Chapter Sixteen.
The result of the trial was as great a surprise for Lawless as it had been for Theodore Smythe. Lawless had ridden into Stellenbosch daily for the paper, and had scanned the columns eagerly for any mention of the case. On the day that he read of Van Bleit’s acquittal he sent off the telegram, the receipt of which had decided Van Bleit on a change of air.
He had ridden into town alone; Tottie, who usually accompanied him, had remained at home to attend, as she informed him, to the ravages her wardrobe had sustained through the hard wear of the veld. When Lawless got back he flung the paper in through the open doorway and rode on to the stable, where he off-saddled, and then returned to the house. Tottie, when he entered, was seated at the table in her favourite attitude, with her elbows upon it and her chin in her hands, devouring the paper with avidity. She looked up as his tall figure blocked the doorway and laughed.
“He’s got the devil’s own luck,” she said. “But this is all right for you, old man.”
Lawless walked up to the table.
“I’ve sent off a wire asking him here,” he said.
She laughed again.
“You don’t lose time... And what’s to become of me? Plainly, you wouldn’t expose me to such a risk as that.”
“I shall banish you to the hut we looked at on our arrival. It’s quarter of a mile away, and the bush just behind it. You’ll sleep there and spend your days in the bush.”
“What a lively programme!” she ejaculated.
“Fairly dull—yes.” He went nearer to her and laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’m not going to pretend that you’ll get much joy of it,” he said. “But you wanted to help me.”
She looked up and nodded.
“Yes, I wanted to help... If I had to spend my nights as well as my days in the bush, I’d do it.”
His hand gripped her shoulder till it hurt.
“You’re the right stuff,” he said,—“the best stuff. You and I together will pull this off.”
That night was destined to be a night of surprises. Hardly had they supped, while they yet lingered at the table discussing their plans, a sound broke suddenly upon the silence, a sound so unusual that Lawless stopped abruptly in the middle of his talk, and Tottie’s head went up with a jerk like the head of a wild thing scenting danger. And so they remained for a while listening in attitudes of strained attention. The sounds were unmistakably made by the heavy creaking wheels of a waggon travelling towards them across the veld. Tottie looked at her companion inquiringly.
“It’s a surprise party, baas,” she said. “They’ve seen our light and are for outspanning.”
For answer Lawless pushed back his chair, and, rising, started to clear away the evidence of the tête-à-tête meal. She helped him swiftly and in silence, pausing every now and again to listen to the sounds that were gradually getting nearer, growing momentarily louder and more distinctive. The cracking of a whip was heard, and above it the noise of men’s voices raised in a rollicking song.
“Get into the bedroom,” Lawless commanded. “You must make your escape by the window, and sleep in the hut.”
“But—strangers!” she protested. “Why shouldn’t I participate in the fun?”
“We can’t run the risk,” he said.—“No! You make yourself scarce, and leave this to me. Strangers or no, they’re rowdy... I would rather have no woman in this.”
She demurred still, foreseeing a merry evening, and not relishing the part allotted to her; but he carried his point; and reluctantly she went into the bedroom and fastened the door upon herself. He waited until she was secure from observation, then he opened the outer door and stood in the lighted aperture, looking into the night.
“Hallo!” shouted a voice in English out of the darkness.
“Hallo!” he answered back.
A young man came forward, swinging a lantern in his hand.
“We’re outspanning here,” he said. “I never expected such luck as that this place was occupied. A fire is all we need. We carry provisions with us.”
“Come in and welcome,” Lawless answered. “How many of you are there? Whatever accommodation I have is at your service.”
“We are five,” the other answered. “They’re unharnessing the mules. We lost our driver at the last uitspan.” He lifted his lantern and looked about him. “This is a slice of luck. For two nights we’ve been jolly near frozen, sleeping in the wain.”
“I’m glad,” Lawless said, “that you happened this way. I was just about fed up with my own society. Let’s lend a hand with unharnessing the mules. It’s a Godsend a visitation like this.”
The young man looked at him curiously.
“If you’re so out of conceit with it all, why do you stay?” he asked.
“Because,” Lawless answered, and smiled strangely, “I was under the delusion I’d have companionship when I took the place. My tenancy expires shortly, and I shan’t renew it.”
The new-comer understood. He looked away from his companion and spat noisily on the ground.
“I’m glad we chanced by while you were still in possession,” he said.
They walked together by the fitful light of the lantern to where the rest of the party were busy with the mules. They lent a hand, and when the team was outspanned and haltered to the disselboom inside a hastily improvised laager, they repaired to the house, carrying provisions with them. Amongst the provisions was a limited quantity of whisky and any amount of Cape dop. Most of the party were already drunk. It was evident from the outset that they meant to make a night of it.
“I expect,” Lawless said, as he preceded his visitors into the living-room, “that you’ll be glad of a hot supper. My culinary powers are not great, such as they are I’ll be happy to cook for you.”
“Don’t you bother, baas,” the young man who had first introduced himself exclaimed. “I’ll cook for them. You supply the fire and the roof, that’s quite enough.”
Lawless was immeasurably relieved. Tottie had done all the cooking their simple household had required; he had very little idea of the art himself. But he knew where the cooking utensils were kept, and supplied them; and the young man set about making a stew that smelt very appetising as it heated over the fire. The others sprawled before the hearth and drank while they waited for the meal. Before it was ready a further interruption occurred that made an addition to the numbers already assembled. It was indeed a night of surprises for the man who acted as host to these unexpected and none too welcome guests.
The new-comer made his appearance on horseback, and rode right up to the window before anyone suspected his approach. The sound of his horse’s hoofs was deadened by the noisy chaff round the fire. He looked in through the open window upon the rowdy group, and, leaning from the saddle, gripped the sill with his hand.
“Hallo, there!” he shouted in a cheery voice. “Got room for another? I’ve lost my bearings on this tractless waste, and seeing your uitspan calculated some sort of hospitality was going forward. I’m going to stable my mount. May I come in? I’m Tom Hayhurst.”
Lawless started, and looked round. The name conveyed much to him. It conveyed something to several others present; they looked up with a grin of welcome.
“Good old Tom!” said one man. “I haven’t seen him since we were at the poor man’s diggings together.”
Tom Hayhurst’s face beamed in upon them.
“Who’s baas here?” he asked.
“I am,” Lawless answered quietly, stepping forward to the aperture. “There’s room for your mount in the stable. Come in.”
“Right!” the young man answered. “I don’t know you from the devil. Got a lantern, anyone?”
