Chapter XI: Part 11

"Aha, yes. I dare say 'e's bin putting you up to the ropes," went on the old fellow, leering and winking at Claverton, and speaking in a tone which he thought was the perfection of genial banter; but which made its object wildly long to shy a bottle at his head. Ordinarily he looked upon old Garrett with a kind of amused contempt; but to be made the butt of his muzzy jests, that was quite another thing. So, completely ignoring him, he drew Lilian's attention to an effect of light and shade high above them on the cliff opposite.

"Now we'll make for the cave," he said, as, feeding operations over, pipes began to appear.

"Yes. I'll get my drawing things," answered Lilian, rising.

"Are you going up to the cave?" said Miss Smithson, a pretty, fair-haired girl, who lived in the neighbourhood and whom they saw a good deal of. "That'll be delightful--I should so like to see it. Mr Gough, will you come, too; there are some beautiful ferns up there?"

Gough assented, while Claverton inwardly anathematised poor Lucy Smithson, little thinking how unjustly, for she was really going out of her way to render him a service.

The four started. No one else seemed inclined to embark in the undertaking, having had enough knocking about at present, they said; old Garrett adding: "We old fogies don't feel up to climbing, so we'll just sit and 'ave a nice comfortable chat and a smoke."

"And a big drink," added Claverton, cynically, to his companion. "What an infliction that old fool can become!"

"He is rather overpowering," assented Lilian. "Who can the old fellow have been?"

"A bricklayer, most likely, or a clodhopper of some sort. These fellows save a little coin, or make a lucky venture at the Diamond Fields, and buy a farm, and then, there they are. There's precious little class distinction here."

"I suppose so. But as the country gets more thickly settled, that'll all come."

"Yes. You see, in the old times when all these older men had to rough it together, and were dependent on each other for mutual help and defence, it was the smartest fellow who was made most of, irrespective of social grade. And these bricklayer chaps and journeymen were always in request, and could not only command high wages at any time, but didn't care what they did, so they made their pile quickly enough. In a few generations most of the class distinctions of the old country will prevail here, as education and the importation of educated people grows. As it is, the rising generation, if you notice, is better educated than its parents, and in many instances undisguisedly looks down on its grandparents."

"Yes, I've noticed that," said Lilian. "And my predilection generally lies with the old people, who, if somewhat uncultured, are kindness itself."

"And their very roughness makes them the fittest people to open up a new colony," went on Claverton. "Now look at that scowling fellow Jeffreys--how weary I am of his eternal scowl, by the way. Well, his grandfather would hardly have been taken on as valet to Mr Brathwaite's father in the old country, and yet here the Jeffreys mix with us as equals, and are among the most well-to-do people anywhere about. Isn't this shade delightful?"

For they were walking beneath a growth of massive yellow-wood trees, whose great twisted limbs overhead shut out the sunlight, though here and there it struggled through and lay in a golden network on the ground. Masses of lichen festooned from trunk and bough, and monkey ropes and trailers of every description hung here straight and cord-like, there tangled together in the most hopeless confusion. A gloom lay beneath the shadowing trees, but it was the softened gloom of a cathedral aisle; and the column-like trunks, firm and massive, stood in rows along the coarse of the stream which bubbled along--now in little clear pools, now brawling over a stony shallow.

"Yes, perfectly sweet," answered Lilian.

"Then, like all things to which that description applies, it isn't to last, for here we turn upward."

A ragged track, half path, half water-course, diverged from the stream, leading up the bush-covered hillside, steep as a flight of steps.

"Wait a minute," called out Lucy Smithson, who was overtaking them. "I don't think I'll go up after all. It's turned out so hot, and here we leave the shade. Do you mind, Mr Gough?" she added to her companion. "But don't let me keep you from going, I can easily go back alone. It isn't far."

This was out of the question, and she knew it. The fact being that the whole move was a little ruse on her part with the object of befriending Claverton and Lilian, in a way covering their retreat, so as not to make it quite so conspicuous. Who knew, thought the good-natured girl, but that this very afternoon might decide the future of those two? So she had laid her little plan.

Gough, who had his own reasons for wanting to rejoin the others, professed that turning back was the very course he should have thought advisable, so with a conventional word or two of regret, they separated.

"Now one can breathe again," exclaimed Claverton, in a tone of relief.

"I don't know," laughed his companion; "climbing a flight of very steep steps is likely to put one out of breath. And it's awfully steep here."

"It is rather," he answered, taking her arm to help her up the rough bush path, which was, in truth, like a flight of stairs. "But you'll go wild with delight when we get to the top, I expect. It's just one of those views you revel in. And," he added, tenderly, "this is the first time I have had you all to myself to-day."

"I thought I should have ridden this morning," she said.

"Were you sorry you didn't?"

"They said it was too far for me to ride," she went on as if not hearing his question. Then, looking suddenly at him: "Yes, I was sorry; but--"

Claverton's heart gave a bound. Was this anything to augur from, after all? No. Lilian was not as most girls.

"But what?" he asked, eagerly. "Nothing," and the expression of her face was grave and troubled.

