The Outspan: Tales of South Africa
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For a time it answered, but Mallandane, besides being naturally unstable, must have been bitten by drink, for he broke out again, and nothing either wife or friend could do could save him. There came scenes – brutality and insult to the wife, ingratitude and insult to the friend. She told us nothing except in pity and forgiveness of her dead husband – nothing, that is, that justice to Cassidy did not require; but it is not difficult to imagine what happened, and, indeed, I know now that it was only the pitiful helplessness of the wife and child, and the knowledge that his presence was food, and even life, to them, that held Cassidy to his partner; for in his fits of drunkenness Mallandane would have murdered both wife and child.
Cassidy worked from four in the morning until eight at night, and at times through the day he would run up from the claims to the house, to see that all was well. All he made went to keep the house going, and it was given as a matter of course. No complaint was made, although Mallandane now ceased even the pretence of work and spent the whole day in the canteens.
But the end came when least expected. Mallandane, when he did come home at all, did not get up until hours after Cassidy was at work. He used to awake drunk and dazed, and wander off at once, unshaven, dirty and half dressed, to the nearest canteen.
One morning, however, there was a change. He was grey-faced, puffy and sodden, it is true, but he fussed about the house briskly, talking to himself. He got out a clean moleskin suit, and told the servant that he could not wait for breakfast, as he had to fire the eight o’clock shots, and the holes were all charged and waiting for him.
Within a quarter of an hour Cassidy had come up for breakfast. Mrs Mallandane met him on the way and told him what the servant had in the meantime told her; and Cassidy raced back to stop his delirious partner. With a madman’s cunning and instinct he had slipped down the mine from ledge to ledge and along dangerous slopes until he reached the lowest workings, and when Cassidy, after some delay in getting a bucket on the hauling-gear to go down in, reached the spot, the boys told him that Mallandane “umtagati” (bewitched) had gone into the drive to fire the charges, and would let no one go near him.
Cassidy looked at the black mouth of the drive. He did not think of the worthless sodden wretch who had gone in there. He recalled the partner of years, the mate of good times and bad, and he recalled, too, the horror-stricken look on the face of the woman he had just left. He dashed in to the sound of a warning yell from every man in the mine.
When occasion calls there is still no lack of brave men. Heroes spring into recognition from every grade of life, from every class of material; and while the half-dozen explosions still echoed and reverberated in the circle of the mine, there were men dashing in to the rescue at the imminent risk of their lives, heedless of the deadly fumes and of possible unexploded charges.
“The firm” lay in one heap – Cassidy on his back, Mallandane athwart him. To the only person to whom he ever spoke of the affair, Cassidy said: “He was stooping to light another fuse when I reached him. I gripped both arms round him as he turned on me and tried to carry him out. It was a wrestling match, for he showed fight. My face was over his one shoulder, as his was over mine; but mine was turned towards the shots.”
A piece of the rock that shattered poor Cassidy’s face entered the back of his partner’s head, and he never stirred again.
Cassidy lay for months in hospital, bandaged, blindfolded, barely alive; and the woman he had stood by, stood by him. When he was able to walk about, it was on her arm he leaned. When he was fit to leave, it was to her house he went to be tended for months longer. He never complained nor lost heart, although he knew that one eye was gone and thought he would lose the other.
Some seven or eight months had passed, and he was getting well and strong – he was healing. She had always dreaded the effect of the first sight of himself, and for this reason had removed the mirrors from the rooms he frequented; but one day, when she had been out for a while, she found him lying on the sofa, the bandage off his eyes, and a hand-glass dropped on the carpet close by. It was the only time he had fainted or in any way given in.
Later in the evening he said:
“I don’t really mind so much now that I know. It was the suspense that worried me.” And, after a pause, he added in a voice that seemed to let you hear his heart lifting: “I’ll be able to tackle work again soon, and will be all right again.”
“That was the only allusion,” Mrs Mallandane said, “that he ever made to his disfigurement. I believe it was out of delicacy and consideration for my feelings that he never spoke about it. You could not even see that he ever thought of it, for he had that splendid manliness that doesn’t know what self-consciousness means.
