GONE!
I wonder if many married couples are quite as happy as we found
ourselves. Cynics, a growing class, declare that few illusions can
survive a honeymoon. Well, I do not know about it, for I only married
once, and can but speak from my limited experience. But certainly our
illusion, or rather the great truth of which it is the shadow, did
survive, as to this day it survives in my heart across all the years of
utter separation, and across the unanswering gulf of gloom.
But complete happiness is not allowed in this world even for an hour.
As our marriage day had been shadowed by the scene which has been
described, so our married life was shadowed by its own sorrow.
Three days after our wedding Mr. Carson had a stroke. It had been long
impending, now it fell. We came into the centre hut to dinner and found
him lying speechless on the couch. At first I thought that he was
dying, but this was not so. On the contrary, within four days he
recovered his speech and some power of movement. But he never recovered
his memory, though he still knew Stella, and sometimes myself.
Curiously enough he remembered little Tota best of all three, though
occasionally he thought that she was his own daughter in her childhood,
and would ask her where her mother was. This state of affairs lasted
for some seven months. The old man gradually grew weaker, but he did
not die. Of course his condition quite precluded the idea of our
leaving Babyan Kraals till all was over. This was the more distressing
to me because I had a nervous presentiment that Stella was incurring
danger by staying there, and also because the state of her health
rendered it desirable that we should reach a civilized region as soon
as possible. However, it could not be helped.
At length the end came very suddenly. We were sitting one evening by
Mr. Carson’s bedside in his hut, when to our astonishment he sat up and
spoke in a strong, full voice.
“I hear you,” he said. “Yes, yes, I forgive you. Poor woman! you too
have suffered,” and he fell back dead.
I have little doubt that he was addressing his lost wife, some vision
of whom had flashed across his dying sense. Stella, of course, was
overwhelmed with grief at her loss. Till I came her father had been her
sole companion, and therefore, as may be imagined, the tie between them
was much closer than is usual even in the case of father and daughter.
So deeply did she mourn that I began to fear for the effect upon her
health. Nor were we the only ones to grieve; all the natives on the
settlement called Mr. Carson “father,” and as a father they lamented
him. The air resounded with the wailing of women, and the men went
about with bowed heads, saying that “the sun had set in the heavens,
now only the Star (Stella) remained.” Indaba-zimbi alone did not mourn.
He said that it was best that the Inkoos should die, for what was life
worth when one lay like a log?—moreover, that it would have been well
for all if he had died sooner.
On the following day we buried him in the little graveyard near the
waterfall. It was a sad business, and Stella cried very much, in spite
of all I could do to comfort her.
That night as I sat outside the hut smoking—for the weather was hot,
and Stella was lying down inside—old Indaba-zimbi came up, saluted, and
squatted at my feet.
“What is it, Indaba-zimbi?” I said.
“This, Macumazahn. When are you going to trek towards the coast?”
“I don’t know,” I answered. “The Star is not fit to travel now, we must
wait awhile.”
“No, Macumazahn, you must not wait, you must go, and the Star must take
her chance. She is strong. It is nothing. All will be well.”
“Why do you say so? why must we go?”
“For this reason, Macumazahn,” and he looked cautiously round and spoke
low. “The baboons have come back in thousands. All the mountain is full
of them.”
“I did not know that they had gone,” I said.
“Yes,” he answered, “they went after the marriage, all but one or two;
now they are back, all the baboons in the world, I think. I saw a whole
cliff black with them.”
“Is that all?” I said, for I saw that he had something behind. “I am
not afraid of a pack of baboons.”
“No, Macumazahn, it is not all. The Babyan-frau, Hendrika, is with
them.”
Now nothing had been heard or seen of Hendrika since her expulsion, and
though at first she and her threats had haunted me somewhat, by degrees
she to a great extent had passed out of my mind, which was fully
preoccupied with Stella and my father-in-law’s illness. I started
violently. “How do you know this?” I asked.