Someone handed him a lantern through the window, and he rode away, whistling. One of the men laughed.
“Old Tom has been missing lately. Wonder where he’s been?” he mused.
“There are plenty of us can’t always account for our movements,” someone else answered, amid a fresh guffaw of mirth. “But wherever he’s been in the interval, he’s always good company. Say, baas, you’ve got a picnic to-night.”
Lawless made no reply. The name of Tom Hayhurst had roused memories, had taken him back to a lonely bungalow in Cape Town, where a man had related to him briefly how Tom Hayhurst had failed him in an important mission. He had been for wringing Tom Hayhurst’s neck at the time. He did not feel especially friendly towards him on that particular night; but Hayhurst had happened upon his dwelling out of the darkness, and claimed his hospitality, as was customary in the veld.
He moved back to the ring round the fire, and seated himself on an upturned box and stared thoughtfully into the flame. The arrival of the new-comer was strangely annoying to him.
Hayhurst came in noisily, and shaking hands with the man who had been at the diggings with him, nodded to the rest. They made way for him at the fire. He stood in front of it, looking curiously at Lawless while he warmed his hands at the blaze. The scar on Lawless’ face seemed to hold his attention.
“My name’s Hayhurst,” he remarked somewhat pointedly.
Lawless surveyed him with an air of quiet aloofness, and, without removing the pipe from his mouth, replied:
“So you said before.”
Hayhurst was not easily disconcerted, but he reddened slightly and gave an awkward laugh.
“It’s damned cold,” he said. “I’m chilled to the bone. If anyone presses me, I’ll take a glass of dop... Don’t overdo it with water.”
Stephens, the man from the diggings, handed him a glass. Young Hayhurst drank the contents, and remained a while staring into the empty tumbler with a thoughtful smile on his face. Then he put the tumbler down, and returned to his occupation of warming his hands. He glanced again at Lawless.
“I’ve heard of you,” he said,—“from a chap who won’t tell any more tales of anyone, good or bad... That mark on your face gives you away.”
“Don’t be personal, Tom,” hiccoughed his friend.
Lawless got up.
“I’ve heard of you, too,” he returned curtly. “The repetition of the information wouldn’t be likely to make you vain, so we won’t go into that.”
There was a perceptible hang in the conversation. The men broke off in their talk to listen, and the man who was cooking the supper looked up from his task to stare. The sense of something in the air penetrated even to the dulled wit of the most intoxicated of the party, a man of rough appearance and no education, who spent all his spare time in getting drunk, and crowded as much work into his sober hours as three ordinary men would have accomplished. He shook his head gravely, and then with solemn deliberation refilled his ever-empty glass from the bottle of dop at his elbow.
“Don’t mix your drinks,” he counselled... “bad for the constitootion—very.”
He maundered on, but nobody heeded him. Hayhurst was looking steadily into the keen eyes of the man whom he recognised from the description he had once listened to of the peculiar scar on his face. He had no shadow of a doubt as to the man’s identity.
“Since what I have heard of you,” he returned, “might be calculated to make you vain, I’ll spare your modesty. As for my own reputation!” He laughed suddenly. “That wouldn’t pay for whitewashing, would it, boys?”
He gazed round on the group with the laugh still in his eyes. Rentoul, who had given the advice against mixing one’s liquor, looked up owlishly.
“You never done a dirty trick, Tom,” he said... “Nothin’ mean about you. Gimme your ’and, me boy. No need for whitewashing... What say?—Tom’s all ri’, ain’t ’e?”
Hayhurst flung himself down on the hearth beside him, and stretched his legs, encased in dusty gaiters, towards the fire.
“Tom’s a good sort,” Rentoul continued, blinking round on the rest... “Always said so—goo’ sort!—but fond of his liquor. You’re drunk, Tom... Been takin’ wets along the road.”
Hayhurst laughed again.
“The veld’s so overstocked with pubs—ain’t it?” he said.
“Here, hand out the plates, someone—will you?—this mess is ready,” announced the chef.
There was a general move. The clattering of plates and knives superseded the talk; and for a fairly lengthy interval conversation gave place entirely to the sound of hungry men feeding noisily in rude and primitive fashion.
Chapter Seventeen.
When supper was ended the plates were pushed into a bucket of water and left to soak until they should be required again. One of the men got hold of the newspaper, and read it aloud to the rest. The names of Van Bleit and Simmonds were familiar to everyone present. Some of them had been personally acquainted with the owners of the names, and all were interested more or less in the case.
“It’s the best man that has reached his terminus,” Stephens remarked. “I could spin a yarn or two about Van Bleit.”
“Who couldn’t?” laughed another man. “But he always comes up smiling, somehow. I should say this let off was the biggest surprise he ever had.”
“’E served me an ugly trick once,” muttered Rentoul darkly, endeavouring to obtain a further supply of dop from the empty bottle beside him... “Over a woman that was... When I was down with dysentery too.”
He sat up with a poor attempt to look sober, and leaning forward tried to push the floor away, which, in the most annoying manner, threatened to hit him in the face. To avoid collision with it, he stood upon his feet, and turning round two or three times to get his balance, raised his arms and solemnly addressed the grinning group of listeners.
“Dysentery’s a crool complaint, gets a grip on a man. Reg’lar epidemic it was in camp that year. Doctor done ’is best to stamp it out, but whot could ’e do in that beastly ’ole? I done whot I could to ’elp ’im. ‘Boys, the doctor’s right,’ I says. ‘You’re a dirty lot o’ swine. Look at your camps. D’you expect the doctor to go round an’ stick ’is nose into your stinking places? Why don’t you clean up? ... Personal cleanliness... I know... I’ve seen it afore.’” He pointed at the grinning faces about him, and became personal and aggressive. “You wouldn’t wash your dirty mugs if you could ’elp it, any of you.”
“That’ll do, Mat,” someone interrupted.
“Neither would I,” resumed the orator in a more conciliatory tone, “unless I ’ad to. But we’ve got to be clean... We’ve got to ’elp the doctor... We’ve got to fight this thing. Coming events cast their shadders before. It’ll be here amongst us next. And it ain’t no use waitin’ for the Government. What’s the use of the Government when you’re out prospecting with six boys, an’ the lions come on you an’ kill three of them? Whot d’you do? S’pose you got a gun loaded in two barrels... Do you run back to call the p’lice? ... Do you go for the magistrate to come an’ ’elp yer? Where’d you an’ your boys be? ... No! You put your barrel into their guts and pull the trigger—yes, every time. An’ we got to do the same with the dysentery. ’E don’t come on you with a bound; ’e crawls through the grass, like a snake. ’E comes on gradually and slow... takes you unawares. We’ve got to stamp ’im out. We’ve got to pull the trigger, and not wait for the Government...”
