"'Look,' she said. That was all: 'look!'
"Her fingers and her palms were flayed and raw and oozed blood, but he simply glanced at them.
"'You should have learned to work before,' was all his answer. 'Every one pays for learning, and you pay late. Go back to the churn.'
"The next thing', of course, was that she was missing, but Jan Uys was not troubled. He mounted his horse and rode out along the Drifts Road, going quietly, with his pipe alight. It was the road by which he had brought her from her home, and he knew the girl would try to go to her mother. In a few miles he picked up her spoor, and found some of the sole of one of her shoes. A mimosa carried a shred of her dress, and in another place she had sat down. As he went farther, he found she had sat down in many places.
"'Good,' he said. 'She is tired, and soon I shall catch her.'
"He came up with her twenty miles along the road, sitting down again. Her hair was all about her shoulders, and her face was white, with the great eyes burning in it like those of a woman in a fever.
"'You are ready to come back?' he asked, sitting on his horse, smoking and scowling down on her.
"'What are you going to do with me?' she asked in a trembling voice.
"He laughed that short ugly laugh of his. 'You are a child,' he answered. 'I shall whip you.'
"Then she commenced to plead with him to let her go, to return without her, to spare her, to kill her. In the middle of it he leaned from the saddle, and caught hold of her arms and lifted her before him.
"'All this may stop,' he said, turning the horse. 'You have brought disgrace on me; you shall be punished.' And he carried her back.
"He did whip her—not brutally or terribly, I believe, as a man might do from wounded pride and revenge, but as a child is whipped, to warn it against future foolishness. And from the time of that beating the course of their life changed. She was no longer a child, but a very grave and silent woman, not prayerful at all, as might have been hoped, but just still and solemn. Dreadful, I call it. Then the young man Moore entered their lives.
"Jan Uys was making a dam right below the Hangklip. You know the dam: half of it is cut from the rock, and the water all comes into it from the end. It was not a matter of half a dozen Kafirs with spades, like most dams, but a business for dynamite and all kinds of ticklish and awkward work. So Jan wisely did not put his own fingers to it, but sent to the Rand for an Uitlander to come out and burst the rocks; and they sent him this young fellow, the Irishman Moore. He was a tall youth, with hair like some of the red in that sunset over yonder, and a most astonishing way of making you laugh only by talking about ordinary things. And when he joked anybody would laugh, even the Predikant, who was always preaching about the crackling of thorns under a pot. With him, in a black box like a little coffin, he had a machine he called a banjo, upon which he would play lewd and idolatrous music which was most pleasing to the ear; and he would sing songs while he played, which all ended with a yell. He was good at bursting the rocks, too. He would load holes full of dynamite in three or four places at once, and fetch tons of stone and earth out with each explosion. Jan Uys was pleased with him, for the young man cared nothing at all for his savage looks and ugly ways, and called him the Old Obadiah, who was a writer of the Bible.
"'My wife,' he told him, 'is a young woman, and sad. You must talk to her in the evenings and make her laugh.'
"The Irishman looked at him with a strange face. 'The poor creature needs a laugh,' he said.
"So he used to talk to her on the stoop in the evenings, while Jan sat within at his Bible, and heard the murmur of their talk without. More than once, too, he heard a sound that was no longer familiar to him—the sound of Dia's pleasant childish laughter, and he scowled at his book and told himself he was satisfied. I think, perhaps, he had sometimes seen himself as he was, an old hard man crushing the soul of a child. Vaguely, perhaps, and unwillingly, but still he saw it sometimes.
"This went on. The Irishman blew up his dynamite and talked with Dia and played with her. Jan, watching, saw the color had returned to her cheeks and the life to her eyes. He came into the kitchen once and she was singing. She stopped suddenly.
"'Why do you not go on?' he asked, with his little red eyes staring at her.
"She had nothing to say, and he went away, to go down to the dam. The Irishman was sitting on an ant-heap away in the sun, and Jan passed him without speaking, and walked down to the place of explosions. He was looking at the marks of fire on the rocks, when it seemed to him he heard a shout, and he saw, as he turned his head, that the Irishman was standing up. But he made no beck, and Jan walked along. When he looked again the young man had both hands to his head. Jan shaded his eyes to watch him.
"Moore walked a few paces to and fro, stood still, and then, with a start, commenced to run furiously down to where Jan was standing. He ran with long strides and very fast, and was soon beside the old man, and seized him by the arm.
"'Out of this!' he cried. 'Out of this! The holes are loaded, and ye've sixty seconds to save yer life.'
"Jan stood still. 'Why did you not tell me before?' he asked; but the other did not answer, but only dragged at his arm.
"Jan shook his hand off. 'I have a mind to stay,' he said in a calm voice. 'If Dia is made a widow, you will know how to look after her.'
"'And that's true!' cried the Irishman. 'But you shan't make a murderer of me.'
"And he drew back his fist and knocked the old man down. Catching him by the collar, he dragged him to the shelter of a big boulder, flung him close to it, and lay down on top of his body. In the next moment the blast went off, and the gust of fire and rocks and earth roared and whistled through the air above them. The sound struck them like a bludgeon, and they lay for a while, stunned and deafened, while pieces of stone slid and tinkled on the boulder that had sheltered them. At last they rose.
"'I made a mistake and I am glad,' said Jan.
"'Will you shake hands with me?'
"'I will not,' was the answer.
"'So be it. But there can be no need to tell Dia of this.'
"The Irishman nodded, and that afternoon, again, he and Dia were in the garden, throwing stones at a sardine-tin on a stick to see who could hit it first. Dia knocked it down easily, and Jan, sitting indoors with his coat off, heard them laughing.
"At supper that night he looked up to Dia.
"'This coffee has a sour taste,' he said.
"'Mine hasn't,' said the Irishman.
"'Try mine, then,' said Jan, and passed Dia his cup to hand to him. She fumbled in taking it and dropped it on the floor. The new cup that she poured out for him had no sour taste.
"For several days after that there was a sour taste in many things that he ate and drank, and he complained of it each time.
"'You must be getting ill,' Dia said.
"'It is possible,' he answered, watching her. 'I have felt very strange of late days.'
"He saw the color leave her cheeks, and a light come into her eyes.
"'What can it be?' he said. 'Should I have a doctor, do you think?'
"'I am afraid of doctors,' she answered. 'Let me give you some of my herb medicine.'
"He drank what she brought him and put the cup down.
"'I was hard to you once. Dia,' he said, 'I have been sorry since.'
"That night he sent a mounted Kafir for his brother, and when, at noon next day, that brother came, Dia and her Irishman were already gone. But Jan would not have them hunted.
"'I whipped her once,' he said, 'and I am paid for it.'
"His brother, a great simple soul, was dumbfounded.
"'Do you mean that she has poisoned you?' he demanded.
