register a vow to see me through this craze, if you like to call it
so, and I'll love you for ever. I like to think of it as Empire work.
Come and do a little Empire work too."
"But I don't want to. I'm bored to tears with the Empire. We hear a
great deal too much of it nowadays; that and Standard Bread. I don't
know which is the worst"--making a wry face--"and, besides, if you
really want to do Empire work, your plain duty is to marry Dutch
Willie and cement the races."
A cloud flitted for a moment across Meryl's fair face, which Diana was
quick to see, and she snoozled down into her cosy bed with a little
chuckle.
"Got you there, my fair Imperialist! Dutch Willie, or let us call him
William van Hert, will drop this wild anti-British policy of his like
a hot brick, if you will only make up your mind to be Madam van Hert,
and bless his hearth with a Dutch doll or two, having good English
blood in their veins as well as eighteen-carat Dutch," and the
chuckles grew more and more audible.
But Meryl only got up slowly and moved away to her own little bed.
"Well, I shall ask father to-morrow, and if you won't come I shall try
to make him take me without you. I think he will."
"O, no he won't. If you are really quite obdurate, I shall do a little
Imperial work also. I shall come along to keep watch and ward, and see
that you don't fail the Empire by losing your heart to some
fascinating young Rhodesian settler and forget your own South Africa
altogether. Dutch Willie is a lot the nicest Dutchman who ever
belonged to that obtuse people, and I foresee it will be my lot to
guide you to your high destiny on behalf of the two races."
Meryl only smiled dreamily, as if she scarcely heard. Swiftly,
mysteriously, unaccountably, as is her way, Rhodesia had caught her
senses and filled all her horizon for the time being. She nestled down
into her own pretty bed, with the unrest already fading from her eyes,
and a new gladness in her heart, as of one renewed with a great
purpose and comforted with a wide hope.
IV
THE RHODESIAN PROJECT
Aunt Emily represented what Diana was pleased to call "the family
skeleton in the flesh." She was Henry Pym's only sister, and there had
been a time when she shared a pound a week with him in a tiny cottage
in Cornwall, while he worked as a miner in order to teach himself all
he could about mining. After that she had taken a situation as
housekeeper, while he went out to South Africa to make his fortune.
Later she had spent a year or two with him, sharing his struggles in
the new country, and then he had married, and she was once more left
to take care of herself; for at that stage Henry's finances would
barely keep himself and his wife. Three years afterwards, when his
genius for finance was bearing fruit, his wife died, and at
twenty-seven he found himself a childless widower just becoming
prosperous. He again offered his sister a home, but her recollections
of Africa were none to draw her back thither, and she chose to
continue life in the comfortable situation she had procured as
companion to an invalid lady. So Henry devoted himself entirely to the
science of money-making, and at thirty-five he was a rich man. He
married a second time, choosing for his wife among the gentlest-born
Johannesburg could offer, and winning the sweet woman who was Meryl's
mother. About the same time his brother came out from England and
joined him, and in fifteen years they were two of Johannesburg's
wealthiest millionaires. A few years later both were widowers, and
very shortly afterwards John Pym died, leaving his only daughter and
all the wealth that would be hers to his brother's care. Thus the
household became as we have seen it, for Henry, remembering gratefully
how his sister had stood by him in his days of struggle, now insisted
upon her sharing his luxurious homes and acting as chaperon to the
two girls. That she was a little trying he knew perfectly, but his
sense of fair play and kinship resolutely turned a deaf ear to the
half-spoken pleas of the girls, that he would give her instead a cosy
home of her own, and procure a younger and brighter chaperon for them;
and she had now become a fixture.
But what irritated Diana so was the fact that had the good lady
consulted her own taste, she would infinitely have preferred the cosy,
independent home; but just as Henry's sense of fair play offered her a
place in his, so her sense of duty to the two motherless girls made
her accept it in spite of her inclination.
"If people would but consult their comfort instead of their duty,"
quoth poor Diana, "how much nicer it would be all round! Uncle doesn't
really want her here, and she doesn't really want to come, and we'd
give our heads to be rid of her; but just because Old Man Duty loves
to make people supremely uncomfortable, here we all are!" and her
expressive gesture made further comment unnecessary.
