On a January night in 1898, Charles Bramham was smoking and writing in
the dining-room of Sea House.
All the doors and windows were open: his coat was off: his white silk
shirt gaped at the neck and the sleeves were turned up. Mosquitoes in
vicious clouds proclaimed with shrill, treble voices their intention to
make a dash for his throat and hands as soon as they could find a way
through the tobacco smoke.
It had been a pitiless day--the sun a ball of brass, and the thermometer
at eighty-five degrees--but the evening sea-breeze had reduced the
temperature by five degrees. Flying ants and gnats of every description
were flinging themselves at the electric lights, and a bat circled
monotonously round the ceiling. But Bramham wrote and smoked placidly
on. A little stack of a dozen or more finished letters stood at his
elbow, and he was busy on his last now--one to his brother in England.
"Read the _Field_ for December 16th. There are two letters about
American cartridges for shot-guns--they've impressed me very much, and
for long shots at grouse, and driven partridge, I am certain they'll be
better than anything we've had yet."
As he made his period voices and steps advanced upon him, and he blew an
opening through the smoke to get a view of the doorway. Entered Carson
and Luce Abinger with scowls upon their brows.
"Ah, you great, lazy hulk!" growled Abinger amiably. "Sitting here in
your shirt sleeves, and neglecting the decencies of civilised life."
They distributed themselves upon chairs and proceeded to add to the
density of the atmosphere.
"Yes, I know," said Bramham, pushing back his chair and regarding
them--"a boiled shirt with a flopping front to it like yours, and poker
with a lot of perpetual growlers. What made you leave the delights of
the Club to come and spoil my mail-night?"
"Capron," said Abinger laconically.
"What! again? A repetition of last night?"
Bramham shot a glance at Carson, but the latter's face expressed nothing
more than _ennui_: he had put his head far back in his chair, and was
smoking ceilingwards, following the gyrations of the bat with a
contemplative eye.
"A repetition of every night until he gets knocked on the head by some
fellow whose temper isn't so sweet as mine." Abinger's smile was not
seductive. "He as good as told me that I had an ace up my sleeve, and
later, he suggested that Carson had better not play for such high stakes
in case he shouldn't find it convenient to pay. We discovered that we
had a pressing appointment with you: but we left him Ferrand to insult."
Bramham got up and went to the sideboard, bringing glasses and decanters
to the table.
"Capron isn't built for too much corn," he remarked. "Water-gruel is his
tack, and he ought to be put on to it before somebody hurts him."
They all drank and smoked again in reflective concord.
"It is a pity," continued Bramham, with a dreamful Socratic air, "that
some fellows' tastes and appetites are not matched by their physical
abilities. There's an odd jumble of material in our construction! It
would be an advantage and make life much more interesting, now, if all
our anatomical parts were standardised, so that every weak or worn
portion could be taken out and renewed from a stock controlled by the
highest power, who would only replace the affected piece if one had made
a decent effort to retain one's mind and body in a healthy condition."
"Oh, get out!" said Abinger. "Is your name Max Nordau, perhaps?"
"Or are you Mr. Lecky?" derided Carson.
"Ah, well, you fellows can laugh, but it would be a good scheme all the
same. Capron, now----"
Without warning of either foot or voice the last-named person at this
moment appeared in the doorway with a debonair smile upon his lips, the
figure of Ferrand behind him.
"Capron, now--is thirsty," said he. "And what was the interesting remark
you were about to make, Brammie, my dear?"
"Only just _that_," Bramham responded serenely. "That you were probably
thirsty--as usual. Help yourself--and you, Ferrand."
They drank and were seated, and all smoked, less peacefully now, but
more reflectively. Capron appeared to be the only person afflicted with
_gaiete de coeur_.
"What do you men think?" he demanded. "I went with Ferrand to see his
patient at the Royal--he's actually got a patient!--and what do you
suppose I saw while I was waiting for him in Ulundi Square?"
The others remained calm and incurious.
