Hervey 10 - Warrior

by Allan Mallinson

  'You shall first have to wake me!'

  'Depend upon it! And . . .' his voice changed, 'what of the dragoons at Dukuza?'

  'Buried. We saw to that. And French read a few words over them. More seemly, I thought, than my doing so.'

  Hervey nodded, which by the light of the torch Fairbrother took to be approval (in truth it was more a gesture of resignation). He wished no man dead in another's place, but he was relieved that French had not been with the others at Dukuza: a last-minute change of duty – the haphazard fortune of war.

  The dragoons, for all their relief at finding haven, tramped in wearily. Hervey hailed each of them, all but a couple by name. Corporal McCarthy was last man.

  'Good morning, sor!'

  Hervey's spirits lifted. The old hands might still call McCarthy (who had first been an infantryman) the footiest dragoon on a horse, but his cheeriness in all circumstances was worth three sabres. 'Corporal McCarthy, there is no serjeant here.Would you be so good as to take local rank?'

  'Local rank? I will, sor. Easy come, easy go!'

  Hervey smiled. McCarthy's rank had come and gone throughout his service. It was just a pity – if he could think of it as mildly as mere pity – that Collins was at Nonoti still, and Wainwright at Cape Town. With those two he would have been certain of having men about him who would instinctively make the right decision (and, as God knew it, they had precious few men here to risk making anything but the right one).

  While the nigh-exhausted dragoons were doing what they could to revive themselves and their troopers, Hervey handed his torch to one of Ngwadi's men, and slipped out of the kraal to accustom his eyes to the darkness once more. There was no real need of it: if there were Zulu out there, Corporal Cox's picket would detect them. But it helped him compose his mind to the trial ahead. And trial he knew there would be. The dragoons had seen nothing on their approach march, but as Fairbrother readily conceded, this might as easily mean the Zulu hid themselves. Yesterday, Mbopa's men had been here. Where were they now? They had had a sharp check, it was true – none, though, but that Mbopa could have expected with so small a number. Hervey was certain it had been a reconnaissance in force, to test the defences of the kraal, to make Ngwadi show his strength – or lack of it. He could only presume that reinforcements were indeed marching here at warrior-speed this very moment, as the herd boys said. And if they possessed the stamina of Fairbrother's guide, they might be here now.

  Every man in the kraal was standing to his arms, whether spear, rifle or sabre. They were as secure as in any of the fortresses of Spain: firing the thorn stockade could not drive them out, for even if they had been ringed with flame, the kraal was large enough for them to form in the centre (and fire-blackened thorn was no easier to penetrate). Hervey had put Welsh in charge of the inner defences, for with the admirable Corporal Cox in command of the picket work, the riflemen had no need of an officer. Welsh could communicate well enough with Ngwadi's lieutenants. Need any of them venture from the kraal, therefore? His instinct told him they must: to allow Mbopa the initiative, when there was little hope of exterior relief, was to risk a surprise they would be ill-balanced to deal with.

  He congratulated himself that he had, at least, timed things as well as he had, for as the assemblage was taking post, the first shafts of sunlight were broaching the eastern horizon. He slipped back inside the kraal, and the sentries made fast the hurdle.

  Slowly the darkness gave way to shadows, and then to that curious, hovering half light in which there was no colour, only shapes and forms, and from this to morning, like a stage revealed. A glorious morning, as elemental as those he had known in Bengal, the scent of the land in the air, the essence of the country in one breath . . .

  And then, as if he had blinked and another curtain had risen, there was the dread sight before him: five hundred yards away, no more, a long, black line stretching for half a mile, the right flank where the sun rose, the left on a hill just high enough to overlook the kraal. Hervey had Somervile's telescope, and standing on the platform from which the sentries observed, he swept the line.

  The warriors stood by their shields – five hundred men, by his rapid reckoning. Even with the return of most his dragoons, now, they would have the devil of a job of it.

  Somervile came striding, although Hervey had asked him to stay at his hut, so that in a sudden alarm there could be no confusion in finding him. 'Good God!' he gasped on seeing the host, standing stock-still except to check his pistols were still in his belt.

  'Somervile, I asked you—'

  Four shots rang out in quick succession, thick white smoke indicating where the picket lay, prone, at the edge of the mealie planting. Hervey took up his telescope again, forgetting his irritation.

  'Well done, riflemen,' he exclaimed, their marksmanship exceptional. 'Three down, perhaps a fourth – I couldn't see all the line at once.' Nor was it just their marksmanship which inspired his esteem: it was their address, for he had given them no particular orders – and the senior of them but a 'chosen man'.

  Another four shots – the second barrels.

  'Upon my word, I never saw better shooting. Four hit, and almost next to each other!'

  The line remained still.

  In half a minute the picket fired again, and then the second barrels, and with equal accuracy.

  Yet the line stood rooted.

  'Corporal Cox!' bellowed Hervey, keen to seize the opportunity.

  The corporal came doubling. 'Sir!'

  'Take out all your riflemen. Get up the briskest fire. Drive them off their perch!'

