The city had been more than usually in a ferment during the past week. It had been the election week, and although none of the Johannesburghers had much hope of a change, yet until the affair was decided, there had been a good deal of wordy speculation.
However, as even the most credulous feared, Oom Paul Kruger had once more managed to keep his chair, thanks to his simple and direct management. While he was travelling the country canvassing for votes, the old hypocrite played with his people, as the man who wants to buy an annuity plays with the insurance company. He did the sick and feeble old man who had only a few months more to live, and appealed to the sympathy of those who were tired of him as a master. He played this rôle so perfectly as to deceive even his own intimates. As for the Uitlanders, he humbugged them so completely that they became jubilant about the nearness of their emancipation. Even for a little while the news of his return did not depress them overmuch. This they considered to be a dead certainty, with the ballot boxes in the hands of his supporters.
A rumour had somehow spread, on the day after the announcement of the result, that he was dead. For one whole hour Johannesburg lost its head, and became intoxicated with joy. Shareholders bounced inside the chain, while some were even mad enough to wire the happy event to London, where for another hour on the Stock Exchange Paul Kruger gained more popularity than he had ever gained in his life.
But, alas! they were not long left to this most unseemly joy. Hardly had they wiped their mouths after drinking to his safe translation to another sphere than the Grand Old Man of Pretoria showed them how dead he was.
He enjoyed giving them surprises, and the one he sprang on them now was the summary dismissal of Chief Justice Kotze, the only Dutchman who was above bribery or coercion.
Now, indeed, he was beginning his fresh tenure without any pretence of wearing gloves. Whoever dared to oppose his autocratic tyranny, and stand up for any other laws than those which his will dictated, was to be swept out of the way. At this act of tyranny, worse than any that the Stuarts ever perpetrated, even Philip Martin looked anxious.
“It is the beginning of the end,” he said. “Cecil Rhodes’s last message was for us to hold on and lie low. How much longer will we be allowed to do this?”
Kotze protested against this unlawful outrage, and refused to accept his dismissal. But he gained no more by that than the Uitlanders had done.
The inhabitants of Johannesburg were struck dumb when they heard of this scandal, coupled with the tidings that the president’s late illness had been all shammed. Even the Boers themselves were staggered, as this touched their rights as much as it demolished all safety for the Uitlanders. Throughout Africa a wave of expectant horror passed. What would this hoary tyrant not do next, now that he had demolished the law? He was supreme. Anarchy and massacre would possibly be the next order of the day.
Once again, as in the time of the Jameson Raid, men began to send away their wives and children, and prepare themselves for the inevitable.