her feet, small animals would walk proudly through trees and grass.
She entered the house, and faced the long vigil of her death. With deliberation and a stoical pride she sat down on the old sofa that had worn into the shape of her body, and folded her hands and waited, looking at the windows for the light to fade. But after a while she realized that Dick was seated at the table under a lighted lamp, gazing at her.
`Have you finished packing your things?' he asked. `You know we must be gone by tomorrow morning.'
She began to laugh. `Tomorrow!' she said. She cackled with laughter; until she saw him get up, abruptly, and go out, his hand over his face. Good, now she was alone.
But later she watched the two men carry in plates and food, and begin to eat, sitting down opposite her. They offered her a cup of liquid which she refused impatiently, waiting for them to go. It would be over soon; soon, in a few hours it would be over. But they would not go. They seemed to be sitting there because of her. She went outside, blindly, feeling with her hands at the edge of the door. There was no lessening of the heat; the invisible dark sky bent over the house, weighing down upon it. Behind her she heard Dick say something about rain. `It will rain,' she said to herself, `after I am dead.'
`Bed?' said Dick from the doorway, at last.
The question seemed to have nothing to do with her; she was standing on the verandah, where she knew she would have to wait, watching the darkness for movement.
`Come to bed, Mary!' She saw that she would first of all have to go to bed, because they would not leave her alone until she did. Automatically, she turned the lamp down in the front room, and went to lock the back door. It seemed essential that the back door should be locked; she felt she must be protected from the back; the blow would come from the front. Outside the back door stood Moses, facing her. He seemed outlined in stars. She stepped back, her knees gone to water, and locked the door.
`He's outside,' she remarked breathlessly to Dick, as if this was only to be expected.
`Who is?'
She did not reply. Dick went outside. She could hear him moving, and saw the swinging beams of light from the hurricane lamp he carried. `There is nothing there, Mary,' he said, when he returned. She nodded, in affirmation, and went again to lock the back door. Now the oblong of night was blank; Moses was not there. He would have gone into the bush, at the front of the house, she thought, in order to wait until she appeared: Back in the bedroom she stood in the middle of the floor. She might have forgotten how to move.
`Aren't you getting undressed?' asked Dick at last, in that hopeless, patient voice.
Obediently she pulled off her clothes and got into bed, lying alertly awake, listening. She felt him put out a hand to touch her, and at once became inert. But he was a long way off, he did not matter to her: he was like a person on the other side of a thick glass wall.
`Mary?' he said. She remained silent.
'Mary, listen to me. You are ill. You must let me take you to the doctor.'
It seemed to her the young Englishman was speaking; from him had originated this concern for her, this belief in her essential innocence, this absolution from guilt.
`Of course, I am ill,' she said confidingly, addressing the Englishman. `I've always been ill, ever since I can remember. I am ill here.' She pointed to her chest, sitting bolt upright in bed. But her hand dropped, she forgot the Englishman, Dick's voice sounded in her ears like the echo of a voice across a valley. She was listening to the night outside. And, slowly, the terror engulfed her which she had known must come. Once she lay down, and turned her face into the darkness of the pillows; but her eyes were alive with light, and against the light she saw a dark, waiting shape. She sat up again, shuddering. He was in the room, just beside her! But the room was empty. There was nothing. She heard a boom of thunder, and saw, as she had done so many times, the lightning flicker on a shadowed wall. Now it seemed as if the night were closing in on her, and the little house was bending over like a candle, melting in the heat. She heard the crack, crack; the restless moving of the iron above, and it seemed to her that a vast black body, like a human spider, was crawling over the roof, trying to get inside. She was alone. She was defenceless. She was shut in a small black box, the walls closing in on her, the roof pressing down. She was in a trap, cornered and helpless. But she would have to go out and meet him. Propelled by fear, but also by knowledge, she rose out of bed, not making a sound. Gradually, hardly moving, she let her legs down over the dark edge of the bed; and then, suddenly afraid of the dark gulfs of the floor, she ran to the centre of the room. There she paused. A movement of lightning on the walls drove her forward again. She stood in the curtain-folds, feeling the hairy stuff on her skin, like a hide. She shook them off, and stood poised for flight across the darkness of the front room, which was full of menacing shapes. Again the fur of animals; but this time on her feet. The long loose paw of a wildcat caught in her foot as she darted over it, so that she gave a sharp little moan of fear, and glanced over her shoulder at the kitchen door. It was locked and dark. She was on the verandah. She moved backwards till she was pressed against the wall. That was protected; she was standing as she should be, as she knew she had to wait. It steadied her.
