Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland Read online

still holding his gun, but with the hand off the lock. "I'mconfoundedly glad of any company. It's a beastly night for anyone to beout alone. Wonder you find your way. Sit down! sit down!" Peter lookedintently at the stranger; then he put his gun down at his side.

  The stranger sat down on the opposite side of the fire. His complexionwas dark; his arms and feet were bronzed; but his aquiline features, andthe domed forehead, were not of any South African race.

  "One of the Soudanese Rhodes brought with him from the north, Isuppose?" said Peter, still eyeing him curiously.

  "No; Cecil Rhodes has had nothing to do with my coming here," said thestranger.

  "Oh--" said Peter. "You didn't perhaps happen to come across a companyof men today, twelve white men and seven coloured, with three cart loadsof provisions? We were taking them to the big camp, and I got partedfrom my troop this morning. I've not been able to find them, though I'vebeen seeking for them ever since."

  The stranger warmed his hands slowly at the fire; then he raised hishead:--"They are camped at the foot of those hills tonight," he said,pointing with his hand into the darkness at the left. "Tomorrow earlythey will be here, before the sun has risen."

  "Oh, you've met them, have you!" said Peter joyfully; "that's why youweren't surprised at finding me here. Take a drop!" He took the smallflask from his pocket and held it out. "I'm sorry there's so little, buta drop will keep the cold out."

  The stranger bowed his head; but thanked and declined.

  Peter raised the flask to his lips and took a small draught; thenreturned it to his pocket. The stranger folded his arms about his knees,and looked into the fire.

  "Are you a Jew?" asked Peter, suddenly; as the firelight fell full onthe stranger's face.

  "Yes; I am a Jew."

  "Ah," said Peter, "that's why I wasn't able to make out at first whatnation you could be of; your dress, you know--" Then he stopped, andsaid, "Trading here, I suppose? Which country do you come from; are youa Spanish Jew?"

  "I am a Jew of Palestine."

  "Ah!" said Peter; "I haven't seen many from that part yet. I came outwith a lot on board ship; and I've seen Barnato and Beit; but they'renot very much like you. I suppose it's coming from Palestine makes thedifference."

  All fear of the stranger had now left Peter Halket. "Come a littlenearer the fire," he said, "you must be cold, you haven't too muchwraps. I'm chill in this big coat." Peter Halket pushed his gun a littlefurther away from him; and threw another large log on the fire. "I'msorry I haven't anything to eat to offer you; but I haven't had anythingmyself since last night. It's beastly sickening, being out like thiswith nothing to eat. Wouldn't have thought a fellow'd feel so bad afteronly a day of it. Have you ever been out without grub?" said Petercheerfully, warming his hands at the blaze.

  "Forty days and nights," said the stranger.

  "Forty days! Ph--e--ew!" said Peter. "You must have have had a lot todrink, or you wouldn't have stood it. I was feeling blue enough when youturned up, but I'm better now, warmer."

  Peter Halket re-arranged the logs on the fire.

  "In the employ of the Chartered Company, I suppose?" said Peter, lookinginto the fire he had made.

  "No," said the stranger; "I have nothing to do with the CharteredCompany."

  "Oh," said Peter, "I don't wonder, then, that things aren't looking verysmart with you! There's not too much cakes and ale up here for thosethat do belong to it, if they're not big-wigs, and none at all for thosewho don't. I tried it when I first came up here. I was with a prospectorwho was hooked on to the Company somehow, but I worked on my own accountfor the prospector by the day. I tell you what, it's not the menwho work up here who make the money; it's the big-wigs who get theconcessions!"

  Peter felt exhilarated by the presence of the stranger. That one unarmedman had robbed him of all fear.

  Seeing that the stranger did not take up the thread of conversation, hewent on after a time: "It wasn't such a bad life, though. I only wish Iwas back there again. I had two huts to myself, and a couple of niggergirls. It's better fun," said Peter, after a while, "having these blackwomen than whites. The whites you've got to support, but the niggerssupport you! And when you've done with them you can just get rid ofthem. I'm all for the nigger gals." Peter laughed. But the stranger satmotionless with his arms about his knees.

