Kitabı oku: «The Luck of Gerard Ridgeley», sayfa 6
Chapter Nine.
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The time intervening having been spent in getting together the loads, and otherwise seeing that everything was in order for the road – wheels greased, waggons overhauled, all necessary supplies for the trip got safely on board – by the following evening they were ready to start.
The said loads consisted of every conceivable kind of object of barter then in favour among the up-country natives – blankets and Salampore cloth, knives and hatchets, tobacco and snuff, beads and umbrellas of wondrous colours, brass wire for bangles, brass buttons and striped handkerchiefs, looking-glasses and musical instruments, and a score of other “notions.” For their own use and that of their native servants they carried sacks of mealie-flour, coffee and sugar, a tin of biscuits or so, and two or three sides of bacon sewn up in canvas, with a few tins of preserved fruit, and ditto vegetables.
Each waggon was drawn by a full span of sixteen oxen, which were engineered by a leader and driver to the span, both natives. The waggons and their fittings were similar to that which brought Gerard up from the coast, one of them, indeed, being the same vehicle. The load took up nearly the whole available space, just leaving room for a small tilt, which contained a mattress for sleeping on, also lockers, and canvas pockets hung round the sides. Altogether it is wonderful what a lot can be stowed away on board these ships of the veldt.
One of the waggons had been loaded up in the morning and sent on to the outspan; the other was ready by sundown. As they went lumbering down the street, the oxen fresh and rested, stepping out briskly to the shout of the driver and the occasional crack of his long whip, Gerard, seated beside Dawes on the box, felt quite elated as he heard the driver’s reply to passing natives inquiring their destination: – “Kwa Zulu,” and could enter fully into the spirit of the said reply, given loftily and as it were with a touch of pity for the unfortunates condemned to stagnate at home.
“I was in luck this morning, Ridgeley,” said Dawes, as they superintended the inspanning of the other waggon. “I picked up a capital Basuto pony, dirt cheap. He’ll do for you to ride. There he is, by the side of mine.”
Two steeds were being driven up, knee-haltered. One was a bay, the other a strongly-built mouse-coloured pony of about fourteen hands. Gerard was delighted:
“They tell me he’s a good shooting horse,” went on Dawes, “so that’s another advantage. I always like to have a horse along. One can turn off the track, and get a shot at a buck without having to fag one’s soul out to catch up the waggons again; and then, too, one sometimes wants to go into places where one can’t take the waggons, and for that, of course, a horse is nearly indispensable. Are you fond of shooting?”
Gerard answered eagerly that he had hardly ever been lucky enough to get any. It was, however, the thing of all others he was keenest to attempt. But he had not even got a gun, though he had a revolver.
“Well, we’ll soon make a shot of you,” said Dawes. “There’s a Martini rifle in the waggon, and a double gun, one barrel rifled, the other smooth. We’ll find plenty to empty them at when we get up into the Zulu country, never fear.”
Then, the waggons being inspanned, and the two horses made fast behind, they started. And as they toiled slowly up the long hill which led away to the border, and presently the lights and blue gum-trees which marked the site of Maritzbnrg lying in its great basin-like hollow disappeared behind the rise, Gerard felt that this was the most glorious moment of his life. The most dazzling vista seemed to open out before him – adventures and strange experiences to crowd upon each other’s heels. Was he not bound for that wild, mysterious, enchanted land, of which he had heard many a strange tale from those who had called from time to time at Anstey’s? “Up-country,” they would say, with a careless jerk of the finger, “up-country!” And already he seemed to hear the booming roar of the prowling lion round the midnight fire, to see the savage phalanx of the Zulu regiment on the march, bound upon some fell errand of death and destruction. All the hard and dull routine of the last few months, the utter desolation of his uncongenial life, even the terrible and sickening realisation that he was next door to destitute, all were forgotten now; all such memories swallowed up in the anticipation of what was before him. As they trekked along in the moonlight, seated side by side on the box of the foremost waggon, Dawes proceeded to initiate Gerard further into some of the mysteries of native trade.
“As I was telling you,” he said, “there’s a regular fashion among natives, just the same as among white folks. For instance, take Salampore cloth; there are the two kinds – the thin dark blue and gauzy, and the lighter-coloured and coarser kind with the orange stripes. Now, the Zulus are keen as mustard on the first, and simply won’t look at the last, whereas with the natives of Natal, whether of Zulu or Basuto blood, it’s exactly the other way about. Again, take beads. We’ve got all sorts – black, white, blue, pink, red. Now, which would you suppose the Zulus are keenest on?”
