CHAPTER XXIII
IN THE DRIFT OF THE VAAL
The day had been intensely hot, and our travellers sat in the shade ofthe cart overpowered and gasping. During the afternoon a faint breezeblew, but this had now died away, and the stifling air felt as thick asthough they were breathing cream. Even the two Boers seemed to feel theheat, for they lay outstretched on the grass a few paces to the left, toall appearance fast asleep. As for the horses, they were thoroughly doneup--too much so to eat--and hobbled along as well as their knee-halterswould allow, daintily picking a mouthful here and a mouthful there. Theonly person who did not seem to mind was the Zulu Mouti, who sat onan ant-heap near the horses, in full glare of the setting sun, andcomfortably droned out a little song of his own invention, for Zulusseem as clever at improvising as are the Italians.
"Have another egg, Jess?" said John. "It will do you good."
"No, thank you; the last one stuck in my throat. It is impossible to eatin this heat."
"You had better. Goodness knows when and where we shall stop again. Ican get nothing out of our delightful escort; either they don't know orthey won't say."
"I can't, John. There is a thunderstorm coming up. I feel it in my head,and I can never eat before a thunderstorm--and when I am tired," sheadded by an afterthought.
After that the conversation flagged for a while.
"John," said Jess at last, "where do you suppose we are going to campto-night? If we follow the main road we shall reach Standerton in anhour."
"I don't think that they will go near Standerton," he answered, "Isuppose that we shall cross the Vaal by another drift and have to'veldt' it."
Just then the two Boers woke up and began to talk earnestly together, asthough they were debating something hotly.
Slowly the huge red ball of the sun sank towards the horizon, steepingthe earth and sky in blood. About a hundred yards from where they satthe little bridle path that branched from the main road crossed thecrest of one of the great landwaves which rolled away in every directiontowards the far horizon. John watched the sun sinking behind it tillsomething called off his attention for a minute. When he looked up againthere was a figure on horseback, standing quite still upon the crest ofthe ridge, and in full glow of the now disappearing sun. It was FrankMuller. John recognised him in a moment. His horse was halted sideways,so that even at that distance every line of his features, and even thetrigger-guard of the rifle which rested on his knee, showed distinctlyagainst the background of smoky red. Nor was that all. Both he andhis horse had the appearance of being absolutely on fire. The effectproduced was so wild and extraordinary that John called his companion'sattention to it. Jess looked and shuddered involuntarily.
"He looks like a devil in hell," she said; "the fire seems to be runningall up and down him."
"Well," said John, "he is certainly a devil, but I am sorry to saythat he has not yet reached his destination. Here he comes, like awhirlwind."
In another twenty seconds Muller had reined the great black horse on tohis haunches alongside of them, and was smiling sweetly and taking offhis hat.
"You see I have managed to keep my word," he said. "I can tell you thatI had great difficulty in doing so; indeed I was nearly obliged to givethe thing up at the last moment. However, here I am."
"Where are we to outspan to-night?" asked Jess. "At Standerton?"
"No," he said; "I am afraid that is more than I could manage for you,unless you can persuade the English officers there to surrender. WhatI have arranged is, that we should cross the Vaal at a drift I know ofabout two hours (twelve miles) from here, and outspan at a farm onthe other side. Do not trouble, I assure you you shall both sleep wellto-night," and he smiled, a somewhat terrifying smile, as Jess thought.
"But how about this drift, Mr. Muller?" said John. "Is it safe? I shouldhave thought the Vaal would have been in flood after all the rain thatwe have had."
"The drift is perfectly safe, Captain Niel. I crossed it myself abouttwo hours ago. I know you have a bad opinion of me, but I suppose you donot think that I would guide you to an unsafe drift?" Then with anotherbow he rode on to speak to the two Boers, saying, as he went, "Will youtell the Kafir to put the horses in?"
With a shrug of the shoulders John rose and went to Mouti, to help himto drive up the four greys, which were now standing limply together,biting at the flies, that, before a storm, sting more sharply than atany other time. The two horses belonging to the escort were some fiftypaces to the left. It was as though they appreciated the positionof affairs, and declined to mix with the animals of the discreditedEnglishman.
The Boers rose as Muller came and walked towards their horses, Mullerslowly following them. As they drew near, the horses hobbled away fortwenty or thirty yards. Then they lifted up their heads, and, as aconsequence, their forelegs, to which the heads were tied, and stoodlooking defiantly at their captors, just as though they were trying tomake up their minds whether or not to shake hands with them.
Frank Muller was alongside the two men now, and they were alongside thehorses.
"Listen!" he said sternly.
The men looked up.
"Go on loosening the reims, and listen."
They obeyed, and slowly began to fumble at the knee-halters.
"You understand what our orders are. Repeat them--you!"
