An entire regiment on parade was an impressive sight. This one, clad in smart grey with silver embellishments, and with pennants fluttering on tall lances, seemed to stretch forever into the distance as Val stood on the grass twenty feet from the end ranks. The total silence made the sight even more awesome. Colonel Beecham out in front of his men drew his sword, raised it, then lowered it until it pointed to the ground. Atwood glanced at Val, said in a croaky voice, ‘Quick march,’ and they went side by side towards a spot marked by crossed swords which lay ten feet ahead of the commanding officer. Atwood halted them behind the swords, then gave the order to about turn.
Val then knew the true meaning of loneliness as he faced six squadrons of mounted men and their officers dressed in the uniform each had sworn to die for. The veld had never seemed so vast; he had never felt so exposed. Atwood stepped smartly forward, then turned about face looking even more ashen. In the continuing silence he reached up to remove Val’s shining brass helmet with its yellow and white plume, and placed it on the ground. He then unbuckled the sword belt, drew out the weapon, and drove its point into the ground before laying the scabbard beside the helmet. The heavy, encrusted hilt swayed from side to side on the fine blade as Atwood appeared to falter momentarily. Val’s choking sensation had increased so that he was forced to swallow every ten seconds or so as he stared beyond Atwood to those ranks which, in the half-light, resembled the phantoms imagined by the French in Portugal during a different war.
Then Atwood was ripping from Val’s tunic epaulettes, buttons and all insignia of rank which he had last night loosened in preparation. These joined the items already on the ground along with the yellow ceremonial sash and the cross-straps. Throughout this indignity, the unhappy subaltern’s fingers shook and a muscle jumped in his cheek. The final act he must perform was to remove the ornate spurs worn by Lancer officers. When these lay in the pile, he stepped away, turned, and marched back to the wagon.
Val stood out there alone beside the things he had worn with such pride. The wind ruffled his hair and blew open the buttonless tunic as a subaltern left the ranks at the far end and slowly walked his horse across to the spot. When he reached it he leaned down from the saddle to grasp the hilt of the sword. After drawing it from the ground he flung it on to the emblems of rank, then turned to face Colonel Beecham. Saluting the senior man of the regiment, he asked in barrack-square tones for permission to proceed. Beecham’s return salute gave it. The subaltern Val knew to be a recent replacement, then commanded, ‘Mr Havelock, fall in!’
As the man began to ride away very slowly back to the far end, Val feared he would be unable to move. The strength appeared to have drained from him. Only superhuman effort allowed him to get started on the walk that would complete his humiliation. The silence was terrible. Even the horses condemned him with it. If only a bird would sing. He followed the brown gelding at a dragging pace, staring at its swaying haunches as if in a living nightmare. When a sound finally broke the silence it added to that nightmare. Distant bugles called men to the stables at the start of a busy regimental day; sounds he would not hear again without re-living these moments.
They reached the far end of the massed horsemen at last. There, he was halted and turned to face the long line ranged along the plain. Almost immediately, Max Beecham shouted an order. This was taken up by the first squadron-commander as Val began to walk behind the gelding towards the wagon three hundred yards away. Corunna Squadron executed the precise manoeuvre which turned the ranks ninety degrees. During the time it took Val to walk the gap between squadrons, Waterloo was similarly turned, and Corunna faced front again. The orders were repeated by each successive commander so that the members of the 57th Lancers showed their contempt by turning their backs on a man they now rejected.
By the time he reached the fifth squadron Val thought his breast would burst open from the pain within it. He prayed it did not show in his face as he forced one leg after the other in almost funereal pace behind the walking horse. The slower the pace the longer the ordeal. The subaltern had received his orders.
