Vere must have slept, for it was fully dark when he next looked at the sky. The work of healing was continuing around him, and food was being offered to those fit enough to eat. He refused the meal but accepted a mug of strong tea. Shortly afterwards he wished he had not. The world spun madly for a while bringing acute nausea, so he lay back again and kept very still until he saw Edward Pickering smiling down at him. Vere was immensely glad to see his friend alive and whole.
‘This is what comes of ignoring my advice,’ said Edward, squatting beside him. ‘You should have stayed at the rear.’
‘I did.’
‘Then how did you become involved in that courageously foolhardy attempt to bring in a wagon full of ammunition under heavy fire?’
Vere had no idea what he was talking about and listened in growing confusion as his friend assured him that the action had been successful, despite two men being killed, and the remainder wounded in a shell explosion.
‘I’ve spoken to the doctor about you,’ he continued. ‘All you are suffering from is concussion, and a touch of heatstroke like the majority of our poor men. Ashleighs must have charmed lives.’
‘I pray that applies to my brother,’ Vere murmured.
‘Your brother?’
‘In the Fifty-seventh.’
‘Mmm!’ Edward gave him a considering look before adding, ‘I heard a few minutes ago that the Fifty-seventh have not yet engaged the enemy, but that a big push towards Kimberley is to be made soon when they are certain to be used. I trust their commanders are men of greater wisdom than ours, and are furnished with accurate information concerning enemy positions and strength. We had no notion Colenso was so heavily defended. Our spies are either too timid or they are in the pay of the enemy.’
Edward recounted in bitter terms his regiment’s part in the battle, and vague images of that terrible day began to return to Vere while he spoke. When his friend departed and Vere fell asleep, they continued as garish, desperate dreams. At some time during the night he was half aware of being coaxed to drink a slightly bitter liquid, before hands bathed his face and torso with tepid water. His brain was too troubled to allow him full consciousness. Visions floated through his sleeping mind to torment him. He saw his older brother’s desecrated grave superimposed upon the face of the man who had revealed the truth about Vorne. He saw Colin Steadman’s corpse transfixed by a spear, and heard Charlotte asking repeatedly: Is that what you want? Sir Gilliard’s stern features appeared, then vanished, throughout these confused images. But his voice seemed ever present. You refused Dunwoody’s offer to serve your queen and country merely to become an effeminate wielder of brushes? Have you no honour?
The desert and a dry, dusty plain became one as his grandfather’s voice was drowned by gunfire and the screams of battling men. One moment there were Dervishes rushing towards him, mouths open as they uttered their unnerving war cry; then white robes became khaki uniforms and the black faces turned white as they grimaced in agony. His knees and elbows were surely broken. He was supporting an unbearable weight on his back as he trod over the mutilated carcases of oxen which lay for as far as he could see. The young lad shot at his side fell to reveal that he was, in reality, Val. Yet, when Vere bent in distress to hold him close, his brother’s body floated away on a river lined by men with rifles.
It was daylight when the nightmares faded and a brand of sanity returned. Vere was depressed and immensely disturbed over Edward’s remarks about bringing in an ammunition wagon. How could he have been involved in the battle? He had been watching it all from the rear.
A doctor came asking how he felt, then added, ‘Don’t worry too much, Mr Ashleigh. The symptoms you are suffering from will only be temporary. It is essential for you to rest quietly for a couple of days, sleeping whenever you feel like doing so. Drink nothing stronger than water, and keep cool. As soon as I have orderlies to spare, you’ll be carried back to your tent where I can look in on you now and then. It may be a while yet, however. We have to put all the serious cases aboard the hospital train by midday, when it’s due to leave for Durban. Relax and be patient. We were not prepared for such numbers of casualties.’
