TROOPER PETER HALKET OF MASHONALAND

by Olive Schreiner

Author of "Dreams, " "Dream Life and Real Life, " "The Story of an AfricanFarm, " etc. 

Colonial Edition

(A photographic plate at the front of the book shows three peoplehanging from a tree by their necks. Around them stand eight men, lookingnot at all troubled by their participation in the scene. Of this eventall the survivors appear to be white, the victims black. The plate istitled "From a Photograph taken in Matabeleland. " S. A. )

To a Great Good Man, Sir George Grey, Once Governor of the Cape Colony, who, during his rule in South Africa, bound to himself the Dutchmen, Englishmen, and Natives he governed, byan uncorruptible justice and a broad humanity; and who is rememberedamong us today as representing the noblest attributes of an ImperialRule. 

 "Our low life was the level's and the night's; He's for the morning. "

Olive Schreiner. 

 19, Russell Road, Kensington, W. , February, 1897. 

 Aardvark - The great anteater. Cape Smoke - A very inferior brandy made in Cape Colony. Kopje - Little hillock. Kraal - A Kaffir encampment. Mealies - Maize (corn). Riem - A thong of undressed leather universally used in South Africa. Vatje of Old Dop - A little cask of Cape brandy. Veld - Open Country. 

Chapter I. 

It was a dark night; a chill breath was coming from the east; not enoughto disturb the blaze of Trooper Peter Halket's fire, yet enough to makeit quiver. He sat alone beside it on the top of a kopje. 

All about was an impenetrable darkness; not a star was visible in theblack curve over his head. 

He had been travelling with a dozen men who were taking provisions ofmealies and rice to the next camp. He had been sent out to act as scoutalong a low range of hills, and had lost his way. Since eight in themorning he had wandered among long grasses, and ironstone kopjes, andstunted bush, and had come upon no sign of human habitation, but theremains of a burnt kraal, and a down-trampled and now uncultivatedmealie field, where a month before the Chartered Company's forces haddestroyed a native settlement. 

Three times in the day it had appeared to him that he had returned tothe very spot from which he had started; nor was it his wish to travelvery far, for he knew his comrades would come back to look for him, tothe neighbourhood where he had last been seen, when it was found at theevening camping ground that he did not appear. 

Trooper Peter Halket was very weary. He had eaten nothing all day; andhad touched little of the contents of a small flask of Cape brandyhe carried in his breast pocket, not knowing when it would again bereplenished. 

As night drew near he determined to make his resting place on the top ofone of the kopjes, which stood somewhat alone and apart from the others. He could not easily be approached there, without his knowing it. He hadnot much fear of the natives; their kraals had been destroyed and theirgranaries burnt for thirty miles round, and they themselves had fled:but he feared, somewhat, the lions, which he had never seen, but ofwhich he had heard, and which might be cowering in the long grasses andbrushwood at the kopje's foot:--and he feared, vaguely, he hardly knewwhat, when he looked forward to his first long night alone in the veld. 

By the time the sun had set he had gathered a little pile of stumps andbranches on the top of the kopje. He intended to keep a fire burning allnight; and as the darkness began to settle down he lit it. It mightbe his friends would see it from far, and come for him early in themorning; and wild beasts would hardly approach him while he knelt besideit; and of the natives he felt there was little fear. 

He built up the fire; and determined if it were possible to keep awakethe whole night beside it. 

He was a slight man of middle height, with a sloping forehead and paleblue eyes: but the jaws were hard set, and the thin lips of the largemouth were those of a man who could strongly desire the material good oflife, and enjoy it when it came his way. Over the lower half of the facewere scattered a few soft white hairs, the growth of early manhood. 

From time to time he listened intently for possible sounds from thedistance where his friends might be encamped, and might fire off theirguns at seeing his light; or he listened yet more intently for soundsnearer at hand: but all was still, except for the occasional crackingof the wood in his own fire, and the slight whistle of the breeze as itcrept past the stones on the kopje. He doubled up his great hat and putit in the pocket of his overcoat, and put on a little two-pointed caphis mother had made for him, which fitted so close that only one lockof white hair hung out over his forehead. He turned up the collar of hiscoat to shield his neck and ears, and threw it open in front that theblaze of the fire might warm him. He had known many nights colder thanthis when he had sat around the camp fire with his comrades, talking ofthe niggers they had shot or the kraals they had destroyed, or grumblingover their rations; but tonight the chill seemed to creep into his verybones. 

The darkness of the night above him, and the silence of the veld abouthim, oppressed him. At times he even wished he might hear the cry of ajackal or of some larger beast of prey in the distance; and he wishedthat the wind would blow a little louder, instead of making that littlewheezing sound as it passed the corners of the stones. He looked downat his gun, which lay cocked ready on the ground at his right side;and from time to time he raised his hand automatically and fingered thecartridges in his belt. Then he stretched out his small wiry hands tothe fire and warmed them. It was only half past ten, and it seemed tohim he had been sitting here ten hours at the least. 

After a while he threw two more large logs on the fire, and took theflask out of his pocket. He examined it carefully by the firelight tosee how much it held: then he took a small draught, and examined itagain to see how much it had fallen; and put it back in his breastpocket. 

Then Trooper Peter Halket fell to thinking. 

It was not often that he thought. On patrol and sitting round camp fireswith the other men about him there was no time for it; and Peter Halkethad never been given to much thinking. He had been a careless boy at thevillage school; and though, when he left, his mother paid the villageapothecary to read learned books with him at night on history andscience, he had not retained much of them. As a rule he lived in theworld immediately about him, and let the things of the moment impingeon him, and fall off again as they would, without much reflection. But tonight on the kopje he fell to thinking, and his thoughts shapedthemselves into connected chains. 

He wondered first whether his mother would ever get the letter he hadposted the week before, and whether it would be brought to her cottageor she would go to the post office to fetch it. And then, he fell tothinking of the little English village where he had been born, and wherehe had grown up. He saw his mother's fat white ducklings creep in andout under the gate, and waddle down to the little pond at the back ofthe yard; he saw the school house that he had hated so much as aboy, and from which he had so often run away to go a-fishing, ora-bird's-nesting. He saw the prints on the school house wall on whichthe afternoon sun used to shine when he was kept in; Jesus of Judeablessing the children, and one picture just over the door where he hungwith his arms stretched out and the blood dropping from his feet. ThenPeter Halket thought of the tower at the ruins which he had climbed sooften for birds' eggs; and he saw his mother standing at her cottagegate when he came home in the evening, and he felt her arms round hisneck as she kissed him; but he felt her tears on his cheek, because hehad run away from school all day; and he seemed to be making apologiesto her, and promising he never would do it again if only she would notcry. He had often thought of her since he left her, on board ship, andwhen he was working with the prospectors, and since he had joined thetroop; but it had been in a vague way; he had not distinctly seen andfelt her. But tonight he wished for her as he used to when he wasa small boy and lay in his bed in the next room, and saw her shadowthrough the door as she bent over her wash-tub earning the money whichwas to feed and clothe him. He remembered how he called her and she cameand tucked him in and called him "Little Simon, " which was his secondname and had been his father's, and which she only called him when hewas in bed at night, or when he was hurt. 

He sat there staring into the blaze. He resolved he would make a greatdeal of money, and she should live with him. He would build a largehouse in the West End of London, the biggest that had ever been seen, and another in the country, and they should never work any more. 

Peter Halket sat as one turned into stone, staring into the fire. 

All men made money when they came to South Africa, --Barney Barnato, Rhodes--they all made money out of the country, eight millions, twelvemillions, twenty-six millions, forty millions; why should not he!

Peter Halket started suddenly and listened. But it was only the windcoming up the kopje like a great wheezy beast creeping upwards; and helooked back into the fire. 

He considered his business prospects. When he had served his timeas volunteer he would have a large piece of land given him, and theMashonas and Matabeles would have all their land taken away from them intime, and the Chartered Company would pass a law that they had to workfor the white men; and he, Peter Halket, would make them work for him. He would make money. 

Then he reflected on what he should do with the land if it were no goodand he could not make anything out of it. Then, he should have tostart a syndicate; called the Peter Halket Gold, or the Peter HalketIron-mining, or some such name, Syndicate. Peter Halket was not veryclear as to how it ought to be started; but he felt certain that he andsome other men would have to take shares. They would not have to pay forthem. And then they would get some big man in London to take shares. Heneed not pay for them; they would give them to him; and then the companywould be floated. No one would have to pay anything; it was just thename--"The Peter Halket Gold Mining Company, Limited. " It would floatin London; and people there who didn't know the country would buy theshares; THEY would have to give ready money for them, of course; perhapsfifteen pounds a share when they were up!--Peter Halket's eyes blinkedas he looked into the fire. --And then, when the market was up, he, Peter Halket, would sell out all his shares. If he gave himself only sixthousand and sold them each for ten pounds, then he, Peter Halket, wouldhave sixty thousand pounds! And then he would start another company, andanother. 

Peter Halket struck his knee softly with his hand. 

That was the great thing--"Always sell out at the right time. "That point Peter Halket was very clear on. He had heard it so oftendiscussed. Give some shares to men with big names, and sell out: theycan sell out too at the right time. 

Peter Halket stroked his knee thoughtfully. 

And then the other people, that bought the shares for cash! Well, theycould sell out too; they could all sell out!

Then Peter Halket's mind got a little hazy. The matter was getting toodifficult for him, like a rule of three sum at school when he could notsee the relation between the two first terms and the third. Well, ifthey didn't like to sell out at the right time, it was their own faults. Why didn't they? He, Peter Halket, did not feel responsible for them. Everyone knew that you had to sell out at the right time. If they didn'tchoose to sell out at the right time, well, they didn't. "It's theshares that you sell, not the shares you keep, that make the money. "

But if they couldn't sell them?

Here Peter Halket hesitated. --Well, the British Government would have tobuy them, if they were so bad no one else would; and then no one wouldlose. "The British Government can't let British share-holders suffer. "He'd heard that often enough. The British taxpayer would have to pay forthe Chartered Company, for the soldiers, and all the other things, if ITcouldn't, and take over the shares if it went smash, because there werelords and dukes and princes connected with it. And why shouldn't theypay for his company? He would have a lord in it too!

Peter Halket looked into the fire completely absorbed in hiscalculations. --Peter Halket, Esq. , Director of the Peter Halket GoldMining Company, Limited. Then, when he had got thousands, PeterHalket, Esq. , M. P. Then, when he had millions, Sir Peter Halket, PrivyCouncillor!

He reflected deeply, looking into the blaze. If you had five or sixmillions you could go where you liked and do what you liked. You couldgo to Sandringham. You could marry anyone. No one would ask what yourmother had been; it wouldn't matter. 

A curious dull sinking sensation came over Peter Halket; and he drew inhis broad leathern belt two holes tighter. 

Even if you had only two millions you could have a cook and a valet, togo with you when you went into the veld or to the wars; and you couldhave as much champagne and other things as you liked. At that momentthat seemed to Peter more important than going to Sandringham. 

He took out his flask of Cape Smoke, and drew a tiny draught from it. 

Other men had come to South Africa with nothing, and had madeeverything! Why should not he?

He stuck small branches under the two great logs, and a glorious flameburst out. Then he listened again intently. The wind was falling and thenight was becoming very still. It was a quarter to twelve now. His backached, and he would have liked to lie down; but he dared not, for fearhe should drop asleep. He leaned forward with his hands between hiscrossed knees, and watched the blaze he had made. 

Then, after a while, Peter Halket's thoughts became less clear: theybecame at last, rather, a chain of disconnected pictures, paintingthemselves in irrelevant order on his brain, than a line of connectedideas. Now, as he looked into the crackling blaze, it seemed to be oneof the fires they had make to burn the natives' grain by, and they werethrowing in all they could not carry away: then, he seemed to see hismother's fat ducks waddling down the little path with the green grasson each side. Then, he seemed to see his huts where he lived with theprospectors, and the native women who used to live with him; and hewondered where the women were. Then--he saw the skull of an old Mashonablown off at the top, the hands still moving. He heard the loud cry ofthe native women and children as they turned the maxims on to the kraal;and then he heard the dynamite explode that blew up a cave. Then againhe was working a maxim gun, but it seemed to him it was more like thereaping machine he used to work in England, and that what was going downbefore it was not yellow corn, but black men's heads; and he thoughtwhen he looked back they lay behind him in rows, like the corn insheaves. 

The logs sent up a flame clear and high, and, where they split, showeda burning core inside: the cracking and spluttering sounded in his brainlike the discharge of a battery of artillery. Then he thought suddenlyof a black woman he and another man caught alone in the bush, her babyon her back, but young and pretty. Well, they didn't shoot her!--and ablack woman wasn't white! His mother didn't understand these things;it was all so different in England from South Africa. You couldn'tbe expected to do the same sort of things here as there. He had anunpleasant feeling that he was justifying himself to his mother, andthat he didn't know how to. 

He leaned further and further forward: so far at last, that the littlewhite lock of his hair which hung out under his cap was almost singed bythe fire. His eyes were still open, but the lids drooped over them, andhis hands hung lower and lower between his knees. There was no pictureleft on his brain now, but simply an impress of the blazing logs beforehim. 

Then, Trooper Peter Halket started. He sat up and listened. The wind hadgone; there was not a sound: but he listened intently. The fire burnt upinto the still air, two clear red tongues of flame. 

