Part 31 (1/2)
We were the victims of treachery. Some of our pretended friends had been bribed, turned informers, and went over to the enemy. These were the traitors and deserters; they have pocketed the price of blood, and are at work again, no doubt, like spiders in their dark, gloomy offices, making false promises, deluding the people into the a.s.semblies they convoke, only to bring the troops upon them, and then reap their reward for betraying their victims.”
In this strain Lyle proceeded; Gray paid but little heed to his sophistry--his mind was intent on casting aside the thraldom under which he writhed; but fate seemed against him.
And Amayeka, what was to become of her? Lyle next pointed out the advantages of the prospect before them. It was by no means certain, he said, that the Boers must necessarily fight against the English government; it was well-known that Vander Roey had gone to the Commander-in-Chief to hold a conference; it was not improbable that terms would be made, and that a territory would be given to the Dutch settlers, where they might exercise their own laws.
”Here,” said Lyle, ”we may find a place of rest, for, unless something is to be gained by it, I am not inclined for war for fighting's sake.”
This was, as the reader may divine, untrue; but he adapted his expressed opinions to the tone of Gray's mind at the moment.
”So, for the present, my lad, make your mind easy; you cannot get away from this if you would, and you would not if you could, for your dusky lady-love is, without doubt, yonder in the hills, and no bad refuge neither. By Jove, this is a fine country--ha! Doda told me it was a n.o.ble pasture-land for horses, and see, the mountain-sides are dotted with them; and here is a troop of jolly young Boers. Now remember, once for all, my lad,” continued Lyle, clutching Gray suddenly by the arm--”let me tell you to put a good face on the matter. As to getting these people just now to listen to your history, and give you a guide or an escort to take you back--you young fool!--to fight against them, it is of no use. All your reasoning would be as useless as whistling jigs to milestones--all your wrath like the grimaces, and the sputtering, and the swearing of the bushmen at a storm of thunder and lightning. So now say 'good morrow' to these young fellows with the best face you can.”
A party of youths rode up as Lyle spoke; the latter informed them, in tolerable Dutch, that he was the trader whom Brennard had located at Umlala's Kraal, and, as he had no intention of at once avowing himself willing to be enrolled as a rebel, he affected to have started from the Kraal with mere prospects of traffic. He then related what had occurred since his departure, and Gray listened with a beating heart to the reply made to Lyle on his inquiring whether a Kafir girl had been brought to the mountains by the young men of the foraging party.
”Yes; but they had earned her over the hills to the Boers' large encampment, where she would be taken care of by some of the women.”
With this information Gray and Doda were obliged to be content. The young Dutchmen informed Lyle that the ammunition was on the south-western side of the mountains, where it was carefully stored in some of the bushmen's caves, long abandoned by their first tenants, until Vander Roey sent intelligence of the result of his conference with the Commander-in-Chief, Vander Roey's wife was in charge of it, and, under her directions, instalments of gunpowder were daily forwarded on pack-oxen and horses, the pa.s.ses of the mountains being impracticable for wagons.
The young Boers having turned their horses' heads in the direction of the mountains, the convicts and Doda accompanied them to the temporary bivouac, where Vander Roey's wife held sway in the absence of her husband. The three were left among the scattered tents and wagon-tilts of the few families congregated together in the sequestered spot, while the riders hastened to Mrs Vander Roey to inform her of the new arrivals in the camp. Lyle and Gray were soon summoned by the lady, who advanced to the door of the cave to receive them, and ask their business.
