FEEDING THE OSTRICH CHICKS.
He began to think these rough Boers knew more than he did after all. Perhaps he could find out how they managed it.
There was one particular corner at which Zyl paused with evident pride. It was a perfect square, marked off from the rest of the garden by a row of flowering cactus. In the angle of the wall stood a clumsy, three-cornered stool, which Zyl endeavoured to make Jack understand was his own handiwork. The frame of an old umbrella had been nailed to the wall, and as its silk covering had altogether disappeared, it had been skilfully thatched with grass. Two young creeping-plants were making haste to climb the wall to reach it.
A small orange-tree, which could have seen little more than a single summer, was planted in the very centre of the little square, with a ring of rice-plants round it, brought from an unfrequented dell among the neighbouring rocks. A circular path divided this from the side borders, where Jack observed an abundant crop of seed springing up in the shape of a Dutch "Z."
This was enough for Jack. He guessed once it was Zyl's own garden. How he envied him the possession. But this was a bad feeling, and Jack crushed it in its birth, smothering it with a burning desire to emulate the Dutch boy's skill, and, if possible, surpass it.
"I must have the seat big enough for two," thought Jack, "and father and I could have our supper there."
So the time slid by until Genderen returned, leading Sannie in a clean pinafore, with both her chubby hands filled with sweets, the Dutch child's delight. She held out one to Jack, who had given her the "beauty picture."
As he stooped to take it, he softly parted the curly mop of flaxen hair, and looked ruefully at the darkening bruise it shaded. This reminded him of Vickel.
"I must, I ought to go and look after her," he thought.
Now, Jack could climb like a cat; and as he despaired of making his new friends understand how much he wanted to go back to his father's waggon, he suddenly leaped upon Zyl's seat, and was over the wall in a moment. His astonished companions stared after him with their fingers in their mouths, utterly amazed. They would have said only a Kafir could have done it.
Once outside the wall of Jaarsveldt, Jack ran eagerly to the waggon. The oxen were leisurely ruminating. Everything was right but Vickel. Where was Vickel? A cry of bitter self-reproach burst from his lips. He tried to call her name, but his voice failed him. All the terrible excitement he had undergone seemed to culminate in that moment. A cold shiver ran through him, for this new trouble was of his own making. If he had not left Vickel so long, he would not have lost her.
He was blaming himself too keenly to know what he was doing. He tried to call her, but his voice sounded hoarse, and unlike his own. The echo from the neighbouring rocks repeated his heart-breaking call. He did not know what an echo was, and believed that some one else was calling his bird in the distance. Off he set, as fast as he could go, hoping to overtake the unknown somebody who was tempting his pet away. Once he thought he heard his ostrich screaming behind him. He paused, completely bewildered.
No; it was only Zyl shouting to him to stop. But Jack had had enough of Zyl's company for the present, and would not comply. So the two chased each other over the red sand, nearer and nearer to those sombre mosses of frowning brown which had exercised such a power over Jack's imagination.
The heat was now intense, but there was neither sight nor sound of Vickel. He ran till he could run no further, and had hardly breath enough left to call her name. Then he remembered Genderen's oranges, and sitting down under one of the low karroo bushes, which reminded him of home, he began to eat them. This helped him to recover his voice, and putting both hands to his mouth, he once more shouted, "Vickel," and again the rocks gave back his cry.
At this moment an ox-cart drove slowly out of one of the rocky defiles, in the direction of Jaarsveldt. Zyl, who was gaining on his flying friend, saw it also, and apparently recognizing the two men who were in it, waved his hat and shouted in his turn.
The Hottentot driver turned the head of his ox towards the boys, whilst his companion answered Zyl with the "view halloo" of an English sportsman.
Jack sprang to his feet at the sound of an English voice, realizing for the first time in his life all that word "countryman" means in a foreign land.
The ox-cart rumbled on. Zyl was running to meet it with eager joy. Jack had no eyes for the Hottentot driver; all his attention was centred on the big sun-umbrella which almost covered his companion.
As the boys came up to the cart, it was swung backwards. The owner of the umbrella, an aristocratic-looking young Englishman of twenty-two or twenty-three, held out his hand to Zyl with a smile. It was a pleasant smile as far as it went, for it only played around his lips; it never reached his eyes. About them there was a reckless, "don't care" expression which rather repelled Jack; but Zyl was obviously delighted to meet him.
"Please, sir, have you seen an ostrich?" asked Jack.
"Yes, dozens, my little man. But what is that to you?" was the somewhat curt reply.
"Please, sir, I have lost my Vickel, my own tame ostrich, and I have heard somebody calling her over there, the way you came," added Jack, pointing to the rocks.
"Somebody!" repeated the stranger, shaking with laughter. "I rather think it was Mr. Nobody. You little fool, to go chasing an echo! Come, jump in, both of you; for we are all risking a sunstroke crossing the veldt at noon. I did not bargain to be so late, I assure you."
Then he turned to Zyl and asked some questions in Dutch, to which the young Boer responded with more alacrity than usual. He scrambled up into the cart at once, trying to pull Jack after him.
"No, thanks," persisted Jack; "I don't want to ride; I must find my bird."
"Nonsense!" retorted the stranger. "Jump in this minute, or you will lose yourself. And where on earth will you be so likely to find your bird as in the ostrich camp at the next farm?"
"Perhaps you are right, sir," said Jack brightening.
"Boys do not say 'perhaps' to me," he continued, seating the two between himself and the Hottentot driver, who was by no means pleasant as a near neighbour on so hot a day.
Zyl got close to the Englishman, as if he had a special right to appropriate him, so Jack turned to the Hottentot, who did not laugh at his trouble, and promised readily, if he saw an ostrich with scorched wings, to catch her. Jack ventured to ask him in a whisper who the Englishman was that he was driving.
"He no father of mine," answered the driver; for to him father and master meant the same. "He be a Ingleese, who come and go from farm to farm, and he do cram little boys' heads with big words for three long days, till they sleepy, sleepy."
At this description of himself and his present occupation as itinerant schoolmaster, the Englishman laughed until he shook again. Then he laid one arm on Zyl's broad shoulders, and leaned across to question Jack.
"What makes you so curious about me?" he asked.
"Because you are an Englishman, and so is my father," replied the little fellow.
"Then I have a great mind to come and see him and cram your empty head; but mind you, if I find you going sleepy, sleepy, this will pretty quickly wake you up again," retorted the boyish schoolmaster, shaking the cane he carried.
Jack grew very red, being painfully conscious of his own short-comings; but he answered manfully, "I shouldn't be sleepy in the morning."
"All right," laughed the schoolmaster. "Zyl has been telling me all about you, John Treby, junior. Just give that to your father," he continued, tearing a leaf out of his pocket-book on which was written, "Sandford Algarkirke."
"Father will come back to Jaarsveldt to fetch me and the waggon, and then I will give it to him," answered Jack promptly.
"Will he come to-night?"
"Oh yes," answered Jack.
"Better and better!" cried young Algarkirke. "Then I shall see him to-night. I have not spoken to an Englishman for seven months. What part of the old country did your father come from?"
"Nottingham," returned Jack. "He told me only last night—no, I mean the last night at home, just before the thieves came—never to forget I have a grandfather living at Nottingham."