But, as a matter of fact, she made a very easy and good-natured
chaperon, and it was only some of her irritating little ways that
troubled them. Without being really deaf, she usually failed to hear
any opening speech, and this Diana coped with very summarily. "Aunt
Emily," she would begin. "Eh ... eh ... eh ... eh ... ah," and when
Aunt Emily had duly enquired, "What did you say, my dear?" she would
speak her sentence for the first time. Or, again, with reference to
her propensity to get exceedingly worked up upon a subject of very
little general interest, she would say, "The great point is, not to
start her off, and not to give her a chance to start herself off. A
little perspicacity will soon tell you what subject to nip in the bud,
or when to talk as hard and fast as you can about something else."
"And as for her mournfulness," declared the matter-of-fact young
heiress, "well, that's genuinely funny. If I've got a bit of a hump
myself, and I hear Aunt Emily, with a face of heroic resignation, say,
'I can bear it,' I begin to feel quite chirpy at once."
But when the Rhodesian project came seriously under discussion, they
were all a good deal surprised to hear Aunt Emily take part in it as
one who must inevitably be of the party. Henry Pym was a reserved,
undemonstrative man, and when Meryl begged him to let them accompany
him on his travels, though he said very little, he was secretly a good
deal gratified and pleased. His own early hardships had taught him the
inestimable value of learning self-dependence and plucky endurance,
and it was not without some regret he viewed a future for the girls
entirely of rose leaves. Yet how could it very well be otherwise?
When, however, Meryl pleadingly asked him to take them to Rhodesia
with him, he perceived that the trip might be beneficial in more ways
than one.
"You probably don't understand," he told her quietly, "that I am going
on a business, prospecting trip. I am going right away from hotels and
railways to see mines, and I don't intend to be bothered with anything
elaborate in the way of an outfit. I suppose I shall take a tent, and
travel in a travelling ambulance, but certainly nothing out of the way
in food or equipment. You would have to do the same, and as you know
absolutely nothing in the world about 'roughing it,' you probably
wouldn't like it at all."
"But that is just what we should like," Meryl urged. "That is one
reason why we want to come."
They were sitting in the smoke-room with him, as was often their habit
in the evening, preferring it, as he did, to the stately drawing-room.
Meryl sat on a footstool near him, watching his face anxiously, while
Diana, with an open book on her knee, listened from the depths of an
enormous arm-chair in which she had curled herself.
"Shouldn't we ever need to wash?" she asked suddenly, in a sprightly
voice that set them all laughing.
"Well, it's a hot country, you know," said her uncle, "but it might be
more or less optional."
"Scrumptious!" and Diana snoozled lower into her chair.
"Uncouth," remarked Aunt Emily, disapprovingly.
"Or do you mean unclean?" enquired the sinner.
"It is quite the maddest idea I ever heard of." Ignoring her, and
growing more and more mournful, the poor lady heaved a deep sigh.
"But need you be bothered with us?" enquired Meryl, diplomatically.
"Wouldn't you rather have a nice quiet summer in England?"
"And let you go alone?... How could I?... Your father will be much
engaged with his business, and it would be most unseemly for two girls
of your age to be left so much alone. I believe it is a dreadful
country, but if you can face it, I think I can find the courage to
come with you."
"Think you can bear it, aunty?..." chirped the voice from the
arm-chair, and Meryl frowned in a little aside at the snoozler.
"If they decide to come at all, they would be all right with me out on
the veldt," put in Mr. Pym. "If they are prepared to eat 'bully beef'
and probably do their own washing-up."
"How horrible!..." from the arm-chair. "It sounds worse than chewing
mule harness."
"What do you mean, Diana?" her aunt asked, nervously.
"Oh, didn't you know there was nourishment in mule harness?... It's
simply splendid stuff when you've had nothing else for days."
The poor lady shuddered, and her brother chuckled, but Meryl
interposed with, "Don't listen to her, Aunt Emily. It isn't likely we
shall ever have had nothing for days."
"I once heard of a man ..." began the spinster, putting down her work,
and raising her head with the air they all knew so well, denoting a
long rigmarole about some exceedingly uninteresting person, and Diana
immediately chimed in with, "Shall you wear a knickerbocker suit,
aunty, or just a commonplace divided skirt?"
