“I cannot do it,” gasped Suzanne, turning pale and not heeding her outburst, “and, Heer van Vooren, you are a coward to ask it of me.”
“Can’t you?” he sneered. “Well, you need not, unless you please, and it is true that young women like best to be kissed alone. Here, you Kaffirs, pull that little devil up; slowly now, that she may learn what a tight string feels like about her throat before it chokes her.”
In obedience to his command three of the evil fellows with him caught hold of the end of the rope which hung over the bough, and began to pull, dragging the light form of Sihamba upwards till only the tips of her big toes touched the ground.
“Doesn’t she dance prettily?” said Swart Piet with a brutal laugh, at the same time motioning to the men to keep her thus a while.
Now Suzanne looked at the blackening lips and the little form convulsed in its death struggle, and could bear the sight no more.
“Let her down!” she cried, and, springing from the saddle, for all this while she had been seated upon her horse, she walked up to Piet, saying, “Take what you seek, but oh! for your sake I wish to God that my lips were poison.”
“No, no,” gasped Sihamba, who now was lying half choked upon the ground.
“That is not our bargain, dear,” said Piet; “it is that you should kiss me, not I you.”
Again Suzanne shrank back, and again at his signal the men began to pull upon the rope. Then seeing it, with her face as pale as death, she learned forward and touched his lips with hers, whereon he seized her round the middle, and, drawing her to him, covered her with kisses till even the brutes with him called to him not to push his jest too far and to let the girl go. This he did, uttering words which I will not repeat, and so weak was Suzanne with shame that when his arms were taken from her she fell to the ground, and lay there till the old Hottentot, her servant, ran to her, cursing and weeping with rage, and helped her to her feet. For a while she stood saying nothing, only wiping her face, as though filth had bespattered it, with the sun _kapje_ which had fallen from her head, and her face was whiter than the white cap. At last she spoke in a hoarse voice:
“Loose that woman,” she said, “who has cost me my honour.”