"The White Hand and the Black" (continued 3)

“I have a bit of good news for you, child,” said Thornhill that evening. “Your aversion, Manamandhla, is going—if he hasn’t already gone.”

“A good thing too,” answered the girl, to whom it was no news. “I hope you won’t let him come back.”

“I think not,” said Thornhill, with a dry laugh. “We have had enough of each other.”

Edala had been observing the change in her father of late, and now she studied him more closely than ever. The harassed, worried look that had been upon him had suddenly dropped off; simultaneously with the departure of Manamandhla—she did not fail to observe. He became his old calm, even-minded self. But a week later the Zulu returned.

“I would like to serve Nkose a little longer,” was his tranquil explanation, when tackled by Thornhill. The latter looked at him in silence for a few minutes. To the Zulu this deliberation gave no anxiety.

“You can stay then,” was the reply, uttered grimly.

“Nkose is my father. He will care for me. Were I dead there are two others, two of my own blood, who know that there are ‘mouths’ on Sipazi which swallow up men—who know which one it is that gives not back that which it swallows—but yet that which it swallows could be brought back with long lines. And I—whau, I know of one of these ‘mouths’ which gives back that which it swallows, but gives them back lame for the rest of life.”

Here was a contingency that had clean escaped Thornhill’s calculations. However, he showed no sign of being perturbed by the statement. Was it true? A little reflection convinced him that in all probability it was not. Manamandhla would never be such a fool as to share a momentous secret—a, to him, valuable secret—with another, let alone with two others. But he would pretend to believe it, all the same; so would the blackmailer be thrown the more off his guard.

“Did your brother’s son succeed with the additional two cows, Manamandhla?” he said, airily, taking no notice of the Zulu’s last remark.

“Nearly. Not quite. It is in the air still. Nkose, two more would complete the lobola, for the girl is fine and much sought after, and her father—whau! he is miserly and loves cattle much.”

“Yet I think one more will content him. We will talk further about it.” And Thornhill laughing to himself turned away.

“So we have got that beast back again? I thought he had gone for good,” said Edala, her straight, clear glance full on her father’s face.

“Meaning Manamandhla? So did I, but I don’t think he’ll stay long—no, not long.”

Still she kept her glance upon him, and though the words were spoken easily, naturally, and without any outward intonation of significance, it seemed to Thornhill that the girl read his thoughts, his intent. She, like himself, could school her face, yet not altogether. Its expression now seemed to reveal horror, loathing, repulsion—yet not for Manamandhla. Reading it, something moved him to say:

“I have been thinking things over, Edala, and perhaps, after all, I can see my way towards letting you carry out your cherished wish—that of going to Europe to study art seriously. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

She made no answer. He had expected her to brighten up at the suggestion.

“You are not happy here, and I—well perhaps I am getting more than a little tired of living in an atmosphere of chronic suspicion and repulse. And yet, child, the time may come—and come too late—when you will bitterly regret the care of a father who has been to you as very few fathers within my experience have ever been to their children—in fact, I can hardly recall the case of one. But there—ingratitude is only to be expected, in fact nothing else could be under all the circumstances.”

This with intense bitterness. His self control had momentarily broken down. The girl, who had begun to soften, grew hard again.

“I don’t know that I’ve anything to be so thankful and appreciative over—under all the circumstances,” she said, with a scathing emphasis on the echo of his words. He looked at her fixedly, sadly.

“Not now, but that will come. That will come—perhaps when it is too late.”

His tone was quiet, and there was a sad conviction of prophecy in the words that again softened her—almost frightened her—as he turned away. In a moment a huge impulse moved her to go after him and declare that she had no wish whatever to leave him; that she would give no thought in the world to any consideration but himself; that she had been horribly hard and ungrateful and selfish; but assuredly some demoniacal influence was floating in the air just then, for the impulse passed. And her father, too, was striving to harden his heart. Why not? A man never ceased to gain in experience of life and human nature even if he lived to a hundred; and he himself was only in his prime. Why then break his heart over that which was only to have been expected?

By an effort he dismissed the subject from his mind. The latter then reverted to the subject of Manamandhla, and the result of his meditations boded no good to that ill-advised Zulu.

Chapter Fifteen.

A Revelation—with a Vengeance.

“Then, it wouldn’t have killed him, Vine?”

“I think not. I could not quite locate the stuff. You see I have had no opportunity of making a study of these native drugs. They take precious good care we shan’t,” answered the District Surgeon.

Elvesdon was conscious of a sense of relief at this verdict. It would save complications at any rate. He would not now be obliged to open up a serious enquiry at a time when the native pulse had to be fingered very carefully.

“But why the deuce should they give him the stuff if it wasn’t to get him out of the way?” he said.

“Well, you see, a drug, even of a poisonous nature, may have other uses than to cause death. It may be administered in sufficiently small proportions to cause a sort of waking stupefaction, a semi-consciousness in which the will power lies torpid, and the recipient may be made to do or say anything which others may choose to make him do or say. Now Zavula is an important chief—a very important chief—and respected as a singularly able and level-headed one, consequently his ‘word’ once uttered would carry more weight than that of upstarts like Babatyana and half a dozen others put together. See?”

“Yes. In other words he’d be of more use to them alive than dead?”

“That’s it. But—by the way, Elvesdon, it’s a pity I didn’t have that bowl a bit sooner. You know traces of some poisons are easier located if investigated early.”

“Yes, but we were both of us so infernally busy. And perhaps neither of us took the thing sufficiently seriously.”

The two were seated in Elvesdon’s inner office, and were, so to say, holding an inquest on the District Surgeon’s investigation of old Zavula’s drinking bowl. The doctor was a sturdy, thick-set man, of anything from fifty onwards but probably much more; grizzled and red-faced; very downright in manner, but genial and well-liked. He and the new magistrate had taken to each other at once.

“Think there’ll be trouble Elvesdon—over the new tax for instance?” said the doctor.

“The Lord only knows, and He won’t tell. I’m doing all I can, but this business of Zavula’s looks more than a bit ugly. I don’t mind telling you. Babatyana’s an infernal scoundrel, and he’s practically chief of the Amahluzi. Poor old Zavula is for all practical purposes only a sleeping partner, I’m afraid.”

“M-m,” said the other.

“Well I think, as you can’t certify that this stuff was enough to constitute an attempt on old Zavula’s life, there’s nothing to be gained by stirring up any mud over the job. He’s cute enough, and obviously able to take care of himself. The jolly old boy sent me quite an affectionate message only the day before yesterday—no—it was the day before that.”

The grisly side to this statement lay in the fact that on the day named the said ‘jolly old boy’ was lying in his unknown grave in the rock cleft—had been for some time—and the whole of the Amahluzi tribe was in a simmering state of incipient rebellion.

“You see a good deal of the Thornhills, don’t you, Elvesdon?” said the doctor, changing the subject.

“Yes. I like them too. It’s a jolly lucky thing, I reckon, to find a man like Thornhill at one’s elbow in a place like this. He’s such a rational, level-headed chap—cultured too, and rattling good company.”

“And the girl—what do you think of her?”

“She’s charming—so unconventional, and high bred to the finger tips, as the French say, or, to put it literally, ‘to the ends of the nails.’ I don’t mind telling you, Vine, that she’s clean outside my experience.”

The older man smiled queerly.

“Yes. She’s a nice girl,” he said, “but—peculiar.”

Now Elvesdon had just reached that stage with regard to Edala that this damning of her with faint praise rather jarred upon him.

“Well but—isn’t she?” he retorted, unwittingly sharply. “Nice—I mean.”

“I said so,” answered the other.

Still Elvesdon was not satisfied. There was something infernally, provokingly, shut-up-like-an-oyster about the tone. He felt moved to ‘draw’ the utterer.

“Peculiar, you said,” he went on. “Yes, that I can believe. Do you know, Vine, the first Sunday I went over there, I had a queer experience. You know that big mountain on their place just opposite the house— Sipazi it is called?” The doctor nodded. “Well then, they took me up there in the afternoon to show me the view. You’ll remember that tremendous krantz that literally overhangs the valley?” Again the other nodded. “Well there’s a beast of a tree that grows out from its brink, horizontally at first, then upwards. There’s just room for one—fool, I was nearly saying—or one and a half, to sit on it. Well what does the young lady do but climb down and sit on it as if she was in an armchair on the stoep at home. It turned me nearly sick to see her do it, I can tell you.”

“I daresay.”

“That’s not all. She skipped up again, and—invited me to do the same.”

“And did you?”

“Well I had to. It was in the nature of a challenge, you see. I tell you squarely and as man to man, I would willingly have forfeited a year’s pay to have got out of it—when I got on to the beastly log, I believe I would have forfeited five. But how could I have backed out of doing a thing a girl had just done, and thought nothing of? Ugh! it gives me the cold shivers all down the back even now, to look back on those few moments when I sat, hung out in mid-air, over that ghastly height. And, you must remember the krantz slopes away inwards from the top just there. Ugh!”

Vine sat back in his chair and chuckled. Elvesdon was obviously an imaginative chap, he was saying to himself. Why, as he told the story he was going through the experience again, and part of its horror had taken hold on him.

“Well, what did she say when you came back?” he said.

“That I was the only one besides herself who had ever done it. She had asked several, and they had all cried off. I don’t say it to brag, mind—in proof whereof I don’t mind adding that she said she could see I was in a beastly funk all the time, because my hand on the branch of the infernal tree shook, and, by the Lord, it did.”

“Reminds one of the old yam about the lady and the knight and the jay’s nest on the castle wall,” said the doctor. “Never mind, Elvesdon. I’m one of those who funked going on it. She asked me to once.”

