Down the slope he thundered, and the sound of his horse’s hoofs came to the ears of Suzanne, who, frozen with terror, crouched in the grass near the spring at the foot of it.  Turning her eyes from the ridge where she had seen the Zulus, she looked behind her.  At first she could see nothing except a great horse with a man upon its back, but as she stared, presently she recognised the horse—­it was the schimmel, and none other.

And the man.  Whose shape was that?  No, this one had a golden beard.  Ah!  He lifted his head, from which the hat had fallen, and—­did she dream?  Nay, by Heaven, it was her husband, grown older and bearded, but still her husband.  In the piercing agony of that happiness she sank back half-fainting, nor was it till he was almost upon her that she could gain her feet.  He saw her, and in the dim light, mistaking her for a Zulu soldier who way-laid him, lifted the gun in his hand to fire.  Already he was pressing the trigger when—­when she found her voice and cried out: 

“Ralph, Ralph, I am Suzanne, your wife.”

As the words left her lips it seemed to her as though some giant had thrown the big horse back upon its haunches, for he slipped past her, his flanks almost touching the ground, which he ploughed with outstretched hoofs.  Then he stopped dead.

“Have I found you at last, wife?” cried Ralph, in a voice of joy so strange that it sounded scarcely human.  “Mount swiftly, for the Zulus are behind.”

Thus, then, these two met again, not on the Mountain of the Man’s Hand indeed, as the vision had foretold, but very near to it.

“Nay,” Suzanne answered, as she sprang on to the saddle before him, “they are in front, for I saw them.”

Ralph looked.  Yes, there they were in front and to the side and behind.  All round them the Zulu impi gathered and thickened, crying, “Bulala umlungu” (Kill the white man) as they closed in upon them at a run.

“Oh!  Ralph, what can we do?” murmured Suzanne.

“Charge them and trust to God,” he answered.

“So be it, husband,” and, turning herself upon the pommel of the saddle, she threw her arms round his neck and kissed him on the lips, whispering, “At least we have met again, and if we die it shall be together.”

“Hold fast,” said Ralph, and calling aloud to the horse he set his teeth and charged.

By now the Zulus in front were running down the opposing slope in clusters not much more than a hundred yards away; indeed, the space between them was so narrow that the schimmel, galloping up hill under his double load, could scarcely gather speed before they were among them.  When they were within ten yards Ralph held out the gun in one hand and fired it, killing a man.  Then he cast it away as useless, and placing his right arm about the waist of Suzanne, he bent his body over her to protect her if he might, urging on the horse with feet and voice.