"Nottingham!" exclaimed Algarkirke in a tone that bordered on alarm, while for a moment the reckless "don't care" expression was banished from his brow.
VI.
THREE DAYS WITH THE BOOKS.
THE arrival of the schoolmaster quickened the slow paces of the Boer's family. The thrifty "tante" was anxious to make the most of his three days' sojourn.
The Black Antelope had dragged off Zyl and Sannie to the wash-tub. Being in disgrace already, they submitted, but not without a pout and a grimace at the inordinate scrubbing the zealous creature thought it her duty to inflict. Genderen, she insisted, ought to show her respect for "the man of books" by taking off the long checked pinafore and exhibiting the brightly-flowered cotton dress beneath it.
The Black Antelope's veneration for a man who make a white sheet talk, by just sprinkling it with something black, knew no bounds. She would have remained all day watching her charges whilst the lessons were going forward if her mistress would have allowed it, on the "qui vive" for other magical performances perhaps as wonderful. This was certainly a sign that pen and ink were not often required in the Boer's household when the schoolmaster was not present.
Tante Milligen was seated on the lumbering settee, smoothing down the sides of her voluminous apron, whilst the schoolmaster did justice to the ample lunch she had provided for him. Whilst he ate, she enlarged upon her own and her husband's satisfaction with their present arrangements. She hoped they were doing their duty by their children. They had always taken them to church twice a year, although it was such a long way to Pretoria; but now they had a schoolmaster in the neighbourhood again, they must all make up for lost time.
Young Algarkirke was not slow at taking a hint, so he professed himself quite ready to begin lessons at once.
The Black Antelope bustled in her charges, with their freckled faces polished to a deep rose-pink, and arranged the chairs. Books were brought out and selected from the heterogeneous contents of the capacious cupboard, and slates were dusted.
Sandford Algarkirke looked at Sannie with some dismay, for she was an addition to the party quite outside his hopes or expectations.
"She is young," remarked Tante Milligen; "but she will have to make a beginning some day, and there is no time like the present. We don't keep any schoolmaster amongst us over-long, and then there is often a year or two before we get another to settle, so I hope you will let her take her turn with her brother and sister."
Forthwith the assiduous Kafir produced an additional cushion, which raised the would-be learner to the level of the big table, and darting upon a Latin grammar Mr. Algarkirke had just taken out of his own pocket, she laid it open before her with great solemnity.
"That will do," said Tante Milligen, pointing her domestic to the door. "Now bring me that pinafore, and I'll see how I can patch it."
"Inkosi! (Kafir for mistress) Inkosi!" exclaimed the excited black. "One word, and I will trouble your ears no more this day. The little Ingleese lamb without a mother lies weeping in the dust by his father's oxen. Why? Because he is shut out while the books speak. Open to him, inkosi, that he too may learn wisdom."
"Listen to our black spider," muttered Zyl. "Has not she got eyes all round her head, and feet that can run every way at once? Oh, we are just dummies and blocks beside her."
"Be still," whispered Genderen; "she'll get him in."
"Let him come, then," said Tante Milligen.
"By all means," added the schoolmaster warmly.
A swifter messenger than the Black Antelope never lived. She ran at her fastest now. The fleetness of foot had won for her her name. But her volubility was lost on Jack, who could not understand any one of the endearing epithets she showered upon him. It was true he was crying bitterly, but her conjecture as to the cause of his grief was quite a mistake, for he was mourning over his folly in losing sight of Vickel.
She caught him by both his hands and whirled him away to the door of the sit-kamé, where Zyl was stumbling through a page of Dutch history, about which his teacher knew nothing, whilst Genderen, with her fingers in her mouth and her low forehead drawn into most painful puckers, was trying hard to cast up an addition sum.
Mr. Algarkirke's knowledge of Dutch had been picked up during a short stay in Amsterdam before he emigrated, and when he found himself at a loss for a word, he recalled attention by a rap with his cane.
Genderen sighed heavily, and Zyl tugged at his fore-lock. Lessons with the Dutch children were a very laborious matter. If they had not been so fully alive to their importance, the new schoolmaster would have been a failure. With stolid gravity Zyl pulled through blunders his master was quite unable to rectify, and closed his book at last with an air of satisfaction that would have convulsed an English school with merriment.
Mr. Algarkirke seated Jack beside him, for an English child was a welcome addition to his pupils. But alas! the school-books were all in Dutch, except the Latin grammar, at which Sannie was profoundly staring.
"May I do a sum?" asked Jack, who knew "the good spell at the figures" did not come off so frequently as his father desired.
Jack found it much easier to grapple with the difficulties of long division in the day-time, when he was wide awake, than in his brief but pleasant lessons between winks, when his father was often more weary than himself. He said he should like a good spell at arithmetic, using his father's words a little proudly. But when Mr. Algarkirke rewarded his painstaking by setting him another and a longer example in money division, he felt himself becoming something worse than sleepy, for he was downright stupid at the conclusion.
"Please, Mr. Algarkirke, may I have a book?" he asked.
"Touch a book with such dirty paws!" retorted the schoolmaster, who had considerably widened the distance between them. "No, sir; no, I say."
Jack crimsoned to the roots of his hair, and hid his hands under the table. The schoolmaster grumbled something in Dutch. All eyes turned on Jack.
"A travelling schoolmaster expects his pupils to be ready for him. It is not treating me with proper respect to come here covered with soot and dust," he continued sharply.
Jack got up slowly and went to the door.
The Black Antelope was told off to recall him; but her ready wit had already divined the cause of Mr. Algarkirke's offence. Poor, disconcerted Jack was whirled away into one of the side rooms, where tub and towel awaited him.
The touch of his hot head and burning hands distressed her, and ere the bathing was finished, she felt quite sure the poor child would be prostrate with African fever before many hours were over. Should she tell her mistress? The Boers were so hard and unfeeling to their slaves, the Kafir could not depend upon their sympathy. But her woman's heart went forth to the poor white lamb without a mother, and she made up her mind to steal out at night and watch over him, if he were sent back into the waggon to sleep alone.
She took away his burnt and blackened clothes, and dressed him in a cast-off suit of Zyl's; but the shirt and trousers were immensely too big, so she rolled up the sleeves of the former to his elbows and the legs of the trousers to his knees. In place of a belt, she found a large scarlet and orange handkerchief of the "oom's," and wound it round Jack's waist, dancing round him with delight, and shouting to a sister Kafir, who was pounding home-grown pepper in the entrance court, to come and admire his little shell-like ears, his shapely knees, etc.
Jack, who could not understand her lavish praise, felt supremely ridiculous when she led him back to the sit-kamé, where the business of school was proceeding rapidly. A hearty laugh greeted Jack's transformation.
"You need not have leaped from a chimney-sweep to a merry-andrew," observed Mr. Algarkirke, as the mirth subsided, "and you an English boy."
Slow of speech as Zyl and Genderen habitually were, they resented the tones of reproach in which these words were spoken. Dropping an unwary ink-spot on her copybook as she gathered up her courage, Genderen began the story of the fire, which Zyl confirmed with sundry snorts of vengeance against the thievish Kafirs.
"And so they brought you here just as they pulled you out of the flames!" exclaimed the young Englishman. "Why did not you tell me this before, Jack?"
