CHAPTER XXIX

Johannesburg,

_March 6th._

There is something about the state of things here that is not at

all healthy. To use the well-known phrase that I have so often

read, we are all living on the edge of a volcano. Bands of strikers,

or so-called strikers, patrol the streets and scowl at one in a

murderous fashion. They are picking out the bloated capitalists

ready for when the massacres begin, I suppose. You can’t ride in

a taxi—if you do, strikers pull you out again. And the hotels hint

pleasantly that when the food gives out they will fling you out on

the mat!

I met Reeves, my labour friend of the _Kilmorden,_ last night. He

has cold feet worse than any man I ever saw. He’s like all the rest

of these people, they make inflammatory speeches of enormous

length, solely for political purposes, and then wish they hadn’t.

He’s busy now going about and saying he didn’t really do it. When

I met him, he was just off to Cape Town, where he meditates making

a three days’ speech in Dutch, vindicating himself, and pointing

out that the things he said really meant something entirely

different. I am thankful that I do not have to sit in the

Legislative Assembly of South Africa. The House of Commons is bad

enough, but at least we have only one language, and some slight

restriction as to length of speeches. When I went to the Assembly

before leaving Cape Town, I listened to a gray-haired gentleman

with a drooping moustache who looked exactly like the Mock Turtle

in _Alice in Wonderland._

He dropped out his words one by one in a particularly melancholy

fashion. Every now and then he galvanized himself to further

efforts by ejaculating something that sounded like “Platt Skeet,”

uttered _fortissimo_ and in marked contrast to the rest of his

delivery. When he did this, half his audience yelled “Whoof,

whoof!” which is possibly Dutch for “Hear, hear,” and the other

half woke up with a start from the pleasant nap they had been

having. I was given to understand that the gentleman had been

speaking for at least three days. They must have a lot of patience

in South Africa.

I have invented endless jobs to keep Pagett in Cape Town, but at

last the fertility of my imagination has given out, and he joins

me to-morrow in the spirit of the faithful dog who comes to die by

his master’s side. And I was getting on so well with my Reminiscences

too! I had invented some extraordinarily witty things that the

strike leaders said to me and I said to the strike leaders.

This morning I was interviewed by a Government official. He was

urbane, persuasive and mysterious in turn. To begin with, he

alluded to my exalted position and importance and suggested that

I should remove myself, or be removed by him, to Pretoria.

“You expect trouble, then?” I asked.

His reply was so worded as to have no meaning whatsoever, so I

gathered that they were expecting serious trouble. I suggested to

him that his Government were letting things go rather far.

“There is such a thing as giving a man enough rope, and letting

him hang himself, Sir Eustace.”

“Oh, quite so, quite so.”

“It is not the strikers themselves who are causing the trouble.

There is some organization at work behind them. Arms and explosives

have been pouring in, and we have made a haul of certain documents

which throw a good deal of light on the methods adopted to import

them. There is a regular code. Potatoes mean ‘detonators,’

cauliflower, ‘rifles,’ other vegetables stand for various

explosives.”

“That’s very interesting,” I commended.

“More than that, Sir Eustace, we have every reason to believe that

the man who runs the whole show, the directing genius of the

affair, is at this minute in Johannesburg.”

He stared at me so hard that I began to fear that he suspected me

of being the man. I broke out into a cold perspiration at the

thought, and began to regret that I had ever conceived the idea of

inspecting a miniature revolution at first hand.

“No trains are running from Jo’burg to Pretoria,” he continued.

“But I can arrange to send you over by private car. In case you

should be stopped on the way I can provide you with two separate

passes, one issued by the Union Government, and the other stating

that you are an English visitor who has nothing whatsoever to do

with the Union.”

“One for your people, and one for the strikers, eh?”

“Exactly.”

The project did not appeal to me—I know what happens in a case of

that kind. You get flustered and mix the things up. I should hand

the wrong pass to the wrong person, and it would end in my being

summarily shot by a bloodthirsty rebel, or one of the supporters

of law and order whom I notice guarding the streets wearing bowler

hats and smoking pipes, with rifles tucked carelessly under their

arms. Besides, what should I do with myself in Pretoria? Admire

the architecture of the Union buildings and listen to the echoes

of the shooting round Johannesburg? I should be penned up there

God knows how long. They’ve blown up the railway line already, I

hear. It isn’t even as if one could get a drink there. They put

the place under martial law two days ago.

“My dear fellow,” I said, “you don’t seem to realize that I’m

studying conditions on the Rand. How the devil am I going to study

them from Pretoria? I appreciate your care for my safety, but don’t

you worry about me. I shall be all right.”

“I warn you, Sir Eustace, that the food question is already

serious.”

“A little fasting will improve my figure,” I said, with a sigh.

We were interrupted by a telegram being handed to me. I read it

with amazement:

“Anne is safe. Here with me at Kimberley. Suzanne Blair.”

I don’t think I ever really believed in the annihilation of Anne.

There is something peculiarly indestructible about that young

woman—she is like the patent balls that one gives to terriers. She

has an extraordinary knack of turning up smiling. I still don’t

see why it was necessary for her to walk out of the hotel in the

middle of the night in order to get to Kimberley. There was no

train, anyway. She must have put on a pair of angel’s wings and

flown there. And I don’t suppose she will ever explain. Nobody

does—to me. I always have to guess. It becomes monotonous after a

while. The exigencies of journalism are at the bottom of it, I

suppose. “How I shot the rapids,” by our Special Correspondent.