Of late she had been a prey to sad misgivings; at times she felt as if she had been playing a deceitful and unworthy part. She had let this man go on thinking she was learning to care for him--for she was sure that he did think so--knowing the while that she could never be anything to him; and now the time of her stay was drawing very near its close, and she must explain to him that the fact of having given him so much of her society, and sought his confidence, and shown her unmistakable esteem for him, was only her side to the compact which they had ratified that evening under the stars, and that they must part as they had met-- strangers, or what to him would seem but little less cold--friends only. Yet she had been very happy with him, happier even than she dared own to herself. And now she must explain all this, and what would he think of her? Would he hate her? Would his powerful, all-in-all love change to bitter contempt? Ah! there lay the sting. But, no! She felt that he was different somehow to other men. He would understand perhaps, and pity her, and even not withdraw his love. She could not bear the thought of losing that--and she was so lonely. Yes; she would explain; this very day, she had made up her mind as to that. But when she tried to begin she had stopped short, and when he would have had her continue, had answered "Nothing."

Claverton did not urge her. He respected her sudden reticence, as he respected her every word, her lightest look. He, too, had his own thoughts to occupy him. With the shadow of her approaching departure lying upon his mind, deepening day by day as the time drew on, he was fast relapsing into the state of restless despondency to which he had been a prey before he tempted his fate so futilely. The wave of reckless happiness into which he had unquestioningly plunged, with nearly two months of Lilian's society before him, had rolled on, leaving him even worse than before. He would cast the dice again; but, instinctively, he felt that this time the throw would be fatal. Should he do it to-day? The opportunity was a rarely favourable one. But, no! He would not mar the recollection of this one golden day, one of the few last they would spend together.

So in silence they continued the ascent, every now and then pausing to rest and look back. At length the arching trees overhead gave way, and a wall of rock rose in front.

"We are nearly there now," said Claverton, leading the way along beneath the rock. "This is our way."

"Oh, look!"

There was a rustle among the bushes, as a buck, which had been lying in the sun at the base of the cliff, sprang up and plunged into the cover, where they could hear it bounding away down the hill.

"How pretty! I've never seen one so close before--at least, not alive," she went on. "I could see its eyes quite plainly; but how it startled me!" she added, with a laugh.

"All the unwonted eights that you do see are always when you are with me," said Claverton, with a pleased smile. "But here we are at last. One more staircase, though."

They stood before a yawning fissure falling back so as to make a natural staircase to the brow of the cliff. Nearly a hundred feet above, queer jagged pinnacles stood one above the other all up the sides of the gully, at whose entrance rose a great perpendicular tower of rock, with a huge boulder resting fantastically upon its summit. A tiny thread of water trickled down a well-worn channel, and from every cornice and cranny trailed a profusion of the most delicate maiden-hair ferns.

Lilian was enchanted. While pausing for a moment to rest, she dipped her hands into some clear water gathered in its little stony basin. In the act of withdrawing them, a ring slipped from one of her fingers and fell to the bottom of the water. It was a curious ring, consisting of two ropes of solid gold twisted together. Her companion fished it out, and, as he returned it to her, he noticed that she was deathly pale. But he made no remark, only glanced in the opposite direction for a moment, in order to give her time to recover her self-possession. Yet he connected the circumstance with her former lapses of hesitation and restraint. In silence they resumed their way, and at length gained a wide ledge at the other end of which was the cave. It seemed of some depth, being wider and loftier at the month, narrowing thence into darkness.

"Wait, let me go in first and explore," he went on, as a matter of precaution holding ready in his pocket the small revolver which had been his constant companion since Mopela's attempt on his life. Then striking a match he was about to advance.

"What's that?" exclaimed Lilian. But he had seen it as soon as she had, and placed himself in front of her. It was a human skull, standing on a ledge of rock about breast-high, and the eyeless sockets and white teeth looked ghastly enough, grinning at them dimly through the darkness. In an instant he had laid hold of it and jerked it away out of the cave down into the bush beneath.

"What was it?" she repeated.

"Only a stone. A rolling one, like yours truly. I don't suppose it has stopped yet."

He was glad she had not seen the hideous thing, and lighting another match he peered cautiously around, lest there should be a second skull. There was, but it was lying on the ground with the face turned away from them, and Lilian took it for a stone. There would have been to her something horribly ghastly in these grisly death's-heads, lying there in that gloomy cavern, just faintly visible by the flickering light of the match he carried.

"That's all right," he said, as they returned to the light. "I didn't much think we should find anything very terrific, but it's as well to look. Sometimes a snake takes up his quarters in a place like this."

"What's this?" cried she, as something crackled beneath her feet.

"Oh, some of those old bones the _Baas_ was telling us about. I don't suppose there's much left of them now, five-and-twenty years after."

Lilian shuddered slightly.

"Let's get into the air again," she said. "This place is rather awesome."

"Very well. But look, here are the Bushman drawings."

The walls of the cavern were plentifully adorned with hieroglyphics-- rude figures of men and animals--worked into the smoother parts of the rock with a kind of blue dye. Here and there the surface had been smoothed away to admit of the barbarous frescoes.

"They are very queer," said Lilian, "but candidly I am just a little disappointed in them. I thought they were much more artistically done."