Tante Milligen began to think the interruption had been too prolonged, so she got up and reminded the new teacher that Sannie had not yet had her turn.
The young Englishman, who would have been at his ease in the lecture-room of an Oxford professor, inwardly groaned. His disgust at the sight of the little blue-checked bundle that was dog's-earing his Latin grammar exceeded Jack's on the preceding evening.
But happily for him, no alphabet could be found in any one of the time-worn school-books that Tante Milligen had produced. They had already served the educational needs of three generations, and many a loose page had disappeared in the process. What was to be done? Tante Milligen was rummaging her cupboard, but in vain.
Jack, who was sitting on a corner of Zyl's chair, helping him through the mazes of his multiplication, looked up brightly, and offered to cut out an alphabet with his knife if he might have a loose book lid which was lying on the table.
But the process of alphabet cutting proved so interesting to Zyl and Genderen they could do nothing but watch it, until Mr. Algarkirke banished Jack and his knife to the back of the settee. Sannie crept after him unperceived, and learnt her first lesson unawares, for Jack had chosen a nice sized capital "A" on the title-page of the Latin grammar, which he got her to hold before him as a pattern; but the little fat fingers let the leaves fly over a dozen times. The bruise on her forehead made Jack wince every time he caught sight of the blue-green shadow.
He was patience itself, and turning back to his copy pointed to it with a smile, sometimes finding another A and sometimes turning back to the title-page with which he started, until at last Sannie's finger followed his as she drawled out, "Das is ein" (that is one); and she was right. Whilst Jack was at work on the B, Sannie fitted her card A to the corresponding capital in the pages of the grammar.
By the time Jack reached the eighth letter, his material was exhausted. He passed them quietly to Mr. Algarkirke, and sat down again, resting his aching head against the back of the settee, unnoticed by anyone, whilst Sannie was called up for her first lesson.
With a disdainful curl of the lip, as if he were condescending to the very dust, Mr. Algarkirke laid the letters in order, and mounting the too juvenile pupil on the chair beside him, informed her with much preceptorial display that A was the first letter of the alphabet and the first of the vowels.
Sannie made answer with a long-drawn "Jah!" and held up the Latin grammar.
"That," said he, taking the volume from her to conceal the laughter that was choking him—"that is a little beyond you. One step at a time."
Sannie stared at him with one hand in her mouth, duly impressed with the solemnity of the occasion. Whilst he consulted the four corners of the room as to what he should say next, Jack guessed his dilemma, and renewed his petition for a book. The Latin grammar was handed to him. As Jack took it, he swept the letters into a heap, and smiling at the round baby face, almost ready to dissolve in tears, he pointed to the A on the title-page.
"Well done, my little Dutchwoman!" exclaimed Algarkirke as Sannie picked out the cardboard duplicate from the little heap of letters and held it up to Jack.
Tante Milligen let her hands fall upon her lap. It was wonderful. Mr. Algarkirke's reputation as a schoolmaster was established for ever.
"Allamachter!" she exclaimed. "Why I was full three months before they got me to see the difference between one letter and another. No more German teachers for me. You can't beat the English at work. They take it all square. We must make much of him."
The Black Antelope was quite ready to echo her mistress's opinion. Feeling she had now seen both tutor and pupils fairly started on the road to learning, Tante Milligen withdrew to her kitchen, having been assured for the last half-hour that the roast was burning.
Mr. Algarkirke coughed ominously.
"Jack," he whispered in an English aside, "you are a brick. You have helped me over the worst bit of drudgery in my day's work. Now, if there is anything I can do for you or your father, you must tell me."
"Please, sir," cried Jack, brightening, "will you sell father a coat?"
"If I were not so wretchedly down in my luck, I would give one, but anyhow, he shall have it for a trifle," answered Algarkirke, "if he wishes."
Jack scarcely longed for evening more earnestly than his young countryman, who knew not how to keep the attention of his stolid pupils through the sleepy heat of an African afternoon. The room was like an oven. Algarkirke was painfully conscious the slow intellects of the Boer's children were gaining from him nothing but a jumble of confused ideas. School in the wilderness is a difficult matter, manage as you will. Genderen's sleepy yawn, which she was unable longer to repress, reminded the young tutor of the Hottentot.
A bright thought occurred to him—an object lesson out of doors. Weights and measures taught amid the heaps of corn in Van Immerseel's granary would be made clear to the most sluggish understanding. The "fatted calf," as he chose to designate poor Sannie, was snoring at his feet. He left her undisturbed to the enjoyment of her siesta, and marched out the other two, slate in hand, to their own favourite resort, the farm-yard. Jack followed wearily. At that moment he would have been content to share the sheep-skin in the corner.
The Hottentot herdsman stood grinning at the novel proceeding. With bushel and strike, steelyard and sack, Zyl was at home; and Genderen, with her pencil between her lips, noting down the figures at Mr. Algarkirke's dictation, seemed a different being. Jack stood nearest to the door. A tug at his sleeve made look round. There was his Vickel, with her queenly breast and outspread wings, obviously intent upon dragging out her little master into the free, fresh air to share with her the pleasures of a straw-stack, in which she had been revelling with her new-found kin. Jack forgot everything in his joy at seeing her again.
But Zyl, whose remembrance of her attack in the morning was as vivid as ever, banged up the door and shut them both out.
Jack was now feeling too ill to wish to return. He went with Vickel to the rustling straw, and was soon fast asleep, with his aching head pillowed on Vickel's downy breast.
He awoke with a shiver, for the evening dews were falling. The ostrich was roosting beside him, with her head under her wing. The farm-yard gate was shut; but it was easy to get on to the wall from the top of the stack. Jack did not disturb his bird; for he thought if she began to clamour, the noise would be heard indoors, and some one would be sure to come and fetch him. He longed to be left alone. He wanted nobody but his father, and he would look for him where he had left him in the early morning. So Jack let himself drop down the other side of the wall and crept into the waggon.
VII.
THE BLACK ANTELOPE.
THE evening darkened into night, but Jack's father did not return. Tante Milligen had sent her Kafir maid to look for Jack, and when she heard he was asleep in his father's waggon, she thought it best to leave him there. But the kind-hearted Black Antelope was troubled, for his restless sleep convinced her the fever was upon him. She had washed his sooty clothes for pure love of his fair English face, and laid them by him in the waggon.
Among the few trifles which had been saved from the fire was Mr. Treby's drinking-flask, which was in the pocket of his coat, but had not been destroyed with it. Before he departed, he had filled it with water for Jack's benefit, and left it, with the remains of the dinner Tottie had provided, by the sleeping child. Jack could not touch the bone of cold mutton or the crust of bread, but he drank the water. He fell asleep with the flask in his hands. It had been a keepsake from an English friend, and Mr. Treby's name was engraved upon the silver stopper.
The night was intensely hot, and the moon was near the full. The light of the lamp still streamed through the half-open door of the sit-kamé, where Tante Milligen was awaiting the return of her husband and son. Most of the Kafir servants had been dismissed to their huts for the night.
Sandford Algarkirke, preferring the company of the fireflies to the conversation of the Boeress, had retreated to the orange grove, where he too was listening for the first sound of the horses' feet. But they were scarcely audible, for the weary travellers rode slowly over the sandy veldt, and were within sight of the farm before any one at home was aware of their presence.
