The Claw Part 14

"Oh, I hope not. Do you think you ought to see a doctor, Deirdre? Dr Abingdon here is quite clever they say, though he does look such an old _roue_. But Jand, in Salisbury, is the best man. Even Dr Jim goes to him when he is ill."

"I am quite well, Judy." I got up from the table and looked out of the window. I felt as if I could die of weariness and the sick blankness of life. Across the square near Anthony Kinsella's hut a group of men stood talking animatedly. I turned away with my hand to my head. I wished I might never see any more men for a thousand years--and yet--

"I am quite well, Judy, but my head aches. I think I will go for a long walk. Perhaps that will do me good."

"Well, I can't offer to come with you, my dear. Apparently I am to have the pleasure of doing my own housework to-day--but I shall go out first and see if Colonel Blow can't spare me one of the Government boys. It is ridiculous to be left like this."

Mrs Valetta was still standing in the dining-room with that dry smile on her lips when I pa.s.sed through with my hat on, but she did not offer to accompany me.

I walked and walked and walked--over the stubbly bleached gra.s.s, through the towns.h.i.+p, past the outermost huts, across the rutted dusty main road to the river that wound itself halfway round the town. When the freshness of the morning was long past, and the fierce heat of midday was beating down on me from above, and surging up through the soles of my shoes from the earth, I found at last a place of shelter on the sweeping sunlit plain. Between two upright boulders almost on the river bank there was a little cleft of shadow lined with moss and small, harsh-leaved fern, and there I flung myself down and unburdened my heart of its weight of tears. I wept until I had no more tears, until it seemed that last night's moonlit madness must be washed away, all Anthony Kinsella's scorching kisses from my lips, all his treachery from my memory. Only the young know the exquisite tragedy and solace of tears: of broken sobs that come shuddering up from the soul to the lips; that are of the body and yet most terribly of the spirit; that rack and choke and blur out the beauty of life; that afterwards bring a brief but exquisite peace.

Yes, afterwards a certain peace stole over my wretched spirit; I could watch in an impersonal way a tiny purple lizard which lay flat upon a near stone searching me with beady, curious eyes; and I could feel my unprotected feet and ankles which had not found the shade aching and burning in the sun's heat.

But I knew it to be only the peace of utter weariness--the peace of a twilight hour after the first black, bitter rain of a stormy season that must be faced. The struggle, the pain, the strain would rea.s.sert themselves later. Still, I was glad of the respite. It gave me time to think, at least; to consider desperately what I should do, how I should bear myself, how I could best hide my pain from the world.

It seemed to me then that I was very friendless and alone in that wide sun-scorched land of pale gra.s.ses and turquoise skies--far from my dead mother and my brother and the friends of my life. Fate had dumped me on the African veldt and suffering had overtaken me. All the things I had known and loved--pictures, books, marbles, dim churches, and magnificent music--seemed useless to help or comfort me. These things do not matter to Africa; and when one is dumped on a burning African plain they do not seem to matter to life.

After long, painful thought I fell to trying to form some decision, some wretched plan by which to spare myself more wretchedness. First, I knew that I must see Anthony Kinsella at once. I must find out how deep the wound was he had dealt me before I could burn it out. I must meet him calmly, and calmly demand the truth from him. If these things I had heard were false then he must instantly proclaim the truth to every one, for I would not bear for myself or for him the sneers and suspicions of the world.

If they were true, these things--true that he was married, true that he had been the lover of married women, that he had mocked me with false words--if it were true--ah! G.o.d, if it were true! I searched my heart for scorn and contempt to pour upon Anthony Kinsella from my eyes and at least from the expression of my lips, _if it were true_--and I could find none! I could not find scorn and hatred anywhere in me for the man to whom I had given my heart and soul a few hours before. I could not remember anything that I had ever seen him do or heard him say that merited my scorn. I had nothing against him but women's scandalous tales. And surely, I thought, a man who was bad to the core as they said he was must have betrayed himself to me by some look or deed. But never, never! I could remember nothing but kind words, wise words, just words, quiet, deliberate, courageous actions (even his punishment of the driver I knew to be just), fearless smiles, straight, intent glances.

And then, his burning, pa.s.sionate words on my lips. Surely no lover's words were ever more knightly than his. Swearing with our love to cleanse his heart of old sins--vowing by old creeds and lost dreams!