“Only one thing showed unmistakably that he did feel it, and that he felt he was dead to all the promise of his past. You must have remarked his manner of speech?” she observed, turning to me. “He spoke like a working man. That was his only shield. He deliberately sank himself to that level to be spared the prominence and pity that would be given him as a gentleman. It was his hope to pass through life unnoticed. With me, and with me only, he had no disguise, no concealment, no reserve!”
He used always to talk of their affairs as one and the same, in order to keep up the illusion he had encouraged in her from the beginning when he had told her very seriously that “it would never do to liquidate the firm’s business now. It would mean sacrificing everything.” She agreed to do whatever he thought right; and at the end of every month he used to hand to her, scrupulously accounted for, a sum greater or less, according to “the firm’s profits for the month.”
From his own “profits” he always managed to have something – no matter how little – to spend on Molly, who was his pet and companion always. The proceeds of the sale of house and furniture – when they had to be given up – were handed over to Mrs Mallandane “for a stand-by,” and she went into lodgings because she “would feel more comfortable and have more time to give to Molly there,” – not because he was watchful over her good name and would not stay in the house once he was well enough to walk alone.
When Cassidy extended the firm’s “business” – that is to say, went to the Cape Colony, Natal, and Transvaal, in search of contracts on the various railway lines – he continued to remit the “profits” with the most elaborate statements, which Mrs Mallandane, as a partner, felt bound to study, and, as a woman, often wept over in despair.
This had gone on for several years, and it was not until after she had gone to Barberton, “to be near the business,” that something had made her suspicious that the joint capital locked up in the business was all a generous imposition.
“It only needed the suggestion,” said Mrs Mallandane, “to show me an appalling chain of evidence – evidence of his generosity and patient tactful help – evidence of my blind content and foolishness. I spoke to him when next he came in. He could see that I knew, and he simply said that ‘Ralph would have done the same for him.’ God forgive me! He gave up his life to me! He suffered living death for me! He lived when it would have been a million mercies to have died. He bore all that man could bear and never grudged it. And I – I cut his heart in two when I refused his help! I know it! I wished I had died before I got the look he gave me when I told him that I could not take his help. Month after month went by and he did not come to me – he, who used to be here on the first day of every month. But I knew he was near. Twice I saw him passing slowly by at night when he had come to watch over us. The first time I was too surprised to call. The second time I called him and he came to me. He stayed until late that evening; and he went away happy again because we registered our second compact: that if we (Molly and I) were ever in real need I would send for him; that if he were sick or in need of friends the privilege of friends should be ours.”
She stopped for quite a while, and when she spoke again her voice trembled and it was all she could do to control it so that she could speak at all. I could not bear to look in her face.
“You two have seen him,” she said, and, turning to me, added, “You have known him. I have liked to tell you all about him; and I like to tell you now that I know he loved me – that I think it is the greatest honour a woman can have to be loved by such a man: for not any woman that I have ever known, or heard of, or read of, was good enough for him!”
She left the room for a moment, and returning laid something on the table before us, saying:
“You remember him as you saw him. Try – try to think of him as I do – like this! It is all you can do for the memory of a good and honourable man.”
It was the photograph I had seen in her book the day I left to bring him in.
All those things happened some years ago.
Out on the grass there, in front of my window, there is a little girl trying to dissuade a very small boy from pulling the black ear off an old white bulldog; but the fat little fists keep their grip, and as he staggers under the effort the little chap says:
“Molly mus’ pull Danl Conn! olla ear! Make him det up!”
Watching them with the brightest, merriest smile in the world, and looking years younger than when I first saw her, Mrs —
But if I mentioned her name this would not be an anonymous story.
Chapter Five.
The Pool
Everyone remembers the rush to De Kaap some years ago. How everyone said that everyone else would make fortunes in half no time, and the country would be saved! Well, my brother Jim and I thought we would like to make fortunes too; so we packed our boxes, donned flannel shirts, felt hats and moleskin trousers, with a revolver each carelessly slung at our sides, and started. We intended to dig for about a year or so, and then sell out and live on the interest of our money – 30,000 pounds each would do. It was all cut and dried. I often almost wished it wasn’t so certain, as now one hadn’t a chance of coming back suddenly and surprising the loved ones at home with the news of a grand fortune.