“Sit down, Mat, and give somebody else a chance,” Stephens interrupted, with a wink at the rest.
“You can ’ave your say,” retorted Mat, “when I’ve finished.” He turned round and round, emphasising his remarks with repeated blows of one hard soiled fist upon the grimy palm of the other hand. “We’ve got to stamp it out,” he shouted. “We’ve got to fight it. I remember when I was young—”
“For God’s sake, dry up!” interposed another. “You’ve missed your vocation.”
“Who’re you gettin’ at with yer ‘vocation’?” Rentoul demanded with bitter superiority. “I don’t know anything about vocation. I picked up my eddication off jam tins and pickle bottles. I’ve no time for vocation. If you’d been in Jo’burg when I was there, you’d ’ave ’ad no time for eddication either. You’d ’ave been in tronk, where they makes yer wash yer face every morning—behind the ears too. To hell with yer! I’ve said all I want ter say... We’ve got to stamp it out.”
He fell to muttering, and eyeing the last interrupter malevolently, sat down again.
“We’ve got to stamp it out,” he said. “Gimme the bottle, Tom. You’ve swilled too much of that dysentery mixture, me boy. You’re drunk—tha’s what you are.”
“Van Bleit was running some quarry in Cape Town,” an older man observed, continuing the conversation from where it had been broken off. He sucked thoughtfully at his pipe and stared into the fire... “Woman with lots of money, I heard—and looks too. Must be hard up for an honest man if she takes on Karl.”
“This case will have about finished that game, I should fancy,” the chef of the party remarked.
Lawless got up, and flung a fresh log on the fire. He kicked it into position with his boot, and pressed it down among the glowing embers, pressing heavily as though it were some enemy he trod beneath his foot. Then he turned slowly round.
“Time’s been standing still for some of you,” he said. “I’ve been in Cape Town recently. There’s nothing in that report.”
Rentoul looked up from his corner.
“Whot you talking about?” he asked. “Time always stands still... We move—Time don’t move. If you come back in a thousand years, Time will still be ’ere, I tell you... I read it in them magazines.”
“Did you see Van Bleit when you were there?” someone asked, ignoring the dissertation on Time.
“I did. I lunched with him the day I left. He is by way of being a—chum of mine.”
Rentoul made a clumsy effort to get upon his feet.
“Then I’m goin’ to ’it you,” he said. “I can’t get at ’im, but I’ll bash your mug in, see if I don’t.”
“Oh! sit down, and don’t be a silly ass,” Lawless returned irritably.
Tom Hayhurst pulled the quarrelsome member back into his place.
“Go easy, Mat; he’s baas here,” he said.
Rentoul scowled darkly.
“I don’t own any man baas,” he muttered thickly. “I don’t care a damn for any man breathing... All men are equal. I don’t care for you, nor anyone. In a few years we’ll all be the same. When some digger comes along and digs up my skull and Cecil Rhodes’ skull, who’ll tell which was Mat Rentoul’s, and which Rhodes’?”
Somebody laughed.
“They’ll only need to look at the size of the cavity in the craniums, Mat,” he said.
“There you go again!” Rentoul rejoined acrimoniously. “Fancies yerself a British encyclopaedia don’t yer?”
The oldest of the party, who was slightly grizzled, and had the appearance of one who might have done something in the world and had somehow missed his opportunities, looked hard at Lawless.
“Weren’t you in the C.M. at one time?” he asked. “The name conveys nothing, but I seem to remember your face.”
Lawless nodded.
“That’s right,” he said. “I knew you the minute I saw you. But as I stood for law and order in those days and you didn’t, I did not insist on the acquaintance. It was only the accident of the different sources from which we drew our pay that put me in the right and you seemingly in the wrong. The Police were too damned interfering with the privileges of humanity for my taste. That’s why I chucked it.”
“Good!” The grizzled man smiled in appreciation of the speaker’s sentiments, and tossed his nearly empty tobacco-pouch across to him. “Fill up,” he said. “That’s good stuff.”
Lawless caught the pouch, filled his pipe, and tossed it back again to the owner.
“It was while I was in the Police I got chummy with Van Bleit,” he volunteered.
Tom Hayhurst rose unexpectedly and swaggered through the group sprawling before the hearth, until he stood close to Lawless, with his back towards the fire.
“I wouldn’t mind making a wager there isn’t a man here who hasn’t heard of ‘Grit,’” he said.
His face was flushed, his mien slightly defiant, as though he challenged, not only the men he addressed, but the stern, keen-eyed man who surveyed him disapprovingly with his strangely penetrating, inscrutable grey eyes.
“‘Grit’!” The grizzled man looked up with a laugh. “Of course. That was the name you went by in the days when you weren’t Lawless either in name or occupation. To think I should forget!”
“You’re too damned modest,” yelled a youngster. “The chaps tell stories about you up in Rhodesia to-day.”
“Fairy-tales,” Lawless responded, smoking indifferently.
“That’s a lie, anyway,” retorted Hayhurst. “I know one or two facts.”
“Among facts I know about you,” Lawless replied sharply, “is that you gab too freely. Sit down, and shut up.”
Hayhurst looked nettled. He lost his ready assurance and lapsed into a sulky mood.
“I’ll knock any man’s head off who says that about me,” he muttered.
“Well, come and knock mine off,” was the curt invitation; and during the derisive laughter that followed Hayhurst sat down.
“Shake!”
Mat Rentoul had emerged from his corner, and, swaying at Lawless’ elbow, unsteadily advanced his huge fist.
“Shake!” he repeated peremptorily. And on the command being complied with, he turned about and harangued the rest. “Said I’d ’it ’im, didn’t I? Well, ’e can ’it me, if ’e likes. I’ll ’it any man whot isn’t a friend of ’is. That woman I spoke of—”
“Oh! dry up,” shouted Lawless, beginning to lose his temper.
“’It me, if you like,” returned Mat imperturbably... “I’ve said you might... Gave ’er ’is last thick ’un, ’e did, and ’elped ’er back to ’er friends. She told me ’erself... You did—you lie!—an’ took in yer belt two ’oles when you fancied she wasn’t looking. I don’t care what hell’s scum you chum with... they won’t do you any ’arm.”
