Ned laughed, and told his message, which the other listened to with sparkling eyes.
“We have been ready and waiting for this message for months past. So Kruger is going to make the grand move at last? He will get a mighty surprise, instead of giving us one, as he intends.”
He rubbed his hands gleefully.
“I for one am heart-sick of all this long suspense and inaction. I shall welcome the hour with the greatest delight. Only there will be some bloodletting before the affair is settled.”
“I don’t mind that,” answered Ned. “Before I arrived in Johannesburg I did not know what hatred or revenge meant. It was Kruger and his Boers who planted these passions in my heart on my first visit. During my absence the plants did not thrive much. Now that I have returned, however, the Transvaal air seems to have revived them suddenly.”
“Yes,” said Philip Martin. “Hatred, envy, deceit, revenge, greed, and gracelessness are plants that grow well and quickly in the South African Republican garden. They are fine Dutch bulbs, and take kindly to the Transvaal air. Since you have given me the news of this crowning scheme of perfidy on the part of the crafty and senseless tyrant Kruger, I also feel as if I don’t mind shedding some gore if I can only help to put him in his proper place—the felon’s cell. Lately he has been playing one of his favourite games with us, which to those in the ‘know’ means ‘spoof’ eventually. He has been acting the part of ‘Codlin’ as the only real friend of the Uitlander—the kindly old humourist of Pretoria, the simple-minded farmer chief.”
“Yes; he tried to make traitors and spies of us in that way,” remarked Ned.
“Just so. He has been talking about conciliation and the blessedness of unity amongst brethren. Every Sunday of late he has occupied the Dopper pulpit, and his orations have been noted for their breadth and mildness. The police wink at small offenders where before they pounced upon them rigidly. A general tide of indulgence and generosity appears to be setting in towards us in every direction. There are rumours that the franchise and full burgher rights will be proclaimed on the tenth. This the Volksraad have already formally passed, with certain conditions which are to be told us by the president himself on that momentous day.”
“Yes,” replied Ned, grimly; “the conditions you might have suspected all along, knowing Kruger’s tactics of old. He seems to be an animal of instinct and habit. Like the dog, he always turns round the regulation number of times. He never varies in his movements, and never changes.”
“You are right, Romer; he does not. He will humour us up to the last moment, and then give us our option—to become traitor burghers and rebels to our queen, or else be shot down ruthlessly. There will be no mistake about the shooting if we decline, therefore we must take time by the forelock, and anticipate the kindly intentions of Oom Paul. What are you going to do meanwhile?”