"A stunning girl. Just arrived by to-day's mail-boat I found, upon
discreet inquiry, in the office. You fellows ought to see her. She swung
herself through that square like a yacht in full-rig. The funny part of
it is that I saw her in Durban a year or two back, and she was pretty
_then_; but now, by Gad! she has a face that would set any man's blood
on fire."
"Indeed!" said Abinger dryly; and Bramham virtuously remarked: "We are
not all so inflammable as you."
"Ah, I forgot! You're all saints and celibates here."
Capron's loose lips took a sardonic twist. "Quite a mistake for the
women to call you and Abinger and Eve the three bad men, isn't it? I
asked the beautiful Mrs. Gruyere only yesterday why it was--and what do
you think she said, my dears?"
No one seemed anxious to learn, but Capron sprightfully proceeded:
"--Because one's wife wouldn't live with him, and another wouldn't live
with his wife, and the third has a _penchant_ for the wife of his
neighbour."
The withers of the three bad men were apparently unwrung. If any of them
were embarrassed they concealed the fact skilfully behind stony eyes and
complexions of varying degrees of tan. Carson seemed to be composing
himself for a good night's sleep. It is true that Bramham, whose wife
had been dead for less than a year, appeared to swallow something
unpleasant before he remarked in an equable manner that Capron and Mrs.
Gruyere were a nice brace of birds.
"Don't say that, Brammie." Capron was possessed of a high-pitched,
rather Celtic voice. "I defended you all manfully. 'Oh,' said I, 'you
should not be too hard upon them. They have a _mot_ which they respect
about gates and girls.' At that she left me so suddenly that I hadn't
time to find out from her which of you is which."
"P-per-haps," stammered Abinger softly, "if you ask us we'll tell you."
"Well, y-yes," said Capron, mocking Abinger with the fearlessness of the
man of many drinks; "I think p-perhaps I ought to know, seeing that I
have a wife myself."
The silence that ensued had a quality in it which made it differ from
all the other silences of that evening: and it only lasted a second, for
Carson awoke, and he and Bramham rose abruptly and spoke together.
"I am going to bed," said one.
"I must finish my mail," said the other; and added, "Don't go to bed,
Carson. I want your opinion about those American cartridges for
shot-guns. Would you advise me to have my guns re-chambered?" He put his
hand on Carson's shoulder and they walked away together to the end of
the room.
"Heum!" commented Capron. "Commend me to a Colonial for good manners and
hospitality!" But both Abinger and Ferrand had turned their backs on him
and gone into the verandah. In consideration of these things he helped
himself once more to Bramham's good whiskey, and presently went home
with the rest of his witticisms unsaid, but far from being dead within
him.
Insensibly the others presently found themselves once more in their
chairs in the dining-room. Desire for sleep had apparently forsaken
Carson, and Bramham's mail no longer pressed. They looked at each other
with grim, unsmiling faces.
"What did you want to bring him here for?" demanded Carson of Ferrand,
but the latter was unabashed.
"I couldn't shake him, and I was tired of his insults. It was indicated
that Bram should have a turn."
"Someone ought to do unto him as was done unto the Levite's concubine,"
was Abinger's graceful contribution.
"Stop talking about the fellow," said Bramham irritably. "He makes me
tired. If he hadn't a beautiful and charming wife he would be lynched,
and I'd supply the rope."
So they talked about other things, but there was a notable lack of
charity, divine or human, about their conversation, for Capron's words
had left a bad taste in the mouths of three of them, and the fourth
knew it. Indeed, Ferrand, being a doctor, knew most things about his
neighbours, and having lived in Africa for a score of years, he could
not be expected to be entirely lacking in malice and a touching interest
in other people's sins. He presently proceeded to give them a
neighbourly dig.
"I caught a glimpse of the girl at the Royal myself. She certainly is a
wonder. Let us hope that all Capron's legends are not based on an
equally good foundation?" He grinned cynically at the others. It would
have been better for all bad men present to have ignored this friendly
amenity, but Carson had a raw place and didn't like it flicked.