The fifth squadron was Napier, the one Val had served until receiving his commission. As he approached the first ranks, Felix Wheeler gave the order to turn and guided his stallion round. He and his troop officers found themselves facing ranks of men who had not moved. Wheeler repeated his order in sharp tones, but not one member of the rank and file obeyed. There was nothing he could do with a hundred or more men who refused to insult someone who had lived and fought with them as their friend and champion; someone they would have followed into the thickest battle fray, if necessary. The same thing happened with Lockheart Squadron, the last ranks at the end of that terrible walk. The men he had so recently commanded, and those of the other troops stood their ground to show their loyalty and high regard for a fine, courageous soldier.
The ancient ritual almost over, the mounted lieutenant led Val back to the spot where his sword had been flung to the ground. He stood out there alone in the blinding horizontal rays of the rising sun while the rider rejoined the ranks, and he continued to stand there as the regiment he had sacrificed everything to join rode in procession back to the town. He remained on that stark, barren plain his head echoing with Sir Gilliard’s demand that he live Vorne Ashleigh’s life for him, and with his own youthful voice saying, ‘I swear I’ll not let you or the family down, sir, and I’ll serve my country with my last breath … but I can’t live my brother’s life for him. I must live my own.’
*
He had no idea how many days he had been on the move. A man lost count of time on the veld. It was easy to skirt towns and hamlets; there was no difficulty in avoiding people. People condemned; people jeered. He had been cast out. The wilderness was the best place for him. Thick blond stubble adorned the chin of a haggard face burned dark brown. A network of fine white lines spread out around blue eyes that stared with the haunted gaze of many who had travelled this land alone. The rough jacket and breeches he wore were stained and filthy; his hands on the reins were streaked by grime. The horse he rode and the other he led were in good condition. His love and respect for these beasts rose above all else. They were noble creatures still.
He knew the time had come to release them. From the top of the hills he had seen a small settlement, but distances were deceptive in this clear air and it was still some way off. He would try to get closer to ensure that they were able to smell other horses and the familiar scent of humans when he said goodbye.
Two miles on he fell from the saddle for the fourth time and lay beneath the scorching sun unable to move or think, until a velvety nose nudged his cheek and warm air was blown through nostrils to fan his closed eyelids. They opened lethargically to see a long, long nose and trusting brown eyes watching him. His comatose brain roused enough to tell him his equine friends would not leave him, so he could not die here. It was imperative to go on and tether them near enough to the settlement for them to be found.
He rolled over and slowly found his feet. The effort made the earth spin. Without strength enough to climb into the saddle, he set off in a stumbling walk knowing the horses would follow. Forcing one leg before the other he imagined he could see the swaying flanks of that gelding; that he could hear those orders clear and sharp in the dawn. Through bleary eyes he saw the grouped houses and choked back a sob of thankfulness. The destruction of Martin Havelock was almost complete.
He tethered the animals to a tree on the outskirts of the settlement, then struck out for the wilderness alone. The farewell was deliberately brief. They had served him more loyally than he had served them. Blindly staggering onward to put as much distance as possible between himself and other people, he eventually encountered a hollow, lost his footing and keeled over. This was as good a place as any. A horseman would one day come across a corpse surrounded by aasvogels and ride on fatalistically. There would be nothing on it to give an identity. Just one more traveller of the veld, lost and down on his luck.
Obl
ivion was broken by voices shouting nearby. The sound penetrated the blessed nothingness and rattled around in his head, gradually taking on some meaning. It was a sound that sent a message to his weary brain; one it could not ignore. His eyes slowly opened and saw nothing but sky. They closed again, but his mind refused to allow him the peace he wanted. The voices were still shouting. The language they used sent a signal of danger to his senses and muscles. His eyes again opened; his right arm moved. He must alert his troopers. His right leg bent as he slowly rolled on to his stomach. The voices came from the west where the lowering sun was about to be obscured by a cloud. He reached out to pull himself forward but advanced only a foot or so. His limbs were reluctant to obey his will, yet it was strong enough to keep him crawling painfully towards the rim of the hollow.
