by Tim Jeal
Their progress from ledge to ledge could easily have been observed. Francis raised a finger to his mouth and, beckoning her closer to him, pointed to the central rock. She understood at once: they needed to take cover.
As they ran for the rock, a man in a skirt of leopard tails emerged from behind it. He froze before flinging himself out of sight again. Francis jerked back the bolt of his rifle, too late to fire.
He and Clara crouched together behind the rock in the baking sunlight, with no idea how many men lay hidden only yards away. Francis took out his revolver, slipped off the safety catch, and handed the weapon to her. He indicated that she was to cover the right of the rock, while he would take the left. The blood was roaring in her ears. Her hat had fallen off in the dash to the rock, and the sun was burning her neck and cheek.
In time, the three troopers would return and, finding their horses still waiting, start to search. She clung to this thought as to a buoy in a storm. But again and again the corpses of the Frenchman and his wife filled her mind. As a child she had seen the young son of her father’s coachman killed by a horse – the awful cracking noise of hoof against skull still haunted her. One moment laughing; the next, stone dead on the cobbles.
Her heart was beating so fast she feared it might burst. Above her on the rock she saw little orange lizards darting after flies. Sweat was trickling between her breasts and down her back. Dark patches had appeared at the armpits of Francis’s uniform. The stippled wooden handle of the gun felt slippery in her hands.
Soon after thirst started to torment her, Francis took a canteen from his pocket and handed it to her. She drank gratefully and returned it. A little later, he offered her his hat to shade her burning face. Being darker-skinned, she gave it back again after a while. Occasionally, faint sounds came from behind the rock, but what they meant, Clara could not say.
The sun was inching closer to the upper crags when, far to their right, a man emerged from a slit in the rock-face. Clara cried out. Francis swung around and fired almost in the same movement. A huge man now sprang from behind their rock, wielding an axe. Clara screamed. Francis swung with his rifle butt and caught him in the ribs. The axe crashed wide and struck sparks from the rock. Francis swung again with his rifle but slipped. The axe flashed above him. Clara raised her revolver and fired. The man crumpled sideways. She fired again, hitting him in the neck. Francis was on his feet as another man peered around the side of the rock. Without time to aim, Francis fired from the hip and missed. The tribesman flinched and discharged his flintlock into the ground. Before Francis could fire again, his adversary dropped his gun and fled.
Francis grabbed Clara’s hand. They half slid, half scrambled down the steepest rocks until reaching the next substantial ledge. An overhang gave them shelter from anything that could be hurled from above. Clara was trembling uncontrollably and would have fallen if Francis had not held her.
‘You saved my life,’ he murmured.
‘We saved each other’s.’ A great sob broke in her throat.
His cheek was touching hers, but she did not turn away. Behind the rock, it had been as if everything that mattered to her had been about to be snatched away, his life more than hers. And now that he was suddenly restored to her, she felt his value more deeply. She remembered the axe poised above him and relived the split second before she fired – the barrel of her revolver shaking so much that she had shut her eyes as she squeezed the trigger. On opening them, she had expected to see Francis dead, his face upturned, hair wet with blood: the last sight she would ever see before she suffered the same fate.
She held Francis more tightly. Then, as if this were a dream, she drew back and looked at him, alive – dear God, alive – those cornflower eyes, that straight fair hair like a boy’s. She touched his face, leaned forward, and kissed him on the lips, a soft, sweet kiss that left her weaker than before.
‘Forgive me,’ she sighed as they drew apart.
For answer he kissed her again. ‘My darling,’ he whispered. ‘My darling.’
As they held each other, she prayed: May I never turn my back on love because it is alive and hurts. He was looking at her with eyes that were helpless but repentant, as if he feared he had wronged her. She desperately wanted to tell him not to be sorry. Instead of speaking, she reached out and held his lapels. Then, drawing him closer, she tilted back her head. They kissed, then parted, breathing deeply like swimmers.
Far below, the troopers were dismounting after hearing the shots. Francis shouted to them to shoot anyone on the rocks above. Before leaving the ledge, he took Clara’s hand and kissed it gently on the palm and on the fingers – a vow, she told herself, while fearing it might be a valediction.