"Hope is all most of us have to live on in this land of flies and lies,"
he snarled. "We won't rob you of your income, Ferrand."
"Bite on that!" added Bramham without any polish of manner.
Capron had certainly succeeded in leaving an atmosphere of irritability
behind him. Only Abinger remained impassive, and suavely demanded a
description of the girl. Ferrand, amongst other things, was something of
a poet: fire came into his eye.
"She's pale, but she glows like a rose: she has chaste eyes, but there
is _diablerie_ in the turn of her lip. She walks like a south wind on
the water, and she has a rope of black hair that she can take me in tow
with if she likes."
At the end of this monograph the three bad men laughed rudely, but they
avoided looking at each other; for each had a curious, half-formed
thought in his mind which he wished to conceal.
Bramham thought: "Part of that might fit one woman ... but it literally
_couldn't_ be her ... I wonder if I should go round and----"
"If I _could_ be interested in a girl," thought Carson, "I might.... _A
rope of black hair!_ ... anyway, I have to go and look up Nickals at the
Royal to-morrow."
"Could it possibly be that devil Poppy?" was Abinger's thought. "I shall
go round and see." What he said was:
"She must be a boneless wonder!" and the others derisively agreed. They
further advised Ferrand to go and lie in Hyde Park with a sheet of brown
paper over him, like all the other poets out of work.
Subsequently other subjects arose. When the clock struck eleven, Ferrand
departed, remembering suddenly that his long-suffering man was waiting
round the corner to drive him home.
Abinger was the next to make a move. His house on the Berea was still
open, and in charge of Kykie, but it knew him no more. When he chanced
to come to Durban from Johannesburg, where he now chiefly resided, he
slept at the club. As he was making himself a last drink, Bramham said:
"Isandhlwana nineteen years ago to-day, Luce!"
The two men looked at each other with friendly eyes. They were not
greatly sympathetic, but brave memories shared make a close bond between
man and man. Silently both their glasses went upwards in a wordless
toast. In a moment and silently, too, Carson was on his feet. They drank
to the men who died on Isandhlwana Day. Afterwards, Bramham and Abinger
fell into talk about that year. They had both fought in the Zulu war.
Carson listened with glinting eyes, the weariness swept from his face
for the first time that night. Bramham's face became like a boy's.
Abinger's looks changed, too. His sneers were wiped out, and his scar
took on the appearance of one that might have been honourably gained.
Once he laughed like a rollicking boy.
"That day we lay above Inyezan, Bram ... do you remember? When you
potted the big fellow in the _umpas_ tree!... after he had sniped about
ten of our men ... by God! the cheek of that brute to perch himself up
there within a hundred yards of us!... and no one knew where the shots
were coming from ... it was a miracle you spotted him in that thick
foliage ... he came down like a fat, black partridge ... and lay still
under the tree ... we went and looked at him after the fight was all
over, Carson ... he was an enormous chap ... the biggest Zulu I ever
saw ... our natives recognised him--chief _Gaarons_, one of their best
leaders ... a sure shot ... he got ten of our men ... but Bram got _him_
all right."
They sat for two solid hours reminiscing.
"You and Luce have had some times together, Charlie!" said Carson, after
Abinger had gone.
"Yes ... it makes one feel old--I suppose we _are_ getting on, Karri,
but we were in our early twenties those days ... Abinger rather younger
than I was, perhaps ... he was a different fellow then, too--of course,
it was years before he met that Spanish devil who slashed his face
open.... Do you know, Eve, that when I was in London last I saw her
dancing in the old, sweet way at the Alhambra?"
"I thought she was dead?"
"So did I--but she wasn't. She is, _now_, however ... dropped down one
night behind the scenes and passed out in half an hour."
"_Tant mieux!_" said Carson serenely. "She didn't play according to
rules. Well, I suppose, we must turn in, Bram--I've a ton of things to
do to-morrow ... those cases of guns and ammunition and stuff are due,
aren't they?"
"Yes: I got the advice about them: they'll be in dock to-morrow. We'll
go down and look everything over during the week if you like. How long
are you going to give yourself before you go back?"