Remembering these things, living them over and over again, I knew at last that I could never scorn Anthony Kinsella. It was not only that I loved as a lover. There was a look in his eyes that pulled at the mother-spirit in me and made my spirit croon a song over him and forgive him for the sake of his boyhood all the sins he had ever committed.

There was a look about his mouth that made my spirit kneel to him.

There was a note in his voice that when I remembered it saying "Deirdre, I love you!" drove spirit out altogether and left me only a flaming, glowing woman in the arms of the man I loved. I could never scorn him.

But I could still doubt, and doubting, scorn myself. That was a new form of torture that a.s.sailed me; scorning myself for his easy triumph over my heart and lips. Then I could have torn the heart out of my breast and flung it into the river close by--it hurt so; then I could have crushed beneath the boulders that towered over me the hands that had flown so readily to his clasp--I hated them so; then I could have laid my proud head in the dust for the feet of women to trample over.

Ah! I suffered through the terrible hours of that long day, lying there in the suns.h.i.+ne, my face to the hard brown bosom of the old witch who had already clawed and torn my heart. Over and over the dreary round of words and facts and doubts and fears my mind travelled, until it was sick and numbed and knew only one thing clearly, that I must see Anthony Kinsella. I had a wound that would kill me if it were not treated at once. It could not be covered over with the thin skin of indifference; there was poison in it; it must be seared out with a red-hot iron.

Afterwards, perhaps it would heal.

Slowly and vaguely I retraced my steps to the town. It was late in the afternoon. The sun was sinking, but the heat still came up overwhelmingly from under foot, and I felt faint for want of food. I had gone farther than I knew into the veldt, and I was almost fainting with exhaustion when at last I reached the first huts of the towns.h.i.+p.

The sun had gone then, leaving the skies primrose coloured--a pale, lovely light, that yet had something ominous and sinister in it.

To my vague astonishment I found the place humming like a beehive and alive with moving figures. Horses were being walked up and down the streets, saddled and loaded with rolls of blankets and provisions.

Waggons stood before the doors of shops and hotels being loaded with boxes and cases of things. Men were rus.h.i.+ng in and out of their huts, cleaning straps, shouting to each other and behaving in an odd way.

They seemed to be doing everything for themselves. There was not a black boy to be seen. I never thought little Fort George could wear such an air of business, either. What could have happened? Even in my misery of mind I found room for curiosity at these things. Several men we had entertained the night before pa.s.sed me, but they barely noticed me--merely lifted their hats and pa.s.sed hastily on. I did not feel annoyed, but I knew there must be something very important in the wind to make them behave so indifferently, and, with such strength as I had left, I quickened my steps and arrived home in a few minutes.

Mrs Valetta met me at the door. Her face was composed and cold as a stone, but very white.

"What is it?" I asked fearfully. "What is the matter?"

"Oh, nothing," she said, and smiled with a ghostly, bitter smile. "Only the war at last! The final batch of horses have arrived and the men are off to Matabeleland."

I stood speechless. A vision of Anthony Kinsella's face flashed across my mind. Now I knew why Mrs Valetta looked like that. I turned away from her, but she followed me into the house.

"Where is Judy?"

I could scarcely believe my ears at her answer:

"She left for Salisbury this morning with Mrs Brand. As soon as you had gone she went out to look for house-boys, and met Mrs Brand, who was rus.h.i.+ng to tell us the news and that she had determined to make a dash for Salisbury in her Cape cart before any one commandeered her horses. Mrs Saurin being in a great state of mind about her husband of course begged to go with her, and they set off just after eleven while all the men were at the Court House attending a defence meeting called by Colonel Blow. It is rather daring of them to go off like that, but Constance Brand is a dauntless creature and they'll be all right."

"But have they gone alone?"

"They have Jim with them--one of George Brand's Cape boys--quite trustworthy. All the Mashona boys ran away during the night; there's not one left in the town. It is supposed that they got messages from their chiefs to return to their kraals. But it is not they who have risen, you know. They are poor friendly things without any fight in them. It is the Matabele whom we have to fear--cruel, ferocious brutes--"

"Did Judy leave no message for me?" I quite understood that Judy should want to get back to d.i.c.k, but it seemed to me a cold-blooded thing to leave me to my fate like this, and in the hands of Mrs Valetta!

