"How is it you never married?" I asked of Abe on an evening after the
mealie cobs had been shelled, and we were too dead tired to brush the
husks from our hair.
"Me! Well, you see this yer cob. It's worth nothin', 'cos all the
mealies been shelled off. That's me--I'm a shelled cob, and wimmen folk
isn't got any use for that sort of bargain."
"But you told me the other day that you were thinking of marriage once.
That time, you know, when the Kaffirs smashed your furniture."
"Jes' so--the critturs. They broke a fine four-posted bed and a hull
lot o' chiney."
"And the lady."
"You see, bossie, she was gone on that four-poster and the chiney.
'Twasn't me she was thinkin' of nohow."
"Nonsense, Abe; you're too modest."
"Well, she forgot me, an' took up with a armchair an' a copper kettle
which belonged to young Buck Wittal, son to ole Bob. A armchair an' a
shiney kettle, that's what cut me out, sonny; but Buck went up the gum
'cos she would have a swing lookin'-glass. That's so! Wimmen is mighty
keen on the look o' things, an' that kettle fetched her. Them was
times!"
"Courting times?"
"Fighting times, sonny; all up an' down the country, in an' out the
kloofs, an' over the mountains, by gum. I tole you about that chief--
how I spoored him a full forty mile from the Chumie after Black 'Xmas?"
"Black 'Xmas!"
"You mean by that raising o' the voice you never yeard o' Black Xmas!
Well, well, the ignorance an' the vanity o' learnin' which takes no
account of the great happenings in your own country, and you come
swaggerin' about with your Greek turnips."
"I assure you I never heard of Black 'Xmas."
"Never yeard of the soldier settlers away up by the Chumie--them as were
planted there by Sir Harry Smith--of their wives and children, making
merry on Christmas Day, 1850--making merry with the old custom, and the
sounds of the laughing going out into the dark kloof, where the Kaffirs
crouched, eyeing them as they fingered their assegais. Lor' love you,
lad: when the poor little children were running at their games, and the
women were talking over their washing up, and the men at their pipes in
the quiet of the afternoon, the war shout broke suddenly from the wood.
There was stabbing, and a blaze, a great gasp, and the life went out of
them all that Christmas Day. That was Black Xmas--men, and women, and
children, and dogs, and every crawlin' crittur given to the assegai. I
were on my way there after stray cattle, and I yeard the cry of a little
child, sonny, and the sand went out o' young Abe Pike that day. I seed
it all--yes--lad, and I see it now in the nights, the stabbing of the
women and little ones."
"And what did you do, old man?"
"What did I do? I dunno, sonny--I dunno! I must a walked an' walked
all through the night, for the nex' morning I were away beyond the
Chumie in a deep kloof, without knowing how I came there. Then the cry
of the little one went out o' my ears and out of my eyes with the sight
of them leapin' devils about the burnin' houses, an' I saw the rifle in
my hand--for ther' came boomin' through the trees the sound of a Kaffir
singing from his chest. I found him in a clearin', stampin' with his
feet and swingin' his kerrie before the chief and his headmen seated all
aroun' against the trees, with their long pipes all agoin'. The blood
was still caked on his arms, an' I plunked him in the breast."
"You shot him? Good old Abe!"
"It were a ole muzzle-loader--one smooth, one rifle--and I shifted, but
it weren't long afor' they picked up my spoor, and in the fust rush I
could hear the rattle of assegais as they follered. Then it was quiet
in the kloof, an' I knew what a animile must feel when the hunter's
after him, or the tiger's tracking him down. Bymby I yeard the call of
the bush-dove every side, and I gave the call too at a venture, keepin'
my eye on a dark spot where the last cry came from. Sure enough I seed
the leaves tremble, and there was a show of red paint where the Kaffir
stood. That were the bush-dove, and he called again; then he came
steppin' along to the fern chump where I were hid, movin' like a shadder
with the whites of his eyes showin' as he glanced around. By gum, lad,
I thought it was all over, but another dove called an' he moved off. I
yeard the calls growin' softer an' softer, and I made a move to slip
away; but there's no gettin' to the bottom of a red Kaffir's cuteness."
"How is that?"
"Why, sonny; that chap never went off when he made as if he would. He
jes' slipped behind a tree, and when I ris my head out of them ferns he
druv his assegai at me, and it clean pinned my left arm to my side.
See, here's the scar;" and the old man rolled back the sleeve of his
worn shirt until a white scar was revealed on the fleshy part of the
upper arm.
"I fetched a groan, and he sprang out to belt me over the head, but I
kep' my senses, an' knocked the wind clear outer him with a straight
thrust of the muzzle. As he stood gasping, I give him back his own
assegai."
"You killed him?"
"Maybe he died; but Kaffirs is tough, and at the thrust he gave his cry,
standin' there with his legs wide apart, afore he sank among the ferns.
I turned an' ran, keeping down the little stream till I come to a
krantz, with the water slidin' down, an' I swung over, holdin' fast to a
monkey tow. I slid down fifty feet, and then let go, holdin' the rifle
high over head, and fell feet first inter a little round pool at the
bottom. It was a chance, sonny, but I kep' my bones sound and the
powder dry. I did that. I tell you young Abe Pike was some pumpkins.
Then I pushed on an' on till I went over a ridge into another kloof, an'
through that to another kop, standing up above the wood in a mass of
stone. I sat down in a cleft, and the weakness came on me from the loss
of blood and the want of food. Well, I tell you, sonny, I fit ag'inst
the weakness, an' with a spread of shirt, holdin' one end in my teeth, I
bound up the wound after plugging it with dirt. Right away I looked
over the country, an' I see'd to the right the smoke rising and across a
stretch of veld I seed a black patch movin'. 'Twere Kaffirs on the
march, an' following the directshun they were taking, I seed a white
speck to the left; a farmhouse, sonny, with a thin trail of smoke going
up from the one chimney."
"The Kaffirs were on their way to sack the place."
"They were that, and I set off to beat 'em. But look here, I said when
I started talking, I was going to tell you how I trekked the Kosa chief,
and here I been a' spinnin' on about another thing."
"Did you get to the house first?"
"What--me! I did that, sonny. I got there fust, an' there was nobody
in--not a one though the pot was on the fire. I went off with the pot
into a patch of mealies, and when the Kaffirs came up an' smashed things
I were eatin' pap outer the pot, yes, that's so."
"And did they find you?" I ventured after a long pause.
"That pap were good, but it wanted salt--it did that. So long, sonny,
so long," and the old man moved off to bed.