Then, on the other side of the kopje he heard the sound of footstepsascending; the slow even tread of bare feet coming up. 

The hair on Trooper Peter Halket's forehead slowly stiffened itself. Hehad no thought of escaping; he was paralyzed with dread. He took up hisgun. A deadly coldness crept from his feet to his head. He had worked amaxim gun in a fight when some hundred natives fell and only one whiteman had been wounded; and he had never known fear; but tonight hisfingers were stiff on the lock of his gun. He knelt low, tendinga little to one side of the fire, with his gun ready. A stone halfsheltered him from anyone coming up from the other side of the kopje, and the instant the figure appeared over the edge he intended to fire. 

Then, the thought flashed on him; what, and if it were one of his owncomrades come in search of him, and no bare-footed enemy! The anguish ofsuspense wrung his heart; for an instant he hesitated. Then, in a coldagony of terror, he cried out, "Who is there?"

And a voice replied in clear, slow English, "A friend. "

Peter Halket almost let his gun drop, in the revulsion of feeling. Thecold sweat which anguish had restrained burst out in large drops on hisforehead; but he still knelt holding his gun. 

"What do you want?" he cried out quiveringly. 

From the darkness at the edge of the kopje a figure stepped out into thefull blaze of the firelight. 

Trooper Peter Halket looked up at it. 

It was the tall figure of a man, clad in one loose linen garment, reaching lower than his knees, and which clung close about him. Hishead, arms, and feet were bare. He carried no weapon of any kind; and onhis shoulders hung heavy locks of dark hair. 

Peter Halket looked up at him with astonishment. "Are you alone?" heasked. 

"Yes, I am alone. "

Peter Halket lowered his gun and knelt up. 

"Lost your way, I suppose?" he said, still holding his weapon loosely. 

"No; I have come to ask whether I may sit beside your fire for a while. "

"Certainly, certainly!" said Peter, eyeing the stranger's dresscarefully, still holding his gun, but with the hand off the lock. "I'mconfoundedly glad of any company. It's a beastly night for anyone to beout alone. Wonder you find your way. Sit down! sit down!" Peter lookedintently at the stranger; then he put his gun down at his side. 

The stranger sat down on the opposite side of the fire. His complexionwas dark; his arms and feet were bronzed; but his aquiline features, andthe domed forehead, were not of any South African race. 

"One of the Soudanese Rhodes brought with him from the north, Isuppose?" said Peter, still eyeing him curiously. 

"No; Cecil Rhodes has had nothing to do with my coming here, " said thestranger. 

"Oh--" said Peter. "You didn't perhaps happen to come across a companyof men today, twelve white men and seven coloured, with three cart loadsof provisions? We were taking them to the big camp, and I got partedfrom my troop this morning. I've not been able to find them, though I'vebeen seeking for them ever since. "

The stranger warmed his hands slowly at the fire; then he raised hishead:--"They are camped at the foot of those hills tonight, " he said, pointing with his hand into the darkness at the left. "Tomorrow earlythey will be here, before the sun has risen. "

"Oh, you've met them, have you!" said Peter joyfully; "that's why youweren't surprised at finding me here. Take a drop!" He took the smallflask from his pocket and held it out. "I'm sorry there's so little, buta drop will keep the cold out. "

The stranger bowed his head; but thanked and declined. 

Peter raised the flask to his lips and took a small draught; thenreturned it to his pocket. The stranger folded his arms about his knees, and looked into the fire. 

"Are you a Jew?" asked Peter, suddenly; as the firelight fell full onthe stranger's face. 

"Yes; I am a Jew. "

"Ah, " said Peter, "that's why I wasn't able to make out at first whatnation you could be of; your dress, you know--" Then he stopped, andsaid, "Trading here, I suppose? Which country do you come from; are youa Spanish Jew?"

"I am a Jew of Palestine. "

"Ah!" said Peter; "I haven't seen many from that part yet. I came outwith a lot on board ship; and I've seen Barnato and Beit; but they'renot very much like you. I suppose it's coming from Palestine makes thedifference. "

All fear of the stranger had now left Peter Halket. "Come a littlenearer the fire, " he said, "you must be cold, you haven't too muchwraps. I'm chill in this big coat. " Peter Halket pushed his gun a littlefurther away from him; and threw another large log on the fire. "I'msorry I haven't anything to eat to offer you; but I haven't had anythingmyself since last night. It's beastly sickening, being out like thiswith nothing to eat. Wouldn't have thought a fellow'd feel so bad afteronly a day of it. Have you ever been out without grub?" said Petercheerfully, warming his hands at the blaze. 

"Forty days and nights, " said the stranger. 

"Forty days! Ph--e--ew!" said Peter. "You must have have had a lot todrink, or you wouldn't have stood it. I was feeling blue enough when youturned up, but I'm better now, warmer. "

Peter Halket re-arranged the logs on the fire. 

"In the employ of the Chartered Company, I suppose?" said Peter, lookinginto the fire he had made. 

"No, " said the stranger; "I have nothing to do with the CharteredCompany. "

"Oh, " said Peter, "I don't wonder, then, that things aren't looking verysmart with you! There's not too much cakes and ale up here for thosethat do belong to it, if they're not big-wigs, and none at all for thosewho don't. I tried it when I first came up here. I was with a prospectorwho was hooked on to the Company somehow, but I worked on my own accountfor the prospector by the day. I tell you what, it's not the menwho work up here who make the money; it's the big-wigs who get theconcessions!"

Peter felt exhilarated by the presence of the stranger. That one unarmedman had robbed him of all fear. 

Seeing that the stranger did not take up the thread of conversation, hewent on after a time: "It wasn't such a bad life, though. I only wish Iwas back there again. I had two huts to myself, and a couple of niggergirls. It's better fun, " said Peter, after a while, "having these blackwomen than whites. The whites you've got to support, but the niggerssupport you! And when you've done with them you can just get rid ofthem. I'm all for the nigger gals. " Peter laughed. But the stranger satmotionless with his arms about his knees. 

"You got any girls?" said Peter. "Care for niggers?"

"I love all women, " said the stranger, refolding his arms about hisknees. 

"Oh, you do, do you?" said Peter. "Well, I'm pretty sick of them. I hadbother enough with mine, " he said genially, warming his hands by thefire, and then interlocking the fingers and turning the palms towardsthe blaze as one who prepares to enjoy a good talk. "One girl was onlyfifteen; I got her cheap from a policeman who was living with her, andshe wasn't much. But the other, by Gad! I never saw another nigger likeher; well set up, I tell you, and as straight as that--" said Peter, holding up his finger in the firelight. "She was thirty if she was aday. Fellows don't generally fancy women that age; they like slips ofgirls. But I set my heart on her the day I saw her. She belonged to thechap I was with. He got her up north. There was a devil of a row abouthis getting her, too; she'd got a nigger husband and two children;didn't want to leave them, or some nonsense of that sort: you know whatthese niggers are? Well, I tried to get the other fellow to let me haveher, but the devil a bit he would. I'd only got the other girl, and Ididn't much fancy her; she was only a child. Well, I went down Umtaliway and got a lot of liquor and stuff, and when I got back to camp Ifound them clean dried out. They hadn't had a drop of liquor in camp forten days, and the rainy season coming on and no knowing when they'd getany. Well, I'd a vatje of Old Dop as high as that--, " indicating withhis hand an object about two feet high, "and the other fellow wanted tobuy it from me. I knew two of that. I said I wanted it for myself. Heoffered me this, and he offered me that. At last I said, 'Well, just tooblige you, I give you the vatje and you give me the girl!' And sohe did. Most people wouldn't have fancied a nigger girl who'd had twonigger children, but I didn't mind; it's all the same to me. And I tellyou she worked. She made a garden, and she and the other girl worked init; I tell you I didn't need to buy a sixpence of food for them in sixmonths, and I used to sell green mealies and pumpkins to all the fellowsabout. There weren't many flies on her, I tell you. She picked upEnglish quicker than I picked up her lingo, and took to wearing a dressand shawl. "

The stranger still sat motionless, looking into the fire. 

Peter Halket reseated himself more comfortably before the fire. "Well, I came home to the huts one day, rather suddenly, you know, to fetchsomething; and what did I find? She, talking at the hut door with anigger man. Now it was my strict orders they were neither to speak aword to a nigger man at all; so I asked what it was. And she answers, ascool as can be, that he was a stranger going past on the road, and askedher to give him a drink of water. Well, I just ordered him off. I didn'tthink anything more about it. But I remember now. I saw him hangingabout the camp the day after. Well, she came to me the next day andasked me for a lot of cartridges. She'd never asked me for anythingbefore. I asked her what the devil a woman wanted with cartridges, andshe said the old nigger woman who helped carry in water to the gardensaid she couldn't stay and help her any more unless she got somecartridges to give her son who was going up north hunting elephants. Thewoman got over me to give her the cartridges because she was going tohave a kid, and she said she couldn't do the watering without help. So Igave them her. I never put two and two together. 

"Well, when I heard that the Company was going to have a row with theMatabele, I thought I'd volunteer. They said there was lots of loot tobe got, and land to be given out, and that sort of thing, and I thoughtI'd only be gone about three months. So I went. I left those womenthere, and a lot of stuff in the garden and some sugar and rice, and Itold them not to leave till I came back; and I asked the other man tokeep an eye on them. Both those women were Mashonas. They always saidthe Mashonas didn't love the Matabele; but, by God, it turned outthat they loved them better than they loved us. They've got the damnedimpertinence to say, that the Matabele oppressed them sometimes, but thewhite man oppresses them all the time!

"Well, I left those women there, " said Peter, dropping his hands on hisknees. "Mind you, I'd treated those women really well. I'd never giveneither of them one touch all the time I had them. I was the talk of allthe fellows round, the way I treated them. Well, I hadn't been gone amonth, when I got a letter from the man I worked with, the one who hadthe woman first--he's dead now, poor fellow; they found him at his hutdoor with his throat cut--and what do you think he said to me? Why, Ihadn't been gone six hours when those two women skooted! It was all thebig one. What do you think she did? She took every ounce of ball andcartridge she could find in that hut, and my old Martini-Henry, and eventhe lid off the tea-box to melt into bullets for the old muzzle-loadersthey have; and off she went, and took the young one too. The fellowwrote me they didn't touch another thing: they left the shawls anddresses I gave them kicking about the huts, and went off naked with onlytheir blankets and the ammunition on their heads. A nigger man met themtwenty miles off, and he said they were skooting up for Lo Magundi'scountry as fast as they could go. 

"And do you know, " said Peter, striking his knee, and lookingimpressively across the fire at the stranger; "what I'm as sure of asthat I'm sitting here? It's that that nigger I caught at my hut, thatday, was her nigger husband! He'd come to fetch her that time; and whenshe saw she couldn't get away without our catching her, she got thecartridges for him!" Peter paused impressively between the words. "Andnow she's gone back to him. It's for him she's taken that ammunition!"

Peter looked across the fire at the stranger, to see what impression hisstory was making. 

"I tell you what, " said Peter, "if I'd had any idea that day who thatbloody nigger was, the day I saw him standing at my door, I'd have givenhim one cartridge in the back of his head more than ever he reckonedfor!" Peter looked triumphantly at the stranger. This was his onlystory; and he had told it a score of times round the camp fire for thebenefit of some new-comer. When this point was reached, a low murmurof applause and sympathy always ran round the group: tonight there wasquiet; the stranger's large dark eyes watched the fire almost as thoughhe heard nothing. 

"I shouldn't have minded so much, " said Peter after a while, "though noman likes to have his woman taken away from him; but she was going tohave a kid in a month or two--and so was the little one for anything Iknow; she looked like it! I expect they did away with it before it came;they've no hearts, these niggers; they'd think nothing of doing thatwith a white man's child. They've no hearts; they'd rather go back to ablack man, however well you've treated them. It's all right if you getthem quite young and keep them away from their own people; but if oncea nigger woman's had a nigger man and had children by him, you might aswell try to hold a she-devil! they'll always go back. If ever I'm shot, it's as likely as not it'll be by my own gun, with my own cartridges. And she'd stand by and watch it, and cheer them on; though I never gaveher a blow all the time she was with me. But I tell you what--if ever Icome across that bloody nigger, I'll take it out of him. He won't countmany days to his year, after I've spotted him!" Peter Halket paused. It seemed to him that the eyes under their heavy, curled lashes, werelooking at something beyond him with an infinite sadness, almost as ofeyes that wept. 

"You look awfully tired, " said Peter; "wouldn't you like to lie down andsleep? You could put your head down on that stone, and I'd keep watch. "

"I have no need of sleep, " the stranger said; "I will watch with you. "

"You've been in the wars, too, I see, " said Peter, bending forward alittle, and looking at the stranger's feet. "By God! Both of them!--Andright through! You must have had a bad time of it?"

"It was very long ago, " said the stranger. 

Peter Halket threw two more logs on the fire. "Do you know, " he said, "I've been wondering ever since you came, who it was you reminded me of. It's my mother! You're not like her in the face, but when your eyes lookat me it seems to me as if it was she looking at me. Curious, isn't it?I don't know you from Adam, and you've hardly spoken a word since youcame; and yet I seem as if I'd known you all my life. " Peter moved alittle nearer him. "I was awfully afraid of you when you first came;even when I first saw you;--you aren't dressed as most of us dress, you know. But the minute the fire shone on your face I said, 'It's allright. ' Curious, isn't it?" said Peter. "I don't know you from Adam, butif you were to take up my gun and point it at me, I wouldn't move! I'dlie down here and go to sleep with my head at your feet; curious, isn'tit, when I don't know you from Adam? My name's Peter Halket. What'syours?"