The Black Antelope had just paid her last visit to the fever-stricken child. She found him trying to drain another drop from the now empty flask. She took it from him, intending to refill it, and was stepping out of the waggon with it in her hand when the "oom" rode up.
In that brilliant moonlight he saw the silver-mounted flask in the black girl's hand as clearly as if it had been noonday, and so did Mr. Treby, who rode beside him. Believing she had stolen it from the waggon, the Boer leaped from his horse and struck her such a blow with his clenched fist that she lay moaning on the ground.
"Bread of mine was never yet broken by a thief, and never shall be!" he exclaimed indignantly, snatching the flask from her unresisting hand and returning it to Mr. Treby.
The gate of Jaarsveldt was flung open as Tante Milligen and the schoolmaster ran out to ascertain the cause of the commotion. The rest of the party spurred forward; but amidst the stamping of hoofs and the neighing of horses, the Boer's stentorian voice was heard denouncing the guilty hand that dared to touch the Englishman's goods in his absence.
"What is he saying?" asked Jack's father in an anxious aside to the German Otto.
The shepherd translated his master's words, adding, "Your things are safe enough under Van Immerseel's protection."
"Jah! Jah!" cried Walt, who was standing behind them. "We'll show you in the morning how we punish a thief at Jaarsveldt. Such gentry, be their colour what it may, had better not come here."
The noise had effectually roused poor Jack from his feverish sleep. He saw the Black Antelope, who had been so kind to him all day, staggering to her feet but he saw his father in the group, and scrambling out of the waggon, he rushed to him, gasping, "Don't let them hurt her, father dear! Oh, don't! Don't!" For the Boer had doubled up his gigantic fist to deal a second blow.
Mr. Treby stepped forward and caught Van Immerseel's arm, expressing his heartfelt thanks for his timely intervention, yet adding a plea for mercy to the delinquent.
The Kafir girl cast one loving look of gratitude on Jack, and slunk away into the shadows.
Tante Milligen, with her arms akimbo, was warmly applauding her husband's conduct.
Sandford Algarkirke had drawn back into the garden. He held the gate in his hand, and was listening attentively to every word.
"Please, sir," cried Jack excitedly, "you can make these people understand. Do come and tell them the poor Kafir girl only went to fetch me some more water. I am sure she did not mean to steal the flask."
"Then say so," was the brief reply; "but do not drag me into the matter."
"Of course I would, if I could speak their Dutch. I ought, I must; but they do not know what I am saying, so it is of no use. But you can explain it; and if you do not, they will beat her dreadfully," urged Jack. "We must not let the innocent suffer. It is not right, Mr. Algarkirke."
"Come along, then," returned the young schoolmaster, and taking Jack's hand he led him into the house, where the travellers were already seated round the supper-table.
"This little fellow has asked me to be his interpreter," said Algarkirke as he repeated Jack's assertion.
But the burly Dutchman only laughed.
"Say no more now, Jack," interposed his father, making room for his boy beside him. "Circumstances are very much against her."
"And circumstances weigh so heavily when you have only innocence without proof to balance them in the other scale; but she is happy to have even a child like you to believe in her," added the young schoolmaster, with a bitterness that made Jack's father think,—
"Some personal experience, something in your own life, gave its sting to that remark."
"She will never pilfer again," remarked Walt; "she is too true a Kafir for that. There is the dog-nature in them all—just the same sort of fidelity, and all that." So the talk ran on, and in the discussions over more important matters the Black Antelope was forgotten by all but Jack and the schoolmaster.
The sheep-tracks had been carefully traced, but they did not lead to the district of the free Kafirs in the valleys among the rocks. Mr. Treby began to think his Tottie was right in her estimate of the thieves. But the scare had spread through the whole district. The police would be here in the morning and until they had investigated the matter, watch must be kept, for fear the aggressors should return and attack another of the lonely farms which dotted the sandy waste.
Mr. Treby had encountered his white-haired Hottentot Seco returning. He brought him word that the new settler at Scarsdorp found the wild life in that vast karroo too rough for his taste, and had previously decided to change his sheep-farm and try tobacco-growing in Natal. The news which Seco carried made him hasten his departure all he could. He would "trek" at once (as the African settlers say when they move, using the old Dutch word their neighbours the Boers have made familiar throughout the district), if he could buy or hire another waggon to carry the rest of his goods.
Mr. Treby caught at the opportunity this offered him to retrieve his fortunes. He decided to place his waggon and oxen at his neighbour's service. For this he would receive a good round sum. He would drive it himself; and when he had delivered the goods, he must start for Kimberley and dig for diamonds, until he had gained money enough to rebuild his house and stock his farm. Van Immerseel was ready to hire his pasture for the rest of the season, and pay him on his return—not with money, but with sheep.
Jack, of course, would go with him, for he could work with him at the diamond diggings. Jack could manage a sieve; his young eyes would be as sharp as his own to pick out the sparkling diamonds as he sifted the loosened earth in which they were embedded. The journey would give his burned arm time to recover its natural strength, before he shouldered mattock and spade among the crowds of busy workers at the Kimberley diggings.
Such were the plans that Mr. Treby was revolving, as he did justice to the cold mutton and steaming coffee Tante Milligen had provided for the travellers.
"It is chancey work at the diamond mines," remarked the "oom." "A fellow may dig for weeks and get nothing but dirt for his pains; or he may make his fortune in a day."
"I can only try," answered Jack's father; "and with God's blessing I may pull round before another year."
How the young schoolmaster listened, as if he longed to follow his example.
Otto had been to Kimberley, and he described the giant circle, where the diamonds were to be found. So much earth had been already scooped away that he could liken it to nothing but an enormous basin, filled with men of all colours, grubbing in the earth like human ants. He spoke of its ceaseless toil and its uncertain gains.
But Mr. Treby still repeated, "I can only try. Hard work won't frighten me."
It was the look on Jack's face that was frightening him. He saw the feverish flush and the glittering eyes, and felt him shiver as the child crept closer and closer to his side.
"What is the matter, my boy?" he whispered.
But Jack did not reply. The group of rough, bearded men hastily snatching a supper seemed to him no better than the unreal phantoms of a troubled dream. Tante Milligen's broad, quaint figure, with her bare arms and borderless cap, seemed everywhere. The talk of dangers and daring thrilled through his over-excited brain; and then, worse than all, the great trap-door in the ceiling over his head appeared to open and shut of itself. The plum-stones which studded the floor seemed to dance before his eyes, until he hardly knew where he was. But his father's arm was around him, and to that he clung desperately.
When he came to himself, his father was pouring something down his throat from a cow's horn; Tante held a candle in her hand, and was saying something in Dutch. Jack caught the oft-repeated word "slaap-kamé" (sleep-chamber). At last she opened the door into one of the side rooms, which Jack could distinguish the curtains of a huge four-post bed. The room felt hot and stifling as his father carried him in and laid him down upon the softest pillow Jack had ever known. Tante Milligen stuck the candle she carried somewhere in the wall.
"There is no sleep for me to-night," said Jack's father. "I do not expect any disturbance; but come what may, I can keep watch within doors."
"And I shall share your vigil," interposed the schoolmaster; "so your little boy can occupy this room (where I was to have slept) undisturbed. Don't say no, for a dash of adventure has all imaginable charms for me."
