Aletta: A Tale of the Boer Invasion. Mitford Bertram

      “There would be every excuse, wouldn’t there?” he answered, entering into the joke, and, moreover, hugely amused, remembering that almost the last words May had spoken to him had been to chaff him about these very girls, and now almost their first words had been to chaff him about her.

      “You ought not to say that in our presence,” said Andrina, with a mimic pout.

      “Of course not. But if you had not interrupted me I was going to add—‘but for the fact of the propinquity of Ratels Hoek and the entrancing but utterly perplexing choice of counter-attractions it affords.’ ”

      “Why will you make those girls talk such a lot of nonsense, Mr. Kershaw?” laughed Mrs. De la Rey. “They always do whenever you come here. I declare you are making them very dreadful.”

      “Didn’t know I exercised such influence over the young and tender mind. It isn’t I who do it, Mrs. De la Rey. It’s Adrian there. Depend upon it, he is the delinquent.”

      Now Adrian was a good-looking, well-set-up young fellow, who, his fiery “patriotism” notwithstanding, had his clothes built by an English tailor and talked English fluently. Indeed, in the De la Rey household it was spoken almost as frequently as the mother tongue, and the above conversation had been carried on about equally in both languages, gliding imperceptibly from one to the other and back again.

      “Adrian? Why, there isn’t a grain of fun left in Adrian these days,” said Condaas, mischievously. “See how solemn he looks. I believe he thinks about nothing but fighting the English.”

      “Well, we have just ridden two solid hours together, and he didn’t want to fight me,” said Colvin.

      But the young “patriot” was not enjoying this form of chaff, for he turned away, indignantly muttering to the effect that some matters were too high and too great to be made fun of by a pair of giggling girls.

      “Now we have made him kwaatj,” said Andrina. “See now, I’ll get him to laugh again.” Then, raising her voice, “Adrian! Adrian! wait. I want to stroll round the garden with you and hear about The Cause.”

      “That has made him more kwaat than ever,” whispered Condaas; for the badgered one, who had hesitated, turned away again with an angry jerk, scenting more chaff on his sacred subject. Andrina looked knowing.

      “Adrian!” she hailed again—“Wait. I want to tell you about Aletta. Really. You know, I heard from her yesterday.”

      The effect was magical, also comical. The affronted “patriot” stopped short. There was no irresolution now about his change of front.

      “Come, then,” he said.

      With a comical look at the other two, Andrina tripped off, and that she had satisfactorily carried out her stated intention was manifest by the animated way in which they appeared to be conversing.

      “That drew him,” chuckled Condaas. “You know, Mr. Kershaw, he was awfully mashed on Aletta the last time she came home.”

      “Condaas, what sort of expressions are you using?” said her mother reprovingly. “I don’t know where you learnt them, or what Mr. Kershaw will think.”

      “Why we learnt them from him, of course, Ma,” replied the girl. “You don’t suppose we picked up that kind of thing from the very solemn old maid you got for us as English governess.”

      “Not from me. Maybe it was from Frank Wenlock,” said Colvin, who was speculating how the object of their present merriment could pass by the charms of Andrina, who was undeniably a pretty girl, in favour of her elder sister. The latter he had never seen. She had been absent in Cape Town, at school or with relatives, ever since his own arrival in that part of the country, but there were photographic portraits of her, decking the wall of the sitting-room and the family album. These, to his impartial eye, conveyed the impression of rather a heavy-looking girl, at the awkward stage, with bunched-up shoulders and no pretensions whatever to good looks. To be sure, he had heard a great deal on the subject of the absent one, her attainments and attractiveness, but such he unhesitatingly attributed to family bias.

      Struck with a sudden idea, he moved into the sitting-room, and casually, as it were, drew up in front of a framed portrait which stood upon the piano.

      “That is the latest of Aletta,” said Condaas, who had followed him in. “She sent it up to us only a post or two ago; since you were here.”

      “So?”

      He bent down and examined it intently. It represented a girl of about nineteen or twenty. The idea of awkwardness conveyed by the other portraits was no longer there, but in looks he failed to detect any improvement Aletta De la Rey was plain, assuredly plain, he decided.

      “Oh, goeije! here come a lot of people,” exclaimed Condaas. “The ‘Patriot,’ I suppose.”

      A rumbling sound was audible, drawing nearer and nearer. Both made for the window. A cavalcade of Boers was approaching the house, and in the midst, as though escorted by it, moved the white tent of a Cape cart.

Chapter Four.

       Table of Contents

      The Conversion of Stephanus De La Rey.

      A striking contrast no less than a striking personality was offered by the two leading figures in this group as Stephanus De la Rey advanced to welcome his noted visitor. Both were fine types of their nationality and class—the one calm-faced, reposeful, with the air of a thoroughly contented and prosperous man; the other bright-eyed, restless, alert, with the nervous rapidity of movement of one existing in a state of chronic tension. The greeting between the two was cordial enough, and there was much handshaking, as the others, to the number of a round dozen, dropped in by twos and threes.

      “Why, who is this?” exclaimed the delegate, a shade of distrust coming into his face as he shook hands with Colvin Kershaw—for among Boers the ceremony of introduction is but seldom performed. “An Englishman, I believe?”

      “That is so, Mynheer Botma. And one who is very proud to make the acquaintance of so famous and gifted a man as yourself,” replied Colvin, who spoke the taal very fairly well.

      The delegate shot a keen glance at the speaker, then he became quite cordial. He hated the English, but it suddenly occurred to him that this particular Englishman had a look of one who might be turned to some account. Accordingly he engaged him in conversation, during which Colvin adroitly contrived to insinuate that his sympathies were all with the Transvaal cause, and that for the person of Oom Paul in particular he entertained feelings of the profoundest admiration.

      “That is good,” said Jan Grobbelaar, showing his tusks approvingly. “We were having much talk about this only last evening, brother,” Turning to the delegate: “Colvin is a neighbour of mine. He is not like other English.”

      Whether the object of this comment was gratified thereby or not, he made no sign; but one result of the voucher thus made was that the assembled Boers, to most of whom he was well known, conversed with far less restraint—both then and during the course of the evening. And the burden of their conversation was confined well-nigh entirely to the very strained relations then existing between the Transvaal and the suzerain Power, and what was going to be done upon the final and certain rupture thereof.

      Not much was said during the evening meal, and that little was mainly confined to local and farming matters and the prospects or the reverse of a speedy rain. The Boer guests fell to with a will, and did ample justice to the springbuck stew and other delicacies of the veldt as there set forth in abundance; for Mrs. De la Rey had anticipated just such an inroad as had taken place. Moreover, she was a model housewife, and possessed of wonderful Dutch recipes of old-time Cape and Batavian origin, and within her domain here were none of the insipid