"Hotel be blowed, Stara, what, a guest of mine put up at that Duikerpoort drinking shanty. Thank'ye no, I don't do that sort of thing. Now be off. Here's your pony, and tell Graeme from me he's very welcome; don't forget," and Richard rather huffily pushed aside the cane blinds and disappeared into the house.
Stara mounted and rode slowly away, the old antagonists watching each other once more across the battlefield of her mind—loyalty and straight-dealing on the one side, and love on the other. Of struggle between them, however, there was now none, for the question had been fought out three weeks before, on that day when the single word "Coming" had been flashed to her across six thousand miles of sea. Then indeed the battle had been fierce but final, for Stara, unlike most women, did not, her antagonist once down, lift him up again for the pleasure of renewing the combat with the consequent certainty of ultimate defeat.
Slower than Hector in decision, for to her the throwing overboard of honour and loyalty was a heart-wrenching pang, she nevertheless, in this instance, showed herself stronger than he, and the giving up of all once determined on, the sacrifice would be made freely and unreservedly. And so honour and loyalty were crushed down, and love remained alone on the field. Her mouth hardened, she thrust aside the thought of what lay behind, and, striking her pony with her spurred heel, hurried on to the destiny rushing to meet her.
For miles she rode without drawing rein, her mount lolloping easily on, as if impervious to heat or fatigue, till at length, some eight miles having been covered, she pulled up, and, dismounting, loosened the girths and led the pony away from the track to a small rise a few hundred yards away. Here she left him, the reins trailing loosely on the ground—Basuto-bred, he would stay there, she knew, for hours—and, throwing herself down on the grass, lay there, with her eyes fixed on the road ahead, a white thread seaming the yellow plain, till, topping a distant rise, it became lost to view.
Far below her, stretching across the track, a great herd of blesbok were moving restlessly, their forms looking vague and unreal through the gauzy veil of heat. Save for them and a wide-winged lammergeier hanging motionless in the blue vault above, sign of life there was none—veldt, kopje, and mountain slumbered undisturbed.
Suddenly Stara's body stiffened, her half-closed eyes opened wide, and a look almost of terror came into them, for the peace was broken at last, and the blesbok below, like her, were startled. Their aimless wanderings ceased, the outlying groups drew in, till the herd became one solid mass, and their heads were turned away from her towards the rise, beyond which the road dipped and was lost to sight.
Something had frightened them, but what? Then Stara's eyes grew wild as she, too, saw what that something was—a small cloud of dust topping the hill, and then rapidly descending into the plain below her. For a while the herd stood staring, and then began to move away, at a walk first, then at a trot, and finally in a headlong gallop, bounding over the grass for some miles, when they stopped, wheeled sharply about and again stood staring.
The cloud of dust drew nearer, taking shape as it came, till a Cape cart drawn by mules could be plainly seen. In the cart there were two figures—one in black, with a conical hat, sitting bolt upright and brandishing a whip; the other seemed strangely misty and indistinct to Stara.
She rose, turned her eyes towards the browsing pony, and moved away; then stopped, with her mouth firm-set, and sat down once more.
"What a woman I am, after all," she muttered, "flight, hide for him to pursue and find; we're all the same, pretend as we like. Heavens, how fast that cart's coming, what does Jacob mean by driving the mules like that? Ah! they've seen me; there's the boy pointing with his whip, they're stopping, and it's come at last. Oh, I daren't look at him, I know he'll show elation, and I shall hate him."