"The dying man shook his head.
"'They used to count the colors,' he said. 'There was much of love in the colors, but there was nothing of me. Let them go!'
"And so," concluded the Vrouw Grobelaar impressively, "he died, and it all came of counting the colors in the sunset, which is a warning to you, Katje—"
"To count colors," interrupted that maiden hotly. "I think the old wretch got just what he deserved."
The old yellow-fanged dog-baboon that was chained to a post in the yard had a dangerous trick of throwing stones. He would seize a piece of rock in two hands, stand erect and whirl round on his heels till momentum was obtained, and then—let go. The missile would fly like a bullet, and woe betide any one who stood in its way. The performance precluded any kind of aim; the stone was hurled off at any chance tangent: and it was bad luck rather than any kind of malice that guided one three-pound boulder through the window, across the kitchen, and into a portrait of Judas de Beer which hung on the wall not half a dozen feet from the slumbering Vrouw Grobelaar.
She bounced from her chair and ballooned to the door with a silent swift agility most surprising to see in a lady of her generous build, and not a sound did she utter. She was of good veld-bred fighting stock, which never cried out till it was hurt, and there was even something of compassion in her face as Frikkie jumped from the stoop with a twelve-foot thong in his hand. It was, after all, the baboon that suffered most, if his yells were any index to his feelings. Frikkie could smudge a fly ten feet off with just a flick of his whip, and all the tender parts of the accomplished animal came in for ruthless attention.
"He ought to be shot," was Frikkie's remark as he curled up the thong at the end of the discipline. "A baboon is past teaching if he has bad habits. He is more like a man than a beast."
The Vrouw Grobelaar seated herself in the stoop chair which by common consent was reserved for her use, and shook her head.
"Baboons are uncanny things," she answered slowly. "When you shoot them, you can never be quite sure how much murder there is in it. The old story is that some of them have souls and some not: and it is quite certain that they can talk when they will. You have heard them crying in the night sometimes. Well, you ask a Kafir what that means. Ask an old wise Kafir, not a young one that has forgotten the wisdom of the black people and learned the foolishness only of the white."
"What does it mean, tante?" It was I that put the question.Katje, too, seemed curious.
The old lady eyed me gloomily.
"If you were a landed Boer, instead of a kind of schoolmaster," she replied, witheringly, "you would not need to ask such a question. But I will tell you. A baboon may be wicked—look at that one showing his teeth and cursing—but he is not blind nor a fool. He runs about on the hills, and steals and fights and scratches, and all the time he has all the knowledge and twice the strength of a man, if it were not for the tail behind him and the hair on his body. So it is natural that sometimes he should be grieved to be such a mean thing as a baboon when he could be a useful kind of man if the men would let him. And at nights, particularly, when their troop is in laager and the young ones are on watch among the high rocks, it comes home to the best of them, and they sob and weep like young widows, pretending that they have pains inside so that the others shall not feel offended and turn on them. Any one may hear them in the kloofs on a windless night, and, I can tell you, the sound of their sorrow is pitiful."
Katje threw out a suggestion to console them with buckshot, and the Vrouw Grobelaar nodded with meaning.
"To hate baboons is well enough in the wife of a Burgher," she said sweetly. "I am glad to see there is so much fitness and wifeliness about you, since you will naturally spend all your life on farms."
Katje's flush was a distress signal. First blood to theVrouw.
"Baboons," continued the old lady, "are among a farmer's worst enemies. They steal and destroy and menace all the year round, but for all that there are many farmers who will not shoot or trap them. And these, you will notice, are always farmers of a ripe age and sense shaped by experience. They know, you may be sure. My stepsister's first husband, Shadrach van Guelder, shot at baboons once, and was so frightened afterwards that he was afraid to be alone in the dark."
There was a story toward, and no one moved.
"There were many Kafirs on his farm, which you have not seen," pursued the Vrouw Grobelaar, adjusting her voice to narrative pitch. "It was on the fringe of the Drakensberg, and many spurs of hill, divided by deep kloofs like gashes, descended on to it. So plenty of water came down, and the cattle were held from straying by the rocks, on one side at any rate. The Kafirs had their kraals dotted all about the land; and as they were of the kind that works, my stepsister's husband suffered them to remain and grow their little patches of mealies, while they worked for him in between. He was, of course, a cattle Boer, as all of our family have always been, but here were so many Kafirs to be had for nothing, that he soon commenced to plough great spaces of land and sow valuable crops. There was every prospect that he would make very much money out of that farm; for corn always sells, even when cattle are going for only seven pounds apiece, and Shadrach van Guelder was very cheerful about it.
"But when a farmer weighs an ungrown crop, you will always find that there is something or other he does not take into account. He tells of the weather and the land and the Kafirs and the water on his fingers, and forgets to bend down his thumb to represent God—or something. Shadrach van Guelder lifted up his eyes to the hills from whence came the water, but it was not until the green corn was six inches high that he saw that there came with it baboons. Armies and republics of them; more baboons than he had thought to exist,—they swooped down on his sprouting lands and rioted, ate and rooted, trampled and wantoned, with that kind of bouncing devilishness that not even a Kafir can correctly imitate. In one night they undid all his work on five sown morgen of fat land, and with the first wink of the sun in the east they were back again in their kopjes, leaving devastation and foulness wherever they passed.
"It was my stepsister's husband that stood on one leg and cursed like a Jew. He was wrathful as a Hollander that has been drinking water, and what did not help to make him content was the fact that hardly anything would avail to protect his lands. Once the baboons had tasted the sweetness of the young corn, they would come again and again, camping in the kloofs overhead as long as anything remained for them, like a deaf guest. But for all that, he had no notion of leaving them to plunder at their ease. The least one can do with an unwelcome visitor is to make him uncomfortable; and he sent to certain kraals on the farm for two old Kafirs he had remarked who had the appearance of cunning old men.
"They came and squatted before him, squirming and shuffling, as Kafirs do when a white man talks to them. One was quite a common kind of Kafir, gone a little gray with age, a tuft of white wool on his chin, and little patches of it here and there on his head. But the other was a small twisted yellow man, with no hair at all, and eyes like little blots of fire on a charred stick; and his arms were so long and gnarled and lean that he had a bestial look, like a laborious animal.
"'The baboons have killed the crop on the lower lands,' said Shadrach, smacking his leg with his sjambok. 'If they are not checked, they will destroy all the corn on this farm. What is the way to go about it?'
"The little yellow man was biting his lips and turning a straw in his hands, and gave no answer, but the other spoke.
"'I am from Shangaanland,' he said, 'and there, when the baboons plague us, we have a way with them, a good way.'
"He sneered sideways at his yellow companion as he spoke, and the look which the latter returned to him was a thing to shrink from.
