Renshaw Fanning's Quest: A Tale of the High Veldt

Chapter Fourteen.

Against Time

By sundown Renshaw was in the heart of the mountains. And now, as his steed’s gait warned him, it was time to off-saddle again. The river lay below, about a hundred yards from the road. Dismounting, he led his horse down through the thick bush, and removing the saddle, but not the bridle, which latter he held in his hand, allowed the animal to graze and get somewhat cooler before drinking. Then, saddling up again, he regained the road.

The latter was in most parts very bad, as it wound its rugged length through a savage and desolate poort or defile, which in itself was one long ambuscade, for thick bush grew up to the very roadside, in places overhanging it. The sun had set, but a lurid afterglow was still reflected upon the iron face of a tall krantz, which, rising from the steep forest-clad slope, cleft the sky. Great baboons, squatted on high among the rocks, sent forth their deep-chested, far-sounding bark, in half-startled, half-angry recognition of the presence of their natural enemy – man; and, wheeling above the tree-tops, ascending higher and higher in airy circles to their roost among the crags, floated a pair of lammervangers (A species of black eagle) whose raucous voices rang out in croaking scream over the glooming depths of the lone defile like the weird wailing of a demoniac.

Darkness fell, for there is no twilight to speak of beneath the Southern Cross, and the dull, dead silence of the mighty solitude was unbroken, save for the hoarse roar of the river surging through its rocky channel, and the measured hoof-beats of the horse. And as he urged the animal on through the gloom all Renshaw’s apprehensions seemed to renew themselves with tenfold intensity. The appalling details of the gruesome tragedy chased each other through his mind in all their red horror, and his overwrought brain would conjure up the most grisly forebodings. What if he should arrive too late! Those unprotected women helpless at the mercy of these fiends, red-handed from the scene of their last ruthless crime, devils incarnate let loose upon the earth, their lives forfeit, the noose ready for their necks, their only object to perpetrate as many hideous infamies as possible before meeting the doom that would sooner or later be theirs! No wonder the man’s brain seemed on fire.

The road took a sudden trend downwards. The river must be crossed here. The drift was a bad one in the daytime, at night a dangerous one. But the latter consideration, far from daunting him, rather tended to brace Renshaw’s nerves. Warily he urged his horse on.

The water was up to the saddle-flaps – then a step deeper. The horse, now almost swimming, snorted wildly as the roaring whirling flood creamed around him in the starlight. But the rider kept him well by the head, and in a trice he emerged panting and dripping on the other side.

Suddenly in front from the bush fringing the road there flashed forth a faint spark, as of a man blowing on a burnt stick to light his pipe. All Renshaw’s coolness returned, and gathering up his reins, he prepared to make a dash for it. Then the spark floated straight towards him, and – he laughed at his fears. It was only a firefly. On still. He would soon be there now. Another drift in the river – splash – splash – out again – still onward.

Suddenly the horse pricked forward his ears and began to snort uneasily. Now for it! Still it might be only a leopard or a snake. But all doubt was speedily nipped in the bud by a harsh voice, in Dutch, calling upon him to stop.

Peering forward into the darkness, he made out two figures – one tall, the other short. They were about a dozen yards in front, and were standing in the middle of the road as though to bar his passage. There was no leaving the road, by reason of the bush which lined it on either side in a dense, impenetrable thicket.

This was by no means Renshaw Fanning’s first experience of more or less deadly peril, as we have already shown, and his unswerving coolness under such circumstances was never so consummately in hand as now, when not merely his own life, but the lives of others dearer to him still, were in the balance. His mind was made up in a flash.

“Clear out, or I’ll shoot you dead,” he answered, in the same language, whipping out his pipe-case, and presenting it pistol fashion at the shorter of the two men, who was advancing as if to seize his bridle.

The resolute attitude, the quick, decisive tone, above all perhaps the click, strongly suggestive of cocking, which Renshaw managed to produce from the spring of the implement, caused the fellow instinctively to jump aside. At the same time came a flash and a stunning report. Something hummed overhead, and most unpleasantly near. The other man had deliberately fired at him.

Then Renshaw did the best thing he could under the circumstances. He took the bull by the horns.

He put his horse straight at his assailant, at the same time wrenching off his stirrup – no mean weapon at a push. But the fellow, losing nerve, tried to dodge. In vain. The horse’s shoulder hit him fair and sent him floundering to earth; indeed, but for the fact that the animal, frenzied with fright, swerved and tried to hang back, he would have been trampled underfoot.

Again Renshaw did the best thing he could. Mastering a desire to turn and brain the ruffian before he could rise, he rammed the spurs into his horse’s flanks and set off down the road at a hard gallop; not, however, before he was able to recognise in his assailants a Hottentot and a Bastard. Luckily, too, for three more flashes belched forth from the hillside a little way above the scene of the conflict, but the bullets came nowhere near him. Then upon the still silence of the night he could hear other and deeper tones mingling with the harsh chatter of his late assailants. There was no mistaking those tones. They issued from Kafir lips. He had walked into the very midst of the cut-throat gang itself – had come right through it.

Then the question arose in his mind, would they pursue him? He was certain they had no horses, but he had still about four miles to go, and his own steed was beginning to show signs of distress. The fleet-footed barbarians could travel almost as fast on two legs as he could on four. They might pursue him under cover of the bush and converge upon his line of flight at any moment. And then his heart sank within him as he thought of a certain steep and very stony hill which still lay between him and his journey’s end.

How his ears were strained; how every faculty was on the alert to almost agonising pitch as, peering back into the silence of the gloom, he strove to catch the faintest sound which should tell of pursuit.

“Up, old horse! Nearly home now!”

