Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases Part 17

"They put the body in the saddle, and rode on either side, close in, and Peter held it upright with a hand on its shoulder, as a man might conceivably ride by a comrade.

There was yet no light of day, only a grayness that streaked the night sky, and a bitterness in the air like a note of mourning. Slowly, walking their sleepy horses, they pa.s.sed along the streets, dark save where a lamp at a corner shed a yellow and dismal light about it. Creatures of the night, slouching here and there, looked at them; policemen, screening from the wind in dark corners, thrust forth heads; but they rode on, and none stopped them, and thus they came forth of the city and faced the veld again.

"They raised their faces to its freshness, familiar and friendly as the voice of one's kin, and pushed the horses to a trot, while behind them the blur of light that was the city paled and died down as the miles multiplied under their hoofs. Peter had the leading rein of the middle horse while Barend steadied its burden, and thus they traveled towards the east and home.

"When the sun was high, they no longer dared follow the road. Out of those they must meet and exchange words with, there would surely be some whom they could not deceive-some who had seen death before and knew the signs of it. So they pulled aside, and made for the high land of Baviaan's Nek, riding across the gray gra.s.s and among the yellow ant-hills till close on noon. Then, dipping to a hollow, where some willows cast a shade upon a pool of a spruit, they dismounted and laid the dead man in the cool, while they off-saddled the horses and rested themselves. There were biltong and bread in their saddle-bags, and tobacco they did not lack, and the need for food drove them to make a big meal. They were concerned with this so deeply that they did not notice that a Kafir, carrying the bundles which Kafirs always carry on the trek, had come up to them.

"He was an old Kafir, his wool gray and his skin rough with age, but his eyes were bright with the full of strength and peaceful with wisdom. He lay down at the pool's brink and drank, and then gave them good day.

"'Will the baas permit me to sit in the shade of the trees?' he asked. 'It is hot traveling.'

"He looked from them to the stretched body of Emmanuel as he spoke.

"'Sit over there, then,' said Barend, 'and see you keep quiet.'

"'Oh, I shall not wake that baas, at all events,' said the old Kafir, pointing to the body.

"Both the Boers were startled at this, but the man walked calmly to the farthest tree, and piled his bundles there.

"'We all have our troubles,' he said, as he shook out his brown blanket. 'Age for some of us, sorrow for others. And then there is death, too. I am not dead, at least.'

"'Why do you talk of death?' demanded Peter sharply.

"The old Kafir held up a finger. There was a kind of mirth in his motion. 'Hush, or you will wake him,' he replied.

'But I know all about death, except the taste of it. I know how it looks, and how it lies on the ground, and how it comes, and how it is concealed.'

"He raised his hard old face with eyes half-closed, and snuffled at the air.

"'And how it smells, too,' he said.

"'You will learn the taste of it in a minute,' cried Barend, springing to his feet with a white face. 'You old scarecrow, what is it you are hinting about? Do you take us for murderers?'

"The old Kafir sat down among his bundles and fumbled for his pipe. There was no concern on him; he had the still ease of one who comes upon his own special task, sees it, and knows he is the master of it. While Barend, shaking a little, stood gauntly over him, he filled his pipe, lit it, and blew forth a cloud of smoke.

"'Pooh!' he said. 'The baas gives too much importance to trifles. A dead man is of less worth than a living one. It is the baas I am interested in--not the carrion.'

"He spat very leisurely and took the pipe to his lips again.

"Barend, after a little hesitation, sat down again.

"'I have known white men,' said the old Kahr, leaning back against his tree, 'who scratched crosses in the ground, and traced them on their b.r.e.a.s.t.s with a finger, when they came upon death or the dead. That is a strong charm. And in the east, yonder, are others who spill wine on the earth. But in my tribe we neither make crosses nor waste liquor. We spit. Where is the baas going?'

"'Across Baviaan's Nek,' said Barend, very quietly.

"'Ah! That is a long way. Tonight the baas should camp by the huts that are over the drift where the great rocks are.

There are Kafirs there who will not fear this luggage of yours. They will sell food and shelter, and refrain from curiosity. Will that serve the baas?'

"'Surely,' said Barend, and tossed him some tobacco.

"The old Kahr caught the horses for them and helped them to lift the dead man to the saddle. By this time the body had become stiff, and needed a constant effort to hold it steady. The sun was hot as they rode on, and the dust smoked up about the fetlocks of the horses. The stiff feet of the dead man were in the stirrups, and as now and again they broke into a short canter, he seemed as though he would stand up in his stirrups to look ahead.