"'What is this way?' demanded Shadrach.
"'You must trap a baboon,' explained the old Kafir. 'A leading baboon, for choice, who has a lot to say in the government of the troop. And then you must skin him, and let him go again. The others will travel miles and miles as soon as they see him, and never come back again.'
"'It makes me sick to think of it,' said Shadrach. 'Surely you know some other way of scaring them?'
"The old Kafir shook his head slowly, but the yellow man ceased to smile and play with the straw and spoke.
"'I do not believe in that way, baas. A Shangaan baboon'—he grinned at his companion—'is more easily frightened than those of the Drakensberg. I am of the bushmen, and I know. If you flay one of those up yonder, the others will make war, and where one came before, ten will come every night. A baboon is not a fat lazy Kafir; one must be careful with him.'
"'How would you drive them away, then?' asked Shadrach.
"The yellow man shuffled his hands in the dust, squatting on his heels. There! There! See, the baboon in the yard is doing the very same thing.
"'If I were the baas,' said the yellow man, 'I would turn out the young men to walk round the fields at night, with buckets to hit with sticks, and make a noise. And I—well, I am of the bushmen—' he scratched himself and smiled emptily.
"'Yes, yes?' demanded Shadrach. He knew the wonderful ways of the bushmen with some animals.
"'I do not know if anything can be done,' said the yellow man, 'but if the baas is willing I can go up to the rocks and try.'
"'How?'
"But he could tell nothing. None of these wizards that have charms to subdue the beasts can tell you anything about it. A Hottentot will smell the air and say what cattle are near, but if you bid him tell you how he does it, he giggles like a fool and is ashamed.
"'I do not know if anything can be done,' the yellow man repeated. 'I cannot promise the baas, but I can try.'
"'Well, try then,' ordered Shadrach, and went away to make the necessary arrangements to have the young Kafirs in the fields that night.
"They did as he bade, and the noise was loathsome,—enough to frighten anything with an ear in its head. The Kafirs did not relish the watch in the dark at first, but when they found that their work was only to thump buckets and howl, they came to do it with zest, and roared and banged till you would have thought a judgment must descend on them. The baboons heard it, sure enough, and came down after a while to see what was going on. They sat on their rumps outside the circle of Kafirs, as quiet as people in a church, and watched the niggers drumming and capering as though it were a show for their amusement. Then they went back, leaving the crops untouched, but pulling all the huts in one kraal to pieces as they passed. It was the kraal of the old white-tufted Shangaan, as Shadrach learned afterwards.
"Shadrach was pleased that the row had saved his corn, and next day he gave the twisted yellow man a lump of tobacco. The man tucked it into his cheek and smiled, wrinkling his nose and looking at the ground.
"'Did you get speech of the baboons last night among the rocks?' Shadrach asked.
"The other shook his head, grinning. 'I am old,' he said.'They pay no attention to me, but I will try again.Perhaps, before long, they will listen.'
"'When they do that,' said Shadrach, 'you shall have five pounds of tobacco and five bottles of dop.'
"The man was squatting on his heels all this time at Shadrach's feet, and his hard fingers, like claws, were picking at the ground. Now he put out a hand, and began fingering the laces of the farmer's shoes with a quick fluttering movement that Shadrach saw with a spasm of terror. It was so exactly the trick of a baboon, so entirely a thing animal and unhuman.
"'You are more than half a baboon yourself,' he said. 'Let go of my leg! Let go, I say! Curse you, get away—get away from me!'
"The creature had caught his ankle with both hands, the fingers, hard and shovel-ended, pressing into his flesh.
"'Let go!' he cried, and struck at the man with his sjambok.
"The man bounded on all fours to evade the blow, but it took him in the flank, and he was human—or Kafir—again in a moment, and rubbed himself and whimpered quite naturally.
"'Let me see no more of your baboon tricks,' stormedShadrach, the more angry because he had been frightened.'Keep them for your friends among the rocks. And now be offto your kraal.'
"That night again the Kafirs drummed all about the green corn, and sang in chorus the song which the mountain-Kafirs sing when the new moon shows like a paring from a fingernail of gold. It is a long and very loud song, with stamping of feet every minute, and again the baboons came down to see and listen. The Kafirs saw them, many hundreds of humped black shapes, and sang the louder, while the crowd of beasts grew ever denser as fresh parties came down and joined it. It was opposite the rocks on which they sat that the singing men collected, roaring their long verses and clattering on the buckets, doubtless not without some intention to jeer at and flout the baffled baboons, who watched them in such a silence. It was drooping now to the pit of night, and things were barely seen as shapes, when from higher up the line, where the guardians of the crops were sparser, there came a discord of shrieks.
"'The baboons are through the line,' they cried, and it was on that instant that the great watching army of apes came leaping in a charge on the main force of the Kafirs. Oh, but that was a wild, a haunting thing! Great bull-headed dog-baboons, with naked fangs and clutching hands alert for murder; bounding mothers of squealing litters that led their young in a dash to the fight; terrible lean old bitches that made for the men when others went for the corn,—they swooped like a flood of horror on the aghast Kafirs, biting, tearing, bounding through the air like uncouth birds, and in one second the throng of the Kafirs melted before them, and they were among the corn.
"Eight men they killed by rending, and of the others, some sixty, there was not one but had his wound—some bite to the bone, some gash, where iron fingers had clutched and torn their way through skin and flesh. When they came to Shadrach, and woke him wearily with the breathless timidity of beaten men, it was already too late to go with a gun to the corn-lands. The baboons had contented themselves with small plunder after their victory, and withdrew orderly to the hills; and even as Shadrach came to the door of the homestead, he saw the last of their marshaled line, black against the sky, moving swiftly towards the kloofs.
"He flung out his hands like a man in despair, with never a word to ease his heart, and then the old Shangaan Kafir stood up before him. He had the upper part of his right arm bitten to the bone and worried, and now he cast back the blanket from his shoulder and held out the quivering wound to his master.
"'It was the chief of the baboons that gave me this,' he said, 'and he is a baboon only in the night. He came through the ranks of them bounding like a boulder on a steep hillside, and it was for me that his teeth were bared. So when he hung by his teeth to my arm and tore and snarled, I drew my nails across his back, that the baas should know the truth.'
"'What is this madness?' cried Shadrach.
"'No madness, but simple devilry,' answered the Shangaan, and there came a murmur of support from the Kafirs about him. 'The leader of the baboons is Naqua, and it was he who taught them the trick they played us tonight.'
"'Naqua?' repeated Shadrach, feeling cold and weak.
"'The bushman,' explained the old man. 'The yellow man with the long lean arms who gave false counsel to the baas.'
"'It is true,' came the chorus of the Kafirs. 'It is true; we saw it.'
"Shadrach pulled himself together and raised a hand to the lintel of the door to steady himself.
