Jasper Lyle Part 47

There were busy artificers on the camp-ground; fortifications were in progress, and traders were opening their stores. Everything gave promise of establishing a thriving town; wagons were winding down the green slopes of the western hills, and fine herds of cattle and flocks of sheep and goats were pa.s.sing through on their way to fresh pasture-lands.

A c.u.mbrous and old-fashioned, but comfortable, English carriage with four fine horses stood at the gate of the Daveneys' cottage. Ormsby, somewhat wasted by his wounds--happily the one on the temple, was but a cut from a pa.s.sing a.s.segai--led Lady Amabel to her equipage, and Mr Daveney followed, leading Eleanor in deep mourning. Major Frankfort stood at the gate with Sir Adrian; he gave his hand to Lady Amabel--she felt it tremble.

He could not see Eleanor's face, it was closely veiled; they had never met since that fearful night at Annerley, but now she held her hand out to him. He heard her utter the word "Farewell."

Sir Adrian shook hands with him, and Lady Amabel leaned forward to say "G.o.d bless you."

But Frankfort answered not a word.

"Farewell." In after-years, in the deep solitude of midnight, on the sea, in the still noon of summer days in English woods, where he loved to cast himself beneath the umbrageous oaks, and dream of Kafirland, that soft and sorrowful voice still whispered "Farewell."

Lady Amabel retired with her young and mourning guest to the shades of Newlands. Eleanor never accompanied her friend to the busy scenes of Government House. Her father and mother soon established themselves in a lovely spot within a day's journey of Cape Town, and here she hoped to find that seclusion and repose, which she had vainly sought before.

Marion and Ormsby were married, and embarked for England; soon afterwards, Lady Amabel and Eleanor bade them adieu, as they stepped into the boat awaiting them in the treacherous waters of Table Bay; poor Marion's cheeks were flooded with tears.

Eleanor was calm and pale, but it seemed now as though she never could weep.

Lady Amabel longed to see some change in her demeanour, but nothing seemed to move her. The evening after her sister's departure she sat so still within the embrasure of a window, that her kind friend thought she must be asleep; but no, the large mournful orbs were fixed on the darkening heavens in which the sentinel stars were mustering their radiant hosts. Her thoughts were not of earth--they were with her angel boy--her lost Francis--that link between herself and the mysterious world, of which we know nothing, save that there is no sin there, and therefore no sorrow.

The dwelling purchased and improved by the Daveneys commanded a magnificent view of the sea.

Eleanor sat in one of her mournful reveries, as was usual with her at eventide. In the daytime she resolutely employed herself--mechanically, if possible. She never sang now, but she would play whole pages of difficult music, then work in the garden; walking, or riding for miles with her father, filled up the afternoons; but the evening time was truly the dark hour with her. She loved best to be alone at this time.

So there she sat, her book dropped listlessly on her knee, and her melancholy gaze fastened on the shining waters of the moonlit ocean, that washed the rocky boundary of the grounds she had helped to fashion and to plant with orange-groves.

Her father and mother were in an adjoining room; she heard a door open, and some one, not of the household, spoke in a low voice; but she recognised it--it was May's.

She went to meet him, and give him welcome; the poor little bushman cried and laughed with joy.

And Fitje came, and Ellen, and they sat down in the doorway, and said they would stay, if they might. May was going to Cape Town, and would come back again, and be gardener and groom, and everything, if Daveney would have him.

"Going to Cape Town?"

"Yes, with Master--Master Frankfort." They were travelling by land from Algoa Bay, and had come to see the Knysna River, and May had a letter for the _Ba.s.s_. It contained an inclosure.

Eleanor retreated into the other room.

Eleanor's Note to Frankfort.

"Most generous Friend,--

"I love you too well to take undue advantage of your kindness. Return to England; there, earlier and happier impressions may be revived; and although I would not have you forget me, think only of the unfortunate Eleanor as one whose hopes are fixed on Heaven.

"Farewell."

The Trails, weary with the repeated aggressions on their property in Kafirland, came nearer the civilised districts of the Cape; they established a mission and a school within a few miles of the Knysna River. A young a.s.sistant of Mr Trail's attracted the notice of all the farmers' daughters around, but he paid no heed, did "that handsome young teacher," to the bright glances aimed at him. He seldom entered the houses of the richer settlers, except in cases of sickness, when Mr Trail was absent from home.

The Vanbloems had returned to an old family farm, which they had deserted in the hopes of bettering themselves by seeking "larger pastures;" they were wiser than their rebellious brethren, for, instead of flying beyond the boundary, they retreated to their original settlement, and contented themselves with less land but surer ground. I speak of the elder Vanbloem, with whom Frankfort and Ormsby made acquaintance in their first days of travelling.

Gray--for he was the young teacher--had resolved one day on asking Mr Trail to make some inquiries of Amayeka, albeit he dreaded the issue of such inquiry.

Poor Amayeka!--Surely the younger Vanbloem's had not deserted her; but she might have been taken from them by violence.

That day old Vanbloem came to tell Mr Trail that his son's wagon was outspanned in a valley an hour's ride from the station; he and some neighbours were going to meet him, would Mr Trail go too?

The party pa.s.sed the mission station that evening; there were hors.e.m.e.n and wagons, quite a cavalcade--for some one from every family had gone out to welcome the new-comers, returning to the land of their forefathers.

It was dusk when Mr Trail returned home; Gray started on hearing his master's voice.

"Master"--so he called the missionary--"master, are there bad tidings?-- has she survived the fury of her people?"

"Come hither, Gray," said Mr Trail; "Amayeka is here."

Meek and trembling, poor Amayeka had seated herself on the lowest step of the stoep; her head was bent low, and her cloak drawn around her.

"Amayeka," said Mr Trail, "rise, and come in."

She shook her head, and crouched lower.

"Master," whispered she, "I am ashamed--"

"Amayeka," said another voice beside her.

Mr Trail had prepared her to meet her lover.

He left them together.

Next day a group entered the chapel of the mission station; it was said there was to be a wedding--a strange wedding; the young English teacher was to be married to a Kafir girl--it was quite true.

At first the settlers in the neighbourhood turned away their heads when the young teacher and his dusky wife pa.s.sed them by; but Amayeka was so humble, so industrious, so neat, what could be said against her?

Mrs Trail helped her to establish a school. To look into her room on Sabbath nights, and see her the centre of a crowd of children, would do your heart good. She is no longer young--at thirty the women of her race are old--but her voice is musical and girlish as ever; and were you to hear her and her husband leading the Evening Hymn, you would never recognise, in the grave and neatly-dressed catechist and his wife, the young unhappy pair whom I once introduced to you sitting forlorn and wretched by the riverside in Kafirland, with the eyes of the Wizard Amani glaring at them from his ambush.

Ormsby's patrimony was large; his family at first were disposed to receive his wife with hauteur--they were among that cla.s.s of English owls who fancy themselves eagles, especially in their own county.

Ormsby took possession of his fine estate, and left the army, glad that he had been a soldier for many reasons; but, above all, because he had thus been given the means of finding a fair and happy-tempered wife in Kafirland. He made his sisters welcome to Ormsby Park, and they confessed, among their country friends, that she was to be "tolerated."

Frankfort's cousin, the d.u.c.h.ess, the former friend of Mrs Daveney, begged to be introduced to young Mrs Ormsby at a ball, and asked affectionately about her mother's welfare. The d.u.c.h.ess was childless, had led "the most monotonous life in the world;" she was dying to hear of Kafirland.

"Did the people there live on the white men they killed in war time? and how was it that Marion was so fair, and would Mr and Mrs Daveney ever come to England again?" etc.