"Well, my leave is six months, you know--one of them gone already, by
Jove! I shall be about another three or four weeks fixing up my private
affairs on the Rand and getting things sent off from here. Then I
propose to give myself a few months at 'home' before I go into exile for
five years."
"Five years of solitude and natives and pioneers!" commented Bramham.
"Pretty tough on you!"
"Oh, you needn't pity me. I don't mind the solitude. There'll be plenty
to do turning that little sixty thousand square miles into a civilised
centre, now that we've got the roads open. In five years' time we shall
have the rails laid right to the capital, and the mines in full swing.
That's the time I shall make tracks for newer scenes. But in the
meanwhile it's fine, Bram. The fellows that make pioneers are the right
stuff--_you_ know that. It's the people who come up after the work is
done who stick in my gizzard."
"I daresay it's all right," said Bramham. "There are bright bits, no
doubt. And, of course, you'll get more ribbons to tie your stockings up
with and lockets to hang on your breast when you come back. But it seems
to me to be a precious lonely life in the meantime, and I'm glad it
isn't mine. Why don't you take your wife up with you, Karri?" He spoke
with an idle smile, not looking at Carson, but at his hands on the bale
before him arranging cigars in a box. Carson gave him a quick glance,
but he laughed carelessly.
"Even if I possessed such a luxury I couldn't very well ask her to come
up to a wild place like that--for wild it will be for many a year yet,
thank the gods! Do you suppose any woman would care about it?"
"I know half a dozen who'd jump at the chance, and I expect you do,
too. Women are fearfully keen on adventure nowadays. And then you're an
attraction in yourself, Karri."
"Thanks, old chap! You're easily pleased, I'm afraid." Carson's smile
was affectionate, but frankly sleepy. He began to yawn. Bramham, caring
nothing for hints of weariness, pursued the subject.
"Joking apart--you ought to marry. Why don't you, Karri?"
"For one thing, I can't afford it. You forget that I'm not a bloated
millionaire like you. My little excursions into different parts of the
interior were never cheap, and the original expedition into Borapota
cost me privately as much as it did the Government, and since I've been
Administrator I've found it a mighty expensive business, and you know,
I've never been a money-hugger, Bram. I suppose I am a thousand or two
to the good now, apart from my shares and concerns on the Rand, which
wouldn't fetch much with the market in its present condition. But how
far would that go towards setting up a _menage-a-deux_ in the desert?
Even supposing that I knew someone anxious to share it----"
"You have your salary--two thousand a year," argued Bramham. He did not
know what a _menage-a-deux_ was, but he could guess.
"So I have, by Jove! and I need it. If you think I play John the Baptist
when I take to the wilderness, Bram, you're mistaken. I do myself
remarkably well to make up for the lack of society. If the soul is
neglected, the carcase isn't. You come up and visit me some time, old
man. You'll find all the blessings of civilisation with me, except
woman."
"You're a nice sort of pioneer!" Bramham said; but he knew what Carson
meant. The best kit, the best guns, and saddlery, and horses, cost money
everywhere, and when it comes to transporting them over a few thousand
miles of unbroken roads--why, of course, it is expensive!
"I know all about that, Carson--all the same, I think it would be a good
thing if----"
Carson interrupted him. "You're beginning to be a nuisance, Bram. But
I'll be patient with you, and tell you the truth. I don't want _a_ wife,
but _the_ wife, and I haven't met her yet--the woman who could stand the
test of five years of _wattle-and-daub_, and boot-and-saddle, and
sleeping under the stars for a change when one gets tired of the
_wattle-and-daub_; with nothing much to contemplate by day but the
unlimited horizon and nothing much to hear by night but the dirge of the
jackals, and the sound of the wind in forest trees, or the rush of a
river. _We_ know that these things are fine, Bram--the best you can get
in a passable world. But would they be fine with the wrong woman?--with
any woman but the one who----"
He stopped abruptly, got up, and began to walk about the room. In the
doorway he stood for a moment looking seawards through the black night.
