“Why of course I do,” unhesitatingly replied Anstey, though not without quailing before the indignation and contempt depicted on all three faces.
“Well, then, I for one believe you are telling the most infernal lie ever laid tongue to,” said the transport-rider. “As for you, youngster,” turning to Gerard, “I can only say I’m sorry for you, for you have fallen into the hands of the biggest blackguard in the whole of this Colony. Why on earth didn’t you make him give you a receipt or something?”
“The fact is, he is related to me. I thought I could trust him. How should I know he was no better than a common thief?”
“You’re a mighty virtuous lot, eh, Sam Carruthers?” sneered Anstey. “I’ve heard of a few tricks being played with waybills before to-day, while the load’s on the road.”
“You just shut up, or I’ll about knock your head off, Anstey, and be glad of an opportunity to do it, too!” said another of the transport-riders.
“Will you?” yelled Anstey, moving towards the inner door to ensure a retreat in the event of any of them making an attempt at climbing over the counter which now separated them from him. “I tell you what it is. You’re all in league with this swindling young thief, who is trying to bluff me out of money. But it won’t do—it won’t do. He can take his things and go to the devil. He came to me a beggar, and he can go out a beggar—the ungrateful dog. And, if any one likes to try the smashing trick, I’ve got a barker here that knows how to bite.”
And, making a rapid skip inside, he reappeared in a moment with a long-barrelled revolver.
All the anger, the indignation, almost the grief at being robbed, left penniless, had momentarily faded from Gerard’s mind before the overwhelming disgust which he felt for the other’s villainy. It was too painful, too nauseating. That a man of Anstey’s birth and antecedents, a relative, though a distant one, of his own, could stoop to such a black, pitiful, crawling theft, was revolting beyond words. He now looked upon him with a kind of horror, as upon some loathly and hardly human monster.
“It is just as he says,” he said at last. “I have no receipt, and no witnesses. I suppose I can do nothing.”
“Just try, my hearty—just try; that’s all!” jeered Anstey. “Maritzburg’s busting with law and lawyers. See what you can do. You’re quite welcome.”