From Veldt Camp Fires

“There is one other point, your Honours. Long after Sam Vesthreim delivered that skin on my waggon, I read in the newspapers that he had been arrested for I.D.B. – only a few weeks after I saw him – and sentenced to a term of imprisonment. I have been puzzling mightily over this case, and I must say, the more I think of it, the more unaccountable seems to me the fact of Sam Vesthreim sending that dried crocodile skin up-country. If it had been down-country, or to England, I could understand it; but in this case it seems very much like sending coals to Newcastle. I never knew that Sam was in the I.D.B. trade till I saw his imprisonment in the paper. I think he had some peculiar object in getting that skin out of his house. And I cannot help thinking, your Honours, that Sam Vesthreim, if he could be found, could throw a good deal of light on this crocodile and diamond business. In fact, I’m sure of it. It’s quite on the cards, to my thinking, that he put the diamond in that crocodile himself.”

Some questions were put to the witness by counsel for both sides, without adding to or detracting from the narrative in any way. The court seemed a good deal impressed by David’s story, as indeed did the whole of the crowded audience, who had breathlessly listened to its recital. Mr Flecknoe, the detective, was called forward. He informed the court that Sam Vesthreim was now at Cape Town undergoing a long term of imprisonment. He was no doubt at work on the Breakwater.

The senior judge was a man of decision, and he had quickly made up his mind. After a short whispered consultation with his colleagues, he spoke. “The turn this case has taken is so singular, and the evidence given by Mr Ayling has imported so new an aspect, that in the prisoner’s interest we are determined to have the matter sifted to the bottom. I will adjourn the court for a week, in order to secure the convict Vesthreim’s attendance here upon oath. Will this day week suit the convenience of all counsel in this case?”

Counsel intimated that the day of adjournment met their views, and once more the crowded court emptied. As David Ayling turned to leave, he caught Frank Farnborough’s eye. He gave him a bright reassuring nod, and a wink which did him a world of good. Altogether, Frank went back to another weary week’s confinement in far better spirits than he had been for many days. There was, at all events, some slight element of hope and explanation now. And it was refreshing to him as a draught of wine, to find such a friend as David Ayling fighting his battle so stoutly, so unexpectedly.

Nina Staarbrucker stole silently out of the court, only anxious to get home, and escape observation. There were many eyes upon her, but she heeded them not at all. Thank God! there seemed some ray of light for Frank; for herself, whether Frank came out triumphantly or no, there was no outlook, all seemed blackness and gloom. Otto’s part in this wretched business had made ruin of all her hopes. Her brother’s treachery had determined her upon seeking a career of her own; work of some sort – anywhere away from Kimberley – she must get, and get at once, so soon as the trial was over, and whatever its result.

Once more, in a week’s time, the court wore its former aspect, the characters were all marshalled for the final act. The new addition to the caste, Mr Samuel Vesthreim, a lively, little, dark-visaged Jew of low type, seemed on the best of terms with himself. For more than fifteen months he had been hard at it on Cape Town Breakwater, or road-scarping upon the breezy heights round the Cape peninsula – always, of course, under the escort of guards and the unpleasing supervision of loaded rifles – and really he needed a little rest and change. This trip to Kimberley was the very thing for him. What slight sense of shame he had ever possessed, had long since vanished under his recent hardening experiences; and as the little man looked round the crowded court, and saw the well-remembered faces of many a Kimberley acquaintance, it did his heart good. He positively beamed again – in a properly subdued manner, of course.

The senior judge remarked to the advocates, “Perhaps it will save the time of all if I put some questions to this witness myself.” The suggestion was gracefully received, and the judge turned to the little Jew, now attentive in the witness-box.

“Samuel, or Sam Vesthreim, you are a convict now undergoing a term of penal servitude at Cape Town, I think?”

“Yeth, my lord.”

“It may perhaps tend slightly to lessen or mitigate the extreme term of your imprisonment if I receive perfectly truthful and straightforward answers to the questions I am going to ask. Be very careful, therefore. Any future recommendation on my part to the authorities will depend upon yourself.”

“Yeth, my lord,” answered Sam, in his most serious manner – and he meant it.

“About seventeen months ago you were in business in Beaconsfield, were you not?”

“Yeth, my lord.”

“Do you know Mr Ayling here?” pointing to the trader.

