Book I—The Transvaal Emissary. (continued 3)

Frank was right, if somewhat inconsiderate. May was in a bad temper—a very bad temper indeed. Hardly had he gone than she flung on her white kapje, the same we first saw her in, and which became her so well, and went out too, but not after him. She went round among her fowl-houses, then strolled along the quince hedges to see if any of the hens had been laying out and in irregular places for the benefit of the egg-loving muishond, or similar vermin, but her mind some how was not in it. She gazed out over the surrounding veldt. A little cloud of dust away in the distance caused her to start and her eyes to dilate. But it passed away and was gone. It heralded the approach of nobody. The distant flying cackle of a cock koorhaan alarmed had the same effect, but no sign of life, far or near, save the slow movement of black ostriches grazing, and the occasional triple boom as they lifted up their voices. The sun, flaming down in the cloudless forenoon, caused the great expanse of plains to shimmer and glow with mirage-like effect, giving to each distant table-topped mountain an appearance of being suspended in mid-air.

Her eyes filled as she stood thus gazing, and two shining tears rolled down.

“Oh, I must get away from here,” she said to herself. “All this is weighing upon my nerves. I hate men—selfish, cruel, heartless wretches!”

She caught her voice, and was conscious that the pulsations of her heart had undergone an acceleration. Away in the distance a large dust-cloud was advancing, and with it the white tilt of a Cape cart.

“Only some tiresome Dutch people,” she said to herself, with a weary sigh. “I hope to goodness they won’t come here, that’s all.”

But her wish was doomed to non-fulfilment, for very soon the cart was seen to turn off the road that should have taken it by and to strike the branch track leading direct to the house. A flutter of feminine garments within it betokened the nature of the visit.

“May, where are you? May?” shouted Frank, in stentorian tones. “Oh, there you are. Here’s a whole crowd coming down into the drift. Looks like the De la Reys. They’ll be here in a minute.”

“I wish they’d be somewhere else in a minute, then,” muttered May to herself with a frown that quite transformed the pretty, winning face within the ample white kapje.

Frank’s surmise proved correct. The occupants of the cart were the three De la Rey girls and their brother Jan. As they drove up Mrs Wenlock came out in a flutter of excitement and welcome.

“How good of you to come over!” she said. “I am so glad to see you. We don’t get many visitors just now. Why, Aletta, I should hardly have known you. My, but you must have been away quite a long time. I suppose you have been having grand times down at the Cape. And how tall you have grown! Well, I always say it does a girl good to send her about among folks and to see a little of the world. Let’s see, I don’t think you and my May have ever met. She was not with us when we first came up.”

May, who had already been exchanging greetings with the other girls, now turned to this one.

“No, we haven’t,” she said. “How do you do, Miss De la Rey?” And as the two clasped hands each was mentally reading the other.

“What a figure!” thought May to herself. “How easily and with what unconscious grace she moves! I wish I had it instead of being fat and dumpy”—which she wasn’t—“and beautifully dressed, yet quite plainly. Well, she isn’t pretty, that’s one thing. Oh no, she isn’t in the least pretty.”

“So this is ‘the only English girl,’” Aletta was thinking. “She is pretty. Yes, mother was right, she is very, very pretty. Those blue eyes—like Table Bay when the sun shines on it at noon—I wish I had them. And the gold of her hair, and her beautiful colouring. I do believe old Tant’ Plessis must be right. Frank, too, has improved since I saw him. He has grown quite good-looking.”

The said Frank, having shouted ineffectually for one of the boys, presumably away on some other business, was helping Jan to outspan.

“Well, Jan,” said Mrs Wenlock as they all went inside, “you have been a long time bringing your sister over to see us.”

“Andrina and I have only just got back ourselves, Mrs Wenlock,” struck in Condaas. “Aletta has had a lot to do at home. And we have had old Tant’ Plessis there and ever so many people.”

“Ever so many people. Yes, I think you have had some people you would have been better without, if report speaks true,” replied Mrs Wenlock, shaking a finger at the speaker with a good-humoured laugh. “There are those who come a long way to breed sedition and discontent and differences among folks who are quite happy and contented. We quite thought you had deserted us nowadays because we were English.”

Mrs Wenlock, you see, was one of those good souls who pride themselves on speaking their minds—in this case an utterly tactless operation. A momentary frost lay upon the whole party. But the situation was relieved by the readiness of Aletta.

“Why, Mrs Wenlock, you are forgetting that there is some English blood in us,” she said.

“To be sure I was, child. And your father, although there is no English in him, he is a man for whom I have the greatest regard. He is the last man to listen to agitators and sedition-mongers—of that I am quite sure. How is he, by the way, and your mother?” They reassured her as to the perfect state of health and well-being enjoyed by both parents, which had the effect of leading the conversation away from a very delicate subject. May, the while, had been out of the room to see about getting tea ready, and now returned in time to hear the following:—

“Why don’t you bring your gun over, Frank?” Jan was saying. “Man, there is a fine lot of guinea-fowl down along the river—if Colvin has left any, that is. Maagtig, but he is fond of shooting birds. One klompje down on the draai by the white rock had nearly sixty birds in it, and now there are nine. Colvin has shot all the rest. Guinea-fowl are not easy to get at, you know. There are other klompjes, but he will do the same with them, so you had better be quick or there will be none left.”

“He must have been shooting a lot at your place, Jan.”

“He has. Rather. He comes over nearly every other day to have a shoot. Why, we shall soon have hardly anything left if he goes on at that rate. But the season will soon be over now. Not that we care much about season or no season if we want a buck to eat.”

“Tut-tut, Jan! What’s that you’re saying? And your father Field-cornet, too!” struck in Mrs Wenlock.

May, who was presiding at the tea-tray, hearing this apparently harmless dialogue, felt it to be just about all she could do to restrain the ugly frown which threatened to cloud her face. “He comes over nearly every other day,” Jan had said, yet he had not been near them for about three weeks, or close upon it—not, indeed, since that evening he and Frank had returned from Schalkburg together. He had never been away from them so long as that since he had been settled on his own farm, nor anything like it. What did it mean? What was the attraction? The sport? Well, the sport wasn’t bad at Spring Holt. No—a darker thought gripped her mind and heart, making her miserable. The time corresponded, within a day or two, to that of Aletta’s return. Well, what then? Surely she was tormenting herself unnecessarily. Surely she could hold her own against a Dutch girl—an ugly Dutch girl—she added spitefully to herself. But just then, as she was discharging her duties of deputy hostess mechanically while thus thinking, the voice of the “ugly Dutch girl” broke in upon her broodings, with a remark addressed to herself.

“You have been in the Transvaal lately, I hear, Miss Wenlock?”

“Not quite lately; not for a year. I have some relations in Johannesburg, and was stopping with them.”

“Ah! I have some there too. I may be going up there soon, but have never been. It is a very wonderful place, is it not?”

“Oh, yes. Miles ahead of any other in South Africa. It hasn’t got the Sleepy Hollow sort of look all these other musty old places have. English capital and energy have put it in the forefront.”

This was no sort of remark to make under the circumstances, and herein was another instance of May’s lack of breeding which would now and again crop up. It may have been that she was stung by a new discovery which had been brought home to her with the first utterance. This “ugly Dutch girl” had a beautiful voice, soft, well modulated, thoroughly refined.