The sun rose and the temperature rose with it. As the treatment tents were gradually vacated by men being sent down the line to hospital ships lying at Durban, Vere was shifted beneath the shade of one with others waiting for minor treatment. They chatted with the bravado of men who emerge from battle with only slight wounds, and their words deepened Vere’s confusion. He was excluded from their conversation, and yet he had apparently fought in their battle. How could he have done that? He was no longer a soldier.
From his position by the entrance to the tent he could see a train standing on the line a hundred yards distant. He lay watching smoke drift from an engine at the head of carriages clearly marked with a red cross. It was due to depart at noon. With a rhythmic click-click of wheels, it would head through the splendid terrain he had seen from the observation platform on the way up, to arrive in Durban late this afternoon … if the Boers had not blown the track to force a halt somewhere in the heart of Natal.
That thought remained to blot out all others as Vere continued to watch the thin grey curl of smoke drift up into the blue. If anyone protested as he slowly rolled from the stretcher, got to his feet and staggered from the tent, he did not hear. The ground resembled a sponge into which his boots sunk with every step: the train seemed to shift its position each time he looked up. It took him a long time to reach it. Medical staff were busy at the rear so did not notice him haul himself up the three iron steps of the leading carriage, then sink on to the iron platform. Grasping the rail with shaking hands to stop himself rising, falling and spinning around in giddy fashion, he then found the entire train moving with him. He closed his eyes and pressed his body against the solid comfort of the carriage.
Constant gliding movement had replaced the seesawing when awareness returned. The passing scene told Vere little. He had no idea how long they had been travelling. The train was progressing slowly to avoid jolting the patients, so Vere managed to struggle to a sitting position, then waited for everything to settle into place before peering round the edge of the carriage to look ahead. Hills and more hills! He prayed they had not already passed his destination. Clinging to the rail, he stared beyond the engine as it ran between the heights and told himself he might still be there when it puffed into Durban. An age later, as the train rounded a bend, he saw buildings clustered beside the track where a row of lamps had illuminated Vrymanskop two weeks earlier, and knew he had arrived where he most wanted to be.
There was no alternative but to lower himself down the steps then tumble to the ground on the far side of the track. He lay where he fell for some time, trying to summon enough energy to get up. His weakness appalled him. The temptation to stay where he was was so strong, only the image of her face drove him to seek it. He raised his head with an effort and squinted along the track. The train was no longer even a shimmering blot in the distance.
The sun was at its zenith; the air was heavy and still. There was no sign of movement in the main street. He struggled to his feet and began to stagger towards it. The fat burgher in his hut beside the track had either resumed his doze after seeing the train pass, or had slept soundly throughout. He was snoring as Vere made for the hotel, where a lion-coloured dog also slumbered in the shade cast by its entrance. It ignored Vere.
The door stood open. Inside, the atmosphere was still hot but thankfully dim after the glaring brightness. Vere was blinded for a while until his eyes adjusted to the change of light. The scent of lavender still pervaded the vestibule; the furniture shone with polish. The sepia portraits on the walls were now old friends. It was like coming home after being lost. He felt tears well up as he gazed at the empty rooms and told himself everyone in Vrymanskop must be asleep.
The old clock was not. With musical notes it proclaimed the time to be one-thirty. As the chimes ceased, the rear door opened and she came th
rough with some papers in her hands. She looked very cool and fresh in pale green with white lace trimming. Her hair was defying confinement and lay against her cheeks and neck in bright curling tendrils. He longed to touch them, let them encircle his fingers. Wanting to go to her, he nevertheless found it impossible.
As she took a file from a shelf beneath the desk she grew aware of a presence and glanced up. Her hands stilled, her whole body stilled with momentary shock.
She soon conquered it to say, ‘You are using your rosy glass most unwisely. Can you really be so foolish?’ Words would not come. He could only gaze with heartfelt relief at the one person who played no part in his present confusion. She represented sanity and peace.
Her expression began to change as she came around the desk. Two yards from him her eyes widened with alarm. ‘Oh, my dear, whatever has happened to you?’
