“That depends on yourself,” she answered. “All this,” and she indicated the wide and arid landscape, which, with the night dews still lingering on its gaping surfaces and sapless vegetation, sparkled in the early sunshine with a glitter as of silver and gems, “appeals to people differently. Some see in it beauty, and others only barrenness—but always it is impressive. It hurts or it pleases, according to the mood.”
“But you believe I shall see its beauty,” he said quietly.
“Yes,” she answered; “I believe that—otherwise, I would not have suggested your coming.”
They rode in silence for a while. Momentarily the sun gained power; the freshness of the early day yielded to its burning ardour, was caught up and enveloped in its heated embrace; the dew on the scant vegetation sparkled a moment and the next was absorbed; and the hot yellow stones basking in its rays revealed unexpected streaks of colour and fanciful patterns and quaint veinings, as they caught the refracted rays, and transmitted them, and gave back some of their assimilated heat into the shimmering air.
The soil became more sandy the farther they rode, and more arid; wide bare patches of sand appeared, and again other patches sparsely covered with dry brown scrub. An occasional ostrich, suggestive of farms in the neighbourhood, wandered over the sunbaked ground, and pecked at the little stones. Here was Africa—the real Africa—untamed, barbaric, fiercely splendid, and cruel in its callous disregard of life.
Matheson’s gaze travelled over the scene, travelled to the distant hills, and rested there. A dark shadow like a black stain lay upon the hillside, the curious effect of some unseen cloud. In his imagination it seemed a significant, even a sinister, shadow. He watched it for a time, but it moved so slowly that it did not appear to move at all, but to be in reality a black stain on the face of the land. He removed his gaze, and when later he looked again the shadow had passed.
“This is the real thing,” he said—“the key to Africa. The Karroo is the small sister of the Sahara.”
Suddenly, moved by some unaccountable emotion, he turned towards her swiftly.
“How can you endure living here?” he asked. “The loneliness... Heavens! the loneliness... It suggests a world in the making. The beauty! ... Yes, I acknowledge the beauty, the terrible beauty of it. But—how often do you see a human face besides your own?”
She broke into a quiet laugh.