On the Heels of De Wet

by Lionel James

A NEW CAST.

For the moment the Intelligence officer could ill disguise his astonishment. Here, standing in front of him, was the girl who had taught him his first lesson in staff jurisprudence. The memory of the incidents at the farmhouse, her petulance with the Tiger, her tears for her lover, had been almost effaced by the vicissitudes of the last forty-eight hours. If he had ever thought of the girl at all, it had been in the same spirit as a mariner recalls a passing ship, whose shapely lines were barely distinguishable in the night. His surprise was such that he could only marvel that while, travel-stained and dishevelled, he had arrived at Britstown with an effort, she had already reached that goal, and, to judge from the studied neatness of her attire, had reached it with consummate ease. Her smile and attitude as she held out her hand to her visitor expressed satisfaction at the meeting—a satisfaction tempered with a determination to show a front which should declare a full measure of resistance. Taking advantage of his officer's surprise, the Tiger discreetly withdrew.

Intelligence Officer. "Miss Pretorius,—how did you get here?"

Miss Pretorius. "Quite simply. Partly on horseback, partly in a Cape cart."

I. O. (recovering somewhat) "Naturally; I did not anticipate that you had walked. But with what object?"

Miss P. (the corners of her pretty mouth sinking in defiance) "I might easily have walked, and arrived before a British column. As to my object in coming here, surely your Africander spy has informed you?"

I. O. "If you mean the Tiger, he has told me nothing!"

Miss P. "And may I also ask something,—What authority have you to put me such a question? At the institution which prided itself in teaching me—an Africander girl—the manners and customs of the English, they were emphatic upon the impertinence of asking personal questions."

I. O. "I must apologise, Miss Pretorius. But the circumstances are hardly normal. We cannot get away from the fact that we are influenced against our better natures by an unfortunate state of war."

Miss P. (petulantly) "Oh, the war! That is just like you Englishmen—you paragons of manly virtue—you make the war a cloak for all your sins. It is such an upright war, therefore in its furtherance you can do no wrong—cannot even be unmannerly. It is this that has made you so beloved in the Republics; but how does your attitude hold good with me? I am a loyal British subject, living at peace with all men in a British colony. What right, therefore, have you to catechise me as to my goings and comings? I do not even live within the legitimate area of your so-called just war. I am only exposed to its rigours—that is, as far as the insolence of those who should be our defenders affects us women—because you English, in spite of your vaunted power and military magnitude, cannot defend us, your Africander dependants, from a few simple farmers. Where is your manhood, where the courtly bearing of the Englishman, of which I have heard so much—and seen so little?"