“I know it because I saw her, Macumazahn. She is disguised, she is
dressed up in baboon skins, and her face is stained dark. But though
she was a long way off, I knew her by her size, and I saw the white
flesh of her arm when the skins slipped aside. She has come back,
Macumazahn, with all the baboons in the world, and she has come back to
do evil. Now do you understand why you should trek?”
“Yes,” I said, “though I don’t see how she and the baboons can harm us,
I think that it will be better to go. If necessary we can camp the
waggons somewhere for a while on the journey. Hearken, Indaba-zimbi:
say nothing of this to the Star; I will not have her frightened. And
hearken again. Speak to the headmen, and see that watchers are set all
round the huts and gardens, and kept there night and day. To-morrow we
will get the waggons ready, and next day we will trek.”
He nodded his white lock and went to do my bidding, leaving me not a
little disturbed—unreasonably so, indeed. It was a strange story. That
this woman had the power of conversing with baboons I knew.[*] That was
not so very wonderful, seeing that the Bushmen claim to be able to do
the same thing, and she had been nurtured by them. But that she had
been able to muster them, and by the strength of her human will and
intelligence muster them in order to forward her ends of revenge,
seemed to me so incredible that after reflection my fears grew light.
Still I determined to trek. After all, a journey in an ox waggon would
not be such a very terrible thing to a strong woman accustomed to
roughing it, whatever her state of health. And when all was said and
done I did not like this tale of the presence of Hendrika with
countless hosts of baboons.
[*] For an instance of this, see Anderson’s “Twenty-five Years in a
Waggon,” vol. i. p. 262.—Editor.
So I went in to Stella, and without saying a word to her of the baboon
story, told her I had been thinking matters over, and had come to the
conclusion that it was our duty to follow her father’s instructions to
the letter, and leave Babyan Kraals at once. Into all our talk I need
not enter, but the end of it was that she agreed with me, and declared
that she could quite well manage the journey, saying, moreover, that
now that her dear father was dead she would be glad to get away.
Nothing happened to disturb us that night, and on the following morning
I was up early making preparations. The despair of the people when they
learned that we were going to leave them was something quite pitiable.
I could only console them by declaring that we were but on a journey,
and would return the following year.
“They had lived in the shadow of their father, who was dead,” they
declared; “ever since they were little they had lived in his shadow. He
had received them when they were outcasts and wanderers without a mat
to lie on, or a blanket to cover them, and they had grown fat in his
shadow. Then he had died, and the Star, their father’s daughter, had
married me, Macumazahn, and they had believed that I should take their
father’s place, and let them live in my shadow. What should they do
when there was no one to protect them? The tribes were kept from
attacking them by fear of the white man. If we went they would be eaten
up,” and so on. Alas! there was but too much foundation for their
fears.
I returned to the huts at mid-day to get some dinner. Stella said that
she was going to pack during the afternoon, so I did not think it
necessary to caution her about going out alone, as I did not wish to
allude to the subject of Hendrika and the baboons unless I was obliged
to. I told her, however, that I would come back to help her as soon as
I could get away. Then I went down to the native kraals to sort out
such cattle as had belonged to Mr. Carson from those which belonged to
the Kaffirs, for I proposed to take them with us. It was a large herd,
and the business took an incalculable time. At length, a little before
sundown, I gave it up, and leaving Indaba-zimbi to finish the job, got
on my horse and rode homewards.
Arriving, I gave the horse to one of the stable boys, and went into the
central hut. There was no sign of Stella, though the things she had
been packing lay about the floor. I passed first into our sleeping hut,
thence one by one into all the others, but still saw no sign of her.
Then I went out, and calling to a Kaffir in the garden asked him if he
had seen his mistress.
He answered “yes.” He had seen her carrying flowers and walking towards
the graveyard, holding the little white girl—my daughter—as he called
her, by the hand, when the sun stood “there,” and he pointed to a spot
on the horizon where it would have been about an hour and a half
before. “The two dogs were with them,” he added. I turned and ran
towards the graveyard, which was about a quarter of a mile from the
huts. Of course there was no reason to be anxious—evidently she had
gone to lay the flowers on her father’s grave. And yet I was anxious.