Full of excitement (certainties notwithstanding) we went down to Kent’s Forwarding Store, and there met Mr Harding, whose waggons were loaded for the gold-fields. This was our chance, and we took it.
On November 10, 1883, we crossed Little Sunday’s River and outspanned at the foot of Knight’s Cutting. The day was close and sultry, and Harding thought it best to lie by until the cool of the evening before attempting the hill. It wasn’t much of a cool evening we got after all; except that we had not the scorching rays of the sun beating down upon us, it was no cooler at 10 p.m. than at mid-day. We were outspanned above the cutting, and the oppressive heat of the day and the sultriness of the evening seemed to have told on our party, and we were all squatted about on the long soft grass, smoking or thinking. Besides my brother and myself there were two young Scotchmen (just out from home) and a little Frenchman. He was a general favourite on account of his inexhaustible good-nature and unflagging high spirits.
We were, as I have said, stretched out on the grass smoking in silence, watching the puffs and rings of smoke melt quietly away, so still was the air. How long we had lain thus I don’t know, but I was the first to break the silence by exclaiming:
“What a grand night for a bathe!”
There was no reply to this for some seconds, and then Jim gave an apathetic grunt in courteous recognition of the fact that I had spoken. I subsided again, and there was another long silence – evidently no one wanted to talk; but I had become restless and fidgety under the heat and stillness, and presently I returned to the charge.
“Who’s for a bathe?” I asked.
Someone grunted out something about “no place.”
“Oh yes, there is,” said I, glad of even so much encouragement; and then, turning to Harding, I said:
“I hear the water in the kloof. There is a place, isn’t there?”
“Yes,” he answered slowly, “there is one place, but you wouldn’t care to dip there… It’s the Murderer’s Pool.”
“The what?” we asked in a breath.
“The Murderer’s Pool,” he repeated with such slow seriousness that we at once became interested – the name sent an odd tingle through one. I was already all attention, and during the pause that followed the others closed around and settled themselves to hear the yarn. When he had tantalised us enough with his provoking slowness, Harding began:
“About this time last year – By-the-by, what is the date?” he asked, breaking off.
“The tenth!” exclaimed two or three together.
“By Jove! it’s the very day. Yes, that’s queer. This very day last year I was outspanned on this spot, as we are now. I had a lady and gentleman with me as passengers that trip. They were pleasant, accommodating people, and gave us no trouble at all; they used to spend all their time botanising and sketching. On this afternoon Mrs Allan went down to the ravine below to sketch some peculiar bit of rock scenery. I think all ladies sketch when they travel, some more and some less. But Mrs Allan could sketch and paint really well, and often went off alone short distances while her husband stayed to chat with me. She had been gone about twenty minutes when we were startled by a most awful piercing shriek – another, another, and another – and then all was still again. Before the first had died away Allan and I were running at full speed towards where we judged the shrieks to have come from. Fortunately we were right. Down there, a bit to the right, we came upon a fair-sized pool, on the surface of which Mrs Allan was still floating. In a few seconds we had her out and were trying restoratives; and on detecting signs of returning life we carried her up to the waggons. When she became conscious she started up with oh! such a look of horror and fright. I’ll never forget it! Seeing her husband, however, and holding his hand, she became calm again, and told us all about it.
“It seems she had been sitting by the side of the stream sketching the pool and the great perpendicular cliff rising out of it. The sunlight was playing on the water, silvering every ripple, and bringing out every detail of the rocks and foliage above. Feathery mosses festooned from cliff to cliff; maidenhair ferns clustered in every nook and crevice; the drops on every leaf and tendril glistened in the setting sun like a thousand diamonds. That’s what she told us.
“She sat a few minutes before beginning, watching the varying shades and hues, when, glancing idly into the water, she saw deep, deep down, a sight that horrified her.
