Argosy All-Story Weekly — page 131: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE keep the matter dark, on the grounds that Oom Piet was a little mad. But after that the English settlers gave the homestead at the foot of the kopjes a wide berth. It was this affair which prompted the local predikant to visit Oom Piet and at- tempt to convert the old man to a gospel of forbearance. ‘Love your enemies; be kind to those who persecute you,” said the predikant. “To hate as you hate, Oom Piet, is to live in sin.” 3 “ Almighty!” the other exploded. “Come with me and I will show you what no man else has seen these many years. I myself will tell you things and quote you words, also, from the Good Book.” He led the minister to a large barn and, pushing back the heavy bars, slowly opened the ponderous doors. The barn—it was a big, gloomy place—was empty, and the rafters were covered with cobwebs and the dust of years. “‘ There,” said Oom Piet, and the predi- kant winced at the pent-up hate expressed. in the old man’s voice. ‘‘ There, predikant! Shall I cease to hate while that remains?” He pointed to a large, hand-hewn beam from which hung a rope, rotting with age; at the end of the rope was a noose—a hang- man’s noose. “J—I don’t understand, Oom Piet. What is this?’’ the predikant stammered. “ Almighty! You don’t understand! Then I will tell you. From that beam the Englishers hung my _ grandfather—after Slagter’s Nek, that was. And what had he done? Nothing. Nothing save to deny that any man could take his Kafhrs away from him. For that they hung him.” ‘But this is no cause to harbor hatred, Oom Piet. That was long ago—ninety years and more—and the judge who con- demned him was a Hollander.” “A Hollander—Ach Gott! A lickspittle! Even so the law was the Rooinek’s; the hangman an Englisher. And long ago, you say. Then again listen. You remember the war of 1881, the war of independence, not?” The old man spat his sarcasm. “You fought then like a good burgher. Not so long ago, no. Was not my nephew shot BEAM. 921 by those cursed liars and hypocrites—shot before war was declared? And in this last war—fought because that son of Belial, Rhodes, wanted more gold—they hung my son on that beam. He had fired on them, they said. Almighty! Was it not war? And my vrouw, ach! the good vrouw, they sent to their cursed pestilence camps, and there she died. Shall I forget, then, to hate? No, I tell you. ‘ An eye for an eye,’ the Good Book says. ‘A tooth for a tooth.’ ” ‘Your son had taken the oath of alle- giance,” the predikant said mildly, “ and in times of war many mistakes are made. Our burghers were not altogether blameless, as you well know. And the good Vrouw van Slyke—she was old, Oom Piet; ther time was very near. Had the English not taken her to the concentration camp she would have died of starvation. Even so, it is the better part to forgive.” Oom Piet, trembling with rage, raised his clenched fist above his head and his faded blue eyes blazed as they must have blazed in the days of his youth. He took a step toward the predikant, towered over him as if meaning to strike him, then, laughing harshly as the other shrank from him, let his hand fall to his side. “Vou’re like a licked hound,” he said finally in dangerously quiet tones. ‘ You have been with these Englishers too long; — you have listened to them and read into the words of the Good Book such meaning as they would have you read. ‘Listen. I had a chair—a strong chair. I made it myself out of good, hard wood, thinking it would seat my grandchildren’s children. But the ants, the white ants— the verdoemte skellums—egot to it, and, but yesterday it was, when I sat on it, it fell to pieces; it was but dust. And so the English- ers have got to you. Unseen, and you knowing nothing of it, they have got to you as the ants got to my chair; they have taken all the good burgher blood, mind and heart from you. There is nothing left of the man who was. Outward seeming you are the same man who fought with me at Spion Kop and starved with me after Co- lenso; but you are not the same. No. You— But go! Go, before I think you are an Englisher and kill you.” comicvooksscom