"Yes, I always think people make more fuss about them than they are worth. They are sorry attempts after all."

"I think I shall make a sketch of the kloof, bringing in that great jutting cliff. What a pity it just hides the waterfall!" continued she.

He undid her basket and got out her drawing materials. Then they discovered that the little portable water-tin was empty.

"I'll get you some from down there in half a minute," he said, starting to his feet.

"But--but--I don't quite like being left alone here," she said, hesitatingly, casting an apprehensive look backward at the gloomy cave.

Claverton stopped.

"Then we must go together," he said. "As far as the end of the ledge, anyhow. Then I shall have you in sight while I scramble down the rocks."

"What a helpless creature I am!" she exclaimed, with a sad little smile.

"I wouldn't have you otherwise for all the world," replied he, tenderly; and they started on their quest. Swinging himself over the ledge he filled the little vessel from the trickle of water in the gully, and was with her again in a minute.

"Now," he went on, arranging a large flat stone as a seat for her, just in the shade of the cavern's month. "Now, you must make the most of the time, and knock up an adequate representation of the scene, and I believe I shall have the cheek to ask you to copy it again for me," and he threw himself down on the rock beside her.

"Don't sit there in the sun," said she. "And I shall tire you out, keeping you tied here by the hour. It would be much more amusing to you to be away with the others."

Claverton indulged in a long, quiet laugh. "That idea strikes me as something too rich. Tire me out! When I have been longing the whole day to be with you, and with you only and alone. When I could sit here for ever and ever only to be by your side and to see you and to hear the music of your voice, darling. I never want a better heaven than this-- than this one--here, at this moment," he went on, with a burst of passionate abandonment as different from his ordinary self-control of speech as the beautiful scene before them was from a Lincolnshire fen.

Lilian made no reply, but bent her head rather lower over her drawing, and her fingers trembled ever so slightly. Clouds of spreuws flitted among the crags opposite, their shrill whistle echoing melodiously from rock to rock. Bright-eyed little conies sat up peering warily around for a moment, and then scampering into their holes among the stones and ledges; and a large bird of prey circled slowly overhead uttering a loud rasping cry, then soared away over the valley. Beneath, the forest lay sleeping in the lustrous sunlight, and now and again from its cool recess would be upborne the soft note of a hoopoe.

Lilian worked on, neither of them speaking much. Claverton, for his part, was content to lounge there, as he had said, for ever, so that only he might watch that graceful white figure--bending over the sketch-block--and the delicate patrician profile, the fringed eyelid opening wide as she kept looking up from the paper to take in the scene. The sound of his own voice had a tendency to break the charm, so he kept silence. And thus the time wore on, till at last the sketch was finished, and Lilian, laying down the block to dry, rose to her feet.

"There," she said; "I think we must be going."

Her companion's countenance fell. "Not yet. Look. You haven't filled in that tuft of aloes on the krantz, and there's more shading wanted here."

She laughed. "I can fill that in at home. And the shading's quite right, really. Do you know how long we have been here?"

"I know how long we haven't been here--half long enough."

"Two hours and a quarter. We must really be going. They'll be wondering what has become of us."

"Really not. They won't trouble their heads about us. A little longer. Heaven knows when I shall get you all to myself like this again," he pleaded. "And--Why, Lilian--darling--what is it?" For she had suddenly grown very white.

"You are tired," he went on. "The heat and the climb have been too much for you. What a ruffian I was to have made you come! But it's shady and cool here, let's wait a little longer; the rest will do you good."

"No, I am not tired; but we will wait a little longer. I--I have something to say to you, and this is a good opportunity of saying it."

"Yes. What is it?"

"Do you remember our compact?" she went on, with a sort of shiver, and speaking in a dead, mechanical voice. "Have you forgotten it--that night by the water? I had no right to bind you to such a one-sided agreement. It was not fair to you. I only thought of myself, and it was selfish of me--sinfully selfish--to ask you to consent to such a thing."

"Selfish! You selfish? Well, what next?"

There was silence for a moment. Before--beneath them lay the beautiful valley, its abrupt slopes and iron-bound krantzes soft in the golden sunshine. A couple of crimson-winged louris flitted among the tree-tops beneath, and the hum of insects floated up with a faint and far-away sound. Behind--above them yawned the gloomy cave, those whited relics of primeval barbarism lying silent and ghastly on the shadowed floor, the sole witnesses of this conflict of love in all its heart-wrung hopelessness. What a mocking irony of circumstances is that which has caused such a scene in the drama of civilisation--civilisation in its highest and most refined phase, to be enacted here in this savage spot, where lie the dead bones of the most degraded of the human race.

"Yes, selfish. I valued your society, your friendship, so much, I could not bear to lose it. I was afraid you would leave me, then and there; and, oh! I have never known what real chivalrous sympathy was till I met you, and I have needed it so. Yet I might have known what would be the result of tasking you to the utmost of your strength--beyond it, rather. Well, our compact," she went on, in an altered voice, as if nerving herself for an effort. "You have not kept to it. You must not talk to me as you have been doing lately--to-day even. You must not--"

She turned half away; she felt faint and sick at heart and dared not look at him. What would he say to her? Suddenly something struck her on the shoulder, just behind the neck. The concussion was of the nature of a blow, rather quick than violent. She turned upon her companion, lost in a kind of scared wonder.

