The suggestion, as you must agree, quite justified Katje's moving closer to me.
"It was like this," resumed the Vrouw Grobelaar, after an expressionless glance at the two of us. "Christina was a wild fanciful girl, with an eye to every stranger that off- saddled at the farm, Katje; and she had barely a civil word to waste on a bashful Burgher. I can't say I ever saw much in her myself. She was a tall young woman, with a face that drew the eye, as it were; but she was restless and unquiet in her motions, and, to my mind, too thin and leggy. But men have no taste in these things; and if Christina had been of a decent turn, she might have had her pick of all the unmarried men within a day's ride, and there used to be some very good men about here.
"But, as I said, she kept them all on the far side of the fence, and for a long time their only comfort was in seeing no one else take her. Till one day a surprising thing happened.
"A tall smart man rode into the farm one afternoon and hung up his horse on the rail. He swaggered with his great clumping feet right into the house, and went from one room to another till he found the old father.
"'Are you Mynheer van der Poel?' he asked him in a loud voice, standing in the middle of the chamber with his hat on his head and his sjambok in his hand.
"'I am,' answered the other.
"'I am John Dunn,' said the stranger. 'I have a store at Bothaskraal, and I am come to ask for your daughter to wife.'
"'An Englishman?' asked the old man.
"'To be sure,' said the stranger.
"'But where have you seen the girl?' asked Mynheer van der
Poel.