"I am delighted to see you back," he exclaimed as they entered. "I heard in confidence from one of your party, when they joined me a week back, that you had gone on a mad-brained adventure to try and blow up the Komati-poort bridge. I was horrified! I had, of course, given you leave to act on your own responsibility, but I never dreamt of your undertaking an expedition of that sort. Of course you found it impossible to get there. A lad told me that you had reckoned on being away six or seven weeks, and it is less than a month since the date on which he told me you left. Anyhow, I heartily congratulate you on all getting back." "We got there, sir, but nothing could be done with the bridge, it was so safely guarded. However, we did blow up two big cannon and a battery of small ones, some ten thousand rifles, and an enormous quantity of ammunition." "You don't say so, Chris? Then you had better luck than you deserved. One of the correspondents told me this morning that there was news in the town by a telegram from Lorenzo Marques that there had been an accidental explosion at Komati-poort, but it did not seem to be anything serious. Tell me all about it." "I congratulate you most heartily," he said, when Chris had finished the story. "Of course you have written a report of it?" "Here it is, sir. I have made it very brief, merely saying that I had the honour to report that, with Messrs. Peters, Brown, and Willesden, I succeeded in blowing up, with two hundredweight of dynamite, the things I have mentioned to you, destroying a large quantity of rolling stock, badly damaging five locomotives, and destroying roads and sidings to such an extent that traffic can hardly be resumed for a fortnight. Is the general here, sir?" "No, but he will be here this afternoon. Now, I will not detain you from your friends. No doubt they saw you ride in, and will be most anxious to hear of your doings. You will hardly know them again. When they came up to join us they adopted the uniform of the corps, feeling that it would be uncomfortable going about in a large camp in civilian dress. They brought with them uniforms for you all, for they seemed very certain that you would return alive." "I am very glad of that, sir, for the soldiers all stared at us as we came up here. I suppose they took us for sight-seers who had come up to witness the battle."