Gerard replied that of course they would go for the brightest coloured ones – say, the red or blue.
“Not a bit of it. The ones they like best of all are the black, after them the white. There’s a fashion about these things, as I tell you. Now, you’d think one of them pocket-knives, with a blade like a sabre, and a saw and a corkscrew, and the Lord knows what amount of gimcrackery all in one handle, would fetch them more than any mortal thing. Well, it wouldn’t. They’d hardly say thank you for one such knife that might have cost you a guinea, whereas, for them roughly knocked together butcher knives, that cost me tenpence apiece wholesale, they’ll give almost anything. They like to make a sheath for the thing, to hang around them.”
“What sort of people are they in the way of trade?” asked Gerard.
“Hard as nails. Haggle the eyes out of your head. But you’ve got to be firm over a deal, for they’re up to all manner of tricks. If the barter is live stock, they’ll try all they know to jockey you with some worthless and inferior beasts, and so on. Dishonesty? No, they don’t think it dishonest. It is simply their principle of trade – devil take the hindmost. So far are they from dishonest, that I have more than once in the Zulu country left my waggon standing for an hour at a time with absolutely nobody in charge, and have come back to find it surrounded with people waiting for me, and yet not a thing touched or displaced. How would that pan out for an experiment in England, for instance?”
“But poorly, I’m afraid,” laughed Gerard.
“Just so. No, the Zulu is the hardest nail going at a deal. But once the deal is over and it’s no longer a question of trade, he’s the most honest man in the world. You’ll soon get into their ways and know exactly how to deal with them, and meanwhile try all you know to pick up as much of the language as you can. Sintoba, the driver of the other waggon, is a smart clever chap, and talks English fairly well. You can’t do better than learn all you can from him.”
Thus, with many a useful hint and anecdote illustrative of native character or the life of the veldt, would Dawes beguile the time as they trekked along, all of which Gerard drank in eagerly. His anxiety to make himself of use knew no bounds. He was up before the first glimmer of dawn, and would have the “boys” astir and the fire started for the early pannikin of black coffee, sometimes even before Dawes was awake, to the latter’s astonishment and secret satisfaction. In a day or two he could take his share at inspanning as readily as the rest, was as deft at handling the whip as the professional driver, Sintoba himself, and knew all the oxen by name. And at night, as they sat around the red embers, he was never tired of listening to Dawes’s narratives of experience and adventure, whether his own or those of others. He was, in fact, as happy as the day was long, and felt almost fraternal when he thought of Anstey, remembering that but for that worthy’s rascality he would not be here now.
Several days had gone by. They had passed through Grey Town, and the magnificent bush country beyond, with its towering heights and great cliffs rearing up their smooth red faces from tossing seas of verdure. They had met or passed other waggons from time to time – for it was the main road to the Transvaal – and now they were descending into the Tugela valley.
“Hot, eh, Ridgeley?” said Dawes, with a dry smile, mopping his forehead with a red pocket-handkerchief.
“Yes, it’s warm,” assented Gerard, who in reality was nearly light-headed with the terrible heat, but would not own it. There was not a breath of air. The sun-rays, focused down into the great bush-clad valley, seemed to beat with the force of a burning-glass, and the heights on either side shut out whatever breeze might have tempered the torrid fierceness. A shimmer rose from the ground as from the outside of the boiler of a steam-engine, and the screech of the crickets kept up one unending and deafening vibration.
“Do we outspan on this side or cross first?” said Gerard, as the cool murmur of water became audible.
“We’ll outspan on the other. The river’s low enough to cross without any trouble; but the drift isn’t always a good one. The principle of the road is always outspan on the other side of a drift – that is, the opposite side from the one you arrive at. These rivers, you see, come down with surprising swiftness, and then, of course, if you delay, you may be stuck for a week or more. The exception, however, to this rule is, if there’s more water in the river than you quite like but yet not enough to stop you. Then it is sometimes a good plan to outspan for a little while to rest your oxen, because they’ll need all their strength for pulling through.”