“Oh! let him alone, Grit,” the man whose pouch he had shared, and who was called Graves, interposed carelessly. “Nobody’s listening. Send round the bottle, boys. There’s been too much leakage in one quarter. Play fair.”
Somebody produced a tin whistle, and after a very creditable performance on it, took a draught from a glass another man offered him, wiped his lips with the back of his hand, and started a familiar music-hall ditty.
“You take solo, Tom,” Stephens suggested.
Hayhurst, who was lying sulking, with his elbow on the floor and his hand supporting his head, kicked out a dusty riding-boot aggressively, but made no other move.
“I’m holding my jaw,” he said.
“Don’t be a jackass. If you won’t take the solo, I will.”
The other rolled over and sat up.
“There’s one thing I object to more strongly than singing myself on the present occasion,” he remarked, “and that’s listening to you. Give me the note, Bill, and then go ahead.”
The men sat round, smoking and listening, while Bill played his little tin whistle, and the youngster sang in a throaty tenor some jingling absurdity about a girl and a balloon. Each in his way was an artist, and made music out of the poor material. Mat Rentoul grew noisily hilarious, and then tearful; but he joined in the chorus with the rest. Lusty and strong rang out the voices from half a dozen stalwart throats, all of which needed lubricating when the song was finished before they started afresh. Through the open window the sound floated out into the night. The stars that hung low in the purple heavens blinked as it were with astonishment at this rude breaking of the surrounding peace, and someone, crouching in the darkness against the mud wall of the hut, with the dirty blanket wrapped around her to protect her from the cold, opened wide eyes and listened intently to the unfamiliar noise.
One by one the voices trailed off, till only the tenor was left singing to the thin accompaniment of the tireless tin whistle. Then that too ceased, and the night was silent again, given over to the watchful stars and the stirless air, as they waited for the dawn.
Lawless looked round on his sleeping guests, and stirred the fire noisily with his boot until it leapt into flame. Slumber had overtaken these men where they sprawled before the hearth. Some rested easily with their heads pillowed on their arms; one—it was Rentoul—lay like a log on his back, his great mouth open, breathing stertorously, and his twitching limbs flung wide.
“Hogs!” he muttered.
He fetched a pillow from one of the bedrooms, and lifting Rentoul’s inert head slipped it underneath. As he straightened himself after the performance of this office he became aware of a pair of eyes that followed his movements with interest, and perceived that among those silent figures one at least was wakeful and alert.
Hayhurst sat up, and then got upon his feet.
“Not all hogs this journey,” he said. And added: “The bed where that pillow came from will serve me better than the floor.”
Lawless nodded.
“There’s a bed apiece,” he answered. “The floor to-night is good enough for these.”
He flung on fresh logs, and stepping between the closely packed forms, took up the lamp from the table and led the way to the bedrooms. Before separating for the night Hayhurst held out his hand.
“To show there’s no ill-feeling,” he explained with a self-conscious laugh.
Notwithstanding the late carousal of the previous night, the morning found the men early astir. Rentoul awoke only half sober, and had to sharpen his faculties with a nip before he rose, and, despite his overnight homily on personal cleanliness, wiped the dust from his hair and beard with a grimy hand and sat down to breakfast unwashed. In the clear light of day they were a rough, strangely assorted lot; only the older man, Graves, with his air of distinction and education, stood out from the rest, like a man-of-war among a flotilla of “tramps”—but a man-of-war that has been in battle and come out of it badly damaged.
“Rum go, our meeting again, like this,” he said to Lawless, while they stood in the sunshine together and watched the others inspanning the mules. “I’d ask you to make a return call, only,”—he lifted his shoulders and smiled—“I’m a descendant of Cain—a wanderer upon the earth. I’ll own my six feet some day, I suppose, and come to anchor.”
Lawless glanced at the speaker with interest.
“I’m something of a rolling stone myself,” he answered. “I doubt I shall ever lay claim to greater acreage than you.”
“Ah!” Graves stroked the back of his head reflectively, and stared vaguely away into space. “Failures!” he muttered... “Eh?... And to think of some of the fellows who’re on top!”
“It’s another form of selfishness, theirs,” Lawless replied. “They’ve gone for the one thing, and stuck to it. A single idea would never satisfy either you or me. One man takes Wealth for his mistress; another, being polygamous, goes for a bevy of mistresses that we may bring under a common heading—Pleasure. The fool pursues Ambition, and the sentimentalist his Ideal... And when it comes to the finish—as Rentoul says—who shall say which man’s skull it is he turns up?” Graves nodded assent.
“And yet,” he said—“a man’s talents... It seems rotten things should pan out like that. I was never a white-haired boy exactly, but I had ideas once of doing something... Rot, of course—damned rot! And queer, too, how ideas run to seed before they fruit. I tell you a man needs to be ever on the alert, watching his ideas to prevent the growth exceeding the vitality. We don’t prune and tend enough. We’re so proud of our ideas that we let ’em run up rank and weedy, till they seed before time. It’s the man with the strength of mind to nip the young shoots and exert patience who sees the fruition of his ideas.”
“I confess I don’t understand,” said Lawless, “how you came to allow all yours to seed. With men like those,” and he waved his hand in the direction of the swearing, noisy group hitching the mules to the disselboom with many loud and unnecessary oaths, “it’s easy of comprehension. But—”
Graves filled in the pause with a laugh. “Ah well!” he returned... “Who can say? The secret to the riddle lies in what you spoke of just now... I’m a polygamist.”
Chapter Eighteen.
Lawless stood in the sunshine and watched the departure of this strange aggregate of human limitation setting forth on its journey into the infinitudes. The clumsy waggon, drawn by its team of four mules, with the dirty faded hood of yellowish green shading the wain, bumped and rumbled over the uneven ground. The jingling of the harness, the creaking of the heavy wheels, and the loud and too frequent cracking of the long whip, struck separate and not inharmonious notes of sound in the stillness of the morning air. And above these sounds a strong voice rang out heartily:
“Good-bye, Grit.”
The men in the waggon started to sing, “For he’s a jolly good fellow.” The rude music of their voices came back strongly to Lawless’ ears, and then grew fainter, and yet more faint, until only the silence reigned about him, and the waggon showed smaller and smaller as it trailed slowly across the veld, farther and farther into the illimitable blue distance. Hayhurst had ridden off some time before, taking an opposite direction to that followed by the waggon. The occupant of the shanty was left alone. The world seemed to have emptied suddenly and to have overlooked himself in its indiscriminate sweeping away of all life.
