Aletta: A Tale of the Boer Invasion

“No, no, I don’t mean that,” she answered, slowly, in a dazed kind of manner. “But why did you do it? We were such friends before.”

“And are we not to be again?” is the reply that would have arisen to most men’s lips. But this one knew when to let well alone.

“Forget it, May,” he said. “Believe me, I never wanted to offend you. And don’t think hard things of me when I am away, will you? Good-bye.”

“No, no. But you had better go now. Good-bye.”

Her tone was flurried, with an admixture of distress. It was just the time not to answer. He went out, and as he walked away from the house, he felt not ill-satisfied with himself and his doings in spite of his very decided repulse. As touching this last some men might have felt rather small. Not so this one. A subtle, unerring instinct told him that he had come out with all the honours of war.

“It is only the first step,” he said to himself. “You were frightened at first, my darling, but the time will come, and that sooner than you think, when you shall kiss me back again, and that with all the sweet ardour and passion wherewith I shall kiss you.”

Then a very blank thought took hold upon his mind. What if all the sympathy he had created in her was reflex – if whatever feeling she had for him or would come to have was due solely to his complete likeness to that other? Why the mere sight of Colvin, a chance glimpse in some public place such as when they two had first met, might shatter his own carefully calculated chances. It was a horrid thought – that at any moment that unpalatable relative of his might appear and spoil everything.

Not everything, at any rate. The greater scheme, apart from the incidental one of love, would always remain untouched. Colvin, he had already discovered, was in Pretoria. So far he was within the toils, or at any rate within appreciable distance of so being.

“It will make the working out of it so much the easier,” he said to himself. “Great God alive! why should Colvin have all the good things of earth? And the ungrateful dog isn’t capable of appreciating them either. Well, well, thanks to this benevolent war, his luck is now on the turn, while mine – Oh, damn!”

The last aloud. A big powerful native, armed with a heavy stick, swinging along the sidewalk at a run, utterly regardless of the bye-law which rendered him liable to the gaoler’s lash for being on the sidewalk at all, had cannoned right against him. Quick as thought, and yielding to the natural ire of the moment, Kenneth shot out his right fist, landing the native well on the ear with a force that sent him staggering. Recovering his balance, however, the fellow turned and attacked him savagely. At the same time, two others who seemed to spring out of nowhere – also armed with sticks – came at him from the other side, uttering a ferocious hiss through the closed teeth.

Save for a walking-stick Kenneth was unarmed. In the existing state of affairs the road was utterly lonely, and the odds against him were three to one, three wiry desperate savages, armed with clubs, which they well understood how to use. Instinctively once more he let out, and landed another, this time between wind and water, doubling him up in the road, a squirming kicking shape. The remaining pair sprang back a step or two with knobsticks raised, ready to rush him both at once, when – suddenly both took to their heels.

The cause of this welcome diversion took the form of a horseman. He was armed with rifle and revolver, and had a full bandolier of cartridges over his shoulder. As he stepped out to meet him, Kenneth could see he was young, and well-looking. His first words showed that he was a Dutchman.

“Wie’s jij?” he asked, sharply, as his horse started, and backed from the approaching figure. Then peering down, and catching sight of the face, he cried, in would-be jovial tones:

“Maagtig, Colvin. You, is it? Ah, ah, I know where you have just come from. Ah, ah! You are slim!”

Chapter Five.

Something of a Plot

Kenneth Kershaw narrowly scanned the face of this very opportune new arrival, and decided that he didn’t know him from Adam. The other looked at him no less fixedly, and it was clear that he did not know him from Colvin.

Colvin, again? What the deuce was the game now? But he decided to play up to the rôle. He might get at something.

“So you know where I have just come from, eh, ou’ maat?” he said. “Now where is that?”

“Ah! ah! Miss Wenlock is a pretty girl, isn’t she?” rejoined the other meaningly. “Ja, Colvin, you are a slim kerel. Prettier girl than Aletta, isn’t she?”

Aletta? That must be the Boer girl Colvin was supposed to be entangled with, decided Kenneth quickly. But what was her other name, and who the devil was this good-looking young Dutchman who talked English so well? Aletta’s brother possibly. He just replied “H’m,” which might have meant anything, and waited for the other to continue.

“What will Aletta say when she knows?” went on the Boer, and his bantering tone, through which the smouldering glow of malice underlying it could not entirely be kept from showing, gave Kenneth his cue.

“Say? Oh, but she need not know,” he answered with just a touch of well-simulated alarm.

