"Uncle," said Jess that morning to old Silas Croft as he stood by thekraal-gate, where he had been counting out the sheep--an operationrequiring much quickness of eye, and on the accurate performance ofwhich he greatly prided himself.
"Yes, yes, my dear, I know what you are going to say. It was very neatlydone; it isn't everybody who can count out six hundred running hungrysheep without a mistake. But then, I oughtn't to say too much, for yousee I have been at it for fifty years, in the old colony and here. Now,many a man would get fifty sheep wrong. There's Niel for instance----"
"Uncle," said she, wincing a little at the name, as a horse with a soreback winces at the touch of the saddle, "it wasn't about the sheep thatI was going to speak to you. I want you to do me a favour."
"A favour? Why, God bless the girl, how pale you look!--not but what youare always pale. Well, what is it now?"
"I want to go up to Pretoria by the post-cart that leaves Wakkerstroomto-morrow afternoon, and to stop for a couple of months with myschoolfellow, Jane Neville. I have often promised to go, and I havenever gone."
"Well, I never!" said the old man. "My stay-at-home Jess wanting to goaway, and without Bessie too! What is the matter with you?"
"I want a change, uncle--I do indeed. I hope you won't thwart me inthis."
Silas looked at her steadily with his keen grey eyes.
"Humph!" he said; "you want to go away, and there's an end of it. Bestnot ask too many questions where a maid is concerned. Very well, mydear, go if you like, though I shall miss you."
"Thank you, uncle," she said, and kissed him; then turned and went.
Old Croft took off his broad hat and polished his bald head with a redpocket-handkerchief.
"There's something up with that girl," he said aloud to a lizard thathad crept out of the crevices of the stone wall to bask in the sun. "Iam not such a fool as I look, and I say that there is something wrongwith her. She is odder than ever," and he hit viciously at the lizardwith his stick, whereon it promptly bolted into its crack, returningpresently to see if the irate "human" had departed.
"However," he soliloquised, as he made his way to the house, "I am gladthat it was not Bessie. I couldn't bear, at my time of life, to partwith Bessie, even for a couple of months."