But the stranger was arranging the logs on the fire. The flames shot upbright and high, and almost hid him from Peter Halket's view. 

"By gad! how they burn when you arrange them!" said Peter. 

They sat quiet in the blaze for a while. 

Then Peter said, "Did you see any niggers about yesterday? I haven'tcome across any in this part. "

"There is, " said the stranger, raising himself, "an old woman in a caveover yonder, and there is one man in the bush, ten miles from this spot. He has lived there six weeks, since you destroyed the kraal, living onroots or herbs. He was wounded in the thigh, and left for dead. He iswaiting till you have all left this part of the country that he may setout to follow his own people. His leg is not yet so strong that he maywalk fast. "

"Did you speak to him?" said Peter. 

"I took him down to the water where a large pool was. The bank was toohigh for the man to descend alone. "

"It's a lucky thing for you our fellows didn't catch you, " said Peter. "Our captain's a regular little martinet. He'd shoot you as soon as lookat you, if he saw you fooling round with a wounded nigger. It's luckyyou kept out of his way. "

"The young ravens have meat given to them, " said the stranger, liftinghimself up; "and the lions go down to the streams to drink. "

"Ah--yes--" said Peter; "but that's because we can't help it!"

They were silent again for a little while. Then Peter, seeing that thestranger showed no inclination to speak, said, "Did you hear of thespree they had up Bulawayo way, hanging those three niggers for spies? Iwasn't there myself, but a fellow who was told me they made the niggersjump down from the tree and hang themselves; one fellow wouldn't ballyjump, till they gave him a charge of buckshot in the back: and then hecaught hold of a branch with his hands and they had to shoot 'em loose. He didn't like hanging. I don't know if it's true, of course; I wasn'tthere myself, but a fellow who was told me. Another fellow who was atBulawayo, but who wasn't there when they were hung, said they fired atthem just after they jumped, to kill 'em. I--"

"I was there, " said the stranger. 

"Oh, you were?" said Peter. "I saw a photograph of the niggers hanging, and our fellows standing round smoking; but I didn't see you in it. Isuppose you'd just gone away?"

"I was beside the men when they were hung, " said the stranger. 

"Oh, you were, were you?" said Peter. "I don't much care about seeingthat sort of thing myself. Some fellows think it's the best fun out tosee the niggers kick; but I can't stand it: it turns my stomach. It'snot liver-heartedness, " said Peter, quickly, anxious to remove anyadverse impression as to his courage which the stranger might form; "ifit's shooting or fighting, I'm there. I've potted as many niggers as anyman in our troop, I bet. It's floggings and hangings I'm off. It's theway one's brought up, you know. My mother never even would kill ourducks; she let them die of old age, and we had the feathers and theeggs: and she was always drumming into me;--don't hit a fellow smallerthan yourself; don't hit a fellow weaker than yourself; don't hit afellow unless he can hit you back as good again. When you've always hadthat sort of thing drummed into you, you can't get rid of it, somehow. Now there was that other nigger they shot. They say he sat as still asif he was cut out of stone, with his arms round his legs; and some ofthe fellows gave him blows about the head and face before they took himoff to shoot him. Now, that's the sort of thing I can't do. It makes mesick here, somehow. " Peter put his hand rather low down over the pit ofhis stomach. "I'll shoot as many as you like if they'll run, but theymustn't be tied up. "

"I was there when that man was shot, " said the stranger. 

"Why, you seem to have been everywhere, " said Peter. "Have you seenCecil Rhodes?"

"Yes, I have seen him, " said the stranger. 

"Now he's death on niggers, " said Peter Halket, warming his hands by thefire; "they say when he was Prime Minister down in the Colony he triedto pass a law that would give their masters and mistresses the right tohave their servants flogged whenever they did anything they didn't like;but the other Englishmen wouldn't let him pass it. But here he can dowhat he likes. That's the reason some fellows don't want him to besent away. They say, 'If we get the British Government here, they'll begiving the niggers land to live on; and let them have the vote, and getcivilised and educated, and all that sort of thing; but Cecil Rhodes, he'll keep their noses to the grindstone. ' 'I prefer land to niggers, 'he says. They say he's going to parcel them out, and make them work onour lands whether they like it or not--just as good as having slaves, you know: and you haven't the bother of looking after them when they'reold. Now, there I'm with Rhodes; I think it's an awfully good move. Wedon't come out here to work; it's all very well in England; but we'vecome here to make money, and how are we to make it, unless you getniggers to work for you, or start a syndicate? He's death on niggers, is Rhodes!" said Peter, meditating; "they say if we had the BritishGovernment here and you were thrashing a nigger and something happened, there'd be an investigation, and all that sort of thing. But, withCecil, it's all right, you can do what you like with the niggers, provided you don't get HIM into trouble. "

The stranger watched the clear flame as it burnt up high in the stillnight air; then suddenly he started. 

"What is it?" said Peter; "do you hear anything?"

"I hear far off, " said the stranger, "the sound of weeping, and thesound of blows. And I hear the voices of men and women calling to me. "

Peter listened intently. "I don't hear anything!" he said. "It must bein your head. I sometimes get a noise in mine. " He listened intently. "No, there's nothing. It's all so deadly still. "

They sat silent for a while. 

"Peter Simon Halket, " said the stranger suddenly--Peter started; he hadnot told him his second name--"if it should come to pass that you shouldobtain those lands you have desired, and you should obtain black men tolabour on them and make to yourself great wealth; or should you createthat company"--Peter started--"and fools should buy from you, so thatyou became the richest man in the land; and if you should take toyourself wide lands, and raise to yourself great palaces, so thatprinces and great men of earth crept up to you and laid their handsagainst yours, so that you might slip gold into them--what would itprofit you?"

"Profit!" Peter Halket stared: "Why, it would profit everything. What makes Beit and Rhodes and Barnato so great? If you've got eightmillions--"

"Peter Simon Halket, which of those souls you have seen on earth is toyou greatest?" said the stranger, "Which soul is to you fairest?"

"Ah, " said Peter, "but we weren't talking of souls at all; we weretalking of money. Of course if it comes to souls, my mother's the bestperson I've ever seen. But what does it help her? She's got to standwashing clothes for those stuck-up nincompoops of fine ladies! Wait tillI've got money! It'll be somebody else then, who--"

"Peter Halket, " said the stranger, "who is the greatest; he who servesor he who is served?" Peter looked at the stranger: then it flashed onhim that he was mad. 

"Oh, " he said, "if it comes to that, what's anything! You might as wellsay, sitting there in your old linen shirt, that you were as great asRhodes or Beit or Barnato, or a king. Of course a man's just the samewhatever he's got on or whatever he has; but he isn't the same to otherpeople. "

"There have kings been born in stables, " said the stranger. 

Then Peter saw that he was joking, and laughed. "It must have been along time ago; they don't get born there now, " he said. "Why, if GodAlmighty came to this country, and hadn't half-a-million in shares, theywouldn't think much of Him. "

Peter built up his fire. Suddenly he felt the stranger's eyes were fixedon him. 

"Who gave you your land?" the stranger asked. 

"Mine! Why, the Chartered Company, " said Peter. 

The stranger looked back into the fire. "And who gave it to them?" heasked softly. 

"Why, England, of course. She gave them the land to far beyond theZambezi to do what they liked with, and make as much money out of asthey could, and she'd back 'em. "

"Who gave the land to the men and women of England?" asked the strangersoftly. 

"Why, the devil! They said it was theirs, and of course it was, " saidPeter. 

"And the people of the land: did England give you the people also?"

Peter looked a little doubtfully at the stranger. "Yes, of course, shegave us the people; what use would the land have been to us otherwise?"

"And who gave her the people, the living flesh and blood, that she mightgive them away, into the hands of others?" asked the stranger, raisinghimself. 

Peter looked at him and was half afeared. "Well, what could she do witha lot of miserable niggers, if she didn't give them to us? A lot ofgood-for-nothing rebels they are, too, " said Peter. 

"What is a rebel?" asked the stranger. 

"My Gawd!" said Peter, "you must have lived out of the world if youdon't know what a rebel is! A rebel is a man who fights against his kingand his country. These bloody niggers here are rebels because they arefighting against us. They don't want the Chartered Company to have them. But they'll have to. We'll teach them a lesson, " said Peter Halket, thepugilistic spirit rising, firmly reseating himself on the South Africanearth, which two years before he had never heard of, and eighteen monthsbefore he had never seen, as if it had been his mother earth, and theland in which he first saw light. 

The stranger watched the fire; then he said musingly, "I have seen aland far from here. In that land are men of two kinds who live side byside. Well nigh a thousand years ago one conquered the other; they havelived together since. Today the one people seeks to drive forth theother who conquered them. Are these men rebels, too?"

"Well, " said Peter, pleased at being deferred to, "that all depends whothey are, you know!"

"They call the one nation Turks, and the other Armenians, " said thestranger. 

"Oh, the Armenians aren't rebels, " said Peter; "they are on ourside! The papers are all full of it, " said Peter, pleased to show hisknowledge. "Those bloody Turks! What right had they to conquer theArmenians? Who gave them their land? I'd like to have a shot at themmyself!"

"WHY are Armenians not rebels?" asked the stranger, gently. 

"Oh, you do ask such curious questions, " said Peter. "If they don'tlike the Turks, why should they have 'em? If the French came now andconquered us, and we tried to drive them out first chance we had; youwouldn't call us rebels! Why shouldn't they try to turn those bloodyTurks out? Besides, " said Peter, bending over and talking in the mannerof one who imparts secret and important information; "you see, ifwe don't help the Armenians the Russians would; and we, " said Peter, looking exceedingly knowing, "we've got to prevent that: they'd getthe land; and it's on the road to India. And we don't mean them to. Isuppose you don't know much about politics in Palestine?" said Peter, looking kindly and patronisingly at the stranger. 

"If these men, " said the stranger, "would rather be free, or be underthe British Government, than under the Chartered Company, why, when theyresist the Chartered Company, are they more rebels than the Armenianswhen they resist the Turk? Is the Chartered Company God, that every kneeshould bow before it, and before it every head be bent? Would you, thewhite men of England, submit to its rule for one day?"

"Ah, " said Peter, "no, of course we shouldn't, but we are white men, andso are the Armenians--almost--" Then he glanced at the stranger's darkface, and added quickly, "At least, it's not the colour that matters, you know. I rather like a dark face, my mother's eyes are brown--but theArmenians, you know, they've got long hair like us. "

"Oh, it is the hair, then, that matters, " said the stranger softly. 

"Oh, well, " said Peter, "it's not altogether, of course. But it's quitea different thing, the Armenians wanting to get rid of the Turks, and these bloody niggers wanting to get rid of the Chartered Company. Besides, the Armenians are Christians, like us!"

"Are YOU Christians?" A strange storm broke across the stranger'sfeatures; he rose to his feet. 

"Why, of course, we are!" said Peter. "We're all Christians, we English. Perhaps you don't like Christians, though? Some Jews don't, I know, "said Peter, looking up soothingly at him. 

"I neither love nor hate any man for that which he is called, " said thestranger; "the name boots nothing. "

The stranger sat down again beside the fire, and folded his hands. 

"Is the Chartered Company Christian also?" he asked. 

"Yes, oh yes, " said Peter. 

"What is a Christian?" asked the stranger. 

"Well, now, you really do ask such curious questions. A Christian is aman who believes in Heaven and Hell, and God and the Bible, and in JesusChrist, that he'll save him from going to Hell, and if he believes he'llbe saved, he will be saved. "

"But here, in this world, what is a Christian?"

"Why, " said Peter, "I'm a Christian--we're all Christians. "

The stranger looked into the fire; and Peter thought he would change thesubject. "It's curious how like my mother you are; I mean, your ways. She was always saying to me, 'Don't be too anxious to make money, Peter. Too much wealth is as bad as too much poverty. ' You're very like her. "

After a while Peter said, bending over a little towards the stranger, "If you don't want to make money, what did you come to this land for? Noone comes here for anything else. Are you in with the Portuguese?"

"I am not more with one people than with another, " said the stranger. "The Frenchman is not more to me than the Englishman, the Englishmanthan the Kaffir, the Kaffir than the Chinaman. I have heard, " said thestranger, "the black infant cry as it crept on its mother's body andsought for her breast as she lay dead in the roadway. I have heard alsothe rich man's child wail in the palace. I hear all cries. "

Peter looked intently at him. "Why, who are you?" he said; then, bendingnearer to the stranger and looking up, he added, "What is it that youare doing here?"

"I belong, " said the stranger, "to the strongest company on earth. "

"Oh, " said Peter, sitting up, the look of wonder passing from his face. "So that's it, is it? Is it diamonds, or gold, or lands?"

"We are the most vast of all companies on the earth, " said the stranger;"and we are always growing. We have among us men of every race and fromevery land; the Esquimo, the Chinaman, the Turk, and the Englishman, wehave of them all. We have men of every religion, Buddhists, Mahomedans, Confucians, Freethinkers, Atheists, Christians, Jews. It matters to usnothing by what name the man is named, so he be one of us. "

And Peter said, "It must be hard for you all to understand one another, if you are of so many different kinds?"

