by Geoff Lawson
Next morning we walked the three blocks to town, where
mother and Eleanor went in search of Christmas presents and I
wandered off on my own. Halfway down my first block I
found what I was looking for – a sporting shop that traded
firearms. Rifles were visible in a rack that could be seen from
the windows, so I went on in for a look. There was the usual
pile of second-hand shotguns, some shiny new ones and a
couple of well-used military Martinis that had been shortened
for hunting. There was also a new Stevens with an unusual
folding, tang rear sight and a second-hand pump action
carbine.
But I couldn’t be bothered with any of these – it was the
pair of new Winchesters which caught my eye. One was the
most impressive magazine rifle I had ever seen and it had
“Model 1895” engraved on the tang. I held it reverently. It
oozed strength and quality, the action as tight as a vault; but it
was too long and heavy for the bush. It was also expensive; at
thirty-six pounds you would require a bank to afford it.
I put it back in the rack and pulled out the other.
Immediately, I was impressed by how light and graceful it was
– and beautiful to point. It had a tapered twenty-four-inch
barrel and the magazine held fifteen cartridges. By depressing
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the lever and pulling it back one could fire it every few
seconds. I just had to have one of these – it was nothing less
than a mechanical marvel. The stubby .44 cartridge was hardly
the most modern round available but as I scanned through the
catalogue, I found the following commentary from the
company that created it.
From the frozen wastes of the north to the steaming jungles
of the equator, the .44 Winchester Central Fire has killed more
game large and small and men good and bad, than any other.
That was good enough for me. The salesman put the rifle
back in its box and I bought two hundred and fifty Union
Metallic Co. cartridges in packets of fifty – the whole lot
coming to eighteen pounds and nineteen shillings.
Elated that I had achieved what I had set out for, I returned
to the street, the box with the Winchester tucked firmly under
my arm. I sauntered casually along, idly scanning displays in
shop windows, and studied the mixture of people walking past.
There were elegantly dressed ladies and gentlemen and
layabouts that loitered outside bars. There were hardware
shops and outfitters, cake shops with delicious smells and
bakers of fancy breads and biscuits. There was a wine shop
with drinks I had never heard of and a shoe shop just for
ladies. All of the sidewalks were covered with verandahs on
fancy, cast-iron poles and I could see my reflection on
shopfront windows as I sauntered on by.
Then I saw her! It was her all right – I could hardly forget
that face. Instantly, shopping dimmed and I moved to the edge
of the footpath. From up ahead she had crossed the road from
the other side and continued on in the same direction, and as
she crossed she momentarily looked my way. Had she seen
me? Had she remembered who I was? I lengthened my stride.
We crossed Maria Place and I further increased my pace. What
would I say? I didn’t really know.
When we were separated by thirty yards she suddenly
disappeared into a large three-storey building. I followed her
and looked for her, but she was gone. The store was huge and I
crisscrossed from one side to the other looking down every
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aisle, but she was nowhere to be seen. At the far end of the
store was a grand staircase, but she couldn’t have got that far
without me being able to see where she went.
In desperation, I looked around and saw that just inside the
entranceway there was an elevator. That was it then, she could
be anywhere in the building by now. Unwilling to trust myself
to the unknown pitfalls of an elevator I piled up the stairs,
where I passed beneath impressive, storey-high leadlight
windows on my flight to the floors above. Disappointment
followed; she wasn’t there either.
I went back outside. The ornately-built brick store was
called Warner’s, and was so large it had two grand entrances
separated by long glass windows. I walked across the road and
turned to look back, watching and waiting for her to reappear,
but she didn’t materialise. I gazed in some adjacent windows
but by now I had lost all interest in shopping, so I turned to
look back at Warner’s, waiting for what seemed an agonisingly
long time until eventually, weary and disappointed, I walked
away. I didn’t know it then, but three floors above she was
watching from an office window.
It was one week later, while we were eating our evening
meal, that father mentioned the number of holes made by pigs
in our fences. These had increased markedly in recent weeks
and something had to be done, so would I like to take a few
days from regular work and go and fix them? I sure would, for
as well as doing repairs to fences I would have a great
opportunity to try my new rifle.
Wild pigs are no respecters of fences. They poke their
snouts between the wires and push until they create a space to
slip through, extending the wire and leaving a permanent hole
that allows sheep to escape. Commonly one could find pig
dung with wool embedded in it, proving that pigs had been
feeding on sheep carcasses. Aside from the damage they
caused to pasture, they would also eat any new-born lambs,
making it imperative to pursue them relentlessly at lambing
time if you wanted to preserve your flocks.
