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Kelly accompanied Burke when, after hurried preparation and consultation with Schafen, he finally took the rough road that wound by the kopje on his way to the Merstons' farm.
He went out again into the blazing sunshine, and a little later she heard him talking to Schafen as they crossed the yard to the sheep-pens. She saw him again at the midday meal, but he ate in haste and seemed preoccupied, departing again at the earliest moment possible.
She yearned to get right away by herself. She went to her room, however, and lay down for a while, trying to take the rest she needed; but when presently she heard the voice of Hans Schafen, his Dutch foreman, talking on the verandah, she arose with a feeling of thankfulness, donned her sun-hat, and slipped out of the bungalow.
He went to the window and stood gazing out with drawn brows. With an effort she broke the silence. "What has Schafen to report? Is all well?" He wheeled round abruptly and stood looking at her. For a few seconds he said nothing whatever, then as with a startled sense of uncertainty she turned towards him he spoke. "Schafen? Yes, he reported several things.
It was in the guttural tones of Hans Schafen the overseer, and with a jerk she remembered that the man always sat on the corner of the stoep to await Burke if he arrived before their return from the lands. It was his custom to wear rubber soles to his boots, and no one ever heard him come or go. For some reason this fact had always prejudiced her against Hans Schafen.
He heard Schafen out with no sign of consternation, and when he had ended he drove on to the farm and stabled his horses himself with his usual care. Then he went into his empty bungalow. . . Slowly the long hours wore away. The sun rose in its strength, shining through a thick haze that was like the smoke from a furnace. The atmosphere grew close and suffocating.
"Sylvia, if things go wrong, if the servants upset you, come to me about it! Don't go to Guy!" She understood the reference in a moment. The flush turned to flaming crimson that mounted in a wave to her forehead. She drew back from him, her head high. "And if Schafen or any other man comes to you with offensive gossip regarding my behaviour, please kick him as he deserves next time!" she said.
As for Burke, he went straight out to his horses, looking neither to right nor left, untied the reins, and drove forth again into the veldt with the dust of the desert rising all around him. Hans Schafen met his master on the boundary of Blue Hill Farm with a drawn face. Things were going from bad to worse. The drought was killing the animals like flies.
In the same conversation with Eckermann from which the first quotation is made, Goethe seems to defy the investigator who would endeavor to define his indebtedness to Sterne, its nature and its measure. The occasion was an attempt on the part of certain writers to determine the authorship of certain distichs printed in both Schiller’s and Goethe’s works. Upon a remark of Eckermann’s that this effort to hunt down a man’s originality and to trace sources is very common in the literary world, Goethe says: “Das ist sehr lächerlich, man könnte ebenso gut einen wohlgenährten Mann nach den Ochsen, Schafen und Schweinen fragen, die er gegessen und die ihm Kräfte gegeben.” An investigation such as Goethe seems to warn us against here would be one of tremendous difficulty, a
Let's leave Guy and Schafen to look after things, and go to the top of the world by ourselves! I'll take great care of you. You'll be happy, you know. You'll like it." He spoke urgently, leaning towards her. There was nothing terrible about him at that moment. All the mastery had gone from his attitude. He was even smiling a little. Her heart gave a great throb.
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