“No, and you did not give him 30 pounds for them! Sis, Pa, you must be fair, then, but!”
Chrissie’s eye was sparkling. She could not keep her feet still. She was entranced at the prospect of seeing Carol Uys, who was one of her suitors. He was the least prosperous of them, and her father was always crying out upon him, for a pat-looper because he had to augment his poor income by going about and doing a little cattle dealing, but she liked him better than Piet van der Merwe, or big Farnie Roos. She was not in love with any of them, but she was very much in love with love and life, was Chrissie, and could not help a little bubble of pleasure welling up from her heart and escaping from her lips in a girlish laugh as she turned back into the house. A jolly-out-of-doors, healthy girl, chock-full of animal spirits and laughter and fun. One of the kind that old mother Nature has her eye on for purposes of her own!
It was dark and cool inside the house, for Jackalsfontein, as in all decent Boer farms, had every door and window closed tight at six in the morning and not opened again until six in the evening, this being the Boer method of keeping out the scorching heat of summer. And a very good method too.
In her bedroom, Chrissie proceeded to tidy her crisp blonde hair which was always perfectly tidy, and tie a broad piece of blue ribbon round her neck in such fashion that a fascinating bow was under her hair and the two ends of it stuck out behind each ear making her eyes look so much bluer that they resembled two bits of radiant sky studding her merry face. For some time she meditated over a large silver locket with a flying crane engraved on it, and containing a tin-type photo of her mother. She usually wore this on Sundays, suspended by a black ribbon round her neck, and was aware that it lent great chic to her appearance.
In the end, she decided not to wear it upon this occasion for fear her father should notice and ask her in front of Carol why she had it on. Not for the world would she have had Carol think that she titivated herself for him.
At length, the sound of wheels grating in front of the house made her fly from her glass to the kitchen on the business of preparing coffee for the new-comer. For no matter how unwelcome the caller at a Boer house may be, he is always offered the hospitality of the country—a cup of coffee.
With her own hands, Chrissie set out the bright tin beakers on the table of the Eat-kammer, and piled high a plate of sweet hard rusks. Then opening the front door, she stepped once more into the sunshine.
And, after all, it was not Carol Uys who stood there mopping the beads from his brow with a white handkerchief, and talking to old man Retief. It was a stranger with that red burn on his face and neck which only Britishers seem to achieve in the South African climate, and which long ago won for them the nick-name of “rooi-neks.”
At the sight of him, Chrissie became shy and stood poised on one foot like a bird ready to take wing. It seemed she had arrived at an unpropitious moment. The old man’s eyes were suffused with blood and his fist lay on the table as though he had just banged it down there. His jaw stuck out aggressively. The stranger’s jaw also stuck out, but his hazel eyes had a cool, collected stare in them. This he transferred to Chrissie and removed his hat with the usual Dutch greeting.
“Dag Mevrow.”