The Curse of Carne's Hold: A Tale of Adventure

by G. A. Henty

He groaned at his helplessness to aid her, and had he not had a perfect faith in the cunning of his companions, and in their ability to follow her up wherever she was taken, he would have been inclined to take the mad step of charging right in among the Kaffirs, upon the one chance of snatching her up and carrying her off from among them.

Roland Mervyn, of the Cape Rifles, was a very different man from Captain Mervyn, of the Borderers. The terrible event that had caused him to throw up his commission and leave the country had in other respects been of great advantage. He had for years been haunted by the fear of madness, and whenever he felt low and out of spirits this fear of insanity had almost overpowered him. The trial had cured him of this; he had convinced himself that had he inherited the slightest taint of the curse of the Carnes, he would have gone mad while he was awaiting his trial; that he had kept his head perfect under such circumstances seemed to him an absolute proof that he was as sane as other men, and henceforth he banished the fear that had so long haunted him.

It was in truth that fear which had held him back so long from entering into a formal engagement with his cousin Margaret. He looked upon it as an absolutely settled thing that they would be married some day, but had almost unconsciously shrunk from making that day a definite one; and although for the moment he had burst into a fit of wild anger at being as he considered thrown aside, he had since acknowledged to himself that Margaret's decision had been a wise one, and that it was better that they two should not have wedded.

He had always been blessed with good spirits, except at the times when the fit of depression seized him; but since he had been at the Cape, and been on active duty, these had entirely passed away, and his unvarying good temper under all circumstances had often been the subject of remark among his comrades.

As he rode along that night he acknowledged, what he had never before admitted to himself, that he loved Mary Armstrong. The admission was a bitter rather than a pleasant one.

"I shall never marry now," he had said to his mother, at his last interview with her. "No wife or child of mine shall ever hear it whispered that her husband or father was a murderer. Unless this cloud is some day lifted—and how it can be, Heaven only knows—I must go through the world alone," and so he thought still. It might be that as Harry Blunt he might settle down in the Colony and never be recognised; but he would always have the fear that at any moment some officer he had known, some man of his regiment, some emigrant from his own county, might recognise him, and that the news would be passed round that Harry Blunt was the Captain Mervyn who escaped, only from want of legal proof, from being hung as the murderer of his cousin.

"I didn't think I was such a fool," he muttered to himself, "as to be caught by a pretty face. However, it will make no difference. She will never know it. If her father recovers, which is doubtful, she will go back with him to the old country. If not, she will go back alone, for without friends or relatives she cannot stay here, and she will never dream that the sergeant of the Cape Rifles, who had the luck twice to save her life—that is, if I do save it—was fool enough to fall in love with her."

An hour before morning one of the Fingoes came back from the front with the news that the Kaffirs had turned off into a kloof, and were going to halt there. The party soon collected, and retired to a clump of trees a mile back. One of them was ordered to act as sentry near the kloof, and bring back word at once should any movement take place. The rest of the party, upon reaching the shelter of the trees, threw themselves upon the ground, and were soon fast asleep; even Ronald, anxious as he was, remaining awake but a few minutes after the others.

The sun was high before they awoke. As they were eating their breakfast the sentry returned, and another was despatched to take his place. The man reported that he had seen nothing of the main body of Kaffirs, but that four of them were placed on the watch near the kloof. Kreta led Ronald to the edge of the wood, and pointing to a jagged range of hills in the distance said, "Amatolas."

"How far are they away, Kreta?"