The man with the tooth, who was addressed, still handling the reim,began as follows: "To take the two prisoners to the Vaal, to force theminto the water where there is no drift, at night, so that they drown: ifthey do not drown, to shoot them."
"Those are the orders," said the Vilderbeeste, grinning.
"You understand them?"
"We understand, _Meinheer_; but, forgive us, the matter is a big one.You have the orders--we wish to see the authority."
"Yah, yah," said the other, "show us the authority. These are twoharmless people enough. Show us the authority for killing them. Peoplemust not be killed so, even if they are English folk, without properauthority, especially when one is a pretty girl who would do for a man'swife."
Frank Muller set his teeth. "Nice fellows you are to have under one!"he said. "I am your officer; what other authority do you want? But Ithought of this. See here!" and he drew a paper from his pocket. "Here,you--read it! Careful now--do not let them see from the waggon."
The big flabby-faced man took the paper and, still bending down over thehorse's knee, read aloud:
"The two prisoners and their servant (an Englishman, an English girl,and a Zulu Kafir) to be executed in pursuance of our decree, as yourcommanding officer shall order, as enemies to the Republic. For so doingthis shall be your warrant."
"You see the signature," said Muller, "and you do not dispute it?"
"Yah, we see it, and we do not dispute it."
"Good. Give me back the warrant."
The man with the tooth was about to obey when his companion interposed.
"No," he said, "the warrant must remain with us. I do not like the job.If it were only the man and the Kafir now--but the girl, the girl! Ifwe give you back the warrant, what shall we have to show for the deed ofblood? The warrant must remain with us."
"Yah, yah, he is right," said the Unicorn; "the warrant must remain withus. Put it in your pocket, Jan."
"Curse you, give it me!" said Muller between his teeth.
"No, Frank Muller, no!" answered the Vilderbeeste, patting his pocket,while the two or three square inches of skin round his nose wrinkledup in a hairy grin that, owing to the cut on his head, was even morecurious than usual. "If you wish to have the warrant you shall haveit, but then we shall up-saddle and go, and you can do your murderingyourself. There, there! take your choice; we shall be glad enough toget home, for we do not care for the job. If I go out shooting I like toshoot buck or Kafirs, not white people."
Frank Muller reflected a moment, then he laughed a little.
"You are funny folk, you home-bred Boers," he said; "but perhaps you areright. After all, what does it matter who
keeps the warrant, providedthat the thing is well done? Mind that there is no bungling, that isall."
"Yah, yah," said the fat-faced man, "you can trust us for that. Itwon't be the first that we have toppled over. If I have my warrant I asknothing better than to go on shooting Englishmen all night, one downthe other come on. I know no prettier sight than an Englishman topplingover."
"Stop that talk and saddle up, the cart is waiting. You fools can neverunderstand the difference between killing when it is necessary to killand killing for killing's sake. These people must die because they havebetrayed the land."
"Yah, yah," said the Vilderbeeste, "betrayed the land; we have heardthat before. Those who betray the land must manure it; that is a goodrule!" and he laughed and passed on.
Frank Muller watched his retreating form with a smile of peculiarmalignity on his handsome face. "Ah, my friend," he said to himself inDutch, "you and that warrant will part company before you are many hoursolder. Why, it would be enough to hang me, even in this happy land ofpatriots. Old ---- would never forgive even me for taking that littleliberty with his name. Dear me, what a lot of trouble it is to be ridof a single enemy! Well, it must be done, and Bessie is well worth thepains; but if it had not been for this war I could never have managedit. Yes! I did well to give my voice for war. I am sorry for the girlJess, but it is necessary; there must be no living witnesses left. Ah!we are going to have a storm. So much the better. Such deeds are bestdone in a storm."
Muller was right; the storm was coming up fast, throwing a veil of inkycloud across the star-spangled sky. In South Africa there is but littletwilight, and the darkness follows hard upon the heels of the day. Nosooner had the angry ball of the setting sun disappeared than the nightswept with all her stars across the sky. And now after her came thegreat storm, covering up her beauty with his blackness. The air wasstiflingly hot. Above was a starry space, to the east the black bosomof the storm, in which the lightnings were already playing withan incessant flickering movement, and to the west a deep red glow,reflected from the sunken sun, yet lingered on the horizon.
On toiled the horses through the gathering gloom. Fortunately, the roadwas almost level and free from mud-holes, and Frank Muller rode justahead to show the way, his strong athletic form standing out clearlyagainst the departing western glow. Silent was the earth, silent asdeath. No bird or beast, no blade of grass or breath of air stirred uponits surface. The only sign of life was the continual flickering of thoseawful tongues of light as they licked the lips of the storm. On for mileafter mile, on through the desolation! They were not far from the rivernow, and could hear the distant growling of the thunder, echoing down itsolemnly.
