The Sound of Thunder (35 page)

“They have learned, ” Leroux muttered as he worked the bolt of his rifle, and the empty case pinged away among the rocks.

“They have learned well,” and he killed another man. At two places on the ridge the Maxim guns began their frenzied hammering bursts.

Before it reached the second row of markers, the first line of infantry no longer existed, it was scattered back in the grass, completely annihilated by the terrible accuracy of the Boer fire.

The second line walked over them and came on steadily.

“Look at them come,” shouted a burgher farther down the line.

Though they had seen it a dozen times before, all of these ragged farmers were awed by the passive, impersonal advance of British infantry.

“These men fight not to live but to die!” muttered the man who lay beside Leroux.

“Then let us help them to die, ” Leroux shouted. And below him on the plain the slow inexorable ranks moved forward towards the third row of markers.

“Shoot, Kerels. Shoot straight,” Leroux roared, for now he could see the bayonets. He pressed a clip full of ammunition down into the magazine, and with the back of his hand brushed the clinging drops of sweat from his eyebrows, pushed the rifle forward and knocked down four men with his next six shots.

And then he saw the change. At one place the line bulged as men began to hurry forward, while on the flanks it wavered and disintegrated as others hung back or crouched down behind pitifially inadequate cover.

“They are breaking! ” Leroux howled excitedly. “They won’t reach the slopes. ” The forward movement faltered, no longer able to stand the mauling they were receiving, men turned back or went to ground while their officers hurried along the ranks goading them on. In so doing they proclaimed to the Boer riflemen that they were officers and at that range they did not survive long.

“They’re finished!” shouted Leroux, and a thin burst of cheering ran along the ridge while the Boer fire increased in volume, flailing into the milling confusion of a broken infantry assault.

“Hit them, Kerels. Keep hitting them!” The following ranks overran the leaders, then in turn faltered and failed as the Maxim and Mauser fire churned into them.

Out on the plain a bugle began to lament, and as it mourned, the last spasmodic forward movement of the assault ceased, and back past the dead and the wounded streamed the retreat.

A single shell rushed overhead to burst in the valley beyond and immediately, as if in frustrated fury, the guns lashed the kopje once more. But in the jump and flash of the shells five hundred Boers cheered and laughed and waved their rifles at the retreating infantry.

“What happened on the river?” Leroux called in the tumult, and after a while the answer came back.

“They did not reach the river. They are broken there also.”

Leroux lifted his hat from his head and wiped the sweat and the dust from his face. Then he looked at the sunset.

“Almighty God, we give you thanks for this day. We ask your mercy and guidance in the days that are to come.”

The shellfire lashed the hills like the surf’ of a storm, driven sea until the night came. Then in the darkness they saw the fires of the British bivouacs spread like a garden of yellow flowers on the plains around them.

“We must break out tonight.” Leroux looked across the fire at Zietsmann.

“No.” The old man spoke softly, not looking at him.

“Why?” demanded Leroux.

“We can hold these hills. They cannot drive us from them.

“Ja! We can hold them tomorrow-two days, a week-but then it is finished. We lost fifty men today from the guns.”

“They lost many hundreds. The Lord smote them and they perished.

” Zietsmann looked up at him now and his voice gathered strength.

-We will stay here and place our trust in the Lord.” There was a murmur of agreement from those who listened.

“Menheer. ” Leroux covered his eyes for a moment, pressing fingers into them to still the terrible aching. He was sick from the lyddite, and tired-tired to the depths of his soul. It would be easier to stay. There would be no dishonour in it for they had fought like no men before them. Two more days and then it would be over without dishonour. He removed his hands from his face. “Menheer, if we do not break out tonight we never will. By tomorrow we will not have the strength.” He stopped for the words came slowly, slurred a little from a brain dulled by the lyddite and the hammering of big guns. He looked at his hands and saw the suppurating sores on his wrists. There would be no dishonour. They would fight this last time and then it would be finished.

“But it is not a matter of honour,” he mumbled. Then he stood up and they watched him in silence for he was going to speak. He spread his hands out in appeal, and the firelight lit his face from below leaving his eyes in shadow, dark holes like the sockets of a skull. He stood like that for a while and his rags hung loosely on the gaunt wasted body.

