The Heart of the Empire

by Philip McCutchan

  After a word with Commandant Opperman, the messenger came back and told the escort to bring Ogilvie forward. Halting him in front of Opperman, the leader handed over a sealed envelope from Wessels. Opperman broke the seal, brought out a letter, and read it quickly, glancing from time to time at Ogilvie.

  “You are Private Bland of the Kimberley Regiment, a disillusioned soldier — yes?”

  “Yes, Commandant.”

  Opperman tapped the letter. “I gather you haven’t come to join me as a soldier.”

  “No, Commandant. I am no soldier.”

  “No stomach for the fight, eh?”

  “No,” Ogilvie answered boldly.

  “You’re like many of our burghers, then!” Opperman’s nostrils flared and he glanced with disdain towards the pitifully thin columns of recruits. “Well — at least you’re honest, Private Bland! All day I’ve listened to excuses — farms that can’t be left, old parents who are sick — and half of them, even when they do join and are sent to the front, they lurk behind in their laagers and leave the fighting to their comrades of better spirit!”

  Opperman had spoken loudly; his words rang around the walls of the hall, and men glanced uncomfortably towards the angry red-haired figure, standing like a rock amidst shifting sands. More quietly Opperman said, “This is a time of great courage, but it is also a time of dismal cowardice. I don’t know in which category I should place you, Private Bland. Can you enlighten me?”

  Ogilvie shrugged: affected carelessness but felt a sharpening of all his senses as he realised that now was the vital moment when he would determine the fate of his mission, the moment when Opperman would get that first important impression. He said, “It’s not of any concern to me. I think you must decide, Commandant Opperman. I got out of Kimberley because I detested the way we — the British — were trying to impose our will and our ways on your people, whose land this is. Not only because I disliked starving! And I came also with a message … no doubt Commandant Wessels mentions this in his letter.”

  “Yes, he does. I see you know Mrs Gilmour.”

  “Yes. You see, I came partly for her sake.”

  “And risked the guns of both the British and the Afrikaners?”

  “It was the only way.” Ogilvie laughed. “Who can ever say, Commandant, where to draw a precise line between courage and cowardice?”

  Old Red Daniel gave an approving nod. “Well said, young man. And the message?”

  “I’d prefer to deliver it in private, Commandant.”

  “It is not a written message?”

  “No.”

  “I see. Very well — in that case, it shall be done as you wish. I’m wasting my time here anyway. Have I your word that you’ll behave yourself — and not try to kill me, or run away?”

  Ogilvie said, “I had no need to come at all, if I wished to run away when I’d got here.”

  “True! But you could have come to kill me, couldn’t you?”

  Ogilvie looked him in the eyes. “I haven’t come to kill you, Commandant.”

  “You swear that, a Bible oath?”

  “I swear it, upon my honour.”

  “The honour of a deserter, Private Bland?”

  Ogilvie flushed angrily.-”I may be a deserter, but I still have my standards, my personal honour, as a gentleman — ”

  “A gentleman, Private Bland?”

  “You should know, surely, that there are many of my station serving in the ranks at this moment, as volunteers.”

  “Yes,” Opperman said. “Yes, I do know that.” Suddenly he reached out and clapped Ogilvie on the shoulder. “I think I shall trust you. For one thing, you have no arms to kill me with!” He gave a deep, throaty laugh, and looked at the escort. “Your Commandant writes that he wants you back quickly — I’ll not detain you. You may leave your charge with me now. Refresh yourselves and your ponies, and then ride back to Kimberley. Give my regards to Commandant Wessels — and tell him I know he’ll hold the siege line at Kimberley as General Botha will hold it at Ladysmith! Mr Bland, you’ll come with me to my hotel.”