She was a woman apparently five or six and twenty years of age, though probably she was much less. She was not what might be termed a true specimen of the Boeress in Southern Africa, but was, in colonial parlance, an Africander, of French extraction, her father belonging to the race who established themselves at the Cape after the revocation of the edict of Nantes; and her mother, although the wife of a Boer, had a alight touch of dark blood in her veins. To these circ.u.mstances, which, in the eyes of the community to which she belonged, were objectionable, she owed her raven hair, drawn back from the temples, and bound round her head in cla.s.sic fas.h.i.+on. The forehead was low, but well formed; the eyes long, dark, and fringed with black lashes, that softened their fiery expression; the nose aquiline, with the delicate nostril indicative of Indian blood; the mouth scarlet-lipped, and radiant with pearly teeth; her figure, above the middle height, and gracefully, if not perfectly, shaped, was set off by the dress, which, albeit coa.r.s.e and rough, was picturesque; a petticoat of bright-coloured _voerchitz_, a bodice of the same material, but of different pattern, over which was thrown a rich silk handkerchief of orange hue--a gift from Cape Town; loose sleeves, reaching a little below the elbow of a beautiful arm; cotton stockings, pa.s.sing fine, and _veldt sc.o.o.ns_, of better make than was common among her people, fitted to a tolerable foot and slender ankle. Such was the attire of Mrs, or, as she chose to call herself, Madame Vander Roey; and, as she came forward, the rays of the setting sun illuminated her figure, and set off the manifold hues of her costume in a very striking manner. Even the attention of the listless deserter was arrested by the vision of this showy dame, who, with a pistol in her belt, her arms folded across the orange handkerchief her head thrown back, and her flas.h.i.+ng eyes bent eagerly on Lyle, awaited their approach in front of her rude but picturesque domicile. She opened the conversation by the direct inquiry addressed to Lyle in Dutch, of ”Where do you come from, and what is your business?”
Lyle replied, with equal decision of tone,
”I am the trader from Umlala's Kraal; I have been, in communication with Vander Roey for more than six weeks.”
”Vander Roey has been absent nearly a month, but I did not wish Umlala's people to know this; the scouts were told he was ill, and have received the ammunition; some of it I have stored, some has been sent over the mountains. Are you here only as traders, and who is this boy?”
She scanned the dejected-looking Gray with something like glances of contempt.
”Doda, good morrow; you are to be trusted, because you would gain nothing by betraying us. Go, you will find meat cooking at those fires in the hollow. Who, I say, is this boy?”
”A deserter from the service of my king,” answered Gray, ”and a miserable creature.”
Lyle would have spoken; Madame Vander Roey forestalled him, by asking in English, ”And what is your business here? Do you come as friend or enemy?”
”As neither,” replied Gray; ”but I am a most unfortunate young man.”
”Neither friend nor enemy!” said Madame Vander Roey, elevating her dark-pencilled eyebrows; ”then why come you here at all?”
Lyle, seeing that Gray had resolved on making a true statement of past occurrences, suddenly exclaimed, ”At least accept me as your friend; I am one of those who have been banished by my country for taking part with the ill-used, the poor, and the weak--in a word, we are convicts, who escaped lately from the wreck of the _Trafalgar_, and from the moment that I set foot on sh.o.r.e, I resolved to seek Vander Roey, whose fame has spread to England--aye, and to the land of his forefathers, to Holland; but of this we can speak hereafter. We have been travelling for some days on foot, are weary and hungry, and long for the rest and refreshment which we believe you will give us. This lad will come to his senses by-and-by; if he does not,” added the elder convict, with a bitter laugh--one of those laughs which Eleanor could not distinguish between jest and earnest--”we most teach him the use of his wits.”
Gray knew it was vain to remonstrate with his evil genius. Madame Vander Roey invited both the travellers into her retreat, and Gray pa.s.sively followed Lyle and the lady into the bushmen's cave, her present dwelling-place.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.
THE PATRIARCH.
It was, like most of these retreats, a deep recess in the rocks. The walls were ornamented with grotesque drawings, poorly executed in coloured clay, of men and animals, the figures of the former more resembling apes than men. The ground--for flooring there was none, save a carpet woven by Nature's tasteful hand--was partially covered with mats and skins, and the furniture consisted of a rickety camp-table and two or three broken stools. A long roer and a pair of large pistols were slung against the scarp of rock at the back of the recess, and the place was faintly illuminated by a primitive kind of lamp--a calabash filled with sheep-tail oil--from the centre of which rose a rush wick.
The coolness of this retreat,--for the sun's rays never penetrated therein,--was delicious, after pa.s.sing so many days in the open air during the hottest period of the South African summer.