When I got near the graveyard I met one of the natives, who, by my
orders, had been set round the kraals to watch the place, and noticed
that he was rubbing his eyes and yawning. Clearly he had been asleep. I
asked him if he had seen his mistress, and he answered that he had not,
which under the circumstances was not wonderful. Without stopping to
reproach him, I ordered the man to follow me, and went on to the
graveyard. There, on Mr. Carson’s grave, lay the drooping flowers which
Stella had been carrying, and there in the fresh mould was the spoor of
Tota’s veldschoon, or hide slipper. But where were they?
I ran from the graveyard and called aloud at the top of my voice, but
no answer came. Meanwhile the native was more profitably engaged in
tracing their spoor. He followed it for about a hundred yards till he
came to a clump of mimosa bush that was situated between the stream and
the ancient marble quarries just over the waterfall, and at the mouth
of the ravine. Here he stopped, and I heard him give a startled cry. I
rushed to the spot, passed through the trees, and saw this. The little
open space in the centre of the glade had been the scene of a struggle.
There, in the soft earth, were the marks of three pairs of human
feet—two shod, one naked—Stella’s, Tota’s, and _Hendrika’s_. Nor was
this all. There, close by, lay the fragments of the two dogs—they were
nothing more—and one baboon, not yet quite dead, which had been bitten
in the throat by the dogs. All round was the spoor of numberless
baboons. The full horror of what had happened flashed into my mind.
My wife and Tota had been carried off by the baboons. As yet they had
not been killed, for if so their remains would have been found with
those of the dogs. They had been carried off. The brutes, acting under
the direction of that woman-monkey, Hendrika, had dragged them away to
some secret den, there to keep them till they died—or kill them!
For a moment I literally staggered beneath the terror of the shock.
Then I roused myself from my despair. I bade the native run and alarm
the people at the kraals, telling them to come armed, and bring me guns
and ammunition. He went like the wind, and I turned to follow the
spoor. For a few yards it was plain enough—Stella had been dragged
along. I could see where her heels had struck the ground; the child
had, I presumed, been carried—at least there were no marks of her feet.
At the water’s edge the spoor vanished. The water was shallow, and they
had gone along in it, or at least Hendrika and her victim had, in order
to obliterate the trail. I could see where a moss-grown stone had been
freshly turned over in the water-bed. I ran along the bank some way up
the ravine, in the vain hope of catching a sight of them. Presently I
heard a bark in the cliffs above me; it was answered by another, and
then I saw that scores of baboons were hidden about among the rocks on
either side, and were softly swinging themselves down to bar the path.
To go on unarmed as I was would be useless. I should only be torn to
pieces as the dogs had been. So I turned and fled back towards the
huts. As I drew near I could see that my messenger had roused the
settlement, for natives with spears and kerries in their hands were
running up towards the kraals. When I reached the hut I met old
Indaba-zimbi, who wore a very serious face.
“So the evil has fallen, Macumazahn,” he said.
“It has fallen,” I answered.
“Keep a good heart, Macumazahn,” he said again. “She is not dead, nor
is the little maid, and before they die we shall find them. Remember
this, Hendrika loves her. She will not harm her, or allow the babyans
to harm her. She will try to hide her away from you, that is all.”
“Pray God that we may find her,” I groaned. “The light is going fast.”
“The moon rises in three hours,” he answered; “we will search by
moonlight. It is useless to start now; see, the sun sinks. Let us get
the men together, eat, and make things ready. _Hamba gachla_. Hasten
slowly, Macumazahn.”
As there was no help, I took his advice. I could eat no food, but I
packed some up to take with us, and made ready ropes, and a rough kind
of litter. If we found them they would scarcely be able to walk. Ah! if
we found them! How slowly the time passed! It seemed hours before the
moon rose. But at last it did rise.
Then we started. In all we were about a hundred men, but we only
mustered five guns between us, my elephant roer and four that had
belonged to Mr. Carson.