Forging the Blades Part 21

"That makes the charm of the study."

"Do you paint, then, Mr Denham, in addition to your other scientific accomplishments?"

"No; I thought I could dabble in it at one time, but had too many serious irons in the fire. Still, I'm given to drawing mental pictures, and this is one of them, that's all. By the way, your father was saying you were going to be kind enough to act as my guide this afternoon. Is that so?"

"Oh yes. We were talking about it before you came out. Where would you like to go?"

"That I leave entirely to you. By the way, yes. Will you show me the spot where you shot the record head?"

"It's rather far, I'm afraid, for one afternoon. However, we'll see.

Well, I'm through with this job now. I'll put it inside. Look! there are some people coming to the store, I expect. Yes, they are. Come and see me shop-keep, Mr Denham."

She took the tin of dough into the kitchen, and returned in a second with some keys.

Two women and a youth were approaching. Verna unlocked the door, and, as he entered, Denham looked curiously around and above at the multifold variety of trade goods. The atmosphere was inclined to be musty, and, by virtue of the nature of some of the things, not over-fragrant.

The natives entered, rather shyly, giving the salute. They stared curiously at Denham. His fine physique and general bearing impressed them. There could only be one opinion as to what had brought him there.

He had come to offer U' Ben _lobola_ for the _Inkosazana_. But they would make a fine pair! This they told each other afterwards.

"Well, what is wanted?" Verna asked.

"Tobacco. Smoking tobacco such as white people use," answered one of the women.

"Sapazani's 'children' indulging in white men's customs? Ah, ah!"

answered Verna, with a shake of the head. The woman looked somewhat subdued, and managed to convey that it was a thing they did not wish talked about.

The while Denham was taking in the whole scene, keenly interested.

Never had the liquid Zulu sounded so melodious as when it flowed from Verna's lips, he decided to himself. Then other things were requisitioned. Yards of calico were unfolded, and critically examined by the intending purchaser. He watched the deftness and patience with which Verna handled the things and bore with the intending purchasers, who would look at the articles and then go and squat in a corner of the room and talk over the transaction with each other in an undertone. The boy was looking at him sideways, with staring eyeb.a.l.l.s.

"That's their way," said Verna, with a merry glance at him. "You can't rush these people. If you did you'd lose all your trade."

"By Jove! but I never thought there could be so much poetry in handing things out over a counter," he burst forth.

"Thanks. But remember what I told you just now, also on a former occasion," she answered, her eyes sparkling with fun. "You must not pay me compliments, especially ironical ones. I am only an up-country trader's daughter, who helps her father, up to her little best."

"Upon my conscience there was nothing ironical about it," he replied somewhat vehemently, "It was dead, sober earnest."

She smiled again and nodded; then turning to the native women suggested they had been a good while making up their minds. They took the hint, and the deal was concluded.

Denham, the while, was in something of a maze. Most girls situated as she was would have rather tried to keep him off witnessing this phase of their everyday home life--in other words, would have tried all they knew to "sink the shop." This one, on the contrary, had actually invited him to witness it, just as she might have invited him to come and have a look at the garden.

"Well, Mr Denham," said Verna, as the red-painted top-knots of the two women vanished round the doorpost, "and what do you think of me in my capacity of shop-girl?"

"If I were to tell you I should lay myself open to another rebuke," he answered, with a laugh in his eyes.

"Have I been so hard on you as that? I didn't mean to be. By the way, you are not smoking. Try some of this," reaching down an open bag of Magaliesberg from a shelf.

"Thanks. I say, what's this?" looking at the bullet hole in the wall.

"Oh, that's nothing," she answered rather shamefacedly. "At least, you heard all about it down at Ezulwini. Anyway, it's nothing to brag about. Let's go outside."

"Certainly," acquiesced Denham, grasping, with ready tact, that she did not wish to pursue the subject. And he was right. Even as in the matter of shooting the koodoo she shrank from dwelling upon anything that would tend to set her forth in his eyes as a strong, self-reliant Amazon type of woman; more so now than then.

"I wish I was more like other girls, Mr Denham," she broke forth with that winning, breezy naturalness which had so struck him. "If I were musical, for instance, and all that, I could play to you of an evening.