It was a time when people were wont to rave at and wrangle with each other over the rights and wrongs of the political situation then nearly at its most acute stage, on far less challenge than May’s tone and words implied. This Dutch girl, however, did nothing of the kind. She went on talking pleasantly as though no such remark had been made—asking questions about the place under discussion, and seeming to take a vivid interest in the answers. Poor May felt very small, very inferior. She was honest enough to own to herself that she had transgressed against the laws of good breeding, and to admire the other’s self-possession and ready tact, though, as constituting another attraction, she loved not the possessor of these qualities any the more.

Then Frank and Jan went out to smoke a pipe or two together, and talk shop, and about sport, and the latest rumours from the Transvaal—though this guardedly. The girls, left behind, were chatting, and looking at things, notably some English fashion papers which May had got out. Then they, too, took a stroll out to look at May’s fowl-houses, and finally all met at dinner.

There was no lack of conversation. Aletta was telling them about her experiences at the capital—where none of her hearers, save Frank, had ever been—moved thereto by many questions from Mrs Wenlock, and all the good times she had been having—balls, and bicycle picnics, and Government House receptions, and dances on board one or other of the warships at Simonstown. May, listening with vivid interest, almost forgot her ill-humour, only failing where she was reminded of it by envy. That was the sort of life her own soul hankered after, instead of being stuck away on a dismal up-country farm. That was life—this stagnation. Yet could she at that moment have been offered her choice, whether she would be there or here, she would have elected to remain where she was.

“I thought Cape Town a beastly place,” declared Frank. “Nothing on earth to do there, and they wanted me to wear a bell-topper hat on Sunday.”

Aletta broke into one of her whole-hearted laughs.

“That’s the best definition I’ve ever heard,” she said. “No, really, I shall have to tell it to some of them next time I am down there again—if ever I am.”

“It’s true, all the same,” persisted Frank, looking remarkably pleased with himself and the consciousness of having said a good thing. But his mother told him he was talking nonsense, and proceeded with her cross-examination of Aletta. Had she seen the Governor, and was he like his portraits? and so on.

Oh, yes, she had seen him pretty often. Spoken to him? He had once or twice, in a kindly conventional way, spoken to her, but she was certain he would not know her from Eve if he were to see her again. There were so many people he had to talk to in the same way at officially social functions. But the point in this qualification was lost upon her questioner, whose honest middle-class soul swelled with a congenial respect for one who had actually talked with the Governor.

“Hallo! by George, there’s someone coming!” exclaimed Frank, as the raucous coughs of the one decrepit cur whose acquaintance we have already made, together with a sound of hoofs, gave notice of the fact. “Wonder who it is?”

May looked up quickly, a whole world of eager expectancy, of forestalled disappointment in her glance. And as she did so she met the eyes of Aletta.

Chapter Thirteen.

Two Verdicts and some Rancour.

“Hallo, Colvin!” cried Frank, going out on the stoep. “Why, man, we had begun to think you were dead.”

“So?” said Colvin Kershaw, who was busy loosening the girths preparatory to off-saddling. “Whose cart is that, Frank? Looks like Stephanus’.”

“It is.”

“Is he here then?”

“No; only the girls.”

“Which of them?”

“All three.”

“Oh—. No, don’t have him put in the camp,” as a Hottentot came up to take the horse. “Just knee-halter him, and let him run. He can pick up enough round the house.”

As he entered, and greeted the girls, a subtle instinct told him that two of them were watching each other and him. May’s reception of him was somewhat brusque and rather too studiously off-handed. He read her face like the page of a book. She, keenly observant, noticed that he greeted the other three with the easy friendliness of people who know each other well, but without the faintest difference of tone or inflection in talking to each and all of them.

“Why, Mr Kershaw, we were thinking you were dead,” said Mrs Wenlock, in her cordial, breezy way. “It is a long time since we saw you last.”

“So Frank was saying, Mrs Wenlock. But I am not. Death has not given me a call yet.”

None there knew how very near truth their jesting words came—save one. One knew it, and with her Colvin, for the life of him, could not help exchanging a look. It was an exchange, and, swiftly as it flashed between them in its fulness of meaning, it did not go unobserved—by one.

“Hallo, Colvin, you’ve got your rifle along this time,” cried Frank, through the open window, who was examining the piece. “Why, I thought you never carried anything but a shot-gun down here.”

“I don’t generally. But I might be going up into the Wildschutsberg,” and again he brought his eyes round to those of Aletta. “Now and then you get a long shot at a reebok up there.”

“Why, this is the same old gun you had up in Matabeleland,” went on Frank, sighting the weapon and pointing and recovering it. “Nothing like these Lee-Metfords with the Martini block. By George, Miss De la Rey, how he used to make the niggers skip in the Matopos with this same pea-shooter!”

“Yes?” said Aletta, brightly, with simulated interest, but with a dire chill at her heart. What if this weapon should come to be pointed at others than dark-skinned barbarians, and that soon? Truth to tell for some occult reason the patriotic enthusiasm had cooled a little of late.

“Adrian had one of the new guns round at our place the other day,” said Jan. “A Mauser. He said it would shoot three miles. It is wonderful. I can hardly believe it.”

“Well, try a shot or two out of that, Jan,” said Colvin. “Only leave a few cartridges, in case I should come in for a good chance, riding along.”

Jan did—making some excellent practice, at ant-heaps scattered at varying distances over the veldt. Then his sisters declared that he had better see about inspanning, for it was time they were getting home.

“I shall have to be moving soon myself,” said Colvin. “I want to be in Schalkburg to-night.”

“In Schalkburg?” echoed Mrs Wenlock. “Why, you are in a hurry—and we haven’t seen you for such a time.”

“Yes; it’s a pity. But I have to do some business there first thing in the morning, so it’s as well to get there over-night.”

“I thought you said you might be going up to the Wildschutsberg,” said Aletta, with a spice of mischief. “Isn’t that rather a long way round?”

“It is rather. Only in the opposite direction. But I won’t go that way.”

And then, the cart being inspanned, they exchanged farewells. The handclasp between Colvin and Aletta was not one fraction more prolonged than that which he exchanged with the other two girls—if anything shorter. May, watching, could not but admit this, but did not know whether to feel relieved or not.

“So that is ‘the only English girl’!” said Aletta to herself as they drove off. “Old Tant’ Plessis was both right and wrong. They are not engaged, but still there is a sort of something between them, and that something is all, or nearly all, on her side. She would not make him happy, either—or be happy with him. She is pretty, very pretty, but common. She is gusty-tempered, has no self-command, and would be horribly jealous. No. She could never make him happy.”

Those whom she had left, however, were at that very moment formulating their opinions upon her, but aloud.

“What a nice girl Aletta has grown into!” Mrs Wenlock was saying. “She used to be shy and awkward, and nothing to look at, before she went away, and now she’s so bright, and smart, and stylish, and almost pretty. It’s wonderful what her stay at Cape Town has done for her.”

“I don’t think she’s pretty at all,” said May decisively. “I call her ugly.”

“No, I’ll be hanged if she’s ugly,” said Frank.

“No, indeed,” agreed his mother; “look what pretty hair she has, and pretty hands, and then her manner is so delightful. And there is such a stylish look about her, too! Don’t you agree with me, Mr Kershaw?”

“Yes; I do,” was the reply, made as evenly as though the subject under discussion had been Andrina or Condaas, or any other girl in the district.

“Well, I think she’s a horrid girl,” persisted May. “Style, indeed? What you call style, I call ‘side.’ She puts on a kind of condescending, talk-down-to-you sort of manner. These Dutch girls,” with withering emphasis on the national adjective, “are that way. They go away from home for a little and come back as stuck-up as they can be. That one is too grand for anything—in her own estimation. A horrid, stuck-up thing.”