CHAPTER 20
On Fynn’s orders, Robert Haslam was wearing his jacket turned inside out, with the pale lining exposed, since the black cloth had been judged to be too eye-catching against grey rocks and sandy scrub. Fynn was squatting next to him in the shade of a stunted acacia, slicing thin strips from a lump of dried meat with his hunting knife. Four scouts were nearby, observing the hillside, shielding their field glasses to prevent their flashing in the sun. Today they were closer than usual to the people they were seeking.
Robert turned to Fynn. ‘If they spot us at this distance, won’t they rush at us?’
‘No, sir. They’ll think we’re tryin’ to lure them into a bigger force. So they’ll work around back of us.’
Fynn had observed this particular hillside several times before, because he had noticed that the number of cooking fires had been steadily increasing. Robert could make out the glint of guns and assegais as men moved on the skyline. Fynn began to edge his way cautiously around the hill, making sketches of every cave opening he could spot. Past experience told Robert that the American would next try to capture a young woman from a neighbouring village, to question her about the men. The first time this had happened, Robert had anticipated torture. But on that occasion and on all others, fear alone had elicited a flood of information.
Without the daily routines of life at the mission, Robert felt disoriented and lonely. He feared that the social chatter of the cavalry officers might make Clara nostalgic for the life she had abandoned. Their lascivious glances troubled him. May I never fall victim to mistrust and jealousy, he prayed. These young men were pitiable. Their carefree hedonism was no help against impending death. Robert pulled himself into a kneeling position. ‘O merciful God who knoweth that every unrepented sin is a fountain of fresh error, guide these poor sinners back, of their own volition, on to the one true path that leads to Thy salvation. Grant this, I pray, for the sake of Thy Son, Jesus Christ, Amen.’
That night, under the stars, men stirred in their sleep, while others kept watch. They had all been soaked to the skin in a late shower, but a fire was out of the question. An hour earlier, a man had lit a cheroot and Fynn had kicked him black and blue for betraying their position. Every night, the American went around rapping men’s feet through their horse blankets. If they took off their boots at night, the patrol could not ride off at a moment’s notice. Robert reflected sadly that most Christians could learn a lot about dedication from Mr Heywood Fynn.
*
Not long after his lucky escape, Francis Vaughan sat in his tent, writing to Clara. On his table lay the torn scraps of earlier attempts. Easy to apologize for placing her in danger; simple to express anger with his incompetent scouts; a pleasure to praise her courage. The problem was how to refer to the kisses, the memory of which still delighted him, and at the same time tell her that they could never repeat such behaviour. In a few days’ time, her husband, at great risk to himself, might meet Chief Mponda and be instrumental in saving all their lives. To deceive him would be despicable.
Francis fiddled with his smoking lamp and then wrote: ‘Please be generous enough to forget an incident which I now greatly regret and cannot excuse.’ He sighed aloud and scored through the paper. The inescapable fact was that she had kissed him first and had done
so deliberately. He remembered her pulling back to look at him before slowly leaning forward. So how could he apologize without insulting her? Was it even chivalrous to speak of regret? It certainly wasn’t truthful. And she had saved his life.
No other woman of his acquaintance would have been brave enough to endure the ordeal they had shared without going to pieces. And Clara had moral courage too: the sort required for her to admit she had lost her faith. The sadness of her situation haunted him. Even on first meeting her in that crowded hotel supper room, he had hated to think what Africa might do to her.
In the end Francis abandoned his efforts to settle everything in a letter and instead wrote a simple note in which he asked her to meet him by the stream above the horses’ drinking pool. He asked Corporal Winter to deliver the note, feeling relieved, although nothing had been decided. Only by talking to her in person would he be able to admit how he felt and yet insist upon honourable behaviour.
‘Take it to her,’ Francis repeated, puzzled by Winter’s hesitation.
‘She was asking things about you, sir.’
‘Like what, Corporal?’
