ed Selwood, with whom Violet Avory was, nevertheless,
a prime favourite. "Just like you women! You're all alike, every one
of you."

His wife vouchsafed no reply, and the whirr of the sewing machine went
blithely on. Soon the silence was broken by an unmistakable snore. The
slumbrous warmth of the afternoon had told upon Selwood. His head had
fallen back, his pipe had slipped on to the floor. He was fast asleep.

An hour went by. It was getting nearly time to go to the kraals and
count in the sheep. Still he snored steadily on. His wife, drowsy with
the continual whirr of the sewing machine, felt more than half inclined
to follow his example.

Suddenly there was a sound of wheels on the grassy plot outside the
front garden, then a voice exclaiming in dubious tone--

"Here's a take in. I believe they're all away from home."

The voice proceeded from one of the two occupants of a very travel-worn
buggy standing at the gate.

"No, they're not!" cried Mrs Selwood, to whom that voice was well
known. "Come--wake up, Chris. Here is Renshaw himself!"

"Eh--what! I believe I've been asleep!" cried Selwood, starting
up--"Renshaw--is it! Hallo, old chap. This is first-rate," he added,
rushing out. And the two men's hands wore locked in a close grip.
"Allamaghtag! But you are looking pulled down--isn't he, Hilda?--though
not quite so much as I should have expected. How are you, sir? We are
delighted to see you," he went on as Renshaw duly introduced his friend.

["Allamaghtag!" "Almighty!" A common ejaculation among the Boers. It
and similar colloquialisms are almost equally frequent among their
colonial brethren.]

Then Marian appeared--her sweet face lighting up with a glow of glad
welcome for which many a man might have given his right hand--and then
the children, who had been amusing themselves diversely after the manner
of their kind, anywhere outside and around the house, came crowding
noisily and gleefully around "Uncle Renshaw," as they had always been in
the habit of calling him. To the lonely man, fresh from his rough and
comfortless sick-bed, this was indeed a home-coming--a welcome to stir
the heart. Yet that organ was susceptible of a dire sinking as its
owner missed one face from the group,--realised in one quick, eager
glance that the presence he sought was not there.

Violet's room was at the back of the house, consequently she had heard
but faintly the sounds attendant on the arri