The Settler and the Savage Part 20

"They're discussin' the best method of puttin' us out of existence,"

said the hunter, with a grim smile. "Some of 'em want to cut our throats at once and have done with it; some would like to torture us first; others are in favour of hangin', but all agree that we must be killed to prevent our tellin' the whereabouts of their hiding-place up here,--all except one, the one you gave chase to this afternoon. He advises 'em to let us go, but he don't seem very earnest about it."

"I think I know the reason of his favouring us," said Considine, with a look of hope.

"Indeed?"

"Yes; he once journeyed with me from Capetown to the karroo, and probably he feels a touch of regard for his old travelling companion."

"H'm! I wouldn't give much for his regard," growled Van Dyk. "The reed is slender, but it's the only one we have to lean on now. However, we've got a reprieve, for I heard 'em say just now that they'll delay executing us till to-morrow, after reaching one of their other and safer retreats in the mountains."

The prisoners were put into a smaller cave, close to the large one, that night. Their bonds were made more secure, and, as an additional precaution, their legs were tied. Two men were also appointed to guard the entrance of their prison.

About midnight the camp was perfectly still, and the only sounds that broke the silence were the tinkling of a neighbouring rill and the footfall of the sentinels. Van Dyk and Considine were lying uneasily on the bare ground, and thinking of the tragic fate that awaited them on the morrow, when they observed the dim figure of a man approaching from the innermost end of the cavern with a drawn knife in his right hand.

Both started up and leant on their elbows; more than this they could not do. They felt some alarm, it is true, but both came to the same conclusion--that it is foolish to cry out before you are hurt.

The figure bent over Van Dyk, and whispered in his ear. Next moment the hunter stood on his feet with his limbs free.

"You were right, young sir," he said to Considine as he stooped over him and cut his bonds; "there _is_ a touch of humanity in the rascally Hottentot after all. Come; he bids us follow him. Knows a secret pa.s.sage out o' the cave, no doubt."

The black-bearded huntsman turned as he spoke, and followed the dim figure, which melted into the depths of the cavern as if it had been a spirit. A few minutes' gliding through darkness tangible, and they found themselves in the open air among thick bushes. Though the night was very dark there was sufficient light to enable Considine to see the glittering of white teeth close to his face, as a voice whispered in broken English--"You's better tink twice when you try for to chases Tottie next time! Go; Van Dyk, him's old hand in de bush, will guide you safe."

Before morning Considine was back in Conrad Marais' parlour, relating his adventures among the Bergenaars with a half-belief that the whole affair was nothing more than a romantic dream.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

TREATS OF THE ZUURVELD AGAIN, AND ONE OR TWO SURPRISING INCIDENTS.

Seated one evening at the door of their dug-out hut or cavern on the banks of the river, the three brothers Skyd discussed the affairs of the colony and smoked their pipes.

"Never knew such a country," said John Skyd, "never!"

"Abominable!" observed James.

"Detestable!" remarked Robert.

"Why don't you Skyd-addle then?" cried Frank Dobson. "If I thought it as bad as you do, I'd leave it at once. But you are unjust."

"Unjust!" echoed John Skyd; "that were impossible. What could be worse?

Here have we been for three years, digging and ploughing, raking and hoeing, carting and milking, churning and--and--and what the better are we now? Barely able to keep body and soul together, with the rust ruining our wheat, and an occasional Kafir raid depriving us of our cattle, while we live in a hole on the river's bank like rabbits; with this disadvantage over these facetious creatures, that we have more numerous wants and fewer supplies."

"That's so," said Bob; "if we could only content ourselves with a few bulbous roots and gra.s.s all would be well, but, Frank, we sometimes want a little tea and sugar; occasionally we run short of tobacco; now and then we long for literature; coffee sometimes recurs to memory; at rare intervals, especially when domestic affairs go wrong, the thought of woman, as of a long-forgotten being of angelic mould, _will_ come over us. Ah! Frank, it is all very well for you to smile, you who have been away enjoying yourself for months past hunting elephants and other small game in the interior, but you have no notion how severely our failures are telling on our spirits. Why, Jim there tried to make a joke the other day, and it was so bad that Jack immediately went to bed with a sick-headache."

"True," said Jack solemnly, "quite true, and I couldn't cure that headache for a whole day, though I took a good deal of Cape-smoke before it came on, as well as afterwards."

"But, my dear chums," remonstrated Dobson, "is it not--"

"Now don't ask, `Is it not your own fault?' with that wiseacre look of yours," said John Skyd, testily tapping the bowl of his pipe on a stone preparatory to refilling it. "We are quite aware that we are not faultless; that we once or twice have planted things upside down, or a yard too deep, besides other little eccentricities of ignorance; but such errors are things of the past, and though we now drive our drills as straight as once, heigho! we ruled our account-books, things don't and won't improve."