He had sprang to his feet and was shaking something from his hand. It fell on the ground, and he stamped upon it and crushed it.

"What is that?" she asked, glancing from the ground to his face, which was growing very white.

"Only entomology," he replied. "Look at it."

A huge red scorpion lay on the ground, where he had trodden upon it. It died hard, however, and though half-crashed it lay writhing and darting out its formidable sting in its rage.

"In half a second it would have been on your neck; it was going there as fast as it could crawl when I picked it off," he said.

"Has it stung you? Of course it has," she cried, her rich voice vibrating with concern. "Why, Arthur," she went on, all in a glow of admiration; "do you mean to say that you snatched that dreadful creature off me with your bare hand?"

It was the first time she had ever called him "Arthur," and for a moment he almost forgot the furious pain of the sting.

"Just that. I'd lay hold of the devil himself under far less provocation, I assure you. It was the only way of getting it off quick enough. By Jingo, it hurts, though. Look away for a moment, I'm going to slash it."

Opening his knife, which was keen and sharp as a razor, he drew its blade across the wound in a couple of deep gashes. The blood spurted freely, and he ground his teeth in the convulsive anguish caused by the venomous brute's sting, which seemed to go through his whole frame. Then he applied his lips to the wound and sucked.

"Good thing it missed that large vein," he said. For he had been just in time to seize the creature and crush it up in his fingers, during which process it had whipped up its tail and stung him twice just round the back of the hand. "Oh, I shall be all right, but we'd better get back. The Baas sometimes carries a bottle of Croft's Tincture. That'll put it right in no time," continued he, with rather a ghastly smile. For the sting of a scorpion is terribly painful; indeed, unless a remedy is at hand the sufferer will undergo the most acute agony. The sting of the Apocalyptical locusts has been well compared.

"Yes, yes. Let us be going," she said, hurriedly. "Is it dreadfully painful?"

"I hardly feel it when I look into your eyes, darling. And your very voice has a soothing effect."

She had just been taking him to task for talking to her in this strain, regardless of their compact, but how could she upbraid him now--when he was in this terrible pain--and all for her? Suddenly he reeled giddily, and his face became even more livid; and the perspiration stood in beads upon his forehead. An awful fear gripped her heart. All the grim stories she had heard of deaths from stings and snakebites crowded up. If this were to prove fatal and he were to die at her feet, having laid down his life for her! At this moment she knew her own heart if she had never done so before. Further self-disguise was useless. This incident had swept away the veil.

"Ah, why did you do it?" cried she, in tones of thrilling anguish. "I would sooner it had stung me a hundred times! You can hardly walk! Lean on me. See! I am not such a weak support, after all."

She had passed her arm through his, and, for the moment, felt as strong and determined as even he could have been. All thoughts of prudence and conventionality were scattered to the winds in her awful apprehension. He was suffering horribly--it might be, even, that his life was in danger.

"Why, how childishly weak I am!" said he, with another forced smile. "The thing can't hurt so much, after all; hang it, it can't!"

But it did. There was no getting rid of that fact, try as he might to ignore it. Thus they made their way back.

"Look, now, I mustn't make a crutch of you any more. We shall be coming upon the others directly," said Claverton, as they drew near to the halting-place.

"I don't care if we do," she replied, fearlessly.

"But I care; and I'm not going to let you do what you might regret afterwards," rejoined he, sadly, remembering the burden of their conversation at the time of the occurrence.

"Ah, why did you do it?" she repeated. And by that time they were in sight and earshot of the rest of the party.

"Hallo, Arthur! What's up?" asked Mr Brathwaite, noticing his unwonted aspect.

"Nothing much; only a sting. Got any Croft's Tincture?"

"Is it a snake?" inquired the old man, with more alarm in his voice than he intended to betray.

"No; a scorpion."

The while Mr Brathwaite had been uncorking a small bottle. "Lucky I didn't change my coat at the last moment this morning. I was as nearly as possible doing so, and this would have been left behind if I had, sure as fate. Now, let's have a look at it."

An infusion of the healing fluid was applied, and soon the sufferer began to feel perceptibly relieved. The throbbing became less violent, and, although much swollen already, the hand grew no larger. Old Garrett stood by, watching the doctoring process, lecturing the while, his theme the deterioration from its ancestry of the rising generation.

"There," he was saying, "I'll be bound that none of you young fellers 'ave any of that stuff with you--and what would you 'ave done without it? We old stagers is always ready for any emergence," (his auditors presumed he meant emergency)--"always ready. All there, sir; all there?"

"Have you got any of it yourself?" asked the patient, catting him short.

"'Ave I? Well, let's see. No, I 'aven't to-day, but I generally 'ave."

"Oh!" said the patient, significantly.

"There, you'll do now," said Mr Brathwaite, tying up the hand with a handkerchief. "It'll hurt a little for a time, but the swelling will soon go down. But how did it happen?"