“The devil she did.”

“Yes. I told her straight I was much too old and fat to launch out in those circus experiments. But that excuse wouldn’t do with an athletic young ’un like you.”

“Well, several other ‘athletic young ’uns’ seem to have shied at it anyway. Here, I seem to be bragging again but I don’t mean to. Of course a man’s a fool to try and do a thing of that sort if he knows he can’t. Still, I thought I could—at a pinch.” And again the listener chuckled.

“By the way, Vine,” said Elvesdon tentatively, “you’ve been here a long time and I’m only a new broom. Did you know Thornhill’s wife?”

“Yes.”

“What was she like. You know I’ve been over at their place several times, and have never seen any portrait of her of any kind. Nor have I ever heard her alluded to in any way.”

“No. You wouldn’t be likely to.”

Elvesdon nodded.

“I see,” he said.

“No—not that. You’re on the wrong track. Look here, Elvesdon,” went on the doctor, gravely. “You’d better have the real position from me, since you’re sure to have it sooner or later from somebody else, and then probably more or less inaccurately given. The wonder to me is that you’ve heard nothing about it already, but I suppose the few people round here, seeing you were rather thick with Thornhill, concluded to keep their heads shut.”

“But, Vine, what is the mystery? What the devil is the mystery? Let’s have it.”

He was speaking quickly, excitedly. For the life of him he could not help it.

“Thornhill is supposed to have murdered his wife,” answered Vine.

“Good God!”

Elvesdon had started up in his chair, as if he had suddenly realised the presence of a pin in the cushion, and then sat back, staring at the other; and indeed his amazement was little to be wondered at, for to be suddenly told that a man for whom he had conceived a sincere liking and regard, and a growing friendship, was a probable murderer, was disconcerting, to say the least of it.

“‘Supposed’? Exactly. But it was never proved against him?” he said, recovering himself and feeling somewhat relieved. “As, of course it couldn’t have been or he wouldn’t be where he is now. What were the facts?”

“Mrs Thornhill disappeared.”

“How and where?”

“‘How’ is just what nobody knows. ‘Where’—on their own place, same place they’re living on now.”

“What would the motive have been?” Elvesdon had collected himself. He was vividly interested but was becoming magisterial again.

“Motive? Plenty of that; in fact that’s what made things look sultry against Thornhill. She led him the devil of a life. To put it briefly, Thornhill’s version was that she rushed out of the house one night after a more than ordinarily violent ‘breeze,’ making all sorts of insane announcements. He did not follow her immediately, as he said at the time, partly because he wanted to give her time to come to her senses, partly because—and here he was injudiciously frank, in that he supplied motive and turned public opinion against himself—he honestly did not care what happened to her, so sick was he of the life she had been leading him. He said nothing about her disappearance at first, explaining that he expected her back at any minute, in which case he would have made a fool of himself all about nothing.”

“Couldn’t he have taken up her spoor?” said Elvesdon.

“Not much. There had been a succession of violent thunder-storms, and the face of the veldt was washed smooth by torrential rains. No spoor to be taken up.”

“By Jove, it’s a mysterious affair,” said Elvesdon. “How long ago was it, by the way?”

“Eighteen or nineteen years. He was arrested and kept in the tronk for some weeks, while every hole and corner of his farm was searched. They even dug up the cattle-kraals in search of remains—you know, Elvesdon, like that Moat Farm business in England a year or two ago—only of course in this case they found nothing. Thornhill half laughed when he was told of this, only saying that he had never for a moment imagined they would. Well of course, there was only one way out; for no one knows better than yourself that a man can’t be put upon his trial for murder until it is proved that a murder has been committed, which in this case it seemed impossible to do. So our friend was turned loose again.”

“Of course. But what of the general opinion. Was it believed he’d done it?”

“That’s just how it was. Not a man Jack or woman Jill but was firmly convinced of it, and for a long time he was practically boycotted. For the matter of that, even now they don’t get many visitors you may have noticed.”

“Yes. That has occurred to me. By the way. Vine, what about the children. How did the suspicion affect them as they grew up? Did they believe it?”

“The boys didn’t, but the strange and sad part of it is that the girl did, and does still.”

Elvesdon started.

“And—does still?” he echoed. “I see.”

Now the situation stood explained. Edala’s strange behaviour, the cold aloofness with which she treated her father, except at rare intervals. Heavens, what a ghastly shadow to lie between them! Yet, as it did so he, perhaps her behaviour was not altogether unnatural.

“The boys didn’t believe it?” he repeated.

“No—never. They grew up firmly refusing to believe it. They were fine youngsters. Jim, poor chap, was killed in the Matopos in ’96. He was the eldest. Hyland is broking at the Rand. By the way, Thornhill was telling me the other day that he expected him down on a visit.”

“Yes, I know. There was someone else he was expecting, an English relative. She wrote to him from Durban, inviting herself, and he wired her back to roll up as soon as she liked. Then he heard nothing more about her. By the Lord, I wonder,” he broke off. “I wonder if she got hold of this yam about him, and concluded to stop away. It might be.”

“So it might. But what I wonder at, Elvesdon, is that this affair should be all news to you. Why it caused some considerable kick up at the time.”

“At the time. That’s just it. It must have been during the couple of years I was over in England and the States.—Come in,” as a knock came at the door.

“Please sir,” said the native constable, who was proud of airing his English, “dere’s one lady—like see Nkose.”

“One lady? Look here Isaac. Do you mean a ‘lady’ or some bywoner vrouw, come for a summons against somebody?”

“Dis one lady, sir. She ask for Mr Elvesdon, not for de magistrate.”

“Oh, show her in. Don’t go, doctor, till we see what she wants.”

Chapter Sixteen.

The New Arrival.

The native constable was holding open the door. There was a soft rustle of feminine attire as its wearer crossed the empty Court room, and the newcomer entered.

“Mr Elvesdon, I believe?” she said, after a rapid glance at both men, and easily identifying the right one. “I must introduce myself. My name is Carden—Evelyn Carden—and you may have heard of me from Mr Thornhill. He lives near here, does he not?”

“Yes. About two hours. Sit down, Miss Carden,” handing her a chair. “As a matter of fact I have heard of you. The Thornhills have been wondering that they did not—after your letter.”

The newcomer’s eyebrows went up in surprise.

“The Thornhills not heard!” she exclaimed wonderingly. “But they must have. Why I wired from Durban here, just as I was directed; but it was to put off coming just then. And they never received it?”

“No. I can answer for that. Er—by the way, did you send it yourself, Miss Carden?”

“Well, no. The fact is I didn’t. I gave it, the wire, and also a letter, to a coolie porter at a station just this side of Pinetown—I forget the name—to send for me.”

Elvesdon smiled.

“That accounts for the whole trouble,” he said.

All this time he had been taking stock of the newcomer. She was of fair height, and plainly but unmistakably well dressed. She had straight features and a reposeful expression, an abundance of light brown hair, and clear grey eyes. She had just missed being exactly pretty, yet the face was an attractive one, and there was an atmosphere of refinement and savoir faire about her that left no room for doubt as to her standing in the social scale. She seemed about two or three and thirty in point of age—in reality she was not more than twenty-eight. All this he summed up in a flash, as he went through the above preliminary formalities.

“This is Dr Vine, our District Surgeon, Miss Carden,” he said in introduction. “Are you travelling alone, may I ask?”

“Yes. This time I thought I’d spring a surprise on my unknown relative, so of course I was obliged to hire a cart at Telani—the driver is such a disagreeable old man, by the bye. And the horses are wretched beasts. Why I had to stop the night at a most abominable roadside place—an accommodation house, I think they called it—presumably because ‘accommodation’ in every sense, was the very last thing they had to offer.” She laughed, so did the two men.

“Then there was a monster centipede kept appearing and disappearing on the wall above my bed, so that I had to keep the light going all night, and hardly got any sleep at all. And now one of the horses is dead lame, and I am wondering how I am going to get on to Mr Thornhill’s—unless you can help me, Mr Elvesdon.”

There was a something in the tone of this tail-off that conveyed to the listeners the impression that she was very much accustomed to being ‘helped’—in things great as well as small—and made no scruple about requisitioning such help.

“Certainly I can, Miss Carden,” answered Elvesdon. “If you will allow me I shall be delighted to drive you out to Thornhill’s this afternoon. Meanwhile it is just lunch time—if you will give me the pleasure of your company—you too, doctor? Very well then, we may as well adjourn at once.”

During lunch Elvesdon was somewhat silent. He had directed his native servants when to inspan his spider and to transfer the visitor’s baggage to that useful vehicle—further, he had arranged matters with the driver of the hired cart, an unprepossessing specimen of what would be defined in the Southern States as ‘mean white,’ and while doing so, the astounding revelation made to him by Vine had come back to him with all its full force. He did not know what to think. Thornhill seemed to him the last man in the world to commit a cold-blooded murder—and that the murder of a woman—but—what if it was a hot-blooded one? Looking back upon his observation of this new found friend he recalled a certain something that contained the possibilities of such—goaded by the weight of an intolerable incubus. And his sons believed in him and his daughter did not? Well, Elvesdon leaned to the opinion of the sons, and all his official instinct weighed on that side. There was absolutely no evidence that any crime had been effected at all, and did not the legal text-books teem with instances of disappearance for which innocent people had been executed in the ‘good old times’? Why of course. No. He at any rate was going to keep an open mind, and turn into fact the time-worn legal fiction that the accused was innocent until he was proved guilty.

So he was rather silent during lunch. The weight of Vine’s revelation was still on him; but the newcomer was quite at her ease and chatted away with Prior and the doctor.