“On the rocks at the bottom of the pool lay the body of a gigantic Kaffir, his throat cut from ear to ear, and the white teeth gleaming and grinning at her.
“Instinctively she screamed and ran, and in trying to pass along the narrow ledge she slipped and fell into the water. Had her clothes not buoyed her up she would have been drowned, as when the cold water closed round her it seemed like the clasp of death, and she lost consciousness.”
“Well, what about the nigger?” I asked, for Harding had stopped with the air of one whose tale was told.
“Oh, he was dead right enough – throat cut and assegai through the heart. A fight, I expect.”
“What did you do?” I asked.
“Raked him out and planted him up here somewhere. Let’s see – yes, that’s the place,” – indicating the pile of stones my brother was sitting on.
Jim got up hurriedly; perhaps, as he said, he wanted to look at the place. Yet there was a general laugh at him.
“Did you think he had you, Jim?” I asked innocently.
“Don’t you gas, old chap! How about that bathe you were so bent on?”
Merciful heavens! The words fell like a bucket of ice-water on me. I made a ghastly attempt at a laugh, but it was a failure – an utter failure – and of course brought all the others down on me at once.
“The nigger seems to have taken all the bathe out of you, old man,” said one.
“Not at all!” I answered loftily. “It would take more than that to frighten me.”
Now, why on earth didn’t I hold my tongue and let the remark pass? I must needs make an ass of myself by bravado, and now I was in for it. There was a perfect chorus of, “Go it, old man!” “Now, isn’t that real pluck?” “Six to four on the nigger!”
“I pet fife pound you not swim agross and dife two times.” This last came from the little French demon, and, being applauded by the company, I took up the bet. The fact is I was nettled by the chaff, and in the heat of the moment did what I regretted a minute later.
As I rose to get my towel I said with cutting sarcasm:
“I don’t care about the bet, but I’ll just show you that everyone isn’t afraid of his own shadow; though,” I added forgetfully, “it’s rather an unreasonable time to bathe.”
Here Frenchy struck a stage attitude, and said innocently:
“Ah! vat a night foor ze bade!”
The shout of laughter that greeted this sally was more than enough to decide me, and I went off in search of a towel.
Harding, I could see, did not like the idea, and tried to persuade me to give it up; but that was out of the question.
“Mind,” said he, “I’m no believer in ghosts; yet,” he added, with rather a forced laugh, “this is the anniversary, and you know it’s uncanny.”
I quite agreed with him, but dared not say so, and I pretended to laugh it off. I was ready in a few moments, and then a rather happy idea, as I thought, struck me, and I called out:
“Who’s coming to see that I win my bet?”
“Oh, we know we can trust you, old chap!” said Jim with exaggerated politeness. “It’d be a pity, you know, to outnumber the ghost.”
“Very well; it’s all the same to me. Good-bye! Two dives and a swim across – is that it?”
“Yes, and look out for the nigger!”
“Mind you fish him up!”
“Watch his teeth, Jack!”
“Feel for his throat, you know!” This latter exclamation came from Jim; it was yelled out as I disappeared down the slope. Jim had not forgotten the incident of the grave, evidently.
I had a half-moon to go by, and a ghostly sort of light it shed. Everything seemed more shadowy and fantastic than usual. Besides this, I had not gone a hundred yards from the waggons before every sound was stilled; not the faintest whisper stirred the air. The crunching of my heavy boots on the gravel was echoed across the creek, and every step grated on my nerves and went like a sword-stab through me.
However, I walked along briskly until the descent became more steep and I was obliged to go more carefully. Down I went, step by step, lower and lower, till I felt the light grow dimmer and dimmer, and then quite suddenly I stepped into gloom and darkness.
This startled me. The suddenness of the change made me shiver a bit and fancy it was cold; but it couldn’t have been that, for a moment later the chill had gone and the air was close and sultry. It must have been something else. Still I went down, down, down, along the winding path, and the further I went the more intense seemed the stillness and the deeper the gloom.
Once I stood still to listen; there was not a stir or sound save the trickling of the water below. My heart began to beat rather fast, and my breath seemed heavy. What was it? Surely, I thought, it is not fright? I tried to whistle now as I strode along, but the death-like silence mocked me and choked the breath in my throat.