"The scorpion was on my shoulder, and Mr Claverton snatched it off with his bare hand," answered Lilian, quickly, in her clear tones.

"Awkwardly enough, too, as the result shows," rejoined Claverton. "By the way, has Hicks slain anything? We heard him cannonading away down the kloof like the Siege of Paris." He said this with the object of changing the topic, and the statement was not strictly historical in every particular.

"Ha, ha!" laughed Mr Brathwaite. "Hicks banging away, as usual. He never will move without his gun. One thing, though, if he isn't dangerous to beast, he isn't to man either. He's always careful enough."

"I've sent for the horses," said Jim, who had just come up. "Hallo, Claverton! What's the row with your hand?"

Then the story was raked up afresh, and all eyes were turned upon its hero, which he hated, and looked around seeking a means of escape, when, to his intense relief, a diversion occurred, in the shape of Hicks and Allen dragging between them a huge bushbuck ram, which the former had shot.

"Hicks to the fore. Hooray!" cried Armitage. "How much salt did you lodge on its tail, old man?"

"Go to Bath, Jack. You're not the only fellow in the world who ever shot anything," retorted Hicks, who was hot and testy. Then there was a general laugh, and at length the jollity was cut short by the inexorable hand of Time. The vehicles were in-spanned, for they must needs depart. Those who were to ride were busy saddling up, and at length farewells having been exchanged, all started on their respective ways, some riding, some driving. Armitage declared that the last thing he saw of old Garrett was that worthy balancing himself in his trap trying to draw a cork, while his hopeful held the reins; but no one knew whether to believe the statement or not. One thing, however, presumption was all in favour of its veracity, so they gave the old toper the benefit of the doubt--in the wrong direction.

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER TWENTY THREE.

"SUNSHINE OUTSIDE--ICE AT THE CORE."

"After all, this is a glorious sort of life!" exclaimed Hicks, striking his hatchet into a thorn-stump and standing upright, in all the elation of his health and strength, to gaze at the sun--now rather more than an hour high--and then at the surrounding _veldt_, all dewy and sparkling.

"It is," assented his companion, making a final chop at a thorn-bush which he had cut down. "Here, Tambusa, lay hold of that `tack' and bang it up against the others. There. The devil himself would yell if chucked against that hedge now."

For they were repairing sundry breaches in the fence of the wet-weather kraal.

Tambusa obeyed; but in the act of doing so stumbled, and, trying to save himself, sat right on the most thorny end of the branch he was manipulating.

"I never did see such a nigger for blundering," laughed Claverton, as Tambusa, picking himself up, endeavoured to extract the sharp mimosa spikes which had stuck in his naked carcase. "Hang it, man; you had the whole district for as far round as you can see to sit down in, and yet you pick out such a seat as that."

The Kafir grinned dolefully, not much relishing this keen jest; but he liked its propounder, and so he grinned.

"Yes. It's a glorious life," continued Hicks, bent on philosophising, apparently. "One never feels off one's chump. Suits a fellow down to the ground."

"It does," acquiesced the other. "By the way, I hear the Brathwaite girls are going away next week."

"Eh!--what? No. Who told you that?" cried Hicks, turning sharply.

"Oh! didn't you know? My informant was Ethel herself. I thought you knew."

Hicks looked "off his chump" enough now, to use his own expression, and his companion's satirical soul discovered something irresistibly comic in this sudden transition from elation to crestfallenness, which would have amused him vastly, but that the laugh was not entirely on his own side. So he only repeated: "I made sure you knew."

"No, I didn't. But, I say, though, that's a blue look out. I don't know how we shall get on without them, it'll be slow as slow can be," and then, remembering that his companion might have good reasons for not agreeing with this latter statement, Hicks stopped short, and began blundering out something about "it making all the difference, you know, having a lot of people in the house--or only a few."

"Let's knock off," suggested Claverton. "We're about done here. Tambusa, lug along those `tacks,' we'll bang them up somewhere and go."

It was a couple of days after the fishing picnic, and just each a morning. There had been plenty of work of one kind or another to occupy the whole of the time since then; but to-day they would only ride round the place, and give an eye to the stock, picking up, perchance, a stray shot or two on the way.

"Arthur," said Mr Brathwaite, meeting the two young men on the _stoep_. "Driscoll's just sent over to say he can take you down to see that place of his to-day. I advise you to ride over there and go with him. It's a good place, and going for a mere song. I'd think twice, if I were you, before letting it slip."

"You're right; I'll go over and see it. But could you come too, and give me the benefit of your experience?"

"I can't to-day, I'm afraid. It's a long way, and I don't feel up to it. Still, you have a good eye to the capabilities of a place, I should say. Anyhow, go and look at it."

On second thoughts, Claverton was rather glad. He would be more the master of his own movements if alone, and would be able to return as soon as possible, whereas, at the ordinary regulation speed, the undertaking would carry him through the whole day.

"Have you far to go?" asked Lilian, as after breakfast he sat buckling on his spurs in the passage.

"Yes; it's a good way. I may not be back till nearly dark," he answered, ruefully, taking down his riding-crop from the peg. "But to-day I'm going to imagine myself riding another fellow's horse with my own spurs. I may as well be off, there's that little chatterbox, Gertie, bearing down upon us. Good-bye."

