Part 83 (2/2)
”And you want to do likewise, eh? Only as there are no fowls to practise at here, you'd be hurling it at old Cooke's next door. No, sonny; little boys mustn't play with edged tools, as the copy-books say.”
It is the third day after Claverton's departure--a bright, beautiful morning, with the already tangible promise of great heat. Slowly Lilian strolls along the street, hardly heeding the throng of busy life on all sides; the rolling waggons, with their long, jaded spans, moving to the crack of the driver's whip, accompanied by a shrill, harsh yell; the sun-tanned hors.e.m.e.n ambling about; or the three or four pedestrians, who, booted and spurred, are striding among the crowd in all the glory of their spiked helmets, where an open-air sale is taking place, flattering themselves they present an intensely martial aspect, and putting on ”side” accordingly. Here and there a storekeeper stands before his shop-door exchanging gossip with the pa.s.sers-by; and black fellows of every nationality, clothed in ragged trousers and greasy s.h.i.+rts, with, it may be, a battered hat stuck on top of their dusty wool, stand in knots chattering in their deep ba.s.s, or trundle great packages in and out of the stores. All this Lilian hardly sees as she strolls along, a world of tender thought in the sweet eyes; and the beautiful figure in the cool summer dress forms a very bright and pleasing contrast in that busy workaday throng.
She has been to the library and changed her books, has done one or two little commissions, and now it is getting very hot, as she pauses for a moment to rest and look in at a shop-window. Three days have gone, three days out of the time she has to wait. Ah! how she longs for that time to come to an end! And the hum of traffic increases in the busy street, and from the cathedral spire the hour of ten chimes out.
Suddenly the hand which has been gently twirling the sunshade on her shoulder, closes in rigid grasp round the k.n.o.b; and lo! the beautiful, pensive face is white and bloodless--pale as the snowy ostrich feather adorning her hat--a peerless ”prime white,” which her lover had ransacked the country to procure in order to devote it to its present purpose. For as she stands there Lilian catches that lover's name, and, before she has overheard many words of the conversation of a knot of men chattering behind her, she feels as if she must fall to the ground.
”How do they know he's killed?” one of them was saying, evidently in response to a preceding query. ”They know it as well as they can know it short of finding the body, and the n.i.g.g.e.rs don't leave much of that-- butchering brutes. But, look here. If Claverton started on the line of country Jos Sanders said he did, and didn't turn up at the main camp yesterday by twelve o'clock at latest, he's a dead man. The whole of those locations that side o' the mountains have risen, and a flea couldn't have got through without their spottin' him.”
”He may have gone round t'other way, though.”
”Not likely. Jos said he was in a mighty cast-iron hurry, and laughed in his face when he just cautioned him to look out. There was a Dutchman with him, too.”
”In a hurry? Claverton in a hurry? That'd be a sight worth seeing,”
struck in another. ”Why, if all the n.i.g.g.e.rs in Kafirland were on his spoor, he'd stop to fill his pipe before he'd move.”
”Ah, he's a mighty cool hand,” rejoined the first speaker, admiringly.
”We want a few more like him. You should jes' have seen him that time when we were out under old Hughes. There was only eighteen of us all told, and the n.i.g.g.e.rs were on us by hundreds. If it hadn't been for Brathwaite's fellers we should all have been cut up. We fought the whole afternoon; and Claverton, he seemed to care no more about the n.i.g.g.e.rs than if there hadn't been one of 'em there.”
”Yes, and the way he brought out poor Jack Armitage that time! It was a doosid plucky thing.”
”I say, what's this about Claverton being killed?” exclaimed another voice, whose owner had evidently just joined the group. ”I see the telegram says he may have been taken prisoner.”
The first speaker shook his head ominously.
”Kafirs don't take prisoners,” he said. ”If they do, so much the worse for the prisoners. No, sir. Claverton would fight like the devil, but he'd never let those brutes take him alive, you may safely bet your bottom dollar on that. Poor chap! Hot, isn't it? Let's go and liquor.”
They moved off, and Lilian stood there feeling as if the whole world had suddenly given way beneath her feet. Then she remembered that the newspaper office was but a few yards off. With swaying and uneven steps she made her way there. A boy was standing at the counter, rapidly folding copy after copy of the morning's edition.
”I want a paper, please. One with the very latest telegrams.”
Lilian was surprised at her own calmness; but her ashy face and quivering lips might have told their own tale.
”Yes, mum,” said the boy, handing her one of those lying on the counter, and with it a small, printed slip. ”Latest from the front--an officer killed.”
The words beat like a sledge-hammer in her brain, but she managed to stagger out of the shop. The whole street--vehicles, pa.s.sengers, trees, everything--seemed to go round before her as she strained her eyes upon the printed words of that fatal slip.
An Officer Missing.
”Field-Captain Claverton, of Brathwaite's Horse, left Breakfast Vley two days ago for the main camp, and has not since been heard of. He was accompanied by a Dutchman named Oppermann. There is every reason to fear that they have been out off and killed, as the bushy defiles through which lay their road, are swarming with rebel Gaikas.”
Later.
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