Forging the Blades Part 42

"Going on slowly, but well. Don't excite him, will you?"

"No; I think he'd like to say good-bye. What do you think?"

"As long as he doesn't get excited," was the rather dubious answer.

"Come along."

The hospital at Ezulwini was rather full just then with victims of the rebellion, still in full swing, and the nurses were busy morning, noon and night. Everything about the place was so bright and cheerful that the casual visitor almost wanted to be an inmate for a time. Even the operating-room looked inviting, and more suggestive of cool drinks than of bloodshed. Not here was it, however, that they were to find Harry Stride.

"Well, Stride, old chap, how are you getting on?" said Denham, taking the sick man's listless hand.

"Oh, I don't know; they say I'll pull through, but I'm taking a darn long time about it. And I wanted to go and pump some more lead into those swine, and it'll be all over while I'm lying here."

"Well, better be lying here than lying _there_," said Denham,

"Right-oh! And that's where I should be lying if it hadn't been for you," answered the other earnestly.

"Oh, that's all in the tug-of-war," rejoined Denham. "We don't count that at all. You'd have done the same for me--we'd all have done the same for each other, of course. But I couldn't clear out without saying good-bye, and seeing how you were getting on."

"You're awfully good, Denham; but I don't believe I should have done the same if the positions were reversed."

"Yes, you would. And look here, Stride, you needn't think that I haven't sympathised with you all through. How could I have helped doing so from the very circ.u.mstances themselves?"

Stride was silent for a few moments. Then he said--

"I believe I've behaved like a cur, Denham. If you really did what we-- what I suspected, I'm certain that you were justified. Since I've been lying here I've been thinking things over."

"Well, in that case you may take it from me that it was justified,"

answered Denham gravely.

"I'll swear it was. Well, it's awfully good of you to find time to look in upon me this morning of all days, and I appreciate it."

Denham was moved.

"Look here," he said, dropping his hand upon that of the other, "I must go now, time presses. But, Stride, old chap, I want you to promise me something, and that is that if ever you are in want of a friend you will remember you have the best of that article here. For instance, prospecting is precarious work, and, I'm told, often very hand-to-mouth.

Now, I happen to be one of those fortunate people who is frequently in a position to be of use to his fellow-creatures, and if ever you find yourself in any strait you must apply to me. There are often fairly comfortable bunks I can slide people into. Now, will you?"

"Yes, I will. You are awfully good, Denham."

"That's settled. So now good-bye, and don't get well until it's too late to go and get yourself half killed over again."

A hearty handshake, a pleasant nod and a smile, and Denham was gone.

But Stride called him back.

"You'll give--her--my every good wish?"

"Certainly, old chap, certainly."

The arrival of the missing man had been a source of boundless surprise.

How on earth had he, a stranger, been able to make his way across that long distance of hostile country? Why, it would have taxed to the uttermost the experience and resources of any one among themselves, was the consensus of opinion. The thing was a mystery, and at such Denham left it. He supposed he was born lucky and with a b.u.mp of topography, was how he accounted for it in his easy-going way. But never by word or hint did he let drop anything as to the real agency which had got him through, not even to Verna.

And she? Well, to-day was her wedding day.

The pretty little church at Ezulwini was crammed. Sub-Inspector Dering, incidentally due to leave for the seat of war that evening, acted best man, and subsequently, at the big spread at the Nodwengu Hotel, in the course of his speech pointed out that having helped to "kill" one good man that morning he was due to go off and get another good man killed, himself to wit, that evening, but that he deserved for coming in too late to pick the combination of rose and lily of the whole country for himself; which hit evoked vast laughter and applause, and the festivities flowed on.

"Father," said Verna, in the interval before leaving. "Father, dear old father, what will you do without me? Shall you go back home or what?"

Her tears were falling as she held him round the neck, gazing wistfully into the strong, weather-beaten face, which in spite of her present great happiness it wrung her heart to realise she should see no more, at any rate, for some time to come.

"No, not yet, anyhow. I shall go and take part in this scuffle," he answered. "Perhaps, later on, I'll come and help knock over some of Denham's pheasants in the old country, if he's agreeable."

"If he's agreeable? What's that, Halse?" repeated Denham, who had just then come in. "Why, the sooner you like, the sooner the better for us.

Come now. We'll have a jolly voyage all together."

"No; I'll see this sc.r.a.p through first," was the trader's reply, given with characteristic terseness. "Later on, perhaps."

Then there was a tremendous "send off," and thereafter the bulk of Ezulwini--male--spent the rest of the day and evening proposing the healths of the departed bride and bridegroom.

CHAPTER THIRTY ONE.

ENVOI.

The leafy summer day was at its close--and Horlestone Manor was in one of the leafiest parts of leafy England. Through its cool gardens in the cloudless sunset strolled two people.

"I wonder if you'll ever long for the good old wild surroundings among all this tameness, darling," one of them was saying.

"Tameness! Why, it's Paradise!"

"Paradise! Wait until you see it in winter. You'll yearn for the Lumisana when you're shivering with three feet of snow piled up round the house."

"No, I won't. If I do I'll go and stare at the big koodoo head and the _indhlondhlo_. Let's have another look at them now."

They strolled through the pa.s.sage that led to Denham's large and s.p.a.cious museum. The great head looked down upon them from a prominent s.p.a.ce, where it was throned all by itself. Beneath hung an inscription--

"Shot by Verna Denham, Lumisana Forest, Zululand."

Then the date.

"We shall have to turn that inscription face to the wall if James or Hallam or Downes come to give us their promised look-up," laughed Denham.

"Oh, we'll tell them to look the other way." Then, growing serious: "Strange how so many of the things here should have been instrumental in bringing us our life's happiness. It was through them we came together."

"It was, thank G.o.d," he rejoined, equally serious.