'Nothing, ' she denied in confusion. 'I wasn't. . . ' Before she
realized fully what he was about, he had turned half, way in his seat
towards her and lifted her bodily into his lap.
'Sean, no! ' she gasped and then her protests were muffled.
She heard the laughter of Ada's girls, the hoots of encouragement and
applause from the other carriages, and she kicked and struggled,
pushing with one hand against his chest and trying to keep her hat on
with the other.
By the time he replaced her on the seat beside him, her hair had come
down behind, her hat was off and her cheeks and ears were flaming red.
She had been very thoroughly kissed.
'Nice shot, Sean!'
'Author! Author!'
'Arrest that man!' the cries and the laughter added to her
confusion.
'You're terrible! ' Ruth used her hat as a screen behind which she
tried to control her blushes. 'In front of all those people, too!
' 'That should keep you out of mischief for a while, me lass!
And suddenly she wasn't so sure of the shape of her mountain.
The cavalcade turned off along the rough track from the main road,
splashed through the drift, climbed the far bank and spread out among
the trees. Servants, who had been waiting since the previous evening,
ran to their masters' horses as they halted.
Each vehicle disgorged a noisy blast of children and dogs, and then a
more dignified trickle of adults. The women moved without hesitation
towards the two huge marquees that had been erected among the trees,
while the men unloaded the gun, cases and began assembling their
weapons.
Still sitting on the front seat of the wagon, Sean opened the leather
case at his feet and while his hands automatically titteet the barrels
into the breech piece of his shotgun he allowed him self to review his
preparations with a certain amount of satisfaction.
He had selected this site not only for the cool grove of syringA trees
which provided shade above and a soft carpet of fallen leaves below,
nor for the proximity of the tinkling stream where all the animals
could be watered, but also because it was situated within fifteen
minutes' walk of the first beat.
Days before a gang of Zulus working under Mbejane had cleared out all
the undergrowth beneath the trees, had erected the marquee tents and
the trestle tables, dug the cooking pits and even built two grass,
walled pit latrines discreetly out of view of the main camp Huge log
fires were burning in the cooking pits now, but by noon they would have
burned down to glowing coal beds. The trestle tables about which the
women had already begun working were laden with food. There was a
great deal of activity going on in that direction at the moment, most
of it talking.
From the other wagons men were starting to drift towards him, buckling
on their cartridge belts, hefting shotguns, chatting together
nonchalantly in an attempt to disguise their excitement.