“I do, my lord.”

“Do you remember intrusting Mr Ayling with some goods about that time to take up-country?”

“I do, my lord.”

“What were they?”

“There were three cases of groceries to be delivered in Barkly West, and a crocodile skin to be left at the place of a friend of mine near Zeerust, in Marico, Transvaal.”

“Take that skin in your hands.” The crocodile was handed up like a baby. “Do you recognise it?”

“Yeth, my lord, that is the identical skin, I believe, that I handed to Mr Ayling.”

“Now, be careful. Was there anything inside that crocodile skin?”

The little Jew saw now exactly which way the cat jumped, and he saw, too, that only the truth could be of use to him in the weary days and years yet to come on Cape Town Breakwater. The court was hushed by this time to an absolute silence. You could have heard a feather fall, almost.

“Well, my lord,” the little Jew replied, “there wath something inside that crocodile. I had had a little bit of a speculation, and there was a big diamond inside the crocodile skin. I put it there myself. You see, my lord,” he went on rapidly, “I had been doing one or two little transactions in stones, and I fancied there was something in the air, and so I put away that diamond and packed it off in the crocodile skin, safe, as I thought, to a friend in the Transvaal. It was a risk, but just at that time it was the only way out of the difficulty. I meant to have had an eye on the skin again, myself, a few days after, but I had a little difficulty with the police and I was prevented.”

As Sam Vesthreim finished, Frank could have almost hugged him for the news he brought. An irrepressible murmur of relief ran round the crowded court, a murmur that the usher was for a minute or two powerless to prevent. The judge whispered to an attendant. The diamond was produced and handed to the Jew. “Do you recognise that stone?” said the judge.

“I do, my lord,” answered Vesthreim emphatically. “That is the stone I put inside the crocodile. I could swear to it among a thousand.” The little man’s eyes gleamed pleasurably yet regretfully upon the gem as he spoke.

Here, then, was the mystery of the fatal, puzzling diamond cleared up. There were few more questions to ask. The little Jew frankly admitted that the stone was a De Beers stone, stolen by a native worker; there was little else to learn. Frank was a free man, practically, as he stood there, jaded and worn, yet at least triumphant. It was a dear triumph though, only snatched from disaster by the merest chance in the world – the coming of David Ayling. And the tortures, the agonies he had suffered in these last few weeks of suspense! He knew that nothing – the kindly congratulations of friends, the tenderer affection of relations, the hearty welcome of a well-nigh lost world – none of these good things could ever quite repay him, ever restore to him what he had lost.

In a very few minutes Frank had been discharged from custody. The judges in brief, sympathetic speeches, congratulated him on his triumphant issue from a very terrible ordeal, and trusted that the applause and increased respect of his fellow-citizens would in some slight degree make up to him for his undoubted sufferings.

Frank left the court, arm in arm with David Ayling, whom he could not sufficiently thank for his timely and strenuous assistance. A troop of friends escorted him to the Transvaal Hotel, where his health was drunk in the hearty Kimberley way, with innumerable congratulations. All this was very gratifying, as was the magnificent dinner which a number of friends gave to him a day or two later, at which half Kimberley assisted. But, for the present, Frank desired only to be left severely alone, with the quieter companionship of his few most intimate friends. He was still half stunned and very unwell; some weeks or months must elapse before he should be himself again.

One of his first inquiries was after Nina Staarbrucker, whom he wished sincerely to thank for her brave and honest defence of him at the trial. He learned, with a good deal of surprise, that she had left Kimberley on the morning after the trial, alone. He learned too, with less surprise, that Otto had quitted the town on urgent business in the Transvaal, and was not likely to return for some time. Beyond these bare facts, he could gather little or nothing of Nina and her whereabouts. He rather suspected she had gone to some relations near Cape Town, but for the present her address was undiscoverable.

Very shortly after the result of the trial, Frank Farnborough was granted by his company six months’ leave of absence, with full pay in the meantime. It was felt that the young man had been injured cruelly by his imprisonment, and that some atonement was due to him; and the great Diamond Company he served, not to be behind in the generous shake of the hand, which all Kimberley was now anxious to extend to a hardly used man, was not slow in giving practical manifestation of a public sympathy. The stolen stone had been proved a De Beers diamond, and Frank, its unfortunate temporary owner, had not only been deprived of a valuable find, but for his innocent ownership had suffered terribly in a way which no honest man could ever possibly forget. In addition, therefore, to his grant of leave of absence and full salary, Frank was handed a cheque for five hundred pounds, being, roughly, a half share of the value of the recovered gem.