Panting and giddy, he clutched the short spiky grass and hauled himself high enough to peer beyond the slope on which he was spread-eagled. It was some while before his eyes focused well enough to make out what they saw. A group of six men were squatting beside a long, thick, black line. They were laughing and shouting instructions to each other as they fixed two bundles to it. Then they stood, walked to their horses, mounted and rode off laughing.
He lay staring at the bundles until they became identifiable as sticks of dynamite. The long black line then became a railway track. It took some while for him to work out the significance of what he had discovered. No sooner had he done so than he heard something immediately recognizable: the whistle of a train. Instinct set his head turning left and right. The track stretched for no more than a hundred yards in one direction around a jutting rise of ground. In the other, it ran for less than fifty yards before curving out of sight.
He called to his troopers but no sound came from his parched throat. Pulling himself over the rim to level ground, he began the struggle to get up. Once on his knees he pitched forward again with his face on the coarse ground. He turned it to the right and saw a spiral of smoke rise up beyond the high ground. The train was nearer than he thought. Pushing himself up on arms deliberately strengthened by constant training, he willed himself to a kneeling position then to his feet. With his legs buckling at almost every step, and zig-zagging towards the bundles his blurred eyes saw in several different places, he now heard the rails begin to sing the imminent approach of a train.
He was willing himself onwards across the sands outside Khartoum with a vital dispatch. Although each step was agony he must go on. The Mahdi’s men were close behind him. He could hear their shrill cries. No, it was an engine’s whistle, and those bundles must be removed before they blew it sky high. If only he could see more clearly; if he could just stop his legs from folding up and sending him in the wrong direction. All his troopers had been killed. He must do this for them to show that he had not, after all, let them down. His face was wet with perspiration … or was it tears? They had not turned their backs. They knew he would not let them die out here from an unseen enemy.
*
Lance-Corporal Johns and Sergeant Crookes, one of the best shots in their regiment, were riding as lookouts in the driver’s cab. As they lounged against the sides of it they were discussing the prospect of being stationed near Pretoria for a spell.
Sergeant Crookes broke off in the middle of a sentence, saying to the driver, ‘Do you have to keep making that row?’
‘Yes,’ snapped the man. ‘Although we’re going slowly around the bends there won’t be time enough to stop if there’s anything on the line. The whistle scares off animals if any are crazy enough to graze along the tracks.’
‘Ha, I’d run the stupid buggers down,’ was the reply.
‘Yes, you would. It’s not your country,’ the driver said in disgust. ‘Apart from killing buck for food, we don’t slaughter our wild animals for sport. They are given the freedom of the veld along with any man, woman or child who decides to cross it. All you khaki lads think of is killing. Anything! Why don’t you … there you are, there is an animal on the line,’ he finished, reaching for the handle to blow a blast on the whistle once more.
The sergeant had his field glasses trained on a dun-coloured creature on the line, now visible, which stretched out towards the next curve. ‘Funny looking animal. Shut that bloody row up!’ he snarled, as the driver hung on the whistle handle in a continuing attempt to move the creature. Still studying the hunched shape that appeared to be moving very slowly, he was puzzled. The shape then straightened up slightly, and so did he. ‘Blimey, it’s a bloody Boer!’
‘What?’ cried Lance-Corporal Johns, hanging over the side of the cab to see for himself.
‘It’s a bloody Boer … and in his hand he’s got bloody dynamite,’ yelled the other, dropping the field glasses to dangle on their strap as he snatched up his rifle. ‘Put on the brakes, man!’
‘It’s too late.’ The driver prepared to jump from the cab, but Johns grabbed him by the collar and roared at him to brake.
‘We’ve got five ’undred men on this train and you’re not leaving it, mate,’ he added grimly.
A rifle cracked across the cab, and they all saw the man fall clear of the line as the brake was applied and wheels screamed on tracks. The train came to an eventual halt several yards round the bend, still intact. An officer jumped to the ground and called to Sergeant Crookes for an explanation. The N.C.O. ran back alongside the train where heads were looking inquisitively from open trucks.
