"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.