against one who could so have misjudged him, and so would this. Yet it was more vivid, more saturating, than any of them.
“Not if she went on her knees to me would I ever forgive her that one thing,” he would say fiercely to himself on the occasion of such reactions, thus unconsciously paraphrasing the very words that had been said about him, more than a year ago, and upwards of seven thousand miles away. And there would occur to him the idea that life here was too easy, too stagnant. Yet he had not had things all his own way. The dread scourge which had swept steadily down from the north had not spared him; that rinderpest which had decimated his neighbours’ cattle, as well as that of the natives, had decimated – was still decimating – his own. Even this, however, could not avail to afford him the anxiety which might constitute the one nail destined to drive out the other; for its ravages, however much they might spell loss, and serious loss, could never to him spell utter ruin, as was the case with some others.
Now a sound of distant lowing, and the occasional clear shout of the driver, told that his own herd was being driven in for the night; and then the calves which had already been brought in woke up, in responsive bellow, to greet the approaching herd. Lamont rose and went round to the kraal. Here was a possible source of anxiety, and narrowly and eagerly did he scan the animals as they passed him, lest haply he might discern symptoms of the dread pestilence. But none appeared, nor did a closer investigation as he moved about within the kraal show further cause for anxiety. So preoccupied was he with this that he entirely failed to notice the approach of a horseman in the growing dusk, until the circumstance was brought to his notice by the sharp crack of a whip and a cheery hail.
“Evenin’, Lamont.”
“Peters, by George! Well, I said you’d be back to-night. You’re as punctual as a jolly clock, old man.”
The speaker was outside the gate now, and the two men exchanged a cordial hand-grip.
“Jolly glad you are back too,” he went on. “I’ve got on a fit of holy blues to-night.”
“Oh well, then, it’s a good job I’ve brought along a chum. He’ll help liven you.”
“A chum? Where is he?”
“With the carts. They’re about at the three-mile draai now. His horse knocked out. This was the way of it,” went on Peters, who, having off-saddled his own mount and handed it over to a boy, led the way to the house. “You know Fuliya’s bend on the Pagadi road. No, you don’t? Well, no matter. Here’s luck, old man.”
Down went two long tumblers of whisky-and-selzogene.
“We’ll have another when the other chap turns up,” said Peters, with a jolly laugh. “Well, as I was saying, just before I got to that bend I saw two ugly Makalakas cross the road.”
“Nothing wonderful in that. Most likely they only wanted to get to the other side,” said Lamont slily.
“Eh? Oh, I see. Well they did, of course. They dived into the mopani. But, you know, they gave me the idea of being up to some devilment. They didn’t see me neither, and they had axes and assegais, but of course it was none of my business if they were going to stick or hack some other nigger, so I just rode on. A mile or so farther, just the other side of a dry sluit, I saw a brand-new bush-buck spoor leading into the mopani. I could do with some fresh meat just then – dead sick of ‘bully’ – so started to see if I could get near enough to him with the .303. Well I didn’t. I saw something else that drove the other clean out of my head. On the opposite side of the sluit from me a man staggered out from the trees – a white man – and fell. ‘That’s what those two devils were up to, was it,’ I thought. They’d assegaied him from behind, and would be here in a minute to collect the plunder. You know, Lamont, more than one white man has disappeared in that mopani belt, but it’s always been put down to thirst.”
“Yes. Go on.”
“Well, I just dropped down in the tambuti grass, and wormed forward to where I could see over a bit o’ rock. Then I drew a careful bead on the exact spot where the nigger would stand to finish off the chap, and – by the Lord! – there the nigger was, with an axe all ready in his fist. In about a second he had skipped his own length in the air, and was prancing about on the ground. He’d got it through the head, you see.”
“Good! Did the other show up?”
“Didn’t he? They showed up together. He cleared. But he was too late. I got him too.”
“Good old right and left! Well done, Peters! And the white man – who was he, and was he badly damaged?”
“He wasn’t damaged at all. But he’d have been dead of thirst before night, even if the niggers had never sighted him. He’s a Johnny Raw, and he’d been drawing sort of figures of eight all about that mopani patch for the last forty-eight hours. I didn’t tell him there’d been any shootin’, or any niggers at all, and ain’t going to. That sounds like the carts,” as the noise of wheels and whip cracking drew nearer and nearer. “Yes; it is.”
As the carts drew up, Lamont went back into the room for a moment to get something he had left. When he turned, a tall figure stood in the doorway framed against the darkness beyond.
“Lamont – isn’t it?”
This was a fairly familiar method of address from a perfect stranger, even in a land of generally prevailing free-and-easiness, and Lamont stiffened.
“Let me see, I know the voice,” he said, staring at the new arrival. “But – ”
The other laughed.
“Thought I’d give you a little surprise,” he said. “I’m Ancram. We were staying at Courtland together, don’t you remember?”
“Oh yes – perfectly. Come in. I didn’t recognise you at first because – er – ”
“I haven’t had a shave for a week,” supplemented the other, with an easy laugh. “Well, we can put that right now.”
“It did make a difference certainly. Well, and how are you, Ancram?”
“Hallo!” sung out Peters, appearing at the door. “Brought off your surprise yet, Ancram? He said I wasn’t to give away his name, Lamont, because he wanted to spring a surprise on you. Ha-ha!”
Chapter Three.
Taking in the Stranger
Decidedly Lamont had had a surprise sprung upon him. Whether it was an agreeable one or not is another matter.
His greeting of the new arrival was polite rather than cordial; even pleasant, but not spontaneous. There was a vast difference in his handshake here to that wherewith he had welcomed Peters, for instance; nor did he use the formula, “Glad to see you.” Ancram noticed this, and so did Peters.
Lamont was nothing if not downright, and would never say a thing he did not mean. Peters knew this, wherefore he began to feel mightily uncomfortable, and wished he hadn’t brought the stranger along. But then Ancram had asked him point-blank if he could tell him where to find Lamont, who was a friend of his, and whom he had heard was settled somewhere in these parts; and he had received the question with a great roar of laughter, replying that no man in all Rhodesia was more fully qualified to give him that very information. But if this outsider’s presence was going to prove a thorn in the side of his friend, – rather than do anything to annoy whom he would have cut off his right hand, – why, the sooner they scooted