‘A bloody Boer planting dynamite on the track, sir,’ he panted. ‘I got him, never fear.’
‘Only one?’ queried the captain. ‘That’s unusual. We’d best get moving in case it’s an ambush gone wrong and the rest rush us. Detail a party to go back for the dynamite. Don’t want to leave it lying around for them to have another go. And tell them to be quick,’ he called after the retreating man. ‘We can’t hang about longer than a few minutes.’
The Fusiliers who were given an unenviable task had never moved quicker than they did then. Expecting a volley of rifle fire from the higher ground at any moment one snatched up the dynamite, threw the two bundles into the air so that his fellows could fire at them, then they all hared back to the train with the echo of explosions in their ears. The blood-stained body was left beside the track. The vultures would clear it away. The train was moving even as the Fusiliers clambered back aboard. Within a very short time silence returned to that spot, no more than a spiral of smoke in the distance showing that a troop train containing five hundred soldiers had ever passed by.
Two black men rose cautiously from behind a large aloe. They had hidden there when the six bearded horsemen had appeared. They disliked and feared Boers. It was best to melt into the landscape whenever they were in evidence. After looking around warily, they descended to the figure sprawled face down beside the track. They were mystified by this man who had crawled from a hollow when the Boers rode away. How long had he been there? Why had he been there?
From the way he had moved it seemed probable he was hurt, even dying, when he went to take away what the Boers had put there. They knew what it was and the damage it could do, even before the soldiers had thrown it into the air and fired at it. This man could not have known the danger or he surely would never have done what he did.
Reaching the body they turned it over and stared down at it. He was a big man, strong. Even the rigours of the veld could not disguise what his physique had once been. Blood oozed from his chest in the vicinity of his heart. His eyes were closed, his mouth open in final anguish. The black men looked at the golden hair and facial stubble, then one squatted to prise open an eyelid. A cornea of vivid blue gazed sightlessly at the aasvogels starting to gather overhead.
The second man then squatted to point out faint movement just below the stranger’s right ear. They conferred. This man could not be a Boer; he had disconnected the dynamite only seconds before the train arrived. This man had the looks of English people they knew. Why, then, had his own soldiers shot him and left his body to the mercy of the veld predators? This man p
ossessed great courage. This man still lived. The Lord clearly favoured him, so they must tell Father McBride at the mission.
One rose and ran off effortlessly to fetch help from the settlement ahead. The other sat beside the stranger, shading his face from the sun with his own body, until the mission wagon arrived with bandages and medicines.
15
THOSE AUTUMN DAYS of 1901 were touched by curious events, culminating in the end of an era at Knightshill. No member of the family had a premonition of what was about to happen. Instead, life was happy and peaceful for them all. Charlotte and John had settled into a contented married life and were eagerly awaiting the birth of their child: a gift both thought forever denied them until a year ago. John had been integrated into the family after some difficulty due to his many years as an employee. Now nine months had passed, his reservations had been overcome so that he and Vere ran the estate on easy terms with each other. Charlotte handed over the reins almost imperceptibly and was so occupied with the orchids Vere had now invested in very heavily, as well as impending motherhood, she hardly noticed that she was no longer the first lady of Knightshill.
Kitty fulfilled all her husband’s hopes by making their home the lively, cultural retreat he needed. Very, very gradually the martial dominance of that great house was softened by visits from many acquaintances who had not once worn a scarlet jacket. Vere had never wanted to completely banish the military flavour of a house owned by generations of soldiers, but a balance between culture and gallantry was struck. The old mansion came alive with voices and laughter throughout the year. Balls and dinner parties were frequent; extra staff were employed to cope with the new lighter regime in a house which itself seemed to welcome the fresh breeze of change.
A Distant Hero Page 39