The Great Karoo

by Fred Stenson

  While Frank and Ovide became more isolated, the tendency among the majority of Mounted Rifles was exactly opposite. The constant marching and recombinations served to complete a spiderweb of connection among them. They were by now bound by countless strands of mutual success and failure. The more loyal the group became, the more the exceptions stood out. Frank and Ovide in the horse camp; the Beltons in absentia.

  There was only one part of this to which Frank objected, and that was his inability to get out and look for Dunny. A normal assumption about a man who had lost his horse was that time would make him forget. It was, after all, a war of lost horses. But, if anything, Frank’s sense of loss was increasing and ascending into a tight twist of obsession. No one knew this except Ovide, for Frank and Ovide went about their chores in silence, with the same assumed invisibility as the black men beside them.

  As the whites stopped seeing Frank, the blacks began to. Frank was also much more aware of them. Ovide already had acquaintances among the trench diggers and horse campies. Now that Frank’s eyes were opened, Ovide told him about them. The black men working for the Rifles were all of one people and mostly related. They had not come to the Canadians out of politics but to keep eating when the war destroyed their old economy. Once they were somewhere, they tended to stay. It was difficult to make whites trust them, if they had to start again.

  Their names were Jim, Pete, Abraham, and Nandi. In his unblinkered state, Frank also noticed Dakomi, who had been demoted by Lt. Davidson for some perceived lapse, maybe even because of playing cribbage with Frank. Ovide and Frank were the whites that the rest of the whites treated like blacks, and the black campies welcomed them to their fire and shared the hot food their wives and relatives sometimes brought; also the occasional bottle of strong-tasting beer or fiery spirits.

  Actual language was in short supply but no one cared. Struggling to converse with a handful of words was only frustrating, so they did the rest with gestures and work: the common tongue of a gall on a horse’s back, the face you make when liquor is scorching your throat. The cribbage games with Dakomi resumed. The two took turns poking holes in an ox bone that would be their scoreboard.

  Frank decided he liked this invisibility, for who but a fool would not want to be invisible in a war? In a place on which eyes did not focus, Frank drifted and listened. Because the scouts seemed most likely to encounter his dun mare, he made his ears especially sharp when they were around. When scouts came to camp, he went to their horses and gave them the best care he could—also the best hay, oats, and water. He brushed their horses to an oily gleam, and if the scouts themselves were nearby, Frank would break his silence and ply them with questions.

  He did not get news of Dunny, but he did find out that General Hutton was dissatisfied with the uses his Canadian horsemen were being put to. He wanted them deeper in the war and had decided to create two new camps, one northeast and one southeast of Pan. The north one was Nooitgedacht and the south one Doornkop. A nooitgedacht in Boer Dutch was a place that was unexpected or hard to find. A doornkop was a hill of thorns. That was why the names repeated. Not long after, Frank heard that Mounted Rifles troops would soon head for these outposts.

  Charlie Ross was another good source. Ross loved to tell of his exploits to anyone who would listen, including Frank. Charlie had made one investigative trip to Nooitgedacht and had spent time at Pan. He told Frank that their long-lost D Battery (last seen in the Great Karoo) was at Pan. Dinky Morrison, the Toronto newspaperman and gunner, told Charlie they had been wakened in the night by a sniper. When the villain was caught, he turned out to be a British adjutant who had gone mad and started firing on his own men.

  Charlie had another story about some Mounted Rifles near Bankfontein who had fired in the night at what seemed to be fluttering ghosts. It was a column of black miners waving white flags, trying to get home alive after their labour in a local colliery.

  In other conversations, Frank heard about Charlie Ross. At Reitvlei, Charlie had met a local farmer, a Boer deserter named Christiaan Anandale. This Anandale and Charlie became fast friends, and Charlie got him elevated to the top of Hutton’s scouts. Anandale had a big farm at Reitvlei, and Charlie was said to have purchased a sizable chunk of land next door. Rumour said these two farms were filling up fast with livestock.

