Part 8 (1/2)
As he spoke, the cracking of whips announced the approach of a team. A moment later, and a small Hottentot came, round a bend in the road, followed by the leading pair of oxen. It was the train of Edwin Brook, who soon appeared, riding a small horse. George Dally walked beside him. Scholtz, the German, followed, conversing with the owner of the waggon. In the waggon itself Mrs Brook, Mrs Scholtz, and Junkie found a somewhat uneasy resting-place, for, being new to the style of travel, they had not learned to accommodate themselves to jolts and crashes.
Gertie preferred to walk, the pace not being more than three miles an hour.
”Oh, father!” said Gertie, running up to the side of her sire, with girlish vivacity, ”there is the tall Dutchman who was so polite to me when I was p.r.i.c.ked by the thorn bush.”
”True, Gertie, and there also is the Scot who was so free and easy in giving his opinion as to the farming powers of the brothers Skyd.”
”Your road diverges here, sir,” said Hans, as Brook rode up; ”I fell behind my party to bid you G.o.d-speed, and to express a hope that we may meet again.”
”Thanks, friend, thanks,” said Brook, extending his hand. ”I am obliged for the aid you have rendered me, and the advice given, which latter I shall no doubt find valuable.--You are bound for the highlands, of course,” he added, turning to Sandy Black. ”We of the Albany lowlands must have a friendly rivalry with you of the highlands, and see who shall subdue the wilderness most quickly.”
This remark sent the Scot into a rather learned disquisition as to the merits and probable prospects of a hill as compared with a low-lying region, during which Hans Marais turned to Gertie. Being so very tall, he had to stoop as well as to look down at her pretty face, though Gertie was by no means short for her age. Indeed, she was as tall as average women, but, being only twelve, was slender and girlish.
”How _very_ tall you are, Mr Marais!” she exclaimed, with a laugh, as she looked up.
”True, Gertie,” said Hans, using the only name which he had yet heard applied to the girl; ”true, we Cape-Dutchmen are big fellows as a race, and I happen to be somewhat longer than my fellows. I hope you don't object to me on that account?”
”Object? oh no! But it _is_ so funny to have to look up so high. It's like speaking to father when he's on horseback.”
”Well, Gertie, extra height has its advantages and its inconveniences.
Doubtless it was given to me for some good end, just as a pretty little face and figure were given to you.”
”You are very impudent, Mr Hans.”
”Am I? Then I must ask your pardon. But tell me, Gertie, what do you think of the new life that is before you?”
”How stupid you are, Hans! If the new life were behind me I might be able to answer, but how can I tell how I shall like what I don't know anything about?”
”Nay, but you know something of the beginning of it,” returned the young Dutchman, with an amused smile, ”and you have heard much of what is yet to come. What do you think of the _prospect_ before you?”
”Think of the prospect?” repeated Gertie, knitting her brows and looking down with a pretended air of profound thought; ”let me see: the prospect as I've heard father say to mother,--which was just a repet.i.tion of what I had heard him previously say to these queer brothers Skyd--is a life in the bush--by which I suppose he means the bushes--in which we shall have to cut down the trees, plough up the new soil, build our cottages, rear our sheep and cattle, milk our cows, make our b.u.t.ter, grow our food, and sometimes hunt it, fas.h.i.+on our clothing, and protect our homes. Is that right?”
”Well, that's just about it,” was the answer; ”how do you like that prospect?”
”I delight in it,” cried the girl, with a flash in her brilliant black eyes, while she half laughed at her own sudden burst of enthusiasm.
”Only fancy! mother milking the cows, and me making b.u.t.ter, and Scholtz ploughing, and Dally planting, and nurse tending Junkie and making all sorts of garments, while father goes out with his gun to shoot food and protect us from the Kafirs.”
”'Tis a pleasant picture,” returned Hans, with a bland smile, ”and I hope may be soon realised--I must bid you goodbye now, Gertie, we separate here.”
”Do you go far away?” asked the girl, with a touch of sadness, as she put her little hand into that of the young giant.
”A goodish bit. Some six or eight days' journey from here,--according to the weather.”
”You'll come and see us some day, won't you, Hans?”
”Ja--I will,” replied Hans, with emphasis.
The whips cracked again, the oxen strained, the lumbering waggons groaned as they moved away, and while the Scotch band pa.s.sed over the Zuurbergen range and headed in the direction of the Winterberg mountains, their English friends spread themselves over the fertile plains of Albany.
A few days of slow but pleasant journeying and romantic night-bivouacking brought the latter to their locations on the Kowie and Great Fish River.