After breakfast, I brought in a couple of horses from the
paddocks and put a stock saddle on the lighter one and a
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packsaddle on the other. By mid-morning I’d loaded all the
supplies I would need on the packhorse – wire, staples, batons
and tools, ensuring that the weight of the load was balanced
and firm before getting underway, keeping my food and rifle
with me. I was looking forward to it, for as well as combining
sport and work I would be on my own. Not that I minded my
family – it was just that it was sometimes nice to get away
from seeing the same group of people every day.
I stopped upon reaching my favourite camping place.
There was a clear meandering stream in the centre of a narrow,
sheltered valley; the tops of the surrounding hills were dotted
with bush and the bottoms were a carpet of lush green grass.
Dotted here and there were clumps of young manuka, an
occasional rimu, some beech and the odd kowhai, while the
boggy places were dotted with picturesque stands of tree fern,
a favourite haunt of pigs. I unloaded the horses and set up
camp before making a lunch of cold mutton and taking a tour
of the fenceline to pinpoint the locations of the holes.
On the first evening I lit a fire and positioned my irons
above it, adjusting
the chain that suspended the billy until the
height was about right. I lounged back, watching the flames
lick around the base of the tin, for that was what it was – a
large recycled peach tin. I was content with the chop I’d
cooked for my dinner and as I waited for the billy to boil, I
thought about her.
Would she have actually spoken to me? Possibly, but even
if she remembered who I was, our last meeting would be
unlikely to spark an interest in social pleasantries. She was a
beauty though, no doubt about it; she was probably the belle of
any occasion she went to. I could imagine the men all lining up
to dance her legs off and give her the time of her life. I could
just see it. A beau with a cab to whisk her and her mother
away; a dance or the occasional ball, a Saturday afternoon
flutter at the races, the theatre, or even a Sunday concert by the
kiosk at the lake.
I could picture her in the company of her friends, wearing a
beautiful, cream coloured dress that was complimented by a
parasol of embroidered gold thread. She would be smiling
gracefully to all and sundry while her mother looked on;
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brightly chatting as potential admirers suffered the company of
others while waiting for a chance to engage.
Her life would be one long social adventure. I couldn’t
begin to imagine why she would want to live on a farm like I
did – miles up some dusty road where church on Sunday
would be the only contact with the outside world. For someone
in her circumstances it would be nothing less than a prison
sentence; and yet, that was precisely how I lived.
The water began to boil, so I stopped my fanciful
daydreams and dropped a handful of tealeaves into the water.
What would I have said if I had managed to catch up with her?
Lord only knows, I’m only good at farming. Imagine how
inept I would be at a ball, for in all of my life I’ve never been
to one, or even worn a tux if it came to that. Then there was the
spectre of that upstart brother of hers. I could just see him
hovering and glaring at anyone that he didn’t approve of.
Imagine his reaction if he saw her talking to me. I banged a
spoon against the sides of the tin a few times until the
tealeaves sank to the bottom, then poured some of the brew
into a mug and put it aside to cool.
I had finished working early, so after I had eaten I decided
to walk to the neighbouring farm and visit the Halls. Between
the Halls and the camp was a track that wound its way up a
long, steep ridge and entered the bush line near the summit.
From there it crossed over the skyline and weaved its way
down the valley that contained the Hall house on the far side.
Before I left, I picked up the Winchester and filled the
magazine.
The late afternoon sun was bright and warm. As I climbed,
the whistling of birds could still be heard when I reached the
bush line near the summit. Once under the canopy, the light
dropped and because it was close to sunset, the shadows cast
by the sun’s dying rays were long and dark. The air was cooler
and ten minutes later I reached the top, which was marked by a
giant old rata stump
I stopped for a breather. I was enjoying my walk and felt
relaxed as I looked around, my nostrils absorbing the familiar
scent of greenness and foliage decay. It was then that I made
the discovery of unusually large pig tracks and dung with
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sheep wool in it. Off in the distance a single bird still twittered
among the trees.
Then I heard something that was distinctly alarming and it
seemed to be coming from very close range. Not daring to
move and scanning the pervading gloom, I tried to pinpoint the
direction of the sound. Then I heard it again, off to my left in a
patch of deep shade.