  'Ay, sir!'

  'Can they do the trick, Hervey?' asked Somervile, sounding doubtful.

  'I have no idea. But if yon black line stands obligingly it'll be a deal whittled down in ten minutes!'

  If the line merely withdrew to cover, he would be content – but even if it began to advance he would take satisfaction, for he would have forced Mbopa's hand. The initiative was a damned fine thing to gain at the beginning of an affair thus!

  The line stood for a quarter of an hour. Or rather, that part of it stood which was not knocked down by Corporal Cox and his riflemen. Hervey could scarcely believe that the Zulu held their ground against such accurate fire. He swept back and forward with his 'scope, trying to find some clue to their resolution. 'Boys, in all likelihood. The first courage.' He swore beneath his breath at Mbopa's cynical play with their inexperience.

  The smoke had thickened to a dense fog on the right of the line of rifles, the sun not yet hot enough to disperse it.

  Hervey suddenly stiffened. What if these Zulu were a decoy? He looked about for Ngwadi, seeing him standing just outside the sango, and hailed him. 'Nkosi, your warriors, there and there,' (pointing to either flank of the firing line) 'ikhulu . . . I need a hundred.'

  Ngwadi had his men assembled in moments.

  Hervey jumped from the platform and ran back to the horses, loosing the mare he had ridden the day before and vaulting astride.

  Fairbrother and the dragoons were saddling up as fast as they could.

  'Keep them out of sight till I call!' he shouted over his shoulder, beckoning to Ngwadi to have him and his men follow as he galloped out.

  'Hervey, what . . .' But all Somervile could do was watch as the press of warriors burst from the kraal, their chief at the head.

  They beat Mbopa's men to the ground by a mere half-minute: for as if from out of the earth itself now sprang his best, the veterans, fifty and more on each flank, like a flash-flood. Without Ngwadi's men they would have overwhelmed the rifles in seconds.

  Hervey galloped hard for the picket. In their determined sharpshooting they had not seen the peril on their flanks. 'Up, Rifles! Up! Up!' he bellowed hoarsely, as Ngwadi's men rushed to counter the veterans.

  He managed somehow to get them to their feet. And then as they saw the trap they ran like the wind.

  He only managed to rally them at the entrance to the kraal.

  'Hervey, wha
t happened there?' barked Somervile, now atop his horse.

  'A deuced clever ruse. I should have seen it earlier. This ground is the devil!'

  Corporal Cox had got his riflemen formed again, directing their fire on Mbopa's veterans, though the fight with Ngwadi's men was so entangled as to be a tricky thing for bullets.

  'Those fellows, the Rifles: they looked as if they'd run all morning!' gasped Somervile, his excited gelding pulling defiantly.

  'Oh, they all do that at some time or other,' replied Hervey, impatiently, returning his sabre and trying to make out where was Ngwadi. 'The point is whether or not they'll rally. And they have. What are you doing?'

  'Hervey, I can't sit on my backside while—'

  But out from the kraal burst the rest of Ngwadi's warriors, eager for the fray.

  'Christ! Get back! Get back!' yelled Hervey, turning his horse to try to halt them. 'Get back, damn you! Get back, I say!'

  Even had he shouted in perfect Zulu they were in no mind to hear. There was battle without, their chief was in the midst of it, and no warrior could remain inside with his honour intact.

  'I must see what they do!' declared Somervile, breathily.

  'No, Somervile, I beg you would remain here. We may very well have to gallop for it. Where's Pampata?'

  'I . . .'

  Hervey cursed, and reined about.

  Corporal French was there, his coverman once more, and exactly where a coverman ought to be, except that he had not been given much chance of it these past days. 'Corp' French, detail a dragoon to guard the Zulu woman!'

  'Which Zulu woman, Colonel?'

  'Pampata, damn it!'

  French shook his head. 'Sir, I . . .'

  Hervey realized. 'Captain Fairbrother knows.'

  'Sir!'

  French made back into the kraal.

  Hervey now turned to see Ngwadi's men at last getting the better of the veterans – or at least holding them off. 'Corporal Cox, stand ready to retake your ground.'

  'Sir!'

  'I think, Somervile, that we may allow ourselves a little satisfaction,' said Hervey, his expression now eased.

  'Not nearly as many of them as we feared,' agreed his old friend.

  But scarcely had Hervey allowed himself that satisfaction when Mbopa revealed another hand. Half a mile to their right, on a low, grassy hill, a long line of warriors stood up, like the Guards at Waterloo, and let out a chilling Huzu-u-u! which carried to the kraal as if by a hundred speaking trumpets.

  'The devil!' spat Hervey. 'What's his game?'

  Corporal Cox at once had his riflemen form right to open a harassing fire.

  'You mean why does he divide his force so?' asked Somervile, his gelding beginning to paw the ground impatiently.

  'Yes. He showed five hundred to begin with, and then another hundred at least in that ruse to outflank the picket – and two hundred yonder, now. More than enough to break into the kraal if he used them all together.'