"'Fetch me Naqua!' he ordered, and a pair of them went upon that errand. But they came back empty; Naqua was not at his hut, and none had news of him.
"Shadrach dismissed the Kafirs to patch their wounds, and at sun-up he went down to the lands where the eight dead Kafirs still lay among the corn, to see what traces remained of the night's work. He had hoped to find a clue in the tracks, but the feet of the Kafirs and the baboons were so mingled that the ground was dumb, and on the grass of the baboons' return there remained, of course, no sign. He was no fool, my stepsister's first husband, and since a wild and belly-quaking tale was the only one that offered, he was not ready to cast it aside till a better one were found. At any rate it was against Naqua that his preparations were directed.
"He had seven guns in his house for which ammunition could be found, and from among all the Kafirs on the land he chose a half dozen Zulus, who, as you know, will always rather fight than eat. These were only too ready to face the baboons again, since they were to have guns in their hands; and a kind of ambush was devised. They were to lie among the corn so as to command the flank of the beasts, and Shadrach was to lie in the middle of them, and would give the signal when to commence firing by a shot from his own rifle. There was built, too, a pile of brushwood lying on straw soaked in oil, and this one of them was to put a light to as soon as the shooting began.
"It was dark when they took their places, and then commenced a long and anxious watch among the corn, when every bush that creaked was an alarm and every small beast of the veld that squealed set hearts to thumping. From where he lay on his stomach, with his rifle before him, Shadrach could see the line of ridge of rocks over which the baboons must come, dark against a sky only just less dark; and with his eyes fixed on this he waited. Afterwards he said that it was not the baboons he waited for, but the yellow man, Naqua, and he had in his head an idea that all the evil and pain that ever was, and all the sin to be, had a home in that bushman. So a man hates an enemy.
"They came at last. Five of them were suddenly seen on the top of the rocks, standing erect and peering round for a trap; but Shadrach and his men lay very still, and soon one of these scouts gave a call, and then was heard the pat! pat! of hard feet as the body of them came up. There was not light enough to tell one from another, except by size, and as they trooped down among the corn Shadrach lay with his finger throbbing on his trigger, peering among them. But he could see nothing except the mass of their bodies, and waiting till the main part of them was past him, so that he could have a shot at them as they came back, should it happen that they retired at once, he thrust forward his rifle, aimed into the brown, and fired.
"Almost in the same instant the rifles of the Zulus spoke, and a crackle of shots ran up and down their line. Then there was a flare of light as the bonfire was lit, and they could see the army of baboons in a fuss of panic dashing to and fro. They fired again and again into the tangle of them, and the beasts commenced to scatter and flee, and Shadrach and his men rose to their full height and shot faster, and the hairy army vanished into the darkness, defeated.
"There was a guffaw of laughter from the Zulus, but ere it was finished a shout from Shadrach brought their rifles leaping up again, The baboons were coming back,—a line of them was breaking from the darkness beyond the range of the fire, racing in great leaps towards the men. As they came into the light they were a sight to terrify a host, all big tuskers, and charging without a sound. Shadrach, aiming by instinct only, dropped two as they came, and the next instant they were upon him. He heard the grunt of the Zulu next him as a huge beast leaped against his chest and bore him down, and there were screams from another. Then something heavy and swift drove at him like a bullet and he clubbed his rifle. As the beast flew, with hands and feet drawn in for the grapple, he hewed at it with the butt and smashed it to the ground. The stock struck on bone, and he felt it crush and fail, and there was the thing at his feet.
"How they broke the charge, with what a frenzy of battle they drove the baboons from them, none of the four who spoke again could ever tell. But it must have been very soon after Shadrach clubbed his rifle that the beasts wavered, were beaten, and fled screaming, and the farmer found himself leaning on his weapon and a great Zulu, shining with sweat, talking to him.
"'Never have I had such a fight,' the Zulu was saying, 'and never may I hope for such another. The baas is a great chief. I watched him.'
"Something was picking at Shadrach's boots, and he drew back with a shudder from the form that lay at his feet.
"'Bring a stick from the fire,' he ordered. 'I want to see this—this baboon.'
"As the man went, he ran a cartridge into the breach of his rifle, and when the burning stick was brought, he turned over the body with his foot.
"A yellow face mowed up at him, and pale yellow eyes sparkled dully.
"'Tck!' clicked the Zulu in surprise. 'It is the bushman, Naqua. No, baas,' as Shadrach cocked his rifle, 'do not shoot him. Keep him and chain him to a post. He will like that less.'
"'I shoot,' answered Shadrach, and shattered the evil grin that gleamed in the face on the ground with a quick shot.
"And, as I told you, my stepsister's first husband, Shadrach van Guelder, was afraid to be alone in the dark after that night," concluded the Vrouw Grobelaar. "It is ill shooting baboons, Frikkie."
"I'm not afraid," retorted Frikkie, and the baboon in the yard rattled his chain and cursed shrilly.
The business was something before my time, but I can remember several versions of it, which were commonly current when I first came into the Dopfontein district. It was not much of a tale as a general thing, except that, if you happened to have a strain of hot blood in you, it discovered a quality of very picturesque pathos. However, as you shall see, only the tail end of the story was generally known, and it was the Vrouw Grobelaar, the transmitter of chronicles, who divulged it to Katje and myself one evening in its proper proportions.
As I first heard it the tale was about thus. The drift across the Dolf Spruit, below the Zwaartkop, was a ragged gash in the earth, hidden from all approaches by dense bushes of wacht een beetje thorn. The spruit was here throttled between banks of worn stone, and the water roared over the drift at a depth that made it impassible to foot- farers. Its name Morder Drift (Murder Ford), was secured to it no less by its savage aspect than by the incident associated with it.
One morning a Kafir brought news to a farm of a strange thing at the drift, a tale of violent death at criminal hands. Straightway four men got to horse and rode over. Arriving, they found their information justified in a strange fashion. Seated in the deep southern approach to the water was a Boer woman, a young one, pillowing on her lap the head of a murdered man, whose body oozed blood from a dozen wounds. The woman paid no heed to the approach of the Burghers, and they, on nearing the body, observed that her eyes were fixed across the spruit, and that a smile, a dreadful twisted smile of contempt, ruled her face as though frozen there.
The woman was recognized as a girl of good Boer family who had recently married in opposition to the strong objections of her family; the dead man at her feet was soon identified as all that was left of her husband.
That was the tale: it ended there like a broken string, for while the matter was under investigation at the hands of the feldkornet, a Kafir chief in the Magaliesberg commenced to assert himself and the commando of the district was called out to wait on him. And there the matter dropped, for during the two years that elapsed before she died the woman never uttered a word. But (and here, for me, at any rate, the wonder of the story commenced) every day and all day, come fine or rain, sun or storm, there she would sit in the drift, damning the traitor's road of escape with that smile the Burghers had shuddered at. The scene, and the unspeakable sadness of it, used to govern my dreams.