The stranger answered, "There is a sign by which we all know oneanother, and by which all the world may know us. " (By this shall all menknow that ye are My disciples, if ye have love one to another. )

And Peter said, "What is that sign?"

But the stranger was silent. 

"Oh, a kind of freemasonry!" said Peter, leaning on his elbow towardsthe stranger, and looking up at him from under his pointed cap. "Arethere any more of you here in this country?"

"There are, " said the stranger. Then he pointed with his hand into thedarkness. "There in a cave were two women. When you blew the cave upthey were left unhurt behind a fallen rock. When you took away all thegrain, and burnt what you could not carry, there was one basketful thatyou knew nothing of. The women stayed there, for one was eighty, and onenear the time of her giving birth; and they dared not set out to followthe remnant of their tribe because you were in the plains below. Everyday the old woman doled grain from the basket; and at night they cookedit in their cave where you could not see their smoke; and every daythe old woman gave the young one two handfuls and kept one for herself, saying, 'Because of the child within you. ' And when the child was bornand the young woman strong, the old woman took a cloth and filled itwith all the grain that was in the basket; and she put the grain onthe young woman's head and tied the child on her back, and said, 'Go, keeping always along the bank of the river, till you come north to theland where our people are gone; and some day you can send and fetch me. 'And the young woman said, 'Have you corn in the basket to last till theycome?' And she said, 'I have enough. ' And she sat at the broken door ofthe cave and watched the young woman go down the hill and up the riverbank till she was hidden by the bush; and she looked down at the plainbelow, and she saw the spot where the kraal had been and where she hadplanted mealies when she was a young girl--"

"I met a woman with corn on her head and a child on her back!" saidPeter under his breath. 

"--And tonight I saw her sit again at the door of the cave; and when thesun had set she grew cold; and she crept in and lay down by the basket. Tonight, at half-past three, she will die. I have known her since shewas a little child and played about the huts, while her mother worked inthe mealie fields. She was one of our company. "

"Oh, " said Peter. 

"Other members we have here, " said the stranger. "There was aprospector"--he pointed north; "he was a man who drank and swore when itlisted him; but he had many servants, and they knew where to find him inneed. When they were ill, he tended them with his own hands; when theywere in trouble, they came to him for help. When this war began, and allblack men's hearts were bitter, because certain white men had liedto them, and their envoys had been killed when they would have askedEngland to put her hand out over them; at that time certain of themen who fought the white men came to the prospector's hut. And theprospector fired at them from a hole he had cut in his door; but theyfired back at him with an old elephant gun, and the bullet piercedhis side and he fell on the floor:--because the innocent man suffersoftentimes for the guilty, and the merciful man falls while theoppressor flourishes. Then his black servant who was with him took himquickly in his arms, and carried him out at the back of the hut, anddown into the river bed where the water flowed and no man could tracehis footsteps, and hid him in a hole in the river wall. And when the menbroke into the hut they could find no white man, and no traces of hisfeet. But at evening, when the black servant returned to the hut to getfood and medicine for his master, the men who were fighting caught him, and they said, 'Oh, you betrayer of your people, white man's dog, who are on the side of those who take our lands and our wives and ourdaughters before our eyes; tell us where you have hidden him?' And whenhe would not answer them, they killed him before the door of the hut. And when the night came, the white man crept up on his hands and knees, and came to his hut to look for food. All the other men were gone, buthis servant lay dead before the door; and the white man knew how it musthave happened. He could not creep further, and he lay down beforethe door, and that night the white man and the black lay there deadtogether, side by side. Both those men were of my friends. "

"It was damned plucky of the nigger, " said Peter; "but I've heard oftheir doing that sort of thing before. Even of a girl who wouldn't tellwhere her mistress was, and getting killed. But, " he added doubtfully, "all your company seem to be niggers or to get killed?"

"They are of all races, " said the stranger. "In a city in the old Colonyis one of us, small of stature and small of voice. It came to pass on acertain Sunday morning, when the men and women were gathered before him, that he mounted his pulpit: and he said when the time for the sermoncame, 'In place that I should speak to you, I will read you a history. 'And he opened an old book more than two thousand years old: and he read:'Now it came to pass that Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard, whichwas in Jezreel, hard by the palace of Ahab king of Samaria. 

"'And Ahab spake unto Naboth, saying, Give me thy vineyard, that I mayhave it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and Iwill give thee for it a better vineyard than it; or, if it seemeth goodto thee, I will give thee the worth of it in money. 

"'And Naboth said to Ahab, The Lord forbid it me, that I should give theinheritance of my father unto thee. 

"'And Ahab came into his house heavy and displeased because of the wordwhich Naboth the Jezreelite had spoken unto him; for he had said, I willnot give thee the inheritance of my fathers. '

"The man read the whole story until it was ended. Then he closed thebook, and he said, 'My friends, Naboth has a vineyard in this land;and in it there is much gold; and Ahab has desired to have it that thewealth may be his. '

"And he put the old book aside, and he took up another which was writtenyesterday. And the men and women whispered one to another, even in thechurch, 'Is not that the Blue Book Report of the Select Committee of theCape Parliament on the Jameson raid?'

"And the man said, 'Friends, the first story I have read you is one ofthe oldest stories of the world: the story I am about to read you isone of the newest. Truth is not more truth because it is three thousandyears old, nor is it less truth because it is of yesterday. All bookswhich throw light on truth are God's books, therefore I shall read toyou from the pages before me. Shall the story of Ahab king of Samariaprofit us when we know not the story of the Ahabs of our day; and theNaboths of our land be stoned while we sit at east?' And he read to themportions of that book. And certain rich men and women rose up and wentout even while he spoke, and his wife also went out. 

"And when the service was ended and the man returned to his home, hiswife came to him weeping; and she said, 'Did you see how some of themost wealthy and important people got up and went out this morning? Whydid you preach such a sermon, when we were just going to have the newwing added to our house, and you thought they were going to raise yoursalary? You have not a single Boer in your congregation! Why need yousay the Chartered Company raid on Johannesburg was wrong?'

"He said, 'My wife, if I believe that certain men whom we have raised onhigh, and to whom we have given power, have done a cowardly wrong, shallI not say it?'

"And she said, 'Yes, and only a little while ago, when Rhodes waslicking the dust off the Boers' feet that he might keep them fromsuspecting while he got ready this affair, then you attacked both Rhodesand the Bond (The Afrikander Bond, the organised Dutch political party, through whom Mr. Rhodes worked, and by whom he was backed. ) for tryingto pass a Bill for flogging the niggers, and we lost fifty pounds wemight have got for the church?' And he said, 'My wife, cannot God beworshipped as well under the dome of the heaven He made as in a goldenpalace? Shall a man keep silence, when he sees oppression, to earn moneyfor God? If I have defended the black man when I believed him to bewronged, shall I not also defend the white man, my flesh-brother? Shallwe speak when one man is wronged and not when it is another?'

"And she said, 'Yes, but you have your family and yourself to think of!Why are you always in opposition to the people who could do somethingfor us? You are only loved by the poor. If it is necessary for you toattack some one, why don't you attack the Jews for killing Christ, orHerod, or Pontius Pilate; why don't you leave alone the men who are inpower today, and who with their money can crush you!'

"And he said, 'Oh my wife, those Jews, and Herod, and Pontius Pilate arelong dead. If I should preach of them now, would it help them? Would itsave one living thing from their clutches? The past is dead, it livesonly for us to learn from. The present, the present only, is ours towork in, and the future ours to create. Is all the gold of Johannesburgor are all the diamonds in Kimberley worth, that one Christian manshould fall by the hand of his fellows--aye, or one heathen brother?'

"And she answered, 'Oh, that is all very well. If you were a reallyeloquent preacher, and could draw hundreds of men about you, and in timeform a great party with you at its head, I shouldn't mind what you said. But you, with your little figure and your little voice, who will everfollow you? You will be left all alone; that is all the good that willever come to you through it. '

"And he said, 'Oh my wife, have I not waited and watched and hoped thatthey who are nobler and stronger than I, all over this land, would liftup their voices and speak--and there is only a deadly silence? Hereand there one has dared to speak aloud; but the rest whisper behind thehand; one says, 'My son has a post, he would lose it if I spoke loud';and another says, 'I have a promise of land'; and another, 'I amsocially intimate with these men, and should lose my social standing ifI let my voice be heard. ' Oh my wife, our land, our goodly land, whichwe had hoped would be free and strong among the peoples of earth, isrotten and honeycombed with the tyranny of gold! We who had hoped tostand first in the Anglo-Saxon sisterhood for justice and freedom, arenot even fit to stand last. Do I not know only too bitterly how weak ismy voice; and that that which I can do is as nothing: but shall I remainsilent? Shall the glow-worm refuse to give its light, because it is nota star set up on high; shall the broken stick refuse to burn and warmone frozen man's hands, because it is not a beacon-light flaming acrossthe earth? Ever a voice is behind my shoulder, that whispers to me--'Whybreak your head against a stone wall? Leave this work to the greater andlarger men of your people; they who will do it better than you can doit! Why break your heart when life could be so fair to you?' But, oh mywife, the strong men are silent! and shall I not speak, though I know mypower is as nothing?'

"He laid his head upon his hands. 

"And she said, 'I cannot understand you. When I come home and tellyou that this man drinks, or that that woman has got into trouble, youalways answer me, 'Wife, what business is it of ours if so be that wecannot help them?' A little innocent gossip offends you; and you go tovisit people and treat them as your friends, into whose house I wouldnot go. Yet when the richest and strongest men in the land, who couldcrush you with their money, as a boy crushes a fly between his fingerand thumb, take a certain course, you stand and oppose them. '

"And he said, 'My wife, with the sins of the private man, what have I todo, if so be I have not led him into them? Am I guilty? I have enough todo looking after my own sins. The sin that a man sins against himself ishis alone, not mine; the sin that a man sins against his fellows is hisand theirs, not mine: but the sins that a man sins, in that he is takenup by the hands of a people and set up on high, and whose hand they havearmed with their sword, whose power to strike is their power--his sinsare theirs; there is no man so small in the whole nation that he daressay, 'I have no responsibility for this man's action. ' We armed him, weraised him, we strengthened him, and the evil he accomplishes is moreours than his. If this man's end in South Africa should be accomplished, and the day should come when, from the Zambezi to the sea, white manshould fly at white man's throat, and every man's heart burn withbitterness against his fellow, and the land be bathed with blood asrain--shall I then dare to pray, who have now feared to speak? Do notthink I wish for punishment upon these men. Let them take the millionsthey have wrung out of this land, and go to the lands of their birth, and live in wealth, luxury, and joy; but let them leave this land theyhave tortured and ruined. Let them keep the money they have made here;we may be the poorer for it; but they cannot then crush our freedom withit. Shall I ask my God Sunday by Sunday to brood across the land, andbind all its children's hearts in a close-knit fellowship;--yet, when Isee its people betrayed, and their jawbone broken by a stroke from thehand of gold; when I see freedom passing from us, and the whole landbeing grasped by the golden claw, so that the generation after us shallbe born without freedom, to labour for the men who have grasped all, shall I hold my peace? The Boer and the Englishman who have been in thisland, have not always loved mercy, nor have they always sought afterjustice; but the little finger of the speculator and monopolist who aredevouring this land will be thicker on the backs of the children of thisland, black and white, than the loins of the Dutchmen and Englishmen whohave been. '

"And she said, 'I have heard it said that it was our duty to sacrificeourselves for the men and women living in the world at the same time asourselves; but I never before heard that we had to sacrifice ourselvesfor people that are not born. What are they to you? You will be dust, and lying in your grave, before that time comes. If you believe in God, 'she said, 'why cannot you leave it to Him to bring good out of all thisevil? Does He need YOU to be made a martyr of? or will the world be lostwithout YOU?'

"He said, 'Wife, if my right hand be in a fire, shall I not pull it out?Shall I say, 'God may bring good out of this evil, ' and let it burn?That Unknown that lies beyond us we know of no otherwise than throughits manifestation in our own hearts; it works no otherwise upon the sonsof men than through man. And shall I feel no bond binding me to the mento come, and desire no good or beauty for them--I, who am what I am, and enjoy what I enjoy, because for countless ages in the past men havelived and laboured, who lived not for themselves alone, and counted nocosts? Would the great statue, the great poem, the great reform ever beaccomplished, if men counted the cost and created for their own livesalone? And no man liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. Youcannot tell me not to love the men who shall be after me; a soft voicewithin me, I know not what, cries out ever, 'Live for them as for yourown children. ' When in the circle of my own small life all is dark, andI despair, hope springs up in me when I remember that something noblerand fairer may spring up in the spot where I now stand. '

"And she said, 'You want to put everyone against us! The other womenwill not call on me; and our church is more and more made up of poorpeople. Money holds by money. If your congregation were Dutchmen, I knowyou would be always preaching to love the Englishmen, and be kind toniggers. If they were Kaffirs you would always be telling them tohelp white men. You will never be on the side of the people who can doanything for us! You know the offer we had from--'

"And he said, 'Oh my wife, what are the Boer, and the Russian, and theTurk to me; am I responsible for their action? It is my own nation, mine, which I love as a man loves his own soul, whose acts touch me. Iwould that wherever our flag was planted the feeble or oppressed peoplesof earth might gather under it, saying, 'Under this banner is freedomand justice which knows no race or colour. ' I wish that on our bannerwere blazoned in large letters "Justice and Mercy", and that in everynew land which our feet touch, every son among us might see everblazoned above his head that banner, and below it the great order:--"Bythis sign, Conquer!"--and that the pirate flag which some men now wavein its place, may be torn down and furled for ever! Shall I condone theaction of some, simply because they happen to be of my own race, when inBushman or Hottentot I would condemn it? Shall men belonging to one ofthe mightiest races of earth, creep softly on their bellies, to attackan unwarned neighbour; when even the Kaffir has again and again givennotice of war, saying, 'Be ready, on such and such a day I come to fightyou?' Is England's power so broken, and our race so enfeebled, that wedare no longer to proclaim war; but must creep silently upon our belliesin the dark to stab, like a subject people to whom no other course isopen? These men are English; but not English-MEN. When the men of ourrace fight, they go to war with a blazoned flag and the loud trumpetbefore them. It is because I am an Englishman that these things crushme. Better that ten thousand of us should lie dead and defeated on onebattlefield, fighting for some great cause, and my own sons amongthem, than that those twelve poor boys should have fallen at Doornkop, fighting to fill up the pockets of those already oe'r-heavy with gold. '

"And she said, 'YOU, what does it matter what you feel or think; YOUwill never be able to do anything!'