A cool wind was stirring every paper and drapery in the room now, for
the tide was full, swirling and rustling on the sands not a hundred
yards away with nothing to be seen in the blackness but a skirl of white
foam.
"--Who--what?" asked Bramham stolidly in the room behind him. Carson
came back and sat on the table with his hands in his pockets. The old
discontent was on his face.
"Who can never materialise because she's mostly made up of dreams."
Bramham laughed. "Mrs. Portal once said to me, 'The most wonderful woman
in the world could not pass the standard of a romantic Irishman: or come
near the perfection of the dream-woman whom every Irishman has secretly
enshrined in his heart.' It appears that she was right."
Carson laughed, too: but his face softened.
"Mrs. Portal knows most things about Irish and every other kind of men,
I fancy. The wonder is that she can continue to be charming to us in
spite of it. She's the most delightful woman in the world."
Bramham gave him a shrewd glance. He would have given half he possessed
to say at that moment:
"What about a lovely girl who is drudging away in England to support
your child?" But it was not an ordinary promise that same girl had wrung
out of him, never to reveal by word or look that he knew her secret. She
had bound him by every oath she could think of that had any sanctity for
a man.
Something of scorn presently mingled with the shrewdness of the look he
cast at Carson. He searched the dark face that had so much in it that
was fine and lovable, and yet was marked with sins. But whatever
Carson's sins were they did not give him peace. He did not grow sleek on
them. He had the weary mouth and haggard eyes of the man with the dual
nature, a finer self perpetually at war with a baser, sometimes winning,
sometimes losing--but always striving. Scorn left Bramham's look and
affectionate loyalty came back.
"You can't hate a fellow like that," he thought.
He presently found a further thing to say in which he was far from
imagining himself disloyal to Rosalind Chard, or even prompted by
curiosity.
"Carson ... since we've tumbled on to the subject of women, I'd like to
know what you think about something I've rather advanced opinions
upon ... girls ... girls who've gone over the hard-and-fast line ... not
the ordinary demi-semi-quaver, of course ... nor the kind that are bound
to slip off the rails even with gold fastenings ... I mean the sort of
girl one would be glad and proud to marry, but who, given 'the time, the
place, and the loved one altogether,' as some poet fellow says, cuts
loose the painter for dear love and sheer love. What do you think of a
girl like that, Karri?"
Carson had a distant visionary expression in his eyes. Bramham's words
appeared to have driven his thoughts far afield. He might have been a
man trying to remember a sweet air that evaded his memory, or to lay
hold of something that had no substance.
"It is odd that you should ask me that, Bram," he spoke slowly ... "and
you are the only man in the world I would say it to ... but, that was
the kind of girl I was speaking of when I said _the_ wife ... the only
kind of girl I should ever care about marrying ... I suppose I am alone
among Irishmen in holding such an opinion ... for all their wildness
they're a conventional lot at bottom, especially on this subject ...
and, of course, that's as it should be. But I've lived too long in
lonely places, and I'm more woodsman than Irishman now!... I didn't
think this way always, either.... But once I had a vision, a dream,
_something_ ... about such a girl. The odd part of it is that I was
crazy about another woman at the time--had been for years--and it cured
me of _that_.... But, oh, Lord!" (he gave a sort of groan) "there's been
plenty of water under the bridge since then ... and it was only a dream,
anyway. There may be such girls in the world somewhere ... but not for
me, Bram. Some woman will trap me with an antenuptial-contract, some
day." He got up, laughing mirthlessly. "Great Tophet! it's two o'clock!
I shall never get through with my work to-morrow."
They gripped hands and parted for the night.
Afterwards Bramham mused thus to himself:
"He was lying! He must have been--or else she was. What the deuce is
one to make of it? _Plenty of water under the bridge since then!_ I
daresay!... Capron's stray shaft went home.... I wonder if there's any
truth in _that_ tale!... Well! the longer I live the more I am inclined
to agree with that fellow who said there never yet was a game in history
or anywhere else played square with a woman in it!"