Her arms reached out for him as he began to fall, but darkness returned before their softness had encircled him.
*
Several days passed during which sleep brought nightmares, and waking continued the sensation of being lost in one of them. His head pounded intermittently; his arms and knees ached even in sleep. He believed he must be suffering from the fever that had plagued his early years, yet the person who was never far from his side was calm and encouraging, unlike those who had tut-tutted over him at Knightshill. A doctor came each morning and evening. He was reassuring and nodded satisfaction as he departed. So he might; he was not wandering in a land of pain and mystery.
The headache was absent when Vere awoke on his fourth day, and as he turned his head on the pillow to look around the room everything remained where it should be. He sighed with relief. There was still dull pain in his arms and legs and he felt incredibly weary, but reality appeared to have returned. He was lying in a wide bed set against one wall of a room furnished very simply. Lace curtains were closed to minimize the brightness of morning well advanced, but chequered sunshine glossed a jug and basin patterned with yellow and blue flowers which stood on a table before the window, and it lay in a broad filigree stripe across the white counterpane folded at the foot of the bed. Contentment washed over him. This was an oasis in the midst of a desert in which Vere Ashleigh had been wandering unable to find a destination.
A woman entered quietly, then smiled when she saw his eyes were open. ‘You look much better. The worst should now be over.’
Words eluded him. He studied the face he considered so striking; the neat figure in cream figured cambric, and the vivid hair he longed to release from its chignon.
She crossed to sit on a chair near the bed. The scent of cologne wafted to him. ‘Are you still in pain?’
He shook his head. There was nothing but a wonderful warmth enveloping his body now she was there.
‘No nightmares?’ She smiled again at his expression. ‘You mutter almost non-stop in your sleep, so it’s small wonder you have run out of words.’
He found some swiftly. ‘I’ve put you to a great deal of trouble. I’m sorry.’
‘Business is quiet. The war has kept most people in their homes. Boer families shelter anyone fighting their cause; provide them with food, fresh horses, spare rifles. Those who have no love of Dutchmen are afraid to leave their farms in case they are robbed of these things while away. Looking after you has been no hardship.’ Her mouth twitched with amusement. ‘I have often put to bed the men of my family when they were drunk. You arrived in a state remarkably similar.’
‘I have little recollection of it,’ he admitted.
‘A train bearing red crosses passed through Vrymanskop a short while before I found you in a dazed state downstairs. I imagine you must have tumbled from it,’ she told him with a twinkle in her eyes. ‘How fortunate that your fall occurred at the very place you vowed to revisit.’
‘Very fortunate,’ he agreed, enjoying the way sunlight played on the curve of her cheek to emphasize her pale skin.
‘The military at Durban have been informed that you are here with a doctor in attendance.’
‘I am no concern of theirs, in effect. I’m a civilian.’ She maintained a short silence as she studied him. Then she said, ‘You were surely not attempting to emulate the perfect warrior again.’
Pleased that she recalled their conversation on that other occasion, he managed a faint smile. ‘I hope I’m wise enough not to make the same mistake twice.’
‘Then how did you receive a wound that has given you quite severe concussion?’
‘I have no idea,’ he told her frankly. ‘According to my friend, I assisted in an attempt to recover an ammunition wagon under fire. He would hardly lie to me, and yet it seems incredible. I watched the battle from the rear. I remember that quite well. Why would I have done such a thing?’
‘I cannot possibly answer that. I know too little about you.’ After slight hesitation she added, ‘From your delirious ramblings it seems you might be suffering from that same problem.’
He thought about that for a moment or two. ‘Perhaps I tumbled from the train to solve it.’
She looked him steadily in the eye. ‘There’s no answer to be found here.’
Returning her look he said, ‘I believe there is. Why else would I have made my way to this place when I was hardly aware of what I was doing?’
‘You have answered that with your last words.’
‘No. One thing I do know about myself is that I was determined to return, and if I am using a rosy glass I must persuade you to use it also.’