‘Whether I enjoyed being your orderly.’
‘I trust you said you loved it?’
‘Of course I did.’ He coughed nervously. ‘Have you considered my request, sir?’
‘Not that again.’
‘It’s what I really want to do, sir.’
Preoccupied with Clara, Francis suddenly lost the will to keep opposing his orderly’s desire to be a scout. In truth, he felt he had no right to do so. Arthur Winter was a widow’s only son and had been shot through both legs eighteen months earlier while rescuing a gravely wounded trooper, but could that justify shielding him from his own nature forever?
‘Very well, Corporal. You can report to Mr Fynn when he returns. But don’t blame me if you come to a sticky end.’
Before Arthur Winter could blurt out his thanks, Francis had ducked back into his tent.
*
Ever since Robert Haslam’s departure, Simon had been despairing. He worried constantly about what might happen to him if his master was killed. Would Mrs Robert take him to England with her, or would he be sent back to the kraal, as if he had never learned to live like a white man?
One day, he saw the soldiers playing a strange game in which they hit a ball and ran between some sticks stuck in the ground. A large man, whose beard resembled the straggling fibres on a maize cob, told him it was called cricket. Later, he explained the rules and let Simon try to hit the ball. Like all the white men, this soldier’s face and neck were burned red brown. Simon knew his name was Sergeant, because that was what the men had called him. When he washed at the stream, his chest and back looked whiter than ivory.
It was strange how very naked white men looked without their clothes. A black skin was sufficient clothing in itself. But Simon enjoyed seeing the soldiers splashing each other in the water. They laughed and frolicked like boys and no longer frightened him, as they did on their horses.
This day, when most of the men had returned to their tents, Simon remained perched on the trunk of a fallen tree, watching Sergeant getting dressed. The boy asked, ‘Please, what are the bandages you tie around your legs?’
‘We call them puttees.’
Simon stared beyond the half-dressed soldier. A pale-blue shape was moving through the elephant grass. Simon had washed that very dress yesterday. Forgetting about Sergeant, the boy slipped down from his perch and set off in pursuit of his master’s wife.
*
To prevent anyone’s suspecting that he and Clara were heading for the same place, Francis Vaughan chose a circuitous route. On arrival, he looked around with satisfaction. It really was a splendidly secluded spot, shielded on one side by a tangle of papyrus reeds and on the other by a grove of palmyras.
During the night, Francis had slept badly and awakened drenched in sweat. In his dream, a dozen men had emerged from behind the well-remembered rock; and although he shot them, one by one, they kept on coming. As he turned to speak to Clara, a spear was thrust into her neck. On waking, Francis had felt steadier only after drinking some brandy.
Waiting for Clara, he felt shaky again. Don’t be a fool, he told himself. Just be firm with her. Yet the moment he saw her wonderfully expressive face, framed by its twin curtains of black hair, his resolution melted away. Wanting to be cool and lucid, he could hardly think at all. He took in neither the blueness of her dress nor its delicate darker stripes. The long grass parted with a shushing sound as she approached. Just a dark-haired woman walking by a stream, he told himself, as the telltale signs grew worse: shakiness, confusion, and the treacherous conviction he sometimes had when listening to music: that something he had been born desiring but had never found might yet be within his grasp.
His feet moved; his lips smiled, and he heard himself say quite calmly, ‘But wasn’t that a shocking day? I had nightmares. I doubt if I’ll recover for months.’
‘Don’t things like that happen to you all the time?’ She looked at him so directly that he could feel himself blushing.
‘God, no!’ He laughed. ‘We soldiers are hardly ever in danger.’
‘Not even from married women?’
‘Once in a blue moon.’
She sounded put out that he had not answered honestly. ‘I’d heard that cavalry officers often console neglected wives.’
He said, ‘I suppose that’s better than compromising unmarried girls.’ She was smiling at him – ironically, he thought – and he found himself babbling defensively about the practice in many regiments of denying promotion to officers who married before reaching their mid-thirties. ‘So what’s to be done in the meantime? Live like monks?’
