"Susannah, I can stay here no longer; will you come away with me?"
The girl did not reply. She sat thinking of what the consequences of such a step would be. Her utter inexperience of life was strongly qualified by natural caution, as well as by that instinct of self-preservation which clothes most women like an armour of proof.
"I feel I can stay here no longer," he continued. "Leaving out Oom Schulpad and yourself, I hate and despise every one here. Will you come away with me?"
"I will go with you when you marry me, Max."
"How can I marry you when you are only nineteen and your uncle will not give his consent?"
"I will wait for you. Go away, and you will find me here when you come back--if there is any water left in the well."
"I do not want to go away without you, and I feel I cannot endure to stay. Why are you afraid to trust me?"
"I am not afraid to trust you, but--while you were talking at first I was thinking. I thought to myself that we could not get away and that there was no place for us to go to."
"You can leave all that to me--"
"No, no, it cannot be. If you want to marry me, Max, you must make up your mind never to live in any place but Bushmanland--"
"What! live all our lives at Namies?"
"No, not at Namies. Bushmanland is large; there are many camps and many water-places in it. You know that I am only a poor Boer girl and that I could not live among those women whose pictures you showed me in the fashion books and who never speak anything but English; you would be ashamed of me and I should want to come back to live among the people I know."
Max, after the manner of lovers, a.s.sured her that he never could, under any possible circ.u.mstances, be ashamed of her. She continued in the same strain as formerly--
"I once saw some girls who went past our camp in a wagon, when we dwelt on the other side of the Desert, far away to the eastward, and I felt like a Bushwoman beside them when I noticed their clothes and heard them talk. No, Max, I will never go to any place where you would be able to compare me with women such as those."
Max a.s.sured her that she could easily challenge comparison with any girl in South Africa for physical advantages. Her colour heightened with pleasure at his compliments, but she was not to be moved from her resolution.
"Max, I shall never live in any place outside Bushmanland, so you had better make up your mind to that. Besides, you will have to wait for me until I am old enough to marry without my uncle"s consent. Bushmanland is long and wide, but when a girl is talked about for doing what you want me to do, the tongues of the women are heard, louder than thunder, from one side of it to the other. If I were to do this thing the people of the only land I can live in would look upon me as being no better than a Hottentot girl at the Copper Mines."
Max felt, instinctively, that the girl was right. He made no further attempt to move her, but he reconsidered his decision about leaving Namies at once. At all events he would wait for Nathan"s return. As the lovers walked back to the camp, they said few words to each other.
Nathan returned late in the afternoon of the next day. The brothers met outside the shop. Nathan greeted Max with cheerfulness, as though he wished to ignore what had last pa.s.sed between them. Max looked him straight in the eyes without acknowledging his salute.
"h.e.l.lo," said Nathan, "got the hump, eh?"
Max went into the shop; Nathan followed him after outspanning the horses. In the meantime the flock of sheep had been driven home by a strange herd. Nathan burned with curiosity to know what had transpired.
He walked up to Max and addressed him again--
"Where"s your old chum? I see you"ve got a new n.i.g.g.e.r."
Max gave him a contemptuous glance and then went on with what he had been doing, without replying to the question.
"Are you deaf?"
"I"m not deaf; neither am I blind."
"Then why the devil don"t you answer me? Where"s the old n.i.g.g.e.r?"
"Mightn"t he be lying dead in a sluit where you and Koos Bester left him last week?"
"Look here, none of your blasted conundrums. I didn"t pull you out of a Whitechapel gutter and bring you here to get lip from you."
Max went on with his occupation of tidying the goods upon the shelves, without making any reply. Nathan, furious, strode round the counter and gripped him by the arm. Max turned and gazed steadily into his eyes.
"You b.a.s.t.a.r.d Christian dog, if you don"t answer my question I"ll make pork sausages of you!"
Max seized Nathan by the throat and flung him backwards. The latter"s foot caught against the corner of a box and he fell sprawling under the counter. As he picked himself up Max strode towards him. Nathan recoiled in alarm; he had not expected such treatment from the shy, silent, diffident lad whom he had been in the habit of cuffing and cursing at whenever he felt in a bad temper and wanted to relieve his feelings.
"Where is he?" shouted Max in a voice strident with rage. "He is where you will never be--in an honest man"s grave. He lived long enough to let me know that you and Koos Bester are murderers. I only regret that he did not let me know enough to hang you both."
Nathan quailed; he wondered how much Gemsbok had told. Then he cast up the column of possibilities in his mind. No, he was all right. There might be suspicion, but there could be no proof that he had been accessory to the crime. However, it would be just as well not to provoke Max any further at present. He walked out of the shop and Max closed the door behind him.
The Desert twilight was quickly fading. Nathan wished to be alone, so he strolled past the camps without calling at any of them, and then back along the road he had just previously travelled.
After he had pa.s.sed the last camp by about a hundred yards he sat down on a stone. He was sunk in the deepest thought. An idea had struck him just after Max"s outburst and had taken root, branched and burgeoned until it seemed to be a tree full of flowers which promised rich fruit.
The m.u.f.fled thud of tired horses" feet on the sandy road leading from the dunes broke in upon his reverie. He lifted his head from where it had been sunk upon his breast and chuckled with unclean mirth.
"Well, I think I"m in jam _this_ time," soliloquised he; "whole blooming coppers of it."
When he returned home Max was not on the premises. The shop was locked, but the little room at the back where Nathan slept was open. Of late Max had taken to sleeping on the counter in the shop.
Nathan lit a candle and began to undress. The elation of his mind was evinced upon his face. He went to bed and softly whistled the tune of a music-hall song as he lay back on the pillow with his hands clasped at the back of his head. He felt extremely happy. His luck was in--this last development, over which he had been chuckling so, proved that conclusively.
Again the sound which he had heard when sitting on the stone broke in on his waking dreams, the slow tramp, tramp, tramp of the feet of tired horses, m.u.f.fled by the soft sand. This time the sound came from much nearer than before. Then he heard the creaking of the vehicle and the wisch-wisch of the ploughing wheels. Then the sound ceased. A few moments later he heard a stealthy step approaching the door; just afterwards came a light tap.
"Who is there?" he called out.
"Open the door quickly. It is I, Koos."
Nathan sprang out of bed and drew back the bolt. Koos at once stepped into the room and glanced furtively around. His face looked drawn and haggard and his eyes were bloodshot.
"Are you alone?" he asked, in a husky voice.
"Yes, I am alone. But be careful, I don"t know where Max is."
Koos bent forward until his dry lips almost touched Nathan"s ear, and whispered--
"What has happened? Tell me quickly."
Nathan drew back slightly and let the ghost of a mocking smile flit over his features.
"Oh, I got home all right, thanks. But what brings you here?"
The Boer leant forward across the table and grasped the Jew"s wizened shoulder in his enormous hand. Nathan shuddered convulsively under the pressure; he thought his bones were being crushed. The eyes of Koos seemed to shoot forth dusky flames.
"Tell me quickly," he said.