Colvin, listening, winced. The idea expressed, the very wording of its expression, grated upon him horribly, apart from the identity of the subject thereof. In such wise would May from time to time lapse, and become, as Aletta had put it to herself, “common.”

He made no comment upon her vehement and ill-natured dictum, knowing perfectly well that it was uttered quite as much as a challenge to himself as to relieve the utterer’s feelings; and he was far too old and experienced to be drawn by any such transparent device. But as they re-entered the sitting-room the jarring effect of the words was intensified, bringing back in vivid contrast the last time he was there; that evening when he had been so near turning the most momentous corner which could meet him within the career of life. He had not turned it. A warning hand had, so to speak, been held up. This girl—he could see her as she was then, in her sweet alluring beauty, soft-voiced, appealing. He could see her now, hard-eyed, vindictive, and expressing herself in a manner that savoured of the wash-tub. What a near thing it had been—how narrow his escape!

He would have been tied fast, bound hand and foot. Even now there was a certain length of loose coil around him, which would need some care and judgment entirely to cast off. Still there was no hard-and-fast bond, and looking backward over the events of the past three weeks or so, he felt lost in thankfulness because of the trivial, fortuitous incident which had availed to stay his tongue when it had so nearly spoken.

“You are not particularly lively, after all this time, Colvin.”

He started, and put down the paper he had pretended to read, while the above reflections were coursing through his brain. They were alone together in the room, he and May. Frank, divested of his coat and waistcoat, could be seen in the distance doing odd jobs, and Mrs Wenlock had withdrawn for an afternoon nap. Her visitors, she declared, although dear girls, had tired her.

“No, I’m afraid I’m not,” he said. “I believe I’m tired. Well, let’s talk.”

Something in the words brought back that last evening they were thus alone together. The recollection softened her, but only for a moment.

“I can imagine it seems dull now that your Dutch friends are gone,” she began, in a crisp, gunpowdery way which was more than a declaration of war. It was in fact the firing of the first shell.

“Oh, bother it, May, why will you harp on that insane prejudice of nationality?” he expostulated, but quite good-humouredly, purposely ignoring her real drift. “A good sort is a good sort, no matter what his or her nationality. And I think you’ll allow that old Stephanus and his crowd come under that heading.”

“So you seem to think,” was the acid reply. “You have been there a good deal of late, haven’t you?”

“Yes, I like them very much, and the shoot is choice.” And then he went on to tell her about the bags he had made, and old Tant’ Plessis and her absurd perversities, and the ridiculous muddle the old woman had made between his name and that of the sixteenth-century Reformer. His object was to keep her attention away from personalities. But that object she saw through.

“You were not so fond of them three or four weeks ago,” she said, half turned away from him, and beginning to speak quickly, while the sea-blue eyes filled. “That is just the time that girl has been back. Goodness! I never thought to see you—you—running after an ugly Dutch girl.”

Every word grated upon Colvin’s mind—grated intensely, so much so indeed as to leave no room for anger, only disgust and disillusionment. At that moment, too, there flashed vividly through his mind a vision of the speaker, as contrasted with this “ugly Dutch girl” here in this very room but a few minutes ago, and the contrast was all in favour of the latter—yes, a hundred times over in her favour, he told himself. And now this one was going to make a scene; so much was evident. She was crudely, unsophisticatedly jealous, and had no self-control whatever.

Heavens! what an escape he had had!

“See here, May,” he said. “That sort of remark is not to my liking at all. It is—well, exceedingly unpleasant, and really I don’t care about listening to all this. I am responsible to nobody for my actions, remember, and there is not one living soul who has the slightest right or title to call me to account for anything I do or don’t do. And I am a little too old to begin to obey orders now. So if you will kindly give up abusing people I like, and with whom I happen to be very friendly, I shall be grateful. I don’t like to hear it, and it doesn’t come well from you.”

But the girl made no answer. She had dropped her face into her hands, and was silently sobbing. He, watching her, was softened directly. His first impulse was to take her in his arms and strive to comfort her. He still had a very weak place for her, although the scales had fallen from his eyes, owing to two causes. But an instinct of prudence and a great deal of cynicism born of experience rose up to restrain him. He had gone through this sort of thing before. He had seen women utterly miserable and heart-broken seemingly, on his account, as they said, meaning it, too, at the time; but six months or a year thence had found them laughing in his face, if not playing the same game with somebody else; but he himself had not taken them seriously, wherefore it didn’t matter. Yet it was all part of an education, and of what use was an education save to be applied?

“Don’t cry like that, little one,” he said gently. “Why should we say hard things to each other, you and I? We never used to.”

The gentle tone melted her at once. She dropped her hands. All the hardness had gone out of her face, and the sea-blue eyes were limpid and tender and winning.

“No, we used not. I have become very bad-tempered—very quarrelsome. But—oh, Colvin, I am so tired of life—of life here. It gets upon my nerves, I think. And I have hardly any friends, and you—you the greatest of them all, hardly seem to care for me—for us—now. I—we—never see you in these days, and—I feel it somehow.”

Colvin’s heart smote him. He need not have stayed away so long and so markedly, but there was a reason, and he had acted with the best intentions. Wherein he had blundered, as people invariably do when they suffer their actions to be guided by such tissue-paper motives, instead of by the hard and safe rule of judiciousness, expediency, and knowledge of human nature.

“Poor little girl! You must not run away with all those ideas,” he said. “And, you are flattering me. Well, I will come over again soon, and have a talk, but I must go now. There, will that do?”

He was talking to her quite gently, quite soothingly, just as he used to do, and the effect was wonderful. All the dejection, the sullenness, disappeared from her face, dispelled by a bright, almost happy smile.

“Good-bye, then,” she said. “I don’t think I’ll come and see you start this time. Good-bye, dear.”

Her eyes shone soft and dewy in the upturned face. Her lips were raised invitingly. It was not in mortal man to refuse them, however stern rectitude under the circumstances might dictate such a course. This one did not refuse them.

“Good-bye, my darling!” she breathed into his ear, in a voice so barely audible as to be almost inarticulate. And as he left her and went out to find his horse and see about saddling up, it was with a vague misgiving that the loose coil, to which he had made allusion in his own mind, had, within the last few moments, very perceptibly tightened.

We made use just above of the expression “under the circumstances.” The “circumstances” were, that by that time this cautious, and cynical and experienced man of the world was deeply, devotedly, and entirely in love with Aletta De la Rey.

Chapter Fourteen.

Jelf—Civil Commissioner.

Nicholas Andrew Jelf was Civil Commissioner and Resident Magistrate for the town and division of Schalkburg.

In person he was a tall, middle-aged, rather good-looking man, with dark hair, and a grizzled, well-trimmed moustache, and whose general appearance fostered an idea which constituted one of his favourite weaknesses—that he resembled a retired military man. When mistaken for such openly, he positively beamed; and more than one shrewd rogue got the benefit of the doubt, or obtained material mitigation of the penalty due to his misdeeds, by appealing, with well-feigned ignorance, to the occupant of the Bench as “Colonel.” By disposition he was easy-going and good-natured enough, and bore the reputation among his brother Civil servants of being something of a duffer.

