"What do you think of this, Kenrick?" said Brian, as I went into the
cattle kraal at milking time a couple of mornings after. "Here's old
Dumela saying he wants to leave."
The old cattle-herd was squatted on his heels on the ground. Brian and
his father were seated on a log listening to what he had to say. This
was not much. His brother's son had got into trouble at Gangelizwe's
"Great Place," away beyond the Tsomo, and had involved his brother too.
He must go and help them at once, taking with him the several head of
cattle he had running on the farm. He was getting old, and thought he
would not work any more.
"Why, he's been with you close on twenty years, hasn't he?" I said.
"Rather more," answered Brian. "But that's always the way with these
chaps. The longer they've been with you the more keen they are on
clearing out for a change: for I don't swallow over-much of that
brother's son yarn. Well, he'll have to go, I suppose--eh, dad?"
"Oh, yes." Then it was put to Dumela that he was behaving shabbily in
taking himself off at a moment's notice after all these years, and that,
too, just at a time when we were in need of a thoroughly trustworthy man
to fill his position, after our friction with Kuliso. This he
deprecatorily admitted. Still, if his relatives stood in need of him,
what else could he do? And he was not leaving us entirely in the lurch,
for he had found a man who was ready to take his place now at once, and
who was a good man with cattle. In fact, he was over in his hut now.
"Well, we'd better see him, at any rate," said Brian, and calling one of
the boys, despatched him to Dumela's hut to fetch the stranger. The boy
reappeared in no time followed by--Maqala.
This fellow saluted us gravely, but showed no sign of ever having seen
any of us before. I own his sudden appearance startled me. Was this
part of the game, I wondered, and if so how on earth could it be that an
old and faithful servant like Dumela could aid and abet any mischief
that might be brewing against us? Yet having good reason to bear in
mind this rascal's excellent knowledge of English, I could utter no word
of warning. It was, however, unnecessary, for Brian had recognised him
at once as the man I had pointed out in the street at Fort Lamport.
"Why, that is one of Kuliso's people," he said. "You are a Tembu,
Dumela; how then can you bring me a man of another tribe, and vouch for
him as good?"
Dumela's reply to this seemed lame, and deepened my suspicions more and
more. Would it be well, I wondered, to engage Maqala, and thus have him
more under our own observation? But Septimus Matterson cut the knot of
the difficulty.
"I won't have him," he said. "I won't have him at any price. I've seen
him before, and I don't want to see him again. He is one of the people
who raided us that day, one of the foremost of them too. I wouldn't
trust him further than I could see him, so he may take himself off."
There was no getting round the straight directness of this reply.
Maqala said nothing. He just flung his blanket round him, and lounged
away; but as he did so the look he turned on me was not a pleasant one.
On _me_. I was conscious of a feeling of relief. I, then, was the
object of his hostility. Whatever nefarious scheme he was hatching, I
was the destined victim of it--I and not the boy. Well, that simplified
the situation, for I was flattered to think I knew how to take care of
myself. Yet, even then his implacability was not quite comprehensible,
for Kafirs, as a rule, have a strong sense of justice and are not
vindictive when they realise that they have deserved whatever punishment
they may have got, and if this one did not deserve the somewhat rough
treatment I had twice meted out to him, why I didn't know who did.
Physically he was a tall, lithe specimen of his race, rather
light-coloured, and had an evil cast of countenance. The expression of
that countenance now, as he darted that quick parting glance at me,
reminded me of nothing so much as a roused snake.
Well, Dumela took himself off. He made no profuse apologies or
extravagant expressions on the strength of thus terminating his twenty
years' service. He just bade us farewell, collected his two wives, his
cattle, and such pay as was due to him, and went. We had to put on one
of our farm boys in his place, and were to that extent short-handed,
necessitating more general supervision, which, as Brian was obliged to
be away from home on a matter of business, considerably tended to
enlarge my own sphere of energy. But for this I was not sorry, as it
took me more and more away from the house.
Sometimes Pentridge would accompany me on my rides abroad, and I was
glad to have him, for he was always good company, and, liking the man
for his own sake, I could not feel mean enough to hate him for being
more fortunate than myself. On one such occasion--Beryl having
laughingly but firmly ordered him out of the schoolroom where she was
giving Iris, and now George, their morning lessons, and thus throwing
him for refuge on me--he said something that set me thinking.
"D'you know, Holt, I'm beginning to feel beastly jealous of you."
"So? And why?"
"Why, the way you seem to have captured every one here."
"Didn't know it."
"But you have. Why, it's `Holt says this' and `Kenrick thinks that' on
all hands, till I believe if you weren't such a good chap I'd rather
dislike you."
"`You do me proud,' Pentridge--unless, that is, you're pulling my leg.
Otherwise I hadn't the faintest idea of anything of the kind, and don't
see why it should be so now."
I believe I spoke with needless bitterness, but at the moment I could
not help thinking how much greater reason I had for disliking him.
"Well, but it is. Good old Matterson isn't effusive, as you know, and
I've never heard him boom any one before. But he's always booming you.
That time the Kafirs made that raid on you, he swears you stood by him
like a brick."
"Well, I could hardly turn tail and run away, could I?"
"Not only that, but he said he was astonished at the judgment you showed
on the occasion. And only this morning he was thanking his stars you
were so good at bossing up things, now that he was seedy, and rheumatic,
and Brian had to be away a lot."