"And he said, 'Oh my wife, stand by me; do not crush me. For me in thismatter there is no path but one on which light shines. '

"And she said, 'You are very unkind; you don't care what the people sayabout us!' and she wept bitterly, and went out of the room. But as soonas the door was shut, she dried her tears; and she said to herself, 'Nowhe will never dare to preach such a sermon again. He dares never opposeme when once I have set down my foot. '

"And the man spoke to no one, and went out alone in the veld. All theafternoon he walked up and down among the sand and low bushes; and Iwalked there beside him. 

"And when the evening came, he went back to his chapel. Many wereabsent, but the elders sat in their places, and his wife also was there. And the light shone on the empty benches. And when the time came heopened the old book of the Jews; and he turned the leaves and read:--'Ifthou forbear to deliver them that are drawn unto death, and those thatare ready to be slain; if thou sayest, 'Behold we knew it not!' Doth nothe that pondereth the heart consider it? and he that keepeth thy soul, doth he not know it?'

"And he said, 'This morning we considered the evils this land issuffering under at the hands of men whose aim is the attainment ofwealth and power. Tonight we shall look at our own share in the matter. I think we shall realise that with us, and not with the men we havelifted up on high, lies the condemnation. ' Then his wife rose and wentout, and others followed her; and the little man's voice rolled amongthe empty benches; but he spoke on. 

"And when the service was over he went out. No elder came to the porchto greet him; but as he stood there one, he saw not whom, slipped aleaflet into his hand. He held it up, and read in the lamplight what waswritten on it in pencil. He crushed it up in his hand, as a man crushesthat which has run a poisonous sting into him; then he dropped it onthe earth as a man drops that he would forget. A fine drizzly rain wasfalling, and he walked up the street with his arms folded behind him, and his head bent. The people walked up the other side; and it seemed tohim he was alone. But I walked behind him. "

"And then, " asked Peter, seeing that the stranger was silent, "whathappened to him after that?"

"That was only last Sunday, " said the stranger. 

There was silence again for some seconds. 

Then Peter said, "Well, anyhow, at least he didn't die!"

The stranger crossed his hands upon his knees. "Peter Simon Halket, "he said, "it is easier for a man to die than to stand alone. He who canstand alone can, also, when the need be, die. "

Peter looked up wistfully into the stranger's face. "I should not liketo die myself, " he said, "not yet. I shall not be twenty-one till nextbirthday. I should like to see life first. "

The stranger made no answer. 

Presently Peter said, "Are all the men of your company poor men?"

The stranger waited a while before he answered; then he said, --"Therehave been rich men who have desired to join us. There was a young manonce; and when he heard the conditions, he went away sorrowful, for hehad great possessions. "

There was silence again for a while. 

"Is it long since your company was started?" asked Peter. 

"There is no man living who can conceive of its age, " said the stranger. "Even here on this earth it began, when these hills were young, andthese lichens had hardly shown their stains upon the rocks, and manstill raised himself upwards with difficulty because the sinews in histhighs were weak. In those days, which men reck not of now, man, whenhe hungered, fed on the flesh of his fellow man and found it sweet. Yeteven in those days it came to pass that there was one whose head washigher than her fellows and her thought keener, and, as she picked theflesh from a human skull, she pondered. And so it came to pass the nextnight, when men were gathered around the fire ready to eat, that shestole away, and when they went to the tree where the victim was bound, they found him gone. And they cried one to another, 'She, only she, hasdone this, who has always said, 'I like not the taste of man-flesh; menare too like me; I cannot eat them. ' 'She is mad, ' they cried; 'let uskill her!' So, in those dim, misty times that men reck not of now, thatthey hardly believe in, that woman died. But in the heads of certain menand women a new thought had taken root; they said, 'We also will not eatof her. There is something evil in the taste of human flesh. ' And everafter, when the fleshpots were filled with man-flesh, these stood aside, and half the tribe ate human flesh and half not; then, as the yearspassed, none ate. 

"Even in those days, which men reck not of now, when men fell easilyopen their hands and knees, they were of us on the earth. And, if youwould learn a secret, even before man trod here, in the days when thedicynodont bent yearningly over her young, and the river-horse which youfind now nowhere on earth's surface, save buried in stone, called withlove to his mate; and the birds whose footprints are on the rocks flewin the sunshine calling joyfully to one another--even in those days whenman was not, the fore-dawn of this kingdom had broken on the earth. Andstill as the sun rises and sets and the planets journey round, we growand grow. "

The stranger rose from the fire, and stood upright: around him, andbehind him, the darkness stood out. 

"All earth is ours. And the day shall come, when the stars, looking downon this little world, shall see no spot where the soil is moist and darkwith the blood of man shed by his fellow man; the sun shall rise in theEast and set in the West and shed his light across this little globe;and nowhere shall he see man crushed by his fellows. And they shallbeat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks:nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learnwar any more. And instead of the thorn shall come up the fir-tree;and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and man shallnowhere crush man on all the holy earth. Tomorrow's sun shall rise, "said the stranger, "and it shall flood these dark kopjes with light, andthe rocks shall glint in it. Not more certain is that rising than thecoming of that day. And I say to you that even here, in the land wherenow we stand, where today the cries of the wounded and the curses ofrevenge ring in the air; even here, in this land where man creeps onhis belly to wound his fellow in the dark, and where an acre of goldis worth a thousand souls, and a reef of shining dirt is worth half apeople, and the vultures are heavy with man's flesh--even here that dayshall come. I tell you, Peter Simon Halket, that here on the spot wherenow we stand shall be raised a temple. Man shall not gather in it toworship that which divides; but they shall stand in it shoulder toshoulder, white man with black, and the stranger with the inhabitant ofthe land; and the place shall be holy; for men shall say, 'Are we notbrethren and the sons of one Father?'"

Peter Halket looked upward silently. And the stranger said: "Certainmen slept upon a plain, and the night was chill and dark. And, as theyslept, at that hour when night is darkest, one stirred. Far off to theeastward, through his half-closed eyelids, he saw, as it were, one faintline, thin as a hair's width, that edged the hill tops. And he whisperedin the darkness to his fellows: 'The dawn is coming. ' But they, withfast-closed eyelids murmured, 'He lies, there is no dawn. '

"Nevertheless, day broke. "

The stranger was silent. The fire burnt up in red tongues of flame thatneither flickered nor flared in the still night air. Peter Halket creptnear to the stranger. 

"When will that time be?" he whispered; "in a thousand years' time?"

And the stranger answered, "A thousand years are but as our yesterday'sjourney, or as our watch tonight, which draws already to its close. See, piled, these rocks on which we now stand? The ages have been young andthey have grown old since they have lain here. Half that time shallnot pass before that time comes; I have seen its dawning already in thehearts of men. "

Peter moved nearer, so that he almost knelt at the stranger's feet: hisgun lay on the ground at the other side of the fire. 

"I would like to be one of your men, " he said. "I am tired of belongingto the Chartered Company. "

The stranger looked down gently. "Peter Simon Halket, " he said, "can youbear the weight?"

And Peter said, "Give me work, that I may try. "

There was silence for a time; then the stranger said, "Peter SimonHalket, take a message to England"--Peter Halket started--"Go to thatgreat people and cry aloud to it: 'Where is the sword was given intoyour hand, that with it you might enforce justice and deal out mercy?How came you to give it up into the hands of men whose search is gold, whose thirst is wealth, to whom men's souls and bodies are counters in agame? How came you to give up the folk that were given into your hands, into the hand of the speculator and the gamester; as though they weredumb beasts who might be bought or sold?

"'Take back your sword, Great People--but wipe it first, lest some ofthe gold and blood stick to your hand. 

"'What is this, I see!--the sword of the Great People, transformed toburrow earth for gold, as the snouts of swine for earth nuts! Have youno other use for it, Great Folk?

"'Take back your sword; and, when you have thoroughly cleansed it andwiped it of the blood and mire, then raise it to set free the oppressedof other climes. 

"'Great Prince's Daughter, take heed! You put your sword into the handsof recreant knights; they will dull its edge and mar its brightness, and, when your hour of need comes and you would put it into other hands, you will find its edge chipped and its point broken. Take heed! Takeheed!'

"Cry to the wise men of England: 'You, who in peace and calm inshaded chambers ponder on all things in heaven and earth, and take allknowledge for your province, have you no time to think of this? To whomhas England given her power? How do the men wield it who have filched itfrom her? Say not, What have we to do with folk across the waters; havewe not matter enough for thought in our own land? Where the brain ofa nation has no time to go, there should its hands never be sent tolabour: where the power of a people goes, there must its intellect andknowledge go, to guide it. Oh, you who sit at ease, studying past andfuture--and forget the present--you have no right to sit at ease knowingnothing of the working of the powers you have armed and sent to work onmen afar. Where is your nation's sword--you men of thought?'

"Cry to the women of England: 'You, who repose in sumptuous houses, withchildren on your knees; think not it is only the rustling of the softdraped curtains, or the whistling of the wind, you hear. Listen! May itnot be the far off cry of those your sword governs, creeping towardsyou across wide oceans till it pierces even into your inmost sanctuary?Listen!

"For the womanhood of a dominant people has not accomplished all itslabour when it has borne its children and fed them at its breast: therecries to it also from over seas and across continents the voice of thechild-peoples--'Mother-heart, stand for us!' It would be better for youthat your wombs should be barren and that your race should die out; thanthat you should listen, and give no answer. '"

The stranger lifted his hands upwards as he spoke, and Peter saw therewere the marks of old wounds in both. 

"Cry aloud to the working men and women of England: 'You, who for agescried out because the heel of your masters was heavy on you; and whohave said, 'We curse the kings that sit at ease, and care not whooppresses the folk, so their coffers be full and their belliessatisfied, and they be not troubled with the trouble of rule'; you, whohave taken the king's rule from him and sit enthroned within his seat;is his sin not yours today? If men should add but one hour to your day'slabour, or make but one fraction dearer the bread you eat, would you notrise up as one man? Yet, what is dealt out to men beyond seas whom yourule wounds you not. Nay, have you not sometimes said, as kings of old:'It matters not who holds out our sword, marauder or speculator, so hecalls it ours, we must cloak up the evil it has done!' Think you, noother curses rise to heaven but yours? Where is your sword? Into whosehand has it fallen? Take it quickly and cleanse it!'"

Peter Halket crouched, looking upwards; then he cried: "Master, I cannotgive that message, I am a poor unlearn'd man. And if I should go toEngland and cry aloud, they would say, 'Who is this, who comes preachingto a great people? Is not his mother with us, and a washerwoman; and wasnot his father a day labourer at two shillings a day?' and they wouldlaugh me to scorn. And, in truth, the message is so long I could notwell remember it; give me other work to do. "

And the stranger said, "Take a message to the men and women of thisland. Go, from the Zambezi to the sea, and cry to its white men andwomen, and say: 'I saw a wide field, and in it were two fair beasts. Wide was the field about them and rich was the earth with sweet scentedherbs, and so abundant was the pasturage that hardly might they consumeall that grew about them: and the two were like one to another, forthey were the sons of one mother. And as I looked, I saw, far off to thenorthward, a speck within the sky, so small it was, and so high it was, that the eye scarce might mark it. Then it came nearer and hovered overthe spot where the two beasts fed:--and its neck was bare, and itsbeak was hooked, and its talons were long, and its wings strong. And ithovered over the field where the two beasts were; and I saw it settledown upon a great white stone; and it waited. And I saw more specks tothe northward, and more and more came onward to join him who sat uponthe stone. And some hovered over the beasts, and some sharpened theirbeaks on the stones; and some walked in and out between the beasts'legs. And I saw that they were waiting for something. 

