Chapter Twenty Nine.
Sweeping swiftly, as quickly scudding clouds will sweep athwart a wind-swept sky, memories that were not wholly bitter flashed across Matheson’s mind with each mile that he covered on his journey to Benfontein. Some odd thought or phrase or emotion leapt out of the past into prominence and held him with all the vital qualities of a thing newly realised. Always in imagination he was speeding towards Benfontein, though Nel’s rondavel, and not the farm of Andreas Krige, was his ultimate destination.
From some unexplained, and indeed inexplicable, reason, he had shrunk from being seen off on this journey by his fiancée. She had proposed being at the station for that purpose; but he had raised so many difficulties that she had reluctantly given way to his obvious wish for solitude; and when the time for departure came there was no one on the platform to speed his going.
He felt relieved at this; nevertheless the mood in which he started was heavy, overcast like the day which, bright with promise in the dawn, had later clouded darkly with every prospect of a gathering storm. The darkness of the day fitted his mood. Not since the hour when he had turned his back upon the white walls of Benfontein and driven beside Oom Koos Marais across the blackened veld, had he experienced such heaviness of spirit. Some unexpected spring of emotion had been uncovered by this turning back, and its bitter sweet waters were bubbling to the surface in a succession of reawakened memories which he had cheated himself into believing were buried for ever. No one has ever succeeded in burying memory in a sufficiently deep grave; however untiringly one labours over its interment, the first chance breeze of some recurrent thought or seeming likeness, blows back the loose soil and discovers the stark form that had been laid to final rest. Memory ranks with the immortals: it is vain to attempt to bury what cannot die.
Matheson thrust these reminiscent thoughts from him as he travelled northward, and tried to concentrate upon the immediate prospect of his meeting with Holman. It was his intention to hire a horse at De Aar and ride out to Nel’s farm and take possession of the rondavel. A saddle horse would be a necessity to him; he could not appropriate to his use any of Cornelius Nel’s horses. It was moreover possible that the horses on the farm had been commandeered, and had been taken when their master left to join Maritz. This he found later was the case: the farm had been stripped of everything that could prove of use to aid the rebellion.
The rondavel, however, remained as its owner invariably left it, fully provisioned, and fit for immediate habitation. One servant was left in charge of things, a light-coloured Kaffir who answered to the name of Butter Tom by reason of his fair skin, which, the colour of old parchment, suggested a mixture of alien blood. Butter Tom had been Nel’s body servant in the old days, and he recognised and greeted Matheson with a broad smile of welcome.
“Me take the baas’ horse,” he said. “The baas will find everything he want by the rondavel. Me come bimeby and get the baas something to eat.”
Matheson swung himself out of the saddle.
“Well, I’m hungry, and that’s a fact, Butter Tom,” he said.
The Kaffir gazed at him reproachfully the while he took the reins in his hand.
“Me not fat,” he said seriously, rebuke in his tones and a grave anxiousness in his questioning eyes.
Matheson did not attempt an explanation of the mistake: the native ear was confused with the unfamiliar English. He looked closely at the well-knit figure and smiled.
“No; so I see,” he said. “You get me supper pretty quick, Butter Tom. I’m plenty hungry.”
Whereat Butter Tom laughed quietly. To be plenty hungry was something he did understand.
Matheson entered the rondavel and took a survey of his temporary quarters. Everything was as Nel had left it, neat and orderly; the bed behind the reimpe curtain was made as though in preparation for immediate use: the atmosphere and appearance of the hut suggested a recent occupant. There were a pair of boots, which did not belong to Nel, which were not only smaller but more fashionable in make, under a chair; and on the brightly polished surface of the circular table lay a familiar object—a meerschaum pipe, with quaintly carved bowl, which he remembered to have seen Holman smoking innumerable times. The pipe had lain on the desk beside his hand during their last interview in the dingy office at Johannesburg. It was intolerable presumption, he reflected, that this German whom Herman Nel held in such deep abhorrence should make free with the tatter’s possessions, and pollute in its owner’s absence his home with his treacherous presence.
On the appearance of Butter Tom he made inquiries, and elicited the information that Baas Holman did occasionally use the rondavel, though he had not been there for some days.
“If he come again,” the Kaffir announced sturdily, setting a dish of buttered mealies gently down upon the snowy cloth, “me tell him this baas come from my baas. I serve this baas only. Baas Holman come with the missis two moons since.”