“Ha! ha! ha!” laughed the other. “Need not know? I think, friend Colvin, I have got you on toast, as you English say, for I shall take very good care she does know. The fact is I have been watching you for some time – from the time you met Miss Wenlock at Park Station right up till now, and I fancy Aletta won’t have very much more to say to you when she hears about it all.”

“Oh, but look here,” went on Kenneth, still affecting alarm. “You’re not going to give the show away, old sportsman. Dash it all, it isn’t cricket!”

“Not, eh? You just wait and see,” jeered the other. “Aha, you seem a bit scared out of your high and mighty English ‘side’ now. You chose to come between me and Aletta. We grew up together, and I always looked upon her as mine! She would have been but for you. Curse you! I could shoot you now as you stand there,” growled the Dutchman, fingering the breech of his rifle. “But I won’t, because I want to see Aletta turn away from you in scorn, as she will, directly. That will be a far greater punishment for you – a far better revenge for me.”

“By Jove!” said Kenneth to himself. “There’s sultry weather sticking out for Colvin, anyhow.” This young Boer was evidently a discomfited rival – his own words let that be understood. Then, with lightning swiftness, two aspects of the situation flashed through his scheming brain. He could let the delusion which the other was under as to his identity continue, in which case Colvin would probably appeal to May herself to disprove his alleged visits. But then the two would be brought together again, and that was just what he did not want. Or he could frankly offer his aid to this Dutchman, who would certainly jump at any method, however unscrupulous, by which to discomfit his rival. Colvin would assuredly try reprisals, and in that case the probabilities were he would be shot by the Boers, which was just what he did want. It would end matters comfortably for all concerned. So he decided upon the latter plan.

“See here, my friend,” he said, coolly. “All this time you have been holding on hard to the wrong end of the stick. My name is not Colvin.”

“Not – not Colvin Kershaw?” ejaculated the Boer, open-mouthed.

“No. Devil a bit is it!”

“Now you are lying. There is only one Colvin Kershaw. There cannot be two!”

“Quite right. But I am not that one. There may be other Kershaws, though. Eh! Try again.”

“Are you his brother?” said the Boer, suspiciously.

“Well, I am – er – a relative of his. Nor are you the only person who has taken me for him. The fact is, we are as like as two peas. I don’t wonder you have been obligingly giving me all your plans. No, don’t be afraid. I have no wish to upset them. On the contrary, I am going to offer you my help towards carrying them out.”

It was time to make some such declaration. The Boer’s hand had been stealing towards his revolver holster, and his face was fell with a deadly meaning. It was almost dark, and the road lonely and deserted. Dead men tell no tales, and a dead Englishman found there in the morning would cause no concern whatever to the authorities.

“What help can you give me, and why should you wish to?” he said dubiously, his ingrained suspicion forbidding him to trust the other overmuch.

“It can bring about the very thing that would have happened had I been the real Colvin. For my motive – well, that is my business. I may or may not tell it you later, but somehow I think not.”

“Do you hate him, then?” said the Dutchman, still suspiciously.

“Not in the least. I am perfectly indifferent to him. But he stands in my way, and must get out of it. That is all.”

“He must get out of my way, too,” said the other, with a dark scowl.

“Quite so. And if I help you to get him out of your way, you will help me to get him out of mine?”

“Can I trust you?”

“Well, you’ve got to,” answered Kenneth cheerfully, for he saw that the other was nibbling around the bait. “Don’t be afraid, though. You won’t regret it; and now, excuse me, but I’ll be hanged if I know exactly who you are.”

“My name is Adrian De la Rey,” replied the other. “And yours?”

“Kenneth Kershaw. And now we know each other, there’s no need to stand talking out here where we may be overheard, so come along to my diggings, and we’ll find something to drink, and have the show to ourselves for weaving a plan of campaign. Say though, it was a fortunate thing you happened up when you did. Those niggers were one too many for me.”

Kenneth’s quarters were not very much further on, and were situated in the abode of a Polish Jew who had retired to the back premises. At sound of the voices and horse hoofs, this worthy put out his head, then at sight of the armed and mounted burgher, scurried back like a frightened rabbit into its burrow.

“It’s all right, Svinsky,” called out Kenneth. “Roll up, man. Nobody’s going to eat you or commandeer you.”

Thus reassured, the child of Israel came forth, bowing and cringing.

“Goot evening, sairs. Let dot I shall take de Police chentleman’s ’orse. I haf a shtable und still some forage.”

“Right,” said Kenneth. “After that, Svinsky, we want the house to ourselves. See that we are not interrupted.”