He gazed about him at the solitudes—waste land on all sides, stretching away league upon league in one great sameness,—vast, unchanging open spaces of veld, green and brown and orange, in which the yellow stones shone warmly in the sunshine, and the dew that lay heavily on the ground like a veil of silver flashed a prismatic defiance with the fire of myriads of gems.
He turned about and went into the house. The advent of these men had been unwelcome, their departure left a blank feeling of desolation behind. He had had as much of the solitudes as was good for him, he decided; if Van Bleit arrived, he would settle matters with him speedily and return to the beaten track. He felt depressed, and knew not that it was the influence of Graves’ personality working upon his mind. This man who had stirred up thoughts of failure by his talk, who in his person stood for waste—the result of neither competition nor intellectual incapacity, but of his own ineffectually—had set him thinking of the purposelessness of his life, its want of aim, of every high and right intention that once had actuated him, and which he had flung aside and trampled on in weak resentment against the tide of circumstances he had himself set loose and made no attempt to stem. He also stood for waste—the waste of powers which had left him stunted mentally and morally enervated. It is waste that is responsible for the world’s great failures.
He made an effort to shake off the mood that held him, and moving across the littered room surveyed the disordered breakfast-table with disgust. Empty bottles stood upon the table, and lay under it where they had been rolled the night before when they had yielded the last drop of their contents. They had been thirsty souls, these men who had happened out of the darkness and vanished again with the light,—failures, in a certain sense, each one of them,—a queer conglomerate of misdirected energy.
Lawless had a feeling that he ought to reduce the muddle to order, but he had only a vague idea how to set about it. He caught up the empty bottles, and going outside with them flung them out upon the veld.
“It’s no use, Grit, playing Aunt Sally with those bottles. You can’t hide your debauch from me.”
He turned his face with a laugh and a look of quick relief in the direction of the voice, and there stood Tottie in her short tweed skirt, with a golden lock straggling rakishly over one eye, and her lips unusually pallid.
“You! Gods! I’m glad,” he cried.
“Don’t stare at me like that,” she exclaimed,—“look somewhere else, can’t you? I won’t have the eye of man upon me until I have attended to my toilet. There wasn’t the vestige of a glass in the hut, you lunatic.”
He followed her into the house.
“What an orgy!” she exclaimed, with a swift glance round the untidy room. Her wandering gaze came back to his face and rested upon it curiously. “Reaction!” she murmured.
“Eh?” he said.
She put a hand on his shoulder and pushed him towards the door.
“You’re looking cheap. Clear out of this. I’ll put things right. Come back in half an hour, and you’ll find breakfast ready.”
“I’ve breakfasted,” he answered indifferently.
“Have you? Then you can return in half an hour and repeat the performance with me.”
“I want to ride into town,” he said.
“Yes, of course. I’ll go with you. You might put in your time now grooming the horses. It’ll keep you out of mischief, anyhow... It may be the last ride we’ll take together for many a day.”
He looked swiftly at her. She was trying to hide her feelings, but it was evident that the near termination of this life in the wilds which he had been contemplating with satisfaction, affected her differently. She had enjoyed the uneventful weeks with only his society to companion the long days. It had been a fresh experience which a really strong affection for him had made altogether agreeable. She turned her back on him, and putting up a hand jerked back the straying lock of hair impatiently.
“Get out, Grit. You’re in the way,” she said.
He faced about, and without a word strode out into the sunshine.
It was rather a silent ride they took—that last ride together into Stellenbosch. Lawless was preoccupied, and the woman too appeared busy with her thoughts. She asked him once what he purposed doing if Van Bleit decided not to come up, and he answered shortly:
“If he doesn’t come to me, I go to him.”
She looked him straight in the eyes.
“You mean to best him, Grit,” she said.
“Yes.”
“Remember, I’m your lieutenant.”
“Yes,” he said again. And they fell into silence as before.
Van Bleit’s answer acted somewhat as a set-back to their plans. Lawless had never contemplated the addition of Denzil to their numbers. It came altogether as a surprise.
“This complicates matters,” he said. “Looks fishy... rather as though he had his doubts of me. And yet I’ll swear when I last saw him—”
He broke off and thought about the matter.
“It won’t be so easy to outwit two,” he said. Then a smile of satisfaction dawned in his eyes. “It’s safe to predict, if they’re both up here, we shall have a chance of seeing those letters...”
Van Bleit and Denzil on their arrival hired a Cape cart from the town and drove the twenty miles across the veld. They congratulated themselves long ere they reached their destination on the foresight that had decided them to bring only a small amount of luggage.
“No man,” Van Bleit observed to his companion, “could stick it here for long. What a cheek the fellow has to imagine a woman—and such a woman—is going to find his companionship sufficient to reconcile her to this sort of thing! It’s not surprising Tottie scooted.”
Denzil looked out across the unvarying scene with increasing dissatisfaction.
“Lots of chaps have the Turk in them. They’d like to veil their women,” he returned, with no particular interest in the subject.
He was watching without appreciation the wonderful effects of the sunshine on the inimitable blending of colour in the veld, and the slowly moving shadows that swept across it where the clouds veiled the golden light. A soft wind was blowing, a wind that had the warm feel of the spring in it with its promise of early summer. The Cape winter was passing, going its way unmarked, even as it had come. But here on the high veld the nights were cold yet, and the crispness of the mornings still reminded a man of the feel of an English spring.
Van Bleit examined his finger-nails—which was a habit with him—and laughed.
“That would be all right if the women didn’t prefer being looked at,” he said. “The Turk will have to awake to the fact one day that the veil is out of fashion.”
It was afternoon when they reached the shanty. They had had three stoppages on the journey owing to the breaking of different parts of the harness, that was, native fashion, repaired with string. The horses were outspanned, and left to graze, while the coloured driver flung himself face downwards in the full rays of the sun to sleep for a couple of hours before making the return journey. Van Bleit settled with him, and bade him return for them in three days.
“Make it four,” urged Lawless. “You’re in a devil of a hurry to quit.”
“I should think so,” Van Bleit responded. But he made the alteration in the time. “What on earth do you do with yourself up here? I’d want to cut my throat if I stayed a week.”
“Oh! it hasn’t been half bad. I was getting a bit sick of my own company, though.”
“All alone, eh?”