  When Jeff Davis was among the scouts who came to Franks camp, things were different, but only slightly. For the most part, Jeff acted as if he could not see Frank, and never thanked Frank for his preferential treatment of The Blue. It almost seemed as if Jeff had accepted the majority view that Frank was crazy and deserved his troubles. That is, it would have seemed so except that, during every visit, no matter how brief, Jeff always let Frank know he had not seen or heard about Dunny. If they were alone, he would say it. If not, he would look or gesture. But he got it said.

  In early August, the troops were dispatched to Nooitgedacht and Doornkop. As D Squadron was leaving, Private Anderson was heard to say, “Where are we going? Night Attack?” And Nooitgedacht became Night Attack from then on.

  Ovide and Frank were among those left behind, and, two days later, the remaining scouts at Aas Vogel Kranz captured a herd of horses, Boer ponies and ones stolen by the Boers from the British. When the horses streamed into camp, the soldiers dropped what they were doing and ran to see. They were still looking for that western stock horse they felt the war owed them. But Frank did not shift from his chores in the horse camp and never once supposed Dunny could be among the found herd. He was sure of this because he believed Dunny could only return to him through Jeff.

  That evening, Frank declined a game of cribbage with Dakomi and passed up sitting with Ovide and the others at the campies’ fire. He went and sat in the darkness to brood. From that vantage, he saw someone approach the fire with a lantern, and recognized the silhouette as Staff Sergeant Tracey, the veterinary doctor who had saved so many horses on the Pomeranian. Then Ovide and Tracey came walking through the dark. Tracey wanted to talk to Frank about a horse.

  “I’ll tell you right now, Adams,” said the sergeant, “this is no great gift I’m offering. You better come along and see for yourself.”

  They went to where the new horses were quarantined, most of them already spoken for. Beyond this paddock was a little thorn-bush cage containing one horse: a brown-and-white pinto gelding with a mostly white face and walleyes—blue rims and brown centres.

  Tracey explained that when the horses came in and were sorted, this one had tried to bite and kick everyone and every horse. That was why it was in the thorn cage. Aside from looking insane, Frank decided the gelding was nicely put together.

  “I can’t get close enough to say for sure, but my guess is he’s a ridgling,” Tracey continued. “Because of the one nut inside him, he thinks he’s a stallion. That’s why he’s on the fight all the time. You’re good with horses, so I thought you might be able to sort him out.”

  “What happens if I can’t?”

  “Oh, he’ll be shot.”

  “Think the Boers left him on purpose?”

  “Like a bomb? I wouldn’t doubt it.”

  Tracey held the lantern to light Franks way. He went to where the thorns were thinnest and leaned over. The ridgling flattened his ears and drew his top lip off his teeth.

  “I think he likes me. He’s grinning.”

  Tracey laughed. “Well, do with him what you want.”

  In the tent later, after Ovide began snoring, Frank drank rum from his water bottle. There were four rum rations, two of his own and two more purchased from Ovide, who did not like its taste. Frank had started the accumulation after Dunny was stolen but had not known for what. He recognized the occasion tonight. The deep rum burn, the blur of mind, had been reserved for the moment hope was lost—when he actually believed he would never see Dunny again. Taking on a new horse had delivered it.

  A ridgling (also called a rig, a cryptorchid, a high flanker) was a colt whose nuts, one or both, stayed inside his body. In
the few cases Frank had seen, it was one nut that stayed up while the other came down into the sac. The down nut was always castrated, but the horse grew up acting like a stallion anyway—and often more stallion than a real one. Herding and fighting, and trying to mount every mare he saw. According to Uncle Doc, ridglings were sterile because their bodies were too hot inside to make living jism. It was as if they knew their attempts to breed would not take, and it made them angry.

  It was next morning, and Frank stared at his new horse inside the thorn corral. His head ached and buzzed from the previous night’s rum splurge. He could not see under the horse well enough to say what kind of rig he was, and was not planning to stick his head in the pintos flank any time soon to find out. By the horse’s behaviour, he took him to be the one-nut, half-castrated kind.

  Ovide’s first advice was to keep that high-flanking bastard the hell away from his mare. Ridglings were hard on mares, often injuring them in their crazed attempts to breed or while trying to keep any other horse from doing so.

