The Rhodesian

by Gertrude Page

And still the girl herself sat on and made no sign. The joy of the evening hour was still too new. Under the stars at present she asked nothing better than to live through it again and again in her memory. For whereas a woman is often fearful to anticipate a joy for dread of a disappointment, afterwards, when the realisation is sure and sweet and all her own, she will draw delight from it for many a silent hour in quiet contentment.

And down at the police camp the two troopers and the officer sat likewise under the stars. Stanley was very full of his trip, for Carew had readily given him the two or three days' leave; and in the direction whither they journeyed were roan and sable and water-buck and probably lions to rejoice the heart of a game young British South African policeman with a bloodthirsty desire to kill. Moore, in his quaint, Irish way, chaffed him a good deal, as was his wont; for though one had received his education at the Bedford Grammar School and was a clergyman's son, and the other at a board-school and was the son of a small innkeeper, in the Rhodesia police force all troopers are equals, and there is a frank camaraderie which is very creditable to its members. Carew himself showed very little difference, and in the same spirit the homely Moore had received a cup of tea from Diana's dainty hands, poured out for him by Meryl.

Only, as they twitted each other in slow, easy tones, neither of them attempted to include Carew, who sat a little apart in the darkness smoking his beloved pipe; and when they rose to turn in, he merely acknowledged their pleasant "Good night, sir," with a short "Good night" in reply, and made no movement himself. Even when the lights at the hill-side tents went out he still sat on, alone with the night and the stars. Later, because he knew he should not sleep, he started off up the valley towards the store, feeling a need for action.

And all the time, under the covering darkness, his face seemed to grow graver and graver. He was too wise not to know when danger threatened, and too direct not to face it squarely at once. And the danger that seemed to threaten him now was the likelihood that if he saw much of Meryl Pym he would grow to love her, and perhaps she would reciprocate his love, and for them both there would be only a great pain. That it could by any possibility be anything else did not enter his cogitations. According to his own ideas he could not marry, and least of all could he marry the only child of a millionaire. And it seemed to him further that if he cut off all intercourse at once the danger would be averted. He was quite satisfied in his own mind that the evident attraction had not had time to sink very far down. In two or three days she would go away again and he would go on with his work, and it would all be the same as if they had never met. Manifestly the chief consideration now was to avoid any further friendliness whatever, except the merest courtesy which had obtained at the beginning. If possible, he decided it would be better not to meet any more at all. When a man is strong in one thing, he is usually strong in others; and the quiet strength that had enabled him to break away from an old life of leisure and ease and excitement, and build up another life for himself on entirely different lines in a new country, helped him now quietly to make his decision and try to take the simple, direct course, out of a threatening danger.

And yet it was not entirely easy; the simple, direct way very seldom is. Byways are apt to have softer grass for the feet, deeper shade from the sun, smoother banks to rest upon. The direct, straightforward way often goes on mercilessly up the steep hill, having sharp flints in its pathway, cold winds, dry dust, untempered glare. But the man who dares it with steady eyes usually arrives first at the goal, tempered metal ringing true, while he who dallies in the pleasant byways may find his armour has grown rusty and his powers lax.

As he walked quietly back to the police camp Peter Carew looked straight before him to the dim horizon, and in his eyes there was an expression that few, if any, had ever been permitted to behold. For the hidden sorrow that was his was his alone, and he had never sought nor asked the sympathy of a fellow-creature. In the starlight he looked back into the eyes of his dead love, and it was between him and her only the sorrow might be shared. As he had loved her memory all these years, he would love her still, though in the great loneliness of his heart he might be drawn to that one other woman who so strangely resembled her and so deeply attracted him.

But Meryl was not for him, the penniless policeman, and he knew it.

The hour spent together in the temple ruins had been too sweet, too dangerously sweet, and therefore he would run no further risk. He would not go with Mr. Pym, because that might forge a link of friendship it would be difficult to break; and he would not remain at the camp, because that might involve considerable intercourse if Meryl and Diana stayed behind at the hill-side home alone. He would instead retire to Segundi on the pretext of meeting the Resident Commissioner expected there, and stay until the millionaire's party had departed from Zimbabwe for good. It would be as well to start early, he could easily manage it; and if he saw no prospect of saying good-bye to Mr. Pym in person, he would write him a short note giving some sort of explanation.

So it happened the next morning, before anyone at the hill-side camp was dressed, a Black Watch boy presented a note to Mr. Pym's boy, and a little distance off on the road Major Carew waited on his horse for a message.

And in his tent, still in a sleeping-suit, Mr. Pym read the note, and looked hard for a moment at the sunshine beyond the open flap, as if seeking out there to read, not what was said in the little letter, but what was not said.