He mounted and rode off in a very discontented frame of mind. What did he care if any one made him a present of the whole continent of Africa, if he were not to win _her_? The days were so precious and so few now, and here he was throwing away a whole one for the sake of a wretched "bargain." He wouldn't go--he would let the thing slide--he would turn back. And his face, as he rode, wore an aspect of troubled preoccupation.

Turning from the door, Lilian encountered Gertie Wray in the passage.

"Oh, there you are, Lilian," exclaimed that volatile young lady. "I was just coming to look for you. Do come and teach me that lovely song you promised to, last night. We shall have it all to ourselves. Ethel and Laura are fixed for the morning with Mrs Brathwaite, making dresses or something."

"Very well, dear," assented Lilian, always ready to oblige others. She was not feeling inclined just then to sit hammering out accompaniments for a not very apt learner to murder a song to; but self came second with her. So she did her best to instil the desired accompaniment into the other's understanding; but in about half an hour her pupil got tired of it.

"I think I shall sit indoors and read," said Gertie. "It's too hot to go out."

"Is it? I like the heat," said Lilian. "I think I shall go for one of what you call my `somnambulisms.'"

"And a very good name for them," laughed the other. "To see you walking along, so still and stately, any one would think you were walking in your sleep, but that your eyes are open. Well, go for your `somnambulism,' my peerless Lilian, only don't get too much in the sun or you'll get freckles," and the speaker nestled down comfortably in a chair in a cool corner to while away the morning over a novel.

"You silly child," replied Lilian, laughing as she bent down to kiss her. "You'll be asleep yourself, really and in good effect, in about half an hour at that rate. Good-bye."

She went out, and paused for a moment on the _stoep_ with head gracefully poised and the beautiful figure erect as she stood gazing, with eyes opened wide, upon the glories of the sun-steeped landscape. Then she picked up a volume which lay on a chair under the verandah.

"I'll sit and read a little on that comfortable old seat under the large pear-tree when I'm tired," she thought, and, with the book in her hand, she passed on, down between the orange-trees, and out through the gate in the wooden fence, where the great scarlet-cactus blossoms twined in all their prismatic gorgeousness. Now and then she would stop and bend down to pick a wild flower or to examine some queer insect, and the warm glow of the summer morning seemed to favour her scheme of solitude and meditation. It was hot, but she loved the warmth, there was nothing of enervation in it to her; on the contrary, her thoughts and intellect never had clearer or freer play than on a day like this.

Dreamily and in meditative mood, Lilian wandered on; along the wall of the mealie-land, where the tall stalks spread their broad, drooping leaves, and many a white tufted ear, just bursting through its vernal husk, gave promise of an abundant crop; past the dam, where she lingered a moment to mark the clear shadows in its burning waters now cleft into ripples as, one by one, the mud-turtles, who had been basking on the bank, shuffled their slimy, flat shapes in with an ungainly slide; then by the ostrich camp, whose fierce occupant lazily ambled towards the wall, and then stopped half-way as if changing his mind. Dreamily still she leaned, looking over the wall, her taper fingers gathering together little fragments of stone, which, hardly knowing what she did, she threw into the enclosure, as if enticing the bird to approach. Then turning to pursue her way, behold, a high quince hedge barred it.

"How tiresome!" she said to herself. "I shall have to go such a long way round."

But she had not. A friendly gap opened a few yards further down, and, passing through it, she found herself in a wild, seldom visited part of the garden. Here tangled grass flourished in delightful confusion; and tall fig-trees, branching overhead, cast the sunlight in a network upon the shadowy ground, while among the topmost boughs a few spreuws lazily piped to each other as they revelled in the purple fruit. Then an open bit and sunshine, and the boughs of a large peach-tree swept nearly to the earth, as though to lay its load at her feet. She plucked off one of the peaches, and pressed its blushing, velvety skin against her own soft cheek.

"It seems almost a pity to eat such lovely fruit," she murmured. "They look so smooth and delicate."

Still turning over the peach in her hands, she swept aside the long drooping boughs of a great espalier. A rustic seat was fixed to the trunk, forming a shady nook--though sun-pierced here and there in a qualified degree--and on this she sat down. The surrounding branches falling around, shut in the spot as if it were a tent.

"It is delicious here, after that glare. I wonder who made this seat," mused Lilian, throwing off her hat and preparing to discuss her peach and otherwise enjoy to the full the glories of the golden noontide. Mechanically she opened the book she had caught up as she came out; but without attempting to read. The call of birds echoed through the leafy arches; bees droned in subdued murmur; now and again a tree-cricket broke the quietude with a shrill screech; the air, though not close or sultry, was rich and warm and languorous, and presently Lilian's thoughts began to get confused; her eyes closed; then the book slid from her lap. The influences of the prevailing calm had conquered--she slept.

And what a picture she made, reclining against the rough, twisted arm of the old rustic seat, one hand supporting the graceful head, and the delicate oval face, with its refined beauty of feature! The long lashes lay in a dark fringe upon each smooth cheek, which, lovingly kissed by the warm, generous air, was tinged with a faint but inexpressibly charming flush. The sweet, red lips were closed, but without a trace of hardness in their tender curves; and the whole attitude one of ease, abandonment, and yet of infinite grace in its every contour. A figure thoroughly in harmony with the place, clime, and hour. A lovely picture indeed.

