By Veldt and Kopje

by W. C. Scully

Next morning Nomandewu again returned to the forest, and once more the Kaffir lad followed her. As he drew near the spot where the tree had been felled the sound of the steady, rhythmic falling of the axe smote anew upon his ear. Stealing into his hiding-place of the previous day, Dumani resumed his observations. He found that the branches had all been chopped off just above where they spread out from the top of the clean bole, and that the bole itself was being cut through about three feet below the axis from which the branches spread. After she had severed the trunk Nomandewu lifted the upper portion into a perpendicular position, propped it to prevent it falling, and regarded it intently. Dumani was at once struck by the resemblance it bore to the rustic seat at the homestead. Mindful of a thrashing he had received on the previous day, on account of his cattle having strayed, he hurried away, leaving Nomandewu absorbed in the contemplation of her handiwork.

A few days subsequently Nomandewu surprised everybody by appearing at the homestead and asking to be re-employed. Mrs Westbrook, much relieved, reinstated her at once as cook. Nomandewu had always been taciturn: now she developed an unsuspected vein of friendliness. She had always been an excellent servant: now she performed her duties with increased skill and diligence. Her mistress, although still bitterly grieved at what had taken place, congratulated herself upon the unfortunate incident being, as she imagined, finally closed. She treated Nomandewu with great consideration and, this among other tokens of favour, presented her with a black dress. Nomandewu, who had lived at a Mission Station, understood the significance of this gift and appeared to be appropriately grateful.

Dumani continually puzzled his brain over the scenes he had witnessed in the forest, and still kept up his scrutiny. He knew that Nomandewu had not again gone to the spot where she had felled the tree, so for some time he did not think it worth his while to revisit it either. She seemed to be uneasy in his presence. Often when he appeared in the kitchen she would drive him forth with scoldings; on other occasions she would treat him with friendliness and share with him choice portions of her food. But Dumani’s alert instincts detected a certain spuriousness in these demonstrations.

About ten days after Nomandewu returned to her service, Dumani, impelled by the cravings of his absorbing curiosity, went again to the scene of his espionage in the forest. He found, to his further mystification, that the portion of the tree which resembled a rustic seat had been removed. After diligent search he managed to discover a trail leading up towards the horse-shoe cliff, which was nearly half a mile away from the spot. Weighted by the heavy log the woman’s footsteps had here and there sunk deeply into the soil. He followed the trail until he reached a moraine which was piled against the base of the precipice. In the interstices of this stunted trees grew, and just where it touched the cliff the latter was pierced by a small cavern. Dumani, no longer attempting to trace the footsteps, climbed over the rugged jumble of rocks and made straight for the cavern. In it he found the missing log. A hole had been sunk in the clay floor, and in this the shaft had been firmly fixed. A rustic seat, bearing a most remarkable resemblance to the one at the homestead, had thus been formed.

After one glance over the interior of the cave, Dumani hurried away. The significance of his discovery flashed upon him: the chair could only be meant for Lucy; to this lonely spot the weird woman meant to bring her, and, as Dumani was firmly convinced, to bring her alive. This, then, was to be the scene of Nomandewu’s revenge; to this dark corner of the silent forest was little Lucy to be brought, here to expiate in some dreadful fashion the mischance of her playmate’s death.

The discovery came as a great relief to the overwrought mind of the Kaffir lad. He now had something definite to go upon; it was no longer a case of mere blind groping for hidden motives. The issue was clear: he and Nomandewu had to grip together in a life-and-death struggle, Lucy’s preservation being the reward of his victory, her destruction the penalty of his defeat. Nevertheless, in his unaccountable, savage way, Dumani kept his own counsel—never bethinking him that a word he could so easily speak would remove the terrible danger hanging over the head—to save a single hair of which he would unhesitatingly have died.

Everyone outside the sphere of his strategy became unreal to the absorbed mind of the Kaffir lad, whose faculties, in his intense abstraction, became preternaturally keen. He felt that up to a certain point he could interpret the workings of Nomandewu’s mind as clearly as though she spake aloud her every thought in his hearing. He now knew, with absolute certainty, that she was only waiting for the first favourable opportunity to carry out her design, whatever it might be, against little Lucy, and that such an opportunity could only be occasioned by his absence.

The opportunity soon came. One evening Dumani received an order to start next morning, with some cattle which had been sold, for a farm situated a long day’s journey away. He left before daylight; at breakfast-time both Lucy and Nomandewu were found to be missing.

Early rising was the habit of all at the farm. Lucy had last been seen, shortly after sunrise, in the orchard. This extended from near the house to within a few yards of the narrow strip of bush fringing the stream at the bottom of the valley, and which wound continuously with the course of the stream and connected the various patches of forest with which the valley was so richly furnished.

No rain had fallen for some time past, so at first no spoor could be found. Every soul on the farm turned out and joined in the search. In the course of the day help came from the surrounding farms. Old Gezwindt, a Hottentot celebrated all over the countryside for his skill as a spoor-tracker, was sent for. It was not long before he discovered a fresh barefoot trail leading down the stream, and consequently in a direction opposite to that of the forest at the foot of the horse-shoe cliff. The trail led straight towards another forest, known to be very rough and impenetrable, which lay about two miles from the homestead. The footprints ceased at a ridge of rocks about half a mile from where the first trace had been found. Nevertheless, the indication was sufficient to turn the attention of the searchers wholly to the lower forest.