The White Hecatomb, and Other Stories

by W. C. Scully

The cab was close to the rail-track, and as Brand stood looking at the girl he heard the warning whistle of a dock-engine which was rapidly approaching. The startled horse moved a few paces forward and again stood, this time right on the rail-track. Nothing could now save the cab, but Brand sprang forward, lifted the girl in his arms, and sprang with her out of danger just an instant before the vehicle and the hapless horse were crushed into a mass of hopeless ruin.

The girl was, of course, terribly frightened, and she clung convulsively to her preserver. He spoke to her reassuringly in the Malay language, which, strange to say, she appeared to understand perfectly. With the exception of the priests, very few of the Cape Town Malays understand the Malay tongue, they having adopted a very corrupt dialect of Dutch. He was more than ever struck by her beauty. Her figure was effectually concealed by her dress, but she was tall, and her head, which had become freed from the head-dress when she was being dragged out of the cab, was small, delicately moulded, and gracefully poised over a pair of shapely shoulders, on a neck like the stem of an asphodel. Her colour was very light, her face was a pure oval, and between her shaded eyelids lurked the most wonderful depths of dark, liquid brown that ever drowned the reason of a man.

After being effusively thanked by the girl’s friends, who had now come with a swarm of others from the steamer, Brand took his leave of her with a certain twinge of regret. The girl’s eyes were to him henceforth an abiding remembrance.

It was about a month after the rescue of the girl that Brand’s strange adventure took place.

It was now winter of the year of the small-pox epidemic. The streets of Cape Town at the lower levels were slushy as only Cape Town streets can be, for the rain had been falling steadily for ten days. Then followed a day and a night of absolutely cloudless and unseasonably warm weather, and it was on the night in question that Brand took the walk which had such remarkable consequences.

Brand, another man, and I dined together at the club. The other man had arrived by the last mail steamer from England, and he and I had booked to start by the up-country train at half-past ten. Our luggage was safe at the railway-station, and having nothing to do for the moment, it was suggested that we might take a walk to some of the higher levels where we would be comparatively free of the mud, and from where we might obtain a good view of Table Mountain and the city lights. We accordingly lit our pipes and wandered forth.

There is always much to fascinate in the streets of a strange city, and the Cape Town streets at night, filled as they are with men and women of all shades of colour, garbed variously and speaking divers tongues, are especially interesting—at all events to any one with an imagination.

On this night the streets possessed an unusual attraction of a weird and impressive kind, for the small-pox epidemic was at its greatest height, and a brooding terror overshadowed the stricken city. Every one abroad seemed to have a furtive look. When two met near a lamp-post startled glances were exchanged, and in hurrying along the pavements the passers sheered off to avoid one another. Every now and then an empty coffin would be seen being hurried along the middle of the street upon men’s shoulders. The few cabs on the almost deserted stands looked like hearses, their occupation was almost gone for the time being, for hardly a soul would venture into a cab for fear of infection.

We strolled down Adderley Street for some distance, and then, turning to the left, went up Long Market Street, across Saint George’s and Long Streets, and on until we found ourselves in the Malay quarter on the slope at the base of the Lion’s Rump. Here silence and desolation reigned supreme. The moon had now arisen, so on reaching half-way up the ascent we paused to examine the view and to take breath. Looking back we saw the gleaming city stretched like a vast necropolis under the crags of the great mountain, which gleamed silvery in the moonlight. To our left opened the glassy expanse of Table Bay, with the breakwater lights glinting on the water. From the Malay graveyard on the hill-side above us came the shrill howls of the mourners. There was not a breath of wind. Owing to the comparative suspension of traffic the city seemed silent as the grave.

We retraced our steps for a short distance, and then, turning to the right, walked along a deserted street of white, flat-topped, sepulchre-like houses. All at once we became aware of a sound of loud wailing going on in a house to our left. We stood still for a space and listened. The shrill treble of a woman’s cry could be distinguished, and also the quavering tones of an old man’s voice, full of the deepest agony. We drew near the house very softly. The windows were covered by dark Venetian shutters, between the slats of which a dim light could be discerned. The house was one of a row all more or less similar in size and shape, and built touching each other. Each house had a paved “stoep” in front, with a masoned seat at either end. Against the house next to the one in which the wailing was going on, was standing a ladder which just reached the top of the parapet.