"Neither will be in the least necessary," was the decided answer. "I
have met people from Rhodesia, and they dress quite ordinarily."
"Oh, that's when they're in another country," insisted the
incorrigible. "Up there you simply must wear knickers, or a divided
skirt; it's ... it's ... such a high altitude ... and so ...
windy!..."
"Diana, be quiet," interrupted Meryl, now sitting on the arm of her
father's chair. "If you don't mind we shall leave you behind."
"Well, I don't know that I particularly want to go. It doesn't sound
very inviting except about the washing."
"I think you had all better take a week to decide in," said Henry Pym,
finally. "I won't say anything about the yacht at present, and you can
change your minds and have it if you like. And if your aunt chooses to
stay quietly in England, I'll take a house for her anywhere she likes,
and I'll look after you both myself. You can take care of each other
when I have to be absent for a day."
"Would you like us to go?" asked Diana, screwing her head round
impishly. "Or are we going to be a ... a ... frightful nuisance?"
"I'd like you to come, if you can make up your minds thoroughly to
take the rough and the smooth together, and make the best of it. I
think it will be an experience for you, and a wholesome change from
too much luxury. But mind"--and his strong, dark face looked very
determined--"I want no grumbling and no fretfulness. If you think
you've any real, genuine pioneer spirit in you, _come_. If you're in
doubt about it, stay behind, and go to Norway and have your gaiety."
"I don't think I've very much," said Diana, "but Meryl has enough for
two, I'm sure; and for the rest, I never grumble, and I'm only peevish
with very young men. That, of course, I might work off on the
niggers."
"Has Meryl a lot of pioneer spirit?" asked her father, watching her
with quiet, affectionate eyes.
"Stacks of it. She wants to become an Empire-builder. I don't. I'm
bored with the Empire. But I don't mind sampling just one dive into
the wilderness, to see how I like primitive conditions. I don't know
what Aunt Emily wants with the wilderness though, unless she has a
secret fancy for niggers!..."
"I think that is a little coarse of you, Diana. I have no fancy either
for a wilderness or niggers; but if either you or Meryl were ill, or
anything happened to you, I should never forgive myself had I
remained comfortably at home."
"Nothing will happen to us, aunty. I think you are rather unwise to
think of coming," said Meryl.
"If you go, I shall come as far as Bulawayo anyhow. Then I shall at
least be within reach."
"Well, think it over for a week," said Henry Pym again, getting up and
moving towards his writing-table. "I don't like hurried decisions at
any time. If you like to come and take pot-luck with me I shall be
glad to have your company, but do not let that influence you. Come for
your own sakes, and prepared for anything, or remain behind."
They understood that he wished to be left to do some reading or
writing, and after kissing him good night, went upstairs to their
room.
But Meryl's eyes had already a new glow of hopeful anticipation, and
it was easy to see she did not intend to waste much time in making up
a mind already entirely decided.
Diana found her a little irritating.
"Really, Meryl!" she said, "you look as ridiculously pleased as a cat
with kittens. You are quite the most unaccountable creature in the
world. What, in the name of fortune, _is_ the good of going to
Rhodesia? Frankly, I'd rather stay in England."
But Meryl only smiled happily, and made no comment.
"Oh, put the light out," snapped Diana. "I really can't stand that
superior, complacent air of yours any longer."
For answer the elder girl crossed the room and gave her a hug.
"Don't be cross, Di. You know you'll love the atmosphere of adventure
when you are fairly started. Anyone can go to Norway."
"Adventure! Stuff! Heat and flies and sand, that's all we're in for;
and uncle in a prosaic, 'I told you so' mood."
"We may see lions when we are trekking."
Diana put her head on one side, like a small, bright-eyed bird. "We
can see those in the Zoo, beloved."
"Well, and you can see Norway on a cinematograph."
Diana turned away with a low laugh.
"Clean bowled. Good for you, O wise Hypatia! Well, we'll go to this
heathen land and be horribly uncomfortable for a time, and then we'll
come back and make things hum in London as they never hummed before.
Where is Jeanne, I wonder? If I've got to do my own hair for two solid
months I'll never touch a wisp of it until we go," and she rang the
bell peremptorily.
