Chapter Fourteen.
A Good Understanding.
“To let him go?” echoed the girl. “But—ought you not to have had him arrested as a traitor and a murderer? Good Heavens! The whole plot is too awful.”
“And so I divulge it to you first, instead of to my fellow-man Orwell, R.M., or Isard, commanding the Matabeleland Mounted Police in Gandela. Why?”
Clare looked puzzled.
“I don’t know why,” she said. “But it seems a dreadful responsibility.”
“So I was inclined to think—in fact, very much did think—when having mapped out my plans everything seemed to conspire to smash them up. Yourself among the said everything.”
“Myself? Now, how?”
Lamont smiled that queer sour smile again.
“Why, certainly. Didn’t you make a point of my entering for the tent-pegging? What would have happened if I’d won? I couldn’t receive a prize by deputy. Didn’t you want me to help you and your sister, what time to have left the side of our worthy and reverend magician would have been fatal?”
“Yes. I did that,” said Clare penitently. “But, Mr Lamont, how on earth could I have foreseen that anything of the kind was brewing?”
“No, you couldn’t. I’m not blaming you, you understand, no, not for a moment.”
What was this? Not blaming her? Blaming her! Clare Vidal was not accustomed to be ‘blamed’ any more than to have her requests refused, especially in this land where there were not even enough women to go round, as she was fond of putting it. She was wondering what awful and scathing rejoinder she would have made to any man who should have ventured on such a remark to her a day or two ago. Yet to this one, lounging back there with one elbow resting on a big cold stone, lighting his pipe, she had no thought of scathing rejoinder. She was all aglow with admiration of his nerve and self-reliance.
“Then there was a bore of a fellow—Jim Steele—who was rather screwed, and wanted me to fight him, silly ass! Of course I wasn’t going to do that there, under any circumstances, but he—and the other idiots who thought I was afraid of him—little dreamt how they were trying to dig their own graves. For our worthy schemer Qubani would have thought me grotesque with a swelled eye, and you are bound to sustain some such damage in a rough-and-tumble with a big powerful devil like Steele. It was important then that Qubani should not think me grotesque.”
“Yes, I know. I’ve heard about that affair. There’s very little that doesn’t get round to us, in a small place like this, Mr Lamont. And you told him you’d meet him later—I know all about it, you see. Well, you mustn’t. It’s not at all worthy of grown men to act like a lot of overgrown schoolboys. It’s undignified.”
“Oh, I very much more than quite agree with you there. But then I promised the chap. Now, how can I go back on a promise?”
More than ever now did her brother-in-law’s insinuations with regard to this man come back to Clare. And it struck her that he did not plead that cowardice might be imputed to him if he failed—only that having made a promise he ought to keep it. “He isn’t a bad chap at bottom, Jim Steele,” went on Lamont, “except when he’s squiffy, and then he gets quarrelsome. Probably he’ll have forgotten all about everything by the time he wakes, or if not will recognise that he’s made an ass of himself.”
“I should hope so, indeed. But we are getting away from the witch-doctor. Why did you let him go?”
“Instinct, pure instinct. Natives are queer animals, and you don’t always know quite how to take them. If we had kept old Qubani, the township might have been rushed this very night. By turning him loose, full up with what I told him—well the move is justified by results, or you and I would not be talking together up here comfortably at this moment. Now this one has taken on a sort of respect for me—they do that, you know. I asked him what he thought would happen if I gave away for what purpose he was there. He wilted at that. Then I told him I gave him his life, and he must not be less generous. He talked round and round for a little, then said that I had better begin to move with my things at a time of the moon I reckoned out at somewhere about a fortnight hence. So now you see why I want you to get Fullerton to take you in to Buluwayo.”
“But, he won’t do it. He might if you were to put it to him.”
“That’s just when he wouldn’t. You know what they’d say, Miss Vidal ‘Lamont’s got ’em again’—meaning the funks.”
This was said with little bitterness, rather with a sort of tolerant contempt. Clare felt ashamed as she remembered all the remarks to which she had listened, reflecting on this man’s courage, and all because he did not take kindly to some low, pothouse brawl. She kindled.
“How can anyone say such a thing—such a wicked thing—when you have saved the whole settlement from massacre?”
“Oh, that wouldn’t count. To begin with, they wouldn’t believe what I’ve just been telling you—would say I’d invented it. They’ll believe it fast enough in a week or two’s time though. By the way, it was the sight of old Qubani and his red cap that made me miss that last tilt at the peg, and a good thing I did miss it. Providential, as Father Mathias would say.”
“Father Mathias? Have you seen him lately?” said Clare.
“We travelled part of the way together when I was coming back from Lyall’s. We were caught in a nasty dry thunderstorm and took refuge in Zwabeka’s kraal. It was there I overheard that nice little conspiracy.”
“And so you travelled with Father Mathias?” said Clare. “I hope you were nice to him. He is a great friend of ours.”
“Nice to him, Miss Vidal?” answered Lamont, raising his brows as if amused at the question. “Why not? He is a very nice man. Why should I be other than nice to him?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Except that—well, he is a priest.”
“What then? Oh, I see what you mean. But I have no prejudice against priests. On the contrary—my experience of them is that they are kindly, tolerant men, very self-sacrificing and with considerable knowledge of human nature. When you’ve said that, it follows that they are almost invariably good company. This one was decidedly so. Why on earth should I not be ‘nice’ to him?”
