‘The President?’ Old Piet echoed. ‘Sometimes I do. You remember that I went to stay with him last year at Groote Schuur when I was down at the Cape.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Sari. ‘You’ve always been friends, haven’t you?’
‘Since the days of Botha and Rhodes and the birth-pangs of this great city of Johannesburg,’ the old man told her proudly.
Sari nodded. She had not mentioned the shot in the garden the night before. He must not know that John Campbell had been there with her and she had no wish to have her liberty curtailed. She kept him talking of the old days and then led the conversation to the news he had gleaned in Pretoria that day. It was all very vague, for the telegraph wires were cut, but a few messengers had come through and rumours were rife. The rebels had apparently entrenched themselves in the slum of Vredesdorp. There had been general sabotage out on the East Rand, for half the blackguards in Africa had joined the strikers. There was a persistent rumour that a Committee of Action had been set up which was nothing but a Communist cell.
Old Piet’s eyes grew troubled as he retailed these items of news. He was, Sari thought, beginning to feel the first pricks of suspicion that all was not straightforward in this quarrel, but he would take time to convince, and time was short—John was somewhere among the rabble and Sari was an ardent lover of her own country. She had a shrewd and well-balanced brain. She had studied the questions which were so vital to the welfare of the Union and formed her own conclusions.
That night she went up to bed early, but it was nearly dawn before she had completed her plan and was satisfied with the words she had written so painstakingly over and over again.
She stretched herself, and washed her face; then she changed into riding breeches and a silk shirt, long boots, and a soft hat, which shaded her honey-coloured hair and dimmed the lustre of her strange, changing eyes.
When her father and mother came down to breakfast Sari was not there, and questions to the servants only elicited the fact that her horse was missing from the stable.
‘She will have gone over to see Betty van der Byl at Pretoria,’ Old Piet told his wife. ‘She’ll be back for dinner.’
But dinner-time came and still Sari was absent. Evening brought long shadows on the veldt and the boys were going about their duties in the garden with the soft swish of falling water for the parched plants. Old Piet paced up and down the stoep trying to look as if he were not worried. Uneasy and perturbed by unacknowledged fears he tried to put a brave face on the matter for his wife’s benefit, but he did little to reassure either himself or her. When ten o’clock came Mrs. Vermeer put down her knitting, which had made little progress, and stopped his restless pacing.
‘Let’s face it, my dear,’ she said. ‘We don’t either of us think that Sari is at Pretoria and we’re too old to play a game of bluff with each other. Sari is probably in Johannesburg and she may not be able to get back.’
Piet grunted. ‘I’ll murder anyone who touches …’
‘Of course you will, Piet,’ Mrs. Vermeer said quietly, ‘but Sari has her head screwed on fairly firmly. She may have tried to see John.’
‘She knows I’ve forbidden her to see that Campbell puppy…’
‘You liked him until this strike happened,’ she said.
‘We all make mistakes sometimes,’ he said gruffly, and fell silent, pondering on the possibility that he had also been mistaken in his attitude towards the dispute. He had not liked the sound of the words ‘Red’ and ‘Revolution’ which Sari had used, and he had a well-concealed respect for his daughter’s judgement. His wife’s gentle voice broke in on these meditations.
‘Don’t you think that you might go into the town tomorrow and see if you can hear anything of her?’
‘I’d go tonight if I thought it would be any good,’ he said quickly, ‘but I can’t get through the pickets until daybreak.’
He shouted to the boy and told him to have the ear ready at six. Mrs. Vermeer folded up her work. She would not worry him by sharing her ever-growing anxiety for Sari.
Old Piet drove like the wind for the first five miles of the ten which separated his farm from the city; then he found a barrier piled across the road and guarded by a ragged rabble of men with red brassards round their left arms. They let him through without question, for their leader was a man Piet Vermeer had met in business and who knew that his sympathies were with the strikers. As he drove on he realised that the city was invested. Only the centre, round the Rand Club, was still held by the British and the forces of law and order. No trams were running; all the shops were shuttered and armed police were concentrated in the principal streets. As he drove slowly along he heard the sound of trotting horses coming from a cross-street in front of him. A policeman stepped out into the road and stopped the little traffic there was.
