"Now, young fellows. Bring along your traps this way. Got anything to
declare?"
The voice proceeded from a bluff hearty individual wearing a thick
grizzled beard and a brass-buttoned coat. He was standing in the
doorway of the Custom-house.
"Oh, hang it, I don't know," answered Maitland, peevishly, and looking
around rather wildly. "Those niggers have cleared out every mortal
thing we possess. What they've done with them, Heaven only knows.
There doesn't seem to be any one to look after one's things in this
beast of a place."
The official burst into a loud laugh.
"Any one to look after your things!" he echoed. "You've got to do that
yourself, sonny, here. But we are going to do that too."
"I wish you had said so before," was the ill-tempered reply. "Well,
then, I have got two portmanteaus, a saddle-case and two gun-cases; a
hatbox, a handbag, and two bundles of wraps."
"All right. Step in here," said the official, leading the way inside.
The luggage was all piled on a counter, and presently Harry, to his
intense disgust, found himself nearly five pounds the poorer, which
amount he had contributed to the Colonial revenue as duty upon his guns,
saddle, and a few other small sundries; while Gerard, whose outfit was
of a more modest order, came off considerably lighter.
"Going up-country, mister?" said the official, as, the examination over,
he lit his pipe and strolled into the air again.
"Yes," answered Gerard. "We want to get to Pietermaritzburg first,
though."
"Going to join the Police, maybe?"
"Well, I have at times thought about that, if nothing better turns up.
By the way, perhaps you could tell us of some place here where they
would put us up, at a low figure, for the two or three days we are here.
These hotels run you up such a bill."
"So they do. I can, as it happens, send you to a place where you'll
save the `chips,' at any rate. But maybe you'll find it a bit roughish.
Wayne's, between this and the town--almost in the town. They take in
boarders there, mostly working-chaps and small storemen, but all decent
respectable fellows. But Wayne won't charge you more than half what an
hotel will; and if you don't mind it being a bit rough, you can't do
better than go there. You can mention I sent you."
"That'll do us first rate," said Gerard.
"All right. I'll send a couple of boys up with your traps on a trolley.
Oh, here's one just starting up town."
And hailing two of the native hands, he spoke to them volubly in the
Zulu language, with the result that our friends' luggage was loaded up
there and then upon the vehicle.
"Good-bye, and good luck to you, if we don't meet again. You'll find a
tramcar outside the yard gates," said the jolly official, holding out
his hand.
"Good-bye, and many thanks," replied Gerard, giving it a hearty shake.
An example which Harry Maitland followed, but minus the heartiness.
"What a fellow you are, Ridgeley!" fumed Harry, as soon as they were
alone together. "What sort of a dog-hole is it that that cad is sending
us to? Why, he himself said it was full of navvies and counter-jumpers.
Hanged if I go there! I'm going to the Royal."
"You must please yourself, of course, Harry," was the perfectly
good-humoured reply. "Unfortunately I can't afford to do that. I've
none too much cash as it is, and when that's gone, I don't see the
slightest prospect of getting any more until I can make it myself. So,
as I've got to rough it anyhow, I may as well begin now, and save the
`chips' at the same time. It won't do you any harm either. Try it, for
one night at any rate."
The other sulkily acquiesced. The fact was he did not care to cut
adrift from Gerard just then. He felt very much a fish out of water, in
that strange country; were he alone, he would feel ten times more so.
So comfort must give way to companionship, and he made no further
objections.
A few inquiries soon brought them to the object of their search--a long
low house standing back from the road. It was roofed with corrugated
iron, and on each side were wings containing apparently bedrooms,
opening onto the high _stoep_, for the doors stood wide open. In front
of the house was a barren-looking garden, shaded by a couple of
eucalyptus trees, growing one in each corner.
As they swung back the wooden gate which opened into the garden, the
owner came out onto the _stoep_. He was a tall, loosely hung man, with
the sallow complexion characteristic of the dwellers in the
semi-tropical coast country of Natal.
"Good day, gentlemen. Did you want to see me? I am Wayne."
