CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR.
AN AMBUSCADE IN STONE.
"The chief's in an awful rage, Val," said Denham, when he came to me after a thorough search had seemed to prove that the prisoner had eluded the vigilance of the sentries.

"He swears that some one must have been acting in collusion with the pompous blackguard, and that he means to have the whole of our Irish boys before him and cross-examine the lot." "I hope he will not," I said.
"So do I; for I don't believe one of them would have lent him a hand, and it would offend them all." "Yes," I said; "they're all as hot-headed and peppery as can be." "Spoiling for a fight," put in Denham.
"Yes; and so full of that queer feeling which makes them think a set is made against them because they are Irish." "Exactly," cried my companion; "and it's such a mistake on their part, because we always like them for their high spirits and love of a bit of fun." "They're the wittiest and cleverest fellows in the corps." "And if I wanted a dozen chaps to back me up in some dangerous business, I'd sooner depend on them for standing to me to the last than any one I know." "Oh! it would be a pity," I said warmly.

"I hope the Colonel will think better of it." Denham winked at me as we sat in shelter by the light of a newly-invented lamp, made of a bully-beef tin cut down shallow and with a couple of dints in the side; it was full of melted fat, across which a strip out of the leg of an old cotton stocking had been laid so that the two ends projected an inch beyond the two spout-like dints.
"What does that mean ?" I asked.
"The chief," said Denham, "good old boy, kicks up a shindy, and swears he'll do this or that, and then he thinks better of it.

I've got off my wigging." "How do you know ?" I said.
"Met the old boy after I had been having a regular hunt everywhere with half-a-dozen men, and he nodded to me in quite a friendly way.

`Thank you, Denham,' he said.