Much of the fern was higher than my waist and elsewhere
it would have covered my head, effectively screening the
source of the sound. Then I remembered that large boars were
potential killers – they have been known to stalk and attack
their victims without warning. At other times they grind their
tusks when they are about to charge. Could that be what I was
hearing now? Desperate to find somewhere safe, my eyes
came to rest on the rata stump. At six feet high it was all that
remained of a fallen forest giant, and now it represented my
only likely chance. I reached it in one bound and throwing the
Winchester upon it, I launched myself up.
The boar attacked as soon as I moved. A good pig would
go two hundred pounds, but this brute was double that, for
when he stood extended on his hind legs his snout was almost
level with the top of the stump. For a second I stared into his
bulging eyes, then I grabbed the Winchester and fired straight
at his head.
To my immense disappointment, the bullet simply bounced
off the slope of his forehead. His beady eyes vanished behind a
cloud of powder smoke, although through the pall I could still
make out his shoulder, so I levered another round and shot him
again; but it was of no use. The bullet merely flattened out and
whistled off to god knows where, his tough old hide seemingly
impossible to penetrate.
As I watched, the brute begin to circle, slowly stalking
round and round, the bristles on his back standing up. Only a
few yards away; he was grunting and looking for a way up.
Fortunately, the ground sloped away on the opposite side, so
there was no access for him there. It was obvious by now that
he was not about to let me off the hook and as I pondered what
else I could do, he made a mistake. He quartered away from
me as he skirted a piece of rotting tree, thereby exposing his
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flank. The hide on his flanks would be far thinner than his
shield and therefore he was eminently more vulnerable.
I shot him just behind the ribs; so the bullet would angle
downwards towards his heart. That got him! He spun around
fast and attacked the stump, his beady eyes blazing with fury. I
fired another at his head to discourage him and with eyes
glowering he turned aside. As he did, he exposed his other
flank; so I hit him again, down low, just behind his left front
leg. I heard the thud as the soft lead .44 struck home and he
sprinted off into the gloom. He did not show himself and the
surrounding bush was silent. There was no sound of anything
moving out there.
Twilight was now almost gone. He was lying low, no doubt
trying to fool me into getting down from the stump. There was
no way in hell I was about to do that, so I settled in for a long
wait. Through the silence I could still sense him watching,
waiting for me to make a mistake. I had to resign myself to the
fact that I would not be meeting the Halls tonight, for I would
have to remain on this stump until daylight returned, if I was to
avoid confronting that brute in the dark.
&nbs
p; For once, I missed father’s old Snider. The Snider’s heavy
bullet would have killed him for sure, for he was just too big
for the light bullet of a Winchester. Then I heard him move. He
was still out there. The night dragged on and so did the cold.
Sleep was impossible. I sat and shivered with my rifle cradled
in my arms, stiff and uncomfortable; having to frequently
change position to ease my aches while constantly straining to
hear the surrounding darkness.
Finally, after what seemed a miserable, never-ending
eternity, the cold grey gloom of dawn began to peel the cover
of night away; but I continued to wait, for I was not yet ready
to leave the protection of the stump. More time drifted by.
There were more aches, more cramps and more of nothing
happened. Eventually, stiff and with slits that passed for eyes, I
decided I had endured enough. I could not bear to sit here any
longer, so I slid off the stump with my rifle at the ready.
Nothing happened. The silence of the bush was absolute. The
brute was gone.
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Chapter Four
CAMP ORMANVILLE, Cape Colony.
November 1899
As I approached, Matlock looked up. I had found him reclining
behind his desk, which was strewn with the usual detritus that
went with deskwork. He leaned back and absently scratched at
something behind one ear, his other hand rhythmically tapping
his desktop with a pencil stub.
“I’ve received a memo from Watermeyer that concerns
you, Wilson.” He dropped the pencil and sat upright, lurching
forwards on both elbows.
“It would appear that the Intelligence Bureau are about to
go after Eric von Smidt and have assembled a team for the
task. They want you to go with them, because you are the only
candidate they have who can positively identify him and has
the necessary credentials for the job. So it’s a done deal. I’ll
keep you posted on developments but meanwhile, you are to
keep this under your hat. This operation is very hush-hush.”
A couple of days afterwards, an armoured train pulled into
a siding adjacent to the railway station and remained there.
This sparked a good deal of interest around the camp, as we
had never actually seen one of these fortifications on wheels
before. The army was experimenting with various types of
armoured train, the object being to create a reconnaissance