"'Then he who first came flew from one of the beasts to the other, andsat upon their necks, and put his beak within their ears. And he flewfrom one to the other and flapped his wings in their faces till thebeasts were blinded, and each believed it was his fellow who attackedhim. And they fell to, and fought; they gored one another's sides tillthe field was red with blood and the ground shook beneath them. Thebirds sat by and watched; and when the blood flowed they walked roundand round. And when the strength of the two beasts was exhausted theyfell to earth. Then the birds settled down upon them, and feasted; tilltheir maws were full, and their long bare necks were wet; and they stoodwith their beaks deep in the entrails of the two dead beasts; and lookedout with their keen bright eyes from above them. And he who was king ofall plucked out the eyes, and fed on the hearts of the dead beasts. Andwhen his maw was full, so that he could eat no more, he sat on his stonehard by and flapped his great wings. '

"Peter Simon Halket, cry to the white men and women of South Africa:'You have a goodly land; you and your children's children shall scarcefill it; though you should stretch out your arms to welcome eachstranger who comes to live and labour with you. You are the twinbranches of one tree; you are the sons of one mother. Is this goodlyland not wide enough for you, that you should rend each other's fleshat the bidding of those who will wet their beaks within both yourvitals?--Look up, see, they circle in the air above you!'"

Almost Peter Halket started and looked upward; but there was only theblack sky of Mashonaland over his head. 

The stranger stood silent looking downward into the fire. Peter Halkethalf clasped his arms about his knees. 

"My master, " he cried, "how can I take this message? The Dutchmen ofSouth Africa will not listen to me, they will say I am an Englishman. And the Englishmen will say: 'Who is this fellow who comes preachingpeace, peace, peace? Has he not been a year in the country and he hasnot a share in a single company? Can anything he says be worth hearing?If he were a man of any sense he would have made five thousand pounds atleast. ' And they will not listen to me. Give me another labour!"

And the stranger said: "Take a message to one man. Find him, whether hesleep or wake, whether he eat or drink; and say to him: 'Where are thesouls of the men that you have bought?'

"And if he shall answer you and say: 'I bought no men's souls! The soulsthat I bought were the souls of dogs?' Then ask him this question, sayto him, 'Where are the--'

"And if he cry out, 'You lie, you lie! I know what you are going to say. What do I know of envoys? Was I ever afraid of the British Government?It is all a lie!' Then question him no further. But say: 'There was arushlight once. It flickered and flared, and it guttered down, and wentout--and no man heeded it: it was only a rushlight. 

"'And there was a light once; men set it on high within a lighthouse, that it might yield light to all souls at sea; that afar off they mightsee its steady light and find harbour, and escape the rocks. 

"'And that light flickered and flared, as it listed. It went this wayand it went that; it burnt blue, and green, and red; now it disappearedaltogether, and then it burnt up again. And men, far out at sea, kepttheir eyes fixed where they knew the light should be: saying, 'We aresafe; the great light will lead us when we near the rocks. ' And ondark nights men drifted nearer and nearer; and in the stillness of themidnight they struck on the lighthouse rocks and went down at its feet. 

"'What now shall be done to that light, in that it was not a rushlight;in that it was set on high by the hands of men, and in that men trustedit? Shall it not be put out?'

"And if he shall answer, saying, 'What are men to me? they are fools, all fools! Let them die!'--tell him again this story: 'There was astreamlet once: it burst forth from beneath the snow on a mountain'scrown; and the snow made a cove over it. It ran on pure and blue andclear as the sky above it, and the banks of snow made its cradle. Thenit came to a spot where the snow ended; and two ways lay before it bywhich it might journey; one, on the mountain ridges, past rocks andstones, and down long sunlit slopes to the sea; and the other, down achasm. And the stream hesitated: it twirled and purled, and went thisway and went that. It MIGHT have been, that it would have forced itsway past rocks and ridges and along mountain slopes, and made a path foritself where no path had been; the banks would have grown green, and themountain daisy would have grown beside it; and all night the stars wouldhave looked at their faces in it; and down the long sunny slopes the sunwould have played on it by day; and the wood dove would have built hernest in the trees beside it; and singing, singing, always singing, itwould have made its way at last to the great sea, whose far-off call allwaters hear. 

"'But it hesitated. --It might have been, that, had but some hand beenthere to move but one stone from its path, it would have forced its waypast rocks and ridges, and found its way to the great sea--it might havebeen! But no hand was there. The streamlet gathered itself together, and (it might be, that it was even in its haste to rush onwards to thesea!)--it made one leap into the abyss. 

"'The rocks closed over it. Nine hundred fathoms deep, in a still, darkpool it lay. The green lichen hung from the rocks. No sunlight camethere, and the stars could not look down at night. The pool lay stilland silent. Then, because it was alive and could not rest, it gatheredits strength together, through fallen earth and broken debris it oozedits way silently on; and it crept out in a deep valley; the mountainsclosed it around. And the streamlet laughed to itself, 'Ha, ha! I shallmake a great lake here; a sea!' And it oozed, and it oozed, and itfilled half the plain. But no lake came--only a great marsh--becausethere was no way outwards, and the water rotted. The grass died outalong its edges; and the trees dropped their leaves and rotted in thewater; and the wood dove who had built her nest there flew up to themountains, because her young ones died. And the toads sat on the stonesand dropped their spittle in the water; and the reeds were yellow thatgrew along the edge. And at night, a heavy, white fog gathered over thewater, so that the stars could not see through it; and by day a finewhite mist hung over it, and the sunbeams could not play on it. And noman knew that once the marsh had leapt forth clear and blue from undera hood of snow on the mountain's top: aye, and that the turning of onestone might have caused that it had run on and on, and mingled its songwith the sea's song for ever. '"

The stranger was silent for a while. 

Then he said, "Should he answer you and say, 'What do I care! What arecoves and mountain tops to me? Gold is real, and the power to crush menwithin my hand'; tell him no further. 

"But if by some chance he should listen, then, say this one thing tohim, clearly in the ear, that he may not fail to hear it: 'The morningmay break grey, and the midday be dark and stormy; but the glory of theevening's sunset may wash out for ever the remembrance of the morning'sdullness, and the darkness of the noon. So that all men shall say, 'Ah, for the beauty of that day!'--For the stream that has once descendedthere is no path upwards. --It is never too late for the soul of a man. '

"And if he should laugh, and say: 'You fool, a man may remake himselfentirely before twenty; he may reshape himself before thirty; but afterforty he is fixed. Shall I, who for forty-three years have sought moneyand power, seek for anything else now? You want me to be Jesus Christ, Isuppose! How can I be myself and another man?' Then answer him: 'Deep inthe heart of every son of man lies an angel; but some have their wingsfolded. Wake yours! He is larger and stronger than another man's; mountup with him!'

"But if he curses you, and says, 'I have eight millions of money, and Icare neither for God nor man!'--then make no answer, but stoop and writebefore him. " The stranger bent down and wrote with his finger in thewhite ashes of the fire. Peter Halket bent forward, and he saw the twowords the stranger had written. 

The stranger said: "Say to him: 'Though you should seek to make thatname immortal in this land; and should write it in gold dust, and set itwith diamonds, and cement it with human blood, shed from the Zambezito the sea, yet--. " The stranger passed his foot over the words; PeterHalket looked down, and he saw only a bed of smooth white ashes wherethe name had been. 

The stranger said: "And if he should curse yet further, and say, 'Thereis not one man nor woman in South Africa I cannot buy with my money!When I have the Transvaal, I shall buy God Almighty Himself, if I careto!'

"Then say to him this one thing only, 'Thy money perish with thee!' andleave him. "

There was a dead silence for a moment. Then the stranger stretched forthhis hand. "Yet in that leaving him, remember;--It is not the act, butthe will, which marks the soul of the man. He who has crushed a nationsins no more than he who rejoices in the death throe of the meanestcreature. The stagnant pool is not less poisonous drop for drop than themighty swamp, though its reach be smaller. He who has desired to beand accomplish what this man has been and accomplished, is as this man;though he have lacked the power to perform. Nay, remember this one thingmore:--Certain sons of God are born on earth, named by men Childrenof Genius. In early youth each stands at the parting of the way andchooses; he bears his gift for others or for himself. But forget thisnever, whatever his choice may be; that there is laid on him a burdenthat is laid not on others--all space is open to him, and his choice isinfinite--and if he falls beneath it, let men weep rather than curse, for he was born a Son of God. "

There was silence again. Then Peter Halket clasped his arms about thestranger's feet. "My master, " he cried, "I dare not take that message. It is not that men may say, 'Here is Trooper Peter Halket, whom we allknow, a man who kept women and shot niggers, turned prophet. ' But it is, that it is true. Have I not wished--" and Peter Halket would have pouredout all his soul; but the stranger prevented him. 

"Peter Simon Halket, " he said, "is it the trumpet which gives forththe call to battle, whether it be battered tin or gilded silver, whichboots? Is it not the call? What and if I should send my message bya woman or a child: shall truth be less truth because the bearer isdespised? Is it the mouth that speaks or the word that is spoken whichis eternal? Nevertheless, if you will have it so, go, and say, 'I, PeterHalket, sinner among you all, who have desired women and gold, who haveloved myself and hated my fellow, I--'" The stranger looked down at him, and placed his hand gently on his head. "Peter Simon Halket, " he said, "a harder task I give you than any which has been laid upon you. In thatsmall spot where alone on earth your will rules, bring there into beingthe kingdom today. Love your enemies; do good to them that hate you. Walk ever forward, looking not to the right hand or the left. Heed notwhat men shall say of you. Succour the oppressed; deliver the captive. If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he is athirst give him drink. "

A curious warmth and gladness stole over Peter Halket as he knelt;it was as, when a little child, his mother folded him to her: he sawnothing more about him but a soft bright light. Yet in it he heard avoice cry, "Because thou hast loved mercy--and hated oppression--"

When Trooper Peter Halket raised himself, he saw the figure of thestranger passing from him. He cried, "My Master, let me go with you. "But the figure did not turn. And, as it passed into the darkness, itseemed to Peter Halket that the form grew larger and larger: and as itdescended the further side of the kopje it seemed that for one instanthe still saw the head with a pale, white light upon it: then itvanished. 

And Trooper Peter Halket sat alone upon the kopje. 

Chapter II. 

It was a hot day. The sun poured down its rays over the scattered trees, and stunted bush, and long grass, and over the dried up river beds. Farin the blue, so high the eye could scarcely mark them, vultures wereflying southward, where forty miles off kraals had been destroyed andtwo hundred black carcasses were lying in the sun. 

Under a group of tall straggling trees among the grass and low scrub, on the banks of an almost dried up river bed, a small camp had beenpitched. 

The party had lost their mules, and pending their recovery had alreadybeen there seven days. The three cart loads of provisions they wereconveying to the large camp were drawn up under the trees and had a sailthrown across them to form a shelter for some of the men; while on theother side of the cleared and open space that formed the camp, a smallersail was thrown across two poles forming a rough tent; and away to theleft, a little cut off from the rest of the camp by some low bushes, was the bell-shaped tent of the captain, under a tall tree. Beforethe bell-shaped tent stood a short stunted tree; its thick white stemgnarled and knotted; while two stunted misshapen branches, like arms, stretched out on either side. 

Before this tree, up and down, with his gun upon his arm, his headbent and his eyes fixed on the ground, while the hot sun blazed on hisshoulders, walked a man. 

Three or four fires were burning about the camp in different parts, three cooking the mealies and rice which formed the diet of the men, their stock of tinned meats having been exhausted; while the fourth, which was watched by a native boy, contained the more appetising meal ofthe Captain. 

Most of the men were out of camp; the coloured boys having gone to fetchthe mules, which had been discovered in the hills a few miles off, andwere expected to arrive in the evening; and the white men had gone outto see what game they could bring down with their guns to flavourthe mealie pots, or to reconnoitre the country; though all nativehabitations had been destroyed within a radius of thirty miles, and theland was as bare of black men as a child's hand of hair; and even thebeasts seemed to have vanished. 

In the shade of the tent, formed of the canvas across two posts, laythree white men, whose work it was to watch the pots and guard the camp. They were all three Colonial Englishmen, and lay on the ground on theirstomachs, passing the time by carrying on a desultory conversation, or taking a few whiffs, slowly, and with care, from their pipes, fortobacco was precious in the camp. 

Under some bushes a few yards off lay a huge trooper, whose nationalitywas uncertain, but who was held to hail from some part of the BritishIsles, and who had travelled round the world. He was currently reportedto have done three years' labour for attempted rape in Australia, butnothing certain was known regarding his antecedents. He had been up onguard half the night, and was now taking his rest lying on his back withhis arm thrown over his face; but a slight movement could be noted inhis jaw as he slowly chewed a piece of tobacco; and occasionally whenhe turned it round the mouth opened, and disclosed two rows of brokenyellow stumps set in very red gums. 

The three Colonial Englishmen took no notice of him. Two, who wereslowly smoking, were of the large and powerful build, and somewhat looseset about the shoulders, which is common among Colonial Europeans of thethird generation, whether Dutch or English, and had the placidity andgeneral good temper of expression which commonly marks the ColonialEuropean who grows up beyond the range of the cities. The third wassmaller and more wiry and of an unusually nervous type, with aquilinenose, and sallow hatchet face, with a somewhat discontented expression. He was holding forth, while his companions smoked and listened. 

"Now what I say is this, " he brought his hand down on the red sand;"here we are with about one half teaspoon of Dop given us at night, while he has ten empty champagne bottles lying behind his tent. And wehave to live on the mealies we're convoying for the horses, while hehas pati and beef, and lives like a lord! It's all very well for theregulars; they know what they're in for, and they've got gentlemen overthem anyhow, and one can stomach anything if you know what kind of afellow you've got over you. English officers are gentlemen, anyhow; orif one was under Selous now--"

"Oh, Selous's a MAN!" broke out the other two, taking their pipes fromtheir mouths. 

