cer. He knew tea-time to the second,--ordinarily speaking
that is to say. He could not accustom himself to that extra half-hour's
delay which occurred on mail days, a delay caused by Riffle, the coloured
boy, having to walk to the village to fetch the post. The walk was seldom
entirely fruitless. Generally there was a newspaper of sorts;
occasionally--very occasionally--a letter. Josephus knew that the click
of the garden gate heralded the swift arrival of tea, but it was not
always easy to realize on which days that click was to be expected.

Antony gazed at the scintillating field of corn. The sight pleased him.
There is always a glory in creation, even if it be creation by proxy, so
to speak. At all events he had been the human agent in the matter. He had
ploughed the brown earth; he had cast the yellow seed, trudging the
furrows with swinging arm; he had dug the little trenches through which
the limpid mountain water should flow to the parched earth; he had
watched the first hint of green spreading like a light veil; he had seen
it thicken, carpeting the field; and now he saw the full fruit of his
labours. Strong and healthy it stood before him, the soft wind rippling
across its surface, silvering the green.

The click of the garden gate roused him from his contemplation. Josephus
cocked one ear, his small body pleasurably alert.

Antony turned his head. Mail day always held possibilities, however
improbable, an expectation unknown to those to whom the sound of the
postman's knock comes in the ordinary course of events. Riffle appeared
round the corner of the stoep. Had you seen him anywhere but in Africa,
you would have vowed he was a good-looking Italian. A Cape coloured boy
he was truly, and that, mark you, is a very different thing from Kaffir.

"The paper, master, and a letter," he announced with some importance.
Then he disappeared to prepare the tea for which Josephus's doggy soul
was longing.

Antony turned the letter in his hands. It must be confessed it was a
disappointment. It was obviously a business communication. Both envelope
and clerkly writing made that fact apparent. It was a drop to earth after
the first leap of joy that had heralded Riffle's announcement. It was
like putting out your hand to greet a friend, and meeting--a commercial
traveller.

Antony smiled ruefully. Yet, after all, it was an English commercial
traveller. That fact stood for something. It was, at all events, a faint
breath