Then his dream-fabric tumbled about his ears.

Frikkie had ridden off to worship his beloved, and David and Christina, as was their wont, sat on the stoep.  They’ watched the figure of their son out of sight, and talked a while, and then lapsed into the silence of perfect companionship.  The veldt was all about them, as silent and friendly as they, and the distance was mellow with a haze of heat.  From the kraals came at intervals the voice of little Paul in fluent Kafir; David smiled over his pipe and nodded to his wife once when the boy’s voice was raised in a shout.  Christina was sewing; her thoughts were on Katje, and were still vaguely hostile.

Of a sudden she heard David’s pipe clatter on the ground, and looked sharply round at him.  He was staring intently into the void sky; his brows were knitted and his face was drawn; even as she turned he gave a hoarse cry.

She rose quickly, but he rose too, and spoke to her in an unfamiliar voice.

“Go in,” he said.  “Have all ready, for our son has met with a mishap.  He has fallen from his horse.”

She gasped, and stared at him, but could not speak.

“Go and do it,” he said again, looking at her with hard eyes; and suddenly she saw, as by an inward light, that here was not madness, but truth.  It spurred her.

“I will do it,” she said swiftly.  “But you will go and bring him in?”

“At once,” he replied, and was away to the shed for the cart.  The Kafirs came running to inspan the horses, and shrank from him as they worked.  He was white through his tan, and he breathed loud.  Little Paul saw him, and sat down on the ground and cried quietly.

Before David went his wife touched him on the arm, and he turned.  She was white to the lips.

“David,” she said, and struggled with her speech.  “David.”

“Well?” he answered, with a pregnant calm.

“David, he is not—­not dead?”

“Not yet,” he answered; “but I cannot say how it will be when I get there.”  A tenderness overwhelmed him, and he caught a great sob and put his arm about her.  “All must be ready, little cousin.  Time enough to grieve afterwards—­all our lives, Christina, all our lives!”

She put her hand on his breast.

“All shall be ready, David,” she answered.  “Trust me, David.”

He drove off, and she watched him lash the horses down the hill and force them at the drift—­he, the man who loved horses, and knew them as he knew his children.  His children!  She fled into the house to do her office, and to drink to the bottom of the cup the bitterness of motherhood.  A cool bed, linen, cold water and hot water, brandy and milk, all the insignia of the valley of the shadow did she put to hand, and con over and adjust and think upon, and then there was the waiting.  She waited on the stoep, burning and tortured, boring at the horizon with dry eyes, and praying and hoping.  A lifetime went in those hours, and the sun was slanting down before the road yielded, far and far away, a speck that grew into a cart going slowly.  By and by she was able to see her husband driving, but nobody with him—­only a rag or a garment that fluttered from the side.  Her mind snatched at it; was it—­God! what was it?