"'So Emmanuel always did when he rode among ant-heaps,'

said Peter once.

"Barend only grunted in reply; the strain on his arm and wrist was a heavy one.

"They camped that night at the huts the old Kafir had spoken of. The Kafirs there were of a large build, strong and silent. They glanced once or twice at the body, but said nothing.

Food was forthcoming--, and a big clean hut, and here the two Boers slept beside the corpse. It was only next morning, when they had mounted and were about to start, that one, with the head-ring of dignity about his scalp, gave a word of counsel.

"He stood at Barend's bridle, looking up to him with a sort of pity.

"'The day will be hot, baas,' he said, 'and that will be doubly burdensome. So you may know that beyond the Nek, where the mimosas grow on a damp plain, the ground is very soft. There are huts there, and shovels.'

"Barend nodded his thanks, and they rode through the drift and up the Nek. It was, as the Kafir had predicted, a hot day. One of those days which come in the throng of the summer, when the sun is an oppressor, ruthless and joying in pain, when the earth is dead with heat and dryness and the very air forbears to take a freedom I When they came down the slopes beyond the crest, the flanks and rumps of the horses were slimy with running sweat, and red nostrils spoke of distress. The dead man sat in the saddle with a thin show of eyeball under each lowered lid, and a gleam of teeth above the sunken lower lip, yet for all the world like one that follows a purpose, like one guiding himself to a steadfast end. In the face there was a growing hue that does not visit the living, but the hat-brim cast a shadow over it that lent it an effect of deep gravity and solemn intention.

"'He means to reach the farm.' said Barend, after glancing at him.

"Peter drew rein. 'And yet,' he said, 'he will never do it if we travel thus. We killed horses to make the city in three days; going at this rate, it will take us six to return.'

"'Well,' replied Barend, 'what else is there to do?'

"'Only one thing,' said Peter, 'your horse is the weight- carrier. You must take Emmanuel over your saddle-bow, and we must kill more horses.'

"'But a dead man,' said Barend. 'It is like a blasphemy.'

"'We can do nothing else,' said Peter, and after a little more talking they made the change."

The Vrouw Grobelaar paused and looked at us. Katje was tight in the crook of my arm.

"Words limp while horses stride free," she said, "but conceive that ride. Taking horses where they could find them, they rested no more, nor drew rein save to fill and light their pipes. From Baviaan's Nek they traveled at the canter across the mimosa swamp, and so by the Rhenoster Drift to Ookiep, where Barend's horse fell and he and that other rolled on the veld together. When Peter had found and brought another horse, they made one stage to Jantje's Kraal, and thence, galloping wordless through the night, to Zwartvark. Long rides, you will say! Aye, rides to remember; but think of the br.i.m.m.i.n.g stillness of the journey, hushed and governed by that silent companion, while thought could not stray nor fancy escape from the death that chased at the elbow of each. When, on the third morning, as the sun came spouting up from the low country, they saw afar the roof that was their goal, Peter cried aloud like a child awaking from evil dreams.

"Ere noon their hoofs knocked on the stones in the front kraal, and they bore the body to the shade of the tobacco shed.

"'And now,' said Peter, when that was done, 'who is to tell the ou tante?'

"Barend leaned at the door-post with his arm cast up over his face and said nought, but there came from the house a girl of the neighborhood, who laid a finger to her lips.

"'Hush,' she said. 'Make no noise about this house. Where have you been, the two of you? An hour earlier, and you had been in time. As it is, the Vrouw van der Westhuizen died with no kin about her.'"

THE SACRIFICE

"Do not think," said the Vrouw Grobelaar, looking at me with a hard unwinking eye, "that idle men should have pretty wives. Though Katje will lose that poppy red-and- white when she begins to grow fat. Still--"

Katje made an observation.

"Her mother," pursued the Vrouw Grobelaar, still holding me fixed, "spent seventeen years in one room, because she could not go through the door; and when she died they took the roof on and hoisted her out like a bullock from a well.

But as I was saying, it is not well that idle men--those with leisure for their littlenesses, like schoolmasters and doctors and Predikants should have pretty wives, or they tend to waste themselves. A man with real work and money matters and the governing of cattle and land and Kafirs to fill his day, for such a one it is very well. Her prettiness is an interval, like the drink he takes in the noonday. But for an idle man it becomes the air he breathes. He is all-dependent on it, and it is a small and breakable thing.