lustering ever
around one recollection, well I realised, and not for the first time,
that life seemed very much to have been wasted in my case.

The one talent man in the parable recurred to my mind, and I will even
own, I hope not irreverently, to a sneaking sympathy for that same poor
devil. He might have lost his one talent, or fooled it away, instead of
which, he at any rate kept it--and, after all there is a saying that it
is more difficult to keep money than to make it. Now it seemed to me
that I was very much in the same boat with him. I had kept my talent--
so far--and was it even now too late to add to it, but--what the deuce
had this got to do with Aida Sewin, who formed the undercurrent of all
the riotous meditations in which I was indulging? Well perhaps it had
something.

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.

DOLF NORBURY AGAIN.

When two people, trekking together beyond the confines of civilisation
fall out, the situation becomes unpleasant. If each has his own waggon,
well and good, they can part company, but if not, and both are bound to
stick together it spells friction. For this reason I have always
preferred trekking alone.

Even my worst enemy could hardly accuse me of being a bad-tempered man,
let alone a quarrelsome one. On the other hand I have never laid claim
to an angelic disposition, and if I had the demeanour of my present
companion would have taxed it to the uttermost, since we had each been
betrayed into showing the other our hand. For my part I can honestly
say the fact would have made no difference whatever in our mutual
relations, but Falkner Sewin was differently hung. First of all he
sulked heavily, but finding that this did not answer and that I was
entirely independent of him for companionship, for I would talk to the
Zulus by the hour--he threw that off and grew offensive--so much so that
I felt certain he was trying to pick a quarrel with me. Had it been any
other man in the world this would have concerned me not one atom, indeed
he needn't have tried overmuch. But here it was different. There was
my promise to his cousin, and further, the consideration that Aida Sewin
was his cousin and thus very nearly related indeed. No, on no account
must we come to blows, and yet the strain upon my temper became hourly
more great.

I had not been able to trek when I had intended, by reason of something
beyond the ordinary native delay in bringing in my cattle; in fact in
one particular