But later, when they were bowling away merrily behind a fresh, well trotting pair of horses bound for Sipazi, he was obliged to put this new train of thought out of his head, for the new arrival plied him with all sorts of questions, as to the country and its natives, and other things; then got on to the subject of Thornhill.

“I have never seen him, you know, Mr Elvesdon, since I was ever so small. I don’t know anything really about him beyond what my poor mother told me. By the way—did he marry again?”

Elvesdon started unconsciously. In his present train of thought he was wondering how much she knew as to the matter about which he had only just heard.

“No. He has one girl at home now, and a boy away at the Rand.”

“Oh. That’s nice. Tell me. What is the girl like?”

“Charming. She’s like no other girl I’ve ever seen.”

The reply was made in a perfectly even tone, without any perceptible enthusiasm. The other was interested at once.

“What’s her name?”

“Edala. Peculiar name isn’t it?”

“Rather. Do you think we shall get on?”

Elvesdon burst out laughing.

“I should think it highly probable that you would. She is very unconventional—and you—well if you don’t mind my saying so, Miss Carden, I should think the same held good as regards yourself.”

“Of course I don’t mind your saying so; and it happens to be true. I like being talked to rationally, and not talked down to—as you men are too given to talking to us women. You know—a sort of humouring us, as if we were a lot of spoilt children.”

“But you must remember that if we don’t humour you, ‘you women,’ or at any rate the majority of you, vote us disagreeable if not rude; a favourite word with ‘you women’ by the way. It has such a fine, sonorous, roll-round-the-tongue flavour, you know.”

Evelyn Carden laughed—and laughed merrily. Elvesdon noticed that her laugh was light, open, free-hearted. There was no affectation, or posing, about it.

“I like that,” she said, “the more so that it is absolutely true. I suppose you are often over at the Thornhills’, Mr Elvesdon, as you are so near?”

“Oh yes. I put in Sundays with them, and enjoy it. Your relative is a particularly cultured and companionable man, Miss Carden, and in his quiet way, very genial.”

“And—Edala?”

This with just a spice of mischief, which the other ignored.

“I have already given you my opinion on that subject,” he said.

“How delightful. I am so glad I came up here. I only put it off because some people whose acquaintance I made on board ship asked me out to stay with them at their place near Malvern. I do hope, though, that Mr Thornhill won’t be offended with me about the non-delivery of the wire, but it really wasn’t my fault.”

Here Elvesdon did not entirely agree. He thought she ought to have made more sure. But he said:

“You need have no uneasiness on that score. Thornhill is a man with a large up-country experience, and I know of no better training for teaching a man to take things as they come.”

“Better and better,” she pronounced. “Why, how interesting he will be. But, you yourself, Mr Elvesdon—you must have some strange experiences too?”

“Well, you see, one can’t go through an official life like mine without. But, for the most part, they are experiences of queer and out of the way phases of human nature. I haven’t had any serious adventures if that’s what you mean.”

“No?”

“No. Never mind. I’m used to that note of disappointment. When I was over in England on leave three years and a half ago, I was always being asked how many lions I’d shot—the impression apparently being that one strolled out after office hours and bagged a few brace—and I answered frankly that I’d never seen a lion outside a cage—though I’ve heard them, by the way, at a long and respectful distance—I went down like a shot in general estimation. At last I began to feel like Clive, when hauled up over the looting business, ‘astonished at my own moderation,’ and thought it time to invent a lion lie or two. But it was too late then.”

Again she laughed—heartily, merrily. She turned a glance of unmitigated approval upon the man beside her. He, too, seemed rather unlike other people, with his easy, unconventional flow of talk and ideas; yet whether his life had been spent outside the sphere of adventure or not, she felt certain that given an emergency he would prove the strong, capable official, ready and able to deal with it at the critical or perilous moment.

Elvesdon’s mind, too, was running upon her and he was speculating as to the effect her presence would have upon those among whom her lot was to be cast for a time. She was bright, lively, natural; just the very companion for Edala, though somewhat older. Thornhill, too, wanted livening up; and now, seen in the light of the revelation he had heard that morning, Elvesdon thoroughly understood the restraint which had lain upon that household of two. This stranger from the outside world was just the one to take both out of themselves.

They left the more open rolling country, where the road suddenly dived down into the bosky ruggedness of a long winding valley, and here Evelyn grew enthusiastic over the romantic grandeur of the black forest-clad rifts sloping down from a great row of castellated crags. Here, too, bird and animal life seemed suddenly to blossom into being. Troops of monkeys skipped whimsically among the tree-tops chattering at the wayfarers, and the piping of bright spreuws flashing from frond to frond among the thorn bushes, and the call of the hoepoe, and the mellow cooing of doves making multitudinous melody throughout the broad valley into which they were descending, together with the quaint, grating duet of the yellow thrush—then, too, the deep boom of great hornbills stalking among the grass and stones, yonder, down the slope—all blended harmoniously in the unclouded evening calm, for the sun was near his rest now, and the stupendous krantz fronting the Sipazi mountain shone like fire.

“Why, it is glorious,” declared the newcomer gazing around. “What a lovely country this is.”

“There’s our destination,” said Elvesdon, pointing to the homestead lying on the farther side of the valley beneath, whence already the dogs were announcing their arrival in deep-mouthed clamour. “And there are your relatives,” he added, as two figures could be seen coming down from the front stoep, “and they are already taking stock of us through binoculars.”

Thornhill’s greeting was quiet but cordial.

“Welcome to Sipazi,” he said. “We had about given you up, but better late than never. I am afraid you’ll find it dull here, but after all, it’ll be a new experience I should think.”

“Of course it will, Mr Thornhill, and a delightful one. So this is—Edala.” And the two girls kissed each other.

“How did you know my name?” said Edala, with a laugh.

“Why you don’t suppose I haven’t been ‘pumping’ Mr Elvesdon all about you during our most delightful drive out here, do you? Of course I have.” And then she began entering upon explanations as to the seeming silence in answer to the telegram.

“Oh well, no matter. You’re here now, anyhow,” answered Thornhill characteristically. And Evelyn Carden, looking up into the strong, bearded, rather melancholy face, was deciding that she was going to like its owner very much indeed; and Elvesdon superintending the process of outspanning, was wondering whether these two girls were going to take to each other; and Edala was thinking that they were.

But—somehow, with the faintest possible twinge of uneasiness, the emphasis on those words ‘our most delightful drive’ jarred on her.

Chapter Seventeen.

A Trap—and a Tragedy.

Four men were seated together within a hut. This hut was one of half a dozen which constituted a small kraal, standing at the foot of a smooth perpendicular cliff.

Two of these four we have already seen and two we have not. The former were Babatyana and Nxala; of the latter, one was Nteseni, an influential chief whose kraals adjoined those of Babatyana, while the fourth was Zisiso, a witch-doctor of great, though secret repute. As was to be expected they were plotting. It was night, and the other inhabitants of the kraal, if such there were, slept.

“So my múti was not strong enough, Nxala?” the witch-doctor was saying. “Au! I have never known it like that before.”

“He who is gone was old, my father, and his hand shook,” was the answer. “Who, then, may say as to the strength of the múti when scattered upon the floor of a hut? And now Ntwezi has the vessel that contained it.”

“That should have broken in pieces,” murmured Zisiso.

“Yet it did not, for it reached not the ground.”

“Ntwezi is ever suspicious,” commented the old man.

“Ever suspicious. But there is one who serves him who would serve him no longer. He will be here to-night.”

“That is well. We will hear him.”

This witch-doctor, Zisiso, was a mild, pleasant, genial-mannered old man, to all outward appearance, especially when he came in contact with Europeans. Then, there was no limit to the gentle, self-deprecating plausibility with which he alluded to himself. Elvesdon, for one, had been completely taken in by him, and was, in fact, rather partial to him. More than one missionary had taken him in hand; with conspicuous success from the point of view of the missionary. But he never attended their services or meetings. He was too old, he said. Still he was glad to have heard such a good ‘word.’ He would welcome death now, because he was longing to see all the beautiful things which the Abafundisi had told him were coming after.

The witch-doctor’s trade is forbidden by the laws of the Colony, but it is carried on for all that. The good old custom of ‘smelling out’ has of course disappeared, but what may not be done impressively and in the light of day can be done just as effectively without making any fuss. Someone obnoxious dies or disappears, there are plenty of ways of accounting for his absence. He has gone away to the mines to earn money, or he has trodden on a nail, and contracted tetanus, or his cows gave diseased milk—and so forth. For old Zisiso was a past master on the subject of both external and internal poisons.

It may readily be imagined in what respectful dread he was held among the tribes. Even influential chiefs, such as these here assembled, dared not incur his ill-will, otherwise it is probable that he would have met with a violent and mysterious death long before; besides they never knew when they might not be glad to turn his services to their own account. Even the educated, semi-civilised natives dared not for their lives have done anything to arouse his hostility.

The new Ethiopian movement was to Zisiso utterly laughable, and such exponents of it as the Rev. Job Magwegwe too contemptible for words. But he was too polite to make public his views. A considerable section of the people had thrown themselves into it, and the movement seemed spreading. As an isanusi all his instincts were to make a study of it lest haply he might turn it to account.

Old Zisiso’s professional instincts were not in themselves ignoble, in that they were not dictated by lust of gain, or cupidity, beyond a certain ingrained acquisitiveness common to all savages. Thanks to his wide and mysterious powers, to which allusion has been made, he was already rich in possessions beyond his needs, for he was too old to lobola for more wives. No, it was sheer pride in his profession, similar to that which might prompt the civilised man of science to welcome and investigate any new departure in scientific discovery. But of course the aim towards which Magwegwe and his associates and employers were supposed to be working, was, in the shrewd eyes of this old sorcerer, the veriest humbug.

