"WHO KNEW NOT JOSEPH."
Mr Frederick Romsey Shaston, the new Resident Magistrate of
Doppersdorp, was in every respect a direct antithesis of the old one.
In aspect he was a square-built, middle-aged man, with grizzled hair,
and rather thin, short beard, prominent nose, and cold blue eyes; a man
of few words, and those few words, when spoken, conveying distinctly
that in the speaker's mind there was but one opinion worth the slightest
consideration in all the world--viz., that of Mr Frederick Romsey
Shaston.
He was a man to dislike on sight, one whose manner might be termed
brusque for the sake of euphemy, but which sometimes and by accident
just fell short of being offensive; a man in whom lurked not one spark
of geniality or kindly feeling; a cold, flaccid, mental jelly fish.
The flourish of trumpets which had enveloped the departure of his
predecessor was an offence to him, possibly as suggesting the certainty
of a very different farewell, when his own time should come. In this
spirit he went closely into all connected with the office, hoping to
discover some pretext for throwing mud at Mr Van Stolz' administration.
But he might as well have tried to chip a snowball out of the moon.
To Roden Musgrave he took an intense dislike, which he exhibited in
first pointedly wondering at finding a man of his age in that position;
an impertinence which its recipient could afford utterly to ignore.
From the very first, however, he had made up his mind to bring about a
change, partly to secure the berth for a relation of his wife, partly
because he only felt comfortable with young subordinates, whom he could
treat as he chose; whereas this one, even he realised that he could not
treat as he chose.
For he knew that in experience and knowledge of the world, this man was
immeasurably his superior; and the better able to hold his own, that he
was most thoroughly up to his work. He had mastered all the ins and
outs of office and court routine, and had everything at his fingers'
ends. He would be an extremely difficult man to oust; yet as we have
said, Mr Shasten made up his mind from the very first that ousted he
should be.
By the attorneys and law-agents practising in the District Court the new
R.M. was most cordially detested. Not one of them but had been snubbed
more or less--frequently more--when practising before Mr Van Stolz, but
never undeservedly, and this they well knew. So, too, did they know
that outside the Court, that sunny-natured official would be the first
to crack a joke with them, or lend them his horse, or do them a good
turn in any way he could. The present occupant of the Bench, however,
was past master in the art of delivering himself of cold, scathing,
contemptuous rebukes. The practitioners for once agreed among
themselves. They put their heads together and arranged to "go for" him
whenever opportunity offered, and now and again it did offer, for Mr
Shaston was at times a trifle shaky, alike in his procedure and in his
judgments. Then they went for him tooth and nail, Darrell especially,
who feared no man living, and between whom find the new official many a
passage of arms would occur, of increasing fierceness and frequency.
With the farmers, too, he was unpopular. Mr Van Stolz, himself a
Dutchman, had been pre-eminently the right man in the right place. Mr
Shaston, however, was utterly devoid of that bluff, open-hearted species
of blarney which is the right way to the Boer heart; consequently, by
that stolid and wooden-headed race, he was regarded as the most stiff
and starched type of the _verdommde Engelschman_. Moreover, rightly or
wrongly, he soon acquired a reputation for favouring the native
servants, as against their white employers, in such cases as came before
him; which reputation once established on the part of a magistrate is a
very death knell to his popularity among the Boers, and scarcely less so
among their fellow English stock-raisers.
Some among the townspeople he condescended to admit to a certain degree
of friendship. Among these was Lambert, the District Surgeon, also
Sonnenberg; both of whom toadied him fulsomely, for they began to see in
the new R.M. a possible weapon for striking a deadly blow at the object
of their respective hate. His dislike of his subordinate was by this
time patent, and both worthies now began to chuckle; for they foresaw
the not far distant removal of the latter from Doppersdorp. Not that
this would satisfy the malice of the vindictive Jew; nothing would,
short of the ruin and disgrace of his enemy. Since the gun episode,
resulting so signally in the biter being bit, and bit hard, Sonnenberg
had cudgelled his crafty and scheming brain to hit upon a plan, but
hitherto in vain. As postmaster, the thought had crossed his mind that
he might in some way or another strike at his enemy through his
correspondence. But then the latter never received or despatched any
correspondence; never from month's end till month's end. This in itself
was singular, and set the Jew thinking.
Now, if there was one individual whom the change of administration
concerned almost more than all the rest of the community put together,
that individual was Roden himself. No more was the daily routine
lightened by an occasional cheery talk, the ever-present joke, and the
sociable pipe, and above all by the most perfect of mutual good feeling.
