In his haze the man heard the suffering mother dog whimper, heard a curious bumping, thumping, rumbling. And the man with a half gone wriggle turned to one side.
Little Africa, some things are nasty. The man's dry eyes cracked as they opened, wondered, burned and maddened.
For the skull had fallen off the roof and the hunger-crazed dog and her pups were worrying at it.
The man tried to hurry up and his legs refused. He tried to shout and his lips refused. He tried to pray and his Gods were mixed.
And he clasped his head and his hair seemed to fire his hands.
And the man felt—felt! Felt for he knew not what. Just felt. And he found it and rolled off the stretcher.
I've done it myself, Little Africa, but not that way. He rolled because death was near. And he crawled and pulled himself along—pulled with a desperate wish to do one thing. Crawled and dragged his body half groveling on the ground. Slumped his stomach and lifted it, tore a cheek on the rough ground and didn't feel it. Ripped a hand.
"Girlie," he said to the dog as he got to her, "you and your babies mustn't do that. All's fair in love and war and in death and for the sake of babies. But you mustn't do that."
The dog tried to lick his cheek with the tongue that had chewed the dry head and the man couldn't hold her off.
"Keep away," he said in a silly sort of command, and flicked at her with the strength of a fly.
The pups kept worrying at the head, and the man rolled on his back. Stupid as a calf, he didn't seem to know what he was doing, yet meant to do it And he got the head.
The man held the horrid thing a moment, and the weak pups couldn't jump high enough to touch it. The man looked at the torn, dried skin and the horror of it—looked at the white teeth and the ghastliness. Looked at a woman and the life that might have been and the ghastliness that was. Laughed!
Then the man felt again for the thing he'd carried and dropped.
With muzzle almost to body, he shot—shot, Little Africa, and killed the mother and the pups.
And he lay on his back, Little Africa, and clasped the skull to his breast. Clasped it and hugged it and spoke to it words of love. Called it a name that was as dear that day as it had been years ago. Loved it and petted it—the skull of a dead, dead woman. Caressed it and fondled it and spoke secrets into a dried-up ear. Held it away and looked at it enamoured—drew it back to him and kissed it. Put it inside his shirt and clasped his left arm round it. Lay back exhausted from the violence of his stored-up love.
And the man's right hand searched for the revolver, found it, lifted it, waveringly aimed it. The hand went limp, the revolver rolled from off his chest. The coma of death had come.
THE special coach carrying its own provisions drew up at the front of the store. Four persons hastily alighted. Capeboy driver and Kaffir jumped down and attended the mules.
The four hurried over to the veranda of the store and stood round the prostrate man. One man knelt down.
"Dead!" one asked. "Too late!"
The kneeling man shook his head dubiously.
"Practically the same thing as dead," he announced.
The man worked over the prone body for a moment, injected something, poured something into the mouth, then signed to the rest to help. Together they carried the senseless bag of bones into the store and laid it on the stretcher. And for two long anxious days and nights one or other of the four watched it and fondly attended it. And on the third day there came sunrise.
The insensible man's dry eyes slowly opened. Half crazy they stared up. And the man knew that he was dead and he knew that he was in Heaven.
For the dry, half crazy eyes looked into the eyes of a woman.
Of a woman who, deep in her heart of hearts, had never once ceased to love.
HOPS
STRANGE deeds transpire
Where the midnight fire
Of the hop-pipe lanterns glow.
And misty shapes,
Like cringing apes,
Go flitting to and fro.
There is beauty rare
In the smokers' lair
Where the opium tapers blow.
And the fallen sigh,
And some men die,
As the fancies come and go.
For the dreams they dream
Are dreams of love,
Of memories fond and sweet.
Then they wake in the gloom
To their earthly doom
And totter away to the street.
And the souls that sigh
In the night, and die,
To the land of their dreams are bound.
For their bodies stark
'Mid the damp and the dark
'Tis a city's nameless mound.
But the ones who are left
With the coming of night,
Are back to their cribs in the wall.
Then—the picture fades
I awake with a start—
'Tis a dream I have had—that is all."