Personally he had no particular desire to see the whites ‘driven into the sea’; an eventuality he was far too astute to believe for a moment possible. He was old enough to remember how, under former kings in Zululand, those of his craft, no matter how eminent and skilled, held their lives and possessions on precarious tenure. Dingane and Mpande, for instance, expected a great deal—a great deal too much—from their sorcerers. Cetywayo, to be sure, did not bother his head about them, to speak of. But there, under the rule of the Amangisi, he and his brother witch-doctors could practise unhindered, always provided they did so with due care and secrecy. What, then, was to be gained by trying to upset the existing state of things?

These considerations should, on every ground of reason and self-interest, have ranged old Zisiso on the side of law and order, yet they did not. The South African native is a strangely complex animal, and there are times when it is impossible to tell what line he may or may not adopt, no matter how powerfully self-interest ought to move him in a given direction, and such was the case with this one. Most probably he was actuated by the sheer love of plotting which had characterised his profession from time immemorial; which in fact, was absolutely essential to the keeping-up of its very existence.

“He who comes this night,” went on Nxala, “he who comes this night, will bring back the drinking bowl of him who is gone. He has put another in its place, and when the white doctor sees it, au! he will pronounce that an isanusi of the standing of Zisiso does not know what múti is,” he added quizzically.

“I trust not this dog of Ntwezi’s,” said Nteseni, gruffly. This chief had a strong and heavy face, and though large of frame, unlike most of his rank his size was not due to obesity—the result of a great indulgence in tywala and very little exercise. On the contrary he was a savage of weight and muscle, and would have proved an uncommonly tough customer even to a more than average white man if once they got to close grips.

“Nobody trusts anybody, brother,” murmured the old witch-doctor, pleasantly. “Yet we will hear what he has to say.”

“We will hear,” echoed Babatyana, getting out his snuff-box, and passing it round. Nxala prodded the fire with a stick, and the embers flared up. There was silence as the four sat, taking snuff, the firelight glinting on the shine of their headrings. Suddenly the raucous yaps of a superannuated cur were heard outside.

“Here is the man from Ntwezi’s, brother,” said Babatyana turning to Nxala. “Go out to him or he may be afraid.”

He addressed obeyed. Those within the hut could hear the murmur of deep tones. Then Nxala reappeared, followed by the stranger.

The latter was clad in European attire. As he stooped through the low, arched doorway Nteseni gave the fire a vigorous kick. It flared up anew in a sudden bright light. Nteseni had seen something—a something which he had expected to see.

The newcomer saluted the chiefs, nor was his greeting of old Zisiso any less respectful. The latter handed him snuff—then added humorously:

“Ou! I am old, I am forgetting. Those who are young, and who dwell among the whites, take their gwai in the form of smoke. Here is some, my son,” searching for a bag, “and doubtless thou hast a pipe. Fill it then, and we will talk.”

The other murmured a word of acknowledgment, and did as he was told. Then, from the packet of his jacket—which bulged—he drew forth a bundle. This he proceeded to undo, revealing many fragments of baked clay, in short the fragments of a black drinking bowl.

“Here is what I promised my father,” he said, addressing the witch-doctor. “Whau! I put another in its place, and now I think the Dokotela will believe that Ntwezi is laughing at him.”

“Yet it were better to have brought it whole,” said Nteseni.

“That could I not do,” answered the visitor, who was no other than Elvesdon’s native detective, Teliso. “The shape would have betrayed it.”

“M-m!” hummed the listeners.

Now Nteseni took the fragments and with extraordinary ingenuity and patience began piecing them together. As to the latter—well they had the whole night before them!

“There is not a piece missing,” he pronounced, “no, not even a small piece. To have left such would have been dangerous.”

“Would it not, my father? But I desire the ruin of Ntwezi. He has reduced my pay, and I would be revenged. Further, he has promised to thrash me. I will not go back to him.”

“No, thou wilt not,” returned Nteseni, heavily. “I think thy place is better here among thine own people.”

“Eh hé! That is true, my father. Among my own people.”

Nteseni nodded and went out of the hut. There was nothing extraordinary in this, and the new arrival sat there, letting his tongue go freely, uttering, for the most part, sheer inventions—plausible inventions. The while, he would never fail to pause so as to draw forth the comments of his hearers. These, on their side, met him upon his own ground; whether he was taken in or not they could not tell, but by that time it was to them a matter of sheer indifference either way. Nteseni, who had long since re-entered, was, for him, the most communicative.

Now Teliso was a brave man, even braver than those of his race who had distinguished themselves on the battlefield, in that he took risks as a matter of business and in cold blood, such as they would never have dreamed of taking. But such risks, great as some of them had been, especially of late, were as nothing to that which he was taking now. And—all of a sudden he knew it.

His hand dropped carelessly to the right hand pocket of his coat—he had acquired European ways so there was nothing extraordinary about this move. Yet there was nothing whatever to have excited any suspicion on his part. Not a sound had arisen outside. His entertainers sat as before; no weapons were even visible. Old Zisiso seemed half drowsy, and the same held good of Nteseni, while the other two, Babatyana and Nxala were pursuing the conversation in an even, interested tone of voice. No—it was hard to say where any suggestion of peril might have come in, unless it was that wondrous, well-nigh supernatural intuition characteristic of the savage. Yet at that moment Teliso, realised that he had never been in deadlier peril in his life; no, not even when as a very young umfana he had raced, with bursting heart, and stumbling steps, and labouring lungs, with the flying Native Contingent, for the roaring, flooded passage of Umzinyati river, driven like dust before the wind by Cetywayo’s pursuing victorious destroyers at Isandhlwana.

At this moment he realised that he had one chance, but a desperate one. He must shoot down, and that with lightning rapidity, at least two out of these four, and one of the two must be Nteseni, but—what a responsibility! Then too, he was but imperfectly skilled in the handling of the weapon which he had instinctively brought for his own protection. He hesitated, and—was lost.

“What is that, brother?” said Nteseni, seizing, with a grip of iron, the wrist of the hand which held the butt of the concealed revolver. At the same time, Nxala who was seated on the other side had pinioned his arms. Both were powerful men, and against them Teliso had not the ghost of a chance, even if Babatyana had not taken the opportunity of slipping the noose of a hitherto concealed thong round his ankles, and drawing it tight. Clearly it was useless to struggle, and in a moment he was securely bound.

“Was this needed among ‘thine own people,’ dog of Ntwezi?” said Nteseni, holding up the revolver which he had drawn from the prisoner’s pocket.

“No longer am! Ntwezi’s dog,” answered the latter.

“And was it not wisdom to bring away a useful weapon against when the time comes?”

“Ah—ah! ‘When the time comes.’ But the time has come—for thee, dog of Ntwezi,” sneered the chief. “There are those who talk with the tongue of the Amangisi who heard Ntwezi himself tell another of thine errand here to-night.”

“And that other?” queried the prisoner.

“I answer no questions,” was the contemptuous reply. “Thy treachery deserves a slow and lingering death, yet we will be merciful.”

He called through the doorway in a low tone, and immediately there entered two men.

“Take him away,” said Nteseni.

A wooden gag was thrust into the unfortunate man’s mouth and he was dragged outside, the three chiefs following. The old witch-doctor remained behind.

Teliso knew that doom awaited him, but now he could not even expostulate. The thong which bound his feet was relaxed sufficiently to admit of his taking short steps and thus he was hurried along—whither he had not the remotest idea.

A red moon, appropriately like a huge globe of blood, was rising over the great cliff which dominated the kraal. On the brink, silhouetted against it, a hyena stood and howled.

“He scents meat,” said Nxala grimly. “Well he will soon have plenty.”

For about half an hour thus they proceeded, their way lighted by the lurid glow of the blood moon. Then they halted.

They had come to the brink of a high cliff which overhung a wild desolate ravine.

“I had intended thee to be slaughtered like a goat, Teliso,” said Nteseni. “The death of the spear is not for such as thee.”

With a desperate effort the prisoner had managed to slip his gag.

“The Amangisi have many ropes,” he said. “Even chiefs will hang by some of them before long.” Nteseni laughed.

“I think not,” he answered. “Will yonder moon tell what it has seen? Well, a high leap in the air is before thee, Teliso. Now—take it.”

The unfortunate man hesitated. Those who held him stood aside.

“What? Is it then better to be slaughtered like a goat,” said the chief jeeringly. “Well then, Isazi,” to one of the young men, “thy knife.”

But the threat was enough. The doomed man closed his eyes, tottered, then flung himself forward. A crash and a thud came up to the ears of the listeners.

“You two,” went on the chief, “go down yonder and take off the thongs; his clothing was thick so they will leave no trace. And—I think Ntwezi will need a new dog.”

The redness of the blood moon lightened. Its globe grew golden.

Chapter Eighteen.

Venatorial.

“Father, I think we must take out Evelyn and show her how we shoot bushbucks.”

Thus Edala, one lovely morning at breakfast time.

“I don’t mind. What do you say, Evelyn?”

“That it would be delightful. But shouldn’t I be in your way?”

“Not if you keep quiet, and do as you are told,” said Edala. “Oh, and by the way, don’t wear any colours. It’s astonishing how you miss chances that way.”

“What have I got? Oh I know. I’ve got an old khaki coloured dress. At the time of the Boer war, you know, some of us took on a fit of idiocy in the way of khaki fever. It didn’t last, of course, but I brought the thing out here with me under a sort of vague impression it might be useful in the veldt for knocking-about purposes.”

“The very thing,” cried Edala. “Now go and put it on, and I’ll get into my ‘Robin Hood’ outfit. Father, you see about the horses.”

