Swallow: A Tale of the Great Trek by H. Rider Haggard (the false prince series .TXT) 📗
- Author: H. Rider Haggard
Book online «Swallow: A Tale of the Great Trek by H. Rider Haggard (the false prince series .TXT) 📗». Author H. Rider Haggard
“Read,” I said, and the interpreter read as follows:
“On the twelfth day of September in the year 1825 (the date being written in letters) our little daughter Suzanne found a starving English boy in a kloof, who had been shipwrecked on the coast. We have taken him in as a gift of the Lord. He says that his name is Rolf Kenzie.”
“You see the date,” I said.
“Yes,” answered the lawyer, “and it has not been altered!”
“No,” I added, “it has not been altered;” but I did not tell them that Jan had not written it down till afterwards, and then by mistake had recorded the year in which he wrote, refusing to change it, although I pointed out the error, because, he said, there was no room, and that it would make a mess in the book.
“There is one more thing,” I went on; “you say the mother of him you seek was a great lady. Well, I saw the body of the mother of the boy who was found, and it was that of a common person very roughly clad with coarse underclothes and hands hard with labour, on which there was but one ring, and that of silver. Here it is,” and going to a drawer I took from it a common silver ring which I once bought from a pedlar because he worried me into it. “Lastly, gentlemen, the father of our lad was no lord, unless in your country it is the custom of lords to herd sheep, for the boy told me that in his own land his father was a shepherd, and that he was travelling to some distant English colony to follow his trade. That is all I have to say about it, though I am sorry that the lad is not here to tell it you himself.”
When he had heard this statement of mine, which I made in a cold and indifferent voice, the young lord, Ralph’s cousin, rose and stretched himself, smiling happily.
“Well,” he said, “there is the end of a very bad nightmare, and I am glad enough that we came here and found out the truth, for had we not done so I should never have been happy in my mind.”
“Yes,” answered the lawyer, the interpreter rendering their words all the while, “the Vrouw Botmar’s evidence is conclusive, though I shall put her statement in writing and ask her to sign it. There is only one thing, and that is the strange resemblance of the names,” and he glanced at him with his quick eyes.
“There are many Mackenzies in Scotland,” answered Lord Glenthirsk, “and I have no doubt that this poor fellow was a shepherd emigrating with his wife and child to Australia or somewhere.” Then he yawned and added, “I am going outside to get some air before I sleep. Perhaps you will draw up the paper for the good lady to sign.”
“Certainly, my lord,” answered the lawyer, and the young man went away quite convinced.
After he had gone the lawyer produced pen and ink and wrote out the statement, putting in it all the lies that I had told, and copying the extract from the fly-leaf of the Bible. When he had done the interpreter translated it to me, and then it was that the lawyer told me about the last wishes of the dying lord, and how it would have cost him ten thousand pounds and much business also had the tale proved true. Now at last he gave me the paper to sign. Besides the candles on the table, which being of mutton fat had burnt out, there was a lamp fed with whale’s oil, but this also was dying, the oil being exhausted, so that its flame, which had sunk low, jumped from time to time with a little noise, giving out a blue light. In that unholy blue light, which turned our faces ghastly pale, the lawyer and I looked at each other as I sat before him, the pen in my hand, and in his eyes I read that he was certain that I was about to sign to a wicked lie, and in mine he read that I knew it to be a lie.
For a while we stared at each other thus, discovering each other’s souls. “Sign,” he said, shrugging his shoulders, “the light dies.”
Then I signed, and as I wrote the lamp went out, leaving us in darkness, and through the darkness once more I heard that sound of laughter echoing in the air above the house.
THE WISDOM OF SUZANNE
Now, although Suzanne heard not a word of our talk, still she grasped its purport well enough, for she knew that I proposed to throw dust into the eyes of the Englishmen. This troubled her conscience sorely, for the more she thought of it the more did it seem to her to be wicked that just because we loved him and did not wish to part with him, Ralph should be cheated of his birthright. All night long she lay awake brooding, and before ever the dawn broke she had settled in her mind that she herself would speak to the Englishmen, telling them the truth, come what might of her words, for Suzanne, my daughter, was a determined girl with an upright heart. Now feeling happier because of her decision, at length she fell asleep and slept late, and as it happened this accident of fate was the cause of the miscarriage of her scheme.