“All alone,” Lawless answered. “It was all right while she was here; but the life was too domesticated for her taste. I was on the point of chucking it myself when I sent you that wire. It occurred to me that this might suit your book.”
“Awfully decent of you,” Van Bleit replied. But his eyes narrowed vindictively. He had a score to pay off against this man. His treatment at the hands of Mrs Lawless was, he felt convinced, attributable to him somehow. Grit had played him false in more ways than one.
“It’s not a bad little hutch,” he said, as he looked round the interior.
“Oh! it’s all right... A bit cramped.” Lawless threw open a door. “The bedrooms lead out,” he explained,—“two of them. Boxes, of course; but they serve for single rooms. You and Denzil can make shift for a few nights. I’ll bunk up in here.”
Van Bleit walked into the bedroom.
“Nonsense!” he replied decidedly. “We aren’t turning you out of your room. Denzil and I will sleep together. I’ll not hear of any other arrangement, Grit.”
“As you like,” Lawless answered.
Van Bleit went into the inner room.
“Check number one, Master Grit,” he murmured. Aloud he said: “I’d like a wash, old man. And then, if you’ve anything to eat, we won’t say no.”
When they were alone together, Van Bleit drew Denzil’s attention to the thinness of the partition between the two rooms, and laid a significant finger upon his lips.
“Leaks,” he said, and winked expressively.
He put his eye to a crack in the boarding.
“That’s where he’ll spy upon us when he thinks we’re unsuspecting,” he whispered, coming back. Then, whistling cheerily, he divested himself of his coat and plunged his face into a basin of cold water.
Later, when, having eaten, they sat outside smoking and talking, while the sun dipped below the horizon and the low wind died away, Van Bleit spoke of his trial and the night at the bungalow, giving a word picture of the shooting which by constant repetition he was beginning to believe. The recital made him something of a hero, but it did not reflect well on Colonel Grey.
“It was a damned trap,” he finished, and blew a cloud of smoke into the quiet air. “People who set traps for me are apt to find themselves ensnared.”
“I knew Simmonds. He seemed a decent, harmless sort of chap,” Lawless remarked after a pause. “I can’t associate him with traps, somehow. He lent me ten pounds once, and never bothered me to return it. I’m glad to remember now that I settled my account with him.”
“I’ve settled my account with him too,” Van Bleit rejoined... “I don’t go back on my word whatever the consequences.”
He was growing excited. Denzil, whose impulses did not lead him into indiscretions, brought him up suddenly with the quietly uttered remark:
“No one could have been more upset than you were over Simmonds’ death, dear fellow.”
“That’s a fact,” Van Bleit returned readily. “It was a shock to me. But it was my life against his. I fancy most men value their own lives more highly than another’s. Simmonds tricked me to the bungalow, and he paid the cost. He meant mischief. It isn’t wise for any man to attempt that sort of game with me.”
Lawless smoked in silence, and Denzil, under the pretext of getting a light for his pipe, nudged his friend significantly. Van Bleit in his excitement was giving himself away.
“Well, anyway,” Van Bleit resumed more collectedly after a pause, “he’s gone, poor devil! Let him Rip. My resentment doesn’t cross the border.” He laughed. “I require a certain amount of the commodity this side the Styx... most chaps do. I reckon you’ve got an enemy or so yourself, Grit?”
“I’m pretty well at enmity with all mankind,” Lawless answered. “And my greatest enemy, I take it, is myself.”
“That’s rot,” Van Bleit returned. “Every man has at least a sneaking affection for himself, and no enemy entertains the slightest regard for the object of his animosity.”
“There is something in that,” Lawless agreed, and thought for a moment. “Nevertheless, a man who makes enemies has an enemy in himself,” he added with conviction. “It is so much easier to win friends.”
“My experience hasn’t tended to that conclusion,” Van Bleit replied. “Friends are like the diamonds men dig out of the bowels of the earth at great expense of time and labour, valuable on account of their scarcity.”
“You’ve had some good friends yourself, Karl,” Denzil interposed with a wink. “Take Lawless, for instance. How many men would stay on in this God-forsaken hole solely to accommodate another?”
“There wasn’t much sacrifice in that,” Lawless replied. “The house is mine till the end of the month. So long as I can get anyone to bear me company there isn’t any incentive to leave it. When you go I clear out also. I can’t stick it here alone. The place has served its purpose. I’ve had a good time on the whole. But, as anyone can see, it’s not intended for a single man. In all these weeks I haven’t seen a soul besides yourselves, except for a party of prospectors who outspanned one night.”
He rose and knocked the ash from his pipe. Away in the distance he had seen a pinpoint of light like a dull star low down upon the horizon, and he knew that Tottie had lighted her candle in the lonely hut a quarter of a mile away. He planted himself between Van Bleit’s vision and the hut.
“It’s getting chilly,” he said. “I’ve no particular fancy for watching the stars: Have you?”
“No,” Van Bleit answered, and he and Denzil rose and accompanied their host indoors.
“It’s a dashed sight more comfortable inside,” he remarked.
Lawless drew the outer door to and fastened it. Neither of them had observed that pinpoint of flickering yellow light that was more like the elusive glimmer of a firefly than the luminous brilliance of a star. He wondered how he would have explained it had they remarked on the unexpected illumination in the hut.
Chapter Nineteen.
The following morning Lawless suggested a ride as the only entertainment he had to offer. There were only two mounts, he explained, and looked at Van Bleit. Van Bleit remarked that it would be fairly slow for the third man.
“Let’s take our guns and tramp,” he said. “There ought to be something in that bush yonder.”
“There isn’t,” Lawless answered. “I’ve been there myself.”
“It would give some sort of object for the walk,” Van Bleit observed.
“I can loaf about here very well by myself,” Denzil put in obligingly, missing the venom of the glance Van Bleit shot at him, a glance that Lawless intercepted and read aright. Van Bleit was not minded to trust himself alone in his company. There was not a shadow of doubt in his mind any longer that the Dutchman was suspicious of his intentions. It remained for him to lull those suspicions if possible.
“Come on, Karl,” he said. “Take your gun with you if you’re keen on potting things. But don’t expect much. I’ve been over the ground too often to hamper myself with carrying a gun. I’ll leave the killing to you. Sure you don’t mind?” he asked, turning to Denzil.
“Not in the least. I’ll potter about here. It’s more in my line.”