I refolded the telegram and got rid of my Governmental friend. I

don’t like the prospect of being hungry, but I’m not alarmed for

my personal safety. Smuts is perfectly capable of dealing with the

revolution. But I would give a considerable sum of money for a

drink! I wonder if Pagett will have the sense to bring a bottle of

whisky with him when he arrives to-morrow?

I put on my hat and went out, intending to buy a few souvenirs.

The curio-shops in Jo’burg are rather pleasant. I was just studying

a window full of imposing karosses, when a man coming out of the

shop cannoned into me. To my surprise it turned out to be Race.

I can’t flatter myself that he looked pleased to see me. As a

matter of fact, he looked distinctly annoyed, but I insisted on

his accompanying me back to the hotel. I get tired of having no

one but Miss Pettigrew to talk to.

“I had no idea you were in Jo’burg,” I said chattily. “When did

you arrive?”

“Last night.”

“Where are you staying?”

“With friends.”

He was disposed to be extraordinarily taciturn, and seemed to be

embarrassed by my questions.

“I hope they keep poultry,” I remarked. “A diet of new-laid eggs

and the occasional slaughtering of an old cock will be decidedly

agreeable soon from all I hear.”

“By the way,” I said, when we were back in the hotel, “have you

heard that Miss Beddingfeld is alive and kicking?”

He nodded.

“She gave us quite a fright,” I said airily. “Where the devil did

she go to that night, that’s what I’d like to know.”

“She was on the island all the time.”

“Which island? Not the one with the young man on it?”

“Yes.”

“How very improper,” I said. “Pagett will be quite shocked. He

always did disapprove of Anne Beddingfeld. I suppose that was the

young man she originally intended to meet in Durban?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Don’t tell me anything you don’t want to,” I said, by way of

encouraging him.

“I fancy that this is a young man we should all be very glad to

lay our hands on.”

“Not——?” I cried, in rising excitement.

He nodded.

“Harry Rayburn, _alias_ Harry Lucas—that’s his real name, you know.

He’s given us all the slip once more, but we’re bound to rope him

in soon.”

“Dear me, dear me,” I murmured.

“We don’t suspect the girl of complicity in any case. On her side

it’s—just a love-affair.”

I always did think Race was in love with Anne. The way he said

those last words made me feel sure of it.

“She’s gone to Beira,” he continued rather hastily.

“Indeed,” I said, staring. “How do you know?”

“She wrote to me from Bulawayo, telling me she was going home that

way. The best thing she can do, poor child.”

“Somehow, I don’t fancy she is in Beira,” I said meditatively.

“She was just starting when she wrote.”

I was puzzled. Somebody was clearly lying. Without stopping to

reflect that Anne might have excellent reasons for her misleading

statements, I gave myself up to the pleasure of scoring off Race.

He is always so cocksure. I took the telegram from my pocket and

handed it to him.

“Then how do you explain this?” I asked nonchalantly.

He seemed dumbfounded.

“She said she was just starting for Beira,” he said, in a dazed

voice.

I know that Race is supposed to be clever. He is, in my opinion,

rather a stupid man. It never seemed to occur to him that girls do

not always tell the truth.

“Kimberley too. What are they doing there?” he muttered.

“Yes, that surprised me. I should have thought Miss Anne would have

been in the thick of it here, gathering copy for the _Daily

Budget.”_

“Kimberley,” he said again. The place seemed to upset him. “There’s

nothing to see there—the pits aren’t being worked.”

“You know what women are,” I said vaguely.

He shook his head and went off. I have evidently given him something

to think about.

No sooner had he departed than my Government official reappeared.

“I hope you will forgive me for troubling you again, Sir Eustace,”

he apologized. “But there are one or two questions I should like

to ask you.”

“Certainly, my dear fellow,” I said cheerfully. “Ask away.”

“It concerns your secretary——”

“I know nothing about him,” I said hastily. “He foisted himself

upon me in London, robbed me of valuable papers—for which I shall

be hauled over the coals—and disappeared like a conjuring trick at

Cape Town. It’s true that I was at the Falls at the same time as

he was, but I was at the hotel, and he was on an island. I can

assure you that I never set eyes upon him the whole time that I

was there.”

I paused for breath.

“You misunderstand me. It was of your other secretary that I

spoke.”

“What? Pagett?” I cried, in lively astonishment. “He’s been with

me eight years—a most trustworthy fellow.”

My interlocutor smiled.

“We are still at cross-purposes. I refer to the lady.”

“Miss Pettigrew?” I exclaimed.

“Yes. She has been seen coming out of Agrasato’s Native Curio-shop.”

“God bless my soul!” I interrupted. “I was going into that place

myself this afternoon. You might have caught _me_ coming out!”

There doesn’t seem to be any innocent thing that one can do in

Jo’burg without being suspected for it.

“Ah! but she has been there more than once—and in rather doubtful

circumstances. I may as well tell you—in confidence, Sir Eustace—that

the place is suspected of being a well-known rendezvous used by

the secret organization behind this revolution. That is why I

should be glad to hear all that you can tell me about this lady.

Where and how did you come to engage her?”

“She was lent to me,” I replied coldly, “by your own Government.”

He collapsed utterly.