It was an awful night. Great pillars of mud-coloured cloud came creepingacross the surface of the veldt towards them, seemingly blown alongwithout a wind. Now, too, a ghastly-looking ringed moon arose throwingan unholy and distorted light upon the blackness that seemed to shudderin her rays as though with a prescience of the advancing terror. Oncrept the mud-coloured columns, and on above them, and resting on them,came the muttering storm. The cart was quite close to the river now, andthey could distinguish the murmur of its waters. To their left stooda koppie, covered with white, slab-like stones, on which the sicklymoonbeams danced.
"Look, John, look!" cried Jess with an hysterical laugh; "it is likea huge graveyard, and the dark shadows between are the ghosts of theburied."
"Nonsense," said John sternly; "why do you talk such rubbish?"
He felt that her mind had lost its balance, and, what is more, his ownnerves were shaken. Therefore he was naturally the angrier with her, andthe more determined to be perfectly matter-of-fact.
Jess made no answer, but she was frightened, she could not tell why. Thescene resembled that of some awful dream, or of one of Dore's picturescome to life. No doubt, also, the near presence of the tempest exerciseda physical effect upon her. Even the wearied horses snorted and shookthemselves uneasily.
They crept over the ridge of a wave of land, and the wheels rolledsoftly on the grass.
"Why, we are off the road!" shouted John to Muller, who was stillguiding them, fifteen or twenty paces ahead.
"All right! all right! it is a short cut to the ford!" he called inanswer, and his voice rang strange and hollow through the great depthsof the silence.
Below them, a hundred yards away, the light, such as it was, gleamedfaintly upon the wide surface of the river. Another five minutes andthey were on the bank, but in the gathering doom they could not see theopposite shore.
"Turn to the left!" shouted Muller; "the ford is a few yards up. It istoo deep here for the horses."
John turned accordingly, and followed Muller's horse some three hundredyards up the bank till they came to a spot where the water ran with anangry music, and there was a great swirl of eddies.
"Here is the place," said Muller; "you must make haste through. Thehouse is just the other side, and it will be better to get there beforethe tempest breaks."
"It is all very well," said John, "but I cannot see an inch before me; Idon't know where to drive."
"Drive straight ahead; the water is not more than three feet deep, andthere are no rocks."
"I am not going, and that is all about it."
"You must go, Captain Niel. You cannot stop here, and if you can we willnot. Look there, man!" and he pointed to the east, which now presented atruly awful and magnificent sight.
Down, right on to them, its centre bowed out like the belly of a sail bythe weight of the wind behind, swept the great storm-cloud, whileover all its surface the lightning played unceasingly, appearing anddisappearing in needles of fire, and twisting and writhing serpentwiseround and about its outer edges. So brilliant was the intermittent lightthat it appeared to fire the revolving pillars of mud-coloured cloudbeneath, and gave ghastly peeps of river and bank and plain, milesupon miles away. But perhaps its most awful circumstance was thepreternatural silence. The distant boom and muttering of thunder haddied away, and now the great storm swept on in voiceless majesty, likethe passage of a ghostly host, from which there arose no sound of feetor of rolling wheels. Only before it sped the swift angels of the wind,and behind it swung the curtain of the rain.
Even as Muller spoke a gust of icy air caught the cart and tilted it,and the lightning needles began to ply more dreadfully than ever. Thetempest was breaking upon them.
"Come, drive on, drive on!" he shouted, "you will be killed here; thelightning always strikes along the water;" and as he said it he struckone of the wheelers sharply with his whip.
"Climb over the back of the seat, Mouti, and stand by to help me withthe reins!" called out John to the Zulu, who obeyed, scrambling betweenhim and Jess.
"Now, Jess, hold on and say your prayers, for it strikes me that weshall have need of them. So, horses, so!"
The horses backed and plunged, but Muller on the one side and thesmooth-faced Boer on the other lashed them without mercy, and at lastthey went into the river with a rush. The gust had passed now, and fora few moments the heavy quiet was renewed, except for the whirl of thewater and the snake-like hiss of the coming rain.
For some yards, ten or fifteen perhaps, all went well, and then Johndiscovered suddenly that they were driving into deep water; the twoleaders were evidently almost off their legs, and could scarcely standagainst the current of the flooded river.
"Damn you!" he shouted back, "there is no drift here."
"Go on, go on, it is quite safe!" came Muller's voice in answer.
John said no more, but, putting out all his strength, he tried to dragthe horses round. Jess turned herself on the seat to look, and just thena blaze of lightning flamed which revealed Muller and his two companionsstanding dismounted on the bank, the muzzles of their rifles pointingstraight at the cart.
"O God!" she screamed, "they are going to shoot us."
