The stiff collar and tie chafed his throat and the jacket felt unnatural and constricting, so that he shrugged his shoulders and ran a finger around inside his collar as he came into the kitchen yard of the cottage. It was five months since last he had worn clothes or trodden on a paved sidewalk, even the sound of women's voices was unfamiliar. He paused and listened to them.
Marion Littlejohn was in the kitchen with her sister, and their merry prattle had a lilt and cadence to which he listened with new ears and fresh pleasure.
The chatter ceased abruptly at his knock, and Marion came to the door.
She wore a gaily striped apron, and her bare arms were floury to the elbows. She had her hair up in a ribbon but tendrils of it had come down in little wisps on to her neck and forehead.
The kitchen was filled with the smell of baking bread, and her cheeks were rosy from the heat of the oven. Mark, she said calmly. How nice, and tried to push the curl of hair off her forehead, leaving a smudge of white flour on the bridge of her nose. It was a strangely appealing gesture, and Mark felt his heart swell. Come in. She stood aside, and held the door open for him.
Her sister greeted Mark frostily, much more aware of the jilting than Marion herself. Doesn't he look well? Marion asked, and they both looked Mark over carefully, as he stood in the centre of the kitchen floor. He's too thin, her sister judged him waspishly, and began untying her apron-strings. Perhaps, Marion agreed comfortably, he just needs the proper food. And she smiled and nodded as she saw how brown and lean he was, but she recognized also, with eyes as fond as a mother's, the growing weight of maturity in his features. She saw also the sorrow and the loneliness, and she wanted to take him in her arms and hold his head against her bosom. There is some lovely butter-milk, she said instead. Sit down, here where I can see you. While she poured from the jug, her sister hung the apron behind the door and without looking at Mark said primly, We need more eggs. I'll go into the village When they were alone, Marion picked up the roller, and stood over the table, leaning and dipping as the pastry spread and rolled out paper thin. Tell me what you have been doing, she invited, and he began, hesitantly at first, but with blossoming sureness and enthusiasm, to tell her about Chaka's Gate, about the work and the life he had found there.
'That's nice. She punctuated his glowing account every few minutes, her mind running busily ahead, already making lists and planning supplies, adapting pragmatically to the contingencies of a life lived far from the comforts of civilization, where even the small comforts become luxuries, a glass of fresh milk, a light in the night, all of it has to be planned for and carefully arranged.
Characteristically she felt neither excitement nor dismay at the prospect. She was of pioneer stock. Where a man goes, the woman follows. It was merely work that must be done. The site for the homestead is up in the first fold of the hills, but you can see right down the valley, and the cliffs of Chaka's Gate are right above it. It's beautiful, especially in the evenings. I'm sure it is. I have designed the house so it can be added on to, a room at a time. To begin with there will only be two rooms -'Two rooms will be enough to begin with, she agreed, frowning thoughtfully. But we'll need a separate room for the children. He broke off and stared at her, not quite certain that he had heard correctly. She paused with the rolling-pin held in both hands and smiled at him. Well, that's why you came here today, isn't it? she asked sweetly.
He dropped his eyes from hers and nodded. Yes. He sounded bemused. I suppose it is. She lost her aplomb only briefly during the ceremony, and that was when she saw General Sean Courtney sitting in the front pew with his wife beside him, Sean in morning suit and with a diamond pin in his cravat, Ruth cool and elegant in a huge wagon-wheel sized hat, the brim thick with white roses. He came! Marion whispered ecstatically, and could not restrain the triumphant glance she threw to her own friends and relatives, like a lady tossing a coin to a beggar.
Her social standing had rocketed to dizzying heights.
Afterwards the General had kissed her tenderly on each cheek, before turning to Mark. You've picked the prettiest girl in the village, my boy. And she had glowed with pleasure, pink and happy and truly as lovely as she had ever been in her life.
With the help of the four Zulu labourers Sean had given him, Mark had opened a rough track in as far as the Bubezi River. He brought his bride to Chaka's Gate on the pillion of the motorcycle, with the side-car piled high with part of her dowry.
Far behind them, the Zulus led Trojan and Spartan under heavy packs, the rest of Marion's baggage.
In the early morning the mist lay dense along the river, still and flat as the surface of a lake, touched to shades of delicate pink and mauve by the fresh new light of coming day.
The great headlands of Chaka's Gate rose sheer out of the mist, dark and mysterious, each wreathed in laurels of golden cloud.
Mark had chosen the hour of return so that she might have the best of it for her first glimpse of her new home.
He pulled the cycle and side-car off the narrow, stony track and switched off the motor.
In the silence they sat and watched the sun strike upon the crests of the cliffs, burning like the beacons that the mariner looks for in the watery deserts of the ocean, the lights that beckon him on to his landfall and the quiet anchorage. It's very nice, dear, she murmured. Now show me where the house will be. She worked with the Zulus, muddy to the elbows as they puddled the clay for the unburned Kimberley bricks, joshing them in their own language and bullying them cheerfully to effort beyond the usual pace of Africa.
She worked behind the mules, handling the traces, dragging up the logs from the valley, her sleeves rolled high on brown smooth arms and a scarf knotted around her head.
She worked over the clay oven, bringing out the fat golden brown loaves on the blade of a long handled spade, and watched with deep contentment as Mark wiped up the last of the stew with the crust. Was that good, then, dear? In the evenings she sat close to the lantern, with her head bowed over the sewing in her lap, and nodded brightly as he told her of the day's adventures, each little triumph and disappointment. What a shame, dear. Or, How nice for you, dear. He took her, one bright, cloudless day, up the ancient pathway to the crest of Chaka's Gate. Holding her hand as he led her over the narrow places, where the river flowed six hundred sheer feet below their feet. She tucked her skirts into her bloomers, took a firm hold on the basket she carried and never faltered once on the long climb.
On the summit, he showed her the tumbled stone walls and overgrown caves of the old tribesmen who had defied Chaka, and he told her the story of the old king's climb, pointing out the fearsome path up which he had led his warriors, and finally he described the massacre and pictured for her the rain of human bodies hurled down into the river below. How interesting, dear, she murmured, as she spread a cloth from the basket she had carried. I brought scones and some of that apricot jam you like so much. Something caught Mark's eye, unusual movement far down in the valley below, and he reached for his binoculars. In the golden grass at the edge of the tall reed beds
