But still she answered to Sihamba's voice and plunged on, rolling and stumbling in her gait.
"She will last till the river," she said, seeing Suzanne look at the mare.
"And then---- ?" gasped Suzanne, glancing behind her to where, not five hundred yards away, Swart Piet and his Kaffirs hunted them sullenly and in silence, as strong dogs hunt down a wounded buck.
"And then--who knows ?" answered Sihamba, and they went on without more words, for they had no breath to spare.
Now, not half a mile away, they came in sight of the river, which had been hidden from them before by the lie of the ground, and a groan of despair broke from their lips, for it was in flood.

Yes, the storms in the mountains had swollen it, and it rolled towards the sea a red flood of foam-flecked water, well-nigh two hundred yards from bank to bank.
Still they rode on, for they dared not stop, and presently behind them they heard a shout of triumph, and knew that their pursuers had also seen the Red Water, and rejoiced because now they had them in a trap.
Within ten yards of the lip of the river, the grey mare stopped suddenly, shivered like a leaf in the wind and sank to the ground.
"Now, Swallow," said Sihamba as she slipped from the saddle, "you must choose between that raging torrent and Swart Piet.

If you choose the torrent the great horse is still strong and he may swim through; I can say no more." "And you ?" asked Suzanne.
"I?
I bide here, and oh! I would that Zinti had left the gun with me." "Never," cried Suzanne.

"Together we will live or die.

Mount, I say--mount.