It was useless to be angry with him, for he would only answer with a little smile: "You forget; I must be seeking my wife, who is waiting for me upon the Mountain of the Hand," and then we learned that he had ridden to a far off hill to examine it, or to see some travellers or natives and ask of them if they knew or had heard of such a mountain, with ridges upon its eastern slopes fashioned like the thumb and fingers of a man's hand.
Indeed, in all that countryside, among both Boers and natives, Ralph won the by-name of the "Man of the Mountain" because he rarely spoke of aught else.

But still folk, black and white, knew the reason of his madness and bore with him, pitying his grief.
It was, I remember, in the season after Suzanne had vanished that the Kaffirs became so angry and dangerous.

For my part I believe that those in our neighbourhood were stirred up by the emissaries of Swart Piet, for though he had gone none knew where, his tools and agents remained behind him.

However this may have been, all over the country the black men began to raid the stock, and in our case they ended by attacking the stead also, a great number of them armed with guns.

Fortunately we had a little warning, and they were very sad Kaffirs that went away next day; moreover, forty of them never went away at all.