Briefly Gerard explained the object of their visit.
"I don't quite know what to say," said Wayne. "We don't care as a rule
to take in boarders for so short a time, besides being pretty full up
just now. However, as you're new to the country, we'll do the best we
can for you, if you can manage with a room between you, that is; it's
not a very big one at that. Here it is."
He showed them into one of the rooms aforesaid, opening onto the
_stoep_. It certainly was not palatial, being about twelve feet square.
Its fittings consisted of a small iron bedstead, a ditto washstand with
a zinc basin and ewer, a rather dilapidated chair, a few pegs, and a
cupboard.
"But there's only one bed, and even that is too small for two people,"
cried Harry, in dismay.
The proprietor laughed.
"That's so. One of you will have to shake down on the floor. You can
toss up which it's to be."
"It will do us all right," said Gerard. "Now about terms."
The man named a figure which seemed reasonable enough.
"You see, we could put you in lower if you were going to stop. As it is
it wouldn't pay us."
"I see. We are quite satisfied," said Gerard.
"Right. Maybe you'd like to stroll up into the town a bit. Tea is at
seven. So long!"
"Pretty offhand, that chap," remarked Harry, as they walked along the
broad dusty road towards the town.
Lines of houses, similar to their new abode, and all built apart in
their own grounds, stood on each side of the road, behind hedges of
tamarisk or pomegranate. Tall bananas hung out their feathery tufts,
and the verandahs twined with cactus or jessamine looked cool and
inviting. A stretch of flat marshy land, extending to the blue waters
of the land-locked bay, was still dotted with shaggy tufts of the
"forest primeval."
But the streets showed plenty of life in all its human varieties, black
or white. The red or yellow dresses of the Indian coolies made quite a
glow of colour in the dusty streets. Here and there a tall head-ringed
native from some inland kraal strode down the street, his head in the
air, and majestic in the proud possession of a rather cloudy check
shirt, his kerries on his shoulder, and a bevy of his obedient womenkind
following in his wake. At these original lords of the soil Gerard could
not but look with considerable interest, as he noted with approval the
massive limbs and stately bearing which seemed to raise the scantily
clad savage a head and shoulders above the groups of slightly built,
effeminate Orientals through which he somewhat disdainfully took his
way. Whites, sallow-complexioned townspeople, there were too, standing
about exchanging conversation--rather listlessly, for the close of a hot
summer day in Durban is apt to find men not a little languid--and here
and there a bronzed planter or farmer cantering down the street, bound
for his country home among the sugar-canes or the bush.
A couple of hours' stroll, and our two young friends began to feel a
little of the enervating influence of the hot moist climate.
Accordingly, having hailed a tramcar, they were soon set down at the
door of their new lodgings.
The evening meal had already begun as they entered. Some seven or eight
men, of the class described by the friendly Customs official, were
seated at a long table, making great play with their knives and forks.
The landlord sat at one end of the table and his wife at the other. The
latter, a wooden-faced, middle-aged person, pointed to two seats which
had been kept for the new boarders, and subsided again into silence.
The other inmates, after a furtive stare, resumed their knife-and-fork
play.
The meal, though plain, was extremely good. It consisted of tea, roast
mutton, and potatoes, followed by some splendid pineapples. There was
also boiled Indian corn served up in the ear, and plenty of bread and
jam.
"Never ate `green mealies' before, eh, mister?" sung out Wayne from the
other end of the table, noticing that Harry half shied at the edible in
question. "You just try one; you'll find them first rate."
Some one at the same time handed him the dish. The tender, smoking ears
of corn looked tempting enough. Harry helped himself to one, and
without much thinking what he was doing, put it endways into his mouth,
and took a bite. A shout of laughter went up from the men. They had
been furtively watching him, on the look-out for this. Harry reddened
with anger, then tried to look dignified and indifferent.
"Never mind, mister," cried Wayne, reassuringly. "You ain't the first
by a long chalk who has to learn how to eat green mealies. Half these
chaps grinning here did just the same thing at first. Why, Robertson
there, alongside you, bit the mealie cob clean in half, and then said it
seemed rather dry sort of forage--eh, Robertson?"