Later, for a few moments, Meryl again stood out on the balcony,
enjoying the June night, and as she looked at the stars she smiled
softly. She was going back to Africa, after all--her Africa, and
perhaps Life would give her something big to do yet.
And half unconsciously, though with a sense of pleasurable possession,
she stood with her eyes to the south.
And away in a distant land, on a high hill, strewn with ruins of an
ancient, mysterious race, a man stood with his eyes to the north.
A taciturn, difficult, unaccountable man, who baffled the people that
would fain be friendly with him, and chilled any who showed him
warmth, and yet was invariably liked and trusted by all who had the
perspicacity to see beyond the rigid exterior.
Even to-day, though he was mourning his sovereign, he had shown no
softening of grief to those who beheld him. Rather, if anything, he
had been more silent, more taciturn, more aloof than ever.
Yet the enfolding night and the quiet stars saw what none others saw.
They saw the ache in the steady eyes, the compression as of pain on
the resolute lips, the swift, unusual hunger, sternly suppressed, for
something that had once been in some old life and was now for ever
ended.
V
WILLIAM VAN HERT
They, that is, the Pyms, stayed in Johannesburg before they started on
their travels. Mr. Pym had built for himself a charming house in the
Sachsenwald neighbourhood, architectured, of course, by Mr. Herbert
Baker, and having a lovely view to far blue hills.
Few people who have never seen Johannesburg have the smallest
conception of the charm of its best suburbs, with their wonderful far
vistas to a dream country of blue mountains on the horizon. To most it
suggests little beyond dump-heaps of white powdered quartz, tall
machinery, tall chimneys, with a town of tramways and offices and
wealthy people all struggling together for more wealth.
Yet in a few minutes one may leave all this behind, and drive along
tree-lined roads and avenues to where, probably amidst swaying firs, a
"stately home" of South Africa is picturesquely standing.
Mr. Pym's house was not of the largest, for he had never been
ostentatious of his wealth, and much of it was represented by large
tracts of land, where he generously experimented for the benefit of
the country. As with several rich South Africans, he had his stud farm
and his agricultural farm; and both were kept up to a very high
standard, without any particular consideration for profit and loss.
But his house in the Sachsenwald neighbourhood had more of charm and
comfort in it than display. The rooms were very high and airy and well
ventilated, with artistic colour effects which the girls had achieved,
and something of an Italian air about it.
Along one side, widening into an embrasure at the middle, where doors
from the drawing-room and dining-room stood open to it, ran a broad
tessellated terrace; and from the terrace one looked out over a
lovely garden, gorgeous with the flaming flowers of South Africa, yet
softened by velvety turf such as is seldom seen "over there," and can
only be attained by much consistent care and attention.
It was here the girls loved best to sit: Diana because the prospect
was fresh and breezy and wide, and, true to her namesake, she loved
the smell of the firs and the earth; Meryl because of those far blue
hills which made so fitting a background to the dreamland thoughts
that filled her mind; and, moreover, Aunt Emily did not particularly
love light and air, so she usually remained in her own sanctum, and
Diana was able to enjoy, not one cigarette, but two or three, after
each meal without the tiresome accompaniment of a disapproving eye.
They reached Johannesburg in the latter half of July, and those people
who had not already fled from the high winds and driving dust were
hurriedly preparing to do so. In consequence, few friends were there
to welcome them on their return, and their plans proceeded apace.
Diana had a smart khaki knickerbocker suit made, and a wonderful
broad-brimmed hat with a long feather to go with it. When they
laughingly told her she was not journeying to an uncivilised country,
and could not possibly wear such a garb in modern Rhodesia, she merely
asserted she was going into the wilderness to please them, and in
return they must put up with her in any sort of garb she chose. In the
end Meryl was persuaded to have a knickerbocker garb also, though she
insisted that she would never wear it. Aunt Emily bought yards and
yards of green and blue muslin, in which she proposed to tie up her
head. "You must have a particularly ugly helmet, and a pair of smoked
spectacles, and a butterfly-net as well," said Diana, "and then you
will look as if you belonged to the British Association."
Her uncle, sitting back silently in his big arm-chair, with the quiet
twinkle in his keen eyes, remarked, "And you will look like the
principal boy at a pantomime."
