Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases | Page 8

see. But in a flash he went red as fire, and lashed the old man across the face with his whip. The old man did not move at all; but my brothers held Fanie and called to the Kafirs to come and fetch the old man away. Oh, but I promise you Fanie was angry, as men will be when they are obliged to be good by force.
"Well, that was all that happened that day. Fanie went away, and we all saw that he galloped the horse as fast as it could go. But down by the kraals the Kafirs who were carrying the old man stopped and watched him as he went.
"Well, in a few days most of us forgot the ugly business, though the little picaninny used to walk through my dreams for a time. Still, blood-kin are blood-kin, and Kafirs are Kafirs, and one day Fanie came over to see us again and we gave him coffee. He told us a story about a rooinek that bought a sheep, and the man gave him a dog in a sack, and he paid for it and went away, and we all laughed at it. He was very funny that day, and said that when he married he would choose an old woman who would die quickly and leave him all her farms. So it was late and dark before he up- saddled to go away.
"Well, he was gone a quarter of an hour when we heard hoofs, galloping, galloping, hard and furious, coming up the road. And as we opened the door a horse came over the wall and Fanie tumbled off it and came rushing in.
"We all screamed. He was white like ashes, and wet with sweat, and trembling so that he could not stand.
"'Fanie,' cried my sister, 'what is it?' and he groaned and put his face in his hands.
"By and by he spoke, and kept glancing about him and turning to look behind him, and would not let one of us move away.
"'There was something behind me,' he said.
"'Something?' we all asked.
"'Yes,' he said. 'Something . . . dead I It followed me up here, and I could not get away from it, spur as hard as I would. I think it is a death-call.'
"Then we were all frightened, but we could not help wanting to hear more.
"'No,' said Fanie, 'I did not see it, nor hear it even, but I knew it was there.'
"'It was a sign,' said my mother, a very wise old woman. 'Let us all thank God.'
"So we thanked God on our knees, but I'm sure I don't know what for.
"Then Fanie told us all he knew, and that was just nothing. As he came to the kloof he was afraid of something in front of him. He said he felt like a man in grave-clothes. So he turned, and then the ... whatever it was . . . seemed to come after him; so he galloped and galloped as hard as the horse could lay hoof to the earth, and prayed till his heart nearly burst. And then, not knowing where he was going, he jumped the wall and came among us. We were all silent when he had told us.
"Then Oom Jan spoke. He was very old, and seldom said anything.
"'You have done murder!' he said.
"'If I talk till my mouth is stopped with dust I shall never be able to tell how cold I felt about the heart when I heard that. For the little picaninny came plain before my eyes, and oh! I was all full of pity for Fanie. I liked him well enough in those days.
"He stopped with us that night. He would not go away nor be alone, so he slept with my brothers, and held their hands and prayed half the night. In the morning they took him home on one of our horses, for his own was fit to die from the night's work.
"That was the last I ever saw of Fanie. It was as though he went from us to God. He kissed me on both cheeks when he went away; he kissed us all, but me first of all, and held both my hands. I think he must have liked me too,--don't you think so, Katje?" "'Yes," said Katje softly.
"He went down the road between my brothers with his head bent like an old man's, and I watched him out of sight, and I was very, very sorry for him. I don't think I cried, but I may have. He was a fine tall man.
"One night my brothers came in just as I was going to bed, and one stood in the door while the other whispered to my mother. She looked up and saw me standing there.
"'Go to bed,'