  Frank spent the day feeding and fetching water. Mostly, he fed the ridgling mealies and talked to him all the while. He told him they were in a similar fix: down to their last chance. The rig either made a horse for Frank or was headed for a .45 calibre bullet. The other side was that Frank risked being a pedestrian for the rest of the war.

  It was hard to read the changes in the horse’s china eyes, but Frank thought the day of doting care was producing glimmers of something beyond hatred. In the late afternoon, the pinto fell asleep with Frank only a few feet away. It signified the possible beginnings of trust.

  Frank needed to push this thing along, so next day he borrowed a horse from the free pool and asked for Ovide’s help. From atop the borrowed horse, Frank lassoed the ridglings head. At the same time, Ovide looped the hind legs from his mount. They backed the two horses until the pinto stretched and flopped.

  Now that it was safe, Frank probed the scrotum and found the castration scar. It was over on the left side, which meant that up inside the horse on the right side was the ball that addled his brain.

  Frank tied the ropes to picket pins so he could keep the pinto stretched out. In a gentle voice he told him what they might do together if the horse could silence its urge to fuck and fight all the time. He showed his sleeping blanket and greatcoat to the ridglings eye, dragged the blanket over him, and left it in a heap close to his snuffing nose. He fanned the pintos head with his hat, fanned down his underbelly, and even at his asshole. Kept talking. He ran his hands over the entire horse, broke sticks behind his head, sang a night rider’s howling lament.

  In the course of the day, Frank’s performance spooked horses in the adjacent yard, but the ridgling stopped fighting the ropes. He looked pissed off, then bored, then calm, then asleep. While he slept, Frank removed the ropes. He was able to halter the horse and walk him back to the thorn corral without assistance.

  The following day, Frank approached the thorn cage with Dunny’s saddle and blanket and a new bridle. Ovide was there to help and drew back a span of brush so Frank could enter. The pinto flicked his ears in confusion. He shuffled around but did not spin to kick or lunge to bite. Frank offered an oat bucket and another of cool water. While the ridgling ate and drank, he slipped a halter over the ears, buckled it, and attached the rope. He asked Ovide to swing the brush gate and led the ridgling into the larger world.

  A Boer farmer’s corner post with the big end in the ground had been left for a snubbing post. Frank tied the ridgling short and informed him what was coming: saddle, bridle, rider. He showed the tack to the horse’s eye and nose, and there was dancing excitement when the rig smelled so much mare. Frank placed the blanket and pulled it back an inch. He thumped the saddle on. When he pulled the cinch, the ridgling coughed.

  Frank was still not sure when he climbed aboard. He sat for several minutes, telling stories. Then he asked Ovide to bridle the ridgling. Ovide got him to take the bit, flipped his ears inside the bridle, gave Frank the reins. Then he unbuckled the halter and drew it out from under. Frank waited for the horse to understand that he was now untethered.

  The ridgling started trembling and laid back his ears. Here we go, thought Frank, but did not let himself tense as he would for a bucking horse. When the pinto did nothing but tremble, Frank applied brief pressure on the bit. He tapped lightly with the spurs. When the horse still did not fire, Frank spurred harder and bent him in a tight circle. They walked around the yard several times. Frank dismounted, remounted, pushed the ridgling to a trot. Called it a day.

  After the first ride, the ridgling let Frank scratch between his ears and along his throat latch; allowed him to pick up each of his feet in turn. Ovide shrugged and went back to his own pursuits. The horse was broke, maybe even trained by someone able and not too brutal. But, given all his tendencies taken together, it was likely he had not had many human friends.

  Frank had a horse, albeit one people would laugh at. A perfect match. Why waste a good horse on Frank Adams or a good soldier on the ridgling?

  Night Attack, August 1900

  The first dispatches from the new camps told of snipers and faked attacks, especially at night. Then, before dawn on August 9, Night Attack was night attacked. The Canadians in the main camp stood them off, but the Boers shifted to an outpost and attacked there. Scizzors Chalmers rode out with reinforcements and fought all day.

