Part 80 (2/2)

Claverton bends down again to examine the horse's leg, and the light of the stable-lantern reveals an expression of the most intense and hopeless disgust upon his face. The stable is that belonging to the inn half-way along the King Williamstown road, the hour is shortly after midnight, and he has only just arrived. He has ridden untiringly, not sparing his mount, which indeed can hardly go a pace further; and now his other horse, which he has been counting on as a relay, is dead lame.

It will be remembered that he had left Sam on the road, with orders to rest his horse and follow him at leisure. Shortly after Sam had seen his master's back disappear over the rising ground, the animal began to go lame. Carefully the Natal boy examined his feet. There was no shoe loose, no stone in the frog--no. Poor Fleck had strained a sinew, and, by dint of much toil and considerable pain, the horse managed to reach the inn with his fetlock swelled to a ball.

”Sam, I must get on; and at once. Is there no one here who could sell me a horse?” The native thought a moment. ”There are two men who came down from the camp to-day, Inkos, but their horses are used up. There's a Dutchman going up there, he has an extra horse. That's it; this one over here,” and, taking the lantern, Sam led the way to the other end of the stable. Claverton ran his eye over the animal designated. It was a large, young horse, well put together and in tolerable condition, but it rolled the whites of its eyes and laid its ears back in suggestive fas.h.i.+on.

”Looks skittish,” mused Claverton, as with a wild snort the animal backed and began ”rucking” at its tether, then bounding suddenly forward, came with a fracas against the rickety crib, and stood snorting and trembling and rolling its eyes. ”Half-broken evidently. What's the fellow's name, Sam?”

”Oppermann. Cornelius Oppermann, Inkos.”

”H'm. Getting light,” he mused, opening the door and looking skywards.

”Sam, I'm going to buy that brute anyhow, and go straight on at once.

Now you must wait till the young horse is rested, and take him back to Payne's. Fleck can stay here. And, Sam,” he went on in a graver tone, ”you are to wait there till I come back. Do everything they tell you; and if they send you to me, come at once and as quickly as you can. You see?”

Sam looked crestfallen. He had reckoned upon accompanying his master back to the war. But with the unswerving loyalty of his race towards those whom they hold in veneration he made no demur, and promised faithfully to carry out his master's wishes to the best of his ability.

Ten minutes later Claverton was standing on the _stoep_ of the inn, bargaining with an unkempt, sandy-bearded Dutchman, who, hastily arrayed in his s.h.i.+rt and trousers, stood rubbing his eyes with the air of a man just aroused from a sound sleep; as, indeed, was the case.

”You can take him for forty-five pounds,” the latter was saying, having finished a cavernous yawn.

”Ha--ha--ha! Forty-five? Now look here, Oppermann,” answered Claverton in a chaffing, good-natured tone. ”You're not awake yet, man, or you'd remember the brute wasn't worth a dollar more than twenty. He isn't half-broken, to begin with.”

”Twenty. Nay, what? You shall have him for forty.”

”I rather want him, but I'm in no hurry,” was the reply. ”Here's thirty, down on the nail. Look.”

He pulled out some notes, and the Dutchman's eyes glittered.

”Thirty-five?” he began.

”No. Thirty. Take it or--leave it.”

”Well, well. Give me the money,” and he held out his hand. But Claverton was not quite so ”green” as all that.

”Here, Sam,” he called out. ”Look. The Baas has sold me the horse we were looking at for thirty pounds,” and he handed over the money to the expectant Boer, thus making Sam a witness to the transaction. ”Now go and saddle him up,” he continued.

”Are you starting so soon?” said Oppermann, with surprise. ”I'm going up to the camp--we might ride together. Wait a little quarter of an hour.”

”Can't wait a moment longer. Look sharp.”

The other disappeared with alacrity. He had been looking forward with some apprehension to his lonely journey across the hostile ground, and the escort and companions.h.i.+p of this cool, clear-headed Englishman would be a perfect G.o.dsend to him. So he soon hurried through his scant preparations, and by the time Claverton had settled with the host, and had saddled up, the Boer was nearly ready.

Two rough-looking fellows were talking to the landlord in front of the door as Claverton was about to start. They were the two referred to by Sam as having just come from the war.

”I say, Mister,” called out one of them. ”You're not going all the way alone, are you?”

”Yes.”

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