According to Dutch fashion, every breath of air was carefully excluded from the room, so Mr. Treby set the door ajar, and the light from the lamp on the supper-table streamed across the floor.
An old Hottentot woman, with her shrivelled, yellow hand, brought a cool leaf to lay on Jack's forehead, and muttered something over him like a charm.
Tante Milligen herself fetched a pitcher of herbal tea, and then, with many maternal shakings of her head and sundry commiserative sounds, departed to her own slaap-kamé on the other side of the great room, into which all the doors of the house seemed to open, for the Boer's house was but one story high. There were lofts in the roof, where stores were kept, but these were reached by a wooden ladder outside the house, or through the trap-door which had had so large a share in Jack's delirious fancies.
He could have slept now, poor boy, but for the snoring duet that was kept up by the little sisters on the other side of the wall.
The Kafir servants, who had been playing scout all day by turns, came in to report that all was quiet. Walt decided to go with Otto to his hut by the sheep-kraals, as on the preceding night. Van Immerseel was persuaded to lie down on his bed; but he would not undress so that he could be roused at a moment's notice.
Walt looked in at Mr. Treby before he departed. They showed each other their loaded rifles, and nodded significantly, as if to say, "We are ready." Otto, who had followed, stooped down and picked up something from the floor.
"My knife!" cried Jack, starting upright.
"All right," said his father, laying him gently upon the pillows again.
The German backed into the outer room.
Thinking the entrance of the young men disturbed his Jack, Mr. Treby followed his example, and taking Walt by the arm, went out also.
Swarms of those hard-winged, spotted flies danced round and round the candle, until they stuck fast in the burning tallow. A menacing mosquito buzzed in the curtains of the bed, and banished Jack's last chance of sleep.
At last the house grew still. Mr. Treby set the door of Jack's room wide open, so that he might feel the refreshing night-breeze from the open windows of the sit-kamé.
Believing that his child was dozing, he sat down by the door, with his face buried in his hands.
Algarkirke waited impatiently for his reverie to end. At last he said, "We are countrymen, and in a distant land like this that means friends, and almost brothers, does it not?"
"Of course, of course," returned Mr. Treby absently.
"Then whatever you may have heard about me from your Nottingham friends, you will not repeat it here."
"I!" returned Jack's father, rousing. "I know nothing about you, an utter stranger. I can have nothing to tell. It is years since I left Nottingham."
"It may be useless to ask you to believe me, when I say it was nothing but my own abominable carelessness made me the victim of circumstances," he went on bitterly. "And those who called themselves my friends chose rather to expatriate me than investigate."
"Young man," interrupted Jack's father, "I ask you for no confession; but if you wish to confide in me, every word you utter will be safe. But I must remind you beforehand that a man driven to asking help of his neighbours is not one to look to, to give it."
"You think me a flat," muttered Algarkirke.
"I think you a little too verdant," returned the other. "Whatever your bygones may have been, you have a chance of beginning a new life out here. Do not let your own self-consciousness spoil it. Bury the past, or retrieve it. Remember:
"'Men may rise on stepping-stones
Of their dead selves to higher things.'"
"Could I dig diamonds with you at Kimberley?" was the eager answer to these words of fatherly advice.
"Did you ever use spade or pick?" asked Mr. Treby in his turn.
But Algarkirke shook his head.
"That answers your own question," returned his companion. "Stick to what you can do. You've no father, my lad, or you would not have been pitchforked into these wilds and left to sink or swim. All you brought with you is lost and gone? So I expected. I only wish I could help you."
"Your little boy told me you wanted to buy a coat. I've one to spare," said Algarkirke in a jerky tone, as if the words were forced out one by one. "I left England for Amsterdam—I had a merchant friend who traded with that city—but I was soon shipped off to Africa with a letter of recommendation to a Dutch clergyman at Pretoria. I lived on my money as long as it lasted. I was in the throes of despair when the grand church-going week came round. I shall never forget my first sight of the Boers bringing up their families from long distances in the country to join in the nachtmaal * service at their church.
"A bright idea occurred to my clerical friend. He found out that a schoolmaster was wanting in this district, and recommended me to the post. It was a civil way of freeing himself from a burden. I journeyed back in one of the Boer's wagons, and began the hopeless task of teaching the young idea how to shoot in broken Dutch. It is irksome drudgery; for those Dutch boys are worse than the Irishman's pig; they will neither be led nor driven. But the worst of it is, I have a few days now and then between the turns, and how to keep myself I do not know, until the quarter-day comes to take my promised fees, small as they are."
* Nachtmaal ("night-meal"), the Lord's Supper.
"'In matters of commerce the fault of the Dutch
Is in giving too little and asking too much,'"
laughed Mr. Treby. "Show me this coat, and I'll give you what I can for it."
Algarkirke went into the room for his portmanteau, which he unstrapped softly, for fear of disturbing Jack. But the little fellow was wide awake again, and very anxious to see the coat his father was going to buy. It was of gray traveller's tweed, a little stained with salt-water, but not much the worse for wear. But, alas no endeavours could squeeze Mr. Treby's well-developed shoulders into a garment made to fit young Algarkirke's slim figure. His disappointment was excessive. He looked at the half-sovereign in Mr. Treby's hand and bit his lip.
"Like my wretched luck!" he exclaimed. "But stop! I have another that I left behind me at Inderwick—a light dust-coat, too big for me. Neither is it properly my own; a friend lent it to me one wet day just before I left England. It was packed up with my luggage by mistake. 'Keep it,' he wrote, 'it is not worth returning.' You could wear that, I am sure."
"Can you let me have it before I start?" asked Mr. Treby.
"The people here have promised to send me on to the next farm; it is a part of our bargain. I will ask the man who drives me to bring it back, if that will do. I leave here the day after tomorrow," said Algarkirke, closing his fingers over the gold Mr. Treby dropped into his hand.
His exuberant gratitude was checked by the quiet remark, "We must all do as we would be done by. The strangers in the post-cart helped me yesterday, and I'm glad to be able to help you to-night."
VIII.
JACK'S FEVER.
THE herbal tea Tante Milligen had provided for the little invalid cooled the fever in his veins. When the morning came Jack was sleeping heavily.
But his father could no longer watch beside him. He was obliged to return to his own farm to meet the police, who were expected to arrive that day. He was quite sure that a sufficient party of mounted police would be told off for the defence of the district directly Wilton's report reached head-quarters.
The affair would be investigated; a repetition guarded against; but should he see his sheep again? Mr. Treby's heart failed him there. He knew it was wiser to leave the burning ashes of his house untouched until the police had been. He wanted to bring back Tottie to nurse his Jack now her husband had returned. But Tante Milligen said "No;" she had Hottentots enough in the house already. She did not want one that had been spoiled by these English to come there to upset her girls. The poor child should not want for proper care; she would see to that.
The Boeress was in anything but a happy frame of mind; for the Kafir girl had run away in the night, and Tante Milligen declared she had lost her right hand.
In circumstances like his, Mr. Treby could say no more. He knew he ought to feel very grateful to his Dutch neighbours for their rough and ready hospitality, and he could not endure the thought of encroaching on their kindness.
