The door opened now and she came out and stood looking sadly at her father. She too had subtly changed. Some of the bubbling youth was gone out of her; the shadows in the gay forget-me-not eyes had grown deeper; her lips tipped downwards at the corners.

The coming war between Boer and Briton had already thrown its shadow on her spirit; and too, the gloom of her father’s lost law-case enveloped her as it did all else at the farm. She knew he was a ruined man, with nothing in the world but a couple of hundred pounds, and the farm reduced to half its value. She was no longer the catch of the neighbourhood from a marriageable point of view. The two thousand pounds to which, as her father’s only living child, she had been heiress was gone in litigation, leaving her just like any other poor back-veld farmer’s daughter, a girl who must take the best husband she could get. Not that that worried her. It was her father’s changed habit and appearance that frightened her. She looked at him now with sorrowful eyes.

"Ach! my lieber fader, don’t let it turn your blood like that, then!"

She often made that remark to him, and he never took any notice, never even removed his eyes from the land, though his hand would sometimes mechanically search in his coat pocket for the stumpy roll of tabac and penknife.

"Won’t you come in, Poppa? The sun is toch so hot out here for you!"

The front of the house in fact lay bathed in the full flood of noon-day heat. No shade of flickering blue-gum leaves sheltered it now, for the old man had cut down the row of trees level with the stoep so that no obstacle should impede a clear vision of the dirty work going forward.

"No what, I am maar better here," he said slowly. "I can maar see the scoundrels."

"Fi! my poor Poppa! what does it then do for you, but? Only makes your blood turn more and more."

"Chrissie," he said solemnly. "My blood is turned already. I feel strange in the stomach and in the head since that Judge--" He shook a great fist in the direction of the railway workings. It seemed to her that ever since that morning his hand had strangely increased in size.

"Poppa you are swelling up!" she said in awestruck tones.

"Ja, I am not myself," he muttered dully. "It is those stink-machines-- and that cursed Judge."

She sighed. It was nearly two months since the final edict had been given against him, yet here was his mind still travelling back and forth on the thing as though it had happened yesterday! The world had stood still for him! She let her gaze follow the same direction as his, putting up her hand to shelter her eyes from the glare. At the camp not more than four hundred yards away the men could be seen moving about. Some trolley loads of machinery had just come in, and the gangers were swarming over them like ants; pulling at and handing down sleepers, rails, and great steel girders. A figure dressed in white ducks came out of a tent and directed the scene. At the sight of his straight back and easy walk a little wave of colour curved into the girl’s cheek. Suddenly as if moved by machinery the red-shirted, grey-legged men all ran together, converging in a cluster about one spot. Some of them stooped down, others leaned over the stoopers to look at what lay on the ground. Chrissie held her breath until she saw the white-clothed man waving the others off. It was one of the red-shirted labourers who lay so still on the ground.

"There has been an accident!" she said aloud, looking at her father.

"There will be many an accident before it is finished," he muttered darkly. "God is on my side. He will make them pay with blood."

"Maar, Poppey, it is not the fault of those poor men! They have to earn their living, but," she expostulated. "Look, they are carrying him to a tent—​now they are--" She broke off and stayed watching. It was plain that Braddon was giving certain instructions. He pointed towards the farm, and the men looked that way, but shook their heads and hung back. Then Braddon himself started for the farm with long swinging paces. The colour waned out of Chrissie’s face, leaving her very pale.

"Poppa, the engineer is coming here—​you remember him?"

"Ja, I remember the rooi-nek good enough."

They stayed in silence then, until Braddon reached the stoep. His eyes and Chrissie’s met for a moment as he stood with his hat off, but it was Retief whom he addressed.

"We have had an accident, Oom, and by bad luck not a drop of brandy in the camp. Can you let us have a little? Enough to keep the man going until we get him into hospital."

"I have brandy but not for you," was the surly response.

Braddon reddened angrily, but he knew the old man’s trouble, and strove to be patient.

"Oom, it is not for me. The poor fellow’s leg is broken in two places. I ask you in common humanity."

"That talk is no good here. You will get no brandy of mine."

"Sis, Poppey, then--" put in Chrissie in soft remonstrance. But Poppey turned on her bellowing like a wounded bull.

"Is this my house or yours? Mastag! Do I keep brandy to pour down the throats of rooi-neks who steal my land?"