  "You got any girls?" said Peter. "Care for niggers?"

  "I love all women," said the stranger, refolding his arms about hisknees.

  "Oh, you do, do you?" said Peter. "Well, I'm pretty sick of them. I hadbother enough with mine," he said genially, warming his hands by thefire, and then interlocking the fingers and turning the palms towardsthe blaze as one who prepares to enjoy a good talk. "One girl was onlyfifteen; I got her cheap from a policeman who was living with her, andshe wasn't much. But the other, by Gad! I never saw another nigger likeher; well set up, I tell you, and as straight as that--" said Peter,holding up his finger in the firelight. "She was thirty if she was aday. Fellows don't generally fancy women that age; they like slips ofgirls. But I set my heart on her the day I saw her. She belonged to thechap I was with. He got her up north. There was a devil of a row abouthis getting her, too; she'd got a nigger husband and two children;didn't want to leave them, or some nonsense of that sort: you know whatthese niggers are? Well, I tried to get the other fellow to let me haveher, but the devil a bit he would. I'd only got the other girl, and Ididn't much fancy her; she was only a child. Well, I went down Umtaliway and got a lot of liquor and stuff, and when I got back to camp Ifound them clean dried out. They hadn't had a drop of liquor in camp forten days, and the rainy season coming on and no knowing when they'd getany. Well, I'd a vatje of Old Dop as high as that--," indicating withhis hand an object about two feet high, "and the other fellow wanted tobuy it from me. I knew two of that. I said I wanted it for myself. Heoffered me this, and he offered me that. At last I said, 'Well, just tooblige you, I give you the vatje and you give me the girl!' And sohe did. Most people wouldn't have fancied a nigger girl who'd had twonigger children, but I didn't mind; it's all the same to me. And I tellyou she worked. She made a garden, and she and the other girl worked init; I tell you I didn't need to buy a sixpence of food for them in sixmonths, and I used to sell green mealies and pumpkins to all the fellowsabout. There weren't many flies on her, I tell you. She picked upEnglish quicker than I picked up her lingo, and took to wearing a dressand shawl."

  The stranger still sat motionless, looking into the fire.

  Peter Halket reseated himself more comfortably before the fire. "Well,I came home to the huts one day, rather suddenly, you know, to fetchsomething; and what did I find? She, talking at the hut door with anigger man. Now it was my strict orders they were neither to speak aword to a nigger man at all; so I asked what it was. And she answers, ascool as can be, that he was a stranger going past on the road, and askedher to give him a drink of water. Well, I just ordered him off. I didn'tthink anything more about it. But I remember now. I saw him hangingabout the camp the day after. Well, she came to me the next day andasked me for a lot of cartridges. She'd never asked me for anythingbefore. I asked her what the devil a woman wanted with cartridges, andshe said the old nigger woman who helped carry in water to the gardensaid she couldn't stay and help her any more unless she got somecartridges to give her son who was going up north hunting elephants. Thewoman got over me to give her the cartridges because she was going tohave a kid, and she said she couldn't do the watering without help. So Igave them her. I never put two and two together.

  "Well, when I heard that the Company was going to have a row with theMatabele, I thought I'd volunteer. They said there was lots of loot tobe got, and land to be given out, and that sort of thing, and I thoughtI'd only be gone about three months. So I went. I left those womenthere, and a lot of stuff in the garden and some sugar and rice, and Itold them not to leave till I came back; and I asked the other man tokeep an eye on them. Both those women were Mashonas. They always saidthe Mashonas didn't love the Matabel
e; but, by God, it turned outthat they loved them better than they loved us. They've got the damnedimpertinence to say, that the Matabele oppressed them sometimes, but thewhite man oppresses them all the time!

  "Well, I left those women there," said Peter, dropping his hands on hisknees. "Mind you, I'd treated those women really well. I'd never giveneither of them one touch all the time I had them. I