But he could not leave his boy without a word. Everything was ready for his departure, when at last Jack opened his eyes, half-frightened at his strange surroundings. But the delirious fancies of the night were over, although he felt weak and faint.
Mr. Treby began to hope it was but a slight attack of fever, and that with quiet and care he would soon be better. He was afraid to let Jack talk even about Zyl's garden, or what a naughty bird Vickel had been; and would not let him fret over the poor Black Antelope, assuring him the Boer's anger was soon over, and he had asked her master not to punish her any more.
So with a parting kiss, and a promise to come back as soon as he could, he left his boy once more.
He had not seen Algarkirke that morning, for the schoolmaster had fallen asleep in the garden, under the shadow of Zyl's pent-house, which had been constructed out of the remains of his own broken umbrella—a gift he had bestowed upon the ungovernable urchin to bribe him to sit still during his first attempt at teaching, which he was so terribly afraid would be construed into failure.
With a few forcible words about redeeming the time, Tante Milligen hunted him out of his retreat, ignoring the fact that he had omitted to put in an appearance at their early Dutch breakfast.
"That was his own lookout," she said; so Genderen was ordered to place the books on the table.
Every now and then Tante Milligen put her head in at the door of the sit-kamé, churn-stick in hand, "just to keep 'em at it; for they couldn't afford to pay their money for nothing."
The poor tutor, who was all the worse for his night-watch, yawned in sympathy with his scholars. Mr. Treby had set the door of Jack's room wide open, to give him all the air he could. When Sannie caught sight of his curly head among the pillows, she slid off her chair, and gathering the letters he had cut out for her in her lap, she trotted to his bed. She waddled round the slaap-kamé like a little duck, until she came to the head of the bed where Jack was lying. There was a pout on the rosy lips, and recent ominous catch in her breath, suggestive of distress; for Sannie, like her mother, was sorely distressed at the disappearance of the Black Antelope, who had fondled her from her birth. One little fat hand unclosed and displayed a bit of a dirty card; then the precious letters in her lap were spread out before him, intimating the young lady's desire to repeat the pleasure of yesterday.
Jack thought of his knife, and sprang out of bed to search for it. He shook his pockets inside out, but oh! His knife was nowhere to be found. He put his hand to his head to try to think. Yes, he remembered distinctly. He was sure now that German shepherd had picked it up.
Sannie was frightened when she saw him crawling under the bed, for he thought he would look everywhere about the floor; so she set up a cry, which brought the old Hottentot woman to see what was the matter. Without more ado, she drove out Sannie, seized Jack by the arms and put him back into bed, charging him with imperative gestures to keep there.
Tante Milligen followed with some more of that odious herbal tea, which she compelled him to drink. Then mistress and maid stood over him in earnest consultation. A huge pair of scissors was produced from Tante Milligen's capacious pocket. He hoped she was not going to cut off his head, and felt enormously relieved when he found it was only his hair she wanted. He wondered what she could want it for. Oh, it was wretched to be with people who could not understand a single word. Yet he almost laughed when he saw the shrivelled yellow fingers of the Hottentot sweeping away his curls with evident satisfaction.
"They would stuff a good pin-cushion," he thought.
But they left the heap on the floor, and covered his head with a cabbage-leaf. It seemed so ridiculous, but he was obliged to submit. Then the room was darkened, and the heavy curtains of the bed were closely drawn, and he heard the door shut as they went away. He thought he was suffocating, but at length the darkness and the quiet melted into dreamy sleep. By-and-by they brought him some brandy-posset, which he could not drink. In that darkened room the day seemed like night. No one came near him but Tante Milligen, with the cow's horn in her hand; and in spite of his wry faces, she always contrived to get the thin end of the horn between his teeth, and then there was nothing for it but to gulp down the bitter draught it contained as quickly as he could.
Jack believed he had had seven nights already, and yet his father did not come. Algarkirke strolled in at last, with his pipe in his mouth, and roundly asserted there had been no night at all yet, although he hoped one was coming.
Then Jack unfolded his idea about the pin-cushions, and confided to the schoolmaster how much he would like do the stuffing. "It is my own hair, so they might let me," he added, a little annoyed by the laugh with which this suggestion was received. Then he remembered his knife, and entreated Mr. Algarkirke to look for it in the sit-kamé. "I know," he persisted, "that German picked it up; but where could he put it?"
Algarkirke promised to tell Zyl, and persuade him to undertake the search. But his promise was of the pie-crust order, made to be broken. He wished to pacify the sick child, but, pitying the poor Black Antelope, he did not wish to cast a suspicion on any one else. He seemed sensitive on the subject, and shrank from it, even with Jack; so he did not mention the knife to any one.
Mr. Algarkirke was soon superseded by the Hottentot, who sat down on the foot of the bed and stared at Jack, who shut his eyes so that he should not see her. Then he seemed to feel all round him the flames of his burning home; and yet it was not his Tottie crawling out of the sloot, but the ugly face of this stranger Hottentot that was staring at him between the curtains of the bed.
To all his feverish mutterings she responded with a "Jah! Jah!" which sounded more like the cluck of a hen than a woman's voice. But she gave him mutton-broth and grapes, and forced him to lie still; for Jack had an unconquerable longing to get up and walk about. He told her again and again he must go and meet his father, but he might as well have spoken to a post.
One thing he was truly grateful for. The Hottentot armed herself with a long bough, and every now and then set vigorously to work to drive away the flies, which had teased him so the night before. Yet the sleep he longed for refused to come, until he heard the lowing of the cows as they were driven in for milking, and then the wakefulness of the night was exchanged for a drowsy stupor, which lasted through the glaring noonday heat.
"They have made me a bed in the oven," moaned Jack, when the schoolmaster looked in on the third day to bid him "good-bye."
"I shall send the coat," he said; "I hope it will fit your father. I shall miss your little English face when I come to Jaarsveldt next time, for I suppose then you will be sifting diamonds at Kimberley. You must learn a little of their wonderful Dutch patience from your new friends. I hope your father will come back before I start."
But the young Englishman's wish was not gratified. Mr. Treby did not return until the next morning.
At the sight of his father, Jack revived. The fever had turned at the third day, and Jack began to rally. Mr. Treby's gratitude to the worthy "tante" for her motherly care knew no bounds. She had saved his child. But when he talked of taking him away, Van Immerseel laid his great hand on his arm and shook the other in his face, with a good-natured laugh, which tempered a flat refusal.
Tante Milligen summoned her ancient Hottentot, and five black faces appeared above the half-door of the sit-kamé to back her protestation and convince the anxious father he must leave his child where he was or a relapse was certain.
"What do they all mean?" asked Mr. Treby, turning for enlightenment to the German, who had been summoned by Zyl to speak the decisive word.
But Walt pressed before him. He had brought the Englishman home. He had taken to Jack. Algarkirke had repeated to him many more details about the fire, which he had gathered from Mr. Treby's conversation in the night. He knew now that poor little Jack had been barely rescued from the flames.
During the schoolmaster's three days' sojourn at Jaarsveldt, Walt had been picking up English as diligently as the players on old Tom Tiddler's ground are reported to pick up gold and silver.