  *

  They walked through the streets of the town together and alone. Ogilvie’s pony had been left with the escort to go back to Kimberley where, Opperman said, Wessels would have need of all his transport. Making their way through the throngs of townspeople, all of them wearing Republican colours and once again looking with hostility at the British uniform, Ogilvie and Opperman talked little. Ogilvie was aware of the sharp sidelong glances, summing-up glances, that Old Red Daniel kept giving him as they went along. He felt somehow that Opperman was well disposed. towards him, and for that he guessed he had to thank Wessels’ invocation of the name of Mrs Gilmour. This guess was confirmed once they were in Opperman’s room and seated at a table before very welcome glasses of Dutch lager. Opperman started by saying, “You come from Mrs Gilmour. I am pleased to know she is still living, though she must be very old. How is she?”

  “As you said — very old.”

  “But well?”

  “Physically, yes. Her mind’s no longer strong.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” Old Red Daniel shook his head with apparently genuine sadness, then went on, “Wessels wrote of the diamond. You have it?”

  “Yes.”

  “May I see it, please?”

  “Of course.” Ogilvie brought out the small wash-leather packet, extracted the diamond and unwrapped the tissue-paper. He handed the stone to its namesake, and Old Red Daniel took it with a curious tenderness, placed it in the palm of his hand, and stared at it in silence for a long time, moving it a little so that it caught the light and its facets shone and glittered with richness.

  “So many, many years ago … I was a younger man then, and eager, and full of vigour! If it hadn’t been for Mrs Gilmour’s son — you know, of course, about that?”

  “Yes. You know that the son is dead, do you?”

  Opperman nodded. “I do, and am deeply sorry. I’m told he died in India, fighting the Afghans — in the Khyber Pass to be exact. His wife too.” He examined the diamond again, and there was a far-off look in his eyes. “So the Red Daniel went to his mother, though I know he had a daughter. You knew this?”

  “Mrs Gilmour spoke of her. I gathered … she wants the diamond to go to her grand-daughter eventually. I brought it only at her own insistence, as a password to yourself, Commandant Opperman.” He hesitated. “I feel responsible for its safe keeping. May I have it back?”

  “Of course.” Opperman handed the stone back. “Guard it well, Mr Bland. Guard it with your life! It belonged to a brave man whom I much respected. If anyone should steal it, he will have me to reckon with. And now the message: what is it?”

  “Mrs Gilmour wished me to tell you about the conditions in Kimberley.”

  “They’re bad?”

  “Very bad.” Ogilvie, doing his duty for Mr Rhodes, painted an appalling picture of starvation and disease and disaffection, conditions which, he said, were bringing the garrison close to the point of abject surrender. Opperman listened with full attention, nodding his head at intervals.

  “How does Mr Rhodes find his dealings with the military?” he asked when Ogilvie had finished.

  “With Colonel Kekewich, you mean? Oh, I’ve heard talk of disagreements, but that aspect is rather above my head really. I believe Mr Rhodes will oppose any suggestion of surrender, though.”

  “And Kekewich?”

  “I think he’ll have his hand forced. I think it could become a case of mob rule.”

  “Which will also overrule Mr Rhodes?”

  “Yes.”

  Opperman sat in silence for a while, deep in his own thoughts. “And Mrs Gilmour?” he asked eventually. “What are her views, her personal views?”

  Ogilvie said, “She’s very old, Commandant. She’s still patriotic, of course — you’d not expect anything else of her — but her age is making her see things differently. I believe she has had enough of death and trouble and fighting. I thi
nk — indeed I know — that she would much welcome the ending of all hostilities so long as the end was honourable for both sides. But that’s going ahead too far: her current wish is to see the lifting of the siege — ”

  “A wish in which she’ll not be alone!”

  “No, indeed. But she goes farther than others — inasmuch as she’s sent me to you for help.”

  “How can I help, Mr Bland?” Opperman ran a hand through his fiery red hair. “How can I help, except perhaps by seeing to it — for I have enough influence — that Mrs Gilmour is brought out in safety when the town falls to Wessels and his commandos?”

  “No, she’s not asking for that. It’s … Commandant, this is hard to put to you satisfactorily. I’ve already said, Mrs Gilmour is old and her mind is failing. She is, frankly, bordering on senility, I believe. She is obsessed by an idea … a deep belief that you, and you alone, Commandant, can arrange for the siege to end — that is, in victory for your people, an entry into the town — but, and this is I believe the point, with complete honour for Kimberley’s defenders.” Ogilvie spread his hands wide. “That’s the best I can do, the closest I can get to what she wanted me to tell you.”