By these the magistracy of Schalkburg was regarded as anything but a plum. It was very remote, the district large, and peopled almost entirely by Dutch farmers. The town itself was a great many miles from the nearest railway station; moreover, it was a dull little hole, with the limited ideas and pettifogging interests common to up-country townships. It boasted a large Dutch Reformed church—an unsightly, whitewashed parallelogram with staring, weather-beaten windows—item about a dozen stores, a branch of the Standard Bank, and two “hotels,” designed to afford board and lodging, of a kind, to such of the storekeepers’ clerks or bank clerks—to whom means, or inclination or opportunity, denied the advantages and felicities of the connubial state, for a stranger was an exceeding rarity. Half of its houses were untenanted, save for a few days on the occasion of the quarterly Nachtmaal (The Lord’s Supper) when the township would be filled with a great multitude of Boers and their families from far and near, those who did not own or hire houses, camping with their waggons on the town commonage. But it boasted no natural beauty to speak of, just dumped down, as it were, on a wide, flat plain. Some few of the houses had an erf or two of garden ground attached, which in the spring constituted by contrast a pleasing spot of green amid the prevailing red dust, but for the rest the impression conveyed was that of a sun-baked, wind-swept, utterly depressing sort of place.

Nicholas Andrew Jelf was seated at his office table amid a pile of papers, and his countenance wore a very worried expression indeed. The post had just been delivered, and the contents of the bag had consisted of a greater crop than usual of Government circulars, eke requests for returns, as it seemed, upon every subject under heaven. Moreover, the newspapers, through which he had glanced hurriedly, were mainly remarkable for the number and conspicuousness of their scare headlines. Sensation was the order of the day, and out of the chances of a rupture with the two Republics the canny editor managed to suck no small advantage. But poor Mr Jelf could lay to himself no such consolation. His thoughts were for his already large and still increasing family, and the ruinous hole it would make in the by no means extravagant pay of a Civil servant were he obliged to send it away to a safer locality, as he greatly feared he ought to lose no time in doing.

He turned to his correspondence. The Government desired to be informed of this—or the member for Slaapdorp had moved for a return of that—or Civil Commissioners were requested to obtain the opinion of the leading farmers of their divisions as to how far rinderpest microbes were likely to affect donkeys, given certain conditions of temperature and climate... and nearly a dozen more of like practical utility. Mr Jelf threw down the papers with a grunt of disgust and swore mildly to himself.

“They seem to think a Civil Commissioner must be a whole damned walking ‘Encyclopaedia Britannica,’” he growled. “What’s this? More of the same stuff, I suppose.”

But, as he read, his attention became more riveted and his face anxious and graver. For the official communication, marked “Confidential,” was one urgently requesting information as to the tone and disposition of the Dutch farmers in his division as bearing upon the present state of affairs, and desiring a full and circumstantial report at the very earliest opportunity. The effect of this was to deepen the worried look upon his face and to cause him to swear a little more. Just then a tap came at the door, and his clerk entered.

“Anything by the post that wants seeing to, sir?”

“Anything? I should think so. Just look at all this, Morkel,” pointing to the heap of stuff upon the table.

Morkel did look at it—looked somewhat blue, moreover. He was fond of sport and had intended to ask for a day or two’s leave to join a buck hunt on one of the farms, and was fully capable of grasping the amount of work all that confounded correspondence was going to entail. He was a well-set-up, good-looking young fellow of five and twenty, very proud of his fair proportions and waxed moustache and somewhat dandified attire; for there were three or four passable-looking girls in Schalkburg, and the Civil Commissioner’s clerk was Somebody in the place.

“One would think, at such a time as this, Government would have plenty to do without off-loading all these insane circulars upon us,” went on his chief, irritably. “It isn’t as if the things they want to know were of any practical use—they might as well move for a return of the number of buttons on every prisoner’s breeches over at the gaol as some of the things they do ask, but we’ve got to humour them. By the way, though, there’s one thing they want to know that has a practical side, and that ought to be looked after by a special department manufactured for this emergency. We have quite enough to do without going on the stump, so to say. Look at this.”

He handed the letter marked “Confidential” to his subordinate. The latter read it through carefully, and as he did so he saw light. He thought he was going to get his shoot after all, and a good deal more of it than he had at first hoped for.

“The thing is so unreasonable,” went on Mr Jelf. “Every mortal fad sprung on the House by some tin-pot country member, some retired canteen-keeper and proportionately consequential, is off-loaded on the Civil Commissioner. The Civil Commissioner is requested to do this, and the Civil Commissioner is desired to supply information upon that—as if we hadn’t quite enough to do with our financial and judicial duties. Why the deuce can’t Government have its own Secret Service department as Oom Paul is supposed to have?”

Morkel listened sympathetically, as he always did when his chief indulged in a grumble. The two were on very good terms. Jelf had a liking for his subordinate, who officially was smart and well up to his work, and socially was the only man in the place with whom he could associate on even terms, except the District Surgeon, who was a trifle too fond of his glass, and inclined to be dictatorial. Morkel, for his part, reciprocated the liking. His chief was easy-going, and good-natured in the matter of leave officially, and socially took a sort of paternal and friendly interest in him. These two Civil servants, therefore, got on admirably together.

“Well, the thing has got to be done,” went on Jelf, “and the only way to find out Dutch feeling is to go around among the Dutch. I haven’t the time to do it, and if I had it wouldn’t help, because they’d all shut up like oysters before me. But with you it would be different, Morkel. They’d look upon you as one of themselves.” He little thought how hard he was stamping on the corns of his subordinate; the fact being that, although born of Dutch parentage on either side, Morkel’s weakness was to imagine himself thoroughly and intensely English. “You would have to affect Boer sympathies, though, and we know that under the present Ministry that doesn’t damage a Civil servant at headquarters, eh? What do you think of the idea?”

“It’s a first-rate one, sir. I might go around as if on a sort of wandering shoot.”

“Yes. Take your gun with you. That’ll give colour to the affair. You can have my trap and horses, only spare the springs all you can in going through some of those bad drifts. You’d better take a week of it. Harvey can do a lot of your work for you. He’s almost too good a man for a chief constable. You’d better get as far up into the Wildschutsberg part as you can; they say the Boers up that way are the worst—especially since that firebrand, Andries Botma, has been his rounds. Look up Kershaw too; they say the fellow is three parts Boer in his sympathies. You might be able to get something out of him.”

A knock at the door and the Court constable, being bidden to enter, announced that Mynheer Stephanus De la Rey wanted to see the Civil Commissioner.

“The very man,” exclaimed the latter. “You must get to his farm, Morkel. You’re sure to hear something there. Show him in, Hendrik.”

Stephanus entered, and as he did so Morkel went out, laden with the circulars that needed attention.

Left alone with the magistrate, Stephanus looked a trifle ill-at-ease. His frank geniality seemed to have left him as he replied to that official’s inquiries after his family and concerns wherewith the Boer is wont to preface any and every interview if on anything like friendly terms with his interlocutor. Then he came to the point. He wished to resign his field-cornetcy.

Jelf looked annoyed, and felt it too. What was the reason, he asked. A reliable, influential man like Stephanus was just the man for the office. He would be hard to replace. Would he not reconsider his decision?

But Stephanus was firm; the fact being that since he had become converted to the “patriot” cause he was too honest to continue holding a post under the British Government, honorary as such might be. He did not, however, desire to say as much to the Government representative before him.

But the latter saw through his constraint, and went straight to the root of the thing. He was irritated at the obstinacy, as he called it, of this Boer, and the latter, to his amazement and indignation, found himself being roundly lectured. The Civil Commissioner had heard reports of disaffection among some of the farmers—notably those in the Wildschutsberg district, but he had never expected to find among the disloyal a man so universally respected as the one before him, and much more to the same effect Stephanus, however, kept both his temper and his dignity.

If that was the way the representative of the Government regarded him, he replied, all the more reason why he should adhere to his original resolve, and resign the field-cornetcy in favour of somebody who would be more acceptable. Would Mynheer kindly receive his formal resignation?