"Yes, well, that's what I say. But these fellows, who couldn't do asfarmers, and couldn't do as shopkeepers, and God knows what else; andtheir friends in England didn't want to have them; they're sent out hereto boss it over us! It's a damned shame! Why, I want to know, amn't I asgood as any of these fellows, who come swelling it about here? Friendsgot money, I suppose!" He cast his sharp glance over towards the belltent. "If they gave us real English officers now--"

"Ah!" said the biggest of his companions, who, in spite of his hugeform, had something of the simplicity and good nature of a child in hishandsome face; "it's because you're not a big enough swell, you know!He'll be a colonel, or a general, before we've done with him. I callthem all generals or colonels up here; it's safest, you know; if they'renot that today they will be tomorrow!"

This was intended as a joke, and in that hot weather, and in that dullworld, anything was good enough to laugh at: the third man smiled, butthe first speaker remained serious. 

"I only know this, " he said, "I'd teach these fellows a lesson, if anyone belonging to me had been among the people they left to be murderedhere, while they went gallivanting to the Transvaal. If my mother orsister had been killed here, I'd have taken a pistol and blown out thebrains of the great Panjandrum, and the little ones after him. Fineadministration of a country, this, to invite people to come in and livehere, and then take every fighting man out of the country on a goldhunting marauding expedition to the Transvaal, and leave us to facethe bitter end. I look upon every man and woman who was killed here asmurdered by the Chartered Company. "

"Well, Jameson only did what he was told. He had to obey orders, likethe rest of us. He didn't make the plan, and he's got the punishment. "

"What business had he to listen? What's all this fine administrationthey talk of? It's six years since I came to this country, and I'veworked like a nigger ever since I came, and what have I, or any menwho've worked hard at real, honest farming, got for it? Everything inthe land is given away for the benefit of a few big folks over the wateror swells out here. If England took over the Chartered Company tomorrow, what would she find?--everything of value in the land given over toprivate concessionaires--they'll line their pockets if the whole landgoes to pot! It'll be the jackals eating all the flesh off the horse'sbones, and calling the lion in to lick the bones. "

"Oh, you wait a bit and you'll be squared, " said the handsome man. "I'vebeen here five years and had lots of promises, though I haven't gotanything else yet; but I expect it to come some day, so I keep my mouthshut! If they asked me to sign a paper, that Mr. Over-the-Way"--henodded towards the bell tent--"never got drunk or didn't know how toswear, I'd sign it, if there was a good dose of squaring to come afterit. I could stand a good lot of that sort of thing--squaring--if itwould only come my way. "

The men laughed in a dreary sort of way, and the third man, who hadnot spoken yet, rolled round on to his back, and took the pipe from hismouth. 

"I tell you what, " said the keen man, "those of us up here who have gota bit of land and are trying honestly and fairly to work, are gettingpretty sick of this humbugging fighting. If we'd had a few men like theCurries and Bowkers of the old days up here from the first, all thiswould never have happened. And there's no knowing when a reason won'tturn up for keeping the bloody thing on or stopping it off for atime, to break out just when one's settled down to work. It's a damnedconvenient thing to have a war like this to turn on and off. "

Slowly the third man keeled round on to his stomach again: "Letresignation wait. We fight the Matabele again tomorrow, " he said, sententiously. 

A low titter ran round the group. Even the man under the bushes, thoughhis eyes were still closed and his arm across his face, let his mouthrelax a little, and showed his yellow teeth. 

"I'm always expecting, " said the big handsome man, "to have a paper comeround, signed by all the nigger chiefs, saying how much they love theB. S. A. Company, and how glad they are the Panjandrum has got them, andhow awfully good he is to them; and they're going to subscribe to thebrazen statue. There's nothing a man can't be squared to do. "

The third man lay on his back again, lazily examining his hand, which heheld above his face. "What's that in the Bible, " he said, slowly, "aboutthe statue, whose thighs and belly were of brass, and its feet of mud?"

"I don't know much about the Bible, " said the keen man, "I'm going tosee if my pot isn't boiling over. Won't yours burn?"

"No, I asked the Captain's boy to keep an eye on it--but I expect hewon't. Do you put the rice in with the mealies?"

"Got to; I've got no other pot. And the fellows don't object. It's atasty variety, you know!"

The keen-faced man slouched away across the square to where his fireburnt; and presently the other man rose and went, either to look at hisown pot or sleep under the carts; and the large Colonial man was leftalone. His fire was burning satisfactorily about fifty feet off, andhe folded his arms on the ground and rested his forehead on them, andwatched lazily the little black ants that ran about in the red sand, just under his nose. 

A great stillness settled down on the camp. Now and again a stickcracked in the fires, and the cicadas cried aloud in the tree stems;but except where the solitary paced up and down before the littleflat-topped tree in front of the captain's tent, not a creature stirredin the whole camp; and the snores of the trooper under the bushes mightbe heard half across the camp. 

The intense midday heat had settled down. 

At last there was the sound of someone breaking through the long grassand bushes which had only been removed for a few feet round the camp, and the figure of a man emerged bearing in one hand a gun, and in theother a bird which he had shot. He was evidently an Englishman, and notlong from Europe, by the bloom of the skin, which was perceptible inspite of the superficial tan. His face was at the moment flushed withheat; but the clear blue eyes and delicate features lost none of theirsensitive refinement. 

He came up to the Colonial, and dropped the bird before him. "That isall I've got, " he said. 

He threw himself also down on the ground, and put his gun under theloose flap of the tent. 

The Colonial raised his head; and without taking his elbows from theground took up the bird. "I'll put it into the pot; it'll give it theflavour of something except weevily mealies"; he said, and fell toplucking it. 

The Englishman took his hat off, and lifted the fine damp hair from hisforehead. 

"Knocked up, eh?" said the Colonial, glancing kindly up at him. "I've afew drops in my flask still. "

"Oh, no, I can stand it well enough. It's only a little warm. " He gavea slight cough, and laid his head down sideways on his arm. His eyeswatched mechanically the Colonial's manipulation of the bird. He hadleft England to escape phthisis; and he had gone to Mashonaland becauseit was a place where he could earn an open-air living, and save hisparents from the burden of his support. 

"What's Halket doing over there?" he asked suddenly, raising his head. 

"Weren't you here this morning?" asked the Colonial. "Didn't you knowthey'd had a devil of a row?"

"Who?" asked the Englishman, half raising himself on his elbows. 

"Halket and the Captain. " The Colonial paused in the plucking. "My God, you never saw anything like it!"

The Englishman sat upright now, and looked keenly over the bushes whereHalket's bent head might be seen as he paced to and fro. 

"What's he doing out there in this blazing sun?"

"He's on guard, " said the Colonial. "I thought you were here when ithappened. It's the best thing I ever saw or heard of in my whole life!"He rolled half over on his side and laughed at the remembrance. "Yousee, some of the men went down into the river, to look for fresh poolsof water, and they found a nigger, hidden away in a hole in the bank, not five hundred yards from here! They found the bloody rascal by alittle path he tramped down to the water, trodden hard, just like aporcupine's walk. They got him in the hole like an aardvark, with a bushover the mouth, so you couldn't see it. He'd evidently been there a longtime, the floor was full of bones of fish he'd caught in the pool, andthere was a bit of root like a stick half gnawed through. He'd beenpotted, and got two bullet wounds in the thigh; but he could walkalready. It's evident he was just waiting till we were gone, to clearoff after his people. He'd got that beastly scurvy look a nigger getswhen he hasn't had anything to eat for a long time. 

"Well, they hauled him up before the Captain, of course; and he blewand swore, and said the nigger was a spy, and was to be hanged tomorrow;he'd hang him tonight, only the big troop might catch us up thisevening, so he'd wait to hear what the Colonel said; but if they didn'tcome he'd hang him first thing tomorrow morning, or have him shot, assure as the sun rose. He made the fellows tie him up to that little treebefore his tent, with riems round his legs, and riems round his waist, and a riem round his neck. "

"What did the native say?" asked the Englishman. 

"Oh, he didn't say anything. There wasn't a soul in the camp could haveunderstood him if he had. The coloured boys don't know his language. Iexpect he's one of those bloody fellows we hit the day we cleared thebush out yonder; but how he got down that bank with his leg in the stateit must have been, I don't know. He didn't try to fight when they caughthim; just stared in front of him--fright, I suppose. He must have been abig strapping devil before he was taken down. 

"Well, I tell you, we'd just got him fixed up, and the Captain was justgoing into his tent to have a drink, and we chaps were all standinground, when up steps Halket, right before the Captain, and pulls hisfront lock--you know the way he has? Oh, my God, my God, if you couldhave seen it! I'll never forget it to my dying day!" The Colonial seemedbursting with internal laughter. "He begins, 'Sir, may I speak to you?'in a formal kind of way, like a fellow introducing a deputation; andthen all of a sudden he starts off--oh, my God, you never heard such athing! It was like a boy in Sunday-school saying up a piece of Scripturehe's learnt off by heart, and got all ready beforehand, and he's notgoing to be stopped till he gets to the end of it. "

"What did he say, " asked the Englishman. 

"Oh, he started, How did we know this nigger was a spy at all; it wouldbe a terrible thing to kill him if we weren't quite sure; perhaps he washiding there because he was wounded. And then he broke out that, afterall, these niggers were men fighting for their country; we would fightagainst the French if they came and took England from us; and theniggers were brave men, 'please sir'--(every five minutes he'd pull hisforelock, and say, 'please sir!')--'and if we have to fight against themwe ought to remember they're fighting for freedom; we shouldn't shootwounded prisoners when they were black if we wouldn't shoot them if theywere white!' And then he broke out pure unmitigated Exeter Hall! Younever heard anything like it! All men were brothers, and God loved ablack man as well as a white; Mashonas and Matabele were poor ignorantfolk, and we had to take care of them. And then he started out, that weought to let this man go; we ought to give him food for the road, andtell him to go back to his people, and tell them we hadn't come to taketheir land but to teach them and love them. 'It's hard to love a nigger, Captain, but we must try it; we must try it!'--And every five minuteshe'd break out with, 'And I think this is a man I know, Captain; I'mnot sure, but I think he comes from up Lo Magundis way!'--as if any borndevil cared whether a bloody nigger came from Lo Magundis or anywhereelse! I'm sure he said it fifteen times. And then he broke out, 'I don'tmean that I'm better than you or anybody else, Captain; I'm as bad a manas any in camp, and I know it. ' And off he started, telling us all thesins he'd ever committed; and he kept on, 'I'm an unlearned, ignorantman, Captain; but I must stand by this nigger; he's got no one else!'And then he says--'If you let me take him up to Lo Magundis, sir, I'mnot afraid; and I'll tell the people there that it's not their land andtheir women that we want, it's them to be our brothers and love us. Ifyou'll only let me go, sir, I'll go and make peace; give the man to me, sir!'" The Colonial shook with laughter. 

"What did the Captain say?" asked the Englishman. 

"The Captain; well, you know the smallest thing sets him off swearingall round the world; but he just stood there with his arms hanging downat each side of him, and his eyes staring, and his face getting redderand redder: and all he could say was, 'My Gawd! my Gawd!' I thoughthe'd burst. And Halket stood there looking straight in front of him, asthough he didn't see a soul of us all there. "

"What did the Captain do?"

"Oh, as soon as Halket turned away he started swearing, but he got thetail of one oath hooked on to the head of another. It was nearly as goodas Halket himself. And when he'd finished and got sane a bit, he saidHalket was to walk up and down there all day and keep watch on thenigger. And he gave orders that if the big troop didn't come up tonight, that he was to be potted first thing in the morning, and that Halket wasto shoot him. "

The Englishman started: "What did Halket say?"

"Nothing. He's been walking there with his gun all day. "

The Englishman watched with his clear eyes the spot where Halket's headappeared and disappeared. 

"Is the nigger hanging there now?"

"Yes. The Captain said no one was to go near him, or give him anythingto eat or drink all day: but--" The Colonial glanced round where thetrooper lay under the bushes; and then lowering his voice added, "Thismorning, a couple of hours ago, Halket sent the Captain's coloured boyto ask me for a drink of water. I thought it was for Halket himself, andthe poor devil must be hot walking there in the sun, so I sent him thewater out of my canvas bag. I went along afterwards to see what hadbecome of my mug; the boy had gone, and there, straight in front of theCaptain's tent, before the very door, was Halket letting that bloodynigger drink out of my mug. The riem was so tight round his neck hecouldn't drink but slowly, and there was Halket holding it up to him! Ifthe Captain had looked out! W-h-e-w! I wouldn't have been Halket!"

"Do you think he will try to make Halket do it?" asked the Englishman. 

"Of course he will. He's the Devil in; and Halket had better not make afuss about it, or it'll be the worse for him. "

"His time's up tomorrow evening!"

"Yes, but not tomorrow morning. And I wouldn't make a row about it if Iwas Halket. It doesn't do to fall out with the authorities here. What'sone nigger more or less? He'll get shot some other way, or die ofhunger, if we don't do it. "

"It's hardly sport to shoot a man tied up neck and legs, " said theEnglishman; his finely drawn eyebrows contracting and expanding alittle. 

"Oh, they don't feel, these niggers, not as we should, you know. I'veseen a man going to be shot, looking full at the guns, and fallinglike that!--without a sound. They've no feeling, these niggers; I don'tsuppose they care much whether they live or die, not as we should, youknow. "

The Englishman's eyes were still fixed on the bushes, behind whichHalket's head appeared and disappeared. 