Frank at once set out upon an expedition on which he had long fixed his mind – a hunting trip to the far interior. His preparations were soon made, and, a few weeks later, he was enjoying his fill of sport and adventure in the wild country north-east of the Transvaal, at that time a veldt swarming with great game.

After three months came the rains, and with the rains, fever – fever, too, of a very dangerous type. Frank directed his waggon for the Limpopo River, and, still battling with the pestilence, kept up his shooting so long as he had strength. At last came a time when his drugs were conquered, the fever held him in a death-like grip, and he lay in his kartel gaunt, emaciated, weak, almost in the last stage of the disease. The fever had beaten him, and he turned his face southward and trekked for civilisation.

The waggons – he had a friendly trader with him by this time – had crossed the Limpopo and outspanned one hot evening in a tiny Boer village, the most remote of the rude frontier settlements of the Transvaal Republic. Frank, now in a state of collapse, was lifted from his kartel and carried into the back room of the only store in the place – a rude wattle and daub shanty thatched with grass. He was delirious, and lay in high fever all that night. In the morning he seemed a trifle better, but not sensible of those about him. At twelve o’clock he was once more fast in the clutches of raging fever; his temperature ran up alarmingly; he rambled wildly in his talk; at this rate it seemed that life could not long support itself in so enfeebled a frame.

Towards sundown, the fever had left him again; he lay in a state of absolute exhaustion, and presently fell into a gentle sleep. The trader, who had tended him day and night for a week, now absolutely wearied out, sought his own waggon and went to sleep. The storekeeper had retired, only a young woman, passing through the place, a governess on her way to some Dutchman’s farm, watched by the sick man’s bed.

It was about an hour after midnight, the African dawn had not yet come, but the solitary candle shed a fainter light; a cock crew, the air seemed to become suddenly more chill. The woman rose from her chair, fetched a light kaross (a fur cloak or rug) from the store, and spread it gently over the sick man’s bed. Then she lifted his head – it was a heavy task – and administered some brandy and beef-tea. Again the young man slept, or lay in torpor. Presently the girl took his hand in her right, then, sitting close to his bedside, she, with her left, gently stroked his brow and hair. A sob escaped her. She kissed the listless, wasted hand; then with a little cry she half rose, bent herself softly and kissed tenderly, several times, the brow and the hollow, wasted cheek of the fever-stricken man. As she did so, tears escaped from her eyes and fell gently, all unheeded, upon Frank’s face and pillow.

“Oh, my love, my love!” cried the girl, in a sobbing whisper, “to think that never again can I speak to you, take your hand in mine! To think that I, who would have died for you, am now ashamed as I touch you – ashamed for the vile wrong that was done to you in those miserable days. My love, my darling, I must now kiss you like a thief. Our ways are apart, and the journey – my God – is so long.”

Once more, leaning over the still figure, she kissed Frank’s brow, and then, relapsing into her chair, cried silently for a while – a spasmodic sob now and again evincing the bitter struggle within her. The cold grey of morning came, and still she sat by the bedside, watching intently, unweariedly, each change of the sick man’s position, every flicker of the tired eyes.

During the long hours of the two next days, Frank lay for the most part in a torpor of weakness. The fever had left him; it was now a struggle between death and the balance of strength left to a vigorous constitution after such a bout. Save for an hour or so at a time, Nina had never left his side. Hers was the gentle hand that turned the pillows, shifted the cotton Kaffir blankets that formed the bedding, gave the required nourishment, and administered the medicine. On the evening of the fourth day, there were faint symptoms of recovery; the weakened man seemed visibly stronger. Once or twice he had feebly opened his eyes and looked about him – apparently without recognition of those at hand.

It was in the middle of this night that Frank really became conscious. He had taken some nourishment, and after long lying in a state betwixt sleep and stupor, he awoke to feel a tender stroking of his hand. Presently his brow was touched lightly by soft lips. It reminded him of his mother in years gone by. Frank was much too weak to be surprised at anything, but he opened his eyes and looked about him. It was not his mother’s face that he saw, as he had dreamily half expected, but the face of one he had come to know almost as well.

