'Is she coming back, Pa? ' Dirk inquired.
'No, she's not coming back.'
'Why not?'
Sean did not hear the question. He was watching, waiting for Ruth to
look back at him. But he waited in vain, for suddenly she was gone
over and beyond the next fold in the land and a few seconds later the
column had followed her. Afterwards there was only the vast emptiness
within him.
Sean rode ahead. Ten yards behind they followed, Mbejane restraining
Dirk from a closer approach for he understood that Sean must now be
left alone. Many times in the years they had been together Mbejane and
Sean had travelled in this formation-Sean riding ahead with his sorrow
or his shame and Mbejane trailing him patiently, waiting for Sean's
shoulders to straighten and his chin to lift from where it drooped
forward on his chest.
There was no coherence in Sean's thoughts, the only pattern was the
rise and swoop of alternate anger and despair.
Anger at the woman, anger almost becoming hatred before the plunge of
despair as he remembered she was gone. Then anger building up towards
madness, this time directed at himself for letting her go.
Again the sickening drop as he realized that there was no means by
which he could have held her. What could he have offered her?
Himself? Two hundred pounds of muscle and bones and scars supporting a
face like a granite cliff? Poor value! His worldly goods? A small
sack of sovereigns and another woman's child-by God, that was all he
had. After thirty-seven years that was all he had to show! Once more
his anger flared. A week ago he had been rich-and his anger found a
new target. There was at least somewhere he could seek vengeance,
there was a tangible enemy to strike, to kill. The Boer.
The Boer had robbed him of Ins wagons and his gold, had sent him
scurrying for safety; because of them the woman had come into his life
and because of them she had been snatched away from him.
So be it, he thought angrily, this then is the promise of the future.
War!
He straightened in the saddle, his shoulders seemed to fill out wide
and square. He lifted Ins head and saw the shiny snake of a river in
the valley below. They had reached the Tugela. Without pause Sean
pushed his horse over the lip of the escarpment.
On its haunches, loose rock rolling and slithering beneath its hooves,
they began the descent.
Impatiently Sean followed the river downstream, searching for a drift.
But between the sheer banks it ran smooth and swift and deep, twenty
yards wide and still discoloured with mud from the storm.
At the first place where the far bank flattened sufficiently to promise
an easy exit from the water, Sean checked his horse and spoke
brusquely.
'We'll swim. ' In reply Mbejane glanced significantly at Dirk.
'He's done this before,' Sean answered him as he dismounted and began
to shed his clothing, then to the boy,
'Come on, Dirk. Get undressed.
