I'll come if I can. But I don't know, I've got to look after the farm.

Please try, Sean. Her face was earnest. I'll be waiting for you, I'll

take some lunch and wait all day. Please come, even if it's only for a

little while. all right, I'll come. Promise? Promise. She smiled with

relief. I'll wait for you on the path above the waterfall. She turned

and ran to join her family and Sean drove back to Theunis Kraal. Garrick

was lying on his bed reading. I thought Pa told you to get on with the

branding of those new cattle we bought on Wednesday Garrick laid down

his book and sat up. I told Zama to keep them in the kraal until you

got backPa told you to get on with it. You can't keep them there all

day without feed or water. I hate branding, muttered Garrick. I hate

it when they moo like that as you burn them, and I hate the stink of

burning hair and skin, it gives me a headache, Well someone's got to do

it. I can't, I've got to go down and mix new dip into the tanks for

tomorrow. Sean was losing his temper. Hell, Garry, why are you always

so damn helpless? I can't help it, I can't help it if I've only got one

leg Garrick was close to tears again. The reference to his leg had the

desired effect, Sean's temper steadied instantly. I'm sorry, Sean

smiled his irresistible smile. I tell you what. I'll do the branding,

you fix the tanks. Get the drums of dip loaded onto the Scotch cart,

take a couple of the stable boys with you to help. Here are the keys of

the storeroom. He tossed the bunch onto the bed beside Garrick. You

should be finished before dark.

At the door he turned. Garry, don't forget to do all six tanks, not

just the ones near the house. So Garrick loaded six drums of dip onto

the Scotch cart and went off down the hill. He was home well before

dark. The front of his breeches was stained with the dark, tarry

chemical and some of it had soaked into the leather of his single

riding-boot. As he came out of the kitchen into the passage Sean

shouted from the study. Hey, Garry, did you finish them? Garrick was

startled. Waite's study was a sacred place, the inner sanctum of

Theunis Kraal. Even Ada knocked before going into it and the twins went

there only to receive punishment. Garrick limped along the passage and

pushed open the door.

Sean sat with his boots on top of the desk and his ankles neatly

crossed. He leaned back in the swivel chair.

Pa will kill you, Garrick's voice was shaky.

Pa's in Pietermaritzburg, said Sean.

Garrick stood in the doorway and looked around the room. It was the

first time he had really seen it. On every previous visit he had been

too preoccupied with the violence to come and the only item in the room

he had studied closely was the seat of the big leather easy chair as he

bent over the arm of it and exposed his backside to the sjambok.

Now he looked at the room. The walls were panelled to the ceiling, the

wood was dark yellow and polished.

The ceiling was fancy plaster, in a pattern of oak leaves.

A single lamp hung from the centre of it on a brass chain.

You could walk into the fireplace of brown chipped stone and there were

logs laid ready for the match.

Pipes and tobacco jar on the ledge beside the fireplace, guns in a rack

along one wall, a bookcase of green and maroon leather bound volumes:

encyclopaedias, dictionaries, books on travel and farming, but no

fiction. There was an oil painting of Ada on the wall opposite the

desk, the artist had captured a little of her serenity: she wore a white

dress and carried her hat in her hand. A magnificent set of Cape

buffalo horns above the fireplace dominated the room with their great

crenellated bosses and wide sweep to the tips.