This he was prepared for. But when his new superior began to show his
hostility in the most needlessly gratuitous fashion; to find fault, and
that too often publicly, where, as a matter of fact, no fault was to be
found, his temper, at no time a long-suffering one, began to feel the
strain. Still he kept it in hand, observing the most rigid scrupulosity
in the discharge of his duties, and giving no handle to the other for
putting him in the wrong. He knew that an explosion was only a question
of time, and was shrewd enough so to order his doings as to keep on the
right side.
But, if in his new official superior he had found an enemy, he had made
one in the person of that functionary's wife, though this was perhaps
inevitable. Personally Mrs Shaston was a good-looking woman, tall, and
of rather striking appearance, who had once been very handsome. But to
her husband's brusquerie she added a commanding manner, or, to drop
euphemy, a domineering one, which rendered her a trifle more unpopular
than himself, if that were possible. She had at first inclined to a
modicum of reserved graciousness towards Roden Musgrave, which soon
changed to the most bitter and virulent rancour, when she discovered
that he had no notion whatever of being turned into a sort of running
footman. Her husband's subordinates were her subordinates; such was her
creed, and what did a subordinate mean but one who had to do as he was
told? So when Roden took the earliest opportunity of differing with her
on this point, and that in the most practical way possible, she became
his bitter enemy for all time.
Daily his position became more manifestly unpleasant. He had never laid
himself out to win anybody's goodwill, and this sin of omission had
rendered him as unpopular as those of commission on the part of his
chief had brought about a like result concerning the latter. Of two
unpopular officials in a place like Doppersdorp, or for the matter of
that anywhere, the most powerful would score, and Mr Shaston after all
was a power in the community. Moreover, such a community has a special
faculty for producing a large litter of curs, wherefore many who had
been effusively civil to Roden Musgrave when the latter was
hand-in-glove with Mr Van Stolz, now showed their real nature by
turning round and barking at _him_ unceasingly.
Now, of course such pleasant little amenities as smoking pipes in office
hours, or shutting up at all sorts of times when there was nothing
particular doing, though tending to render life pleasant, were, after
all, irregular, and no one knew this better than Roden; consequently he
was quite prepared for all sorts of changes in this direction, and
accepted them cheerfully. But his new superior thought he saw a very
promising ground of annoyance, which might, if deftly worked, bring
about the revolt he desired.
"There is a matter I have been intending to speak to you about, Mr
Musgrave," he began one day when Roden had taken some correspondence in
to be signed, "and that is your very frequent absences; I don't mean
from the office during hours, but from the town. For instance, I find
that you are frequently absent from Doppersdorp the whole night,
visiting your friends in the country, and not infrequently for two
nights."
"But that would be only from Saturday evening to Monday morning early,
sir; while off duty."
"A Civil Servant is never off duty, Mr Musgrave, except when he is on
leave of absence," was the frigid rejoinder. "Now, I am not aware that
the absences to which I refer come under that heading."
With a strong effort Roden mastered his contemptuous indignation, for he
saw that his superior had discovered a new form of mean and petty
annoyance. He had far too much _savoir vivre_ to make any such retort
as would have arisen to the lips of nine men but of ten in like
position--viz., that Mr Van Stolz had never raised any such objection.
So he said:
"Do I understand, sir, that you object to my sleeping the night at a
friend's house if outside Doppersdorp, even though I am back punctually
for office hours?"
The other felt vicious. The question was unpleasant in its directness,
and, while put with perfect respect, its pointedness seemed cutting.
"Er--you see, Mr Musgrave, we are supposed to be resident here--that
is, to reside here; the object of which is that we may be found when
wanted, and that object is defeated if we are whole nights, or a day and
a night, away from the place. It is not a personal matter, not a
question of what _I_ object to; but supposing any emergency were to
arise requiring your presence, and nobody knew where to find you; or at
any rate, that you were so far away that it amounted to the same thing!"
"Would you mind, sir, stating for my guidance the precise distance the
Service regulations allow an official to ride or walk without having
obtained formal leave of absence?"
The other felt very cornered at this persistent attempt to knock his
objections to match-wood, and proportionately savage.
"I am surprised, Mr Musgrave," he said, speaking more quickly, "at a
man of your age asking such a question. Surely you should know that
there is a common-sense medium in all things."
"Still I should prefer to know exactly what restrictions the Service
places upon our movements. Do you mean, sir, that we are never to pass
the night at the house of a country friend without formal leave of
absence?"
"No, no. I don't mean to lay down quite such a hard and fast rule," was
the more yielding reply, for this deft plurality imported into the
pronoun was disconcerting. "What I would dwell upon, however, is the
strong desirability of returning to the town to sleep, unless detained
by unforeseen circumstances, such as stress of weather, or anything else
which is absolutely unavoidable."
