It seemed as though the suspicions about the designs of Groot Piet and
Lieutenant Gobo were groundless, as for two weeks they trekked on
without an obstacle, though Frank found it necessary to check the
growing impertinence of the Kaffirs by knocking Klaas down out of hand
one morning, and by flogging the leader with a doubled rheim--a hint
which brought about the proper degree of respect due by a native to a
white man. They reached the rolling bush country without further
incident, and found greater objects of interest in the diversity of
animal life.
One evening they drew up on a gentle rise above a river, and found
themselves in the neighbourhood of a Boer trek. About thirty tent
waggons, gleaming white in the dark, were drawn up in ranks of ten,
their desselbooms all pointing to the north, and the space around
thronged with troops of cattle and herds of goats and sheep. This was a
party of "Doppers," shifting ground to get away from the vain delights
and irritating chatter of the uitlanders, who had invaded the South in
the wake of the gold miners. Their austere piety had risen in arms, and
they were now in search of a remote spot where their eyes would not be
offended by the spectacle of ungodly merriment. Their thin nasal notes
as they chanted an evening hymn cut through the air fraught with a
spirit of hopeless despondency at the wickedness of all things human;
but when the singing was over they allowed their morbid curiosity to
draw them to the solitary waggon where one lovely woman, in outlandish
costume, sat laughing with two of the despised uitlanders. The men,
with their dark sombre faces, drew near to offer the accustomed
hand-shake, but the women stood aloof, the younger ones giggling under
their linen kapjes, and the elder standing stolidly, their hands folded
in their aprons.
"Who are you, and whence do you come, if I may be bold enough to ask?"
was the first question of the male spokesman; and when Hume had
courteously responded, there was one word spoken, and that was "tabak."
A roll of tobacco was produced, plugs cut off, and shaved against the
balls of big thumbs, all scarred with knife cuts and blackened with
tobacco. The fragments were solemnly rolled between the broad palms,
the pipes filled, and lit with coals from the fire; and the best flavour
can only be drawn from tobacco by a wood coal.
Then they squatted down on their heels and stared solemnly, making
observations enough to supply them with slow conversations for a week on
the frivolous manners of the strangers.
Hume answered all the questions, and then asked for information himself,
from which he learnt that they had arrived at a good place for a halt,
grass being good and water plentiful, with game in fair numbers a few
miles distant from the road. They were told of a vlei five miles off,
where some of the large antelopes gathered at sunrise, and getting the
direction from the stars, Frank and Webster determined to walk there
that night, so as to lose no time.
After leaving a note with Klaas, now her humble slave, for Miss
Anstrade, who had retired some time previously to her tent, and after
seeing the oxen tied up to the trek-tow, they set off with their guns,
guided by the stars. Frank, with his old hunter's instinct fully
revived, walked along through the deepening gloom without a tumble, but
Webster damaged his clothing and his skin by repeatedly running into
thorn-bushes, whose long, white thorns, curved like the talons of an
eagle, laid fast hold of him.
Now and then a startled antelope would bound away, or a porcupine or
ant-bear roll grunting across their track, while the notes of plovers
and ducks flying overhead broke complainingly on the quiet air, and the
far-off barking of dogs at the "Doppers'" camp accentuated the silence.
Before morning they saw the faint, ghostly gleam of water below them,
and lay down to wait for the first break of day, when they rose to take
their bearings, so that they should not miss the route on their return,
a catastrophe very likely to happen even to experienced hunters in the
bush country. Separating, they each selected a hiding-place by the
water, and before long the cracks of their rifles rang out sharply, Hume
securing a fine sable antelope, while Webster, over-estimating the size
of a buck, which loomed large in the mist, had no luck. After shifting
ground, and walking for an hour, they each met with success. Some time
was spent in gralloching the quarry, after which a fire was lit; they
had a bathe, and then roasted a steak of venison on the glowing coals.
Then they covered the bodies with bushes, and picking up their course,
returned to the outspan, which they reached at noon.