"If you had not interrupted me, Jack, you might have spared much breath and feeling. I was about to say, Is it not a fact that many of the other settlers are beginning to overcome their difficulties though you are not? True, it has now been found that the wheat crops, on which we at first expected almost entirely to depend, have for three seasons proved an entire failure, and sheep do not thrive on our sour gra.s.s pasturage, though they seem to have done admirably with the Scotch at Baviaans River; but have not many of those around us been successful in raising rye, barley, oats, and Indian corn? have they not many herds of healthy cattle? are not pumpkins and potatoes thriving pretty well, and gardens beginning to flourish? Our roasted barley makes very fair coffee, and honey is not a bad subst.i.tute for sugar."

"You have made a successful bag this trip, I see, by your taking such a healthy view of our circ.u.mstances," said Bob.

"Yes, I've done very well," returned Dobson; "and I find the hunter's life so congenial, and withal so profitable, that I'm really thinking of adopting it as a profession. And that brings me to the object of my visit here to-night. The fact is, my dear fellows, that men of your genius are not fit for farmers. It takes quiet-going men of sense to cultivate the soil. If you three were to live and dig to the age of Methuselah you'd never make a living out of it."

"That's plain speaking," said John, with a nod, "and I agree with you entirely."

"I mean to speak plainly," rejoined Dobson, "and now what I propose is, that you should give it up and join me in the ivory business. It will pay, I a.s.sure you."

Here their friend entered into a minute and elaborate account of his recent hunting expedition, and imparted to John Skyd some of his own enthusiasm, but James and Robert shook their heads. Leaving them to think over his proposal, their friend went to make a call on the Brooks of Mount Hope.

"Drat that boy! he's escaped again, and after mischief I'll be bound!"

was the first sound that saluted him as he walked towards the house. It was Mrs Scholtz's voice, on the other side of the hedge with which the garden was surrounded. The remark was immediately followed by a piercing shriek from the nurse, who repeated it again and again. Dobson could see her through an opening in the branches, standing helpless, with her hands clasped and eyeb.a.l.l.s glaring. Thoroughly alarmed, he dashed towards the gate. At the same moment the voice of a child was heard:--

"Oh, look!--look 'ere, nuss, ain't I cotched a pritty ting--such a pritty ting!"

Springing through the gate, Dobson beheld Master Junkie, staggering up the track like a drunken man, with one hand clasped tight round the throat of a snake whose body and tail were twining round the chubby arm of its captor in a vain effort at freedom, while its forked tongue darted out viciously. It was at once recognised as one of the most deadly snakes in the country.

"Ain't it a booty?" cried Junkie, confronting Dobson, and holding up his prize like the infant Hercules, whom he very much resembled in all respects.

Dobson, seizing the child's hand in his own left, compressed it still tighter, drew his hunting-knife, and sliced off the reptile's head, just as Edwin Brook with his wife and daughter, attracted by the nurse's outcry, rushed from the cottage to the rescue. Scholtz and George Dally at the same time ran out respectively from stable and kitchen.

Mrs Scholtz had gone into a hysterical fit of persistent shrieking and laughter, which she maintained until she saw that her darling was saved; then, finishing off with a prolonged wail, she fell flat on the gra.s.s in a dead faint.

Junkie at the same moment, as it were, took up the cry. To be thus robbed of his new-found pet would have tried a better temper than his.

Without a moment's hesitation he rushed at Frank Dobson and commenced violently to kick his shins, while he soundly belaboured his knees with the still wriggling tail of the poor snake.

"What a blessing!" exclaimed Mrs Brook, grasping Dobson gratefully by the hand.

"What a mercy!" murmured Gertie, catching up the infant Hercules and taking him off to the cottage.

"What a rumpus!" growled Dally, taking himself off to the kitchen.

Scholtz gave no immediate expression to his feelings, but, lifting his better half from the gra.s.s, he tucked her under one of his great arms, and, with the muttered commentary, "zhe shrieckz like von mad zow,"

carried her off to his own apartment, where he deluged her with cold water and abuse till she recovered.

"Your arrival has created quite a sensation, Dobson," said Edwin Brook, with a smile, as they walked up to the house.

"Say, rather, it was opportune," said Mrs Brook; "but for your prompt way of using the knife our darling might have been bitten. Oh! I do dread these snakes, they go about in such a sneaking way, and are so very deadly. I often wonder that accidents are not more frequent, considering the numbers of them that are about."

"So do I, Mrs Brook," returned Dobson; "but I suppose it is owing to the fact that snakes are always most anxious to keep out of man's way, and few men are as bold as your Junkie. I never heard of one being collared before, though a friend of mine whom I met on my last visit to the karroo used sometimes to catch hold of a snake by the tail, whirl it round his head, and dash its brains out against a tree."

"You'll stay with us to-day, Dobson!" said Brook.

Frank, involuntarily casting a glance at the pretty face of Gertie--who had by that time attained to the grace of early womanhood,--accepted the invitation, and that day at dinner entertained the family with graphic accounts of his experiences among the wild beasts of the Great Fish River jungles, and dilated on his prospects of making a fortune by trading in ivory. "If that foolish law," he said, "had not been made by our Governor, prohibiting traffic with the Kafirs, I could get waggon-loads of elephants' tusks from them for an old song. As it is, I must knock over the elephants for myself--at least until the laws in question are rescinded."

"The Governor seems to have a special apt.i.tude," said Brook, with a clouded brow, "not only for framing foolish laws, but for abrogating good ones."