• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

'You lost everything?'

'Everything. It always seems to happen that way.'

Van Doorn thought it best not to ask about the other disasters; what he wanted to hear was Retief's attitude toward the English government, for he was a man whose voice was being heard more and more. He spoke often about what he considered 'the persecution of the Boers.'

'The English will never give up until farmers like the three of us are ruined. Finished.'

'Why would any government adopt such a policy?'

'Because Keer will make them. His pressure will never cease until the Kaffirs control all the land. Look at your servants running wild over the veld ...' His voice tapered off at the sight of De Groot's expression. 'They're not satisfied with robbing us of belongings and blood. They want to steal our good name, too. I see that as the English program.'

'Wait, wait!' Tjaart protested. 'You've seen that men like Saltwood and Carleton are decent.'

'They are good men, but they're here in Grahamstown. Keer is in London, and every law he proposes favors the Kaffirs at our expense. The philanthropist ladies in their London parlors will continue to bleat when they hear we Boers are trying to defend our wives and children against their Kaffir darlings.'

Van Doorn was unable to decide how much of Retief's grievance was justified, how much an understandable animosity springing from his ruined business contracts, but before they parted, Retief raised a new bold topic about which there could be no ambiguity: 'Tjaart, would you contribute rix-dollars to a project that Pieter Uys is contemplating? You know Uys, a very good man.'

Van Doorn did not know him, but De Groot did, and most favorably: 'Maybe the best Boer along the sea. What's his plan?'

'He thinks to go on an exploring trip. Up the coast into the fertile valleys along the Indian Ocean.'

'Why?'

'He thinks that one day the Boers might have to move there. I don't want to quit my farm. And I know you wouldn't want to, Tjaart. But it might be prudent if we looked.'

'To what purpose?' Van Doorn asked, and in years that were to come he would never forget Retief's reply. They had reached a landmark where Retief must turn north for his farm among the mountain ranges. Up there lay the kind of place no man would willingly leave, but Retief said, 'I fear the English are determined to drive us into the ground. Did you read Keer's reports?'

'You know I can't read English,' De Groot said.

'Well, I read them all,' Retief said with great force, 'and you know what I think? After next year there will be no more slavery. They'll take our Coloureds away from us, too, and then how will we farm?'

'What has Pieter Uys to do with this?' De Groot asked.

'A wise man considers many plans,' Retief replied. 'Not for me or you. We can manage. But for the poor Boers who are going to be pressed down by English laws. Uys will look at the lands in Natal and tell us if we can farm them.'

'Aren't the lands already taken?' De Groot asked.

'To the north, the Zulu. To the south, a few Englishmen. But in between, magnificent valleys with ample water, trees, good land.'

He asked again for contributions to the Uys expedition, and Tjaart had to say, 'I have no money now. Advance it for me and I'll pay back.' The English had recently introduced their own monetary system, thinking to replace the Dutch that everyone used, and De Groot did have some of the crisp notes. When he handed his offering to Retief the latter took it, held it in his two hands, and allowed the sun to play upon it.

'I do not like this money,' he said.

Nachtmaal (night meal) was Holy Communion. It was held four times each year, and those living near the church were expected to attend each one. But Boers in remote areas were forgiven if they missed entirely for three or four years, because at the first opportunity they would come swarming in on pilgrimages that might last a month. With them they brought children to be baptized, young lovers to