"Ach! you’re a fool to get scared at my jokes. I’ve even forgotten what it was we were talking about. Whatever it was, I should have thought a big strapping fellow like you could have taken his own part."

He laughed blusteringly, and she realised that he did not suspect the other man knew of her identity, and that he meant to keep up the fiction she herself had begun. Doubtless, he, too, expected the stranger to be gone with the dawn before he could make any further discoveries!

It seemed at any rate that there was nothing further to be done for the moment, or until she could be sure of the man whose name she did not even know, or whether he knew hers! After all, had he recognised her? Had she been mistaken in the meaning of that swift look given her when their eyes first met, that seemed to say: "All’s well! I am your friend!"

Surely he must remember her! Yet what had she done to be remembered by? Nothing. She had held herself aloof in disdainful pride from him as from all the others. She knew now that she had always felt an interest in this silent light-eyed man, who never seemed to look at anything but the horizon, and had felt more instinctively akin to him than the others. Still, she had never given any outward sign that he was not, as Laurence Hope has it, "less than the dust beneath her chariot wheels," and had treated him to the same civil disdain with which she froze the other passengers. Oh! would he remember it against her now?--if he remembered her at all!

Her eyes searched his face almost pleadingly; but it told nothing. He had crossed his legs easily, and with one hand nursing his elbow, the other holding his pipe, sat smoking in impenetrable reflection.

Well! it was something to have him here. His very presence gave her a feeling of protection. One of the umfans made a diversion by rising like a somnambulist from his dreams to throw a great heap of fuel on the fire. Mechanically, he performed his task, then, without looking to east or west, rolled himself to sleep again.

"You keep up your fires all night—​here?" remarked the stranger.

"I always keep them up—​it gives those brutes something to do," was Roper’s surly response. "And why not, about here?"

"Oh, it’s a good general plan. But there isn’t any particular need round here. No lions. A stray hyena or two is the worst you’ll strike."

"You seem to know all about it," sneered Roper, his straggly moustache lifted to one side in the usual unlovely manner.

"I ought to. I helped to make that road." The stranger slightly indicated the wide and dusty main track fifty yards off. Roper gaped a moment or two.

"Ah! a blessed pioneer!" he said at last, but there was no benediction in his tone. "And a mighty rotten road it is," he was presently inspired to remark.

"Yes," said the stranger placidly, "roads are like dogs—​and some men-- they soon go to pot if they are not kept in order."

Roper digested this as best he might, but the process did not appear to agree with him.

"No one seems to realise that it’s nearly one o’clock in the morning," he suddenly snarled. "Get off to bed, youngster." He added to the stranger: "If you’re going to make tracks for your waggons at dawn, I should advise you to get some sleep too."

"Thanks, I’m not sleepy—​but I’ll turn in when you do."

"Well, I’m going now. The youngster has the tent. I roll up under the waggon."

"I’ll roll up beside you," announced the stranger pleasantly. "But I hope you don’t snore, for I am a light sleeper, and wake at the slightest sound." He happened to be looking steadily into the eyes of Vivienne as he said this.

"The blazes you do!" burst out Roper violently, as though this were the last straw. "Well, I don’t care a hang whether you sleep or not."

"Thanks," answered the other imperturbably. Vivienne spent a wakeful night. As a matter of fact, snoring was not an accomplishment of Roper’s, so she was unable to gather from the silence that reigned under the waggon whether either or neither of the men slept. She lay straining her ears for what seemed ages, but the only break in the silence was the sound of the umfan at his mechanical duty of replenishing the fire, until, in the dark hour just before dawn, she was aroused from an uneasy doze by a faint movement at the opening of the tent. She lay dead still, and for one moment her heart seemed to miss a beat. In the darkness she could see nothing by which to judge whether the person near were friend or foe, but suddenly her heart beat again, for a faint fragrance of Navy Cut tobacco had come stealing into the tent, and she knew that fragrance well. She had sat next to it for many days in a coach. Very different that to the rank odour of Roper’s Boer tabak.

Then, silently and swiftly, a small heavy object, cold and polished to the touch slid in beside her. Her hand slipped round it, and another hand closed for an instant on hers, then withdrew. No word was spoken.

As soon as it was light enough, she examined her new possession, though her fingers had long since informed her of its character. A beautiful Colt’s, loaded in all its five chambers. A tiny leaf of paper tucked into the barrel bore a few scribbled words:

"Use this if necessary. Don’t worry about consequences. I’ll look after those, Kerry."

Part of the "y" of "Kerry" had been left behind in the note book from which the leaf was torn.

"Well! our friend the gallant pioneer has gone, hey?"