He pointed to the door of the slaap-kaamé where Jack was lying, and asserted most energetically: "Your boy there very bad boy. We make a full stop of him. All right. You put him in there," he added, pointing to Mr. Treby's waggon, which was drawn up outside the gate. "Wohl—" Alas! His English was exhausted; he rubbed his head, imitated the jog-trot of the oxen, and the jolting and shaking of the lumbering waggon.
Dead set at last for want of a word, which Otto could not or would not supply, he snatched the stick from his brother's hand, and drew the outline of a coffin-lid upon the clayey floor. It was but a lame attempt at speaking English, yet for all that he had made his meaning forcible and plain "Take him away?" he asked, making an impressive pause, then by way of answer to his own inquiry, he pointed to his mother and her coloured maids, as if he were counting them on his fingers. Mr. Treby was almost deafened by the babel of tongues around him, whilst Otto fairly laughed when Walt interpreted this clamour of female tongues as "One big no."
Mr. Treby brushed a tear-drop from his eye and shook hands all round. So it was settled that Jack must be left behind. His father's heart was touched by the rough kindliness of his Dutch neighbours.
The loft over the end of the house to the farm-yard happened just now to be empty. Van Immerseel kept his wool there. He had sold it all out, so that the loft would not be wanted until the next sheep-shearing; and Walt suggested that Mr. Treby's things would be quite safe in there until his return. For of course he must unload his waggon before he could let it to his neighbour at Scarsdorp.
He had raked out a few things from the ashes the day before—pieces of iron, hooks, and hinges; the lump of lead into which his bullets had melted; and more than all, the blackened and misshapen contents of his purse. Would his money pass? He could hardly tell. There were two sovereigns sticking together, and the smaller silver pieces had run into a shapeless lump; but the half-crowns, being more solid, were less injured.
Zyl came to help him to unload, whilst Sannie sat at the foot of the wooden ladder watching their proceedings. There was no time to be lost, for Mr. Treby knew that his thirteen oxen would be longer on the road than when he had fourteen, and he wanted to leave everything as straight as he could for Seco and Tottie. But the thought of parting from his little Jack weighed heavily on his heart, for he could not tell how long he should be gone. Vickel, in her joy at having her master back again, insisted on perching on his shoulder, and pecking from his hand, much to Zyl's amusement.
Whilst they were still busy packing in the loft, a messenger arrived from Scarsdorp with the final order for Mr. Treby. He must be ready with his waggon in the morning, when the bearer of the message would return with him.
"That is a fine bird of yours, master," laughed the man, as Vickel saluted him with her loudest scream, "and a valuable one. Nothing so quick as an ostrich to detect a stranger's presence. Why, she will be worth twenty pounds of anybody's money when she begins to lay. A brood of chicks like herself will prove a little fortune. They would be worth ten pounds each as soon as they are out of the shell."
"You think so?" cried Mr. Treby, brightening. "I do not know much about ostrich management. I brought this one up to be a guard about the place. She has cost me nothing, for she lives on the wild rosemary and scrubby grass that the sheep won't eat. If it had not been for my boy, I believe I should sold her for a very small sum in my strait."
"Sell her," exclaimed the messenger, "with ostrich feathers selling at £23 the pound, and she just coming into profit! No, no."
Mr. Treby stroked the fond bird's satin breast as he made her dismount. Could it indeed be true? He thought of the summer morning when one of the wild-looking Kafirs, who were helping him to reap his little wheat-field, had found the ostrich's nest, and had given one of the chicks to Jack for a pet and plaything. Well, he intent upon his sheep had not thought much about her value certainly. He thanked the man for his advice, feeling as if all unawares, he had put his foot on the first step of the ascending ladder of fortune.
"That is news for Jack," he thought, casting a critical glance over his tall favourite, who was now enjoying herself picking a bone like a dog. The bird had wonderfully improved. It was Genderen's bowl of barley night and morning which had wrought the change, but Mr. Treby knew nothing about that. He concluded Vickel got her own living here as she did at home, browsing on the sandy veldt, or he would not have left her at Jaarsveldt.
"Come, Jack," he said, when he told his boy of his intended departure. "Your feathered queen is to make our fortune, according to this man's talk. So it may be a providential thing this illness of yours. It is forcing me to leave you behind, and I should not wonder if you learn a good deal about ostrich management from the Immerseels by the time I come back. They say we might have cut Vickel's feathers this very summer, if they had not been scorched."
It was worth something to bring the sparkle of happiness back into the boy's sunken eyes, as he listened to the comforting assurance that to part with Vickel would be like selling the goose which laid the golden eggs.
"I tell you what, Jack," continued his father; "when we come back from Kimberley, we must buy her a mate of Van Immerseel. They might pay better than the sheep."
Whilst Mr. Treby was thus endeavouring to soothe and cheer the feverish child, he heard an unusual bustle, and looking out of the window, saw three horsemen fully armed, and covered with the summer dust, ride in at the gate. Their strong young horses were flecked with foam, as if they had been travelling fast and far. Van Immerseel's hand was on the bridle of the foremost of the three, an aged Boer, with hair like snow and a frame of iron. They were talking eagerly.
Out ran Mr. Treby, expecting to hear of some fresh outrage that would cap his own, but the few words which caught his ear convinced him that the firing of his lonely homestead was the sole subject of their earnest discussion.
"Ah! Here he comes," exclaimed the old man, who could speak English fairly well. "Ik Van Niepert," he continued, stretching out a hand to Mr. Treby that was the masculine counterpart of Tante Milligen's own.
The Englishman felt as if his fingers would be crushed in the hearty hand-grip which ensued.
"The scare has spread, as these Kafir scares always do, like wildfire. It reached us last night. Farm-house in flames—Jaarsveldt for a certainty, as we all thought. So, as I have been telling my son-in-law here," (and the big hand came down with a slap on Van Immerseel's shoulder which would have made Mr. Treby reel), "with that fear in our heads, it was not long before the rifles were loaded and the horses saddled, and on we've pushed; and I could have sworn we heard the thud of the bullets as we drew near. Thought you were having to fight off the black beggars, as I've done many a time when Milligen was a lass at home."
Van Niepert's sons, two powerful-looking men, with slow tongues and stolid countenances, confirmed their father's words with an assenting grunt, as they dismounted, leaned their saddles against the wall of the house, and turned their horses loose in the yard.
Out ran the children to welcome their grandfather and uncles, with noisy joy, whilst Mr. Treby was explaining the real facts of the case as briefly and clearly as he could. He had heard of Van Niepert as a leading man among the Boers, whose word had had great weight in the conferences between these old Dutch settlers and the British Government, and that he had tried to maintain the friendly relations between them.
IX.
HOW TANTE MILLIGEN MANAGED.
HOW to house so many guests in Jaarsveldt was the question that was troubling Tante Milligen's hospitable mind. Walt and his brother were at once relegated to the threshing-floor in the great barn, where a bed of clean straw was prepared in haste. Walt rolled up his coat without more ado, and lay down, as he had done many a night after a late dance when the house was full. But the spare slaap-kamé must be prepared for Van Niepert, who was treated with great respect by his daughter's family.
One uncle would keep watch with the shepherd until daybreak, when his brother would exchange with him; therefore Walt's vacant bed would serve for both. But what to do with the little English boy—that was Tante Milligen's difficulty. She thought of sending him in Walt's arms to the shepherd's hut, whose bed would, of course, be unoccupied.