“Anything else?”

“Yes—and the guns.”

“But—but,” protested the visitor, “I’ve never fired a gun in my life.”

“You’ll soon learn,” returned Edala, tranquilly. “To-day, though, you need only look on.”

“What an Amazon the child is,” laughed Evelyn. “Why I should never learn. I’m much too nervous. Guns—kick—and all that sort of thing, don’t they?”

“Not if you hold them properly. But, that’s where the ‘learning’ part of it comes in. Well, let’s go and get our toggery on.”

Thornhill did not immediately set to work to make arrangements for the coming sport, instead he lit a pipe and sat thinking. Evelyn Carden had been a guest under his roof for nearly three weeks now, and he was ready to own that she had proved a very great acquisition indeed. She had adapted herself so wholeheartedly to their way of life, and she and Edala had taken to each other wonderfully. It was good for Edala to have the companionship of someone approximately near her own age; the difficulty hitherto had been to obtain such companionship for her. And as regarded himself, why her demeanour was perfection. She could talk brilliantly and well upon all his favourite topics, without ever becoming contradictious or argumentative, as is the way of her sex. She forestalled his every want, yet in such a tactful unobtrusive way; and while perfectly frank and unconstrained, she always managed to bring into her intercourse with him just that little scarcely perceptible touch of deference which the difference between their ages rendered so charming. It had more than once occurred to him that Edala might become jealous, but with a certain grim sadness he had recognised that it might not be altogether a bad thing if Edala did.

Now the said Edala reappeared, clad in what she termed her ‘Robin Hood suit,’ which by the way did not denote ‘bloomers’ or any such atrocity, but was merely an exceedingly workman-like blouse and skirt of sage green, an excellent hue for blending with the prevailing tints of the surrounding bush country. Her golden head was crowned by a soft felt hat, without any adornment whatever.

“Father!” she cried, “you haven’t done anything towards getting up the horses, or getting things ready. And we are ready.”

“I don’t see ‘we’ all the same,” he laughed. “I only see one. And the day has hardly begun. Hullo! What’s all that about?”

‘That’ was represented by an abominable and riotous clamour suddenly raised by the dogs, who were lying outside. They had sprung up and were pouring forth hideous defiance to the world at large. Quickly each had seized the binoculars lying always handy for the scrutiny of new arrivals or passers-by in the distance—and were out on the stoep.

“Why it’s Elvesdon and—Prior,” said Thornhill, lowering the glasses. “And they’ve both brought guns. You didn’t send word, did you, that you were plotting this hunt?”

“No, and it’s a beastly bore they’ve turned up just now,” she answered pettishly. “Now I can’t take my gun.”

“Why not?”

“You know I never shoot when there’s a crowd.”

“Oh well. We know Elvesdon well enough by this time, and Prior’s only a young ’un. I wouldn’t let that count.”

Edala did not want much persuading.

“We had better make a whole day of it then,” she said. “I’ll tell Ramasam to put up lunch, and it had better be taken down to Bees’ Nest Kloof by one o’clock.”

“All right, dear. Do that,” said Thornhill rising.

By this time the new arrivals were riding up to the open space in front of the stables; the dogs squirming and leaping around them and uttering a perfectly frantic clamour. But it was an amicable riot this time, for the guns carried by the two officials told those intelligent quadrupeds that sport was afoot, wherefore they were simply beside themselves with delight.

“Well, Elvesdon, how are you—how are you. Prior?” said Thornhill, meeting the pair as they dismounted. “Why this is a case of the veriest telepathy. Edala had just suggested we should show Miss Carden some sport in the kloofs, and here you turn up, just in the very nick of time.”

“That so?” laughed Elvesdon. “Well, there was nothing particular doing to-day, so this fellow here suggested we should invade you with an eye to a buck or two.”

“Glad of it. Come on in. Had breakfast?”

“Oh yes, before we left.”

“Well, you’d better off-saddle for half an hour. We’re not quite ready ourselves.”

Then the two girls came out. If Elvesdon, who was a sportsman to the finger tips, had any misgiving that under the circumstances of two women in the field the bag was likely to prove nothing very great, he decided in his own mind, as he shook hands with Edala, that there were compensations. The very plainness of her attire, the slight flush of expectation in the flower-like face, the eager light in the clear blue eyes, rendered the girl, in his sight, inexpressibly sweet and winning. He thought he would contrive to keep her near him throughout the day, even to the sacrifice, if need be, of his own share of the sport; which, upon those terms, would be no sacrifice at all.

“And you, Miss Carden, are you a Diana too?” he laughed.

“No, no. I’m only going as a spectator.”

“This little girl was shy about taking out a gun when she saw you coming,” said Thornhill, dropping a hand on to Edala’s shoulder. “I told her you wouldn’t be hard on her if she misses.”

“Er—I’m sure Miss Thornhill never misses,” blurted out Prior, immediately thinking himself an ass, an opinion in which Edala at the moment freely shared.

“Well come on in, and have something after your ride,” said Thornhill, as a couple of boys came up to take the horses.

They were all very jolly and merry, chatting and making plans for the day. Suddenly a tall figure appeared at the foot of the steps of the stoep. The sight of it brought a queer look, though a momentary one to Elvesdon’s face.

“Oh, you’ve still got that chap, Thornhill,” he said carelessly.

“Yes. I find him useful, and at times, rather interesting. I’ll just go out and see what he wants.”

What Manamandhla wanted was this. The Amakosi, he perceived, were about to have a hunt. Might not he come too, and help drive out the bush? He loved to see a hunt, and could make himself of use.

Thornhill’s thoughts on hearing this request were known to himself and his Maker—incidentally, they may have been more than guessed at by the Zulu—as he answered equably that the other could do so if he wished. He was thinking how easy it was to mistake a man for a buck in thick bush—and that a charge of Treble A at close quarters— And the laughter and joking of those within came loud through the open windows; for tragedy and mirth, are they not always more or less closely allied, and running on parallel rails?

“I say, Miss Thornhill, do let me carry your gun for you,” said Prior, eagerly, as he ranged his horse alongside. This was a new experience to him. He had never seen a girl taking part in a hunt before, though of course he had heard of this one doing so.

“Thanks, Mr Prior, but there’s no necessity. Would you like to hold it for me while I shoot? I am even capable of turning a door-handle for myself at a pinch.”

Elvesdon smiled, and Thornhill chuckled. Evelyn Carden did neither. She was fond of being waltzed around, and generally thurificated.

Poor Prior dropped back snubbed. Five was an awkward number and the track was narrow. He remembered too that he had come very near ‘riding out’ his chief. But the latter seemed not in any way perturbed.

Down the valley their way ran. At length they came to a neck, overlooking a downward sweep of dense bush, intersected by a dry watercourse. The dogs, all of a quiver with suppressed excitement, squirmed and whined, yet ever in wholesome dread of their master’s whip. Thornhill proceeded to dispose the guns.

“Elvesdon, you go to the very bottom of the kloof—see, where those two tree ferns stand,” pointing out a spot about three quarters of a mile away. “Prior, you take the other side, and both of you stand about seventy yards from the sluit, and keep well up on the rise till you get to your places. Edala, you take Evelyn with you. The usual place, you know—by the red slab. There ought to be enough to keep all hands lively to-day, we haven’t hunted this kloof for half a year. I’ll drive down, with Manamandhla and Mlamvu. Give you all twenty minutes before we start,” getting out his watch.

“Right,” cried Elvesdon. “Come along, Prior.”

Their way lay together up to a certain point. Then Edala and Evelyn plunged down through a straggling, gappy opening between the thicker recesses of the bush.

“This looks as if it was going to be exciting,” said the latter, none too much at her ease among this kind of rather rough riding.

“By Jove, and it is,” returned Edala, who in moments of animation was apt to be unconventional in her speech. “We’ll leave the horses here,” she went on, sliding from her saddle, and giving her companion—who although a good ‘seat’ in the Row, was not quite so ready at getting on and off as one who scarcely remembered when she could not ride—a helping hand to doing likewise.

“Now, come along,” she said, starting downwards among the loose stones, yet hardly disturbing one of them, “and don’t make any more row than you can help.”

A very few minutes of this descent brought them to a place where the bush forked away into a comparatively open space. Below, the dry watercourse ran, some sixty yards distant. About half that distance a low, broad, flat rock of a reddish tint lay like a huge table.

“You always get a shot here,” whispered Edala. “The bucks always scoot along the same track, just the other side of the red slab. I pull off on them at five yards this side of it, then, if I miss, I get them with the second barrel when they show up beyond it.”

“Shall we—shall you—get a chance to-day?” whispered the other, who had caught her companion’s excitement.

“Rather. You’ll see. But get back a little more. You’re showing too much. An old bushbuck ram is no end of a slim beast. The least sight of you, and he’ll double back. Ah! Now they’re starting.”

“Are these bucks dangerous?” asked Evelyn, her excitement for the moment somewhat clouded by the feminine instinct of scare. It would have been different, of course, had she been beside one of the men—her host or Elvesdon for instance—but when her only bulwark was merely another girl, why the thing seemed to take on a different aspect.

“Dangerous? Good Lord, no. But a wounded ram, who’s still got the use of his legs, well it doesn’t do to go up to him. They’ve got beastly horns, and I’ve twice seen a dog stuck through and through.”

The English-bred girl looked at the Colonial one, with some curiosity, a touch of increased respect and a great deal of admiration. The flush of excitement which had come into Edala’s cheeks, the sparkle in her fearless blue eyes, rendered the face surpassingly beautiful.

“Oh, I’m not afraid with you, dear,” rejoined Evelyn. “Only—you must bear with an ignoramus.”