"I shall remember your wishes in the matter, sir," said Roden, in his
habitual tone of studied and ceremonious politeness, which was the best
commentary on the state of relations existing between himself and his
new superior.
But although there was a show of reason in the other's objection, the
real ugly motive was manifest--viz., petty annoyance, and the thought of
how, at his time of life, his means of existence, or at any rate of that
which made existence tolerable, should be dependent on his capacity for
eating dirt at the hands of such a mean-minded snob as this Shaston, was
bitter and galling to the last degree. The thing was getting past a
joke, past all bearing, in fact. Should he endeavour to arrange a
transfer? Mr Van Stolz might be able to help him in this. But then he
hated to ask anything of anybody: besides, he did not choose to allow
himself to be driven out of the place; to yield the ground; to own
himself beaten. And then there was Mona.
Mona, the bright beacon star that had arisen upon the grey blankness of
his latter-day life. Mona, whose sweet, entrancing spells had woven
around the hard granite of his cynical and desolate heart a glittering
network of golden sun-rays. Mona, whose secret lore had welled forth
warm in its dazzling wares what time he hung helpless over the yawning
jaws of death, and the power of whose marvellous love triumphing over
the material forces of Nature itself, had again availed to save him.
How could he, of his own act, think of leaving her, of going where day
after day, week after week, even month after month, nothing would remain
of her but a memory? Better endure a little discomfort; better exercise
a further stretch of self-control. And then as he thought how sudden
had been the change from the former happy circumstances of life, to this
wherein his hand was against every man and every man's hand against him,
and life was passed in a state of on the defensive, a cold, grey
presentiment shot across his heart. What if it were but the precursor
of another change? Nothing lasts; least of all, love.
Thus musing, and not looking where he was going, he ran right into
somebody. A hearty laugh drowned his apologies. Looking up he found he
had collided with Father O'Driscoll.
"You're the very man I wanted to meet," said the old priest, the first
greetings over. "See now, Mr Musgrave. D'ye mind stepping round to my
place for a moment. I'm in want of a stable-boy, and a fellow has just
come to be taken on, but he seems rather lame in one leg. He says you
know him, and will recommend him."
"I?" echoed Roden in some astonishment. "Does he know me?"
"He does. And--well, here we are."
A sturdy, thick-set Kaffir was squatting against the gate-post of the
priest's house. He rose rather stiffly as they entered, uttering a
half-shy and wholly humorous greeting as his eyes met Roden's, his dark
face and shining white teeth all ablaze with mirth, which indeed the
other fully shared, remembering how and where they had seen each other
last. For in the aspirant for stable duty in the ecclesiastical
establishment, he recognised no less a personage than Tom, _alias_
Geunkwe.
"Hallo, Tom! Where have you dropped from? Damaged leg, eh?"
"Been away to see my father, _Baas_," answered the Kaffir, grinning all
over his face. "An ox kicked me on the leg, but it will soon be well."
"An ox kicked you, did it?" said Roden, with a half laugh; for he
shrewdly suspected the hoof of that ox to have been of very small size,
and made of lead. And the Kaffir laughed again, for he knew that Roden
was not deceived.
"You know him? Is he honest now?" said Father O'Driscoll.
"Thoroughly, I believe. What's more, he's a man of his word. I am
telling Father O'Driscoll you are a man of your word, Tom," said Roden,
translating into Dutch, and speaking with a meaning not lost upon the
Kaffir.
"I am your child, chief," replied the native. "_Au_, I would like to
serve the old _Baas_. He looks kind."
"Well, Tom, I'll take you on so," said the priest. "Go round now, and
see after the horse at once; for faith, it's a long ride the poor beast
has just come off. By the way," he added, turning to Roden as the
Kaffir departed, "I seem to have seen him somewhere before. Has he been
with any one here?"
"He was with that arch-sweep, Sonnenberg, who employed him to do a
particularly dirty trick, and got `had' sweetly in return, as you would
be the first to allow if I were to disclose it. There is another thing
I might reveal which would convince you that in defining Tom as a man of
his word I was speaking no more than the literal truth, only I promised
him never to mention it. You have got a right good boy in him, Father
O'Driscoll, and if I had any use for a boy I'd employ him myself."
"Oh, I'm quite satisfied, I assure ye, Mr Musgrave. Many thanks for
your trouble."
Thus Tom obtained the best place in Doppersdorp, and Roden was able in
some slight measure to requite the loyalty and good faith of the
_ci-devant_ savage warrior, who might, by breaking his word, have
delivered him over on that memorable morning to a violent and barbarous
death.