"That's just a fact, Wayne," answered the man referred to, a tall,
good-humoured young mechanic, seated next to Gerard, and with whom the
latter had already been having some conversation.
The incident led to a good deal of chaff and bantering recrimination
among the men themselves, during the progress of which Harry managed to
smooth down his ruffled feelings.
Supper over, a move was made outside. Some of the men started off for
the town to amuse themselves for the evening, while the others remained
quietly at home, smoking their pipes in the verandah. After the noise
and steamy heat of the dining-room, this was an example our two friends
were not sorry to follow.
"Well, Harry, you can have the bedstead; I'll take the floor," said
Gerard, as a couple of hours later they found themselves in possession
of their room. "I feel like sleeping anywhere, I'm so tired."
"I don't," grumbled the other, on whom the dearth of comfort, together
with the uncongeniality of the position, was beginning to tell. "I feel
more inclined to take the first ship home again than to do anything
else, I can tell you."
"Pooh, man, don't be so easily put off! I suppose that's what most
fellows think at first, though."
Gerard soon dropped off to sleep. Tired as he was, however, and with
every disposition to adapt himself to circumstances, in less than two
hours he awoke. The heat of the room, notwithstanding that the window
was wide open, was suffocating, and, added to this, he awoke with the
sensation of being devoured alive. A subdued groan from his companion,
who was tossing restlessly upon his bed, caught his ear.
"Hallo, Harry! what's the row?"
"Ugh! I was wondering how long you would stand it. I'm being eaten--
dragged out of bed. These infernal mosquitoes!"
That was at the bottom of the mischief, then. In the silence following
on his companion's words, Gerard could hear the shrill trumpet of more
than one of these nocturnal pests, winging his way aloft, to lie hidden
in some secure corner of the ceiling until quiet should once more
prevail, and he could again descend to browse upon his victims to his
heart's content and the repletion of his skin.
"Oh, that's it, is it!" cried Gerard, striking a light with alacrity.
"By Jove, I'm bitten all over!" he went on, examining his hands and
chest, and also becoming aware of the existence of several lumps upon
his head and face.
"So am I," groaned Harry. "I haven't been able to snatch a wink of
sleep this blessed night. Just look at the brutes!"
In the candlelight, some half-dozen of the tiny venomous insects could
be seen floating in the air. A good many more were on the ceiling.
"Why, hang it, I always thought they gave one mosquito curtains in
countries like this!" said Gerard, "and--why, Harry, you've got one.
How is it we didn't spot the thing before?"
"Have I? Where? What--this thing?"
"Yes, of course. Let's see what it's good for."
There was a fold of gauze netting at the head of the bedstead. This, on
further investigation, was found to be large enough to protect the head
and shoulders of the sleeper, and Gerard duly arranged it as best he
knew how for the benefit of his companion.
"There you are, old chap. Now you'll be all right--only it's rather
like shutting the stable door after the horse is stolen. I'll tuck my
head under the sheet, and dodge them that way."
He returned to his shakedown, and put out the light. He was just dozing
off, when another exclamation on the part of his companion aroused him.
"What's the row now?" he cried.
"Row? I should think there was. Just listen to that fellow next door
`sawing planks.'"
A shrill, strident, rasping snore came through the partition, which was
constructed of very thin boarding. A most exasperating snore withal,
and one calculated to drive a light sleeper to the verge of frenzy.
"Well, I'm afraid we can do nothing against that," said Gerard,
ruefully.
Nor could they. And what with the stifling heat, the mosquito bites,
and that maddening snore, our two young friends had a very bad night of
it indeed, and but little sleep fell to their lot. Harry Maitland,
fagged and disgusted, was not slow to air his grievances to the full the
next morning on meeting Wayne. But that unfeeling individual only
laughed.
"So!" he said. "Yes, it's always that way. Mosquitoes are always death
on a new man out from home. They don't think much of us old stagers
when they can get fresh blood. But never mind. You'll soon get used to
that."
Which was all the sympathy they met with.