“Ssh!” said Edala, holding up a hand. “No more talking now.”

Chapter Nineteen.

“Diane Chasseresse.”

For, from above, came a clamour of sound. Thornhill was riding along the upper side of the kloof, Manamandhla was beating down the centre, where the watercourse ran, and Mlamvu, the other native, was making daylight hideous with the wild whoops and yells that marked his progress. The dogs, questing to and fro, filled the air with their deep-mouthed ravings.

This racket faint at first, drew nearer and nearer, where the two girls stood, behind their cover of bush and stone. There came a sound of crashing through the bushes, making straight towards them. Edala held her gun in right business-like fashion—no mere toy-gun but an up-to-date Number 12 hammerless—ready to bring to her shoulder. The other was in a very whirl of excitement. Then the sound ceased.

“It has gone back,” she whispered. “Never mind. Father will get it.”

Even as she spoke the clamour of the dogs was renewed, and, with it, a distant shot, away up on the hillside behind. But at the same time another sound of disturbance, not so violent, but much nearer, and—this too was coming straight towards them.

Edala set her lips. Her gaze was concentrated on a point where the more open ground seemed to triangle into the thicker bush. Then, something leaped into the open, and crossed in leisurely bounds in front of them. It was a magnificent bushbuck ram—whose spiral horns, almost straight, looked of record length. Edala’s gun was at her shoulder and the report rang out. The full charge of Treble A ripped through the dark, chocolate coloured hide, and the beast fell, as though knocked over by a stone, kicking and rolling, and uttering a raucous, agonised bellow.

“Oh, well done! well done!” cried Evelyn, clapping her hands and springing forward.

“Keep back—keep back,” warned Edala, restraining her. “Didn’t I tell you they could be dangerous? And this one has a kick left in him yet.”

He certainly had, for although the charge had crippled him it had been planted rather far back, and now the buck rose on his forelegs, still bellowing savagely and shaking his needle pointed horns.

“I’ll give him another shot,” said Edala. “Wait now.”

But before she had quite got her aim on, the dogs rushed out of the bush and flung themselves open-mouthed on the wounded quarry. Snarling and leaping, they avoided the formidable horns, and, making their attack carefully from the rear, in a moment had pulled down the stricken animal, not, however, before one of them had received an ugly gash along the ribs.

“Well done, little one,” sang out Thornhill, who was coming down the slope towards them. “You’ve opened the day well, anyhow. What do you think, Evelyn?”

“Oh, it was splendid. But I don’t know. It’s a little different to pheasant shooting,” she added, with a look at the copious effusion of blood, which the dogs were eagerly lapping.

“Yes, of course. Oh well, you needn’t look at this part of it,”—as Manamandhla, who had come up, was setting to work on the butchering side of the sport. “We’ll drive on now and give those other two chaps a show. By the way, I got another up there. It was only a half grown ram, and rather far, so I downed him with a bullet.”

“Come on, Evelyn. We’ll help drive,” cried Edala.

“No—no,” struck in her father. “You girls would get torn to pieces down there, with your skirts. You go along outside where the bush ends. Very likely something’ll jump out there.”

But nothing did. They heard the sudden clamour raised by the dogs in full cry, and could mark the course of the quarry by the tremble of the bush fronds as it crashed through—then, far down the kloof, a shot rang out from where Prior was posted. Suddenly there was a strange squawking call, and two large reddish birds rose into the air.

“Vaal koorhaan, by Jingo!” ejaculated Edala, reining in her mount. It was an old shooting pony and stood like a stone. Up went her gun—and with the report one of the birds swerved violently while a cloud of feathers puffed from its side; then it fell heavily to the ground. Its mate still uttering the same squawking cry, was fast disappearing into space.

“That’s splendid,” cried the girl sliding from her horse to pick up the bird; which had been killed clean, and lay with outspread wings. “Fifty paces or very near it. You know, Evelyn, vaal koorhaan are not common, and you can hardly ever get within shot range of them. You can ‘down’ them with a rifle of course, but not often, for they’re precious slim. Lovely feathers too. You shall have them for a hat, in memento of your first hunt.”

“Thanks. That will be jolly,” stroking the beautiful red-brown and pearl-grey plumage. “And they’re so soft. What sort of bird is it, Edala?”

“Kind of little bustard,” answered Edala, who was tying it on the ‘D’ of her saddle. “Ripping good skoff they are, too. I say—there’s a bombardment going on down there. Wonder what they’ve got.”

For below, in the near distance, two double reports had rung out, then a single one. The yelling of the dogs, and the whooping of the beaters had arrived at a climax of clamour, then suddenly ceased.

“Look out,” exclaimed Edala excitedly and in a low tone, as she slid from her horse. “There’s something coming out here. No. It has broken back, whatever it is—” noting the tremulous line among the branches beneath and an occasional faint thud as of hoofs. “Well, let’s go down and see what they’ve got.”

On reaching the spot, where all now had foregathered, it transpired that Prior had turned over two bushbuck ewes, while Elvesdon pleaded guilty to shamefully missing a ram with both barrels.

“Never mind, we’ve not done so badly,” pronounced Thornhill. “Four bucks to four guns out of one kloof isn’t altogether rotten. Edala, what have you got there? A vaal koorhaan, by the living Jingo. Sitting or on the wing?”

“As if I should answer that!” was the reply, in scathing accents.

“She shot it from the saddle too,” put in Evelyn.

“From the saddle did she? Well done, little girl. Well, that is something like.”

Prior gave a loud whistle.

“By Jingo, I should think it was! Why, it’s a record, Miss Thornhill.”

“Oh, I don’t know. Old Witvoet is very steady,” said the girl. “It’s like shooting from an armchair.”

They talked and laughed, and compared notes, while Manamandhla and the two other natives—for one more had overtaken them according to instructions—were engaged in gralloching the quarry; to them a congenial task, for many a tid-bit in the shape of liver and heart found its way surreptitiously into their mouths. The dogs pounced hungrily upon the refuse that was thrown them.

“Not a nice sight, Miss Carden,” said Elvesdon, who had noticed a slight grimace of disgust. “Well, don’t look at it. These are the little unpleasantnesses inseparable from this kind of sport, you know.”

“Oh of course. Why it was foolish of me to even seem to mind. I won’t again.”

Then the word was given to move on. The quarry was placed in trees, where it could be collected after the day’s doings were over, and they began on the next kloof. But it proved a blank, except for an ugly bloated puff adder which Prior cut in two with a charge of shot on the way to take up his position, and by the time they had beaten out the bush, the sun and a fine healthy appetite owned to on the part of all hands, warned that it was high time for something substantial in the way of refreshment.

“Here we are,” cried Edala, as they topped a rise, “and here comes the skoff,” as the figures of two native women, each with a substantial basket on her head could be seen approaching by a narrow bush path. “This is Bees’ Nest Kloof, Evelyn. I’ve never brought you here yet. Look. Half way up that krantz there’s a good sized cleft which holds the bees’ nest, and it’s always there because no one can possibly get at it to take it out. If you get them against the sun you can see the bees going in and out.”

“So they are,” said Evelyn shading her eyes. The krantz was a small one, about fifty or sixty feet high, and in its shade they all dismounted. In a trice the baskets were unpacked—knives and forks, enamelled plates and cups, and several substantial looking parcels being laid out on a rug. Thornhill extracted a comfortable looking bottle.

“Elvesdon, help yourself. Prior, have a glass of grog. We’ve all earned it at any rate.”

The while the boys had got together a fire and as by magic a boiling kettle of coffee was before the party. And the cold viands were done very ample justice to, for the open air in South Africa is the finest appetiser in the world, and have we not said that Ramasam was an exceptionally good cook?

“Well, this is the very jolliest kind of picnic,” pronounced Elvesdon, as he lay in cool comfort on the sward, after they had lunched, filling his pipe.

“Hear hear!” cried Prior emphatically, beginning to perform a like operation. “I say, sir. Give us a fill from yours. My gwai has all run to dust.” Elvesdon chucked him his pouch.

The two girls were busy putting away the things. They had rejected offers of help.

“We know where to pack the things and you don’t,” Edala had said. “You sit still and smoke, then you’ll shoot all the better for it.”

“Thanks, Miss Thornhill,” answered Elvesdon, remembering his double miss.

“Oh, I didn’t mean anything, really I didn’t. Never mind. There’ll be plenty of chances of retrieving your character.”

“Won’t you come and stand near me at the next voer-ly?” he said. “Then you’ll have all the fun of being an eye-witness.”

She laughed.

“Yes, you’d have to be on your mettle then. Well I’ll come and encourage you. I don’t think I’ll shoot just yet, myself. I believe I’ve ever so slight a touch of headache. Later, perhaps—when it gets cooler.”

Then Prior had begun to express unbounded concern. Why of course Miss Thornhill ought to keep quiet, and as much out of the sun as possible. A headache! Fancy that! and no wonder, since it had been so jolly hot—and so on, and so on—till his official chief experienced a savage desire to kick him soundly, in that the blundering idiot was drawing attention to a little arrangement he was wanting to bring off quite unostentatiously.

However, that had soon passed, and now Elvesdon lay there, puffing out smoke, and in full enjoyment of life and this situation therein. He was not overmuch inclined to talk, either; a deficiency for which his subordinate seemed abundantly inclined to make up. He was watching the girl, as she moved about; the erect poise of the gold-crowned head, the swift play of the thick lashes, the straight glance of the clear blue eyes, the full throat, the mellow, clear, whole-hearted laugh. Everything about her, every movement, so natural and unstudied; the flash of each smile which lighted up her face—ah, all this had had too large a share in his dreaming and waking hours of late.