“Oh well, you know—you Protestants do have prejudices of the kind,” she answered somewhat lamely.
“But I am not a Protestant.”
“Not a Protestant? I don’t quite understand.”
“Certainly not I don’t protest against anything or anybody. I believe in competition, and if the Catholic Church were to capture this country, or England, or the entire world for that matter, I should reckon that the very fact of doing so would be to establish its claim to the right to do so.”
Woman the apostle—woman the missioner—felt moved to say, “Why don’t you examine her claims to do so, and then aid in furthering them?” But Clare Vidal, looking at the speaker, only quoted to herself, “Thou art not far from the kingdom of heaven.”
“As a matter of fact,” went on Lamont, “I find among Catholics far more tolerance—using the word in its broad, work-a-day sense—than among those belonging to any other creed. By the way—are you one, may I ask?”
“Why, of course.”
“I didn’t know. Well, you must take my opinion—given in utter ignorance of the fact—for what it’s worth. There’s a sort of a Catholic colony near my place at home, and the priest is one of my most valued friends.”
Clare brightened.
“Really?” she said. “How nice. But, Mr Lamont, how is it you live over here? Do you prefer this country to England?”
“I think it prefers me. You see, I can’t afford to live in my own place. It’s dipped—mortgaged, you understand—almost past praying for. So it’s let, and here I am.”
“So that’s why you are here?”
“Yes. The life suits me too. I believe if a miracle were to be worked, and my place started again clear for me, I should still stick out here, or at any rate come out every other year.”
Clare looked at him, and the beautiful Irish eyes, their deep blue framed by thick dark lashes, were sympathetic and soft. She was thinking of the abominable stories Ancram had been spreading about this man; how he had been hounded out of his county for cowardice, and so on. She repeated—
“So that is why you are out here?”
“Of course,” he answered looking at her with mild astonishment. “Why else should I be?”
“Oh no. I hope you don’t think me very inquisitive, Mr Lamont. Why, it really seems as if I were trying to—to ‘pump’ you—isn’t that the word?”
“But such a thought never entered my head. Why should it?”
Clare felt uncomfortable. There was manifestly no answer to be made to this. So she said—
“By the way, who is this Mr Ancram? You knew him at home, didn’t you?”
“Oh yes. Slightly, and didn’t care for him at that. He turned up at my place here one night. Peters had picked him up in woeful plight down Pagadi way—and gave me the idea he had come to stay. I’ve nothing to say against the chap, mind, but I don’t care for him.”
Clare was no mischief-maker, still she could not help saying—
“Well, I don’t think he’s any friend of yours, from what I’ve heard.”
“No? I suppose not. He’s been putting about a yarn or two of his own here with regard to me, with just that substratum of truth about it that makes the half lie the most telling. But—good Lord, what does it matter?”
Clare’s eyes opened wide. There was no affectation about this indifference—and how different this man was to the general ruck. Instead of getting into a fume and promising to call the delinquent to account, and so forth, as most men would have done, this one simply lay back against the hard cold stone, puffed out a cloud of smoke, and said, “What does it matter?”
“Then you are indifferent to the opinion of other people about you?” she said.
“Utterly. Utterly and entirely. I look at it from this point of view. If anything is said to my discredit, those whose opinions are worth having won’t believe it. If they do, their opinions are not worth having—from my stand-point. See?”
“Yes, I do. You are a practical philosopher.”
“I don’t aim at being. The conclusion is sheer common-sense.”
Then there fell silence. The rays of the newly risen sun poured down hotter and hotter upon the parched-up land, but the air was wonderfully clear. Behind lay the township, its zinc roofs flashing and shimmering in the unstinted morning radiance. Before lay roll upon roll of billowy verdure, and, on the right, a vast expanse stretching away, blue with distance, to the far skyline. Bright, peaceful and free, yet at that moment seething with demoniacal hate and the planning of demoniacal deeds. Yet here they sat, these two, conversing as unconcernedly as though such things were as completely impossible, as completely of the past, as one of them, at any rate, had up to half an hour ago imagined.
“I must be going back,” said Clare. “This is only a before breakfast constitutional.”
“I’ll go too. I’ve found out all I want to. I shall start back home this evening.”
“This evening? Why, you are never going back to that lonely farm again, with these savages plotting to murder us all?”
“Yes, I am. They won’t do it yet I am persuaded of that.”
Clare’s eyes dilated, as he walked beside her, leading his horse. The ‘coward’ again, she could not help thinking to herself. How many of those who so decried him, knowing what he did, would have started on a long solitary ride across the country to return to a solitary, and practically defenceless, dwelling at the end of the journey?
“But get Fullerton to take you into Buluwayo for a time,” he repeated, as they neared the township. “This place is too small, and straggling, and might be rushed.”
“But he won’t. He’d laugh at the idea, if I put it to him.”
“Yes. I know. Fullerton’s a pig-headed chap—very. Still you needn’t put it on its true grounds. Make out you want to shop, or see a dentist, or something, and get your sister to back you up. It’ll be strange if you can’t work it between you. Only—do it—do it.”
She was impressed by his earnestness, and duly promised.
“Do look in and see us before you go out, Mr Lamont,” she said, as they regained the township. “When do you start?”
“About sundown. There’s a nice new moon, and it’s pleasanter to ride at night, also easier on one’s horse.”
“Well, we shall be at home all the afternoon, Lucy and I. Good-bye for the present.”