Fourteen days later Jan returned, and from his face I saw at once that something had gone wrong.

“What is it, husband?” I asked.  “Did not the mealies sell well?”

“Yes, yes, they sold well,” he answered, “for that fool of an English storekeeper bought them and the hides together for more than their value.”

“Are the Kaffirs going to rise again, then?”

“No, they are quiet for the present, though the accursed missionaries of the London Society are doing their best to stir them up,” and he made a sign to me to cease from asking questions, nor did I say any more till we had gone to bed and everybody else in the house was asleep.

“Now,” I said, “tell me your bad news, for bad news you have had.”

“Wife,” he answered, “it is this.  In the dorp yonder I met a man who had come from Port Elizabeth.  He told me that there at the port were two Englishmen, who had recently arrived, a Scotch lord, and a lawyer with red hair.  When the Englishmen heard that he was from this part of the country they fell into talk with him, saying that they came upon a strange errand.  It seems that when the great ship was wrecked upon this coast ten years ago there was lost in her a certain little boy who, if he had lived, would to-day have been a very rich noble in Scotland.  Wife, you may know who that little boy was without my telling you his name.”

I nodded and turned cold all over my body, for I could guess what was coming.

“Now for a long while those who were interested in him supposed that this lad was certainly dead with all the others on board that ship, but a year or more ago, how I know not, a rumour reached them that one male child who answered to his description had been saved alive and adopted by some boers living in the Transkei.  By this time the property and the title that should be his had descended to a cousin of the child’s, but this relation being a just man determined before he took them to come to Africa and find out the truth for himself, and there he is at Port Elizabeth, or rather by this time he is on his road to our place.  Therefore it would seem that the day is at hand when we shall see the last of Ralph.”

“Never!” I said, “he is a son to us and more than a son, and I will not give him up.”

“Then they will take him, wife.  Yes, even if he does not wish it, for he is a minor and they are armed with authority.”

“Oh!” I cried, “it would break my heart, and, Jan, there is another heart that would break also,” and I pointed towards the chamber where Suzanne slept.

He nodded, for none could live with them and not know that this youth and maiden loved each other dearly.

“It would break your heart,” he answered, “and her heart; yes, and my own would be none the better for the wrench; yet how can we turn this evil from our door?”