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Short
Love Stories
The Love Letter
I was always a little in awe of Great-aunt Stephina
Roos. Indeed, as children we were all frankly terrified
of her. The fact that she did not live with the
family, preferring her tiny cottage and solitude
to the comfortable but rather noisy household where
we were brought up-added to the respectful fear
in which she was held.
We used to take it in turn to carry small delicacies
which my mother had made down from the big house
to the little cottage where Aunt Stephia and an
old colored maid spent their days. Old Tnate Sanna
would open the door to the rather frightened little
messenger and would usher him-or her - into the
dark voor-kamer, where the shutters were always
closed to keep out the heat and the flies. There
we would wait, in trembling but not altogether unpleasant.
She was a tiny little woman to inspire so much
veneration. She was always dressed in black, and
her dark clothes melted into the shadows of the
voor-kamer and made her look smaller than ever.
But you felt. The moment she entered. That something
vital and strong and somehow indestructible had
come in with her, although she moved slowly, and
her voice was sweet and soft.
She never embraced us. She would greet us and take
out hot little hands in her own beautiful cool one,
with blue veins standing out on the back of it,
as though the white skin were almost too delicate
to contain them.
Tante Sanna would bring in dishes of sweet, sweet,
sticky candy, or a great bowl of grapes or peaches,
and Great-aunt Stephina would converse gravely about
happenings on the farm ,and, more rarely, of the
outer world.
When we had finished our sweetmeats or fruit she
would accompany us to the stoep, bidding us thank
our mother for her gift and sending quaint, old-fashioned
messages to her and the Father. Then she would turn
and enter the house, closing the door behind, so
that it became once more a place of mystery.
As I grew older I found, rather to my surprise,
that I had become genuinely fond of my aloof old
great-aunt. But to this day I do not know what strange
impulse made me take George to see her and to tell
her, before I had confided in another living soul,
of our engagement. To my astonishment, she was delighted.
"An Englishman,"she exclaimed."But
that is splendid, splendid. And you,"she turned
to George,"you are making your home in this
country? You do not intend to return to England
just yet?"
She seemed relieved when she heard that George
had bought a farm near our own farm and intended
to settle in South Africa. She became quite animated,
and chattered away to him.
After that I would often slip away to the little
cottage by the mealie lands. Once she was somewhat
disappointed on hearing that we had decided to wait
for two years before getting married, but when she
learned that my father and mother were both pleased
with the match she seemed reassured.
Still, she often appeared anxious about my love
affair, and would ask questions that seemed to me
strange, almost as though she feared that something
would happen to destroy my romance. But I was quite
unprepared for her outburst when I mentioned that
George thought of paying a lightning visit to England
before we were married."He must not do it,"she
cried."Ina, you must not let him go. Promise
me you will prevent him."she was trembling
all over. I did what I could to console her, but
she looked so tired and pale that I persuaded her
to go to her room and rest, promising to return
the next day.
When I arrived I found her sitting on the stoep.
She looked lonely and pathetic, and for the first
time I wondered why no man had ever taken her and
looked after her and loved her. Mother had told
me that Great-aunt Stephina had been lovely as a
young girl, and although no trace of that beauty
remained, except perhaps in her brown eyes, yet
she looked so small and appealing that any man,
one felt, would have wanted to protect her.
She paused, as though she did not quite know how
to begin.
Then she seemed to give herself, mentally, a little
shake. "You must have wondered ", she
said, "why I was so upset at the thought of
young George's going to England without you. I am
an old woman, and perhaps I have the silly fancies
of the old, but I should like to tell you my own
love story, and then you can decide whether it is
wise for your man to leave you before you are married."