So Cornelius Nel’s wife had lent her brother-in-law’s house to his enemy. Indirectly Holman was responsible for the breach between the two brothers; he had been the evil genius of Cornelius as well as of Andreas Krige. Leentje Nel was aware of Herman’s dislike; her conduct therefore in lending his rondavel to the object of his aversion seemed to Matheson peculiarly detestable: it betrayed an utter absence of good taste on her part in offering, and on his in accepting, in the owner’s absence hospitality which would not have been extended had Herman Nel been on the spot.
But the fact that Holman used the rondavel, that, having left part of his property there, he meant presumably to return at no distant date, promised well for the meeting he sought with this man who had compassed so much evil and evaded himself any dangerous participation therein. He had no wish to go to Benfontein for the purpose of facing him; it would please him better if Holman descended upon him at the rondavel, where, secure in the knowledge of his right in being there, he would have the advantage over this German, whom Herman Nel would have shot like a jackal as an act of simple justice.
He cautioned Butter Tom not to speak of his presence at the rondavel, and bade him be on the alert against surprise; he had no wish to be caught unaware. More particularly he dreaded discovery by Cornelius Nel’s wife: a man when he is an enemy is openly an enemy, but a woman can be secretive and very bitter. Usually she makes the more relentless foe.
Butter Tom, with the limited intelligence and blind loyalty of his race, understanding only that this baas who was the friend of his baas did not wish his whereabouts known, was satisfied to keep watch without other explanation: the wish of the baas was a command; it was of itself a sufficient reason why he should guard against intruders. Save when engaged on his duties as servitor, he seldom stirred from his post of observation in the shade of the wall, where he squatted on his haunches, and smoked the tobacco which Matheson provided, and kept a vigilant eye on the approaches to the rondavel.
When he was confident that he was unobserved, even by his faithful henchman, Matheson took the precaution to look in the chest where Nel kept the rope ladder with which he mounted to his secret chamber. He felt reassured on finding the ladder rolled up in its accustomed place. No one beside Nel, unless perchance he had disclosed the secret to his fiancée, knew of that hiding place in the roof. In the event of a surprise visit, he intended to make use of his knowledge. He could from the upper chamber observe without being seen all that went on in the room below, could listen without fear of detection to any conversation that was being carried on.
Later, he experimented with the ladder, fixing it as he had watched Nel fix it to the cross beam in the roof. He climbed up it, and removed with very little difficulty the thatch door, and crawled through the opening, closing the thatch behind him. When closed there was a thin division in the thatch through which it was quite easy to look into the room beneath. Satisfied with this trial that he was safe against surprise, he made the descent and rolled up the ladder and returned it to the chest.
The next few days were spent in anticipation of a visit from Holman, who did not appear. Until dusk each day he remained a voluntary prisoner within the rondavel; after sundown he left Butter Tom in charge and ventured forth in search of exercise; Butter Tom was to watch for his return and warn him by signal in the event of a visitor during his absence. But the days passed and left him in undisputed possession of his quarters. If he meant to see Holman it began to look as though he would have to go to Benfontein after all.
This continued immunity from intrusion rendered him less cautious in his actions. He took to sitting outside the hut, and one afternoon went for a walk while it was yet daylight in defiance of being observed by any one on the farm. There was no reason why he should not be seen, save his own wish to surprise Holman. But beyond a native herd and one or two Kaffir women, he met no one; and he returned to the rondavel towards the hour for supper revolving in his mind whether or no he should set forth for Benfontein on the morrow?
It was a matter for surprise to him on nearing the rondavel to find Butter Tom, whom he had left guarding the entrance, no longer at his station. It was the first sign of defection Butter Tom had given; the Kaffir’s negligence set him wondering whether in trusting him implicitly he was acting altogether wisely? He looked about for some sign of him, and discovering none, concluded that he must be in the smaller hut preparing the evening meal, having settled, in his indecision between the rival claims of these separate duties, on the primary importance of attending to the baas’ food.
Matheson entered the rondavel expecting to find the table laid for supper; but no preparation for the meal had been attempted, and no sound came from the native quarters. The rondavel remained to all appearance as he had left it.
And yet, despite the fact that the place was empty, that there was no evidence of any one having been there during his absence, a sense of uneasiness held him—a feeling of being observed, though there was no one visibly present, which was acutely disquieting. Without understanding his reason in doing so, he crossed to the chest beneath the window where the rope ladder lay concealed, and lifted the lid. For a second or so he remained there motionless, holding back the heavy lid with his hand, staring into the empty chest. Some one had been there before him: the rope ladder was gone.