The town of Port Lamport was picturesquely situated on a wide bend of
the Umtirara River. It contained a population of about fifteen
hundred--whites, that is--and was the seat of magistracy for the
surrounding district.
In former times Fort Lamport had been one of the more important of a
chain of military posts extending along what was then the Kafir
frontier, but after a series of long and harassing wars, resulting in
the removal of those troublesome neighbours further eastward, Fort
Lamport, in common with other military posts, was abandoned as such. A
town, however, had sprung up around it, and this, as a centre of
commerce, and also of native trade--for there were still large native
locations in the surrounding district--throve apace.
It was not much of a place to look at; and in its main features differed
little, if at all, from any other up-country township. The houses,
mostly one-storied, were all squat and ugly. There were half a dozen
churches and chapels, also squat and ugly. There were several hotels,
and four or five native canteens. There were the public offices and
gaol, these being the old fort buildings, converted to that use. There
were the usual half-dozen streets--long, straggling, and very dusty--and
the usual market square, also very dusty; the average number of general
stores--dealing in anything, from a pianoforte to a pot of blacking--and
the average number of waggons and spans of oxen standing half the day in
front of them. As for the good citizens--well, of course, they
considered their town the foremost in the Colony, and, on the whole,
were not much more given to strife and litigation among themselves than
the inhabitants of a small community generally are.
But if the town itself was unattractive, its environment was not, with
its background of rounded hills, their slopes covered with dense forest,
while above and beyond rose the higher peaks of the Umtirara range.
In the smoking-room of one of the hotels above mentioned lounged Renshaw
Fanning. It was the hot and drowsy hour immediately succeeding
luncheon, and he was nodding over the _Fort Lamport Courier_, a typical
sheet, which managed to supply news to its constituent world a week or
so after the said news had become public property through other mediums.
Small wonder, then, that Renshaw felt drowsy, and that the paper should
slip from his relaxing grasp. Instinctively he made a clutch at it, and
the action roused him. His eye fell upon a paragraph which he had
overlooked--
"Horrible Murder by Escaped Convicts."
With the fascination which a sensational subject never altogether fails
to inspire, drowsy as he felt, he ran his eye down the paragraph.
"No less than seven desperadoes succeeded in making their escape from
the Kowie convict station last Monday under circumstances of
considerable daring. While the gang was on its way to the scene of its
labours in charge of one white and two native constables armed with
loaded rifles, these scoundrels, evidently acting in concert, managed to
overpower and disarm their guardians at one stroke. Leaving the latter
terribly beaten about the head, and half dead, and taking their rifles
and cartridges, they made off into the bush. The remainder of the gang,
though they rendered no assistance, seemed not eager to re-taste the
sweets of liberty, for instead of following the example of their
comrades they returned quietly to the town and reported the incident.
Next morning early, the runaways visited an outlying vij-kraal belonging
to a Dutch farmer named Van Wyk, and there perpetrated a peculiarly
atrocious murder. The vij-kraal was in charge of a Hottentot herd, who,
hearing a noise in the kraal, ran out of his hut just as the scoundrels
were making off with two sheep. He gave chase, when suddenly, and
without any warning, one of them turned round and shot him through the
chest. The whole gang then returned, dragged out the unfortunate man's
wife and three children, and deliberately butchered them one after the
other in cold blood. The bodies were found during the day by the owner
of the place, who came upon them quite unexpectedly. They were lying
side by side, with their throats cut from ear to ear; and he describes
it as the most horrible and sickening sight he ever beheld. The herd
himself, though mortally wounded, had lived long enough to make a
statement, which places the identity of the atrocious miscreants beyond
all doubt. It may interest our readers to learn that among the runaways
were the two Kafirs, Muntiwa and Booi, who were tried at the Circuit
Court recently held here, and sentenced to seven years' hard labour each
for stock-stealing. The rest were Hottentots and Bastards.
[Half-bloods are thus termed in Cape Colony parlance.] At the same time
we feel it a duty to warn our readers, and especially those occupying
isolated farms in the Umtirara range, to keep a sharp look-out, as it is
by no means unlikely that these two scoundrels may hark back to their
old retreat, and with their gang perhaps do considerable mischief before
they are finally run to earth."
Not one atom of drowsiness in Renshaw now. The sting of the above
paragraph, like that of the scorpion, lay in the tail. His blood ran
cold. Heavens! That household of unprotected women! For Christopher
Selwood was away from home on a week's absence, visiting a distant
property of his, and Sellon, by way of a change and seeing the country,
had accompanied him. Renshaw himself had ridden into Fort Lamport the
previous day on urgent business of his own--nothing less than to
interview a possible purchaser of his far-away desert farm. Under
ordinary circumstances, it was no uncommon thing to leave the household
without male protection for a day or two, or even longer. But now--good
heavens!
He glanced at the date of the newspaper. There should be a later one,
he said to himself. Feverishly he hunted about for it, trying to hope
that it might contain intelligence of the recapture of the runaways.
Ah, there it was! With trembling hands he tore open the double sheet,
and glanced down the columns.
"The Escaped Convicts.
"Our surmise has proved correct. The runaways have taken refuge in
the Umtirara range, from whose dense and rugged fastnesses they will,
we fear, long be able to defy the best efforts of the wholly
inadequate police force at present at the disposal of the district.
They entered a farmer's house on the lower drift, yesterday, during
the owner's absence, and by dint of threats induced his wife and
daughters to give them up all the firearms in the house. They got
possession of two guns and a revolver, and a quantity of ammunition,
and decamped in the direction of the mountains. It is a mercy they
did not maltreat the inmates."
The cold perspiration started forth in beads upon the reader's forehead.
The event recorded had occurred yesterday; the newspaper was of
to-day's date. He might yet be in time. But would he be? It was three
o'clock. Sunningdale was distant thirty-five miles. By the hardest
riding he could not arrive before dark, for the road was bad in parts,
and his horse was but an indifferent one.
In exactly five minutes he was in the saddle and riding rapidly down the
street. It crossed his mind that he was totally unarmed, for in the
settled parts of the Colony it is quite an exceptional thing to carry
weapons. He could not even turn into the nearest store and purchase a
six-shooter, for no such transaction can take place without a
magistrate's permit--to obtain which would mean going out of his way,
possibly delay at the office, should that functionary chance to be
engaged at the time. No, he could not afford to lose a minute.
It was a hot afternoon. The sun glared fiercely down as he rode over
the dozen miles of open undulating country which lay between the town
and the first line of wooded hills. A quarter of an hour's off-saddle
at a roadside inn--a feverish quarter of an hour, spent with his watch
in his hand. Then on again.
Soon he was among the hills. Away up a diverging kloof lay a Boer
homestead, about a mile distant. Should he turn off to it and try and
borrow a weapon, or, at any rate, a fresh horse, and warn the inmates?
Prudence answered No. Two miles out of his road, delay in the middle,
and all on the purest chance. On, on!