Then he found himself comparing her with Evelyn Carden. The latter—sweet, gracious, reposeful—would have appealed—appealed powerfully to many men; but there was no comparison between the two, decided this one. He looked at Thornhill, now as he had done since the doctor’s revelation, in a new light. How could it be true? How could such a man as this have been by any means led into the committal of a cold-blooded murder. No. The idea could not be entertained—not for one single moment could it, he decided. And yet—!

The place where they rested was an ideal of sylvan loveliness, the green glade overhung by the rugged face of the cliff, from whose ledges and interstices jutted here and there the spider-like spikiness of sprouting aloes, or the slender stiff stem of the Kafir bean. Away on three sides swept the tumbled masses of bush verdure; here a ridge, there a rift; in whose cool, shaded depths the melody of bird voices made music without ceasing. Beyond, a towering mountain cone, its steep sides shimmering in the mid-day heat against the deep blue of an unclouded sky, and the splendid air, warm yet invigorating, hummed to the music of harvesting-bees. Even the group of natives, squatted a little distance off, lent a picturesque feature as they talked in a drowsy undertone, and the great, rough-haired dogs lying on their sides panting in the shade bore their part in the picture. And the day was but half through—and there was that gold-crowned head dazzling his glance as though he were gazing at the sun—and life was very well worth living indeed—and there, not so very many miles away, in just such a sweet and restful spot as this, lay the mangled body of dead Teliso; for so do the tragic and the idyllic run side by side on parallel rails. By and bye these might be destined to converge.

Chapter Twenty.

Manamandhla’s Escape.

The horses were caught and saddled up. As they rode forth from their resting place, Edala was exchanging banter with Elvesdon, and in the ring of her dear merry laugh there was no suggestion of a sufferer from headache.

“Now then,” said Thornhill, reining in at the head of a long, deep, wild ravine. “We must arrange our strategy.” And he looked from the one to the other.

“I’ll go and see Mr Elvesdon miss,” said Edala, unhesitatingly. “I know exactly where to place him, and he’ll have the best chances of missing he’s ever had in his life.”

There was a laugh at this, led by the victim himself.

“Then who’ll take care of Miss Carden?”

Prior looked up eagerly, but before he could say anything, Evelyn remarked quietly:—

“Do let me ride with you, Mr Thornhill. It will be just as interesting to see how the things are driven out, as to see how they are shot.”

“But, I’m going down into the thick of the kloof this time. How about skirts?”

“Oh, that’s all right. I’ll keep behind you when it gets thick.”

“Very well then if you do that. There’s a tolerable attempt at a path down there. Prior, you keep along the top, on the right—hundred yards in front of us, or a little more.”

Thornhill was pleased. He was glad to have Evelyn with him. There was something about her that was both congenial and restful. And then she was so tactful and considerate. As a matter of fact he had been meditating whether to ask her to accompany him, but had decided not to. Why should she be bored with an old fogey, while there were young ones in the party? And she—well she must have read his thoughts, and of her own initiative had offered to accompany him. This was the sort of thing that Edala never did. Time had been, when as a child she had adored him, when his every word was law, when she would give up anything and everything to be with him. Now, all this was reversed. In these days she never thought of consulting his wishes, let alone of forestalling them; and the change had caused him many an hour of bitter reflection and disappointment.

“We can start now,” he pronounced. “Those two will have had time to get into position.”

They moved forward and downward, keeping near the bottom of the kloof, while the three natives, spread out on each side, whooped and rapped with their sticks. The way lay now through growth of some denseness, now beneath overhanging trees, or a cliff in miniature, its brow lined with a row of straight stemmed euphorbia. It was hot down here in the kloof, in spite of the abundant shade.

But Evelyn Carden’s thoughts were all upon the man riding in front of her, and she had all but lost sight of the object of their being there at all, sport to wit. This new relative of hers was clean outside all her experience. She admired his strength, his decisive downrightness, his easy refinement of speech and thought; and that in the teeth of the fact that his earlier life had been rough and hard, and, not infrequently perilous. Yet, throughout, those instincts of culture had not only been retained but had developed, and she was forced to own to herself that he was the most delightful companion she had ever met.

And Edala? She was fond of the girl—very—yet there were times when she could not but feel secretly angry with her; she had too much savoir faire, however, to let any trace of it appear. Edala did not appreciate her father in the least: on the contrary she treated him with coldness, even bordering upon repulsion. Of course, of any actuating cause underlying such behaviour she was absolutely ignorant, for they saw no neighbours except perhaps Elvesdon; nor even had they, it is certain that to a stranger and a relative of those concerned, nothing would have been whispered. Besides, was not the whole thing now matter of ancient history?

As they rode along in the bosky shadiness of the deep kloof bottom, the shouts of the beaters on either side, the sudden clangour of the dogs as they struck the spoor of a recently alarmed buck, then the crack of a shot down at the farther end, it seemed to Evelyn Carden that the experience was wholly delightful and exhilarating. She could hardly have told why—but it was so. She was not so very young, and she had had some experiences of life. Perhaps she preferred not to tell herself the ‘why.’

Thornhill, on his part, was not thinking of her at all by this time, or if so it was only to wish she had elected to accompany someone else, which at first sight seems blackly ungrateful of him. Still less was he thinking of the sport, unless in a mechanical way. But Manamandhla, moving parallel with himself some forty yards distant through the thick, high bush; Manamandhla visible to himself, but both invisible to the rest of the on-driving line, how easy to have mistaken him for a buck—to have mistaken him. It would be rather the act of a Johnny Raw, but then, men of ripe judgment and lifelong experience had been known to make similar mistakes. Surely such a chance would not occur again. If only Evelyn had not volunteered to accompany him.

A fell, lurid obsession had seized upon this man’s mind, yet not so as to obscure his judgment, only to do away utterly with all sense of ruth or compunction. This calm, patient savage, who had reappeared—had risen, as it were, from the very dead, to blood-suck him—to batten upon him for the rest of his natural life—had got upon even his strong nerves. He was ageing, he told himself, and all through this. Again the Zulu’s broad back presented a magnificent mark for a charge of Treble A. There would be an end of the incubus, and ‘accidents will happen.’ But then—there was Evelyn riding immediately behind him.

“Well, Mr Thornhill. We seem to have drawn this fairly blank, too,” said her cheerful, pleasing voice, as the bush thinned out in front of them. “Let’s see what they’ve got There was a shot in front, wasn’t there?”

Elvesdon and Edala were standing, waiting for them. On the ground lay a dead bushbuck ewe.

“‘Diane chasseresse’ again,” cried the former, gaily. “Neat shot too. Going like the wind.”

“Well, you made me do it, you know,” protested Edala. “I said I didn’t want to shoot any more just yet.”

“Of course,” laughed Elvesdon. “It was the first opportunity I’ve had of witnessing your prowess, and I preferred that to your witnessing my lack of it.”

As a matter of fact the speaker was a first-rate shot, but there were days when he was ‘off’—and this was one of them, he said.

“Well, it’s better than nothing,” pronounced Thornhill. “Still, we ought to have got more out of there. We’ll take the next kloof down, then sweep round for home.”

“All right,” cried Edala. “Now Mr Elvesdon, we’ll lay voer again, and this time I’m really going to see you miss.”

“That’ll be a new and delightful experience,” said Elvesdon with his usual imperturbability. As a matter of fact he meant every word he said. He would have this girl to himself for the best part of another hour, in the sweet sunshine of the golden afternoon. What did he care for the business of the day. He could always get sport—but this—no.

So the pair started off once more by a circuitous way, to reach the bottom of the kloof where they should conceal themselves. Thornhill, watching them, felt well satisfied. Things were going just as he would have them. Things sometimes went that way, and when they did there was no point in interfering with them, or hurrying them from outside. At any rate such was his philosophy.

“Now, Evelyn, I daresay Prior will take care of you,” he said. “This kloof is confoundedly tangled and difficult. There are klompies of haakdorrn too, here and there, which would tear that pretty skirt of yours into tatters.”

“But—are you going to drive on again? You don’t ever get a shot down there in that thick bush,” she urged, half reproachfully.

“Oh, don’t I? I’ve an idea I shall this time. You get up along the top side with Prior.”

The fell significance of his words was apparent only to his own mind, as indeed how should it be otherwise? Evelyn obeyed the order unquestioningly. She only said, in a half undertone, “You take care that everybody else gets the lion’s share of the fun, anyhow.”

The foremost pair were hurrying along the ridge, now cantering, now walking. At length they reached their allotted station at the bottom of the kloof. The latter was steep, like the other, only the bush was less thick.

“I don’t care for this end at all,” said Edala, when they had dismounted, and having hidden the horses, returned to take up their position. “Look. I’m sure we’ll be better up there,” pointing to a spot about a hundred yards higher up. “Let’s stand there.”

“Won’t it be a bit risky? You see, your father will expect us to be here, and supposing he were to fire at anything just at that point on the strength of it?”

“That’s not likely. Everything will have run out too far ahead of him by the time he gets there. Come.”

“Oh, all right.”

They dived into the bush, penetrating it higher up into the kloof. By the time they halted it was not the hundred yards it looked, but over two.

“This will do,” she said. “Now you’re not to miss.”

Their position was a little plateau, whence they could see without being seen. First-rate shots could be obtained of everything that ran out—and everything that did run out would pass within easy range, by reason of the narrowness of the way. Above, too, they would have ample warning of anything coming, for the bush though just thick enough, was not too dense.

“Diane chasseresse, you are splendid to-day,” whispered Elvesdon as they took up their position. She looked straight into his face, and on hers came a half resentful expression.