Van Bleit did not like the arrangement, but he went. When a man has a gun loaded in both barrels slung across his shoulders, and a revolver charged in all six chambers in his right-hand pocket, he is fairly well provided against attack. It amused Lawless to observe how careful his companion was to ride on his left, and how persistently he kept his right hand in his pocket. He rode himself with both hands quite as ostentatiously displayed on the reins. Whenever he moved the right in the performance of the most simple office he was conscious of being observed until he returned it to its position on the rein. The knowledge that Van Bleit distrusted him gave him a peculiar sense of satisfaction. It was more to his liking to outwit a rogue who was prepared than to take advantage of a man’s trust. He was glad to feel at this stage that they faced one another as foes.
During that ride, between the fragments of conversation, Lawless decided that on some such expedition as the present he would lead Van Bleit to a given place, and, with Tottie’s assistance, overpower him and get hold of what he wanted. In view of the shortness of the time in which to carry out his designs, it was necessary to put his plans into prompt effect. He determined upon seeing Tottie that night. He would slip out when the others were asleep and make his way to the hut. Then, if he could induce Van Bleit to fall in with his arrangements in the morning, success would be fairly assured. His policy in the meantime was to allay Van Bleit’s suspicions. In this he had succeeded fairly well so far. On the homeward journey Van Bleit rode most of the way with his right hand on his thigh; and once, Lawless noticed, when he plunged his own right hand into his pocket his companion did not appear in the least apprehensive. However much he doubted him, it was plain he had given up all thought of treachery on that occasion.
“I suggest we stick indoors and play cards this afternoon,” Van Bleit proposed when they got back. He swung his heavy frame out of the saddle. “It’s warm,” he said.
Van Bleit was lucky at cards. He played for high stakes; it was one of his varied methods of obtaining a livelihood. Certainly that afternoon he became no poorer. He and Denzil between them swept in the stakes.
“We’ll give you your revenge,” he said to Lawless.
And after supper they resumed their game and played far into the night. It was Lawless who eventually insisted on leaving off. He had been chafing for some time, thinking of his thwarted plans. Van Bleit, he knew, was likely enough to play through into the dawn. He pushed back his chair at last and rose.
“If you fellows don’t want any sleep,” he said, “I do. We’ve another day before us.”
Van Bleit laughed, rose, and stretched himself with a huge yawn.
“Late, is it? I never regard the time I spend over cards—or women,” he said. He finished his glass of whisky and scooped in his gains. “To-morrow I’ll give you a chance of winning some of this back.”
Lawless lighted the candles.
“Right!” he said. “I have a feeling that the luck is on the turn.”
“Then you ought to play on... She’s a fickle jade, and will change her mind in the daylight.”
“I’ll risk that. A man can’t be expected to play cards if he’s dead asleep.”
Lawless’ look of alertness when he was alone in the bedroom belied the plea of fatigue. He made such sounds and preparations as he deemed suitable for a man retiring to rest, and kicking off his boots, blew out the light, and flung himself dressed upon the bed. He listened intently to the sounds from the adjoining room. The jerky scraps of conversation between the two men were perfectly audible to him. It was rather like people talking in the same apartment with a screen dividing them. It would require the exercise of the utmost caution to leave the house without arousing their attention.
“Old Grit always had the rottenest luck at cards,” he heard Van Bleit mumbling. “But it’s made up to him in other ways.”
And Denzil in a sleepy drawl replied:
“Don’t believe in luck... When a man gets a thing it’s because he goes for it in the right way.”
Van Bleit’s response to that sapience was a grunted “Good-night.”
For a long while after they had ceased to talk Lawless lay still, staring wide-eyed into the darkness, until by the continued silence,—the heavy soundlessness that enwrapped the house like some listening mystery, he judged the two men were asleep. Nevertheless, it was very warily he slipped his stockinged feet to the floor and then stood up. Noiselessly, one step at a time, feeling his way in the darkness with the unerring judgment of a man who has already in the light measured the distance carefully from wall to wall, he crept towards the door. Cautiously as he proceeded, his hand came in contact with the rickety washstand, and in the general hush the noise he made, though slight enough, sounded tremendous in his imagination. It brought him up all standing, the pulses in his ears beating like so many hammers. He remained quite still and almost held his breath while he listened for the faintest movement from the next room, where Van Bleit and Denzil lay in the dark waiting, as he waited, until they felt the time was ripe for discussing certain plans of their own.
Perfect silence reigned.
Lawless drew a slow breath of relief. There was no sound in the stillness other than that dull hammering of pulses in his ears. The noise he had made, he rightly conjectured, was not so audible as he had feared. But he did not mean running any risks; and so he remained where he was, rigid, waiting, listening, while the minutes slipped away, and the silence, heavy, portentous of lurking evil, remained absolutely unbroken.
He was about to advance a further step when an extraordinary interruption occurred. Stealthily, as though the striker sought to stifle the sound, a match was rubbed lightly against its box, and the next instant a light shone through the chinks in the partition, and from the sounds Lawless judged that someone was getting off the bed, and that in so cautious a manner as to suggest that whoever it was he was anxious not to be heard. For a few moments Lawless suspected that his own movements had aroused attention, and he waited, quiet-eyed and grim, for the next move in the game. But after a while he began to think that he was altogether mistaken. The occupants in the next room were as anxious as he had been not to be overheard. They were whispering together, and one of them moved stealthily across the floor, and a sound that was like the crackle of paper reached Lawless’ ears.
With even greater caution than he had used to cross the floor to the door he now retraced his steps and softly advanced towards the glimmer of light that showed through the chinks in the partition. He put his eye to the biggest crack. Van Bleit stood in his pyjamas beside the bed facing Lawless, a sealed packet, the sight of which gave the watcher a queer start, in his hand. He was speaking to Denzil, who, sitting up in bed, listened attentively with his eyes on the speaker. Van Bleit spoke in so low a tone that had he been facing the other way it was doubtful that Lawless could have heard. As it was he only made out part of what was said.
“I daren’t risk it,” Van Bleit was murmuring. “I don’t trust him... ride this morning... If it hadn’t been that I was armed he would... letters must be got out of this...”
He began to speak more slowly and with greater distinctness.
“We’ll wait for the dawn... there’s no hurry. If he hears you, I’ll say you have gone for a ride before breakfast... out of the window... no need to make a noise... ride slowly for the first half-mile, and keep going towards the bush. If he should happen to catch sight of you, he’d never suppose you were making for the town. I may be quite out in this, of course, but I have my suspicions... satisfied when those letters are safely out of...”
