His room was over the stoep, but at some distance from the front door, and for a while he heard nothing. Then, as his ears became attuned to the night's acoustics, he was aware that somewhere there were voices, the blurred and indistinguishable murmur of people talking. They were hardly audible at all; not a word transpired; he knew scarcely more than that the stillness of the night was infringed. His curiosity quickened, and to feed it there sounded the step of a booted foot that fell with a metallic clink, the unmistakable ring of a spur. Ford sat upright.
A couple of moments later, some one spoke distinctly.
"Keep those hands up," Ford heard, in a quick nasal tone; "or I 'll blow your head off."
Ford thrust the bedclothes from his knees and got out of bed. He lifted the lower edge of the blind and leaned forth from the open window. Below him the stone stoep ran to right and left like a gray path, and a little way along it the light in the hall, issuing from the open door, cut across it and showed the head of the wide steps. Beyond the light, a group of dark figures were engaged with something. As he looked, the group began to move, and he saw that Mrs. Jakes came to the side of the door and stood back to give passage to four shuffling Kafirs bearing the stretcher which was part of the house's equipment. There was somebody on the stretcher, as might have been seen from the laborious gait of the bearers, but the thing had a hood that withheld the face of the occupant as they passed in, with Mrs. Jakes at their heels.
Two other figures brought up the rear and likewise entered at the doorway and passed from sight. The first, as he became visible in the gloom beyond the light, was dimly grotesque; he seemed too tall and not humanly proportioned, a deformed and willowy giant. Once he was opposite the door, his height explained itself; he was walking with both arms extended to their full length above his head and his face bowed between them. Possibly because the attitude strained him, he went with a gait as marked as his posture, a measured and ceremonial step as though he were walking a slow minuet. The light met him as he turned in the doorway and Ford, staring in bewilderment, had a momentary impression that the face between the raised arms was black. He disappeared, with the last of the figures close behind him, and concerning this one there was no doubt whatever. It revealed itself as a trooper of the Mounted Police, belted and spurred, his "smasher" hat tilted forward over his brows, and a revolver held ready in his hand, covering the back of the man who walked before him.
"Here," ejaculated Ford, gazing at the empty stoep where the shadow-show had been, with an accent of dismay in his thoughts. The affair of Margaret and the Kafir leaped to his mind; all that had occurred below might be a new and poignant development in that bitter comedy, and but for a chance he might have missed it all.
He was quick to make a light and find his dressing-gown and a pair of slippers, and he was knotting the cord of the former as he passed out to the long corridor and went swiftly to the head of the stairs, where the lamp that should light Dr. Jakes to his bed was yet burning patiently.
The stretcher was already coming up the staircase and he paused and stood aside to make room for it. The four Kafirs were bringing it up head first, treading carefully and breathing harshly after the manner of the Kafir when he is conscious of eyes upon him. Behind them followed Mrs. Jakes, shepherding them up with hushing noises. A gray blanket covered the form in the stretcher with limp folds.
The Kafirs saw Ford first and acknowledged his presence with simultaneous grins. Then Mrs. Jakes saw him and made a noise like a startled moan, staring up with vexed, round eyes.
"Oh, Mr. Ford," she exclaimed faintly. "Please go back to bed. It 's—it 's three o'clock in the morning."