  “And you left Kimberley for this?”

  “No. Only partly. I told you, I’d already made up my mind I was getting out.”

  Opperman seemed bewildered, not entirely to Ogilvie’s surprise. “Has the old lady any suggestions as to how I can possibly effect all this?”

  “None. She — ”

  “A siege can end only two ways: in its lifting by its relief, or in a final assault by the besiegers!”

  “Three ways — the third being surrender.”

  “Yes, three ways then.” Opperman pushed his chair back, shaking his head in what looked like real regret. “I can’t help, Mr Bland. The information you’ve given me as to the state of life in Kimberley is useful, and will be passed to the right quarter. You may have done a service to the people in the town in perhaps bringing their ordeal more quickly to an end. But as for poor Mrs Gilmour’s fancies … ” He threw his arms up. “What can I possibly do, Mr Bland?”

  “I’ve no idea. I’ve passed the message, I can’t say more. But I wish you could help, though of course I know you can’t. I tried to say as much to Mrs Gilmour, not wishing to raise her hopes, but there was a point I couldn’t pass without being cruel. Maybe I was a coward — but I couldn’t leave her entirely without hope.”

  Opperman nodded. “You did right, perhaps. Yes, I think you did right. But I repeat, I cannot help. I too am a patriot, Mr Bland, and I can’t weaken our effort. Kimberley must be brought down by any means available, so must Ladysmith and Mafeking. No other consideration can be allowed — this would be an indulgence and we can’t afford indulgences! Do you understand my position, Mr Bland?”

  “Of course I do. We’ll say no more about it. My job’s done in any case.” Ogilvie finished his lager.

  “And you, Mr Bland? What are your plans for yourself?”

  “Isn’t that rather up to you, Commandant?”

  Opperman didn’t answer directly; he stared sombrely at Ogilvie for a while, frowning and running his powerful fingers through his hair. Then he said, “You have guts, Mr Bland! You have delivered yourself along with Mrs Gilmour’s message, you have walked into enemy hands, well knowing what the result might be.”

  “Not enemy hands, Commandant. I don’t regard your people as enemies. I have no quarrel with you, none at all. And there’s one thing certain now: I can’t fall in with British troops, nor can I go home to England.”

  “You realised this before you left Kimberley?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then what do you want, Mr Bland?”

  “Why, to stay in South Africa! It’s all that’s open to me now.” He laughed. “I’d not be welcome anywhere in the Empire, would I? Australia, Canada, New Zealand … no, I must stay here, and hope for an Afrikaner victory.”

  “And the Red Daniel? Do you sell that, Mr Bland, and live on the proceeds?”

  “Certainly not!” Ogilvie flushed with anger that was not entirely simulated. “I shall see it’s returned to Mrs Gilmour, or perhaps to her grand-daughter.”

  “Have you any other money?”

  “In England. Not here. I may be able to get some sent out, but it’ll be a tricky business, Commandant.”

  “For a deserter, yes! And if it proves to be … too tricky, Mr Bland, what then?”

  Ogilvie shrugged. “Really, I’ve no idea. I’ll just have to find work, won’t I? I dare say I can turn my hand to a number of things if I try. Farming, perhaps. I’d sooner that, than work in the cities.” He hesitated, scanning Old Red Daniel’s face for hopeful signs but failing to find them. “If you have any ideas or suggestions, Commandant Opperman, I’d be glad to hear them. As a matter of fact … ”

  “Yes, Mr Bland?”

  “Mrs Gilmour did suggest you might be willing to help me get settled.”

  Opperman gave another deep laugh. “Settled — in time of war? We are all of us unsettled to a very high degree, Mr Bland!”

