Comforted a little by this intuition, at length Benita fell asleep.
Next morning, when she came out of the hut, Benita was met by her
father, who with a cheerful countenance informed her that at any rate
as yet there was no sign of the Matabele. A few hours later, too, some
spies came in who said that for miles round nothing could be seen or
heard of them. Still the preparations for defence went on, and the
hundred best men having been furnished with the rifles, were being
drilled in the use of them by Tamas and his two companions, Tamala and
Hoba, who had learned how to handle a gun very well in the course of
their long journey. The shooting of these raw recruits, however, proved
to be execrable; indeed, so dangerous were they that when one of them
fired at a mark set upon the wall, it was found necessary to order
all the rest to lie down. As it was, a poor trek ox--luckily it was
sick--and two sheep were killed.
Foreseeing a scarcity of provisions in the event of a siege, Meyer,
provident as ever, had already decreed the death of the tetse-bitten
cattle. These were accordingly despatched, and having been skinned and
cut up, their flesh was severed into long strips to be dried in the
burning sun as biltong, which secretly Benita hoped she might never be
called upon to eat.
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