They stood at the border of the bush struck with dismay and surprise.
The open space so crowded the night before was now deserted. A few thin
streaks of smoke rose from a number of white ash-heaps, two or three
ringed crows croaked and gabbled hoarsely from a withered thorn, but
there was no other sign of life.
"Why," said Webster, tilting his broad hat back, "you've made the wrong
port."
Hume walked out into the open, and stood by a heap of ashes.
"This is the spot," he said; "here are the marks of our scherm poles;
and there," pointing to the dent of a small heel, "is her spoor."
"Then, where is she?"
Hume pointed to the broad tracks of the waggon-wheels leading north.
"What the devil! then she has moved away. Those swabs of niggers have
mutinied and cleared. And we were fools enough to trust them. Thank
God, they can't be far."
"No, they can't be far."
"Then come on, man; with a trail like those wheel-marks before us we can
overtake them before dark;" and without more words, Webster strode
rapidly on, soon to disappear into the waggon road, which struck into
the bush beyond.
Hume, however, stood by the dead fire, resting on his gun as though
stupefied, but his keen eyes, ranging over every inch of ground, belied
this. So far from being dazed, his faculties were fully alert, and
presently he began quartering the ground in widening circles until he
reached the edge of the bush, when he stopped under a spreading mimosa
and keenly examined the ground beneath. Stooping, he picked up a
half-consumed cigarette, and then went at a trot after Webster, whom he
met returning in a state of white fury.
"You take it very coolly," growled Webster, "lingering like this, when
every minute is precious. The trail has been blotted out by a thousand
hoof-marks, and there is no more sign than a ship makes on the water.
Why the devil don't you suggest something?"
"Look here," said Hume, holding out the fragment of cigarette.
"This is no time to trifle," said Webster, eyeing the thing impatiently.
"No Boer smokes cigarettes."
"Well?"
"Portuguese do."
"What! Good heavens! Has Gobo taken her off?"
Hume ground his teeth.
"I knew it," he said; "I knew when those fellows took the trouble to
speak to our boys on the sly that there was some devilment afoot, but I
thought they had missed their chance of playing some spiteful trick on
us and had gone back. They must have had us in view all along until the
opportunity offered. Last night their chance came, and they have gone
off under cover of the `Dopper' trail."
"If they are with the `Doppers' we can easily overtake them."
"No; they would keep ahead of the trek for a mile or so to hide their
spoor, then they would fall behind and make off by some side-path or
through the veld. Now, you skirt along the left side of the road,
keeping watch for any waggon-track turning aside, while I go along the
right."
They went on rapidly, in complete silence, with bent brows, and a fierce
eagerness at the thought of soon meting out punishment. The task was
not difficult. For the greater part the road passed through thickets of
mimosas near enough together to prevent a lumbering waggon from passing;
at other parts there were small banks where the ground had been cut into
by the heavy wheels, and these would at once have shown signs where a
waggon turned off; and, at long intervals only, were stretches of hard,
sun-baked ground, on which the track of wheels could only be faintly
seen.
Mile after mile they went, kicking up the dust, which stained their
clothing red and caked on their hands and faces, until their eyes glared
as if from masks. Sometimes they would pause to straighten themselves
and to rub their eyes because of the strain upon them, and once Webster
gave a shout; but Hume, after one glance at wheel-tracks a week old,
went swiftly on, and gradually their shadows lengthened out before them
as the sun stood lower and the great heat was tempered by cool breezes.
At last Hume made a sign to Webster, and turned sharply off to the
right, along the track of a solitary waggon, and just at dusk they saw
the gleam of white, amid a cluster of thorns. Forgetting their
weariness, they started off at a run, which did not slacken until they
came within a hundred yards, when Hume, with a gasp, drew up.
The waggon was theirs truly; but there was an unusual silence about. No
fire shed its welcome light, the sails were down, the oxen were away,
and there were no signs of life.
Slowly they went up, with a nameless fear at their hearts, to find the
tent empty, and the contents tumbled about and rifled.