  The harassment of the camps continued, and the concern in the dispatches grew more shrill. Chalmers said he might not be able to hold Night Attack unless he was reinforced.

  On August 16, four more troops were assembled near Middelburg: two for Doornkop and two for Night Attack.

  Frank and Ovide had assumed they would not be going out, but Lieutenant Davidson, whose troop had been chosen, sent a corporal to the horse camp to say that Adams and Smith were needed. Once chosen, Frank decided it made sense. Davidson respected their horse work, even if he was appalled by their soldiering.

  The ride from Aas Vogel Kranz to Pan was the ridgling’s debut. Frank kept him well back of the other lines of riders, an asymmetry the sergeant never would have allowed if the ridgling’s reputation had not preceded him.

  The plan was for the four troops to ride together to Pan, overnight, and split up next morning. Davidson was hoping for a social rendezvous with D Battery. It seemed doubtful they would still be there, but they were, the reason being that Lord Roberts had stalled his western push so his cavalry could chase Christiaan De Wet in the south.

  Dinky Morrison was at Pan, and Lt. John McCrae, and a bunch of other familiar faces. Casey Callaghan was in the gunners’ camp, having ridden a dispatch from Night Attack to Doornkop earlier that day.

  Dinky negotiated an extra rum ration for his battery and its visitors, and they commenced a short but intense reunion. After numerous liquid toasts, they began singing. They started with “Goodbye Dolly Gray,” which was all the rage among the Tommys.

  It’s the tramp of soldiers true, in their uniforms so blue,

  I must say goodbye to you, Dolly Gray.

  When it came to Canadian songs, they were stuck for ones everyone knew after “The Maple Leaf Forever.” They were forced to sing “My Old Kentucky Home,” with Canada substituted for Kentucky.

  Warned that it was almost time for lights out, they called on John McCrae, and he made their eyes moist with “Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes.”

  Or leave a kiss within the cup

  And I’ll not ask for wine.

  Next morning dawned through a gauze of cloud and the officers finished sorting the men. Some last-minute trading evened things out. Franks troop lost Harry Gunn to C Squadron.

  As Franks half set out north, a wind came and shoved the clouds off. It was hard and cold in their faces. The ridgling fought it like a hated enemy, arching his neck and whipping his head. He danced a flamenco, a constant spectacle for anyone who bothered to watch.

  Ovide had woke up that morning feeling unwell. He was once again wor
ried about his mare’s heart and, though sick himself, insisted on walking half of every hour. The wind kept peeling his Stetson off until he left it hanging down his back, dragging like a bucksail on its string. The African sun burned his balding head and gave him a headache. Others were sick on the march, from bad food and water.

  Frank was riding beside a baggage wagon. From inside its box came a groaning that was almost supernatural. The source was Casey Callaghan. Normally unstoppable, the scout had been laid low by a bad can of Chicago beef. Occasionally, Casey’s grey face appeared over the wagon wall, and that was Frank’s signal to spur the ridgling forward. Abraham, the bullwhacker, would see this and run up beside Nandi, the voorloper. All this was to get upwind of Casey, before he aired his ass over the wagon’s gate, shouting and cursing the pain.

  The troops at Night Attack were glad to see them, though they said it would probably bring on an all-out attack. The theory was that the Boers had been waiting for more enemy to show, to make another attack worthwhile.

  The location was a well-named nooitgedacht with trees and coulees in all directions, through which the enemy could crawl. The groans of the sick did not abate through the night, and every so often some light sleeper would jerk awake and brandish his Colt.

  Next morning, Jeff Davis rode in. The Blue looked fresh and dry. He found Lieutenant Davidson first, then went to Casey’s sick wagon. After that, he steered his horse to Ovide and Frank’s fire.

  Ovide was still sick. Without enthusiasm, he was guiding a bit of mutton around his dixie with a pocket knife. He had been complaining all morning about a headache. Frank had his shirt off and held it over the fire, sizzling lice out of the seams. When he caught an escapee, he snapped it against his thumbnail. He was telling Ovide he should have thought about his head before letting his hat flap on his back all day.