I was telling Katje the story, for she said she had never heard it, but this I since learned to have been untrue. At first the conversation had been varied even to the point of inanity, but in time it turned—as such conversations will, you know—to the wonder and beauty of the character of women in general. I think it must have been at this stage that the Vrouw Grobelaar, who had been dozing like a dog, with one ear awake, commenced to listen; and I have always thought the better of the good lady for not annihilating the situation with some ponderously arch comment, as was a habit of hers.
When my tale was finished, though, the contempt of the artist for the mere artisan moved her to complete the record.
"You are wrong when you say the truth never came to light," she said. "I know the whole story."
"But," I answered in surprise, "nothing was ever done in the matter."
"Certainly not," she said with spirit. "It was not a Kafir murder. It was a killing by Burghers, and, though God knows I utterly condemn all such doings, it cannot be denied that there was as much on the one side as on the other."
The due request was proffered.
"It is not a tale to carry abroad," observed the old lady. "It concerns some of my family. The woman was Christina van der Poel, a half sister of my second husband, and what I am now telling you is the confession of Koos van der Poel, her brother, on the day he died. I remember he was troubled with an idea that he would be buried near her, and that she would cry out on him from her grave to his."
The suggestion, as you must agree, quite justified Katje's moving closer to me.
"It was like this," resumed the Vrouw Grobelaar, after an expressionless glance at the two of us. "Christina was a wild fanciful girl, with an eye to every stranger that off- saddled at the farm, Katje; and she had barely a civil word to waste on a bashful Burgher. I can't say I ever saw much in her myself. She was a tall young woman, with a face that drew the eye, as it were; but she was restless and unquiet in her motions, and, to my mind, too thin and leggy. But men have no taste in these things; and if Christina had been of a decent turn, she might have had her pick of all the unmarried men within a day's ride, and there used to be some very good men about here.
"But, as I said, she kept them all on the far side of the fence, and for a long time their only comfort was in seeing no one else take her. Till one day a surprising thing happened.
"A tall smart man rode into the farm one afternoon and hung up his horse on the rail. He swaggered with his great clumping feet right into the house, and went from one room to another till he found the old father.
"'Are you Mynheer van der Poel?' he asked him in a loud voice, standing in the middle of the chamber with his hat on his head and his sjambok in his hand.
"'I am,' answered the other.
"'I am John Dunn,' said the stranger. 'I have a store at Bothaskraal, and I am come to ask for your daughter to wife.'
"'An Englishman?' asked the old man.
"'To be sure,' said the stranger.
"'But where have you seen the girl?' asked Mynheer van derPoel.
"'Oh, in many places,' replied the Englishman, laughing. 'We are very good friends, she and I, and have been meeting every evening for a long time. Indeed, you have to thank me for giving you a chance to consent to the wedding.'
"Now the Heer van der Poel was always a quiet man, but there was nothing weak in him.
"'I do thank you,' he said, 'for playing the part of an honest man, and no doubt the girl has been foolish. A girl is, you know; and you are big enough to have taken her eye. But there will be no marriage; Christina is to marry a Boer.'
"'So you object to an Englishman?' sneered the other.
"'Yes,' said the old man.
"'What have you against the English?'
"'In general, nothing at all. I have found them brave men and good fighters; at Potchefstroom I killed three. But,' and the old man held up his forefinger, 'I will not have one in my family.'
"'I see,' said the other. 'So you refuse me your daughter?'
"'Yes,' answered the father.
"'So be it,' returned the stranger, turning to the door. 'In that case I shall take her without your leave.' And off he went at a canter, never looking back.
"Next day Mynheer van der Poel took Christina into a kraal, and when she had confessed her meetings with the Englishman, he gave her a sound beating with a stirrup- leather, and told her that for the future she must not go alone outside of the house.
"'And either I or one of your brothers will always be at home,' concluded the old man, 'so that if this Mynheer Dunn comes, he will be shot.'
"So Christina for upwards of a month never saw her Englishman. Of course the matter was a great scandal, and her people said as little as they could about it; but, nevertheless, it got about, and the number of visitors to the farm for the next week or two was astonishing. But call as often as they pleased, the Englishman stayed away and they saw nothing of him.
"But one morning when daylight came Christina was missing. They looked about, and there was no trace of her, but in the road outside there was the spoor of a cart that had halted in passing during the night.
"'It is plain enough,' said the old man 'She is with her Englishman at Bothaskraal. Sons, get your rifles, and we will ride over.'
"But on the way they had to pass Morder Drift, and thinking only of the shame to their house, they rode altogether into the water, none looking ahead. There had been rains, and each man was compelled to give all his care to guiding his horse through the torrent, while holding his rifle aloft in one hand.
"When they were thus all in the water together they heard a shout, and the Englishman on a big horse rode down to the water's edge. He had a gun at his shoulder covering them all, and they headed their horses up-stream and halted to hear him speak.
"He was prideful and contemptuous. 'Six of you,' he cried, 'no less than six, who have come out to kill one man, and the whole lot bottled up in the middle of a ditch and waiting to be shot. The first one that moves his rifle till I give permission dies.'
"Not one of them answered, but all kept their eyes on him. Old Mynheer van der Poel had a cartridge in his rifle, and he touched his horse with the spur under water that it might fidget round towards the Englishman.
"'Well,' said the man on the bank, 'if I shot each one of you as you sit, I should be in my right, and not one could blame me. But where I come from one does not shoot even a duck sitting, and I am going to let you go. You shall have a chance to do the thing decently, so come back and fight me openly. Or,' and he laughed as he spoke, 'you can do it another way. I am leaving this cursed country shortly with Christina. See if you can get at me and kill me before then. It's a fair offer; but I warn you you'll find it a dangerous game, and there'll be blood-letting on the one side or the other.'
"He drew back his horse a little, still covering them with the rifle. 'Now,' he cried, 'drop your guns into the water, and you can go. Drop them, I say!'
"One by one the young men let their rifles fall into the stream; but the old father fumbled with his finger. Suddenly there was a shot, and the Englishman's big horse shied at the spurt of mud at his feet. Of course the old man could not shoot without aiming.
"Then the Englishman brought round his gun, and the old man, sitting on his horse, with the water streaming over his saddle, knew that a tremble of the finger would send him to God.
"'But that you are Christina's father,' said the Englishman, in a voice as clear as falling pebbles, 'I would put a bullet through your white head this minute. This time, though, you shall go alive, but by—! you shall have your ducking.'
"And dropping his muzzle, he suddenly shot the straining horse through the head, so that it fell immediately, and the old man was plunged out of sight in the rushing water.