Yes, Mynheer would, in that case. But the farewell greeting between the two was stiff and unfriendly.

Left alone, Jelf felt rather small. He had failed in judiciousness, in tact, and he knew it. He had rubbed his interviewer the wrong way, just at a time when it was essential to keep such a man well disposed and friendly. At any rate, here was one item for his report. If Stephanus De la Rey was disaffected, why, then, the whole of the Wildschutsberg district must be a hotbed of seething sedition.

Thus he expressed matters to his subordinate, as, Stephanus having departed, he called Morkel in to talk over their plan.

“He has all but come round, sir,” said the latter. “I talked him over a good deal, and his is one of the places I’m to go to. He won’t give way about the field-cornetcy, though.”

“Oh, well, we must find somebody else, I suppose. They are all rebels at heart, I believe, and he’s as great a rebel as any. Yes? Come in.”

Again the Court constable entered.

“Mynheer Grobbelaar wishes to see you, sir.”

“Grobbelaar? Is it Jan Grobbelaar?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Show him in. This is getting warm, Morkel. Another damned Field-cornet. I suppose he wants to resign now.”

Swaart Jan entered, his projecting buck-teeth more prominent than ever in an oily grin, as he shook hands with the two officials. Jelf’s manner was short, and he wasted no time in preliminaries.

“Well, Mynheer Grobbelaar, and what can I do for you?”

“Nay, Mynheer, thank you. I have not called on business; just to make a little friendly visit.”

“Oh, not on business?” said the magistrate, greatly relieved in his own mind, yet wishing his visitor at the devil, bothering in like that during office hours. But he changed his mind when the Boer explained that he had been shooting a few springbuck lately, and he had brought in a little matter of a saddle and a couple of haunches, which Mrs Jelf might find good for roasting. It was from a young buck, and would eat well—he went on, in his shambling, diffident way.

Jelf thawed at once, and thanked his visitor. Here was another opportunity of getting at the state of Dutch feeling; and by way of preliminary he told the other about Stephanus’ resignation, adding, with a laugh:

“I thought you had come to resign too, Mynheer Grobbelaar.”

But the little man deprecated the possibility of any such idea having entered his head. It was a pity Stephanus had resigned, though. In answer to other questions—yes, there was some foolish talk among the Boers around him, but it was only talk, and they were young men. The Patriot? Oh, yes, he had visited some of them, but only on a flying visit. Held meetings? Oh, no—and here Swaart Jan’s hands went up in pious horror. What did Mynheer think of him, and those around him, to imagine that he, or they, would countenance such a thing for a single moment?

Jelf felt intensely relieved. Here was loyalty at last, anyhow—another item for his report. And he and his visitor parted with the most cordial of farewells; and Field-cornet Jan Marthinus Grobbelaar, alias Swaart Jan, went out grinning till his tusks nearly came below the level of his chin, as he thought of the cases of Mauser rifles snugly stored in a safe recess within his house, and the ammunition, a quantity sufficient to blow up half the mountain, which was stowed away in a cleft of an adjacent krantz, conveyed and deposited thither by authority of no permit given under the hand of Nicholas Andrew Jelf, Resident Magistrate.

Here was loyalty at last, anyhow! as that astute official had put it to himself.

Chapter Fifteen.

Solution.

How had it all come about? What was there in this girl that had seized and held his mind—his every thought—ever since he had first set eyes on her, all unexpectedly, that evening when he had come in, wet and dripping, having barely escaped with his life? Colvin Kershaw, putting the question to himself twenty times a day, could find no definite answer to it.

No definite answer—no. Therein lay all the charm surrounding Aletta. It was so indefinite. From the moment he had first beheld her the charm had taken hold upon him. He had been unconsciously stirred by her presence, her personality. Yet it was no case of love at first sight. A strange, potent weaving of the spell had been on him then, and, gradual in its development, had enchained him and now held him fast.

Day after day in his solitary dwelling he had recognised it, and analysed it, and striven with its influence, yet had never attempted to throw it off—had never shrunk instinctively from the weaving of its coils around him. It was not born of solitude, as perhaps that other coil, from which he would heartily fain be now entirely and conscientiously free, had been. No matter under what circumstances, or in what crowd they had met, he realised that the result would have been the same; that the spell would still have been woven just the same.

He thought upon the conditions of life, and how such are apt to focus themselves into a very small groove—the groove in which one happens, for the time being, to run. Might it not be that the circumscribed area into which life had resolved itself with him of late had affected his judgment, and led him to take a magnified, a vital view of that which, looked at from the outside world, would have struck him as a passing fancy, and untenable save as such? Judgment, reason, heart, alike cried out to the contrary, and cried aloud.

He might leave this remote habitation on the High Veldt, this region outwardly so unattractive to the casual passer-through with a mind absorbed by the state of the share market in Johannesburg or London, but so enriveting to those who make it their home. He might return to the world he knew so well; might do so to-morrow, without inconvenience or loss. What then? He would merely be measuring the length of his chain, or, if he succeeded in breaking it, would be relinquishing the pearl of great price which he had found here in a far corner of the earth when least expecting any such marvellous discovery, any such unspeakable blessing to be obtained by mortal man.

For so he had come to regard it. Yes, the symptoms this time were there. Nothing was wanting to them now. He had been under the delusion that that which they had represented was, for him, a thing of the past, and in his solitary life and unconscious craving for sympathy and companionship—yes, and even for love, had almost acted upon that idea. But for a timely diversion he would so have acted. Now he could hardly formulate to himself a sufficiency of gratitude to Heaven, or circumstances, or whatever it might be, that he had not.

The narrowness of his escape he realised with a mental shudder. What if this strange new experience, opening as it did such an irradiating vista of possibilities, had come upon him a day too late, had discovered him bound—bound, too, by a chain he well knew there would be no loosening once its links enfolded him? His usual luck had stood him in good stead once more, and the thought suggested another. Would that luck continue?

Would it? It should. He would soon put it to the test. He went over in his mind the whole period of his acquaintanceship with Aletta. It was short enough in actual fact—only a matter of weeks, yet viewed by the aspect of the change it had wrought it seemed a lifetime. He recalled how he had first beheld her, and indeed many a time since, bright, laughing, infecting everyone, however unconsciously, with the warmth of her sunny light-heartedness. No outcome was this either of a shallow unthinking temperament. She could be serious enough on occasions, as he had more than once observed during their many talks together, that, too, with a quick sympathy which pointed to a rich depth of mind. He reviewed her relationship towards her own people, which, as an intimate friend of the house, he had enjoyed every opportunity of observing, and here again he found no flaw. It was clear that the whole family came little short of worshipping her, and through this ordeal too she had come utterly unspoiled. The idea brought back the recollection of the sort of good-humoured, faintly contemptuous indulgence with which he had listened to the singing of her praises by one or other of its members, what time her personality represented to him simply the original of those unprepossessing portraits which adorned the sitting-room; and he acknowledged that the laugh now was completely turned against himself.

Then his thoughts took a new vein, and he seemed to hear the comments of those among whom he had sometime moved— “Colvin Kershaw? Oh yes. Married some farm girl out in Africa and turned Boer, didn’t he?” and more to the same effect, uttered in a languid, semi-pitying tone by this or that unit of a society whose shibboleth was the mystical word “smart,” a society he had been in but not of. Well, so be it. Let them drawl out their banal inanities. In this case he hoped they would do so with reason.

