CHAPTER IV
BESSIE IS ASKED IN MARRIAGE
In due course John Niel recovered from his sprained ankle and the
other injuries inflicted on him by the infuriated cock ostrich (it is,
by the way, a humiliating thing to be knocked out of time by a
feathered fowl), and set to work to learn the routine of farm life. He
did not find this a disagreeable task, especially when he had so fair
an instructress as Bessie, who knew all about it, to show him the way
in which he should go. Naturally of an energetic and hard-working
temperament, he very soon fell more or less into the swing of the
thing, and at the end of six weeks began to talk quite learnedly of
cattle and ostriches and sweet and sour veldt. About once a week or so
Bessie used to put him through a regular examination as to his
progress; also she gave him lessons in Dutch and Zulu, both of which
tongues she spoke to perfection; so it will be seen that John did not
lack for pleasant and profitable employment. Also, as time went on he
grew much attached to Silas Croft. The old gentleman, with his
handsome, honest face, his large and varied stock of experience and
his sturdy English character, made a great impression on his mind. He
had never met a man quite like him before. Nor was this friendship
unreciprocated, for his host took a wonderful fancy to John Niel.
"You see, my dear," he explained to his niece Bessie, "he is quiet,
and he doesn't know much about farming, but he's willing to learn, and
such a gentleman. Now, where one has Kafirs to deal with, as on a
place like this, you must have a /gentleman/. Your mean white will
never get anything out of a Kafir; that's why the Boers kill them and
flog them, because they can't get anything out of them without. But
you see Captain Niel gets on well enough with the 'boys.' I think
he'll do, my dear, I think he'll do," and Bessie quite agreed with
him. And so it came to pass that after this six weeks' trial the
bargain was struck finally, and John paid over his thousand pounds,
becoming the owner of a third interest in Mooifontein.
Now it is not possible, in a general way, for a man of John Niel's age
to live in the same house with a young and lovely woman like Bessie
Croft without running more or less risk of entanglement. Especially is
this so when the two people have little or no outside society or
distraction to divert their attention from each other. Not that there
was, at any rate as yet, the slightest hint of affection between them.
Only they liked one another very much, and found it pleasant to be a
good deal together. In short, they were walking along that easy,
winding road which leads to the mountain paths of love. It is a very
broad road, like another road that runs elsewhere, and, also like this
last, it has a wide gate. Sometimes, too, it leads to destruction. But
for all that it is a most agreeable one to follow hand-in-hand,
winding as it does through the pleasant meadows of companionship. The
view is rather limited, it is true, and homelike--full of familiar
things. There stand the kine, knee-deep in grass; there runs the
water; and there grows the corn. Also you can stop if you like. By-
and-by it is different. By-and-by, when the travellers tread the
heights of passion, precipices will yawn and torrents rush, lightnings
will fall and storms will blind; and who can know that they shall
attain at last to that far-off peak, crowned with the glory of a
perfect peace which men call Happiness? There are those who say it
never can be reached, and that the halo which rests upon its slopes is
no earthly light, but rather, as it were, a promise and a beacon--a
glow reflected whence we know not, and lying on this alien earth as
the sun's light lies on the dead bosom of the moon. Some declare,
again, that they have climbed its topmost pinnacle and tasted of the
fresh breath of heaven which sweeps around its heights--ay, and heard
the quiring of immortal harps and the swan-like sigh of angels' wings;
and then behold! a mist has fallen upon them, and they have wandered
in it, and when it cleared they were on the mountain paths once more,
and the peak was far away. And a few there are who tell us that they
live there always, listening to the voice of God; but these are old
and worn with journeying--men and women who have outlived passions and
ambitions and the fire heats of love, and who now, girt about with
memories, stand face to face with the sphinx Eternity.
But John Niel was no chicken, nor very likely to fall in love with the
first pretty face he met. He had once, years ago, gone through that
melancholy stage, and there, he thought, was an end of it. Moreover,
if Bessie attracted him, so did Jess in a different way. Before he had
been a week in the house he came to the conclusion that Jess was the
strangest woman he had ever met, and in her own fashion one of the
most attractive. Her very impassiveness added to her charm; for who is
there in this world who is not eager to learn a secret? To him Jess
was a riddle of which he did not know the key. That she was clever and
well-informed he soon discovered from her rare remarks; that she could
sing like an angel he also knew; but what was the mainspring of her
mind--round what axis did it revolve--this was the puzzle. Clearly
enough it was not like most women's, least of all like that of happy,
healthy, plain-sailing Bessie. So curious did he become to fathom
these mysteries that he took every opportunity to associate with her,
and, when he had time, would even go out with her on her sketching, or
rather flower-painting, expeditions. On these occasions she would
sometimes begin to talk, but it was always about books, or England or
some intellectual question. She never spoke of herself.
Yet it soon became evident to John that she liked his society, and
missed him when he did not come. It never occurred to him what a boon
it was to a girl of considerable intellectual attainments, and still
greater intellectual capacities and aspirations, to be thrown for the
first time into the society of a cultivated and intelligent gentleman.