Here was some practical cause for self-satisfaction, I thought. In view
of my utter ruin financially, it was gratifying to know that I was
deemed worth my salt in any one line of livelihood. But I answered--
"Well, if you've put your hand to the plough it's satisfactory to know
that you're driving a straight furrow."
"Rather. Brian, too, is always booming you, and as for those two kids,
why they don't cheek you a bit."
"Is that a sign of esteem?" I laughed, for the idea tickled me.
Further, I admit a littleness--in the shape of an anxiety to hear
whether Beryl had added her quota to the general testimonial, and if so
on what terms. But, by accident or design, he forebore to gratify me.
"I should say so," he rejoined. "Knowing their natural temperaments, it
means that they must hold you in profound respect--especially George."
"Poor little devil! He's had the cheek considerably taken out of him of
late," I said. "He used to be rather an outrage."
"So I should imagine. By the way, Holt, they were telling me about how
you got Iris out of the sea that time at East London. It was--"
But whatever "it was" I didn't want to hear.
"Stop there, Pentridge," I said. "That's a forbidden topic and one I'm
completely sick of. It was mere child's play to a fellow who is as
thoroughly at home in the water as I am, so don't talk about it."
"Oh, all right, old chap," he answered good-humouredly, and then he went
on to tell me something about himself. He had been some years in a slow
Dutch township on the border line between the Eastern and Western
Province, and had come to Fort Lamport to try and set up a practice
there if he could buy out the District Surgeon, who was old and inclined
to be shaky. "Yes," I thought somewhat bitterly, "and his reasons for
coming to that particular place are not difficult to fathom."
For it was obvious to my mind that things were coming to a head. He and
Beryl were a great deal together, and more and more of an excellent
understanding seemed to exist between them, and in the light of this it
seemed equally obvious that, apart from the catastrophe which had
overtaken myself, I had been indulging in false hopes before--living in
a fool's paradise, and I don't know whether the discovery rendered the
situation any better for me or not.
One day I came upon them out riding. I had been doing an exhaustive
round of the place and struck the main road. The bush grew right down
to this on each side, and as I gained it I could see two other riders
approaching. Even then I would have withdrawn, not wishing to be the
one too many, but they had seen me. Yet I had seen them a little
before: had seen how happy they looked together, and, with a jealous
pang, how well they looked together, how completely they seemed to
match.
Beryl was looking lovely, the warm paleness of her face just suffused by
the exercise, and the generous kiss of the free open air with just a
sparkle of crisp keenness in it. She looked splendid in the saddle,
too, as she always did, sitting her horse with the most perfect ease and
grace--Meerkat, that very horse I had risked my life to recover and
restore to her. Many a similar ride had we had together, she and I.
And ah! how little I had appreciated it then, I found myself thinking;
yet now to look back upon those times! But they would not bear looking
back upon.
Pentridge seemed, I thought, ever so slightly put out as I joined them,
yet he need not have, for whatever my failings I flattered myself I was
not quite such a fool as Trask, and consequently knew when I was not
wanted. Beryl, on the other hand, did not give even the most subtle
indication of disturbance; but then, after all, women are much better
actors than we are.
"Had a good ride?" I asked carelessly, dropping the bridle rein on the
horse's neck, and shielding a match with my hands to light a pipe.
"Er--yes. Jolly," answered Pentridge. But Beryl said--
"I don't think there's much chance of anything going wrong on the place
while you're about, Kenrick. Why, you're as good as ten policemen."
"Don't know if that's to be taken as a compliment after the way I've
heard some of you talk of that useful force," I answered with a laugh.
"Why, of course it is. But you are really too good about it. You might
take it easy now and then."
"Oh, that's all right," I rejoined in would-be airy tone. "Best thing
in the world for me. I enjoy it."
Beryl's large eyes, deep with one of those strange, unfathomable glances
in which she sometimes indulged, were full on my face. I fancied
Pentridge was making an effort not to fidget uneasily. Well, I was not
going to be a marplot; and flattered myself there was nothing of the
dog-in-the-manger about me, as I replied--
"Well, I shall have to leave you now. By the time I get to the
vee-kraal it will be counting-in time. And the oftener Notuba's sheep
are counted, the better, in my opinion."
I fancied that Pentridge's face cleared, for he knew that the course I
now proposed to pursue would take me away at right angles from their
line of march, viz. the main road. But the same did not hold good of
Beryl.
"I thought you were going to ride home with us," she said; and if the
tone was not one of genuine disappointment, why then she was even a
better actress than I had at first reckoned her.
"I wish I could," I answered. "But now Brian's away, you know! You see
it's a matter I take a pride in."
"Yes, I know you do," she said; and there was that in her way of saying
it that brought back all the old time.
"Well then, `duty calls,'" I rejoined, forcing a laugh. "So long. We
shall meet again in the vast length of an hour or so."
As I turned my horse and struck into the bush path I prided myself on my
own acting powers. In point of fact, I had no intention of going to the
vee-kraal--none whatever. There was no necessity to, seeing I had
counted out there that same morning and had found the count correct.
But `two's company, three's a crowd' if a threadbare, is eke a wholesome
axiom, and I did not choose, under the circumstances, to constitute the
crowd. But it was time I broke off from them if I wanted to keep up my
role; yet I could not help speculating as to what had transpired during
that ride. Had anything? From their looks as I joined them, it might
have. Or from Pentridge's look when I branched off, it might yet be to
come. But then in that case, why did Beryl so genuinely wish me to
accompany them the rest of the way? Well, well. Time would show.