"When he got to the bank, fifty yards down the stream, theEnglishman was gone.
"They went home soberly, all busy with thoughts of their own. When they neared the home kraals the father spoke.
"'This is a business to be wiped out,' he said. 'This shame cannot rest with us. For my part, I could not pray with a clear mind and that Englishman alive.'
"They all agreed with him, though, as Koos admitted, with the death-rattle shaking him, they were all dreadfully afraid of that big swaggering man. The old man had done a fair share of fighting before, and at Potchefstroom, as he said, he had killed three rooineks, so he was ready enough for the business.
"But the young men had only been out against the Kafirs, and there is not very much in that.
"Now old Mynheer van der Poel was not such a fool as to risk his life or the lives of his sons in fighting the Englishman. The war against the rooineks had made him slim; for it is chiefly by wits and knowledge that the Boers have beaten the English. So instead of going out to be shot like a fool, he made a plan.
"You know how Bothaskraal lies. At the back of it there is nothing but the Kafir country and the thorn bush; and if you would get to the dorp, or to the road, or to the railway, you must cross the Dolf Spruit, and for miles the only crossing place is Morder Drift. So at Morder Drift they set a watch, four in the day time and three in the night, never losing sight of the drift.
"In this manner they waited a month till the evil night came. It was a night sent by the devil's own design, a gruesome, cloud-heavy, sulphurous night, and at the drift were the old man, Koos, and the lad Hendrik. Koos was on watch among the bushes; the other two crouched below the bank out of the wind. A little rain dribbled down, and of a sudden Koos whistled like a korhaan.
"The two got their rifles and went down into the water on foot, the old man up stream, the lad down, stepping carefully, for the stream was very strong and pulled at their waists dangerously. Koos walked into the road, above the water and in the shadow, and waited.
"Three horses came down the other side of the drift, and three persons on them. The one was the Englishman, the other was Christina, the third a Kafir. In the darkness of the drift they could not see the watchers, and in the swirl of the water they could not hear the click of the rifles.
"Into the water they rode, and then Koos, who had a magazine rifle, suddenly stood up and shot the Kafir. He screamed and fell into the water, and his horse turned and galloped on.
"'Keep still, Mynheer Dunn,' cried Koos. 'A movement and you are dead. Better raise your hands, I think. That is right. Now, Christina, ride out of the water on this side.'
"'Stay where you are, Christina,' said the Englishman. 'Sir,' he called to Koos, 'you have trapped me sure enough, and I ask and expect nothing. But what are you going to do to Christina?'
"'Are you Christina's husband?' asked Koos. 'Are you married to her?'
"'I am,' answered the other.
"'That is well for Christina. Otherwise she would be shot.We have little patience with wrongdoers, I can tell you.'
"'But what are you going to do with her?'
"'I? Nothing at all,' answered Koos. 'She is no longer my business. It will be for Christina's father to decide what shall be done to her.'
"'Will you promise—' began the Englishman; but Koos laughed.
"'I promise nothing,' he replied. 'In a few moments you will be dead, and past bargaining. Christina, ride on.'
"'Stay a moment,' called the Englishman again. 'I will ask you a favor, anyhow. It is not well to refuse a dying man, and perhaps in a few moments I shall have more power over you. So I beg you, spare Christina.'
"'I promise nothing at all,' answered Koos. 'I am not afraid of ghosts.'
"'I wasn't thinking of that,' said the other. 'So I have nothing to gain whether by talking or holding my tongue?'
"'Nothing at all!'
"'Very well; if that be the case, take that!' and very suddenly he snatched a pistol—one of those things which hold six bullets—from his pocket and shot Koos in the leg.
Christina screamed as her horse bounded and carried her forward out of the water. Koos did not fall, but caught it by the rein and dragged her from the saddle. He held her close, with his left arm about her and his rifle in his right hand, pistol-fashion.
"'Shoot again, rooinek,' he cried mockingly. 'You will be sure to hit one of us.' And then he fired.
"At the same moment Mynheer van der Poel, in the water up- stream, fired, and the Englishman fell on to the bow of his saddle. The horse dashed down the water, and Koos, gripping the screaming girl, heard young Hendrik shoot again.
"There was silence for a minute then, and Mynheer van derPoel climbed out of the water and called to Hendrik.
"'Have you got him?' he cried.
"'Yes,' answered the boy; 'I am holding him up, but he is still alive.'
"'Can he stand?' cried the old man.
"'No,' came the answer from the water.
"'Then drown him,' commanded the father. 'I will come down and help.'
"When he had climbed down into the water again Koos laid the girl down. She was still white; her senses had fled. Presently as he was binding his leg he heard the father say—
"'Now raise him a little, and I will shoot again to make sure'; and immediately the sound of shot burst out. At this the girl opened her eyes, and Koos, looking at her, saw with astonishment that she smiled.
"'Have you killed him, Koos?' she asked very gently.
"'Be quiet,' answered Koos.
"'But tell me,' she persisted.
"'Yes.' he replied at length.
"She closed her eyes and sighed. 'That was cruel,' she said; 'I loved him so.'
"But she sat up again as the old father and the lad dragged the body out of the water.
"'Four wounds,' panted the old man. 'Not one of us missed. That was very good, considering the darkness.' And as he flung the bleeding corpse down he turned upon Christina.
"'Here,' he cried, calling her by a dreadful word of shame.'Here is your husband.'
"'Father,' said young Hendrik, 'there is money in his pockets. If I take it people will say this was done by Kafirs.'
"'Take it then,' said the old man, and when the boy had emptied the pockets he bade him throw the money into the stream.
"Then they mounted and rode away, but not homewards. They rode across the stream to cross it twenty miles down, that their spoor should not betray them.
"And as Koos told me, while his eyes glazed, he turned and looked back, and there he saw Christina with the Englishman's head on her lap, looking after them with a face that set him trembling."
As the old lady concluded I passed an arm round Katje.
One of the most awe-inspiring traits of the Vrouw Grobelaar was her familiarity with the subject of death. She had a discriminating taste in corpses, and remembered of several old friends only the figure they cut when the life was gone from them. She was as opinionative in this regard as in all others; she had her likes and dislikes, and it is my firm belief to this day that she never rose to such heights of conversational greatness as when attending a death-bed. It is on record that more than one invalid was relieved of all desire to live after being prepared for dissolution by the Vrouw Grobelaar.
On the evening following the burial of Katrina Potgieter's baby, which died of drinking water after a surfeit of dried peaches, the old lady was in great feather. Never were her reminiscences so ghoulish and terrifying, and never did she hurl her weighty moralities over so wide a scope. Eventually she lapsed into criticism, and announced that the art of dying effectively was little practiced nowadays.
