Part 23 (2/2)

”I believe you'll miss some of your fowls this morning, Earle,” said Blachland. ”There was a cat or something after them last night. They were kicking up the devil's own row outside our window. Percy wanted to try a shot at it, whatever it was, but I choked him off that lay because I thought it'd scare the house.”

”Might have been a two-legged cat,” rejoined Earle. ”And it isn't worthwhile shooting even a poor devil of a thieving n.i.g.g.e.r for the sake of a chicken or two.”

”Who are you wanting to shoot, Mr Earle?”

”Ah! Good morning, Mrs Fenham. Blachland was saying there was a cat or something after the fowls last night, and it was all he could do to keep West from blazing off a gun at it. I suggested it might have been a two-legged cat--ha--ha!”

”Possibly,” she answered with a smile. ”I'm going to take a little stroll. It's such a lovely morning. Will you go with me, Mr Blachland?”

”Delighted,” was the answer.

The two left behind nudged each other.

”Old Blachland's got it too,” quoth Earle, with a knowing wink. ”I say, though, the young 'un 'll be ready to cut his throat when he finds he's been stolen a march on. They all seem to tumble when she comes along.

I say, Bayfield, you'll be the next.”

”When I am I'll tell you,” was the placid reply. ”Let's go round to the kraals.”

”Well, Hilary, and how am I looking? Rather well, don't you think?”

She was dressed quite simply, but prettily, and wore a plain but very becoming hat. The brisk, clear cold suited her dark style, and had lent colour to her cheeks and a sparkle to her eyes--and the expression of the latter now, as she turned them upon her companion, was very soft.

”Yes. Rather well,” he answered, not flinching from her gaze, yet not responding to it.

”More than 'rather' well, you ought to say,” she smiled. ”And now, Hilary, what have you been doing since we parted? Tell me all about yourself.”

Most men would have waxed indignant over her cool effrontery in putting things this way. This one, she knew, would do nothing of the sort. If anything, it rather amused him.

”Doing? Well, I began by nearly dying of fever. Would have quite, if Sybrandt hadn't tumbled in by accident and pulled me through it.”

”Poor old Hilary!--What are you laughing at?”

”Nothing much. Something funny struck me, that's all. But you were always deficient in a sense of the ridiculous, Hermia, so it's not worth repeating. You wouldn't see it. By-the-way, when I was lying ill, a squad of Matabele came around, under that swab Muntusi, and looted a little, and a.s.segai-ed the two piccaninnies.”

”What? Tickey and Primrose? Oh, poor little beasts!”

”I couldn't move a finger, of course--weak as a cat. In fact, I didn't know what had happened till afterwards.”

Again the humour of the situation struck him irresistibly. The matter-of-course way in which she was asking and receiving the news just as though they had parted quite in ordinary fas.h.i.+on and merely temporarily, was funny. But it was Hermia all over.

”I'd become sick of it by that time,” he went on. ”So I sold out everything, and came down country.”

”To think of your being at the Bayfields' all this while, Hilary. And you didn't know I was here?”

”Hadn't the ghost of a notion. Of course I had heard you were here, but there was nothing to lead me to locate you as 'Mrs Fenham.' By the way, Hermia, what on earth made you strike out in the line of instructor of youth? No. It's really too funny.”

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