Close by him stood Nina Staarbrucker, much more worn, much graver, much changed from the sweet, merry, piquant girl he had known so well at Kimberley. But the dark friendly eyes – very loving, yet sad and beseeching, it seemed to him dimly – of the lost days, were still there for him.

Frank opened his parched lips and in a husky voice whispered, “Nina?”

“Yes,” said the sweet, clear voice he remembered so well, “I am here, nursing you. You must not talk. No, not a word,” as he essayed to speak again, “or you will undo all the good that has been done. Rest, my darling (I can’t help saying it,” she said to herself; “it will do no harm, and he will never hear it again from my lips); sleep again, and you will soon be stronger.”

Frank was still supremely weak, and the very presence of the girl seemed to bring peace and repose to his senses. He smiled – closed his eyes again, and slept soundly far into the next day.

That was the last he ever saw of Nina Staarbrucker. She had vanished, and although Frank, as he grew from convalescence to strength, made many inquiries as the months went by, he could never succeed in gaining satisfactory tidings of her. He once heard that she had been seen in Delagoa Bay, that was all. Whether in the years to come they will ever meet again, time and the fates alone can say. It seems scarcely probable. Africa is so vast, and nurses safely within her bosom the secret of many a lost career.

Chapter Ten.

A Tragedy of the Veldt

The circumstances attending the fate of Leonard Strangeways were very extraordinary, and the three years of silence and doubt that followed the discovery of his body in the veldt seemed but to enhance among white men in the Bechuanaland Protectorate the mystery of that most singular affair. The whole tragedy, from the very remoteness of the place in which it was enacted, was little known south of the Orange River. I have, therefore, thought it worth while to rescue from complete oblivion the grim, strange, and unwonted circumstances of that dark business.

Leonard Strangeways was, in the year 1890, when I first met him, one of the pioneers who entered Mashonaland. He was one of those devil-may-care, reckless, wandering fellows, so many of whom are to be found upon the frontiers of civilisation in Southern Africa. I first saw him, outspanned at breakfast, near Palla Camp on the Crocodile River, with a number of other men, going into Mashonaland upon the same errand as himself. He was the life and soul of the party, and was superintending the “bossing-up” of the meal. For the next week our waggons moved on together and I saw a good deal of Strangeways. He was a tall, handsome fellow of thirty or thirty-one. He seemed to be a general favourite with his party – mainly, I imagine, because he was one of those capable men who excel in everything they undertake. He shot most of the francolins and other feathered game for the half-dozen chums he was travelling with; he had not been long in South Africa, and yet he seemed to comprehend the ways of the native servants and the methods of travel exceedingly well; he evidently understood horses thoroughly, and personally superintended the score of nags that were travelling up with the waggons. He could inspan and outspan oxen, and was already master of other useful veldt wrinkles, which usually take some time to acquire. He could paint remarkably well, I have seen him, in a short hour’s work with water-colours, turn out a very charming sketch of African scenery. And at night, by the camp fire, Strangeways’ banjo and his deep, rich voice were in inevitable request. It is not judged well to inquire too closely into the antecedents of men in the South African interior. I gathered, during the week of travel alongside of Strangeways, that he had led a wandering life for some years, and had recently come across to the Cape from Australia, where he had done little good for himself.

I parted from Strangeways and his fellow pioneers at Palachwe, and saw no more of him for rather more than a twelve-month, when I met him coming down-country, at Boatlanama, a water on the desert road, between Khama’s old town of Shoshong and Molepolole. In latter days this was not the usual route to and from Palachwe and Matabeleland, but having been several times by the Crocodile road, I happened to have taken the more westerly route for a change. On waking up next morning, after a hard and distressing trek from the nearest water in this thirsty country – Lopepe – I was surprised to see another waggon outspanned almost alongside. Still more surprised was I to find one of its two occupants Leonard Strangeways, also with a fellow pioneer travelling down-country. Our greeting was a hearty one, and indeed, I, for my part, was exceedingly well pleased to have encountered once more so genial and pleasant an acquaintance.