‘I understand the problem,’ she said, with a sympathy that surprised him. ‘Please don’t see me as an innocent. I knew all sorts before I married.’ His longing for her was like a deep thirst. Her poor face and neck had been burned by the sun during their ordeal the day before. ‘Why did you ask me to come here?’ she whispered.
He said wretchedly, ‘I owed it to you to say in person what I knew I had to. Your husband’s ready to lay down his life for us. How can I stab him in the back?’
‘He doesn’t care a jot for you or your men. He’s only interested in saving Mponda. That man always mattered more to him than anything …’ Her eyes were filling. ‘I may be dead in a month. We all may be.’
Seeing her close to tears, he could not bear to remain aloof. His right hand hovered over her shoulder, and his left clasped her arm. They embraced, and he tipped her straw hat back to prevent the brim from hitting his face. Then he kissed her lightly on her cheeks and throat, and with a long sigh of relaxation she let her body mould itself to his.
When they had drawn apart, he could not remember what had seemed so important to him minutes earlier. He thought of what might lie ahead, the deaths and suffering, and couldn’t understand why he had thought it more honourable to renounce Clara than to cherish her. Why should she be punished indefinitely for misplaced idealism and a foolish choice of husband? Francis’s eye was caught by some black-and-orange spotted beetles moving purposefully in the grass. He smiled to himself. While he weighed scruples, a world at his feet was going its own way.
They walked towards the palmyras. Beyond them, Francis knew they must choose different paths or risk being seen together. He recalled a boyhood daydream in which he was Sir Lancelot trapped in Guinevere’s chamber. Outside, armed knights were waiting to kill him when he emerged.
Ahead of them, a guinea fowl rose with a whir of wings. Suspecting someone must be hiding in the grass, Francis ran forwards. A dark-skinned figure darted across the path towards a belt of scrub. Francis raised his revolver, but felt such a blow on his wrist that he almost dropped it.
‘Don’t!’ gasped Clara, rubbing her hand where she had hit his arm. She was breathing hard from running after him. ‘It’s only Simon. Robert’s boy.’
‘You’re sure?’
>
‘Of course.’
‘Shouldn’t I try to frighten him?’
‘We don’t know if he saw anything.’
‘I could threaten him anyway.’
‘It wouldn’t work. He’d happily die for Robert.’
Francis kissed her again. ‘He won’t hurt you if he finds out?’
‘I doubt it.’
‘Will he believe the boy?’
‘Probably.’
They walked in silence beside the stream as brown flycatchers swooped across the water. ‘Dear God,’ he said. ‘One day I nearly get you killed; the next, I get you into this.’
‘No, Francis. We got ourselves into it.’
For all her courage, Francis sensed how shocked she was at being discovered. It was impossible to know how the missionary would react. He might rebuke Francis for immorality in front of his men. Or, out of pique, he might refuse to talk to Mponda. When Francis embraced Clara again, she clung to him. And as they kissed, tenderness and need awoke desire. He turned away from her for a moment, as if still able to choose another course. But he knew that the die was cast.
*
When Clara remembered the incredible coyness of much-chaperoned young ladies in Sarston, she could hardly credit her temerity. A murderer, in the eyes of the faithful, had been scarcely more iniquitous than the woman taken in adultery. Love affairs were ‘criminal liaisons’ – at best ‘squalid’. Even within marriage, passion was deplorable.
Yet it was after midnight, and here she was, waiting for Francis without any sense of guilt or shame. Quite the contrary: she was overwhelmed by a tormenting fear in case he failed to appear. On learning that she was sleeping in her husband’s Cape cart, he had given orders for a tent to be put up for her. Gazing at the taut canvas above her, Clara willed time onwards. The evening had passed so slowly that she wondered how her life would crawl on from one day to the next if he let her down.
That afternoon, he had taken her out shooting. For the last two nights, lions had been heard behind the hill: a threatening, primordial sound, the memory of which still had the power to frighten Clara in broad daylight. According to Francis, they dared approach humans only if they had first made a kill in the immediate vicinity, and the absence of vultures proved they had not.