Hoped? For he was not sure, far from it; and herein lay one of the “symptoms,” Not that he would have loved Aletta one iota the less had he been sure. He was not one of those to whom the joy of possession is measured by the excitement and uncertainty of pursuit; and there are some of whom this holds good, however difficult it may be to persuade, at any rate the ornamental sex, that such can possibly be the case. On the contrary, he would feel grateful to one who should spare him the throes and doubts calculated to upset even an ordinarily well-balanced mind under the circumstances, and proportionately appreciative. But whatever of diffidence or anxiety might take hold upon his own mind, Colvin Kershaw was not the man to display it in the presence of its first cause. The cringing, adoring, beseeching suitor of not so very old-fashioned fiction struck him as somewhat contemptible, and as of necessity so appearing to the object of his addresses, no matter how much she might really care for him at heart. He must run his chance to win or lose, and if he lost, take it standing. There was none of the ad misericordiam, wildly pleading element about him.

“Pas op, Baas! The bird!”

The words, emanating from his henchman, Gert Bondelzwart, brought him down to earth again; for the occupation in which he had been engaged during the above reverie was the prosaic one of attending to his daily business, which in this case consisted in going round the ostrich camps and inspecting such nests as he knew of, or discovering indications of prospective ones. To a certain extent mechanical and routine, it was not incompatible with reflection upon other matters. Now he turned to behold a huge cock ostrich bearing down upon him with hostility and aggressiveness writ large all over its truculent personality.

“Here, Gert. Give me the tack!” he said. “That old brute is properly kwaai.”

Now the cock ostrich resembles the aggressive and nagging human female, in that the respective weakness of either protects it, though differing, in that in the first instance the said weakness may be read as “value” and, in the second, proportionately the reverse. For a creature of its size and power for mischief there is no living thing more easy to kill or disable than an ostrich, wherein again comes another diametrical difference. A quick, powerful down-stroke or two with the sharp-pointed toe may badly injure a man or even kill him, if surprised in the open by the ferocious biped, tenfold more combative and formidable during the nesting season. And this one, which now came for its lawful owner, looked formidable indeed, towering up to its great height, the feathers round the base of its neck bristling at right angles, and flicking its jet-black wings viciously. It was a grand bird, whose pink shins and beak, and flaming, savage eye proclaimed it in full season, as it charged forward, hissing like an infuriated snake.

Colvin grasped the long, tough mimosa bough not a moment too soon. Standing firm yet lightly, so as to be able to spring aside if necessary, he met the onrush in the only way to meet it. The sharp pricking of the clusters of spiky thorns met the savage bird full in the head and neck, but chiefly the head, forcing it to shut its eyes. For a moment it danced in powerless and blinded pain, then backed, staggering wildly. Forward again it hurled itself, emitting an appalling hiss, again to meet that inexorable cluster of thorny spikes. In blind rage it shot out a terrible kick, which its human opponent deftly avoided, the while holding his thorn tack high enough to avoid having it struck from his hand—a precaution many a tyro in the ways of the gentle ostrich has been known to forget, to his cost. Again it charged, once more only to find itself forced to shut its eyes and stagger back giddily. Then it came to the conclusion that it had had enough.

“I think he will leave us alone, so long, Gert,” said Colvin, panting somewhat from the exertion and excitement, for even the thorn-tack means of defence requires some skill and physical effort to wield with effect against a full-grown and thoroughly savage male ostrich.

“Ja, Baas. He is real schelm,” returned Gert, who had been standing behind his master throughout the tussle. “But he has had enough.”

It seemed so. The defeated monster, baulked and cowed, sullenly withdrew, and, shambling off, promptly encountered a weaker rival in the shape of one of his own kind, which he incontinently went for, and consoled himself for his own rout by rushing his fleeing inferior all over the camp, and then, gaining the wire fence, went down on his haunches, and wobbled his silly head and fluttered his silly wings in futile challenge to another cock-bird on the further side of that obstruction, whose attention had been attracted by the row, and who was coming down to see what it was all about.

“Now to look at that jackal-trap, Gert. Ah, here it is—and, sure enough, here’s Mr Jack.”

There came into view an iron trap, which, when set, had been level with the ground, deftly covered with loose earth, and baited with half a hare. It was placed in the thick of a bush so as to be inaccessible to ostriches, to protect whom it was there, and as they came up, a jackal, securely caught by the forelegs, struggled wildly to get free, snarling in fear and pain, and displaying all its white teeth.

“Poor little brute,” said Colvin. “Here, Gert, give it a whack on the head with your kerrie and send it to sleep. Toen! look sharp.

“That’s the worst of these infernal traps,” he went on, as a well-directed blow terminated the destructive little marauder’s hopes and fears. “But it has got to be, or we shouldn’t have an egg left.”

“Ja, Baas. That is quite true,” assented the Griqua, to whose innermost mind, reflected through those of generations of barbarian ancestry, the idea of feeling pity for a trapped animal, and vermin at that, represented something akin to sheer imbecility.

“Gert,” said Colvin, as they got outside the ostrich camps, “get up one of the shooting-horses—Punch will do—and saddle him up. I am going over to Ratels Hoek.”

“Punch, sir? Not Aasvogel?”

“Jou eselkop! Did I not say a shooting-horse? Aasvogel would run to the devil before if he heard a shot. He’d run further now since the joke up yonder with Gideon Roux.”

“Ja, sir. That is true”; and the Griqua went away chuckling. He had been poking sly fun at his master, in that Aasvogel was by far the showiest horse in the place. Gert had been putting two and two together. For about once a week that his master had gone over to Ratels Hoek formerly, now he went thither at least twice or three times. Of course it could only be with one object, and with that object no Boer would have thought of riding any other than his showiest horse. Wherefore Gert had suggested Aasvogel.

Likewise, no Boer would have thought of riding forth on such an errand without getting himself up with much care and all the resources at his disposal. Colvin, needless perhaps to say, did nothing of the kind. He got into a clean and serviceable shooting-suit, and with his favourite shot-gun, a sufficiency of cartridges, and a few trifling necessaries in a saddle-bag, he was ready.

Just then his housekeeper, Katrina, Gert’s wife, met him in the door with a note. It had just been brought, she said. Baas Wenlock’s boy was waiting for an answer.

He opened the note. It was in May’s handwriting, wanting to know if he would come over and spend Sunday with them. What should he reply? This was Friday; yet, one way or the other, he was under no doubt whatever that in forty-eight hours he would not be precisely inclined to put in the day at Spring Holt—no—no matter how things went. Yet to refuse would seem unfriendly, and, viewed from one aspect, somewhat brutal. So he left the matter open, pleading hurry in his reply.

Then as he passed out of his door a chill feeling came over him. How would he re-enter it—elate, happy, or—only to calculate how soon he could make arrangements for leaving it altogether, for shutting down this volume of the book of his life? And with a sense of darkling superstition upon him the delivery of that message as he passed the threshold seemed to sound a note of ill augury.

He was destined to meet with another such. When nearly half-way on his ride he came in sight of another horseman cantering along the flat at some distance off, travelling towards him. A few minutes more and he made out Adrian De la Rey.

It was rather a nuisance, he decided. He did not want to meet Adrian just then. Adrian was too addicted to making himself disagreeable in these days. Formerly they had been very friendly, but now, since Adrian had come upon them that morning in the garden, his manner had changed. It had displayed towards Colvin, upon such occasions as they had met, a brusqueness akin to rudeness.

“Daag! Adrian!” cried the latter, reining in.

“Daag!” answered the young Boer gruffly, without reining in, and continuing his way.

