Chapter XXII
The red glow of a dying sun framed in masses of angry storm-cloud; a group of dark-clad figures standing in a roughly-walled enclosure, in their midst a white-clothed priest. Around, the sunlit veldt and mountain mocking the shortness of human life, their own tenure, though but a span, an immortality compared with that of mankind.
“I am the resurrection and the life.” The high-pitched voice rose on the evening air, chanting words that had been millions of times repeated, yet always sounding new, for of death they form the song, and neither Azrael nor Eros can ever weary humanity. Apart from the throng, close to the grave’s brink, a man was standing. Dully the words beat on his brain, but conveyed no meaning, for physical endurance had reached its limit, and understanding for the time was dead.
Vaguely he listened, wondering what it all might mean, now and again raising his eyes to the chasm’s far side, where stood the chanting priest, and beyond him the group of black-clothed figures. What was he doing here, what were these people doing here, and this dark hole at his feet, what was its meaning? Vacantly he looked around, seeking for something to lay hold of, some landmark to link the present with the past, but in vain, all were but as symbols on an ever-flying wheel, seen for a second, gone, seen again and lost once more.
Then for a space the whirling circle stopped, and the figures came to a rest and stood steady before his eyes. Ah, there were two he recognised, a man and a woman, the former rigid-faced and stern, the latter weeping. Yes, he knew them; they were Richard Selbourne and Mary, but why was she crying? There was no reason for it that he could see. He looked hard at them, trying to attract their notice, but in vain, almost it seemed as though they would not see. Ah last Richard looked up, met his eyes full, and without recognition lowered his own again. “Cut me, intentionally too, what, in God’s name for, what have I done? Confound that other fellow too, with them, staring like that; what the devil does he find in me, a stranger, to interest him? Never takes his eyes off me, damn him! Looks like a doctor, well, if you are, go back to your pills, you fool, and leave me alone. I want none of your drugs.”
“O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” Ah, he recognised that. They were burying someone then, and this hole at his feet was a grave. But whose, and what, had it to do with him? Faintly curious, he moved forward and peered down. Yes, there was a coffin, a name on it too, if he could but read:
STARA.
Then back rushed remembrance; he knew, and laughed aloud. Everybody looked up; the man with the deep-set eyes made a half step forward; Mary clutched her husband’s arm; and the priest, scandalised, stopped, and then went hurriedly on: “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes dust to dust.”
Graeme’s head nodded slowly in approval, for here were words of sense at last, little as the mumbling fool that uttered them knew it. To him they were but a formula, the fine words spoken by the hero of some stage drama, the finale bringing down the curtain to a burst of hysterical applause. He alone knew how true they were, and that in death lay no sting and in the grave no victory, but defeat, and in an hour from now the proof of that truth would be given him.
The throng melted away, and moved slowly homeward across the veldt. Two men approached, spade in hand, glanced at Graeme, and then set swiftly to work. The dull thud of earth on wood sounded from below, then earth on other earth, till the yawning chasm had gone and only a brown scar remained.
One final stamp on the loosened soil, and they too, shouldering their tools, went homeward, and Graeme was alone in the fast-falling night. The sun had long since died—to be born again in another world—and over his fiery western grave a pall of blue storm-cloud hung, rapidly rising and spreading over the heavens. The wind moaned fretfully, and the low mutter of thunder came from the distant mountains.
The hour was at hand, its herald the tempest, the birth-pangs of earth in travail of a soul.
A sudden fearful excitement shook Graeme. His knees knocked together, he rocked and swayed, and then the mood passed, and, steady once more, he strode forward till he stood over the lifeless body below, his livid face raised to the darkened sky.
“Stara!” he called, but only the thunder of an outraged God responded. “Stara! Stara!” he shouted again, and then stopped, for the answer had come.
A flash of blue light, a rending crash overhead, and, to the swell of harp and organ, the heavens yawned slowly asunder, and the dead woman, white fire rolling around her, stood looking down upon him. For a moment he remained, with face lit up and hands outstretched towards her, and then, with one loud triumphant cry of “Stara!” fell forward on his face, quivered for a moment, and was still.
Almost as quick as the lightning-flash, from behind the wall at the far side of the cemetery a man came running up, followed slowly and seemingly unwillingly by another.
“Quick, Selbourne,” said the first, “fetch a Cape cart; look sharp, man, the storm will be on us in a minute. God! did you ever see anything like that last flash?”
Richard came slowly up to where the speaker was kneeling, with Graeme’s head against his shoulder, while he was forcing the neck of a small phial between the clenched teeth.
“What’s the matter,” he said coolly, “lightning struck him? If so, he ought to be dead. Is he?”
“Nothing of the kind; he’s as alive as you or I.”
“What’s wrong, then?”
“I don’t quite know—fit of some sort, I should say.”
“Leave him to get over it then. Rain will bring him to. I’m going, I was a fool to stay, don’t know why I did, except that you made such a point of it.”
The other looked up, frowning. “Look here, Selbourne, what your quarrel is with this fellow I don’t know, and don’t want to; but I’m a doctor, and if he’s the biggest blackguard under the sun, he’s my patient now, and I don’t leave him. You go if you like, but in common humanity order the Cape cart.”
“I’ll... see... him... rotting first.”
“See here, Richard Selbourne, I’m a good friend of yours, and I think I’ve shown it, haven’t I? I wasn’t in time, I know, for... but that was not my fault, I came as quick as I could, and there was nothing to be done, but you know what I risked over signing the certificate as I did.”
“I do, and you’ve Mary’s and my eternal gratitude, Lees... but——”
“Show it now, then, by fetching that cart.”
“If you knew what I do, Lees, you’d leave him here to die.”
The other laughed. “Don’t be a fool, Selbourne,” he said.
“Where do you propose to take him? If it’s my house you’re thinking of, you can save yourself the trouble of a journey, I warn you.”
“I’m not, I’ll take him to the hotel, and get him away to-morrow or the day after. You shan’t see him again, I give you my word.”
Richard rose from the wall on which he was sitting.
“On that understanding then,” he said, “I’ll send a cart, but don’t ask me to touch the fellow, because I won’t. You and the boy can lift him, I suppose, or shall I send a man?”
“The boy and I can manage all right; he’s light enough, poor devil. Please be quick, Selbourne.”
The latter walked slowly away, leaving Dr. Lees looking down on the still unconscious figure in his arms.
“Good thing I was watching you, my friend,” he muttered. “I knew when I saw you at the funeral you couldn’t last much longer. I wonder what it all means, and what you saw just now? for you did see something, I know that, and probably will to the end of your days. You’ll be an interesting study in the future, Colonel Graeme, or I’m much mistaken. ‘Stara,’ you called, and that was her name, poor girl; she poisons herself, and my friend Dick, the most amiable fellow I know, hates you, hates you so much that he’d leave you here to die. For you would die of exposure if I left you now; as it is, you’ll be pretty bad for a day or two. Still, I think I’ve got the story all right; it’s an old enough one, God knows. Oh yes, you’re a bad lot, Colonel, right enough, but it’s possible you’re not quite so much to blame as they think. I doubt if you’re quite... responsible; not mad—I’m sure of that—but not quite responsible. Ah, the cart at last! Hi, you, this way; fasten the mules to the wall here, then come and help lift the Baas. Easy, that’s right now.” Together they lifted the light figure into the Cape cart, and, Lees still holding it in his arms, drove away to the Spring Bok Hotel, Duikerport, the mules shying and plunging at the lightning playing on the rocks around.