Ronald was genuinely distressed and it came to Beryl in the nature of an unpleasant discovery that he was so completely in awe of the financier, that his manner, his attitude, the very tone of his voice, changed at the sight of him. And Steppe seemed to expect this homage, took it as his right, dismissed and obliterated Ronnie from participation with a jerk of his head intended as an acknowledgment of his greeting and as an excusal of his presence.
Beryl could not help realizing his unimportance in the millionaire's scheme of life.
The photographs of Jan Steppe which have from time to time appeared in the public press, at once flatter and disparage him. The lens has depicted faithfully the short black beard, the thick black eyebrows, the broad nose and the thick bull neck of him. They missed his immense vitality, the aura of power which enveloped him, his dominant and forceful ego. His voice was thick and deep, sometimes in a moment of excitement guttural, for his grandfather had been a Transvaal Boer, a byworner who had become, successively, farmer and mine owner. Jan Cornelius Steppe, the first, had spoken no English; his son Commandant Steppe, an enlightened and scholarly man, spoke it well. He had been killed at Tugela Drift in the war, whilst Jan the third was in England at a preparation school.
"Huh! Beryl! Very good luck, huh? I shall miss my train but it is worth while. Riding? God! I wish I wasn't so fat and lazy. Motor cars are the ruin of us. My grandfather rode twenty miles a day and my father was never off a horse. Huh!"
Beryl often asked her father why Mr. Steppe grunted at the end of his every question. But it was not a grunt. It was a throaty growl cut short, a terrifying mannerism of his, meaningless but menacing. She used to wonder whether the impression of ruthless ferocity which he gave, was not more than half due to this peculiarity. He towered above her, a mountain of a man, broad of shoulder and long of arm. There was something simian about him, something that was almost obscene. He was fond of describing himself as fat, but this was an exaggeration. He had bulk, he was in the truest sense gross, but she would not have described him as fat.
"Sit down," he commanded, "I haven't seen you since Friday. The doctor came in yesterday morning. Nerves, huh? What's the matter with him?"
Beryl laughed. "Father receives a great deal of misplaced sympathy. He is really very well. He has been jumpy ever since I can remember."
Steppe nodded. He was sitting by her side in the chair vacated by Ronnie, and Ronnie was standing.
"Sit down, Ronnie," she pointed to a chair at the other side of her.
"No-no thank you, Beryl," he said hastily, for all the world like a schoolboy asked to sit in the presence of his master.