Part 28 (1/2)
”Allee story, the strangest that ever I heard If it is true, Hernan Pereira, you deserve to have your back set against a tree and to be shot”
”God in heaven!” he answered, ”am I to be condemned on such a tale--I, an innocent ainst me for a simple reason--that he has robbed me of the love of my cousin, to whom I was affianced Where are his witnesses?”
”As to the shooting at me in the kloof, I have none except God who saw you,” I answered ”As to the plot that you laid againstthe Zulus, as it chances, however, there is one, Kaed, and who now coe!” exclaiainst that of a white man? Also, ill translate his story? You, Mynheer Quaterue, if you do know it, and you are my accuser”
”That is true,” remarked Retief ”Such a witness should not be adment as commandant in the field Hernan Pereira, I have known you to be a rogue in the past, for I re man, Allan Quatermain, at a friendly trial of skill at which I was present; but since then till now I have heard nothing ood or bad
To-day this Allan Quaterainst you, which, however, at present are not capable of proof or disproof Well, I cannot decide those charges, whatever o back with your uncle, Henri Marais, to the trek-Boers, where they can be laid before a court and settled according to law”
”If so, he will go back alone,” said the Vrouw Prinsloo ”He will not go back with us, for ill elect a field-cornet and shoot him--the stinkcat, who left us to starve and afterwards tried to kill little Allan Quatermain, who saved our lives”; and the chorus behind her echoed:
”Ja, ja, ill shoot hi his broad forehead, ”I don't quite knohy it is, but no one seems to want you as a companion
Indeed, to speak truth, I don't myself Still, I think you would be safer with me than with these others whoest that you come on with us But listen here, ainst us a the Zulus, that hour you are dead Do you understand?”
”I understand that I am one slandered,” replied Pereira ”Still, it is Christian to submit to injuries, and therefore I will do as you wish As to these bearers of false witness, I leave them to God”
”And I leave you to the devil,” shouted Vrouw Prinsloo, ”ill certainly have you soon or late Get out of ht, stinkcat, or I will pull your hair off” And she rushed at hi her dreadful vatdoek--which she produced fro hih he were a noxious insect
Well, he went I know not where, and so strong was public opinion against hiht hione, our party and that of Retief fell into talk, and we had much to tell Especially was the coaan, whereby I saved the lives of allthe vultures
”It was not for nothing, nephew, that God Alht,” said Retief to me when he understood the matter ”I remember that when you killed those wildfowl in the Groote Kloof with bullets, which no other ift above all the rest of us, who have practised for so hty is no fool; He knows His business I wish you were coaan; but as that tainted man, Hernan Pereira, is of my company, perhaps it is better that you should stay away Tell aan; does he mean to kill us?”
”Not this time, I think, uncle,” I answered; ”because first he wishes to learn all about the Boers Still, do not trust him too far just because he speaks you softly Remember, that if I had missed the third vulture, we should all have been dead by now And, if you are wise, keep an eye upon Hernan Pereira”
”These things I will do, nephew, especially the last of the on Stay; come here, Henri Marais; I have a word to say to you I understand that this little Englisher ain, and that she loves him Why, then, do you not let them marry in a decent fashi+on?”
”Because before God I have sworn her to another man--to my nephew, Hernan Pereira, whom everyone slanders,” answered Marais sulkily ”Until she is of age that oath holds”
”Oho!” said Retief, ”you have sworn your lamb to that hyena, have you?
Well, look out that he does not crack your bones as well as hers, and perhaps soive some men a worm in their brains, as He does to the wildebeeste, a wor way? I don't know, I aht think the matter over and tell irl of yours will soon be of age, and then, as I a, I'll see she marries the man she wants, whatever you say, Henri Marais Heaven above us! I only wish it were hter he was in love with A felloho can shoot to such good purpose reat, hearty laughs, he walked off to his horse
On the ela and entered the territory that is now called Natal Two days' short trekking through a beautiful country brought us to some hills that I think were called Pakadi, or else a chief na these hills, on the further side of thee party of the trek-Boers, ere already occupying this land on the hither side of the Bush, poor people, that it was fated to becorave of many of them To-day, and for all future time, that district is and will be known by the na, because of those pioneers who here were aan within a feeeks of the time of which I write
Nice as the land was, for some reason or other it did not quite suit e with Marie, having purchased a horse froan to explore the country round My object was to find a stretch of fertile veld where we could settle ere wedded, and such a spot I discovered after some trouble It lay about thirty miles away to the east, in the loop of a beautiful stream that is non as the Mooi River
Enclosed in this loop were so soil, alame was extraordinarily numerous At the head of it rose a flat-topped hill, froh, flowed a plentiful strea Half-way down this hill, facing to the east, and irrigable by the stream, was a plateau several acres in extent, which furnished about the best site for a house that I know in all South Africa Here I deter-place and becoreat herds of cattle I should explain that this ground, which once, as the reed to a Kaffir tribe killed out by Chaka, the Zulu king, was to be had for the taking
Indeed, as there was more land than we could possibly occupy, I persuaded Henri Marais, the Prinsloos and the Meyers, hooa, to visit it with reed to make it their home in the future, but meanwhile elected to return to the other Boers for safety's sake So with the help of some Kaffirs, of whom there were a few in the district, reed out an estate of about twelve thousand acres fora site, set the natives to work to build a roughI should add that the Prinsloos and the Meyers alsoof siside of my own This done, I returned to Marie and the trek-Boers
On theafter my return to the camp Piet Retief appeared there with his five or six coaan
”Well enough, nephew,” he answered ”At first the king was so that we Boers had stolen six hundred head of his cattle
But I showed him that it was the chief, Sikonyela, who lives yonder on the Caledon River, who had dressed up his people in white men's clothes and put theh one of our camps to make it appear that ere the thieves Then he asked ht a grant of the land south of the Tugela to the sea