Even as the words passed her lips three tongues of fire flared from therifles' mouths, and the Zulu Mouti, sitting by her side, pitched heavilyfo
rward on to his head into the bottom of the cart, while one of thewheelers reared straight up into the air with a shriek of agony, andfell with a splash into the river.
Then followed a scene of horror indescribable. Overhead the storm burstin fury, and flash after flash of fork, or rather chain lightning, leaptinto the river. The thunder, too, began to crack like the trump of doom;the wind rushed down, tearing the surface of the water into foam, and,catching under the tent of the cart, lifted it quite off the wheels, sothat it began to float. Then the two leaders, made mad with fear by thefury of the storm and the dying struggles of the off-wheeler, plungedand tore at the traces till at last they rent themselves loose andvanished between the darkness overhead and the boiling water beneath.Away floated the cart, now touching the bottom and now riding on theriver like a boat, oscillating this way and that, and slowly turninground and round. With it floated the dead horse, dragging down the otherwheeler beneath the water. It was awful to see his struggles in theglare of the lightning, but at last he sank and choked.
Meanwhile, sounding sharply and clearly through the din and hubbub ofthe storm, came the cracking of the three rifles whenever the flashesshowed the position of the cart to the murderers on the bank. Mouti waslying still in the bottom of it on the bed-plank, a bullet between hisbroad shoulders and another in his skull: but John felt that his lifewas yet whole in him, though something had hissed past his face andstung it. Instinctively he reached across the cart and drew Jess on tohis knee, and cowered over her, thinking dimly that perhaps his bodywould protect her from the bullets.
_Rip! rip!_ through the wood and canvas; _phut! phut!_ through the air;but some merciful power protected them, and though one cut John's coatand two passed through the skirt of Jess's dress, not a bullet struckthem. Very soon the shooting began to grow wild, then that dense veil ofrain came down and wrapped them so closely that even the lightning couldnot reveal their whereabouts to the assassins on the bank.
"Stop shooting," said Frank Muller; "the cart has sunk, and there isan end of them. No human being can have lived through that fire and theVaal in flood."
The two Boers ceased firing, and the Unicorn shook his head softly andremarked to his companion that the damned English people in the watercould not be much wetter than they were on the bank. It was a curiousthing to say at such a moment, but probably the spirit which caused theremark was not so much callousness as that which animated Cromwell, whoflipped the ink in his neighbour's face when he signed the death-warrantof his king.
The Vilderbeeste made no reply. His conscience was oppressed; he had atouch of imagination. He thought of the soft fingers which had bound uphis head that morning: the handkerchief--her handkerchief!--was stillaround it. Now those fingers would be gripping at the slippery stones ofthe Vaal in a struggle for life, or more probably they were already limpin death, with little grains of gravel sticking beneath the nails.It was a painful thought, but he consoled himself by remembering thewarrant, also by the reflection that whoever had shot the people he hadnot, for he had been careful to fire wide of the cart every time.
Muller was also thinking of the warrant which he had forged. He must getit back somehow, even if----
"Let us take shelter under the shore. There is a flat place, about fiftyyards up, where the bank hangs down. This rain is drowning us. We can'tup-saddle till it clears. I must have a nip of brandy, too. Almighty!I can see that girl's face still! the lightning shone on it just as Ishot. Well, she will be in heaven now, poor thing, if English peopleever go to heaven."
It was the Unicorn who spoke, and the Vilderbeeste made no reply, butadvanced with him to where the horses stood. They caught the patientbrutes that were waiting for their masters, their heads well down andthe water streaming from their flanks, and led them along with them.Frank Muller stood by his own horse still thinking, and watched themvanish into the gloom. How was he to win that warrant back without dyinghis hands even redder than they were?
As he thought an answer came. For at that moment, accompanied by afearful thunderclap, there shot from the storm overhead, which had nownearly passed away, one of those awful flashes that sometimes end anAfrican tempest. It lit up the scene with a light vivid as that of day,and in the white heart of it Muller saw his two companions in crime andtheir horses as the great king saw the men in the furnace. They wereabout forty paces from him on the crest of the bank. He saw them, onemoment erect; the next--men and horses falling this way and that proneto the earth. Then it was dark again.
Muller staggered with the shock, and when it had passed he rushed to thespot, calling the men by name; but no answer came except the echo ofhis voice. He was there alone now, and the moonlight began to strugglefaintly through the rain. Its pale beams lit upon two outstretchedforms--one lying on its back, its distorted features gazing up toheaven, the other on its face. By them, the legs of the nearer stickingstraight into the air, lay the horses. They had all gone to theiraccount. The lightning had killed them, as it kills many a man inAfrica.
Frank Muller looked; then, forgetting about the warrant and everythingelse in the horror of what he took to be a visible judgment, he rushedto his horse and galloped wildly away, pursued by all the terrors ofhell.
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