On toiled the horses through the gathering gloom. Fortunately, the road was almost level and free from mud-holes, and Frank Muller rode just ahead to show the way, his strong athletic form standing out clearly against the departing western glow. Silent was the earth, silent as death. No bird or beast, no blade of grass or breath of air stirred upon its surface. The only sign of life was the continual flickering of those awful tongues of light as they licked the lips of the storm. On for mile after mile, on through the desolation! They were not far from the river now, and could hear the distant growling of the thunder, echoing down it solemnly.
It was an awful night. Great pillars of mud-coloured cloud came creeping across the surface of the veldt towards them, seemingly blown along without a wind. Now, too, a ghastly-looking ringed moon arose throwing an unholy and distorted light upon the blackness that seemed to shudder in her rays as though with a prescience of the advancing terror. On crept the mud-coloured columns, and on above them, and resting on them, came the muttering storm. The cart was quite close to the river now, and they could distinguish the murmur of its waters. To their left stood a koppie, covered with white, slab-like stones, on which the sickly moonbeams danced.
“Look, John, look!” cried Jess with an hysterical laugh; “it is like a huge graveyard, and the dark shadows between are the ghosts of the buried.”
“Nonsense,” said John sternly; “why do you talk such rubbish?”
He felt that her mind had lost its balance, and, what is more, his own nerves were shaken. Therefore he was naturally the angrier with her, and the more determined to be perfectly matter-of-fact.
Jess made no answer, but she was frightened, she could not tell why. The scene resembled that of some awful dream, or of one of Doré’s pictures come to life. No doubt, also, the near presence of the tempest exercised a physical effect upon her. Even the wearied horses snorted and shook themselves uneasily.
They crept over the ridge of a wave of land, and the wheels rolled softly on the grass.
“Why, we are off the road!” shouted John to Muller, who was still guiding them, fifteen or twenty paces ahead.