"I hate to see a person slink out of life," she said. "Give me a man or a woman that knows all clearly to the last, and gives other people an opportunity to see some little way into eternity. After all, there's nothing more in dying than changing the style of one's clothes, and even the most paltry folk have some consideration as corpses. I can't see what there is to be afraid of."
"I don't think that," observed Katje. "Even if it wasn't that I was soon to be dead and buried, the whole business seems horrible. Fancy all the people crowding round to look at you and cry, while they talked as if you were already dead. When Polly Honiball was dying, old Vrouw Meyers asked her if she could see anything yet. Ugh!"
The old lady shook her head. "That's not the way to look at it," she replied. "A good death is the sign of a good life; or anyhow, that's how people judge it. It's as well to give no room for talk afterwards, Katje. And as for the mere death, no good Christian fears that. Why, I have known a man seek death!"
"Did he kill himself?" inquired Katje.
"Kill himself! Indeed he didn't. That would be a crime, and a dreadful scandal. No, he took death by the hand in a most seemly and respectable way, and his family were always thought the better of for it.
"Yes, I'll tell you about it. It will be a lesson to you, Katje, and I hope you will think about it and take it to heart.
"The man I am talking about was Mynheer Andries van der Linden, a most godly and prosperous Burgher, whose farm was on the High Veld. All the days of his life he walked uprightly, and married twice. His sons and daughters were many, and all good, save for one sidelong skellum, Piet, his second son, who afterwards went to live among the English. He had cattle and sheep at pasture for miles, and a kerk on his land, where his nephew, the Predikant, used to preach. And by reason of his sanctity and cleverness Andries grew richer and richer till the Burghers respected him so much that they made him a commandant and a member of the Church Council.
"All prospered with him, as I was telling you, until one day it seemed as if God's hand had fallen from him. He was smitten with a disease of which not the oldest woman in the district had ever seen the like, and his own flesh became a curse to him. The very marrow in his bones bred fire to feed on his body, and he lay on his bed in the torments of hell. For weeks he writhed and screamed like a madman, tossing on his blankets and tearing at his body, or struggling and howling as his sons held him down for fear he should injure himself in his frenzy. The whole thing was very terrible and mysterious; and it was said among the farms that Andries van der Linden could not have been so good after all, or God would not thus visit him with such a scourge.
"For myself, I never believed this, and what he afterwards did will show that I had the right of it. Still, good or bad, the affliction was undeniable, for I myself heard him screaming like a beast as I drove to Nachtmaal.
"The malady lasted for months, and all herbs and pills that were given him did not an atom of good. Even the Kafirs could do nothing, though Klein Andries, the old man's eldest son and a good lad, caught a witch-doctor and sjamboked him to pieces to make him help. In short, the illness was plainly beyond mortal cure, and the old man at last came to see this.
"I should have told you that he had times of peace, when the agony forsook him, and left him limp like a wet clout. Then he would sweat and quake with terror of the pains that would return; and so pitiful was his condition that he could not even listen with a proper patience to the reading of Scripture or the singing of David's psalms. You will see from this what a terrible visitation to a God-fearing man this illness was.
"So he made up his mind. One morning early, while quietness was with him, he called for Klein Andries and bade him shut the door of the room.
"'Andries,' he said, 'I have been thinking the matter to a finish, and I am determined to have an end to this torment.'
"'Have you found any means?' began Klein Andries.
"'Listen,' said the old man. 'It is plain to me, that I shall gain no cure on earth, and I have decided to die. So I shall die at the end of a week about two hours after sunrise.'
"Andries was of course very much taken aback. 'I do not understand,' he said. 'You cannot mean to kill yourself?'
"'Of course not,' answered the old man. 'That will be your part.'
"'How do you mean?' cried Andries.
"'I shall lie here in my bed, with clean pillows and fresh sheets, and the best coverlet. Our people will all be here,—you will see to that,—and when I have spoken to them and shaken their hands, you shall bring in your rifle—'
"'That will do,' said Klein Andries. 'You need tell me no more. I will not do it.'
"'But you are my first-born,' said the father.
"'It is all the same; I will not do it.'
"'Then you can get out of my house, with your wife and your children, and go look for a stone on which to lay your heads.'
"'That is very easy,' answered Klein Andries, quite calmly.'No doubt we shall find that stone you speak of.'
"'And I will get Piet to do it,' said the old man.
"'No,' replied Klein Andries. 'Piet shall not do it.Nobody shall do it. I will not have it done.'
"'Andries,' said the old man, 'you and I must not talk thus. I am your father, and I tell you to do me this service. Say rather, I ask it of you. It is no more than an act of kindness to a stricken man; your hand on the gun will be the hand of mercy.'
"'But I cannot do it,' cried out Klein Andries in a sort of pain.
"'You will do it,' said the old man. 'Remember you are the eldest of my sons. You will do it, Andries?'
"'No,' said Andries.
"'You will do it?'
"'No!'
"'Then, Andries,' said the old man, half raising himself as he lay, and pointing a finger at his son—'then, Andries, eldest son and dearest and all, I will curse you.'
"For a full minute the two looked each other in the eyes, and then Klein Andries let his hand fall on his knee like a man beaten and broken.
"'It shall be as you say,' he answered at last. 'I will do what you ask, but—it will spoil my life for me.'
"'Thank you, my son,' said the old man, sinking back.
"'Oh, I will do it,' said Andries. 'But I hold it a sin, a black and bloody sin, that I commit with open eyes and a full knowledge. But I will do it.'
"So the thing happened, and all that week before his death the old man suffered little. As he said himself, his last taste of life was sweet in his mouth. He thought much upon his grave and the manner of his burying, and would often talk with Klein Andries and Piet, and give them directions.
"'I will not be buried in the kraal,' he said one day. 'My sister Greta never had any love for me, and I had just as lief not disturb her. Put me on top of the hill there; I was always one for an open view.'
"From where he lay he could see through the window the place where he desired to be buried, and the grave of his cousin Cornel, dead twenty years before..
"'Put me, then, on top of the hill,' he said, 'and I shall be able to overlook Cornel. He has a head-board with a round top, so you will give me two boards, one at my head and one at my feet, both with round tops. You would not have that carrion triumph over me?'
"'It shall be done,' said Andries.
"'And you might carve a verse on my headboard,' the old man went on. 'Cornel has only his name and dates, and no doubt he counts on my having no more. His board is only painted; see that you carve mine.'
"'I do not carve letters very well,' began Andries, 'but—'
"'Oh, you carve well enough,' said the old man. 'Very well indeed, considering. You won't have to do very much. There are plenty of short verses in the Psalms, and some—very good ones, too—in Proverbs. The Predikant will soon choose a verse of the right sort. Say a verse, Andries; it is not much.'
"'I will see to it,' said Andries.