"And give me the fever," said Otto with a glooming brow, for he had just overheard Van Niepert recommending his son-in-law to get rid of that German fellow. He might be bully uppermost, but he was certain he was coward underneath. "Get this Englishman to mind your sheep," he added. "He would have been a match for those black rascals single-handed if he had not been frightened off by his boy's danger. You can make it better worth his while than going to dig for diamonds. You say this is just another Kafir scare; but what safeguard have you that it won't be repeated? Answer me that."
Mr. Treby was quick to notice the change in Otto's manner towards him; and getting a hint about the sleeping difficulty, cut it through by proposing to make a bed for Jack in the wool-loft, where he intended to pass the night himself.
To Jack the exchange was delightful, for the loft was cool and still. Mr. Treby left the upper half of the door wide open. The silvery radiance of the African moon fell full upon the slanting roof, and the refreshing night-breeze seemed like new life to the weary child after the choking heat of "that horrid oven."
All the heterogeneous remains of Mr. Treby's belongings were piled in order on the sloping side. Jack's little truckle-bed was placed where the wall was highest, and by it stood the great black traveling-chest Mr. Treby had rescued from the fire. He was kneeling down examining its contents in the moonlight.
"This was your mother's chest, my boy," he said, "and when I lost her, I locked up everything in it that had been her own—sacred treasures to me, that nothing in the world could ever replace. I hurled this out of the burning house first of all; but I little thought this would be really all I should save. She would never have forgiven me if I had let my feelings stand in the way of your good. You are a part of her, my boy; and I am looking them over now to find presents for this hospitable Dutchwoman and her maids. Just an acknowledgment of their kindness to you, my dear, before I leave you altogether to their care."
With a feeling of yearning sadness that winged his thoughts beyond this visible world, Jack leaned his head upon his hand and watched his father unfold the faded dresses. He saw him lay aside some treasured keepsake with a bitter sigh, or press it to his lips in fond remembrance. At last the selection was made.
Some yards of Buckinghamshire lace and an ivory fan were laid aside for Tante Milligen; a leathern reticule, some English photographs of churches, one or two little boxes of Tunbridge ware, for her children. For the coloured maids more useful articles were desirable—a flowered handkerchief, a pompadour dress, a bow of scarlet satin, an apron embroidered with crewels.
"You will not forget the poor Black Antelope, father," whispered Jack softly. "I have not seen her for days; but she was always kind."
"They think she is skulking about, afraid to show herself because of her master's anger; but I will leave this handkerchief for her if she comes back," said Mr. Treby shaking out a Scotch plaid-scarf, which Jack laid carefully under his pillow, reiterating his belief in the black girl's innocence.
"I wish," returned his father, "I was as sure about that young Englishman. I am afraid he has cheated me out of ten shillings I could ill spare; for the man who drove him over to the next farm must have returned by this time, and I can hear nothing of the promised coat. Whether it was misfortune or misconduct shipped him off here in such a hurry, we cannot say. It is the worst of a colonist's life: your heart warms at the sight of a fellow-countryman, and then you find him out to be a worthless scamp. Well, it teaches me to appreciate this worthy old Boer. He struck so hard, Jack, because the flask was not his own. What would become of us now if there was no one we could trust? But there is that straight-forward honesty about him that he will take all the more care of my things because I am a stranger; and that is saying a great deal."
Then Mr. Treby took a great hammer and some nails which he had borrowed, and after he had locked the chest, he nailed down the lid to make it additionally safe.
Everything at last was ready for his departure. Whilst Jack slept the first real sleep since the fever had seized him, his father took the proffered pipe from Genderen's hand, and sat down on the bench in the garden where the Boers were smoking. He turned to Van Niepert, for he had something yet to say. He was thinking what would become of Jack if he were overtaken by any of the perils which menace a traveller in these wild regions. His thoughts were all for his boy.
The Dutchman puffed a great cloud of smoke into the air as he talked of what might be. Then Van Niepert's big hand descended with a thud. "Look yonder, man, across the veldt. Can't either of us see the kopjee (hill) that divides your land from Walt's. But that is there; and the boy's here. Walt must keep them both till the boy is of age to manage his own. Let your mind be easy. There will be the rent laid by year after year—a good round sum to start him with by that time."
"Ik is Walt Immerseel," said his neighbour, sealing the promise the old man's words conveyed with a hearty hand-grip Mr. Treby never forgot.
"I am Walt Immerseel," translated the grandfather. "There, man, is not that enough?"
"Jah, Jah!" muttered the stolid brothers.
"Strike hands on that. Did an Immerseel ever run back?"
Jack's father indeed appreciated to the full that steady persistency that lies at the root of the Dutch character, the source of their wonderful patience and unwearying industry, and also of their dogged obstinacy, making it harder to turn a Dutch Boer aside than the proverbial donkey.
"Never despair," continued old Niepert, puffing away huge volumes of smoke between every sentence, "while you've your hands and your acres. 'Amsterdam was built upon a herring-bone.' You've more than that to work upon."
Never did the good old Dutch proverb teach its lesson to more attentive ears. Yes, in the dreary swamp where the Dutchman first drew breath, the visit of the herring-shoal was the only source of gain.
Mr. Treby felt how good it is to look back at these great works, which patient perseverance has already accomplished in this world of ours, when our own small corner is devastated. It helped him to brace his own energies to the task before him.
But he did not repeat to Jack a single word of all this conversation, for he wanted to cheer him. So he turned away from the clouds which threatened him, and looked only at the brighter side. He spoke of Vickel.
"If she should lay before I come back, you must take the greatest care of her eggs. If they are worth five pounds apiece, Jack, you will be a rich man some of these days."
With his father's arm around him and his father's voice still murmuring in his ears, Jack fell once more into that peaceful, health-restoring sleep which gladdened his father's heart more than anything else.
But when he awakened from it, that father had departed. The waggon had started at daybreak; Mr. Treby was gone.
Little Sannie was singing on the "steop," as the front of the house was called. Bright and busy life was around him everywhere, but he had no share in it. He lay on his face, so that no one should see the tears that would gather in his eyes, he felt so unutterably lonely.
Zyl was the first to come to him. Oh, if they could only talk; but as this pleasure was out of their power, the Dutch boy sat swinging on the lower half of the door, whistling compassionately. The English-made rakes and hoes and all the other odd pieces of iron-work which Mr. Treby had left behind him, attracted his attention.
Whilst he examined them, Jack's red eyes were roving the world without. Where was his father? Which way did he go? Between those huge distorted masses of rock which had hitherto like a brown blot on Jack's horizon? He saw them now with other eyes—giant forms of rainbow-tinted crystal, with smooth bands of gray and red overlying each other; and at their feet the huge red plain that to Jack was home.
But here at Jaarsveldt the more abundant water had partly covered the karroo with a coat of green. In the very crevices of the loosely-built stone walls, dark green leaves peeped forth to the rising sunshine; and on the tumble-down sod walls by the Kafir huts, luxurious chickweed was tangled with the glistening leaves of the ice-plant. A Kafir maid at her early dairy-work was singing a low-voiced chant in sleepy tones, which more nearly resembled the hum of the honey-laden bee than any other sound; whilst the growing sunlight tinted all around with the golden hue of the ripened corn.