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Updated: June 17, 2025
I had completely collapsed, and all was blank. It may have been an hour, or it may have been only a few minutes possibly only seconds passed before I opened my eyes and gazed up, wondering what was the meaning of the soft, warm puffs of moist air, and what it was that kept on snuffing at my face. "Sandho, old boy!"
In almost less time than I take to describe it, one of them, a good-looking, frank young fellow in an officer's uniform, rose in his stirrups and made a snatch at my arm; but, in answer to a touch of the heel, Sandho leaped forward, and my would-be captor passed me, riding on several horse-lengths before he could turn and come at me again; while, by a quick leap aside, Joeboy avoided the man who came at him, and stood with his back to a great stone, with his assagai raised to strike.
Every shot struck high above our heads, and at the end of a few minutes, higher still; at which I wondered, till it suddenly occurred to me that Sandho was not climbing higher and higher up the pass, but descending. All this time Joeboy kept steadily on, apparently as unconcerned as if he were leading the horse home from grazing peacefully away upon the veldt.
The words had hardly left my lips when Sandho stopped short, and uttered a sharp challenging neigh, which was answered from some distance in front; and directly after, as I turned my horse sharply to get under the cover of a huge block we had just passed, there came the loud clattering of hoofs and a shout, as a party of some five-and-twenty well-mounted horsemen cantered out to bar the way.
I can't see you suffer like this;" and, to my horror, he took out his revolver, placed it to his charger's forehead, and fired. The shot had a double effect that was nearly fatal to our chance, for at the clear-cutting report the Colonel's charger laid his head slowly down, and a quiver ran through his frame; but Sandho reared up, made a bound, and was in the act of dashing off.
With the sun rapidly brightening the sky, I urged Sandho forward, but only at a walk, for he was weary and sluggish, and the slightest movement beyond that pace brought back the sickening pain so intensely that I believe if he had broken into a trot I should have fainted and fallen to the ground.
I had had Sandho four years, mounting him as soon as he was strong enough to bear me, and ever since we seemed to have been companions more than master and servant. We had played together; I had hunted him, and he had hunted me finding me, too, when I hid from him; and he answered when out grazing on the veldt with a cheery neigh before galloping to meet me.
So we went on for nearly an hour, with Joeboy leading Sandho in and out among the great blocks of stone which strewed our way, keeping him where the sand was soft by getting well in front, so that the horse's steps were pretty nearly in his own.
He took out a big Dutch pipe and a pouch, proceeding to fill the bowl and press down the tobacco; and as he worked so did I. Edging Sandho nearer and nearer, with my heart beginning to beat with big, heavy throbs, I withdrew my left foot from the stirrup, lowered it down in front of the loosely-hanging rein, and, as soon as that was level with my ankle, twisted my foot again and again, till the rein was three times round.
I exclaimed; and I suppose I must have started and given Sandho a familiar pressure, or else it was the instinct of self-preservation at work in the sensible animal, for he suddenly made a bound forward so unexpectedly that I was nearly unseated; but my arms were now free, and, reaching down and getting tight hold of his leathern breastplate, I held on and let him go.
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