Jess by H. Rider Haggard (feel good novels .txt) 📕

The elder man was speaking seriously now. Muller felt that this was none of the whining cant people in authority among the Boers find it desirable to adopt. It was what he thought, and it chilled Muller in spite of his pretended scepticism, as the sincere belief of an intellectual man, however opposite to our own, is apt to chill us into doubt of ourselves and our opinions. For a moment his slumbering superstition awoke, and he felt half afraid. Between him and that bright future of blood and power lay a dark gulf. Suppose that gulf should be death, and the future nothing but a dream--or worse! His face fell as the idea occurred to him, and the General noticed it.

"Well," he went on, "he who lives will see. Meanwhile you have done good service to the State, and you shall have your reward, cousin. If I am President"--he laid emphasis on this, the meaning of which his listener did not miss--"if by the support of my followers I become President, I will not forget you. And now I must up-saddle and ride back. I want to be at Laing's Nek in sixty hours, to wait for General Wood's answer. You will see about the sending in of those prisoners;" and he knocked out his pipe and rose.

"By the way, Meinheer," said Muller, suddenly adopting a tone of respect, "I have a favour to ask."

"What is it, nephew?"

"I want a pass for two friends of mine--English people--in Pretoria to go down to their relations in Wakkerstroom district. They sent a message to me by Hans Coetzee."

"I don't like giving passes," answered the General with some irritation. "You know what it means, letting out messengers. I wonder you ask me."

"It is a small favour, Meinheer, and I do not think that it will matter. Pretoria will not be besieged much longer; I am under an obligation to the people."

"Well, well, as you like; but if any harm comes of it, you will be held responsible. Write the pass; I will sign it."

Frank Muller sat down and wrote and dated the paper. Its contents were simple: "Pass the bearers unharmed."

"That is big enough to drive a waggon along," said the General, when it was handed to him to sign. "It might mean all Pretoria."

"I am not certain if there are two or three of them," answered Muller carelessly.

"Well, well, you are responsible. Give me the pen," and he scrawled his big coarse signature on the paper.

"I propose, with your permission, to escort the cart down with two other men. As you are aware, I go to take over the command of the Wakkerstroom district to-morrow."

"Very good. It is your affair; you are responsible. I shall ask no questions, provided your friends do no harm to the cause;" and he left the room without another word.

When the great man had gone, Frank Muller sat down again on the bench and looked at the pass, and communed with himself, for he was far too wise to commune with anybody else. "The Lord hath delivered mine enemy into mine hand," he said with a smile, and stroked his golden beard. "Well, well, I will not waste His merciful opportunities as I did that day out buck-shooting. And then for Bessie. I suppose I shall have to kill old Croft too. I am sorry for that, but it can't be helped; besides, if anything should happen to Jess, Bessie will take Mooifontein, and that is worth having. Not that I want more land; I have enough. Yes, I will marry her. It would serve her right if I didn't; but, after all, marriage is more respectable; also one has more hold of a wife. Nobody will interfere for her. Then, she will be of use to me by-and-by, for a beautiful woman is a power even among these fellow-countrymen of mine, if only a man knows how to bait his lines with her. Yes, I shall marry her. Bah! that is the way to win a woman--by capture; and, what is more, they like it. It makes her worth winning too. It will be a courtship of blood. Well, the kisses will be the sweeter, and in the end she will love me the more for what I have dared for her.

"So, Frank Muller, so! Ten years ago you said to yourself: 'There are three things worth having in the world--first, wealth; secondly, women, if they take your fancy, or, better still, one woman, if you desire her above all others; thirdly, power.' Now, you have got the wealth, for one way or another you are the richest man in the Transvaal. In a week you will have the woman you love, and who is sweeter to you than all the world besides. In five years' time you will have the power--absolute power. That old man is clever; he will be President. But I am cleverer. I shall soon take his seat, thus"--and he rose and seated himself in the General's chair--"and he will go down a step and take mine. Ay, and then I will reign. My tongue shall be honey and my hand iron. I will pass over the land like a storm. I will drive these English out with the help of the Kafirs, and then I will kill the Kafirs and take their country. Ah!"--and his eyes flashed and his nostrils dilated as he said it to himself--"then life will be worth living! What a thing is power! What a thing it is to be able to destroy! Take that Englishman, my rival: to-day he is well and strong; in three days he will be gone utterly, and I--I shall have sent him away. That is power. But when the time comes that I have only to stretch out my hand to send thousands after him!--that will be absolute power; and then with Bessie I shall be happy."