At last I reached the stream. The path ran along the side of the water among the rocks and ferns. I looked for the pool, but could not see a sign of it. Still I followed the path until it wound along a very narrow ledge of rock.
I was so engrossed picking my steps along there that, when I had got round and saw the pool lying black and silent at my feet, I fairly staggered back with the shock. There was no mistaking the place. The pool was surrounded by high rocks; on the opposite side they ran up quite perpendicularly to a good height. Nowhere, except the ledge at my feet, would a man have been able to get out of the water alone. The black surface of the water was as smooth as glass; not a ripple or bubble or straw broke its awful monotony.
It fascinated me; but it was a ghostly spot. I don’t know how long I stood there watching it. It seemed hours. A sickening feeling had crept over me, and I knew I was afraid.
I looked all round, but there was nothing to break the horrid spell. Behind me there was a face of rock twenty feet high with ferns and creepers falling from every crevice. But it looked black, too. I turned silently again towards the water, almost hoping to see something there; but there was still the same unbroken surface, the same oppressive deadly silence as before. What was the use of delaying? It had to be done; so I might as well face it at once. I own I was frightened. I would have lost the bet with pleasure, but to stand the laughter, chaff, and jeers of the others! No! that I could never do. My mind was made up to it, so I threw off my clothes quickly and came up to the water’s edge. I walked out on the one low ledge and looked down. I was trembling then, I know.
I tried to think it was cold, but I knew it was not that I stooped low down to search the very depths of the pool, but I could see nothing; all was uniformly dark. And yet – good God! what was that? Right down at the bottom lay a long black object. With starting eyes I looked again. It was only a rock. I drew back a pace and sat down. The perspiration was in beads on my forehead. I shook in every limb; sick and faint, my breath went and came in the merest whispers. So I sat for a minute or two with my head resting on my hands, and then the thought struck me, “What if the others are watching me above?”
I jumped up to make a running plunge of it, but, somehow, the run slackened into a walk, and the walk ended in a pause near the ledge, and there I stood to have another look into the dark, still pool.
Suddenly there was a rustling behind me. I jumped round, tingling, quivering all over, and a pebble rolled at my feet from the rocks above. I called out in a shaky voice, “Now then, you chaps! none of that; I can see you.” But really I could see nothing, and the echo of my voice had such a weird, awful sound that I began to lose my head altogether. There was no use now pretending that I was not frightened, for I was. My nerves were completely unstrung, my head was splitting, and my legs could hardly bear me. I preferred to face any ridicule rather than endure this for another minute, and I commenced dressing. Then I pictured to myself Jim’s grinning face, Frenchy’s pantomime of the whole affair, Harding’s quiet smile, and the chaff and laughter of them all, and I paused. A sudden rush, a plunge and souse, and I was in. Breathless and gasping I struck out, only twenty yards across; madly I swam. The cold water made my flesh creep. On and on, faster and faster; would I never reach it? At last I touched the rocks and turned to come back. Then all their chaff recurred to me. Every stroke seemed to hiss the words at me, “Feel for his throat! Feel for his throat!” I fancied the dead nigger was on me, and every moment expected to feel his hand on my shoulder. On I sped, faster and faster, mad with the dread of being entangled by the legs and pulled down – I swam for life. When I scrambled on the ledge I felt I was saved! Then all at once I began to feel my body tingling with a most exhilarating sense of relief after an absurd fright, a sense of power restored, of self-respect and triumph and an insane desire to laugh. I did laugh, but the sepulchral echoes of my hilarious cackle rather chilled me, and I began to dress.
Then for the first time occurred to me the conditions of the bet: “Two dives and a swim across.” Now, this would have been quite natural in ordinary pools – a plunge, a scramble on the opposite bank, another plunge, and back. But here, with the precipitous face of rock opposite, it meant two swims across and two dives from the same spot. But I did not mind; in fact, I was enjoying it now, and I thought with a glow of pride how I would rub it into Jim about fishing up his darned old nigger with the cut throat.