There was nothing except the need to fight on. He dropped his hands to his sides.

“I am going,” he said with simplicity. “When the moon goes down I ride,” and he walked away from the fire. One by one the men rose and followed him, and all of them were men of his own commando.

Six men squatted in a circle and watched the moon as it touched the hills. Behind them the horses were saddled and the rifles stuck up from their scabbards. By each of the six hundred horses a burgher lay fully clothed, wrapped in his blanket and trying to sleep. Though the horses stamped and moved restlessly there was no jingling of bits for all of them were carefully muffled.

“We will say it again, so that each of us knows his part.”

Leroux looked around the circle. “I will go first with a hundred men and follow the river towards the east. What is your route, Hendrik?

“South, through the cavalry until the dawn, then round towards the mountains.

Leroux nodded and asked the next man: “And yours?”

“West along the river.

“Ja, and yours?”

He asked each in turn and when all had answered-“The place of meeting is the old laager by the Hill of Inhlozana. Is this agreed?”

And they waited, watching the moon and listening to the jackals squabbling over the British corpses on the plain. Then the moon went down below the hills and Leroux stood up stiffly.

Totsiens, KereLs! Good luck to all of us.” He took the reins of his pony and led it down towards the Vaal, while in silence a hundred men led their horses after him. As they passed the single wagon beside the Padda, old Zietsmann was waiting and he came forward leading a pack-mule.

“You are going?” he asked.

“Ja, Menheer. We must. ” “God go with you.” Zietsmann thrust out his hand and they gripped briefly.

“The mule is loaded. Take the money with you. We will not need it here.

“Thank you, Menheer. ” Leroux motioned to one of his men to take the mule. “Good luck.”

“Good luck, General. ” For the first time Zietsmann used his tiTLe, and Leroux went down to the perimeter of their de fences and out into the veld where the British waited.

With the first pale promise of dawn in the sky, they were through and clear. Though twice during the night heavy outbursts of firing in the darkness far behind showed that not all of the escaping bands had been so fortunate.

Sean and Saul stood beside the little scotch cart and Mbejane brought them coffee.

“My God, it’s cold enough to freeze the hanger off a brass monkey.” Sean cupped his hands around the mug and sipped noisily.

“At least you’ve got a hood to keep your tip warm,” Saul retorted.

“We’d better get moving before we all freeze to the ground. ” “Dawn in an hour,” Sean agreed. “Time to start walking our beat,” and he called across to MbeJane,

“Kill the fire and bring my horse. ” In double file with the scotch cart bumping along in the rear they started on the outward leg of their patrol. In the last four days they had covered the same ground as many times, tacking backwards and forwards across the beat that Acheson had assigned them. The grass was brittle with frost and crunched under the horses’ hooves.

While ahead of them the Zulu trackers ranged like gun dogs

and behind the troopers huddled miserably in their greatcoats, Sean and Saul picked up their endless discussion from the point at which they had left it the previous evening. Already they had reached so faR, into the future that they were talking of a federation under responsible government that would encompass all the territories south of the Zambesi.

“That’s what Rhodes has proposed for the last ten years,” Saul pointed out.

“I don’t want any part of that wily bastard. ” Sean spoke emphatically. “He’ll keep us tied for ever to the apron strings of WhiteHall, the sooner we get rid of him and Mimer the better, say

“You want to get rid of Imperial rule?” Saul asked.

“Of course, let’s end this war and send all of them back across the sea. We can run our own affairs. ” “Colonel, it seems to me you are fighting on the wrong side,” Saul remarked, and Sean chuckled.

“But seriously, Saul … ” He never finished. Mbejane came out of the darkness, running with silent purpose so that Sean checked his horse and felt the skin along his arms prickle with nervous excitement.

“Mbejane?”

“Mabuna!”

“Where? How many?”

He listened to MbeJane’s hurried explanation, then swung round to face Sergeant, Major Eccles, who was breathing heavily down his neck.