And so he dreamed on for an hour or more, till at last the fumes of his untutored imagination actually drowned his reason in a spiritual drunkenness. Picture after picture rose and unrolled itself before his mind's eye. He saw himself as President addressing the Volksraad, and compelling it to his will. He saw himself, the supreme general of a great host, defeating the forces of England with awful carnage, and driving them before him; ay, he even selected the battle-ground on the slopes of the Biggarsberg in Natal. Then he saw himself again, sweeping the natives out of South Africa with the relentless besom of his might, and ruling unquestioned over a submissive people. And, last of all, he saw something glittering at his feet--it was a crown!

This was the climax of his dream. Then there came an anticlimax. The rich imagination which had been leading him on as a gaudy butterfly does a child, suddenly changed colour and dropped to earth; and there rose up in his mind the memory of the General's words: "God sets a limit to a man's doings. If he is going too far, God kills him."

The butterfly had settled on a coffin!

About half-past ten on the morning following her interview with Hans Coetzee, Jess was at "The Palatial" as usual, and John was just finishing packing the cart with such few goods as they possessed. There was little chance of his labour proving of material use, for he did not in the slightest degree expect that they would get the pass; but, as he said cheerfully, it was as good an amusement as any other.

"I say, Jess," he called out presently, "come here."

"What for?" asked Jess, who was seated on the doorstep mending something, and looking at her favourite view.

"Because I want to speak to you."

She rose and went, feeling rather angry with herself for going.

"Well," she said tartly, "here I am. What is it?"

"I have finished packing the cart, that's all."

"And you mean to tell me that you have brought me round here to say that?"

"Yes, of course I have; exercise is good for the young." Then he laughed, and she laughed too.

It was all nothing--nothing at all--but somehow it was very delightful. Certainly mutual affection, even when unexpressed, has a way of making things go happily, and can find entertainment anywhere.

Just then, who should arrive but Mrs. Neville, in a great state of excitement, and, as usual, fanning herself with her hat.

"What do you think, Captain Niel? The prisoners have come in, and I heard one of the Boers in charge say that he had a pass signed by the Boer general for some English people, and that he was coming over to see about them presently. Who can it be?"

"It is for us," said Jess quickly. "We are going home. I saw Hans Coetzee yesterday, and begged him to try and get us a pass, and I suppose he has."

"My word! going to get out: well, you are lucky! Let me sit down and write a letter to my great-uncle at the Cape. You must post it when you can. He is ninety-four, and rather soft, but I dare say he will like to hear from me," and she hurried into the house to give her aged relative--who, by the way, laboured under the impression that she was still a little girl of four years of age--as minute an account of the siege of Pretoria as time would allow.

"Well, John, you had better tell Mouti to put the horses in. We shall have to start presently," said Jess.

"Ay," he said, pulling his beard thoughtfully, "I suppose that we shall;" adding, by way of an afterthought, "Are you glad to go?"

"No," she said, with a sudden flash of passion and a stamp of the foot. Then she turned and entered the house again.

"Mouti," said John to the Zulu, who was lounging about in a way characteristic of that intelligent but unindustrious race, "inspan the horses. We are going back to Mooifontein."

"Koos!" said the Zulu unconcernedly, and started on the errand as though it were the most everyday occurrence to drive off home out of a closely beleaguered town. That is another beauty of the Zulu race: you cannot astonish them. No doubt they consider that extraordinary mixture of wisdom and insanity, the white man, to be capable du tout, as the agnostic French critic said in despair of the prophet Zerubbabel.

John stood and watched the inspanning absently. In truth, he, too, was conscious of a sensation of regret. He felt ashamed of himself for it, but there it was; he was sorry to leave the place. For the last week or so he had been living in a dream, and everything outside that dream was blurred, indistinct as a landscape in a fog. He knew the objects were there, but he could not quite appreciate their relative size and position. The only real thing was his dream; all else was as