Strangeways had passed a year in Mashonaland, and, like most of the other Mashonalanders of that distressful season, ’90-’91, had had some pretty tough experiences. However, he had weathered the storm, had sold his pioneer farm, and the options over a number of mining properties, for cash at a good price, and was now going down to Cape Town to enjoy himself, and, as he expressed it, to “blow some of the pieces.” He was in the highest spirits. He had trekked down by this more westerly route for the purpose of getting some shooting. He was a keen sportsman, and was anxious as he came down-country to secure the heads of the gemsbok and hartebeest, two large desert-loving antelopes, not found in Mashonaland. He had succeeded in bagging two gemsbok to the westward of Lopepe, and, after breakfast, was riding out in search of hartebeest.

I had had a hard ride in the sun on the day preceding, and my horse was knocked up. I was not inclined to accompany Strangeways on his quest, therefore I did not see him again till late in the evening, when he returned with a native hunter. It was an hour or two after dark when they came up to the camp fire, where we were drinking our coffee and enjoying a quiet smoke. He rode into the cheerful blaze and dismounted. He had upon his saddle-bow the head and horns of a fine hartebeest bull, the trophy he had coveted, and behind were the skin and a good quantity of meat from the same antelope. “There!” said he, flinging down the head triumphantly, “that’s been a devilish tough customer to bring to bag, but we did the trick after all. If it hadn’t been for Marati, here,” jerking his head at a grinning Bechuana boy, “we should have lost the buck. We followed the blood spoor for five mortal hours, and but for Marati I should have given it up as a bad job. By Jove! I’m fairly beat.”

“Your supper’s in the pot,” I replied, “and there’s enough coffee to float you. Sit down and the boy will bring you a plate and cup. Put your coat on first though, it’s getting chilly.”

As I lay on my rug, Strangeways stood above me in his flannel shirt sleeves, a fine figure of a man, in the flickering blaze. Suddenly his eye caught the white tent of another waggon, which had come in during the afternoon, and was on its way up-country. “Hallo!” he said, “what’s this?”

“Oh, don’t bother about it,” I replied, “they are a mining party going up to Mashonaland. They won’t interest you. Sit down and have your supper.”

But Strangeways was curious; I often think that if he had been less curious he would have been alive at this moment. The third waggon stood about sixty yards away.

“Get my supper ready,” he said, “I’ll be back in a moment,” and walked across to the other camp fire.

I directed his native cook-boy to bring plates and a cup, and have all in readiness for his master’s supper. In less than three minutes Strangeways strode up to the fire again. As he approached, he looked furtively behind him I never saw a man so utterly changed within the space of three short minutes. His face was ghastly pale, he trembled visibly. He said not a single word, but went straight to his horse, which was being off-saddled. He picked up the saddle again, clapped it on the poor tired brute’s back, and to my intense astonishment put his foot in the stirrup and mounted.

“Strangeways,” I said, “what in Heaven’s name are you going to do. Come and sit down and let the nag alone.”

He turned on me a white, terror-stricken face.

“Sh! for God’s sake,” was all he said, under his breath. One glance he threw towards that other camp fire, and then, kicking his horse with the spur, he passed behind our two waggons and rode straight out into the gross darkness of the veldt.

I was so astounded at this extraordinary proceeding, that I confess I let Strangeways ride away without any further protest than the few words I had uttered. I now jumped to my feet and followed in the direction he had taken. I saw and heard nothing. I was about to shout his name, but I had been so impressed with the terror depicted on his face, that I forebore to cry out after him. Somehow, it struck me that he wanted silence. I had always found him a most sensible, level-headed fellow. He had some reason undoubtedly for this sudden fear and strange departure. I waited by the fireside for half an hour, all sorts of doubts and hypotheses thronging my brain. What could it mean? Here was a man, tired, worn-out and hungry, and, above all, desperately thirsty, after a hard day’s hunting and eleven hours spent in the saddle under a burning sun, suddenly flying off from his supper, his rest, and the pleasant camp fire, mounting his tired horse and riding straight out into the veldt with some strong terror gripping at his heart. And such a veldt as it was here. Sheer desert, except for a scanty pit of foul water now and again at long intervals. He could not be mad. He was sane as a judge before he visited the other camp fire; what in God’s name could it mean? I worried my brain for half an hour, and then gave it up. I now roused Strangeways’ pioneer comrade, who had retired early and had been asleep all this time, and talked the thing over with him. We could find no solution.