“Oh! be off with your talk of spooks,” I said, “and come back quickly with those oxen, or I promise you that you will die and be a spook yourself.”

“I will, Baas, I will!” he ejaculated and departed almost at a run, leaving me rather uncomfortable.

I believed nothing of the tale of the spook of Karl, but I saw that Footsack believed in it, and was afraid lest he might be thereby prevented from returning.  I would much rather have gone myself, but it was impossible for me to leave Anscombe so ill in the hands of our strange hosts.  And there was no one else whom I could send.  I might perhaps have ridden to Pilgrim’s Rest and tried to find a white messenger there; indeed afterwards I regretted not having done so, although it would have involved at least a day’s absence at a very critical time.  But the truth is I never thought of it until too late, and probably if I had, I should not have been able to discover anyone whom I could trust.

As I walked back to the house, having parted from Footsack on the top of a neighbouring ridge whence I could point out his path to him, I met Marnham riding away.  He pulled up and said that he was going down to the Granite stream to arrange about setting some one up to watch the wagon.  I expressed sorrow that he should have the trouble, which should have been mine if I could have got away, whereon he answered that he was glad of the opportunity for a ride, as it was something to do.

“How do you fill in your time here,” I asked carelessly, “as you don’t farm?”

“Oh! by trading,” he replied, and with a nod set his horse to a canter.

A queer sort of trading, thought I to myself, where there is no store.  Now what exactly does he trade in, I wonder?

As it happened I was destined to find out before I was an hour older.  Having given Anscombe a look and found that he was comfortable, I thought that I would inspect the quarry whence the marble came of which the house was built, as it had occurred to me that if there was plenty of it, it might be worth exploiting some time in the future.  It had been pointed out to me in the midst of some thorns in a gully that ran at right angles to the main kloof not more than a few hundred yards from the house.  Following a path over which the stones had been dragged originally, I came to the spot and discovered that a little cavity had been quarried in what seemed to me to be a positive mountain of pure white marble.  I examined the place as thoroughly as I could, climbing among some bushes that grew in surface earth which had been washed down from the top, in order to do so.