She shook her head. ‘I must persuade you to look through my darker one.’
His smile reflected the happiness he felt at being with her again. ‘The colour of the glass is unimportant so long as we both look through the same one.’
7
A WEEK PASSED before Vere’s concussion diminished to allow him full recollection, but present happiness softened memory of that disastrous battle. His troublesome warrior instinct subsided in the peace of Vrymanskop. The doctor encouraged a period of rest and tranquillity, so Vere immersed himself in the simple life of that small Natal settlement surrounded by distant flat-topped hills that stood out so clearly against the deep blue of a sky that seemed to go on forever.
During the week, two men had ridden in at dusk to ask for a meal and a bed, then departed before anyone stirred in the morning. Stern, uncommunicative creatures, they had personified Kitty’s maxim of remaining strangers in this spectacular, dangerous land. Her response to Vere suggested that she had abandoned it where he was concerned. The nurse-patient relationship had broken the barriers of convention to allow a familiarity Vere could not otherwise have hoped for in such a short time. Indeed, they might have been a contented small family if they had not all dispersed to separate rooms at night, for Simon Munroe was soon following at Vere’s heels as faithfully as the lion-coloured dog.
Kitty’s son was a complex boy. Sturdy, active and well used to roaming the surrounding hills alone without fear, Vere sensed that he was nevertheless too dependent on his mother. Perhaps the dependence was mutual. They had both been deserted by Munroe and left to fend for themselves in a country where the weak often failed to survive. In a community boasting no more than twenty children between the ages of eighteen months and fifteen years, each one was obliged to mingle with those older or younger, according to temperament. Simon apparently did not fit easily into either group, but he was a rapt companion when Vere read aloud from a selection of classics Kitty had on her shelves, and when he described the haunting quality of the desert or the lush green tranquillity of the countryside of England. Vere spoke merely of a grey-stone house and a productive farm when describing Knightshill. Prudence warned him to say no more on the subject until Kitty agreed to marry him.
Fondness of Simon led him to seek the cause of the boy’s isolation from other children. In doing so he was soon made aware that Kitty was generally regarded with suspicion. A woman from the diamond fields, deserted by a man who might or might not have been her husband, w
ho is then bequeathed a thriving hotel by the old bachelor who had taken her in, was not easily accepted by sober, hardworking settlers. Such a woman’s child suffered the consequences of being different from those around him. Knowing that penalty all too well, Vere casually tackled the subject as he sat with Simon on the stoep one morning waiting for Kitty to bring cups of tea. He was drawing the dog, named Kimber as an abbreviation for the diamond city, and spoke as he concentrated on his sketch-pad.
‘Isn’t it curious how one dog in a litter can look nothing like the rest? I know you chose him because he resembled a lion cub more than a puppy, but I wonder why he is this wonderful tawny shade when the others are black.’ Simon was studying his pet as the animal lay, nose on paws, watching the welcome masculine addition to his world. ‘Kim is special, that’s why.’
‘Of course he’s special,’ Vere agreed, pleased by the boy’s train of thought. ‘Do you think he realizes that?’ Simon sounded surprised by such a question. ‘How can he? We can tell he’s special because we compare him with other dogs, but he only knows that he is himself.’
Vere continued to draw swift lines. ‘But he’s happy.’
‘That’s because I love him.’
Glancing at the earnest freckled face topped by dark-red hair, Vere smiled. ‘It’s really all that matters, isn’t it, Simon? Your mother loves you very much.’
‘And Kimber does.’
‘Yes … and Kimber.’
The boy frowned up at Vere. ‘Does anybody love you, sir?’
‘I certainly hope so,’ he replied with secret amusement.
Growing diffident, Simon said, ‘I like you very much … and so does Kimber. I’m sure Mother does too. Only, you see … well, you don’t seem to be with anyone. Don’t you sometimes feel sad?’
A Distant Hero Page 16