“About thirty miles yet.”
Carden looked at the man in the cart.
“Feel inclined to tramp it, Talfourd?”
“Oh, Lord!” groaned Talfourd. “Do you?”
“Not much!” said Carden smiling. “We’ll camp. After all we’ve got the buck.” He gave a glance to the back of the cart where a beautiful little net buck still warm, but with the glaze of death over its eyes was suspended. Then his keen eye travelled swiftly over the surrounding country. The dust was subsiding, and it could be seen that they were in a wild place of lonely kopjes and immense patches of grey-green bush. Far off, taller, greener trees growing thick and close as moss outlined the banks of the Crocodile River. Across the midst of the scene, round kops and through bush, curved and curled the dusty white road that led to Tuli, and thence upwards and onwards through Mashonaland and Matabeleland to the North.
Swartz had begun to outspan the horses, knee-haltering each so that they would not roam too far.
“They’ll be safer than they would have been fifteen or twenty years ago,” he announced. “It was somewhere about here, on the banks of the river that Baas Kavanagh, the great hunter, was killed by a lion.”
“By George!” said Carden softly under his breath, and his blue eyes took on a misty look that softened them curiously. He was thinking of Francis Kavanagh, the big, lawless, lovable Irishman who hailed from his own part of Ireland—County Carlow, and had all the magic of the west in his voice and eyes. Kavanagh had been the hero of Carden’s boyhood dreams, the man who first inspired him with a love and longing for Africa. His thoughts went back in a straight line to the day when, as a college boy, he had last shaken the hand of the Explorer, famous even at thirty for his travels and exploits. He had told Kavanagh of his intention to come to Africa as soon as college days were over, and the hunter had warmly urged him to come as soon as possible to join a projected Expedition into a part of Africa that had not been penetrated. Carden had indeed left Ireland within two years of that time, but by then Kavanagh had died accidentally and mysteriously as men do die on the veld, with nothing but native rumour to tell of the manner of his death; and Carden with no friend to join, and too poor to fit out waggons for the hunting, adventurous life that lured him, was obliged to make for the comparatively civilised places where money was to be made. Destiny led him to the Diamond Fields, where, gradually absorbed by an unexpected gift in himself for finance, and fascinated by the life of danger and excitement, he had been caught in the big money-making whirlpool, and had stayed. Then when the current set for the Transvaal where the Game was even keener, and the life wilder, with gold for stakes instead of diamonds, he had gone with it, and continued to play the great Game for all he was worth. But always, always he meant to leave it some day, and go where his dreams called him, to the wild, strange spots and lonely places of Africa—sometimes he seemed to hear them calling in the night with a voice that was like a woman’s voice. But in the morning he had gone back to the Game, the money-game, which is one of the most fascinating in the world, and was in those early Rand days full of “battle, murder, and sudden death.” If he had missed hunting lions he had closed with many a human tiger, as his scars, hard eyes, and grim mouth testified. Though usually the top tiger, he had sometimes been brought down himself. Twice he had made and lost enormous fortunes; and now, only moderately rich, but on the eve of a great financial coup that if properly brought off would make him a millionaire, he had suddenly thrown down the Game, and leaving the haunts of money set out for the wilds. He had listened to the voice of his dream at last, and more than ever it had sounded like the voice of a woman; only sweeter than any woman’s voice he had ever heard. In haste, yet with the steady purpose of one who carries out a long-formed plan, he had fitted up his waggons, sent them on to Tuli, and was now on his way to join them and three friends there. His intention was to be away for a year and a half at least, and perhaps longer.
And the end of his second day’s travelling had brought him thus unexpectedly to the place where Francis Kavanagh had died! Ah, well! God rest him for a fine Irishman, a lawless lover, a true friend, and a brave man! The mist cleared from Carden’s eyes and his usual unfeeling, not to say stony, expression returned. He cast another alert look over the country, and instantly espied at some distance a broken-down cattle kraal, and near by it the stooping figure of a Kaffir gathering mis. In a straight line from there, pitched on the side of a kopje, and by reason of its colouring hardly distinguishable from the bush about it was a grey stone house; a light spot in front of it might have been the flicker of a woman’s dress. There was also the gleam of a fire.
“That’s a farm, Swartz. Whose place can it be?”