The current, though smooth and swift flowing, proved stronger than it looked. In splashed the first waggon, amid the shouting and whip-cracking. The leader could hardly keep his feet, and what with the force of the current and the plunges of the fore oxen, he was having a pretty bad time of it. But they emerged panting and dripping on the other side. Gerard, however, who was on the second waggon, came near meeting with a disaster that might have cost him his life.
The great vehicle was three parts through. The driver, wading and splashing beside the span, was urging and encouraging it by the regulation series of shrill and long-drawn yells. Gerard, who was standing on the box, cracking the long whip, and also lending his voice to swell the chorus, was suddenly seen to overbalance, sway, and topple over into the water, disappearing immediately.
John Dawes, watching progress from the opposite bank, turned white as death. Gerard had fallen in front of the wheels!
“Oh, good God! He’s done for!” he gasped.
Meanwhile the driver, who had not seen the accident, was yelling his loudest, with the result that the span was tugging its hardest. The waggon was already emerging from the water, rolling up the steep slope from the drift.
“He’s done for,” muttered Dawes, ashy pale. “He’ll have been ground to pulp under the water.”
But no sooner had the words escaped him, than, lo, Gerard himself, dripping from head to foot! He jumped down from behind the waggon with a celerity that showed he had come to no sort of harm.
“What – what did you do that for?” stammered Dawes. “How did you do it?”
“I just grazed one wheel in falling. Luckily I fell between both, and remembering all you had said about falling off the disselboom, I hung on like grim death to the bottom of the waggon – held my breath under water, knowing we would be out in a minute. Then I worked my way along till I was clear of the wheels and got out. But I’m pretty well blown after it. I couldn’t have held on a minute longer,” he gasped, still out of breath with the almost superhuman exertion he had just gone through.
“By Jove, youngster, but you’ll do!” said the other. “You’ve got pluck and presence of mind, and that’s all you want to carry you through any mortal thing.” And he turned away, to give orders about outspanning, glad of the opportunity to recover his self-possession, for even he had undergone a rude shock over the frightfully narrow escape his young companion had just experienced.
The next morning, when they turned out, Dawes said —
“Do you feel like paying Bob Kingsland a visit, Ridgeley?”
“Rather. Does he live near here, then?”
“A few miles off. In fact, this outspan is almost on his farm. Doorn Draai, it’s called. We’ve come along very well, and the grazing here is first rate. It won’t hurt the oxen to have a day’s rest and a real good fill up. We’ll have breakfast early and ride over. We are likely to find some of them at home, anyway.”
“That’ll be first rate!” said Gerard, with genuine pleasure. And then he set to work to serve out rations to the leaders and drivers, each of whom received a measure of maize-meal, which, going into a common stock, was stirred up in a three-legged pot and soon reduced to porridge, for on such fare do the natives of Natal wax fat and strong. Afterwards he got out a clean basin and kneaded up roster-koekjes, a species of damper-cake, and put them to bake on the ashes for their own breakfast, while Dawes superintended the cooking of a savoury game stew, compounded of partridges, ringdoves, and a plover or two, which they had shot the day before while coming along.
“We don’t live so badly, even on the road, eh, Ridgeley?” said Dawes, as they sat doing ample justice to this, and to the steaming cups of strong black coffee wherewith it was washed down.
“No, indeed,” assented Gerard, briskly, beginning on half a partridge. “Shall we take a gun along this morning?”
“We might. Don’t know that it’s worth while, though. By the way, Kingsland’s a widower, and his pretty daughter keeps house for him. Don’t you go and fall in love with her – in view of the time our trip is likely to last.”
For reply Gerard laughed light-heartedly. It was not likely, he thought, remembering that pair of blue eyes in the buggy.
After breakfast they saddled up the horses, and Dawes having given Sintoba some final instructions, they started. The ride was a pleasant enough one, though somewhat hot. Their way lay mostly at the bottom of a long winding valley with great bush-clad slopes shooting up on either hand, and the sunny air was alive with the piping whistle of spreuws and the cooing of innumerable ringdoves.
“There’s the house,” said Dawes, as a curl of blue smoke rose from the bush-clad hillside about a mile ahead. “And – there’s Kingsland himself,” he added, as a shout from a little way off their road drew their attention to a horseman who was riding towards them.