"Then Piet, whose mind was a dunghill, had a horrible thought. 'But what about the water?' he cried, for the stream from which they took their drinking-water ran past the foot of the hill.
"'You must draw your water higher up, answered the old man. 'If I were not about to die, Piet, and therefore under a need to judge not, lest I be judged, I would cut down your oxen and sheep for that. Go out; I will say what I have to say to Andries.'
"When Piet was gone he went on. 'Remember, Andries, a bare four foot, no more. I would not wish to be late when the dead arise. Just four foot of cool earth, and a black coffin with plenty of room in it.'
"'I will take care,' replied Klein Andries.
"'Very well, do as I have told you, and I shall be very well off. I shall sleep without pain till the last day, and perhaps dream in peace about the verse on my head-board and the round tops.'
"Although I like a man to take it bravely, I can very well understand that that week must have been a terrible one for Klein Andries, who, though a good lad, and a wealthy man at this day, never was particularly quick at taking up an idea. He went about with a bowed head and empty eyes, like a man in mortal shame; and I believe that never since has he quite cast off the load his father laid on him. Not that I see any harm in the affair myself.
"Well, in proper course the day came, and Andries van der Linden lay in his bed between the fresh sheets, propped up with fine clean pillows. His people had come from near and far, for the curious story was well known, and they were proud of their kinsman. They crowded the room in which he lay, all in their best clothes, a little uneasy, as most folks are on great occasions, and all very quiet.
"Old Andries van der Linden was free from pain, and spoke to them all in very cheerful and impressing words. As he lay among his pillows with his white hair thrown back and his beard on his breast, he was a fine man to see—a picture of a good and a brave man. He read aloud from the Bible, and then prayed awhile, giving out his words grandly and without a quaver. Then he shook them all by the hand and bade each one good-bye.
"'Now, Andries,' he said, and lay back smiling.
"Klein Andries stood at the foot of the bed with his rifle resting across the rail, but he dropped his head with a sob.
"'I cannot,' he said, 'I cannot.'
"'Come, Andries,' said the old man again. 'Come, my son.'
"Then Klein Andries caught his breath in his throat and steadied the rifle. The old man lay calmly, still smiling, with fearless eyes.
"'Close your eyes,' said Andries hoarsely, and as the old man did so he fired.
"The windows of the room were blown outwards and broken, but the shot was a true one, and the work was well and workmanlike done."
"It must have spoiled the sheets," observed Katje.
"As to that," said the Vrouw Grobelaar, answering a point that no one had raised, "it has been seen over and over again that sin leaves its mark. Do you not trust or avoid a man because there is honor or wickedness in his face? Ah, men's faces are the writing on the wall, and only the Belshazzars cannot read them.
"But the marks go deeper than a lowering brow or a cruel mouth. Men may die and leave behind them no monuments save their sin. Of such a case I remember one instance.
"Before my second husband was married to his first wife he lived out yonder, on the Portuguese border, and in the thick of the fever country. I have not seen the place, but it is badly spoken of for a desolate, unchancy land, bad for cattle, and only good to hunters. My second husband was a great hunter, and died, as you know, through having his body crushed by a lion. The people out there are not good Boer stock, but a wild and savage folk, with dark blood in them.
"I only know this story from my second husband, but it took hold of me, as he used to tell it. There was a family in those parts of the name of Preez. No relation to the Du Preez you know, who are well enough in their way, but Preez simply,—a short name and a bad one. They were big holders of land, with every reason to be rich, but bad farmers, lazy hunters, and deep drinkers. The Kafirs down there make a drink out of fruit which is very fiery and conquers a man quickly, and these people were always to be seen half drunk, or else stupid from the stuff. Old Preez, the father, in particular, was a terrible man, by all tellings; full threescore and ten years of age, but strong, fiery, and full of oaths. My second husband used to say there was something in the look of him that daunted one; for his hair and his beard were white, his face was savagely red, and his eyes were like hot coals. And with it all he had a way of looking on you that made you run from him. When he was down with drink and fever he would cry out in a terrible voice that his mother was a queen's daughter and he was a prince."
"I have heard of the people you speak of," I said. "They are half-Portuguese, and perhaps the old man was not wholly lying."
"Um! Well, prince or not, he married in his youth a woman of the half-blood, and begot of her a troop of devils. Five sons he had, all great men, knowing not God and fearing none of God's works. And after them came a daughter, a puling slip of a thing, never meant to live, whom they did to death among them with their drinking and blaspheming and fighting.
"My second husband told me tales of that family that set my blood freezing. He had his own way of telling stories, and made you see pictures, as it were. Once, he used to say, for a trifle spoken concerning them and their ways, they visited a missionary by night, dragged him from his bed, and crucified him against his door, while his wife clung to the old man's knees and besought the mercy they never gave and never got. Even the wild folk of the countryside were stricken with the horror and impiety of the deed; and it says much for the fear in which the Preez family were held that none molested them or called them to account.
"In the end the eldest of the five sons took a mind to marry and to leave some of his accursed stock to plague the world when it should be delivered from him and his brothers. They cast about for a wife for him, and were not content with the first that offered. They had their pride, the Preez, and in their place a fair measure of respect, for among the wicked, you know, the devil is king. From one farmhouse to another they rode, dragging forth women and girls to be looked at like cattle. Many a tall, black- browed hussy would have been content to go away with Vasco Preez (such was his unchristian name), but he was not willing to do right by any of them.
"They were returning home from one of these expeditions when they passed a lowly house beside the road with no fence around it. But before the house a girl stood on the grass, with her kapje in her hand, to see the six big men ride by. She was little and slim, and, unlike the maidens of the country, whitish, with a bunch of yellow hair on the top of her head and hanging over her ears. The others would have passed her by, judging her unworthy even an insult, but Vasco reined in his horse and shouted a great oath.
"'The woman for me!' he cried. 'The woman I was looking for! I never knew what I wanted before.'
"The others halted to look, and the girl, frightened, ran into the house. Vasco got down from his horse.
"'Fetch the filly out,' shouted the old man. 'Fetch her out and let us see her paces.'
"Vasco walked straight into the little house, while the others waited, laughing. They heard no screams and no fighting, and presently out comes Vasco alone.
"He went over to his horse and mounted. 'There is nothing to wait for,' he said. 'Let us be getting on.'
"'But the girl?' cried one of his brothers. 'Is she dead, or what?'
"'No,' said Vasco, 'but she would not come.'
"'Would not come!' bellowed the old father, while the others laughed. 'Did you say she would not come?'
"'That is what I said,' answered Vasco, sitting his horse very straight, and scowling at the lot of them.
"'He has a fever,' cried the old man, looking from one to another. 'He is light in the head. My faith! I believe the girl has been beating him with a stick. Here, one of you,' he roared, turning on them, 'get down and kick the girl out of the door. We'll have a look at the witch!'