“Well, look at what?”
“Can’t you see that red patch on the rise there?”
“What, those water-worn dongas?”
“Not dongas—cattle tracks. They are from the drinking-place. That must be the White Rock up there, and I expect the house must be behind the clump of trees.”
They walked on until the trees were reached and they could see the small rough stone house through a thinner portion of the Bush, and there they waited awhile to take counsel. It was finally decided that they should all go up together, but they looked to the one who seemed to be their leader to act as spokesman.
“If he’s a white man at all,” remarked he in front, “he won’t refuse us grub, anyhow; but that’s just it. They say he’s no more white than old Bandine, that he hates the sight of white men, and keeps as far from them as he can. He’s been so long among the darned niggers that he’s just one of them himself.”
They passed along the path to the house, and six of the party waited below while the leader mounted the steps of the mud stoep.
A tall man with a long brown beard stepped out of an open doorway and met him.
The whole party offered “good-evening” with more or less empressement, and certainly with a greater show of politeness than was customary with them; but the man only slid his hands easily into the pockets of a light duck-coat, and looked with critical and not too friendly glance at the leader, ignoring the others.
“We’re out prospectin’ about here,” began the leader, “and we thought we’d just come along and look you up.”