“Hallo, John Dawes!” cried the latter, as he joined them. “Where have you dropped from now – and who have you got with you? Why, it’s young Ridgeley. Well, Ridgeley, I’m glad to see you, my boy. What have you been doing with yourself all this time? By-the-by, didn’t you get my letter?”
“Letter? No,” echoed Gerard, in some astonishment.
“Why, I wrote to you at Anstey’s about a fortnight ago. Found out you were there through the papers. That affair with the Zulu and the Umgeni Fall went the round of the papers. Didn’t you see it?”
“No,” answered Gerard, still lost in astonishment. “I’m very sorry. I don’t know what you must have thought of me, Mr Kingsland, but – I never had that letter. It must have come after I left, and – the fact is, Anstey and I didn’t part on very good terms.”
“So? The paragraph said you were in his employ. Couldn’t you get on with him, or wasn’t the work to your taste?”
“Anstey swindled him out of every shilling he had,” put in Dawes, seeing Gerard hesitate and look a trifle embarrassed. “Biggest blackguard in this colony, is Anstey.”
“So?” said Mr Kingsland again. “Well, we must hear all about your experiences by-and-by, Ridgeley. Here we are at the house now – and here’s my little housekeeper come to see who I’m bringing home to dinner,” he added lovingly, as the figure of a girl appeared at the door and came down the steps to meet them. “Ridgeley, this is my daughter May,” he went on, when they had dismounted. “May, you’ve heard me talk of this young man – we were shipmates on board the Amatikulu. Why, what’s the matter?”
For Gerard was staring in astonishment, and the girl’s blue eyes were opening wide with the same emotion, while a slight colour came into her face. And in those blue eyes Gerard recognised the identical pair which had beamed approval on the deft manner in which he had reduced the odds against the sorely beset Zulu.
“Why, we’ve met before, father, only we didn’t know who we were then,” she answered. “How do you do, Mr Ridgeley? Welcome to Doorn Draai.”
Gerard, in a sort of waking dream, took the hand extended to him – in no wise the sharer of the girl’s quiet self-possession. To think that the owner of those blue eyes which had been in his thoughts a great deal since that chance meeting, should turn out to be old Kingsland’s daughter! And again, the fact that they had dwelt in his thoughts was, considering his age, enough to play havoc with his composure on finding himself thus suddenly and unexpectedly face to face with their owner.
“Met before, have you?” echoed Mr Kingsland, in some surprise.
“Why, of course we have,” said a male voice in the background. “How d’you do, Mr Ridgeley!”
And Gerard found himself shaking hands with the other occupant of the buggy on that memorable evening.
“Been keeping up your boxing since then, eh?” laughed Tom Kingsland. “Why, governor, this is the man who floored those two niggers so neatly. I told you about it, you remember, when we were coming back from Maritzburg.”
“Ah, to be sure, to be sure. He can take care of himself anywhere now, I should think,” said the older man, kindly.
And Gerard, though somewhat shy and embarrassed at finding himself a sort of point of general observation, could not resist a feeling of elation over the consciousness that he stood well in the opinion of his new friends.
Then, after a brief rest, during which Dawes and Mr Kingsland put away a glass of grog together and smoked a pipe or two, they set out for a look round. And then for the first time Gerard was able to take in the place – for at the time of his arrival he had had no eyes for anything but one of its inhabitants. The house, a roomy, one-storeyed building, with a stoep and verandah, stood against the slope of the hill. A little distance off stood the sheep and cattle-kraals, and the huts of the native servants. Below, on the bank of a small watercourse, was a large bit of enclosed and cultivated land, and beside this a fruit orchard.
“I’m afraid it’s a little late for fruit,” said Tom Kingsland, as they strolled through the latter. “There are still a few peaches left, though, and any amount of figs.”
“You can’t grow peaches and grapes like this out-of-doors in England?” said May. “I suppose you hardly ever see such a thing there except under glass.”
“Oh yes – on walls,” said Gerard.
And then, as they wandered on beneath the pleasant shade of the over-arching fig trees, and down by a quince hedge spangled with yellow fruit, or again emerged upon a water-hole where a colony of finks dashed hither and thither chattering in alarm, while their globular nests, hanging like oranges from the boughs above the water, swung and jerked at a rate which promised badly for the eggs they might contain – the girl plied him with all manner of questions about England and the life there. And, lo, when they had laughed over each other’s mistakes and misconceptions with regard to their respective countries, it seemed as if they had known each other all their lives. Certain it was that to Gerard that walk seemed the most delicious he had ever taken. But it could not last for ever, and so they had to return to the house and to dinner.