“Your birds, Eccles. A hundred or so of them, only a mile ahead and coming straight towards us. ” Sean’s voice was tight with the same excitement that made Eccles’s moustache wriggle like an agitated caterpillar on the impassive oval of his face.

“Deploy in single line. They’ll walk Right on top of us in the dark. ” “Dismounted, sir?”

“No,” Sean answered. “We’ll gun charge them as soon as they show.

But for God’s sake keep it quiet.”

As Sean sat his horse with Saul beside him, the two files of troopers opened on each side of them. There was no talking; only the clicking of iron, shod hooves on rock, the rustling of men struggling out of their heavy greatcoats, and the soft rattle and snick of breech, bolts opening and closing.

“Once more into the breach, dear friends,” whispered Saul, but Sean did not answer because he was wrestling with his fear.

Even in the cold of dawn his hands were damp. He wiped them on the thighs of his breeches and slid his rifle from the scabbard.

“What about the Maxims?” Saul asked.

“No time to set them up.” Sean knew his voice was hoarse and he cleared his throat before he went on. “We won’t need them, it’s six to one.

He looked along the silent line of his men. A dark line against the grass that was paling in the dawn. He could see that each of his troopers leaned forward in the saddle with his rifle held across his lap. The tension was a tangible thing in the half darkness even the horses were infected, they moved beneath their riders, shifting their bodies, nodding with impatience.

Please God, let none of them whicker now.

And he peered ahead into the darkness. Waiting with his own fear and the fear of his men so strong that the Boers must surely smell it.

A patch of greater darkness in the dawn, ahead and slightly to the left of centre. Sean watched it for a few seconds and saw it move, slowly, like the moonlit shadow of a tree on the open veld.

“Are you sure they’re Boers?” Saul whispered, and the doubt startled Sean. While he hesitated the shadow spread towards them and now he could hear the hooves.

Are they Boers? Desperately he searched for some sign that would allow him to loose his charge. Are they Boers? But there was no sign, only the dark advance and the small sounds of it, the click and creak in the dawn.

They were close now, less than a hundred yards, although it was impossible to tell with certainty for the dark, moving mass seemed to float towards them.

“Sean … ” Saul’s whisper was cut off by the shrill nervous whinny of his horse. The sound was so unexpected that Sean heard the man beside him gasp. Almost immediately came the sign for which Sean waited.

“Wie’s duar? ” The challenge from ahead was in the guttural of the Taal.

“Charge!” yelled Sean and hit his horse with his heels.

Instantly the whole of his line jumped forward to hurl itself upon the Boers.

Forward in the pounding hooves, forward in the shouting, in the continuous crackle of rifle, fire that sparkled along the line with his fear left behind him, Sean spurred at them. Steadying the butt of his rifle under his right armpit, firing blind, blending his voice with the yelling of six hundred others, leading slightly in the centre of the Line; he took his commando down upon the Boers.

They broke before the charge. They had to break for they could not hope to stand against it. They swung and drove their exhausted horses back towards the south.

“Bunch up!” roared Sean. “Bunch on me!” And his line shortened so they charged knee to knee in a solid wall of men and horses and gunfire before which the Boers fled in wild despair.

Directly in Sean’s path lay a struggling, badly wounded horse with its rider pinned underneath it. Jammed into the charge he could not swerve.

“Up, Boy!” he shouted and lifted his horse with his knees and his hands, clearing the tangle and stumbling as they landed.

Then forward again in the urgent, jostling clamour of the charge.

“We’re gaining!” yelled Saul. “This time we’ve got them.”

The horse beside him hit a hole and went down with its leg breaking like a pistol, shot. The trooper was thrown from it high and clear, turning in the air as he feLL. The line closed to fiLL the gap, and pounded on over the grassland.

“There’s a kopje ahead,” Sean shouted as he saw the ragged loom of it against the dawn sky. “Don’t let them reach it! ” And he raked his spurs along his horse’s ribs.

“We won’t catch them,” warned Saul. “They’ll get into the rocks.

“Damn it! God damn it!” groaned Sean. In the past few minutes the light had strengthened. Dawn in Africa comes quickly once it starts. Clearly he could see the leading Boers ride into the rocks, throw themselves from their ponies and duck into cover.