  “Yes, but surely — ”

  “I am sorry.” Opperman lifted a hand. “I know of no way in which I can help. You are from England. Even though you say you have sympathy for our people, I think our people would find it hard to help you in conditions as they are today. Nevertheless, I will say this, Mr Bland: since we share a friendship with Mrs Gilmour, I shall see what there is I can ‘do — but I make no promises of success. In the meantime, of course, there is the question of your personal safety.”

  “I’m in danger, Commandant?

  Opperman smiled. “You are in enemy territory, Mr Bland, whatever you care to regard it as! Certainly you are in danger, and I can’t very well put a placard on you, can I, saying ‘Approved by Commandant Opperman’!”

  “Then you do approve me?”

  “I like the look of you, yes. You have tried to do a service. I am, of course, bearing in mind other possibilities — for instance, that you could have stolen the Red Daniel from Mrs Gilmour and are making use of it to get my help so that you can live. But I confess I do not see this in your face when I look at you, and I am accustomed to summing men up.”

  Ogilvie inclined his head with a touch of irony in the gesture. “Thank you, Commandant.”

  “I shall trust you therefore. In any case, any untruths will emerge when Kimberley is relieved, for I shall get in touch with Mrs Gilmour then. Now — let us consider your safety. There is only one thing I can do, and that is, to hold you as a prisoner of war, at any rate for the time being — ”

  “No, not that!” With an almost involuntary movement, Ogilvie got to his feet. As he did so, he saw Opperman’s hand slide towards the revolver-butt in its holster, but Ogilvie remained standing, staring down at the Boer leader. A prison camp would be the end of his mission, and up in Egypt Lord Kitchener, if accounts of him were to be believed, would froth at the mouth. “I didn’t get out of Kimberley just to go back into something similar, let me tell you — ”

  “Similar but different. No fighting, and an assured supply of food. I would probably send you to Pretoria, where we have many British — including your Mr Churchill of the Morning Post, son of one of your politicians. A brave young man, who worked for an hour under fire to free a locomotive that one of our commandos had ambushed with boulders. You would be in good company there, Mr Bland.”

  “Perhaps! I’d sooner stay here — ”

  “We have no compound here and there aren’t the men to spare for guards — ”

  “You’d need to escort me to Pretoria and that takes men.”

  “Three only, Mr Bland, three only, and on temporary duty at that. I’m sorry, but there it is. You have my assurance that it’ll not be known to your fellow prisoners that you’re a deserter.” Old Red Daniel got to his feet, ponderously, and stood facing Ogilvie. “Come now — take this in good part! I shall have you in mind, and when the time is right, I shall do what I c
an to help you. When the war is over, and we have won South Africa, I shall be your good friend, Mr Bland.” He laid a hand once again on his revolver. “Now I’m taking you to the police station, to await an escort. Come.”

  Ogilvie could do nothing but obey. His orders were clear: to win Old Red Daniel Opperman’s confidence, which would not be done by strong-arm tactics. Thinking fast, he decided on a move that should be a step in the right direction: much as he disliked parting with it, he brought out the diamond and thrust it towards Opperman. “Take the Red Daniel,” he said. “It’ll be safer with you than in a prison compound — if that is where you’re determined to send me.”

  Opperman nodded, and took the diamond in its wash-leather bag. “Thank you. You have my complete assurance of its safety. I promise you that.” Smiling suddenly, he took his hand away from his revolver-butt. “I shall not need the gun,” he said. “Let us walk out as friends, eh?”

  “All right, Commandant.”

  They left the room together, side by side, and went down the stairs into the small entrance hall where a native woman was on hands and knees brushing the carpet. Out into the street, beneath a hot sun, into a mixture of smells, of mimosa, of horses, of corn from a nearby store. There were not many people about: a few women, shopping with their children, some natives going about their masters’ business, a handful of farmers in from the country, and a couple of wagons creaking slowly past along the dusty street. Ogilvie saw the man from the corner of his eye, the man standing back against the wall at the angle of the hotel, a man with madly staring eyes who came away from the wall and began shouting obscenities at Opperman, a man holding a rifle pointed at Old Red Daniel’s heart. In the next second as the shooting started, Ogilvie changed the pattern of his future very nicely.