It came about in this way. Quite early in the morning—at sun-up, indeed—the Englishmen rose, and coming out of the little guest-chamber, drank the coffee that I had made ready for them, and talked together for a while. Then the young lord—Ralph’s cousin—said that as they journeyed yesterday at a distance of about an hour on horseback from the farm he had noticed a large vlei, or pan, where were many ducks and also some antelope. To this vlei he proposed to ride forward with one servant only, and to stay there till the others overtook him, shooting the wild things which lived in the place, for to be happy these Englishmen must always be killing something. So he bade me farewell, making me a present of the gold chain which he took off his watch, which chain I still have. Then he rode away, smiling after his fashion; and as I watched him go I was glad to think that he was no knave but only an easy tool in the hands of others. We never met again, but I believe that death finished his story many years ago; indeed, all those of whom I tell are dead; only Jan and I survive, and our course is well-nigh run.
When Suzanne awoke at length, having heard from a Kaffir girl that the strangers had ordered their horses, but not that the young lord had ridden forward, she slipped from the house silently, fearing lest I should stay her, and hid herself in a little patch of bush at the corner of the big mealie field by which she knew the Englishmen must pass on their return journey. Presently she heard them coming, and when she saw that the young lord was not with them, she went to the lawyer, who pulled up his horse and waited for her, the rest of the party riding on, and asked where his master was, saying that she wished to talk with him. And here I must say, if I have not said it before, that Suzanne could speak English, though not well. The Hollander tutor had instructed her in that tongue, in which Ralph also would converse with her at times when he did not wish others to understand what they were saying, for he never forgot his mother language, though he mixed many Dutch words with it.
“He has ridden forward an hour or more ago. Can I take any message to him for you?” said the lawyer. “Or if you wish to talk of business, to speak to me is to speak to him.”
“That may be so,” answered Suzanne, “still I like to draw my water at the fountain itself. Yet, as he has gone, I beg you to listen to me, for when you have heard what I have to say I think that you will bring him back. You came here about Ralph Kenzie, did you not, and my mother told you that he is not the man whom you seek, did she not?”
The lawyer nodded.
“Well, I tell you that all this tale is false, for he is the very man,” and she poured out the true story of Ralph and of the plot that had been made to deceive them about him.
Now, as I have said, Suzanne’s English was none of the best and it is possible that the lawyer did not understand. For my part, however, I think that he understood well enough, for she told me afterwards that is face grew grey and anxious as he listened, and that at length he said:
“All this you tell me is very strange and weighty, so much so that I must bring my friend back to look more closely into the matter. Return now to the farm and say nothing of having met me, for by this evening, or to-morrow at the latest, we will come there again and sift out the truth of this question.”
To this she agreed, being guileless, and the lawyer rode away after the other. All that day and all the next Suzanne scarcely spoke to me, but I saw that she was expecting something to happen, and that she glanced continually towards the path by which the Englishmen had journeyed, thinking to see them riding back to the farm. But they rode back no more, and I am sure that the cunning lawyer never breathed one word of his meeting with Suzanne and of what took place at it to the young lord. That book was shut and it did not please him to reopen it, since to do so might have cost him ten thousand pounds. On the third morning I found Suzanne still looking down the path, and my patience being exhausted by her silence, I spoke to her sharply.
“What are you doing, girl?” I asked. “Have we not had enough visitors of late that you must stand here all day awaiting more?”
“I seek no new visitors,” Suzanne said, “but those who have been here only, and I see now that I seek in vain.”
“What do you mean, Suzanne?”
Now of a sudden she seemed to make up her mind to speak, for she turned and faced me boldly, saying:
“I mean, mother, that I told the Englishman with the red hair, the agent, that all the fine tale you spun to him about Ralph was false, and that he was the man they came to find.”
“You dared to do that, girl?” I said, then checked myself and added, “Well, what did the man say?”
“He said that he would ride on and bring the young lord back that I might talk with him, but they have not come.”
“No, nor will they, Suzanne, for if they sought they did not wish to find, or at least the lawyer did not wish it, for he had too much at stake. Well, things have gone finely with you, seeing that your hands are clean from sin, and that Ralph still stays at your side.”
“The sin of the parents is the sin of the child,” she answered, and then of a sudden she took fire as it were, and fell upon me and beat me with her tongue; nor could I hold my own before this girl of eighteen, the truth being that she had right on her side, and I knew it. She told me that we were wicked plotters who, to pleasure ourselves, had stolen from Ralph everything except his life; and many other such hard sayings she threw at me till at last I could bear it no more, but gave her back word for word. Indeed, it would be difficult to say which had the best of that quarrel, for if Suzanne’s tongue was the nimbler and her words were
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