In the Whirl of the Rising. Mitford Bertram
is too contemptible, spreading stories about him behind his back. Why should he do it, Mr Driffield? What on earth motive can he have?”
“Cussedness, I suppose – sheer cussedness. A good deal more mischief is made under that head than is due to mere motive, I imagine.”
“I believe so. By the way, did you persuade Mr Ames to come over for the race meeting?”
“Persuade! I tried to, Miss Vidal. But there’s no getting Ames that far out of his district unless on leave or on duty. Ames spells conscientiousness exaggerated.”
“That’s a pity,” said Clare. “He’s one of the nicest men I know.”
“Except Mr Lamont, Clare,” appended her sister mischievously.
“They’re so different. You can’t compare them,” pronounced the girl, her serenity unruffled. And then they talked of other things, and had lunch; and after a digestive smoke the two men went back to their offices – Fullerton being by profession a mining engineer.
The township of Gandela consisted of a number of zinc-roofed houses, all staringly new, straggling down what would be the main street when the town was properly laid out, but at present was only the coach road. There was a market square, with – at present – only three sides to it; an ugly red-brick building representing the magistrate’s court; ditto another, representing the Church of South Africa; a farther block somewhat more substantially built, which was the gaol, and from which not more than a dozen or so of prisoners had escaped since the place was first laid out two years previously. At a corner of the market square aforesaid stood the only hotel the place boasted, run by one Foster, to whom reference has been made; while away across the veldt, about half a mile distant, were the barracks of the Matabeleland Mounted Police, a troop of which useful force watched over the town and patrolled the neighbourhood. Scenically Gandela was prettily situated, strategically badly. It stood on a pleasant undulating plain, dotted with mimosa, but on one side dominated by a long, thickly-wooded hill called Ehlatini, the first of a range, likewise thickly-wooded, extending farther back. Well, what mattered that? The natives were thoroughly under control, men said. They had been so knocked out by the pioneer force and the Chartered Company’s Maxims during the war of occupation, that they would not be anxious to kick against the white man’s rule again in a hurry.
Would they not? We shall see.
Chapter Seven.
Fellow Travellers
“Well, good-bye, Lyall. Next time you want to do another cattle deal send me word. Only do it before the rinderpest has swept me clean. So long.”
And Lamont, swinging himself into his saddle, rode away from Lyall’s store, quite content with the price he had obtained from that worthy for a dozen young oxen, which he had delivered the day before. Moreover, he could not sufficiently congratulate himself that when he arrived home that evening he would not find Ancram.
He chuckled to himself as he thought how they had got rid of that extremely unwelcome guest. When Ancram had returned from his trip with Driffield, more jaunty than ever, Peters began to play his part, launching forth into awful and blood-curdling instances of the vindictiveness of the Matabele, and what a mistake it was that Ancram should have done anything to incur a feud that might extend through any amount of relationships. Thoroughly yet deftly did he rub it in, and soon Ancram’s nervousness reached such a pitch that he had come to regard poor Zingela – who had no more idea of cutting the strange Makiwa’s throat than he had of cutting his own – as a perfectly ferocious monster, ever on the watch for an opportunity of having his blood.
“You’ll be able to amuse yourself alone for a few days, Ancram,” Lamont had said one morning when the requisite stage of scare had been reached. “Peters and I have got to be away, but we’ll be back in a week at the outside.”
Ancram’s look of blank dismay was something to behold. Couldn’t he come, too? he asked. No, he couldn’t, because there was no spare horse that was in condition for the journey.
“But,” added Lamont consolingly, “you’ll be all right here. Zingela will look after you and show you where to find game, and so on.”
Would he indeed? thought Ancram to himself. Not if he knew it. He supposed it was with a purpose that Lamont proposed to leave him alone with this ferocious savage, to be butchered by him and his relatives – Peters had spread it on thick – but that purpose he intended to defeat. Yes, that was it. He, Ancram, was the only man in the country who knew about the Courtland affair, and of course Lamont wanted to get rid of him at all costs, now that there was another girl in the case.
“Well, old chap,” he had answered, “I think I won’t stop on. The fact is I get beastly bored all by myself, and I think you said there was a hotel in Gandela.”
“Yes. It’s not first-rate, but Foster’s a very decent fellow. If you tell him you’ve been stopping with me he’ll do his best for you,” Lamont had replied.
“But I don’t know anyone there.”
“You’ll very soon get to. There are some very good fellows in Gandela – only don’t go on the wait-to-be-introduced tack.”
Mightily did Lamont chuckle to himself over this reminiscence as he rode along, and his mirth was quite undashed by the consciousness that Ancram bore him no goodwill – and the certainty that he would injure him if he could. For this, however, he cared nothing. The Courtland story might leak out and welcome. There was no one whose opinion he valued sufficiently for it to matter. Wait. Was there not? No. There was no one.
His way lay over undulating mimosa-studded ground, beautiful but for a parched and burnt-up look, due to the prolonged drought; passing now and again a native kraal, heavily stockaded with mopani poles and thorn boughs, for lions were not altogether unknown in that part, as we have seen. A brief off-saddle for lunch, and to cool his horse’s back, and he took the track again.
Lamont was well mounted, and his steed stepped forth at a long, swift, easy walk. In the afternoon heat he became drowsy, and was soon nodding. The art of sleeping on horseback is one that can be acquired by pressure of circumstances, and if the animal is steady in its paces, and knows its way, why, then, there is no further difficulty – and of this one both these conditions held good. Suddenly a loud whinny on its part started the rider bolt awake again.
They were now travelling down a path skirting a range of stony hills. Below, and in front at no great distance, was another horseman proceeding in the same direction. It took but one moment to determine him a white man, and not many more to overhaul him and range up alongside. The stranger was dressed in serviceable khaki and a sun-helmet, all of which was in keeping with the bronzed face and short black beard, but not altogether with the round clerical collar. Catching the sound of hoofs behind, he reined in and turned, and Lamont recognised him as Father Mathias, one of the priests attached to the Buluwayo Mission.
“Good evening, Father,” he called out, as he came up. “Rather far afield, aren’t you? This is an unexpected pleasure. I hope we are travelling the same way, because I’m already a good bit sick of my own company.”
“Mr Lamont, is it not?” said the priest, speaking with a foreign accent. “Ah yes. We met in Gandela, did we not? I too – I shall be very glad of company.”
They rode along, chatting. The while, Lamont was eyeing the other’s horse, a sorry-looking beast at best, and, besides its rider, was loaded up with a fair amount of luggage, in the shape of a large rolled valise across the horn of the saddle and a couple of well filled-out saddle-bags on each side.
“You’d better let me help you with some of that load,” he said at last. “In fact we’ll transfer the lot. My horse is as fresh as paint, and won’t feel it.”
“Oh, I could not think of letting you do that, Mr Lamont. A few pounds more or less make no great difference.”
“Don’t they? I don’t know if you have ever walked with a knapsack, Father, but I have – and it’s just that very pound or so extra that makes all the difference in the world. Are you going to ride that horse all the way to Buluwayo?”
“Yes.