We were after
rhebok, the dun kind, and I recollected how we had followed one
beast, and both he and I had clean lost it. A greyhound works by
sight, and my eyes are good enough, but that buck simply leaked
out of the landscape. Afterwards I found out how it managed it.
Against the grey rock of the kopjes it showed no more than a crow
against a thundercloud. It didn't need to run away; all it had to do
was to stand still and melt into the background.
Suddenly as these memories chased across my brain I thought of
my present case and applied the moral. The Black Stone didn't need
to bolt. They were quietly absorbed into the landscape. I was on
the right track, and I jammed that down in my mind and vowed
never to forget it. The last word was with Peter Pienaar.
Scaife's men would be posted now, but there was no sign of a
soul. The house stood as open as a market-place for anybody to
observe. A three-foot railing separated it from the cliff road; the
windows on the ground-floor were all open, and shaded lights and
the low sound of voices revealed where the occupants were finishing
dinner. Everything was as public and above-board as a charity
bazaar. Feeling the greatest fool on earth, I opened the gate and
rang the bell.
A man of my sort, who has travelled about the world in rough
places, gets on perfectly well with two classes, what you may call
the upper and the lower.
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