I'm afraid you must find the evenings so slow."

"I've only had one evening here, and I didn't find that a bit slow," he answered. "Incidentally, the other evenings we have spent together have been anything but slow."

"Together!" There was something in the word, and the way in which he said it, that struck curiously upon her ears.

"I'm glad of that," she answered. "One always thinks that anybody out from England, accustomed to the livelier sides of life, must become hideously bored in an out-of-the-way wilderness such as this really is."

"It's a very beautiful wilderness, anyway," he said, looking out over the great panorama of mountain and plain and forest, extending over fifty miles, and misty in the heat of the unclouded sunlight. "But that's where you make the mistake. The very contrast is so infinitely restful. Not only restful, but invigorating. Slow! Think, for instance, of all the vividly interesting stories and reminiscences your father has been telling me since we first met, and especially during our journey here. Why, they make this wonderful country simply glow with life--and such life! The life which puts those 'livelier sides of life'

you were just quoting into a dull, drab groove of monotony. No, don't for a moment imagine there is the slightest possibility of a chance of my feeling bored."

There was a vehemence, an intensity, about this deliverance that rather astonished Verna. This man had another side, then? She had read him wrong, or at least not quite right, when she had just sized him up as an even, prosperous man of the world, one whose self-possession nothing could ruffle, a charming companion, but one past anything in the shape of a great enthusiasm. Now she began to realise that she had not seen every side of him, and the discovery in no way diminished her interest in him.

"Well, that rather relieves me, from the responsibility point of view, at any rate," she answered, flashing up at him one of those bright smiles of hers. "So now, on the strength of it, I'll get you to excuse me. There's a lot to do inside. But we'll have such a jolly time of it this afternoon." And with a bright nod she left him.

Denham lit a fresh pipe, and strolled out a little way from the house.

It seemed to him that something had been withdrawn. He missed Verna's presence and gracious companionship. To the full consciousness of this he awoke with a start. He was too old and experienced to do anything that might seem like "hanging around" her, wherefore he took a walk.

But as he looked out upon the panorama spread out in front and around, revelled in the glow of the ambient air, even found something to interest his naturalist soul, in the bushes or gra.s.s, he was still thinking--well, he had better not think. Yet, why should he not? The question pressed itself practically home to him. He was his own master, and in every way in a position to please himself. Why should he not do so?

What a rare "find" this was! he told himself, his thoughts running on Verna. And if he missed her presence because she had been obliged to withdraw for an hour or so, what did it mean? A phrase ran uneasily through his mind, "Can't bear her out of his sight." And this was the first day of his arrival. No, a.s.suredly it was time to pull himself together. And then, her brightly uttered words of parting, "We'll have such a jolly time of it this afternoon." Well, it should be no fault of his if they did not.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

DRAWING IN.

"Mr Denham, I think we'll change the programme, shall we?" said Verna, as she came out, got up for the ride. "Instead of going down we'll go up, if you don't mind. Do you?"

"Why, of course not. I am in your hands entirely."

The horses were waiting, saddled, the boy walking them up and down.

Verna was in a sort of khaki-coloured riding habit, with a hat to match.

In it was a subtle combination of the fashionable and civilised build with the congruous costume of the locality and surroundings that sat her altogether charmingly.

"All right, then. I'll take you where you will get a beautiful view; and the road is delightful. If you feel like getting off to look for a specimen, do so at any time. Now, will you put me into that saddle?"

The smile she beamed at him recalled him to himself. The naked truth of it was that Denham had about shed himself, as a snake sheds its skin.

He was a hard-headed man of the world--a keen, successful financier, yet by now he was dimly realising that he scarcely knew himself.

Experiences came back to him--crowded up galore; yet it seemed to be reserved for him that he should meet, in the wilds of Zululand--and the wilds of Zululand can be very wild indeed, even up to date--an experience utterly outside of all that had gone before.

"Thanks," she said, gathering up her reins. "Now we must go exactly where we like, and do exactly what we like. We are going to make an easy afternoon of it."

"Certainly," he answered. "I am very much in luck's way. I never reckoned on being taken so much care of."