Lawless caught nothing more. But he had heard enough. He saw Denzil take charge of the packet, and he caught sight of the butt of a revolver sticking out obliquely from beneath the pillow.
He drew back softly, and smiled grimly to himself in the dark. Van Bleit in his eagerness to save the letters from falling into his hands was deliberately placing them there. The wily scoundrel had overreached himself.
He stepped softly back to the bed, and lying down, waited for the dawn. It seemed long in coming. And when at last the first pale glimmer of light showed wanly in the sky he began to think that sleep had overcome his companions. There was no stir from within. He lay quite still, listening. After a while he fancied, but could not be sure, that he heard someone moving. He listened more attentively. Without a doubt someone was pattering about the floor in bare feet while he struggled into his clothes as noiselessly as possible. He heard the window-sash slide open, and raising himself and looking out, saw Denzil drop from the low sill and pass beneath his window. He gave him time to reach the stable and saddle a horse. Then he got up quietly and made his careful exit by the door.
Once outside his movements were less cautious. He hurried to the stable, and saddling the second horse, started in pursuit. He rode behind the house, trusting that Van Bleit if he heard would ascribe the sounds to Denzil, and followed the directions he had heard given in the whispered instructions of the previous night.
It was not long before he descried his quarry. Denzil was riding easily, as a man rides for exercise with no particular object in view. He did not once turn his head to look back, but jogging quietly on his way made steadily for the dense cover behind the hut. Lawless quickened his pace and overtook him about a mile from the house. On hearing someone behind him Denzil looked round, and reining in his horse waited for him to come up.
“Hallo!” he said, a trifle uneasily, it seemed to Lawless. “You’re early astir. I thought I had the day to myself.”
“Any objection,” Lawless asked, “to a companion on your ride?”
Denzil laughed awkwardly.
“On the contrary,” he said. “I hate riding alone. But I thought you chaps were dead asleep. This to my thinking is the best time of the day.”
“Yes,” Lawless agreed. “I usually ride before the sun is up.”
They drew abreast, and walked their horses alongside the dense bush. Denzil talked continuously as a man might who was ill at ease and anxious to gain time. It was evident to Lawless that he scented danger, and would gladly have been without his companionship. Once or twice he looked about him furtively, as though some idea of flight possessed his mind; but either his nerve was not equal to the attempt or the possibility of being mistaken in his deductions suggested the prudence of awaiting developments.
The development, when it came, was startling and unpleasant.
He had been looking about him in his furtive, shifty, nervous way, as though wishful yet fearful of attempting escape, when suddenly facing about, impelled by some force other than conscious volition, he found himself staring blankly into the shining barrel of a revolver.
“If you so much as lift a finger,” Lawless said coolly, “I’ll blow your brains out. Halt!”
The horses came to a standstill. Lawless, still covering the other man, freed his foot from the stirrup and swung himself out of the saddle.
“Dismount!” he said, standing with the rein over his left arm, the right raised with the revolver gripped in his hand.
Denzil reddened, but complied with the curt command.
“What’s your game?” he stuttered, as he stood on the veld facing that business-like weapon at uncomfortably close quarters. “What are you up to?”
“Hands up!” Lawless said. And Denzil, alarmed and reluctant, held his hands high above his head.
“I’ll not keep you in that undignified and uncomfortable position longer than necessary,” Lawless went on. “It depends upon yourself how long you have to endure the annoyance. You have in your possession a packet of letters which it is my intention to relieve you of. You will save me trouble, and yourself continued inconvenience, by telling me in which pocket I shall find what I require.”
“Oh! that’s it, is it?” Denzil smiled uneasily. “You might have spared yourself trouble. Van Bleit has the packet. He wouldn’t trust it with me.”
Lawless dropped the rein, leaving it hanging down in front of the forelegs after the Colonial custom with standing horses, and advanced upon the speaker.
“If you waste my time by lying,” he said, “I’ll shoot you. Which pocket is it in?”
Denzil’s eyes snapped; but he was too genuinely alarmed at the cold feel of the revolver against his temples to attempt further procrastination.
“Breast... right-hand side,” he answered shortly.
“This spells ruin for me,” he muttered, as Lawless plunged his left hand inside his coat and drew out the sealed packet Van Bleit had given into his charge in the bedroom a few hours before. “I don’t know how I’ll face Karl. He’ll be for shooting me himself.”
“He’s had one escape from hanging,” Lawless responded drily; “he’ll not risk a second.”
He withdrew to a short distance, briefly examined the packet, and slipped it into his own breast pocket with an extraordinary sense of exultation. He had succeeded where others had failed. He had boasted to Colonel Grey that he would get the letters or kill his man, and here were the letters that had cost so much safely in his possession...
He walked to where he had left his horse standing, and putting his foot in the stirrup, vaulted into the saddle. Then he gathered up his rein, and caught at the rein of the other horse.
“You can lower your hands,” he said; “but be careful what you do with them; I’m not uncovering you yet.”
Denzil dropped his hands to his sides, and watched with considerable interest the movements of the man who had so completely outwitted him.
“You are leaving me to tramp it, I suppose?” he said.
“I’m depriving you and Van Bleit of the means of following me,” was the brief answer.
“Van Bleit will never believe how entirely you surprised me,” Denzil returned dejectedly. “He’ll think I ought to have stuck to the packet at all costs. Man, I wonder if you know the value of what you’ve got there? Look here! ... Stop a bit!” ... His manner became eager and confidential. “Can’t we do a deal, you and I? ... Let me stand in with you—or, better still, give me a sum down, and I’ll let you into the know how to work those letters to the best advantage... What do you say, eh?”
“What I have to say won’t interest you,” Lawless replied. “If I hadn’t passed my word, I wouldn’t touch the damned letters, and the first thing I mean to do with them is to get rid of their charge... But not to you... If you had your deserts you would find yourself on the breakwater. Now, march!” he added. “Turn your back, and keep going.”
He had hardly issued the order when something happened that put an altogether different aspect upon the face of things. Inexplicably, he saw Denzil grinning as he abruptly turned about, and the next moment something hurtled through the air and fell about his shoulders, tightening with a suddenness that pinned his arms to his sides. The revolver flew from his hand, and simultaneously he was jerked violently out of the saddle. He fell heavily to the accompaniment of raucous laughter, and, lying on the veld, straining impotently at the cords that held him, he realised with bitter mortification that Karl Van Bleit had securely lassoed him by a cowboy trick he was an adept in.