“You want a lesson in manners, my young friend,” said Colvin to himself, feeling excusably nettled. “Well, well!” he added. “The poor devil’s jealous, and of course hates me like poison. I suppose I should do the same.”

Thus lightly did he pass it off. He would not have done so perhaps could he at that moment have seen the other’s face, have read the other’s mind. A savage scowl clouded the former, black and deadly hatred seethed through the latter.

“Wait a bit, you verdomde rooinek!” snarled the Boer to himself. “Your days are told. They may be counted by weeks now, and not many of them. These accursed English—is it not enough that they rule our land and treat us like Kafirs, without coming between us and those we love? Their time of reckoning will be here directly—and of this one too. He little knows—he little knows, that he will be dead in a few weeks. No-no!”

He said truly. The object of this murderous though not altogether unjustifiable hatred was holding on his way through the sweet golden sunshine, little thinking of the dread ordeal of blood and horror through which he, and some of those with whom his fate was bound up, were soon—and very soon—to pass.

Chapter Sixteen.

“Of Great Price.”

That visit to the Wenlocks had been productive of result in more directions than one; still, why should it have affected Aletta De la Rey of all people? Yet affect her it did, inasmuch as, after it, she became more happy and light-hearted than ever.

Little had she thought at the time of carelessly suggesting the idea to her mother that such could possibly be the result. But weeks had gone by since the suggestion was made, and the lapse of weeks has sometimes a curious way of bringing about changes and developments by no means to be foreseen by those most concerned therein; which for present purposes may be taken to mean that she and Colvin Kershaw had by this time seen a great deal of each other. And this period Aletta, for her part, looked back upon with vivid and unalloyed pleasure.

He had been a great deal at Ratels Hoek during that time, so much so as to lay her open to considerable chaff at the hands of her sisters, notably at those of Condaas, who declared that it was “a case,” in that he had never been known to favour them with anything like so much of his company before. Even old Tant’ Plessis had remarked upon it, appending by way of rider the query as to when he was going to marry Wenlock’s sister, “the only English girl” and so forth, which joke had become a standing one by then. But Aletta could afford to laugh at it now, in the most whole-souled manner, which development was among the results of that memorable visit.

All their talks together—now grave, now semi-serious, now wholly gay—she delighted to dwell upon. This man was entirely outside her previous experience. Nothing he said ever jarred, even in the slightest degree. There was no question they discussed together to which he could not find a perfectly intelligible side, even if differing; no show of impatience or of humouring her; everything treated from a philosophical, well-thought-out point of view. Or, if the topic were of lighter import, the exact point where the humour came in would somehow strike them simultaneously. There was a subtle vein of sympathy between them, and to dwell upon it thrilled her with a blissful and exquisite delight.

Other considerations apart, it was intensely flattering, the more so as she realised that the attitude was genuine. She had met with plenty of attention during her absence from home, but her head had not been in the least turned thereby. But of all the attention she had met, none had been so grateful, so satisfying, and indeed so sweet as this. Sometimes, in fact, she would wonder if she were not over-estimating its burden, but the momentary misgiving would be quenched. Tone, glance, everything told her that such was not the case.

Yet what could he see in her, to take so much pleasure in talking with her, he who had seen so much of the world what time she herself was running about in short frocks, not so very long able to talk distinctly? How could he give so much consideration to her crude ideas—acquired and fostered, she supposed, during a not very long sojourn in a fifth-rate capital—he who had seen all the mighty capitals of both worlds, and knew some of them intimately? Personally, too, where did the attraction lie? She was not even pretty, like her sister Andrina, or May Wenlock. Yet, comparing herself with the latter, a smile spread over her face, rippling out into a low, whole-hearted laugh, all alone as she was.

Now the above reflections constituted just about as full and complete a tribute as Aletta De la Rey could have given to any man. She had no poorer an opinion of herself than had other girls of her quality and circumstance. She was aware—normally, that is—that what she lacked in attractiveness in one direction was counterbalanced by different advantages in another. Yet now she found herself magnifying her defects, and almost entirely losing sight of their compensations. Of a truth here too were “symptoms.”

Thus meditating, not quite for the first time, Aletta strolled along through the willows by the river bed—much more bed than “river” now, although a faint trickle had kept some of the deeper reaches fairly supplied. She was given to an occasional solitary stroll. It was good for the individual to retire sometimes into private life, was her explanation. But the other girls put—or pretended to put—a different construction upon it. They declared mischievously that there was something on between her and somebody in Cape Town, and she wanted to go and have a good think about him. She, for her part, only laughed, and let them think so if they wanted to. But they humoured her and her inclinations all the same, for, as we said elsewhere, Aletta occupied a sort of metaphorical pedestal within her own family circle.

It was a lovely morning—blue and golden and cloudless. A mirage-like shimmer arose from the veldt, and the sunlight slanted upon the facets of near rock-walls engirdling turret-shaped cone, or flat-topped mount, as though sweeping over patches of gems. A “kok-a-viek,” the yellow African thrush, was calling to his mate in his melodious triple hoot among the willows hard by, and the sounds of workaday life—mellowed by distance—the lowing of cattle, and the shout of native voices, were borne to the girl’s ears as she stood there, revelling, though half unconsciously, in the glow of her youth and vitality, in the sheer joy and delight of living.

Suddenly an old koorhaan concealed somewhere among the thorns on the opposite river bank opened his head, and emitted his long, strident crowing. Another answered further off, then another, and presently the whole veldt was alive with the shrill barkings of the clamourous little bustards. Then the first offender rose with an uproarious suddenness that startled Aletta, and put up about ten more, which could be seen winging their way, far and near, adding their alarmed cacklings to his.

Something had scared the bird—something or somebody. Who could it be? Aletta’s face flushed. Was it Adrian back again? He had been there that morning and had ridden off, very moody and sullen. Had he thought better of it and returned? Was it Adrian—or— And then the flush which had spread over her cheeks and throat deepened, and her eyes shone with a glad light, for there was a hoof-stroke or two hard by—on this side, not on the opposite bank where she had expected the new-comer, whoever it might be, first to show, and then the identity of the latter was exactly as she could have wished.

“I am in luck’s way this morning,” said Colvin, dismounting. “Are you indulging in a solitary meditation, Miss De la Rey?”

She answered in the affirmative. The while he had taken in at a glance the whole picture: the tall, graceful figure against the background of trees, the lighting up of the hazel eyes, the flush of colour which rendered the face, framed within an ample white “kapje,” wonderfully soft and winning, as its owner stood, with her head thrown ever so slightly back, there before him. Something or other—perhaps it was the “kapje” she was wearing—recalled to his mind a somewhat similar meeting in which May Wenlock constituted the other party to the transaction; but, if so, it was only to think what a long time ago that seemed, and what a change had come into and over his life since.

Then, as her glance fell upon his horse, and some birds dangling from the saddle:

“Why, you have been shooting already. Tell me, do you even go to bed with a cartridge-belt on? How many birds have you got?”

“Brace of partridges and two koorhaan. One is a vaal koorhaan, and a fine one too. It took an astonishingly long shot to bring him down. I could have brought along a blekbok, but thought I’d let him go.”

“Why?”

“Oh, I didn’t want the bother of loading him up—and the rest of it. He got up right under Punch’s feet just after I turned into the gate of the third camp. It was impossible to have missed him, for Punch is as steady as a rock. So he stood, or rather ran, reprieved. No. I couldn’t be bothered with him to-day.”

“Why—to-day?”

But with the words she dropped her eyes. Was it before something in his glance? Immediately, however, she raised them again and met his fully, bravely.

