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.