disappointment was less keen than she could have
thought possible. Could it be that the other was so exactly his
counterpart that at times, even subsequent to their first acquaintance,
she could hardly believe it was not Colvin himself, for some motive of
his own, playing a part?

For their first acquaintance had grown and ripened. Kenneth Kershaw had
lost no time in calling, in fact he had a slight acquaintance with Jim
Dixon already, and as time went on his visits became more and more
frequent till they were almost daily. Whereupon Jim Dixon began to
rally his very attractive young kinswoman.

This, at first, annoyed the latter. He was not a refined man, and his
jests were on his own level. More than once he fired them off on the
object of them personally, and Kenneth had looked much as Colvin would
have looked under the circumstances. Then May had affected to take them
in good part, with an eye to information. Who was this Mr Kershaw, she
asked, and what was he doing up there? But Jim Dixon's reply was vague.
He had been there some two years, he believed, but he must have been
longer in the country, because he could talk Dutch quite well. What was
his business? Nobody knew. He was one of those customers who didn't
give themselves away. Like a good many more up there he had got along
sort of "scratch"; but it was said he had made a tidyish bit in the
boom, end of last year. But he was a tip-top swell, any one could see
that. "Nothing like capturing one of these English swells, May,"
concluded Jim, with a knowing wink. "Make hay while the sun shines."
And we dare not swear that the aspirate in that fragrant foodstuff for
the equine race was over distinctly sounded.

Kenneth, for his part, was genuinely attracted by the girl. Her
relatives he at once set down in his own mind as unmitigated outsiders,
but there was the making of something good about May herself. Times,
too, were desperately dull. He hardly knew why he had elected to remain
in the Transvaal, except on the principle of "sitting on the fence." It
was by no means certain that Oom Paul would not remain cock of the walk,
in which eventuality he thought he saw the road to some valuable
pickings. And now this girl had come into his way to brighten it. And
she did brighten it.

She was so natural, so transparent. He could turn her mind inside out
any moment he chose. He had very quickly, and with hardly a question,
discovered the _rais