The Petticoat Commando Part 49

The white dress of a woman fluttering among the leaves rea.s.sured her.

"What is this?" she whispered. "Who are you? Why are you here?"

One of the men came forward.

"Venter and Brenckmann," he said softly, "come for the Captain."

"Yes, yes," Hansie said hurriedly. "I know. We have waited for you more than an hour. But these people? Who are they?"

"Our friends and relatives come to see us off," came the unexpected reply.

Hansie was silent, trying to hide her indignation, her rising resentment, as another and yet another form cautiously emerged from behind the foliage.

"Do you know," she said at last, "that you are not only exposing us to great danger by coming here at a time like this, but that you are making it a thousand times more difficult for the Captain to depart un.o.bserved? How could you be so indiscreet?"

"These people are all trustworthy," one of the men volunteered.

"I have no doubt of it." Hansie extended her hands cordially to them.

"But you must all go now as quietly as you came. Say good-bye and go, please, before I go to call the Captain."

She turned away with a lump in her throat, for no sounds broke the stillness of the night save those of stifled sobs and murmured caresses.

"Fare thee well. G.o.d be with you!"

There was Brenckmann with his three sisters, there was Venter with one sister and a sweetheart, and there was the sweetheart of one of Brenckmann's sisters, to say nothing of the other relatives and friends whom I have been unable to place.

Some distance from the scene, and un.o.bserved by all save one, was the figure of the ever-cautious and discreet van der Westhuizen, guarding the parcels which had previously been conveyed there, lurking among the trees.

Swiftly and silently Hansie sped up to the house to meet the Captain, just as he, unable to bear the suspense any longer, had made up his mind to set out on his perilous expedition alone and was cautiously emerging from the bath-room door, concealing himself under the vineyard as he went.

"They are there, Captain," she said in a quick and lowered voice, "waiting for you under the willows. Lower down near the bush van der Westhuizen is also waiting. He will distribute the parcels when you come. I think everything is in order and the coast clear. The military camp is quiet, the sergeant-major is in his 'tin villa.' Good-bye, Captain. G.o.d bless you."

The man removed his helmet and stood before her in the pale light of the rising moon. His face was very white.

"I shall never be able to thank you. G.o.d keep you. Good-bye, good-bye." He clasped her hand and was gone, as silent as the shadows into which he disappeared.

When Hansie rejoined her mother a few minutes later no word was said on either side. The extreme tension was over, the reaction had set in, and they could not trust themselves to speak, but set to work at once, firmly and decently removing every trace in the house of confusion and disorder.

In the room vacated by Captain Naude they found the snapshots of his wife and children taken in the Concentration Camp.

Mrs. van Warmelo held them up to her daughter's view with a significant look.

"I am not surprised that he would not take them with him," she said.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII

BETRAYED

Hansie was one of those unfortunate women who cannot cry, but I believe she cried that night when the awful strain was over, the house quiet and deserted, and the feeling of "nothing to do but wait"

creeping over her.

She and her mother lay for hours listening for sounds of commotion in the suburb, following in spirit the brave men on their route to the free veld, so perilous and insecure, watching and praying for their safety.

At last Hansie fell into a heavy, unrefres.h.i.+ng sleep, from which she was roused in the early dawn by her mother's voice, hurried and extremely agitated.

"Hansie, Hansie, come here quick!"

"Where, mother? Where are you?"

"In the dining-room! Come at once, come and look!"

Hansie sprang out of bed, alarmed and now thoroughly roused, and ran into the dining-room, where she found her mother concealing herself behind the lace curtains and cautiously looking out of the window to the Military Camp.

She half turned as her daughter approached and said in a whisper: "Don't show yourself. Look, Hansie, we have been betrayed. Our house is suspected. See how it is being watched."

Hansie looked and looked again. There was no doubt of it.

The sergeant was in excited conversation with a man on horseback, well known to Hansie by sight as a detective in plain clothes. Here and there the soldiers were grouped around other private detectives, on horseback and on foot, talking and gesticulating and pointing to the house in wild excitement. What struck Hansie as almost ludicrous, even at that moment, was the _unbounded astonishment_ betrayed by them.

Their looks and gestures spoke as plainly as the plainest words: "Can it be possible? Has that been going on under our noses? And pray, how long?"

"There is no doubt about it. We and our house have been betrayed. But cheer up, mother; forewarned is forearmed. Oh, silly fools, to give away their game like that!"

"They have not seen us yet, Hansie. They think we are asleep."

"Even so, the servants are about. Oh, mother!"

"Go and get dressed, Hansie, and let us behave exactly the same as usual. All we can do now is to see that we do not betray that we _know_ we have been betrayed. How do you think this has come about?"

"The crowd under the willows last night?"

"Gentleman Jim?"

"Flippie?"

They looked at one another inquiringly and slowly shook their heads.

Good reader, after more than ten years, when they talk about this period of their lives, they still look inquiringly at one another and slowly shake their heads.

_Who could it have been? How did it come about?_

When Hansie went out into the garden an hour or so later to gather roses for the table, Harmony was flooded with the exquisite morning sun, the birds were twittering and bickering among themselves, and Carlo sprang up to meet her, barking an affectionate "good morning,"