The fog of terror cleared from her eyes, and she could see, as the lightning flickered, that the two farm dogs were lying with lifted heads, looking at her, on the verandah. Beyond the three slim pillars, and the stiff outlines of the geranium plants, nothing could be seen until the lightning plunged again, when the crowding shoulders of the trees showed against a cloud-packed sky. She thought that as she watched they moved nearer; and she pressed back against the wall with all her strength, so that she could feel the rough brick pricking through her nightgown into her flesh. She shook her head to clear it, and the trees stood still and waited. It seemed to her that as long as she could fix her attention on them they could not creep up to her.
She knew she must keep her mind on three things: the trees, so that they should not rush on her unawares; the door to one side of her where Dick might come; and the lightning that ran and danced, illuminating stormy ranges of cloud. Her feet firmly planted on the tepid rough brick of the floor, her back held against the wall, she crouched and stared, all her senses stretched, rigidly breathing in little gasps.
Then; as she heard the thunder growl and shake in the trees, the sky lit up, and she saw a man's shape move out from the dark and come towards her, gliding silently up the steps, while the dogs stood alertly watching, their tails swinging in welcome. Two yards away Moses stopped. She could see his great shoulders, the shape of his head, the glistening of his eyes. And, at the sight of him, her emotions unexpectedly shifted, to create in her an extraordinary feeling of guilt; but towards him, to whom she had been disloyal, and at the bidding of the Englishman.
She felt she had only to move forward, to explain, to appeal, and the terror would be dissolved. She opened her mouth to speak; and, as she did so, saw his hand, which held a long curving shape, lifted above his head; and she knew it would be too late. All her past slid away, and her mouth, opened in appeal, let out the beginning of a scream, which was stopped by a black wedge of hand inserted between her jaws. But the scream continued, in her stomach, choking her; and she lifted her hands, claw-like, to ward him off. And then the bush avenged itself: that was her last thought. The trees advanced in a rush, like beasts, and the thunder was the noise of their coming. As the brain at last gave way, collapsing in a ruin of horror, she saw, over the big arm that forced her head back against the wall, the other arm descending. Her limbs sagged under her, the lightning leapt out from the dark, and darted down the plunging steel.
Moses, letting her go, saw her roll to the floor. A steady drumming sound on the iron overhead brought him to knowledge of his surroundings, and he started up, turning his head this way and that, straightening his body. The dogs were growling at his feet, but their tails still swung; this man had fed them and looked after them; Mary had disliked them. Moses clouted them back softly, his open palm to their faces; and they stood watching him, puzzled, and whining softly.
It was beginning to rain; big drops blew in across Moses' back, chilling him. And another dripping sound made him look down at the piece of metal he held, which he had picked up in the bush, and had spent the day polishing and sharpening. The blood trickled off it on to the brick floor. And a curious division of purpose showed itself in his next movements.
First he dropped the weapon sharply on the floor, as if in fear; then he checked himself and picked it up. He held it over the verandah wall under the now drenching downpour, and in a few moments withdrew it. Now he hesitated, looking about him. He thrust the metal in his belt, held his hands under the rain, and, cleansed, prepared to walk off through the rain to his hut in the compound, ready to protest his innocence. This purpose, too, passed. He pulled out the weapon, looked at it, and simply tossed it down beside Mary, suddenly indifferent, for a new need possessed him.