"How heavenly!..." said outspoken Diana, and Aunt Emily raised her
hands in horror.
It was on one of the last evenings before their final departure that
William van Hert came from a quiet sea-side place above Durban to see
them. He was taking a long rest there, after a strenuous parliamentary
campaign, and only discovered through a belated newspaper that they
had returned from England, and were contemplating a journey north. He
immediately took a day's road journey to the nearest railway and
departed for Johannesburg.
Diana saw him arrive, and executed a remarkable spring into the air,
finished off with a little kick. "Oh, golly!..." she breathed. "Here's
Dutch Willy come flying to the arms of his ladylove!"
Meryl looked up with swift, questioning eyes.
"Impossible!... He is down at M'genda."
"A little bird whispered, 'She, the fair one of many millions, has
returned,' and straightway the thousand white arms of M'genda failed
to hold him."
"Don't be spiteful, Di. Mr. van Hert cares nothing for anyone's
millions. You know it well."
"I do; and for that reason he should be kept in a glass case. Still,
he cares for a fair Englishwoman who has been--well, kind to him."
"He is interesting. Was there any special kindness in letting him know
that I had the perspicacity to see it?" And they went downstairs
together to receive him.
William van Hert was at that time one of the most disliked, one of the
most attractive, and one of the most disturbing men in South Africa.
Gifted with brains and polish, he was yet, at present, marred by
bigotry, narrowness of vision, and an unreasonable antipathy to the
advance of English ways and customs. Furthermore, having obtained for
himself a considerable following, he was, unfortunately, powerful.
When genuine efforts were being made to bury the hatchet over the
racial question, this man had more than once dug it up again; but it
was not entirely clear at present whether he was actuated by motives
of misguided patriotism, or whether, like far greater men, he only
wanted to make himself thoroughly heard in the world first, and when
that object was satisfactorily attained, he would modify his tendency
to rabid policies and prove himself a reliable statesman. In the
meantime he was dangerous.
In England there were many who quite seriously believed the racial
feud was over. There were others who knew that it was still
exceedingly bitter. There were others again who said very little, and
perhaps professed to know very little, but in the quietness of their
own thoughts pondered deeply and patriotically how a real and sincere
union, and not a merely public newspaper one, was to be wrought
between two fine races, so that in true harmony they might bring a
country of great promise to its day of fulfilment. The men who saw any
solution in making both languages compulsory were not men of true
insight; neither were those who retrenched Englishmen in one
direction, and created new posts for Dutchmen in others. One could but
suppose these men were content to be patriots, not in a big sense to
the whole country, but in a limited one to their own countrymen. To be
patriots of South Africa herself, in her widest sense, seemed too much
to ask of them. Yet, because of the fine qualities many of these men
possessed, one could but hope that ere long what was good for South
Africa would be good for each individual, whether in private life he
called himself English or Dutch.
That William van Hert was ever a welcome guest in the Pyms' household
showed that he had many excellent qualities besides his undisputed
personal attractiveness to counterbalance his obstinate bigotry.
Otherwise Mr. Pym would not have shown him the friendliness he did;
for in his quiet way Henry Pym possessed greatness, and everyone
throughout the land knew that he was of those resolute, reliable few
who would let all their wealth go before they would pander to any
government or any party to save it. Meryl talked to him because she
perceived there was a rough sincerity in the man underneath his
bigotry, and hoped because he was powerful he would presently expand.
Diana alone crossed swords with him, and though perhaps he did not
know it, it was no small thing that she thought it worth while.
He stayed to dine with them in a simple, homely manner, and his
conversation at the table was sparkling and vivacious. He told them
some excellent stories, concluding with one in very broad Dutch that
they had great difficulty in following. And then Diana opened fire.
"Such a monstrous, face-distorting language," she remarked coolly. "I
wonder you don't forbid its use instead of urging it."
The gleam came quickly to her uncle's eye, though he appeared to take
no heed. It was left to Meryl to frown cautiously, and shake a wise
head.
"Don't frown at me, Meryl," said the incorrigible. "It's a hideous
tongue, and he knows it, and what's the good of pretending anything
else? I don't hold with pretence in anything."
"It is the tongue of my country," van Hert told her, more amused than
annoyed. "Every true patriot loves his mother tongue."