The dreaded hill was reached. Minutes seemed hours to the rider, till at length its crest was gained. Then far below in front there twinkled forth a light, and then another. The sight sent a surging rush of relief through Renshaw’s heart.

“Thanks be to God and all the blessed and glorious company of heaven,” he murmured reverently, raising his hat.

For he knew that those lighted windows would not have shone so peacefully had any red horrific tragedy been there enacted.

He was yet in time.

Chapter Fifteen.

The Midnight Foe

“Why, it’s Renshaw!” cried Mrs Selwood, who, hearing the sound of hoofs mingling with the barking of the dogs, had come to the door. “We didn’t expect you till to-morrow. Well, you’re just in time. A few minutes more and we should all have gone to bed. Call Windvogel to take your horse, and come in.”

“I’ll let him run; he’s about done up,” he answered, removing saddle, bridle, and headstall, and turning the animal adrift.

“Has your business fallen through?” she asked, as he followed her into the passage and closed the door.

“It has had to stand over. Come in here, Hilda” – leading the way into an empty room. “I have something to tell you. No – never mind the light. The fewer lights shown the better.”

Then in as few words as possible he told her of the danger which hovered over them.

Hilda Selwood came of a good old colonial stock, and was not lacking in nerve. Still she would not have been a woman had she realised the frightful peril which threatened herself and her children without a shudder.

“We must do what we can, Renshaw,” she said. “Perhaps they will not attack us.”

“‘Perhaps’ is a sorry word to start campaigning upon. What we’ve got to do is to ensure them as warm a reception as possible if they do. My opinion is that they will, if only that they seem to have been watching the road. I believe they have ascertained by some means or other that Chris is away. What people have you on the place just now?”

“Very few. There’s Windvogel and old Jacob and Gomfana. That’s all.”

“Windvogel I don’t trust. Shouldn’t wonder, indeed, if the yellow scoundrel was in league with them. Old Jacob has more than one foot in the grave – he’s no good. But Gomfana, though he couldn’t hit a haystack with a gun, might make useful play with a chopper if it came to close quarters. And now, look here,” he went on, after a moment’s hesitation; “the situation may be desperate. These seven cut-throats are fighting with a noose round their necks. Every one of their lives is forfeited, and they are all well armed. Now, is there no suggestion you can make towards strengthening the garrison?”

“Why, of course. Marian and I both know how to shoot. That makes three of us. And then we are under cover.”

“Well spoken. But I can improve on that idea – if you can bring yourself to agree. Little chaps as they are, Fred and Basil are better shots than either of you, and game to the core.”

Hilda Selwood gave a gasp. Her two little ones! Why, they were mere babies but yesterday! And now she was to be called upon to sacrifice them – to expose them to the peril of a desperate conflict which would fully tax the courage of grown men.

“I’d rather not, if it could possibly be avoided,” she said, at last.

“Very well. But I’m much mistaken if the young scamps won’t take the matter into their own hands directly they hear a shot fired. Now, how many guns have we? There’s mine – two of Chris’s – that makes six barrels; the boys’ muzzle-loaders, ten barrels. Then Chris has a five-shooter – ”

“He took that with him.”

“Did he? Well, I have a six. Altogether we shan’t do badly. And now you had better break the news to Marian and Miss Avory, while I slip down to the hut to rout out Gomfana. And lose no time barricading the windows. Mattresses are the thing for that – almost bullet-proof.”

Arming himself with a gun and revolver, Renshaw slipped out quietly, and made his way to the huts. Gomfana, like most natives, slept heavily, and took a deal of waking; and by the time the situation was brought home to his obtuse brain some minutes had been lost. He was a sturdy youngster of about twenty – a “raw” Kafir – that is to say, one who had never been out of his native kraal, and was stupid and ignorant of European ways. But at the prospect of a fight he grinned and brightened up.

Just as they regained the house a glow suffused the sky against the mountain-top, and a few minutes later a broad half-moon was sailing high in the heavens. Renshaw hailed its appearance with unbounded satisfaction.

The two girls had already lit their candles for bed when Mrs Selwood brought the unwelcome news, judiciously omitting the ghastly tragedy, which could only horrify without encouraging the hearers. Their method of receiving it was as divergent as their characters. Marian, though she slightly changed colour, remained perfectly cool and collected. Violet, on the other hand, turned white as a sheet, and fairly shook with terror. It was all they could do to keep her from going into wild hysterics.

“This sort of thing won’t do at all, Miss Avory,” said Renshaw, entering at that moment; his sable recruit hanging back in the doorway. “Why, all you’ve got to do is to lie down and go to sleep in perfect safety. If we exchange a shot or two that’s all it will amount to. Come, now, I should have thought you would have enjoyed the excitement of a real adventure.”

Violet tried to smile, but it was the mere ghost of a smile. She still shivered and shook. And Renshaw himself seemed changed. None of the diffident lover about him now. He seemed in his element at the prospect of peril. In the midst of her fears Violet remembered Marian’s eulogies on his coolness and resource in an emergency. The recollection quieted her, and she looked upon him with unbounded respect. Then she noted Marian’s calm and resolute demeanour, and even fancied that the look of the latter was expressive of something like contempt – wherein she was mistaken, but the idea acted as a tonic to brace her nerves.

Having seen to the firearms and ammunition, and cautioned the women to remain where they were and allow no more light to be seen than they could help, Renshaw went the round of the house. Effie and the two little ones were sleeping soundly, so also were the two boys. Opening the door, he looked cautiously out. All was still.

He had decided that the four corner rooms should be the points of defence, and the windows accordingly were not barricaded. The others were rendered secure by fixing against each a couple of mattresses. Then he went back to the ladies.

The house was now all in darkness, but the moonlight streaming in above the protecting mattresses gave sufficient light for all purposes.