“Listen, Aletta. I have something to tell you, and it strikes me first as a splendid augury that I should have found you like this all alone. It is of no use beating about the bush, but—give me your hand, dear, then perhaps I shall be able to tell you better.”

Without removing her eyes from his, she put forth her hand. Augury Number 2, he thought, as the long, soft tapering fingers slipped into his. She, for her part, thought how firm, and tender, and speaking was that gaze which she met; and it was of a piece with the manner. No exuberant over-confidence which would have jarred, none of the self-effacing, stuttering diffidence, which would have sapped ever so little, even if but momentarily, the high estimation in which she held this man. Could she herself be as self-possessed?

“I love you, darling,” he said. “I have come over this morning on purpose to tell you so. We have not known each other very long, but I have learnt to love you as I never thought it possible to love. Have you not seen it?”

“I don’t know,” she whispered. But the hand that was within his seemed to close around it with a perceptible pressure.

“Listen now, Aletta”; and there was a softened tenderness about the mere sounding of her name that sent a thrill of delight through her whole being. “I am rather a weather-worn hulk, I fear some people might say, for you in your sweet, bright youth to condemn yourself to go through life with. Yet, if you could bring yourself to face that ordeal, I believe we should make each other very happy. Tell me, now, do you think you can bring yourself to face it—to love an old fogey like me?”

Her eyes answered him. They had never left his, and now the love-light that beamed from them was not to be mistaken.

“Yes, Colvin,” she said softly. “I think I can. But—don’t call yourself names.” And with the words she was gathered to him while they exchanged their first kiss. “Can I love you?” she murmured unsteadily, yielding in his embrace. “Can I love you, did you say? Can I help it? My darling one, you are made to be loved,” she uttered, in a very abandonment of passionate tenderness. “But I—why should you love me—you who have seen so much of the world? I am so inexperienced, so ignorant. I am not even decent-looking. How can I ever make you happy?”

“Ignorant? Inexperienced? My Aletta, you would more than hold your own anywhere—perhaps will some day,” he added, as though to himself. “Not even decent-looking!” he echoed banteringly, and, holding her from him at arm’s length, he affected to scan her up and down. “No. No presence, no grace, supremely awkward—hands like the sails of a fishing-smack.”

“There, that will do,” laughed the girl, giving him a playful tap with one of the libelled hands, a hand which would have served as a model in a sculpture of Iseult of Brittany. “You are only beginning to sum up my imperfections, and I am frightened already. No, really; I feel hardly inclined for a joke even. I am far, far too happy.”

“Kwaa-kwak-kwak! Kwaa-kwak-kwak!”

Both started, then laughed. The old koorhaan, first disturbed across the river bed, was returning, as though some instinct notified him that the fell destroyer was harmless to-day. Right overhead he came, an easy twenty-five yards’ shot. Instinctively Colvin reached for the gun, which he had rested against an adjoining bush; but as quickly he recovered himself.

“We’ll grant the old squawker an amnesty to-day,” he said with a laugh. “I don’t think I could have missed that shot either.”

“Kwaa-kwak-kwak! Kwaa-kwak-kwak!” yelled the bird, as, hovering for a moment, it dropped down among the thorns on the very spot whence it had been first roused. Then they talked on, those two, happy in the happiness which cannot often come in a lifetime—happy in the golden sunshine and the glowing summer of their lives—happy amid the rejoicing surroundings of Nature, in their vastness and peace and calm. Yet, away there to the North—what? The gathering cloud, black as night, sweeping down, steadily, surely—whirled along on the spreading demon-wings of war—the cloud which, bursting into lurid thunders, should overwhelm all with its blasting breath in a vortex of hideous hate and red slaughter, and woe and destitution. No; for the contemplation of this they had no mind.

Suddenly Aletta gave a start, uttering a little cry of consternation.

“There’s the dinner-bell, and you haven’t even off-saddled. How late we shall be!”

“We shall, rather. But what does it matter? Good Lord, though, how the last hour has flown?”

Was it a suspicion born of the fact that these two shared a momentous secret that made them think Stephanus exchanged more than one significant glance with his wife while they sat at dinner? He began to talk about his nephew Adrian. The latter never came near them now. He had changed entirely, and seemed to have run patriotism mad. Moreover, he had taken to associating with certain Boers of a particularly low and disreputable type, such as Hermanus Delport, Gideon Roux, and others.

The while Condaas and Andrina were kicking each other under the table, and Aletta was feeling supremely uncomfortable. Then the worthy Stephanus, suddenly becoming aware that he was romping gaily over mined ground, abruptly changed the subject.

But thereafter was surprise in store for him, when Colvin took him aside and imparted the events of the morning. Stephanus was delighted, and an additional fact, not at present to be divulged, which the other imparted to him, did not lessen his satisfaction.

“Maagtig! Colvin. You are a slim kerel,” he cried, shaking his son-in-law-elect warmly by the hand. “Why, you have kept it dark between you. Well, I don’t know anybody I would rather give my little girl to. Besides, she is almost English in her ways. But, say; it seems a strange thing that you, with ample means to live where you like, should prefer to bury yourself in an out-of-the-way place like this. Of course, for us who are born to it, why it’s different. We couldn’t get on anywhere else.”

“Oh, I like the life, Stephanus. Since I have known Aletta, I have liked it more. By the way, I am under no sort of a cloud at home, if that is what you are thinking about. I could go and set up in London to-morrow if I wanted.”

“I was not thinking otherwise, ou’ maat,” said Stephanus heartily. “Let us go in and tell the wife.”

Mrs De la Rey gave both of them a good-humoured scolding. She ought to have been told first, not Stephanus. Girls belonged first of all to their mother. She, too, was delighted. But the cream of the joke came when they broke the news to old Tant’ Plessis.

“Colvin going to marry Aletta?” cried the latter sharply. “What nonsense are you telling me, Gertruida? Why, Colvin is going to marry Wenlock’s sister. She is the only English girl here, and he is the only Englishman, so of course he is going to marry her. I have heard Mynheer—no, I mean everybody—say so.”

“But it isn’t true, Tanta, I tell you,” explained Mrs De la Rey. “It is Aletta—our Aletta.”

“Aletta?” ejaculated the old woman, upon whom it began to dawn. “Aletta! Oh, mijn Vaterland! Why, he is nearly old enough to be her father!”

“That’s a nasty one!” whispered Colvin to Stephanus, who was nearly losing his life in his superhuman efforts to repress a great roar. It was too much for Andrina and Condaas, who at the other end of the room were pretending to work. They precipitately fled, and, in a moment, splutters and squeals, muffled by a closed door, became faintly audible to those who remained. Aletta had made herself scarce long before.

“Nearly old enough to be her father, and an Englishman!” repeated Tant’ Plessis, wagging her head. “An Englishman! Oh, goeije! Was not one of her father’s people good enough for her? There, Gertruida. See what comes of sending her among the English to learn their ways. She comes home, and wants to marry an Englishman.”

The air, half of horror, half of resignation, wherewith the old woman uttered these words was irresistibly comic.

“Well, Tanta, he isn’t a bad sort of an Englishman, as Englishmen go,” cut in Stephanus, winking the while at his wife. “Besides, remember whom he is descended from, and shake hands and congratulate him,” shoving Colvin forward as he spoke.

“Ja, that is true,” replied Tant’ Plessis, somewhat mollified. “After all, his grandfather was the great and good Calvinus. Well, nephew, follow in his footsteps, and you will be happy. But—Aletta! Oh, mijn lieve Heer! who would have thought it—Aletta!”

Chapter One.