There they found Mr Kingsland’s other son, who was duly introduced to Gerard. Arthur Kingsland was very like his brother Tom, and both were fine specimens of young colonial manhood. They could ride anything, follow spoor, hit any mark at most astonishing ranges, and were afraid of nothing. The reputation of Gerard’s feats, which had already reached them, was a sure passport to their favour, and accordingly they soon became the very best of friends.
“Heard anything more about the Zulu question, Arthur?” said Mr Kingsland during dinner to his youngest son, who had been out on horseback since daybreak.
“Only the usual lie – Cetywayo is going to sweep in and eat us all up at a minute’s notice. Another yarn is that he’s going to drive all the Boers out of the disputed territory.”
“It’s just possible there may be some disturbance there,” said Mr Kingsland. “Still, Cetywayo is much too shrewd a man to declare regular war against the Transvaal.”
“Well, our route lies right through that same disputed territory,” said Dawes. “What do you think, Ridgeley? Like to get into a scrimmage with a Zulu impi?”
“Mr Ridgeley is pretty good at fighting Kafirs, I should say,” put in May, slyly, before he had time to reply.
“Oh, I’m afraid I shan’t hear the end of that little difference in a hurry,” said Gerard, laughing ruefully. “I rather wish I had left Sobuza to fight his own battles.”
“How can you say that?” said May. “Are you so utterly devoid of imagination? Why, you rescued the man twice on the same day! That means that he is to have some influence on your fortunes. You are going up into the Zulu country now. You are sure to see him again.”
“Maybe only to get an assegai put into him if he does,” cut in Tom. “Isn’t there a proverb, that if you save a fellow’s life he’s bound to play you a shady trick?”
“Be quiet, you wet blanket,” retorted the girl. “I foresee different things. I foresee that the Zulu will in some way or other turn up again, and that he will have an influence in Mr Ridgeley’s destinies.”
How true this was fated to prove it was little that either of them thought at the time.
The afternoon was spent very much as had been the morning, strolling around looking about the farm, for it was a slack time just then and there was not much doing. Towards sundown Tom Kingsland suggested they should go down to a water-hole and try for a shot at a duck, an idea which Gerard cordially endorsed, and in the sequel greatly distinguished himself, considering his want of practice with the gun, for the pair of ducks which they brought home represented one apiece. And then, in the evening, while Mr Kingsland and Dawes smoked their pipes on the stoep, the young people gathered round the piano, and Gerard thought he had never heard anything so entrancingly delicious in his life as May’s fresh clear voice lifted up in song. Then – all too soon for him – had come bedtime, and in the morning an early start to rejoin the waggons.
Before Gerard turned in Mr Kingsland followed him to his room for a few words.
“Well, Ridgeley, so you’re going to make another start, this time as an up-country trader. You’ve had a few ups and downs already, it appears; and maybe there’ll come a time when you’ll thank your stars you have.”
“I do that already, Mr Kingsland, for otherwise I should never have found myself launched on this undertaking. What a good fellow Dawes is!”
“He is – he is. But what I was going to say is this. It’ll do you no harm to get an insight into waggon travel and veldt life, and the native trade and the natives themselves. But a sensible fellow like you must see that that sort of thing isn’t going to last a man all his life; and, indeed, it oughtn’t to. It isn’t good for any man to become a confirmed wanderer, a sort of rolling stone. So don’t let this trip unsettle you, or turn your mind from the idea of going in for hard and regular work. Turn it to the best possible account you can while you’re on it, but make up your mind that it isn’t going to last, and that when you come back your plan is to settle down to regular work. You are made of far better stuff than to slide into the mere knockabout, harum-scarum adventurer, as some of these up-country going chaps are only too ready to do, especially when they begin young. So keep that before your mind is my advice to you. And now I dare say you’re wondering whether you are ever going to get to bed, or whether a certain prosy old fellow intends to keep preaching to you quite all night. So, good night, my lad. I won’t say goodbye, for we shall most of us be up before you start. Good night; I need hardly say I wish you every success.”
