“Looks so. Ugly-looking Jew, I should say. Wonder what the devil he was doing down there. I suppose they shot him for plunder. Zulus are not what they were. Time was when a white man was perfectly safe in any part of this country. Who took the photo, by the way?”
“Dickinson, at Makanya.”
“Oh yes, the police sergeant. Well, have they investigated?”
“Rather. They’ve got at his identity, too. He was a Jo’burg Jew named Hyam Golding. The next thing is to find out what induced him to travel that way at all. It doesn’t lead anywhere in particular.”
“Let me see it,” said Verna. “I’m not of the hysterical, ‘fainting-female’ order, am I? Thanks,” as it was handed to her. “What a horrid-looking man he must have been. I mean apart from the conditions under which this was taken. Let’s see some of the others.”
He complied. One he kept out, and handed it to Denham.
“Do you recognise it?” he asked. “You came through it, I think you said.”
“Did I? I think not, considering I didn’t know one drift from the other. However, it’s just possible I may have; but one drift is very like another, especially in photography.”
“It’s the Bobi.”
Somehow Verna’s instincts were instantly on the alert. There was more than a subtle something in Stride’s manner and remarks, a sort of “making a dead set” smack about them. She became cold and hostile towards him at once. He saw this, and realised he had make a mistake. So he left the subject of the head, and drew attention to the other prints.