So thought its only spectator, as, with a rapturous yearning pain at his heart, he noiselessly moved aside the trailing boughs and stepped within their shade. He would not disturb the spell, but stood gazing entranced upon the slumbering form in all its wealth of refinement of beauty.

A large pear fell to the ground with a dull thud. Lilian stirred uneasily, then half rose, letting fall the hand she had been leaning upon. It was seized in a firm grasp by two other hands, and in tones wherein earnest tenderness struggled with a gleeful laugh, a voice whispered:

"One doesn't wear gloves on the frontier, or what a chance of being set up in them for life!"

The long lashes unclosed, and she started ever so slightly. It was too much. The hot blood rushed through Claverton's veins as though it were molten liquid, and lifting her from the seat, he pressed her to him, raining down warm, passionate kisses upon her lips, forehead, eyes, and the soft dark hair which lay against his cheek, whispering wild, delirious words of love and entreaty. Then he felt ashamed of his fierce impulsiveness--his brutality as it seemed, in taking her at a disadvantage. Was she angry or humiliated, or both? She made no resistance as he held her there. Or had he about frightened her to death? Then he held her from him.

"You--here?" she cried, in astonishment; but there was no anger in her tone, although a lovely blush suffused her face, even to the very roots of her dark hair. "I thought you were going to be away all day. You told me you would hardly get back before night."

"I thought better of it. I couldn't remain away from you anything like so long; wherefore I turned back. That's the plain, unvarnished truth. Am I not improving in veracity?"

"Oh! I am hurting your hand!" she exclaimed, suddenly becoming aware that her fingers had been leaning hardly on the place where the scorpion had stung him. No fault of hers, by the way, for she could not have withdrawn them if she would.

"Say, rather, you are healing it. Your touch would have more effect in that line, with me, than that of a whole legion of Apostles," he replied, still holding her.

"Hush! You must not talk like that," said she, gently. Then, referring to the sting: "But I ought not to lecture you, when it was done for me. Ah, why do you take such care of me?" she cried, in conclusion, and her eyes were brimming.

"Why do--Oh, I do take care of you, then, do I?"

"Always. If I want anything, you are sure to have it ready. If ever I have a misgiving about anything, you are sure to be there to dispel it and reassure me. In fact, I can't walk a yard but you are spreading metaphorical carpets before my feet. And yet--Oh, Arthur, why did we ever meet?"

She turned away from him, standing with hands clasped before her, and her eyes fixed on the ground.

"Why did we ever meet?" he repeated, again drawing her to him and bending down to whisper in her ear, a low, quick, passionate whisper. "Because you and I were made for each other. Because we were brought together here, both of us, from the other side of the world on purpose for each other. Darling, that was the first thought that flashed through me the very moment I saw you that first day. All of me before that, was a different self; I hardly recognise it, now. You remember that night by the water--it was the hardest blow I ever had, that that little hand dealt me. But I wouldn't take it as final, I wouldn't give it up, and now I've served my apprenticeship fairly well, haven't I? What you've just said tells me that, even if nothing else did."

There was a frightened, despairing look in her eyes; her lips moved as if she were trying to speak, but the words would not come, and she made as if she would draw away from him.

"Lilian--sweetest--life of my life! Don't look so frightened, darling," he cried, in a tone of thrilling tenderness. "Remember what you have just told me, and for God's sake don't look so frightened. Tell me now that you are going to give me the care of your whole life--your sweet, love-diffusing life. Tell me this: Haven't I fairly established a claim to it? Look at the sunshine around. That shall be an earnest of your life, if you give it to me. My darling--my more than Heaven--only say you will."

He paused, hanging breathlessly on the reply. Again she struggled to speak. The tension was fearful. Would she faint or die? Then he bent his ear yet lower to catch two words hoarsely whispered:

"I--cannot!"

And then again the black bolt of despair shot through Claverton's heart. This was the last throw of the dice, the last chance, and he felt it was. Hitherto he had been almost confident in his hopefulness, now the cup was dashed to the ground. Thus they stood for a space, neither speaking. To Lilian it seemed as if the hour of her death had come, and with her own hand she must drive home the weapon--down, down to her very heart. The stray sunbeams crept along the ground beneath the old pear-tree, insects hummed, and a bird twittered in the radiant light without, and all told of calm and peace, and the very air seemed like a glow from Heaven. With that mysterious instinct which stamps upon the mind the veriest trifles at the time of some momentous crisis, she marked the efforts of two large black ants who were carrying the dead body of a cricket up the trunk of the tree; and to the end of her days she would remember the persevering attempts of the laborious insects as they dragged their burden, regardless of check or stumble, over the rough bark of the old espalier. It seemed to her that hours had passed instead of moments. Then he spoke, but his voice had lost its confident, hopeful ring. "Don't say that. Say you can, and you will!" She tried to lift her head, to speak firmly, but the attempt was a failure.

