Meanwhile Stephen turned for his dog, surprised that the animal, usually so fierce and impetuous, had not led the chase. To his utter astonishment, “Tao” was close at his heels, his tail between his legs, his hackles up, and with every symptom of terror upon him. The thing was incomprehensible; the dog had never feared man or beast in his life before, and many a time and oft had faced, as they turned at bay, the fierce and snarling lion, the dangerous sable antelope with his scimitar-like horns, and the wounded and screaming elephant. At length, turning back, they entered the stable; to their surprise the door was locked, and on being opened the horses as usual were loose and in the last extremity of fright. Nothing more could be done that night. In the morning the Kaffirs and Hottentots searched everywhere for spoor, but could find no trace of the midnight marauder. Cupido, indeed, shook his head, rolled his bloodshot-looking eyes, and appeared to take the occurrence as a matter of course.
Three mornings afterwards the two Kaffirs came to Stephen, declared that they had seen on the previous night the same dark figure just outside their sleeping shed; that the terrible expression on the face of this apparition, which they saw distinctly in the moonlight, had made them utterly sick and terror-stricken; that the thing was a thing of witchcraft, and that nothing would induce them to stay another night on the farm.
“We like the N’kose (chief or master) well,” they said, “but we dare not stay in this country or we shall be slain by the witchcraft we see around us; why do you not get a ‘smeller out’ to cleanse this place from the evil?” The two men, who, in daylight, were, as most Kaffirs are, bold, hardy fellows, were evidently in earnest in what they said, and though Goodrick, who could ill afford to part with them at a moment’s notice, offered them increased wages, they steadfastly declined. At length finding he could not shake their resolution, he reluctantly paid them their money and let them go. Goodrick learned some months afterwards from a friend, that these men had marched straight for the boundary of the Colony, crossed the Kei, and rejoined their own tribe, the Gaikas, in Kaffraria.
Goodrick now began to think somewhat seriously of the matter, and to ask himself with inward misgivings what it all meant. Brave man though he was, like most mortals he was not quite proof against superstition, and he began to find himself half fearing that there was something not quite canny about the place. How else could he account for the locked door, the suddenly vanishing figure, the sickening yell, and the lack of footmarks? However, he kept his thoughts from his wife, and made some excuse about a quarrel with the Kaffirs as to wages, to explain their sudden departure. She, although accepting the explanation, seemed uneasy, and at last burst out, “Oh, Stephen, I think there is something wrong about this kloof—some dreadful mystery we know nothing of. Have you ever noticed that even the Kaffirs in the kraal a few miles beyond the poort never enter here? Not a soul amongst the farmers comes near us, and as for ‘Tao’ he never seems happy now and is always restless, suspicious and alarmed.”
That same night the wild, unearthly scream rose again; the same tumult was heard in the stable; Stephen rushed out, and once again, under the clear moonlight, he saw the figure passing in front of him. This time he had his rifle loaded, and after calling once, fired. Still the figure retreated; another shot was fired, but to no purpose; the figure apparently glided imperceptibly onwards, and then suddenly disappeared, as it seemed, sheer into the earth. Goodrick knew so well his powers with the rifle, with which he was famous as a deadly shot, that he could not bring himself to believe he had missed twice within fifty yards. From this incident he could form no other conclusion, and he shivered as he thought so, than that the night disturber was not of human mould.
Meanwhile the horses were becoming worn to shadows, their coats stared, they lost flesh and looked altogether miserable. Fresh horses had been brought in, but the effect was ever the same. Shortly after, two of the Swellendam Hottentots left, and the other two, with Cupido and Mrs Goodrick’s servant, alone remained. Goodrick was now in great straits; he could not immediately procure other native servants, and only managed to get through his farm work with the greatest trouble and exertion.
Things drifted on uncomfortably for another week or two, and each day as it came and went, seemed to Goodrick and his wife to increase the gloom and uncertainty of their life in the kloof. At length a climax arrived. Christmas, but a sombre one, had sped, and South African summer, with its heat, its flies, and other manifold troubles, was now at its height.
On the 15th of January, 1861, a day of intense heat was experienced. All day the landscape had sweltered under a still oppression that was almost unbearable, and the very animals about the farm seemed touched and depressed by some mysterious influence.
Towards nightfall dark clouds gathered together suddenly in dense masses; in the distance, long, rolling thunder-peals were heard approaching in strangely slow, yet none the less certain movement. Cupido, the old Hottentot, had fidgetted about the house a good deal all the evening, and finally, just before ten o’clock, he asked his master if he might for that night sleep on the floor of the kitchen, in order, as he put it, to attend more quickly to the horses if anything scared them. Goodrick noticed that the old man looked agitated, and good-naturedly said “Yes.”
Still slowly onward marched the stormy batteries of the sky, until at eleven o’clock they burst overhead with a terrific crash (preceded by such lightning as only Africa can show) that literally seemed to tear and rend each nook and corner of the gorge, reverberating with deafening repetition from every krantz and hollow and rocky inequality in the rude landscape. Rain fell in torrents for a time, then ceased. Again and again the thunder broke overhead, while the lightning played with fiery tongue upon mountain and valley, showing momentarily, with photographic clearness, every object around. Sleep on such a night was out of the question, and Goodrick and his wife sat together listening with solemn faces to the hideous tumult. At length, at about twelve o’clock, the storm for a brief space rolled away, only to return in half an hour with increased severity.