As Old Piet watched, the Imperial Light Horse swept round the corner at a sharp trot. They rode their horses easily, these long-limbed tanned boys. Old Piet felt the tears damp in his eyes as the jingle of their bridles made music in his ears. On a sudden impulse he jumped to his feet and cheered as the tail of the column passed him.
A young man leaped on to the running board as he started his car again. ‘Give me a quick lift, sir, will you?’ he said, and Piet saw that he was hatless and in the oily overalls of a mechanic. A long smudge of dried blood was congealed down the side of his face.
‘I’m trying to get news through from Benoni,’ the lad told him in quick, gasping breaths. ‘I was on a motor-bike, but they plugged that and a stone got me so I ran for it.’
Piet frowned. ‘What is happening out there?’ he asked.
‘Eighteen of us were holding the offices, but the manager was forced to surrender to those devils, and they clubbed all of them to death with their rifles, except me. I hid in the chimney until they had gone.’
Piet Vermeer felt his heart grow cold. The nagging doubts which had besieged him the night before were rising again in full force. He set his jaw grimly. He’d find out the truth at the Rand Club and then he’d go and get Sari out of the mouth of hell if those devils had taken her….
‘If Smuts knew half the truth he’d have called out the commandos before this,’ he heard a man saying as he entered the famous horse-shoe bar of the Rand Club. The speaker was one of Old Piet’s best friends—a staunch supporter of the strikers in the early days. He joined the group round the door and heard rumours winging from mouth to mouth. Each man had some story to tell and the evidence was overwhelming. ‘The post-office is in their hands,’ said one; ‘I’ve just come from there.’
‘They’ve blown up the railway line between Krugersdorp and Luipaardsvlei,’ another cut in. ‘Smuts is coming—he knows what’s happening now.’ ‘They’re holding the hills outside the town … the Transvaal Scottish have been cut to pieces by a mob many thousands stronger than they were … arms have been pouring into their hands … Moscow … Reds … rape … rapine… murder….’
Old Piet shuffled away from the excited group. They were talking now of fortifying the Club and making a last stand there. His job was to find Sari. He slipped out without anyone noticing that he had gone.
On foot he made his way towards the danger-spot of the city—Vredesdorp, where the strikers’ headquarters were rumoured to be. He felt stunned now by all that he had heard in the last few hours and the stress of his anxiety for his daughter. His feet dragged him to the foot of the slope and there he leaned against a low wall to rest a moment before breasting the rise.
Some men were talking and laughing round the corner. ‘They had a girl there … a green-eyed blonde … they’ve shut her up until they can deal…’ he heard. He glanced up to the top of the hill. The schoolhouse stood, gaunt and sinister, on top.
Old Piet straightened himself and walked briskly round the corner of the wall. Six men were lounging there and he saw that they, too, wore the red brassard of the rebels. The man nearest him stepped out and held a rifle across the path. ‘Not so fast,’ he said. �
�Where are you off to, old man?’
‘Die skool bo op die hoogte,’ said Old Piet mechanically. It was the best passport he could have used. There were many Dutchmen climbing the hill that morning.
At the door he was stopped again and asked his business. The place was busy with the constant coming and going of rebel troops with rifles slung on their backs. Piet racked his brains and remembered the name of one of the leaders. He had seen him at several meetings—even been introduced to him as ‘one of our firmest supporters’. Spendiff—that was the name.
The ‘General’ was busy, he was told. He could have an appointment at midday for five minutes. Piet controlled his temper and sat down to wait with that same dogged determination which had inspired his forefather to leave Cape Province.