"Oh, yes! She left a number of messages for you which I can't remember.

However, the gist of them all is that you must abide under my wing until you can rejoin her--I am to be your chaperon," she finished, with her dry-lipped smile.

"I should think she and Mrs Brand are more in need of one than I." My tone was glacial.

"Oh! they'll be all right. The danger doesn't lie in their direction but over to the north. Then there are a lot of Salisbury men leaving here tonight to join the Salisbury Column for the front, and Colonel Blow antic.i.p.ates that they will pick up Mrs Brand's cart very soon and see them safely in. The Port George men leave here to-morrow to join the Salisbury and Victoria Columns at the Iron Mine Hill."

"All of them?" I asked dully. As a matter of course I knew that Anthony would be the first to go.

"All but the lame and the halt and the blind, who will stay behind to protect us," said she.

Mrs Skeffington-Smythe and Anna Cleeve now arrived. The latter's striped grey eyes were blurred with tears, and her lips were pale, but the soft pink bloom on her cheeks was stationary.

"Isn't it terrible!" she cried. "Anthony Kinsella's just ridden off with ten men."

Mrs Valetta stood up abruptly.

"Where to?"

"To Linkwater. It appears there are three men and some Dutch women there who were warned long ago to come in, but would not."

"But Linkwater is about seventy miles away."

"I know," wailed Mrs Skeffington-Smythe. "They will be gone four or five days, if they ever get back at all. It is in the direction of Buluwayo, you know, right in the danger zone. Isn't it awful? They may easily get cut off and killed--just for the sake of two or three dirty Dutch people. To take off our best men like that! Tony Kinsella called for volunteers, and Gerry Deshon has gone, and young Dennison, Mr Hunloke, Mr Stair, and all the nicest men--utterly ridiculous, I call it, and so unkind. Don't _we_ need defending, I'd like to know?"

"Oh, we'll be all right and so will they," said Anna Cleeve, in an indifferent sort of way, but her eyes had a strained look. Mrs Skeffington-Smythe, who had seated herself on the sofa, carefully took from the front of her gown a little lace-edged handkerchief and a tiny hand-gla.s.s, and holding it up in front of her began to push back the tears into her eyes as fast as they came out. I never saw such an odd proceeding before, and I watched it with the greatest fascination. A big tear would gather and form on the lower eye-lashes, but before it had time to get through she would receive half of it on her handkerchief and push the rest of it back into her eyes, going from one to the other with the greatest speed. She never allowed any to escape and stain her cheeks--perhaps because there was a great deal of what looked like shoe-black mingled with the tears. All the time she was whimpering in a dismal voice:

"My poor Monty! I wired to him this morning that he is _not_ to go to the front--he is not strong enough--but they said the wire was so busy my wire couldn't go through to-day, and I _know_ he'll go--he's so brave--he's sure to do something frightfully distinguished and daring and get killed doing it. What will be the use of the Victoria Cross to me, I'd like to know, if I lose him?"

"Now, Porkie," said Anna Cleeve, "I shall have to spank you if you don't stop that. Monty won't come to any harm--he's just as well able to look after himself as any other selfish brute of a man. You are nothing but a little fretful porcupine. Don't cry any more now, else I shan't love you. Come back to the tent and lie down. What's the matter with you is that you want rest."

When they had gone Mrs Valetta said impatiently to me:

"Monty Skeffington-Smythe is a little drunken wretch, and the very best thing he could do would be to get killed decently. It would be the first fine act he ever performed and Nina Skeffington-Smythe knows it."

"Then surely she has reason enough to weep," said I, and to myself could only drearily repeat the words, "They will be gone four or five days, if they ever get back at all."

The hour for the march into Matabeleland had struck. For months the British South Africa Company had, with the sanction of the English Government, been preparing to take the field against Lobengula, but the preparations had moved slowly for the waggons and horses needed for such an expedition had to be brought hundreds of miles, arms and stores had to be provided, and men who were not soldiers by profession got into fighting shape by those who were. I made the startling discovery that every man in Fort George had for months been rising in the cool hours of dawn to engage in drill, gun-practice, shooting, and manoeuvring with ox-waggons, the last quite an important feature of warfare with natives, the waggons being used to form forts or _laagers_ in which to take shelter from native attacks and from which to attack in turn.