  'Perhaps he fears our firearms?'

  Hervey nodded, if uncertainly. 'He acts with caution; that much seems true. I wasn't of a mind to put great store by it, but those herd boys' "thousand warriors" looks not so wide of the mark. And if they're exactly correct, there's another two hundred or so which Mbopa's yet to commit.'

  The riflemen began taking a toll, but at half a mile it was not heavy.

  'A few whiffs of grapeshot would serve,' said Hervey, coldly, searching with his telescope for what he could learn of these newshown warriors.

  The line began advancing.

  'I perceive another ploy!' Hervey looked about, weighing his options. The main body of Zulus, four or five hundred, stood motionless two furlongs off. What was left of the attempt to envelop the picket – twenty or so warriors – were making away as fast as they could, pursued by some of Ngwadi's men, although the chief had rallied the bulk of them in good order and was drawing them up to face the main body. There, things would be evenly matched. On the right, however, two hundred more of Mbopa's warriors would be closing with them in the space of ten minutes. It was not as he had wanted it – by far the greater part of the defenders' strength now outside the kraal, and perhaps two hundred more of Mbopa's men yet to show. How would Mbopa use them?

  The left flank was open; unwatched, even. He must at least post a couple of men to cover it. He could see that, inside the kraal, Welsh had fifty or so of Ngwadi's men in hand (and he would need them to guard the walls, so to speak), and the twenty dragoons stood ready. He had not wanted to show them until the last moment, when the sudden appearance of horses and sabres – and if necessary the carbine fire – would have their greatest effect. But the left flank . . .

  'What to do, Hervey?' Fairbrother had come to his side, unbidden. He took in the situation at a glance.

  Hervey was ever glad of his friend's knack of placing himself to advantage. 'See those fellows yonder?' He pointed to the advancing line.

  Fairbrother nodded. It was all he needed.

  Hervey would have directed a couple of dragoons to the left flank, but with only twenty, he decided on riflemen. 'Corporal Cox!'

  'Sir!'

  'Capital shooting. The dragoons will front them now. Keep up a supporting fire, but have two men go onto yonder flank' (he indicated the left) 'and keep a watch there.'

  'Sir!'

  'What would you have me do, Hervey?' demanded Somervile, his face red with the exertion of keeping his increasingly hard-to-hold gelding in hand.

  In truth, Hervey was not much concerned what his old friend did, as long as he kept at arm's length from trouble. He sighed. 'Since you will not retire into the kraal—'

  'I won't skulk in there while everyone else stands to arms out here! Infamous example!'

  Hervey had to check his instinct to say that it would make not the slightest difference to any of them what example he set. 'Since you will not accept my principal advice, I must ask that you remain in this position and be ready at any moment to quit the place altogether.'

  But Somervile was not to be persuaded. He ever liked the smell of powder and the shout of the captains, and, besides, the little prominence not a hundred yards to their left afforded as good a line of escape as it did a place of observation. He dug his spurs into his gelding's flanks.

  Hervey cursed foully. He would now have to detach a dragoon as coverman. He turned to see how Fairbrother and the quarter troop were faring.

  Thank God! They were mounted and making to leave as if riding out of barracks for exercise.

  He turned back to see if the main body of Zulus was moving yet.

  But in that space of seconds, all was overturned. Somervile, coming onto the knoll whence he would observe the field, blundered into half a dozen of Mbopa's veterans who had lain concealed for such a moment. His horse shied, he lost his balance and his pistol, and took the point of an iklwa in his leathered calf.

  Hervey dug in his spurs as his old friend lashed about wildly with his sabre.

  But it was Fairbrother who got there first. He drove straight between Somervile and the nearest spear, cutting viciously at what would have been the lethal hand.

  The warriors reeled at the sudden and unfamiliar, horse and blade. Two of them fell to the sabre's edge, and another to Somervile's second pistol.

  Fairbrother's charger was disobliging, however, and circled large.

  But Hervey had closed fast. He dropped the reins and drew his flintlock with his left hand, pulling back the hammer and firing into the face of a fourth warrior in one motion, his sabre cutting at the next. He put his horse at another, and the point finished the tumbled warrior.

  The one remaining turned and ran. Hervey drew a second pistol, took angry aim, and brought him down at thirty yards.

  'Somervile, you damned fool!' he bellowed as he turned, shaking with rage. 'You are not a soldier! Do as I say, for Christ's sake!'

  Somervile looked thoroughly shaken. Indeed, he looked defeated.

  'The kraal, now!'

  'My
dear Hervey,' he replied feebly, as if lost. 'I'm excessively grateful to you . . . and to you, Captain Fairbrother. I . . .'

  Hervey cleared his throat. 'Forgive me; I spoke roughly. You fought like the devil.'

  Corporal French had now joined them.

  Hervey turned to him. 'Convey Sir Eyre to the kraal, if you please, Corp' French.'

  'Colonel!'

  'With your leave, Hervey?' asked Fairbrother, nodding towards the dragoons as they formed front midway to the advancing line of Zulus.