One of the men on duty at the door was a chatty little chap, half Irish and half some queer coloured mixture that Piet noticed with lip-curling disapproval. He kept up an incessant stream of conversation with his opposite number. He seemed to know everyone by sight and most of their secrets. That one … he had two wives in Brakpan. The other … he liked a bottle of whisky a day … on and on until Piet found it difficult not to tell him curtly to shut his dirty mouth. He tried to shut that nasal voice out, but it droned on like the buzzing of a blow-fly.
Midday dragged itself nearer and Piet looked up as he heard the door of the General’s room open. A man stood in the doorway—and Old Piet stiffened like a pointer in his chair. John Campbell it was—standing there with a red brassard on his arm—John Campbell, the Britisher—the man who had poisoned Sari’s mind against the rebels and here he was right in the heart of them. A spy! The words echoed in Old Piet’s head until he wondered if he had not said them aloud. His brain was still unsteady from the shocks of the morning and now all that he could realise was that this man—this traitor—had got Sari in his power. Sari and the Union … both betrayed by the Reds … Johannesburg given over to rioting and violence … horror to be heaped upon horror….
He got slowly to his feet, still keeping his eyes fixed on John’s. He was a big man and heavy, but John was still the taller by a couple of inches.
‘Where’s Sari?’ he muttered, and his eyes were redrimmed like those of a wild buffalo about to charge.
‘Quite safe,’ John said quietly; ‘the General is waiting for you.’
He turned and led the way into the room and Piet followed mechanically.
Spendiff was sitting behind a big table covered with papers. He looked up as the two came in and Old Piet held out his hand. He thought that he must try and keep on good terms with them until he had got Sari out of their clutches.
Spendiff did not seem to notice the hand. He pulled a paper out of the pile on the desk and tossed it over to Piet.
The old man looked down at it and saw that it was covered with his own handwriting—or was it his?—it was like it, and yet…?
The letter was addressed to Jan Smuts and it was written in Afrikaans. It explained the situation in Johannesburg briefly but clearly, and then went on to say that the writer was sending his daughter with it to ride through the lines. ‘They will not search a girl,’ it ran. She would get on the train outside Johannesburg and take the letter in person straight to the President. In spite of his anxiety Old Piet could not help admiring the clear exposition of what he now knew to be the true position. He wished he had written it himself.
He tossed it back to Spendiff. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘That’s my letter, and I should like to know by what right you hold my daughter? She was only a messenger.’
‘It was you we wanted,’ Spendiff jerked out grimly. ‘We thought the bee would follow the honey-pot soon enough. We’ll let her go when we’re less busy, but you’re for the high jump, old man. We’ve a short way with traitors here. Campbell!’
‘Sir?’
‘This man will be shot at dawn tomorrow—you’re responsible for him!’
Old Piet could not struggle against the six men John called in to escort him. He was taken to a room at the top of the building and left there with his hands tied behind his back.
There was no furniture and only two small windows, one giving on the grassy slope down towards the city in front and the other on the back with a view of the kopjes outside the town. Both windows were heavily barred.
Old Piet stood for a while with his head sunk on his chest. He was cursing himself for the blind fool he had been. Cursing Spendiff and John Campbell with a malevolence which left him cold and shaking.
As the hours wore on and the sun left the front window he grew quieter from sheer mental exhaustion as well as hunger. He sat down with his back to the wall. Escape was, he knew, hopeless; but Sari might still be safe. With all the fundamental religion so deeply imbedded in him since early childhood he prayed that when the hour came he might die as he had lived—with a stiff neck. He prayed that retribution might fall on those enemies of the country he loved.
Old Piet’s religion had been learned in a hard school, and the flames of hell were no allegory to his mind. He consigned John Campbell and Spendiff to them with all the trusting fervour of a fanatic.
A sudden burst of firing broke the silence, and he got up and looked out of the window. Up the grassy slope towards the school the Imperial Light Horse were advancing—dismounted and in open order. For a few minutes they came on unopposed and then a hail of rifle bullets and the chatter of machine-guns burst out. Behind every kopje were massed the rebels—safely in cover. No soldiers could have done it without the support of artillery. Old Piet groaned as he saw the useless waste of brave lives and watched the survivors of that gallant charge limp back to the cover at the bottom of the hill.
