'We will eat first, Mbejane. ' 'It is ready, Nkosi. Hlubi cooked
before he went.'
'Come on, Dirk. Dinner.'
Dirk was the only one who spoke during the meal. He chattered gaily,
wrought up with excitement by this new adventure, while Sean and
MbeJane shovelled fat Hlubi's stew and hardly tasted it.
Out in the gathering darkness a jackal yelped, a lonely sound on the
evening wind, fitting the mood of a man who had lost friends and
fortune.
'It is time.' Sean shrugged into his sheepskin jacket and buttoned it
as he stood to kick out the fire, but suddenly he froze and stood with
his head cocked as he listened. There was a new sound on the wind.
'Horses!' Mbejane confirmed it.
'Quickly, Mbejane, my rifle.' The Zulu leapt up, ran to the horses and
slipped Sean's rifle from its scabbard.
'Get out of the light and keep your mouth shut,' Sean ordered as he
hustled Dirk into the shadows between the wagons.
He grabbed the rifle from MbeJane and levered a cartridge into the
breech and the three of them crouched and waited.
The click and roll of pebbles under hooves, the soft sound of a branch
brushed aside.
'One only,' whispered Mbejane. A pack-horse whickered softly and was
answered immediately from the dari mess Then silence, a long silence
broken at last by the jingle of a bridle as the rider dismounted.
Sean saw him then, a slim figure emerging slowly out of the night and
he swung the rifle to cover his approach. There was something unusual
in the way the stranger moved, gracefully but with a sway from the
hips, long-legged like a colt and Sean knew that he was young, very
young to judge by his height.
With relief Sean straightened up from his crouch and examined him as he
stopped uncertainly beside the fire and peered into the shadows.
The lad wore a peaked cloth cap pulled down over Ins ears and his
jacket was an expensive, honey-coloured chamois. His riding breeches
were beautiffilly tailored and hugged his buttocks snugly. Sean
decided that his backside was too big and out of proportion to the
small feet clad in polished English hunting boots. A regular dandy,
and the scorn was in Sean's tone as he called out.
'Stay where you are, friend, and state your business!'
The effect of Sean's challenge was unexpected. The lad jumped, the
soles of his glossy boots cleared the ground by at least six inches,
and when he landed again he was facing Sean.
'Talk up. I haven't got all night.
The lad opened his mouth, closed it again, licked his lips and spoke.
'I was told you were going to Natal. ' The voice was low and husky.
'Who told you that?' demanded Sean.
'MY uncle. ' 'Who is your uncle?
'Isaac Goldberg. ' Sean digested this intelligence and while he did so
he examined the face before him. Cleanshaven, pale, big dark eyes and
a laughing kind of mouth that was now pursed with night.
'And if I am?' Sean demanded.