"I was quite a young girl when I first met
Richard Weston. He was an Englishman who boarded
with the Van Rensburgs on the next farm, four or
five miles from us. Richard was not strong. He had
a weak chest, and the doctors had sent him to South
Africa so that the dry air could cure him. He taught
the Van Rensburg children, who were younger than
I was, though we often played together, but he did
this for pleasure and not because he needed money."We
loved one another from the first moment we met,
though we did not speak of our love until the evening
of my eighteenth birthday. All our friends and relatives
had come to my party, and in the evening we danced
on the big old carpet which we had laid down in
the barn. Richard had come with the Van Rensburgs,
and we danced together as often as we dared, which
was not very often, for my father hated the Uitlanders.
Indeed, for a time he had quarreled with Mynheer
Van Rensburg for allowing Richard to board with
him, but afterwards he got used to the idea, and
was always polite to the Englishman, though he never
liked him.
"That was the happiest birthday of my life,
for while we were resting between dances Richard
took me outside into the cool, moonlit night, and
there, under the stars ,he told me he loved me and
asked me to marry him. Of course I promised I would,
for I was too happy to think of what my parents
would say, or indeed of anything except Richard
was not at our meeting place as he had arranged.
I was disappointed but not alarmed, for so many
things could happen to either of us to prevent out
keeping our tryst. I thought that next time we visited
the Van Ransburgs, I should hear what had kept him
and we could plan further meetings…
"So when my father asked if I would drive
with him to Driefontein I was delighted. But when
we reached the homestead and were sitting on the
stoep drinking our coffee, we heard that Richard
had left quite suddenly and had gone back to England.
His father had died, and now he was the heir and
must go back to look after his estates.
"I do not remember very much more about that
day, except that the sun seemed to have stopped
shining and the country no longer looked beautiful
and full of promise, but bleak and desolate as it
sometimes does in winter or in times of drought.
Late that afternoon, Jantje, the little Hottentot
herd boy, came up to me and handed me a letter ,
which he said the English baas had left for me.
It was the only love letter I ever received, but
it turned all my bitterness and grief into a peacefulness
which was the nearest I could get, then, to happiness.
I knew Richard still loved me, and somehow, as long
as I had his letter, I felt that we could never
be really parted, even if he were in England and
I had to remain on the farm. I have it yet, and
though I am an old, tired woman, it still gives
me hope and courage."
"I must have been a wonderful letter, Aunt
Stephia,"I said
The old lady came back from her dreams of that far-off
romance."Perhaps," she said, hesitating
a little, "perhaps, my dear, you would care
to read it ?"
"I should love to , Aunt Stephia,"I said
gently
She rose at once and tripped into the house as eagerly
as a young girl. When she came back she handed me
a letter, faded and yellow with age, the edges of
the envelope worn and frayed as though it had been
much handled. But when I came to open it I found
that the seal was unbroken.
"Open it ,open it,"said Great-aunt Stephia,
and her voice was shaking
I broke the seal and read.
It was not a love letter in the true sense of the
word, but pages of the minutest directions of how"my
sweetest Phina"was to elude her father's vigilance,
creep down to the drift at night and there meet
Jantje with a horse which would take her to Smitsdorp.
There she was to go to "my true friend, Henry
Wilson",who would give her money and make arrangements
for her to follow her lover to Cape Town and from
there to England ," where, my love, we can
he be married at once. But if, my dearest, you are
not sure that you can face lift with me in a land
strange to you, then do not take this important
step, for I love you too much to wish you the smallest
unhappiness. If you do not come, and if I do not
hear from you, then I shall know that you could
never be happy so far from the people and the country
which you love. If, however, you feel you can keep
your promise to me, but are of too timid and modest
a journey to England unaccompanied, then write to
me, and I will, by some means, return to fetch my
bride."
I read no further.
"But Aunt Phina!"I gasped. "Why…why…?"
The old lady was watching me with trembling eagerness,
her face flushed and her eyes bright with expectation."Read
it aloud, my dear,"she said."I want to
hear every word of it. There was never anyone I
could trust…Uitlanders were hated in my young
days…I could not ask anyone."
"But, Auntie, don't you even know what he
wrote?"
The old lady looked down, troubled and shy like
a child who has unwittingly done wrong.
"No, dear," she said, speaking very low."You
see, I never learned to read.
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