Dusk came and with it a few lights began to twinkle down below. A sound of distant shouting brought Piet to his feet again at the window which looked on the back. At first he could not see anything new, and then he noticed that the tops of the distant surrounding hills were topped by pin-pricks of light—moving beacons on the kopjes nearer in. On the other side there seemed to be a good deal of activity, too, and suddenly he heard the drone of an aeroplane overhead. He paced backwards and forwards between his two vantage-points and as he watched his excitement grew. Memories of his campaigns on the veldt in the old days came flooding back and a wild hope began to grow in his heart, flickering like one of those points of light on the hills circling the town. He strained his eyes through the gathering darkness—it was—it must be—the commandos! Jan Smuts had arrived and called them out. Those tall, wiry Dutch burghers who would ride without question to the defence of their lands and their country once they understood the danger that threatened their very existence…. And the revolution would be pinched between two fires….
The tramping of feet sounded from the stairs and the door opened. John Campbell, followed by a posse of men, came into the room. They marched Old Piet down to the hall and then he spoke over his shoulder to John. ‘Where are you taking me?’
‘You’re to be shot at once—we can’t wait until dawn. I’ve too much to see to to have prisoners on my hands. We’re evacuating the school.’
Old Piet chuckled. ‘I thought you were the masters of Johannesburg,’ he sneered, ‘and now you’re running away like whipped dogs. I hope they take a sjambok to you before they hang you.’
John’s face was pale and set. He took no apparent notice of the taunt, and having ordered his men into line walked Old Piet over to a deep trench which lay in the shadows at the side of the building. He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and his men saw Old Piet nod his head as if in obedience to some command. John gave the order to fire in a steady voice.
* * * *
‘He must have hit his head on a stone in the trench as he fell,’ John told Mrs. Vermeer. ‘I did not have time to explain that I had got Sari away earlier, only that I had joined the Red Organisation months ago as a spy for the Chamber of Mines….’ He stopped and took a long drink. ‘I knew that someone else would have him shot if I didn’t arrange it first—�
��
‘How did you get him down, darling?’ Sari asked.
‘I carried him,’ he replied briefly. ‘I thought we should get a shot in the back at any moment, but they were too busy evacuating the school to notice that I was not there. When we got down to the cavalry lines they lent me a horse.’
‘Supposing the firing-party had shot him before he dropped?’ Sari asked breathlessly.
‘I loaded their rifles with blanks myself,’ John smiled. ‘The only thing that made me funky was that he might not drop when I gave the signal. If he hadn’t, we should have both been for it.’
A sudden bellow from the next room made them jump. ‘Sari!’ came Old Piet’s voice. ‘Tell that puppy he can have you by right of capture!’
STORY X
This, I think, is the best in the Ghost Hunter series. It’s background is based on fact to the extent that there was at one time a South Kensington flat—in either Barkston or Bramham Gardens, I forget which—that remained tenantless for several years because such a succession of suicides occurred there that at last no one could be induced to take it even at an absurdly low rental. Moreover, it was said that all the suicides had taken their lives in the same way, namely, by throwing themselves out of the window.
This similarity in the manner of death intrigued me and I felt that there must be some natural or psychic explanation for it. No such explanation was ever forthcoming to my knowledge, so I proceeded to invent one for the purpose of adding another Neils Orsen case to my collection.
The Red-Headed Women and Neils’s explanation of the mystery was, of course, my own contribution to the story, but it might give my readers quite a lot of fun, if they feel they have a gift for story-telling, to take the same set of circumstances and try their hand at inventing an entirely different explanation to account for this strange series of suicides by the tenants of an ill-omened flat.
The Case of the Red-headed Women
Gunmen, Gallants and Ghosts Page 14