"They have no right to order Halket to do it--and he will not do it!"said the Englishman slowly. 

"You're not going to be such a fool as to step in, are you?" said theColonial, looking curiously at him. "It doesn't pay. I've made up mymind never to speak whatever happens. What's the good? Suppose one wereto make a complaint now about this affair with Halket, if he's made toshoot the nigger against his will; what would come of it? There'd behalf-a-dozen fellows here squared to say what headquarters wanted--notto speak of a fellow like that"--turning his thumb in the direction ofthe sleeping trooper--"who are paid to watch. I believe he reports onthe Captain himself to the big headquarters. All one's wires are editedbefore they go down; only what the Company wants to go, go through. There are many downright good fellows in this lot; but how many of usare there, do you think, who could throw away all chance of ever makinganything in Mashonaland, for the sake of standing by Halket; even if hehad a real row with the Company? I've a great liking for Halket myself, he's a real good fellow, and he's done me many a good turn--took mywatch only last night, because I was off colour; I'd do anything for himin reason. But, I say this flatly, I couldn't and wouldn't fly in theface of the authorities for him or anyone else. I've my own girl waitingfor me down in the Colony, and she's been waiting for me these fiveyears. And whether I'm able to marry her or not depends on how I standwith the Company: and I say, flatly, I'm not going to fall out with it. I came here to make money, and I mean to make it! If other people liketo run their heads against stone walls, let them: but they mustn'texpect me to follow them. This isn't a country where a man can say whathe thinks. "

The Englishman rested his elbows on the ground. "And the Union Jack issupposed to be flying over us. "

"Yes, with a black bar across it for the Company, " laughed the Colonial. 

"Do you ever have the nightmare?" asked the Englishman suddenly. 

"I? Oh yes, sometimes"; he looked curiously at his companion; "when I'veeaten too much, I get it. "

"I always have it since I came up here, " said the Englishman. "It isthat a vast world is resting on me--a whole globe: and I am a midgebeneath it. I try to raise it, and I cannot. So I lie still underit--and let it crush me!"

"It's curious you should have the nightmare so up here, " said theColonial; "one gets so little to eat. "

There was a silence: he was picking the little fine feathers from thebird, and the Englishman was watching the ants. 

"Mind you, " the Colonial said at last, "I don't say that in this casethe Captain was to blame; Halket made an awful ass of himself. He'snever been quite right since that time he got lost and spent the nightout on the kopje. When we found him in the morning he was in a kind ofdead sleep; we couldn't wake him; yet it wasn't cold enough for him tohave been frozen. He's never been the same man since; queer, you know;giving his rations away to the coloured boys, and letting the otherfellows have his dot of brandy at night; and keeping himself sort ofapart to himself, you know. The other fellows think he's got a touch offever on, caught wandering about in the long grass that day. But I don'tthink it's that; I think it's being alone in the veld that's got hold ofhim. Man, have you ever been out like that, alone in the veld, nightand day, and not a soul to speak to? I have; and I tell you, if I'd beenleft there three days longer I'd have gone mad or turned religious. Man, it's the nights, with the stars up above you, and the dead still allaround. And you think, and think, and think! You remember all kinds ofthings you've never thought of for years and years. I used to talk tomyself at last, and make believe it was another man. I was out sevendays: and he was only out one night. But I think it's the lonelinessthat got hold of him. Man, those stars are awful; and that stillnessthat comes toward morning!" He stood up. "It's a great pity, becausehe's as good a fellow as ever was. But perhaps he'll come all right. "

He walked away towards the pot with the bird in his hand. When he hadgone the Englishman turned round on to his back, and lay with his armacross his forehead. 

High, high up, between the straggling branches of the tree, in theclear, blue African sky above him, he could see the vultures flyingsouthward. 

*****

That evening the men sat eating their suppers round the fires. The largetroop had not come up; and the mules had been brought in; and they wereto make a start early the next morning. 

Halket was released from his duty, and had come up, and lain down alittle in the background of the group who gathered round their fire. 

The Colonial and the Englishman had given orders to all the men of theirmess that Halket was to be left in quiet, and no questions were to beasked him; and the men, fearing the Colonial's size and the Englishman'snerve, left him in peace. The men laughed and chatted round the fire, while the big Colonial ladled out the mealies and rice into tin plates, and passed them round to the men. Presently he passed one to Halket, who lay half behind him leaning on his elbow. For a while Halket atenothing, then he took a few mouthfuls; and again lay on his elbow. 

"You are eating nothing, Halket, " said the Englishman, cheerily, lookingback. 

"I am not hungry now, " he said. After a while he took out his redhandkerchief, and emptied carefully into it the contents of the plate;and tied it up into a bundle. He set it beside him on the ground, andagain lay on his elbow. 

"You won't come nearer to the fire, Halket?' asked the Englishman. 

"No, thank you, the night is warm. "

After a while Peter Halket took out from his belt a small hunting knifewith a rough wooden handle. A small flat stone lay near him, and hepassed the blade slowly up and down on it, now and then taking it up, and feeling the edge with his finger. After a while he put it back inhis belt, and rose slowly, taking up his small bundle and walked away tothe tent. 

"He's had a pretty stiff day, " said the Colonial. "I expect he's gladenough to turn in. "

Then all the men round the fire chatted freely over his concerns. Wouldthe Captain stick to his word tomorrow? Was Halket going to do it?Had the Captain any right to tell one man off for the work, insteadof letting them fire a volley? One man said he would do it gladly inHalket's place, if told off; why had he made such a fool of himself? Sothey chatted till nine o'clock, when the Englishman and Colonial left toturn in. They found Halket asleep, close to the side of the tent, withhis face turned to the canvas. And they lay down quietly that they mightnot disturb him. 

At ten o'clock all the camp was asleep, excepting the two men told offto keep guard; who paced from one end of the camp to the other to keepthemselves awake; or stood chatting by the large fire, which still burntat one end. 

In the Captain's tent a light was kept burning all night, which shonethrough the thin canvas sides, and shed light on the ground about; but, for the rest, the camp was dead and still. 

By half-past one the moon had gone down, and there was left only a blazeof stars in the great African sky. 

Then Peter Halket rose up; softly he lifted the canvas and crept out. On the side furthest from the camp he stood upright. On his arm was tiedhis red handkerchief with its contents. For a moment he glanced up atthe galaxy of stars over him; then he stepped into the long grass, andmade his way in a direction opposite to that in which the camp lay. Butafter a short while he turned, and made his way down into the river bed. He walked in it for a while. Then after a time he sat down upon the bankand took off his heavy boots and threw them into the grass at the side. Then softly, on tip-toe, he followed the little footpath that the menhad trodden going down to the river for water. It led straight up to theCaptain's tent, and the little flat-topped tree, with its white stem, and its two gnarled branches spread out on either side. When he waswithin forty paces of it, he paused. Far over the other side of thecamp the two men who were on guard stood chatting by the fire. A deadstillness was over the rest of the camp. The light through the walls ofthe Captain's tent made all clear at the stem of the little tree; butthere was no sound of movement within. 

For a moment Peter Halket stood motionless; then he walked up to thetree. The black man hung against the white stem, so closely bound toit that they seemed one. His hands were tied to his sides, and his headdrooped on his breast. His eyes were closed; and his limbs, which hadonce been those of a powerful man, had fallen away, making the jointsstand out. The wool on his head was wild and thick with neglect, andstood out roughly in long strands; and his skin was rough with want andexposure. 

The riems had cut a little into his ankles; and a small flow of bloodhad made the ground below his feet dark. 

Peter Halket looked up at him; the man seemed dead. He touched himsoftly on the arm, then shook it slightly. 

The man opened his eyes slowly, without raising his head; and looked atPeter from under his weary eyebrows. Except that they moved they mighthave been the eyes of a dead thing. 

Peter put up his fingers to his own lips--"Hus-h! hus-h!" he said. 

The man hung torpid, still looking at Peter. 

Quickly Peter Halket knelt down and took the knife from his belt. In aninstant the riems that bound the feet were cut through; in another hehad cut the riems from the waist and neck: the riems dropped tothe ground from the arms, and the man stood free. Like a dazed dumbcreature, he stood, with his head still down, eyeing Peter. 

Instantly Peter slipped the red bundle from his arm into the man'spassive hand. 

"Ari-tsemaia! Hamba! Loop! Go!" whispered Peter Halket; using a wordfrom each African language he knew. But the black man still stoodmotionless, looking at him as one paralysed. 

"Hamba! Sucka! Go!" he whispered, motioning his hand. 

In an instant a gleam of intelligence shot across the face; then a wildtransport. Without a word, without a sound, as the tiger leaps when thewild dogs are on it, with one long, smooth spring, as though unwoundedand unhurt, he turned and disappeared into the grass. It closed behindhim; but as he went the twigs and leaves cracked under his tread. 

The Captain threw back the door of his tent. "Who is there?" he cried. 

Peter Halket stood below the tree with the knife in his hand. 

The noise roused the whole camp: the men on guard came running; gunswere fired: and the half-sleeping men came rushing, grasping theirweapons. There was a sound of firing at the little tree; and the crywent round the camp, "The Mashonas are releasing the spy!"

When the men got to the Captain's tent, they saw that the nigger wasgone; and Peter Halket was lying on his face at the foot of the tree;with his head turned towards the Captain's door. 

There was a wild confusion of voices. "How many were there?" "Where havethey gone to now?" "They've shot Peter Halket!"--"The Captain saw themdo it"--"Stand ready, they may come back any time!"

When the Englishman came, the other men, who knew he had been a medicalstudent, made way for him. He knelt down by Peter Halket. 

"He's dead, " he said, quietly. 

When they had turned him over, the Colonial knelt down on the otherside, with a little hand-lamp in his hand. 

"What are you fellows fooling about here for?" cried the Captain. "Doyou suppose it's any use looking for foot marks after all this tramping!Go, guard the camp on all sides!"

"I will send four coloured boys, " he said to the Englishman and theColonial, "to dig the grave. You'd better bury him at once; there's nouse waiting. We start first thing in the morning. "

When they were alone, the Englishman uncovered Peter Halket's breast. There was one small wound just under the left bosom; and one on thecrown of the head; which must have been made after he had fallen down. 

"Strange, isn't it, what he can have been doing here?" said theColonial; "a small wound, isn't it?"

"A pistol shot, " said the Englishman, closing the bosom. 

"A pistol--"

The Englishman looked up at him with a keen light in his eye. 

"I told you he would not kill that nigger. --See--here--" He took up theknife which had fallen from Peter Halket's grasp, and fitted it into apiece of the cut leather that lay on the earth. 

"But you don't think--" The Colonial stared at him with wide open eyes;then he glanced round at the Captain's tent. 

"Yes, I think that--Go and fetch his great-coat; we'll put him in it. Ifit is no use talking while a man is alive, it is no use talking when heis dead!"

They brought his great-coat, and they looked in the pockets to see ifthere was anything which might show where he had come from or who hisfriends were. But there was nothing in the pockets except an emptyflask, and a leathern purse with two shillings in, and a littlehand-made two-pointed cap. 

So they wrapped Peter Halket up in his great-coat, and put the littlecap on his head. 

And, one hour after Peter Halket had stood outside the tent looking up, he was lying under the little tree, with the red sand trodden down overhim, in which a black man and a white man's blood were mingled. 

All the rest of the night the men sat up round the fires, discussingwhat had happened, dreading an attack. 

But the Englishman and the Colonial went to their tent, to lie down. 

"Do you think they will make any inquiries?" asked the Colonial. 

"Why should they? His time will be up tomorrow. "

"Are you going to say anything?"

"What is the use?"

They lay in the dark for an hour, and heard the men chatting outside. 

"Do you believe in a God?" said the Englishman, suddenly. 

The Colonial started: "Of course I do!"

"I used to, " said the Englishman; "I do not believe in your God; but Ibelieved in something greater than I could understand, which moved inthis earth, as your soul moves in your body. And I thought this workedin such wise, that the law of cause and effect, which holds in thephysical world, held also in the moral: so, that the thing we calljustice, ruled. I do not believe it any more. There is no God inMashonaland. "

"Oh, don't say that!" cried the Colonial, much distressed. "Are yougoing off your head, like poor Halket?"

"No; but there is no God, " said the Englishman. He turned round on hisshoulder, and said no more: and afterwards the Colonial went to sleep. 

Before dawn the next morning the men had packed up the goods, andstarted. 

By five o'clock the carts had filed away; the men rode or walked beforeand behind them; and the space where the camp had been was an emptycircle; save for a few broken bottles and empty tins, and the stonesabout which the fires had been made, round which warm ashes yet lay. 

Only under the little stunted tree, the Colonial and the Englishman werepiling up stones. Their horses stood saddled close by. 

Presently the large trooper came riding back. He had been sent by theCaptain to ask what they were fooling behind for, and to tell them tocome on. 

The men mounted their horses to follow him; but the Englishman turnedin his saddle and looked back. The morning sun was lighting up thestraggling branches of the tall trees that had overshadowed thecamp; and fell on the little stunted tree, with its white stem andoutstretched arms; and on the stones beneath it. 

"It's all that night on the kopje!" said the Colonial, sadly. 

But the Englishman looked back. "I hardly know, " he said, "whether it isnot better for him now, than for us. "

Then they rode on after the troop.