"I cannot," she repeated. "Forget me--hate me, if you will," and she shuddered; but he clasped her closer to him. "I can be nothing to you. I am bound--tied--bound firmly. Nothing can release me--nothing!"

A look so stony and awful came into Claverton's face that, had she seen it, she would inevitably have fainted away then and there.

"Oh, Lilian! It can't be--that you are--that--you are--married?" he gasped, and his brow was livid as he hang upon her answer.

"No," she replied, "I am not--that," and again she shuddered.

For a moment the other did not speak, but his face would have made a study passing curious as he analysed the position. In the midst of the shock his coolness seemed to have come back to him in a sudden and dangerous degree.

"Listen, now, Lilian," he said. "You are under a promise to some one--a rash, hasty promise. That much I might almost have seen for myself. I don't care whether it was made in Heaven or in hell; but you are going to annul it, and to annul it in favour of me. For it was a rash promise, and if you keep it you will be doing evil that good may come of it. Your own creed would tell you that much, and would forbid it, too."

"You don't care for this man, whoever he is," went on Claverton, having paused for her reply, but none came, "and he doesn't care for you, or he would never have allowed you to throw yourself on the world's tender mercies as he has done," and his voice grew hard at the thought. "You don't care for him, and you do--for--me," he said, in a desperation which rose far above conventionalities of speech.

Again she made no reply, so he continued; but now his tones were very soft and pleading.

"Yes, you do for me, darling. I could see it. Haven't I seen your sweet face light up at my approach? Haven't I noticed the softening in that exquisite voice when you turned to me? You remember when I came back that time we went after the stolen oxen," (referring to an episode which had involved a three days' absence from Seringa Vale). "You were so glad to see me, then, sweetest. There was no mistaking the speech of those divine eyes of yours. There's no conceit in my saying this, because love sometimes begets love, and have not I poured out the whole of mine at your feet? And I should be a fool not to see that you had been happy when with me. Oh, my darling, I cannot lose you. We cannot part. Only think of it! How can we? What will life be worth? Lilian, I won't live without you. Only give me your future, your past shall never trouble you in your future's sunshine. This wretched promise, it is nothing. It was made unthinkingly; you must retract it. You dare not wreck two lives for the sake of keeping a rash promise. You cannot, you dare not?"

He was terribly in earnest. There was something heartrending in the wild and, as it were, clinging tones of his entreaty, as he saw the prize slipping from his grasp just as he had thought to win it. He had played a bold stake, but it was his last, and the game must be boldly played if it was to be won.

To Lilian the moment was awful. She looked up at the dark, pleading face bent over her, drank in every tone of the strong, earnest voice. It was maddening, delirious. Ah! what happiness might be hers! She would yield. Then came the recollection of another face, another voice none the less pleading, a promise given, spoken low in a darkened chamber and at the side of a deathbed, but spoken in all pure faith and trust, a promise which was to hold good to the end of time, come weal, come woe. A promise--and such a promise--was sacred. She might tear out her own heart in keeping it, but it must be kept. Oh, God! this was indeed awful. Would she be able to bear up much longer, or would she die? And in her ears kept ringing _his_ voice--his loving, earnest, firm voice--firm now, though at times so terribly shaken. "You dare not wreck two lives for the sake of keeping a rash promise." And the picture he had drawn for her! Oh, no; the price to be paid was to be counted in tears of blood, but a promise is sacred to the end of time.

"Only think of the future, Lilian," he whispered, entreatingly. "The future, the bright future. Always sunny like this," glancing at the surroundings. "An earnest of our lives. Yours and mine."

With a low cry she tore herself from his hold and sank down upon the rustic seat.

"Ah, don't tempt me!" she wailed, despairingly, with her face buried in her hands. "You don't know what you are saying. Why do you tempt me like this? It is not fair, it is not manly of you."

The first words of reproach he had ever heard pass her lips--and they were addressed to him!

"I want to save two lives from shipwreck," he said. "Yours and mine."

"Then listen," she said, sitting up, and for the first time speaking firmly. "You must forget all this--you must forget me--hate me, if you will, for having brought you to this. I told you from the first that I could give you no hope whatever, and yet I was selfish enough to ask you to undertake a one-sided bargain. All through, I have been deceiving you, more and more. Think me utterly heartless--but forget me. And you--you have urged me to break a sacred promise for you," she went on in a hard, dry, monotonous voice, as unlike her usual tones as it was possible to be. "Arthur Claverton, I have treated you shamefully. You will always; look back upon my memory with the scorn and contempt it deserves; but on one point you are wrong: _I do not love you_!"

"You do."

The answer came quietly and confidently, as if he had been setting her right upon some trivial point under discussion.

She looked up at him with burning, tearless eyes; for she wae about to pluck her very heart out.

"What! you refuse to believe me? I must have sunk low in your estimation. I have told you the truth, and--and--you must leave me. Will you?" she went on, speaking fast in her fear lest she should break down in the act of sacrifice. "Will you go quite away until I leave this place? It will only be for a few days now, and it will be best for both of us. Will you do this for me?"

"No."

"No? You will not? Then that is the extent of your love for me?" she said. "Ah! now I know you."