] laughed the police sergeant. It was a weird and awesome sight. The whole country was literally in a blaze--the murk of the reddened smoke of burning homesteads obliterating the stars. And ever and anon the fierce, tumultuous thunder of a distant war-dance was borne upon the air, with the vengeful shouts of excited savages, beginning their orgy of torch and assegai. CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE. EUSTACE BECOMES UNPOPULAR. The state of excitement prevailing in Komgha during the period of hostilities within the Transkei, was as nothing to that which prevailed now that the tide of war was rolling around the very outposts of the settlement itself.