John Niel was no empty-headed, one-sided individual. He had both read
and thought, and even written a little, and in him Jess found a mind
which, though of an inferior stamp, was more or less kindred to her
own. Although he did not understand her she understood him, and at
last, had he but known it, there rose a far-off dawning light upon the
twilight of her heart that thrilled and changed it as the first faint
rays of morning thrill and change the darkness of the night. What if
she should learn to love this man, and teach him to love her? To most
women such a thought more or less involves the idea of marriage, and
that change of status which for the most part they consider desirable.
But Jess did not think much of that: what she did think of was the
blessed possibility of being able to lay down her life, as it were, in
the life of another--of at last finding somebody who understood her
and whom she could understand, who would cut the shackles that bound
down the wings of her genius, so that she could rise and bear him with
her as, in Bulwer Lytton's beautiful story, Zoe would have borne her
lover. Here at length was a man who /understood/, who was something
more than an animal, and who possessed the god-like gift of brains,
the gift that had been a curse rather than a blessing to her, lifting
her above the level of her sex and shutting her off as by iron doors
from the comprehension of those around her. Ah! if only this perfect
love of which she had read so much would come to him and her, life
might perhaps grow worth the living.
It is a curious thing, but in such matters most men never learn wisdom
from experience. A man of John Niel's age might have guessed that it
is dangerous work playing with explosives, and that the quietest, most
harmless-looking substances are sometimes the most explosive. He might
have known that to set to work to cultivate the society of a woman
with such tell-tale eyes as Jess's was to run the risk of catching the
fire from them himself, to say nothing of setting her alight: he might
have known that to bring all the weight of his cultivated mind to bear
on her mind, to take the deepest interest in her studies, to implore
her to let him see the poetry Bessie told him she wrote, but which she
would show to no living soul, and to evince the most evident delight
in her singing, were one and all hazardous things to do. Yet he did
them and thought no harm.
As for Bessie, she was delighted that her sister should have found
anybody to whom she cared to talk or who could understand her. It
never occurred to her that Jess might fall in love. Jess was the last
person to fall in love. Nor did she calculate what the results might
be to John. As yet, at any rate, she had no interest in Captain Niel--
of course not.
And so things went on pleasantly enough to all concerned in this drama
till one fine day when the storm-clouds began to gather. John had been
about the farm as usual till dinner time, after which he took his gun
and told Jantje to saddle up his shooting pony. He was standing on the
verandah, waiting for the pony to appear, and by him was Bessie,
looking particularly attractive in a white dress, when suddenly he
caught sight of Frank Muller's great black horse, and upon it that
gentleman himself, cantering up the avenue of blue gums.
"Hullo, Miss Bessie," he said, "here comes your friend."
"Bother!" said Bessie, stamping her foot; and then, with a quick look,
"Why do you call him my friend?"
"I imagine that he considers himself so, to judge from the number of
times a week he comes to see you," John answered with a shrug. "At any
rate, he isn't mine, so I am off shooting. Good-bye. I hope that you
will enjoy yourself."
"You are not kind," she said in a low voice, turning her back upon
him.
In another moment he was gone, and Frank Muller had arrived.
"How do you do, Miss Bessie?" he said, jumping from his horse with the
rapidity of a man who had been accustomed to rough riding all his
life. "Where is the /rooibaatje/ off to?"
"Captain Niel is going out shooting," she said coldly.
"So much the better for you and me, Miss Bessie. We can have a
pleasant talk. Where is that black monkey Jantje? Here, Jantje, take
my horse, you ugly devil, and mind you look after him, or I'll cut the
liver out of you!"
Jantje took the horse, with a forced grin of appreciation at the joke,
and led him off to the stable.
"I don't think that Jantje likes you, /Meinheer/ Muller," said Bessie,
spitefully, "and I do not wonder at it if you talk to him like that.
He told me the other day that he had known you for twenty years," and
she looked at him inquiringly.
This casual remark produced a strange effect on her visitor, who
turned colour beneath his tanned skin.
"He lies, the black hound," he said, "and I'll put a bullet through
him if he says it again! What should I know about him, or he about me?
Can I keep count of every miserable man-monkey I meet?" and he
muttered a string of Dutch oaths into his long beard.
"Really, /Meinheer!/" said Bessie.
"Why do you always call me '/Meinheer/'?" he asked, turning so
fiercely on her that she started back a step. "I tell you I am not a
Boer. I am an Englishman. My mother was English; and besides, thanks
to Lord Carnarvon, we are all English now."
"I don't see why you should mind being thought a Boer," she said
coolly: "there are some very good people among the Boers, and besides,
you used to be a great 'patriot.'"
"Used to be--yes; and so the trees used to bend to the north when the
wind blew that way, but now they bend to the south, for the wind has
turned. By-and-by it may set to the north again--that is another
matter--then we shall see."
Bessie made no answer beyond pursing up her pretty mouth and slowly
picking a leaf from the vine that trailed overhead.
