Chapter XII Gregory’s Womanhood

Slowly over the flat came a cart. On the back seat sat Gregory, his arms folded, his hat drawn over his eyes. A Kaffir boy sat on the front seat driving, and at his feet sat Doss, who, now and again, lifted his nose...

Chapter X Gregory Rose has an Idea

Gregory Rose was in the loft putting it neat. Outside the rain poured; a six months’ drought had broken, and the thirsty plain was drenched with water. What it could not swallow ran off in mad rivulets to the great ‘sloot’ that now foamed...

Chapter VIII The Kopje

‘Good morning!’ Em, who was in the store-room measuring the Kaffirs’ rations, looked up and saw her former lover standing betwixt her and the sunshine. For some days after that evening on which he had ridden home whistling he had shunned her. She might wish...

Chapter VII Waldo goes out to Taste Life, and Em stays at Home and Tastes it

At nine o’clock in the evening, packing his bundles for the next morning’s start, Waldo looked up, and was surprised to see Em’s yellow head peeping in at his door. It was many a month since she had been there. She said she had...

Chapter VI A Boer-wedding

‘I didn’t know before you were so fond of riding hard,’ said Gregory to his little betrothed. They were cantering slowly on the road to Oom Muller’s on the morning of the wedding. ‘Do you call this riding hard?’ asked Em in some astonishment. ‘Of...

Chapter IX He sees a Ghost

Bonaparte stood on the ash-heap. He espied across the plain a moving speck, and he chucked his coat-tails up and down in expectancy of a scene. The waggon came on slowly. Waldo lay curled among the sacks at the back of the waggon, the hand...

Chapter VII He sets his Trap

‘May I come in? I hope I do not disturb you, my dear friend,’ said Bonaparte, late one evening, putting his nose in at the cabin door, where the German and his son sat finishing their supper. It was now two months since he had...

Chapter VI Bonaparte Blenkins makes his Nest

‘Ah, what is the matter?’ asked Waldo, stopping at the foot of the ladder with a load of skins on his back that he was carrying up to the loft. Through the open door in the gable little Em was visible, her feet dangling...

Chapter V Sunday Services

Service No. I The boy Waldo kissed the pages of his book and looked up. Far over the flat lay the ‘kopje,’ a mere speck; the sheep wandered quietly from bush to bush; the stillness of the early Sunday rested everywhere, and the air...

Chapter IV Blessed is He that Believeth

Bonaparte Blenkins sat on the side of the bed. He had wonderfully revived since the day before, held his head high, talked in a full sonorous voice, and ate greedily of all the viands offered him. At his side was a basin of soup,...