“Oh now, now. That’ll do,” she answered, half pettishly. “I suppose you think because I’m a girl I’ve no business in this sort of thing at all. I know I’m about the only one who goes in for it—except in England. There you get the Duchess of this and the Countess of that, and Lady Tom Noddy and all the rest of them placarded in the illustrated weeklies in shooting costume, with their guns, and so on; but here—oh no, the ordinary she-mortal mustn’t touch sport, just because she is a she. What?”

“Nothing. Don’t be so petulant.”

“Ah—ah! That’s what you were thinking. I know it.”

“Don’t crow now. You’re not a thought-reader. And,”—he added to himself, “I sometimes wish you were.”

She made an impatient movement—something, we believe, of the nature of that which our grandmothers called a ‘flounce.’

“Why shouldn’t I shoot bushbucks?” she said, defiantly. “Tell me.”

“When you have told me when I said you shouldn’t. Now why on earth have you raised all this bother about nothing in the world? Tell me.”

She looked at him for a moment as though not knowing whether to be angry or not. But the insidious imitation of her tone in the last two words was too much, and she burst out laughing.

“Ssh!” he said, reprovingly. “We mustn’t make such a row, or Prior will get all the shots. Nothing will come our way.”

Hardly were the words out of his mouth than the dogs burst into cry again. But the sound did not come their way, whatever had been roused had broken away at right angles. Then away back and above there rang out a shot.

“Prior again,” whispered Elvesdon. “What did I tell you?”

They waited in silence. Then Edala whispered:

“Poor chance now. There’s Manamandhla just underneath. The drive is nearly over.”

The Zulu was, as she had said, just beneath. He had halted, and bending down seemed to be trying to get a thorn out of his foot. At the same time Thornhill appeared in sight riding slowly down the other side. Suddenly he caught sight of Manamandhla.

He was barely a hundred yards away. The very expression of his face, the quick, stealthy manner in which he had dismounted—was apparent to the two watchers—and then—Thornhill was taking deliberate aim at the unconscious Zulu. At that short distance he could not miss.

The sharp, warning cry that escaped the pair came too late—yet not, for the bullet just grazed its intended mark, and glancing off a rock hummed away right over Edala’s head, so near, indeed, that she involuntarily ducked.

“Father. It’s Manamandhla,” she cried. “You nearly shot him.”

“Did I. Serve him right if I had,” came back the answer. “What’s the fool doing stalking on all fours instead of keeping on his hind legs? That’s the way to get shot by mistake in thick bush.”

Edala and her companion had exchanged glances. Neither had meant to do so, wherefore the glance of each was quick, furtive, involuntary. And the glance of each revealed to the other that both knew that that shot had not been fired by mistake at all.

“You nearly shot me too, father,” Edala said, as he joined them, and there was an unconscious coldness in her tone. Thornhill’s face lost colour.

“You had no business to be where you are,” was all he said whatever he may have felt. “Your position was quite two hundred yards further down. Nothing brings about shooting accidents so much as people changing the positions they arranged to take up.”

“Lucky we did or Manamandhla would have been shot,” she returned, and felt angry with herself for being unable to restrain a certain significance in her tone.

“That he most assuredly would. You sang out just too late to keep me from firing but not too late to spoil my aim.”

But the man most concerned, was the least concerned of all. Manamandhla himself to wit. From his demeanour he need not have just experienced the narrowest shave he was ever likely to have in his life. When Thornhill rated him he merely smiled and said nothing.

“Well, we can reckon the day as over,” said Thornhill, as Prior and Evelyn joined them at the bottom of the kloof—the latter had bagged what had been driven out in front of him, a duiker ram to wit. “We might have done better, and we might have done worse. Five bushbucks and a duiker among four guns—”

“And a vaal koorhaan,” put in Elvesdon. “Don’t forget the vaal koorhaan, Thornhill. Diane chasseresse has the honours of the day.”

“Hear, hear!” cried Prior.

Thornhill laughed—easily, carelessly. He instinctively felt that both his daughter and Elvesdon were aware that if his last shot had been successful Manamandhla would have met his death by no accident at all. But he was not the man to give himself away.

“Sorry for your ill luck, Elvesdon,” he said. “We may get another chance on the way home, even now.”

“Oh that’s all right. I’m a bit ‘off’ to-day, I suppose. Better luck next time.”

Chapter Twenty One.

Peace—and Potentialities.

“If I had had such a father as yours, Edala, I should simply have worshipped him.”

“I daresay. In fact it strikes me that that’s just about what you’re doing with regard to mine.”

The retort was crisp, not to say scathing. Evelyn Carden was angry with herself for changing colour slightly, the while those clear blue eyes were pitilessly searching her face. But she was not going to quarrel with Edala, so she answered conciliatorily:—

“Now dear, you know I never meant to offend you. Why should I? We have got on so well together. What I said was for your own happiness; that and nothing else. Of course I’ve no earthly right to even seem to ‘lecture’ you.”

“Not yet,” was the still more scathing retort which arose to the other girl’s lips. Fortunately she checked it. She looked up, as though waiting for more.

“I am not a gushing person, Edala dear, but I have grown very fond of you since I have been here. I would not have said anything about this estrangement but that it suddenly struck me—and struck me with horror—that I might have been the unconscious cause of deepening it, or at any rate that you thought I had been. So I think I will find some excuse and—move on.”

Edala softened. She was really fond of the other, and did not, in her heart of hearts, wish to see the last of her.

“No, you won’t, Evelyn,” she answered with characteristic decisiveness. “You’ll stay where you are. Never mind me. If I said anything beastly I’m more than sorry.”

What Thornhill had half welcomed in advance had come about. Edala was jealous. All that she might have done for her father, and had neglected to do, was done by their visitor. Did he want anything found for him—from some article mislaid, to some quotation in the course of his recreative studies—Evelyn was the one to do it, not Edala. Or did he want a companion in his semi-professional rides about the farm, Evelyn never by any chance refused or made excuse, but Edala often did, not only of late but when they had been alone together. In short, at every turn he met with far more consideration from this stranger than from his own child.

The incident which had led to the present discussion had occurred the day before, and was of just such a nature. Edala did not care to go out; it was too hot; besides, she had something else to do. But Evelyn had made no such excuse.

“I’m afraid I’m straining your good nature to cracking point,” Thornhill had more than once remarked on such occasions. “It’s rather more cheerful having some one with you than not, but I believe you never say ‘No’ because you think it a duty not to.”

“In that case a duty becomes a pleasure,” she had answered with a laugh.

Now of late Edala had been set thinking, and as the result of her searchings of heart a certain soreness had set in. Their visitor seemed to be taking her place, and yet she could not blame the visitor. If she would not do things for her father herself she could not fairly blame another person for doing them instead; yet none the less did she feel sore.

But since the incident at the wind-up of the bushbuck hunt the estrangement had widened. That her father had intended to shoot Manamandhla dead, she entertained not the slightest doubt. In the first place a man of his judgment could by no possibility be guilty of such a clumsy blunder as mistaking a human being for a buck under any circumstances whatever. In the next place the expression of his countenance had told its own tale, not only to herself but to the other witness, Elvesdon. What was it, then, but an act of cold-blooded, deliberate murder—in intent? Clearly there existed the strongest reasons for silencing the Zulu? And then a ghastly thought came into her mind. Could it be that he had been an accomplice in that terrible tragedy whose shadow had so early darkened her young life? Her first repulsion for the Zulu—which had begun to give way to a reaction in his favour since his narrow escape from death—returned a hundredfold with this new idea. Should she question him, she asked herself? What was the use? He would tell her nothing.

“Don’t think any more about it, dear,” Evelyn now rejoined. “It was only that I can see how bitterly your father feels your attitude towards him that moved me to refer to a matter which you have every right to tell me is no business of mine at all.”

Edala hardened again.

“Has he been—complaining then?” she said, with a return of bitterness.

“Is it likely? Is he that sort of man, do you think? Ah child, you don’t know what you are doing when you are throwing away the affection of such a father as yours, and repelling and wounding him at every turn. And some day, when it is too late, you may—”

She stopped. The other had put out a hand and stopped her. Those were just her father’s own words, and now, for the first time, they struck her as horribly prophetic. Her eyes filled.

“I’m several years older than you, Edala, and I’ve seen a very great deal of life from all its sides. Mind, I’m not saying this to patronise or talk down to you, only to emphasise what an appallingly scarce thing real affection is. And I can’t bear to go away without having made some effort towards making you realise it too. That’s all that lies at the bottom of my ‘beastly interference,’ as you are calling it within your own mind,” she added with a smile.

“‘To go away’!” repeated Edala, with scornful emphasis, and dropping a hand upon that of the other. “But you’re not going away, so don’t let’s hear any more about it.”

“I’ve not come to live here, you know,” was the laughing rejoinder. “Well then, we won’t talk any more about parting company just yet since you’re not quite so anxious to get rid of me as I thought. Do you know, Edala, I have hardly any friends, almost none—acquaintances, yes,”—in reply to the look of astonishment evoked by the statement—“plenty of them. I am not exactly poor either—not in these days, though I have known the meaning of cruel straits—and can do what I like and go where I like, within modest limits. But I have been very happy here—I don’t know when I have enjoyed any time so much.”

“I should have thought you’d have found it beastly slow,” said Edala, wonderingly, and speaking in the light of her own unsatisfied aspirations. Her new relative was a great enigma to her. Why, for instance, with all her advantages had she never married? though this to her was nothing very wonderful, for she herself, given the same advantages, would have thought of that time-honoured institution as so remote a contingency as not to be worth consideration. Again she seldom said much about her people, or her earlier life, except in a vague and generalising sort of way.