The big Dutchman took off his hat and stroked his beard perplexedly.
Evidently he was meditating something that he was afraid to say. Twice
he fixed his cold eyes on Bessie's fair face, and twice looked down
again. The second time she took alarm.
"Excuse me one minute," she said, and made as though to enter the
house.
"/Wacht een beeche/" (wait a bit), he ejaculated, breaking into Dutch
in his agitation, and even catching hold of her white dress with his
big hand.
Drawing the dress from him with a quick twist of her lithe form, she
turned and faced him.
"I beg your pardon," she said, in a tone that could not be called
encouraging: "you were going to say something."
"Yes--ah, that is--I was going to say----" and he paused.
Bessie stood with a polite look of expectation on her face, and
waited.
"I was going to say--that, in short, that I want to marry you!"
"Oh!" exclaimed Bessie with a start.
"Listen," he went on hoarsely, his words gathering force as he spoke,
as is the way even with uncultured people when they speak from the
heart. "Listen! I love you, Bessie; I have loved you for three years.
Every time I have seen you I have loved you more. Don't say me nay--
you don't know how I do love you. I dream of you every night;
sometimes I dream that I hear your dress rustling, then you come and
kiss me, and it is like being in heaven."
Here Bessie made a gesture of disgust.
"There, I have offended you, but don't be angry with me. I am very
rich, Bessie; there is the place here, and then I have four farms in
Lydenburg and ten thousand /morgen/ up in Waterberg, and a thousand
head of cattle, besides sheep and horses and money in the bank. You
shall have everything your own way," he went on, seeing that the
inventory of his goods did not appear to impress her--"everything--the
house shall be English fashion; I will build a new /sit-kammer/
(sitting-room) and it shall be furnished from Natal. There, I love
you, I say. You won't say no, will you?" and he caught her by the
hand.
"I am very much obliged to you, Mr. Muller," answered Bessie,
snatching away her hand, "but--in short, I cannot marry you. No, it is
no use, I cannot indeed. There, please say no more--here comes my
uncle. Forget all about it, Mr. Muller."
Her suitor looked up; there was old Silas Croft sure enough, but he
was some way off, and walking slowly.
"Do you mean it?" he said beneath his breath.
"Yes, yes, of course I mean it. Why do you force me to repeat it?"
"It is that damned /rooibaatje/," he broke out. "You used not to be
like this before. Curse him, the white-livered Englishman! I will be
even with him yet; and I tell you what it is, Bessie: you shall marry
me, whether you like or no. Look here, do you think I am the sort of
man to play with? You go to Wakkerstroom and ask what sort of a man
Frank Muller is. See! I want you--I must have you. I could not live if
I thought that I should never get you for myself. And I tell you I
will do it. I don't care of it costs me my life, and your
/rooibaatje's/ too. I'll do it if I have to stir up a revolt against
the Government. There, I swear it by God or by the Devil, it's all one
to me!" And growing inarticulate with passion, he stood before her
clinching and unclinching his great hand, and his lips trembling.
Bessie was very frightened; but she was a brave woman, and rose to the
emergency.
"If you go on talking like that," she said, "I shall call my uncle. I
tell you that I will not marry you, Frank Muller, and that nothing
shall ever make me marry you. I am very sorry for you, but I have not
encouraged you, and I will never marry you--never!"
He stood for half a minute or so looking at her, and then burst into a
savage laugh.
"I think that some day or other I shall find a way to make you,"
Muller said, and turning, he went without another word.
A couple of minutes later Bessie heard the sound of a horse galloping,
and looking up she saw her wooer's powerful form vanishing down the
vista of blue gums. Also she heard somebody crying out as though in
pain at the back of the house, and, more to relieve her mind than for
any other reason, she went to see what it was. By the stable door she
found the Hottentot Jantje, shrieking, cursing and twisting round and
round, his hand pressed to his side, from which the blood was running.
"What is it?" she asked.
"Baas Frank!" he answered--"Baas Frank hit me with his whip!"
"The brute!" said Bessie, the tears starting to her eyes with anger.
"Never mind, missie, never mind," gasped the Hottentot, his ugly face
growing livid with fury, "it is only one more to me. I cut it on this
stick"--and he held up a long thick stick he carried, on which were
several notches, including three deep ones at the top just below the
knob. "Let him look out sharp--let him search the grass--let him creep
round the bush--let him watch as he will, one day he will find Jantje,
and Jantje will find him!"
"Why did Frank Muller gallop away like that?" asked her uncle of
Bessie when she got back to the verandah.
"We had some words," she answered shortly, not seeing the use of
explaining matters to the old man.
"Ah, indeed, indeed. Well, be careful, my love. It's ill to quarrel
with a man like Frank Muller. I've known him for many years, and he
has a black heart when he is crossed. You see, my love, you can deal
with a Boer and you can deal with an Englishman, but cross-bred dogs
are hard to handle. Take my advice, and make it up with Frank Muller."
All of which sage advice did not tend to raise Bessie's spirits, that
were already sufficiently depressed.
