by John Wilcox
‘Agreed.’ The Colonel waved in a motion of dismissal, then paused. ‘Before you go, tell me one more thing.’
‘Sir?’
‘Why are you so unhappy at the prospect of staying in the army?’
Simon frowned. What to say? ‘It’s, well, rather personal, sir.’
‘Anything to do with Covington?’
How far to go? Attack his former CO, who had suspected him of cowardice, hounded him for two years and then falsely accused him of desertion in the face of the enemy? Simon fixed his gaze on the tent wall behind Lamb’s head and took a deep breath. Go the whole way . . . ‘Yes, it has. With no disrespect, sir, I have not been impressed by the standard of serving British officers, either at home in peacetime soldiering or out here, on active service. Colonel Covington was allowed to conduct a campaign of persecution of me, a junior officer in his command, for eighteen months back home and then bring a charge of cowardice against me here in Natal. In addition to that, at Isandlwana, mistakes were made in conducting the defence of the camp that I find hard to forgive. We lost so many men needlessly that day, some of them my friends.’ In for a penny, in for a pound. He took a breath to continue, but the Colonel interrupted impatiently.
‘But Covington wasn’t there. It wasn’t his fault.’
‘No, sir. I know that. But the General’s enquiry seems to have put the fault for the defeat on the fact that the native levies broke and fled. That wasn’t the real reason. I was there and I saw it.’ Simon’s pace hurried now, as the indignation took over. ‘Firstly, the camp was left open and unlaagered. It was easy for the Zulus to rush us once the ammunition ran out. And that’s the second point: the ammunition did run out - not because we didn’t have enough but because the damned screws and the steel bands had rusted into the boxes. We just couldn’t get them open. The Zulus were upon us before we could get cartridges to the line. The men had virtually nothing left and our volley firing just died away. The Zulus saw that. They were not fools.’
Simon was now looking indignantly at Lamb. ‘Sir, this column had been in enemy country for several weeks and no one bothered to check the ammunition reserves. It was poor soldiering and the officers were to blame, not the black levies.’
The Colonel snorted. ‘Dammit, Fonthill, mistakes occur on a campaign, you know that. Anyway, we’ve now won the war and finished off the Zulus once and for all. Ulundi was a perfectly executed battle.’
‘With respect, sir, we fought the battle from a defensive square just as though we were at Waterloo, sixty-four years ago. If the Zulus had not attacked so bravely we would probably still be looking for them now. I saw no evidence of generalship there. Anyway, it was terribly one-sided. They had spears and incredible guts. We had Martini-Henrys, Gatling guns and cannon. It was like shooting fish in a barrel.’
The two men faced each other across the table, the tension almost visible between them. Eventually, a rueful smile crept across the face of the Chief of Staff. ‘Hmmmn.’ He rubbed his jaw. ‘I see what you mean about your determination not to serve again. Your . . . opinions are not quite what we would expect from a young officer.’
‘Exactly, sir.’
‘And Covington?’
‘The last time I saw him I promised to stick an assegai in him the next time we met.’
‘How charming of you, Fonthill.’ For the first time both men laughed together. Then Lamb’s face became thoughtful and he walked slowly round the table to join Simon. ‘After hearing all that, I really ought to put you under arrest. But look,’ he said, ‘I have an idea. I want you for intelligence work - out in the field, working on your own, or with this bright Welshman, if you like. You’ve shown you can do that, adapting to a strange environment and all that. But it’s not a task that can be carried out while staying within the confines of normal army discipline. And you certainly won’t have to work closely with the type of regimental officer,’ the Colonel’s voice took on a dry note, ‘whom you don’t exactly seem to admire.’
He leaned against the tent pole. ‘You know I’m an Indian Army man, out here on secondment?’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Ever hear of the Guides?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Part of the Indian Army. Raised in the Punjab and patrol the North West Frontier. Wonderful bunch of men - cavalry and infantry. Indian troops, of course.’ He smiled. ‘Not exactly regular, y’know. In fact, damned irregular. Work as much in native dress as they do in uniform. I could get you a captaincy in the Guides, with sergeant’s rank for your man. Easy enough to do a transfer that way, from the home force to the Indian, though more difficult t’other way round. Chaps who are finding things a bit expensive in the line regiments do it all the time, though this doesn’t apply to you, o’course. Pay’s not bad - and, of course, you would be away from the men you admire so much in Her Majesty’s regular army. What do you think?’
‘Well, if I have to stay in the army, that sounds pretty good to me.’
‘Good. There is one very final point, Fonthill, and in view of what you have said, it is not unimportant.’ Colonel Lamb drew himself to his full height and the word ‘bantam’ came into Simon’s mind. ‘As I said, I am going to India too, to be Roberts’s chief of staff and to take charge - among other things - of this intelligence work. This means you would report to me. Now, how do you feel about that? I don’t want you threatening me with an assegai or - even worse - mopin’ around all bitter and twisted like a rusty corkscrew.’
The two men regarded each other from either side of the tent pole. ‘I could live with that, sir,’ said Simon, half smiling at the challenging, combative face before him. ‘But no more playing dirty, please.’
The blue eyes twinkled again. ‘Only if I have to.’
They shook hands and, clutching his envelopes, Simon re-emerged into the morning sunlight. He looked around and the sentry nodded to his left. There lay Jenkins, fast asleep, curled innocently around a tent peg, one arm hanging from the guy rope. ‘I tried to get ’im to move, sir,’ said the sentry, ‘but he . . . er . . . was a bit rude, like. I was goin’ to call the guard.’
‘No need,’ said Simon. ‘We’re off now anyway.’
With his toe he gently stirred the sleeping Welshman, who disentangled himself from the guy rope and scratched himself. ‘Gawd, you’ve bin ages,’ he yawned. ‘I almost dozed off. What’s happenin’, then? We goin’ to be shot, is it?’
‘No.’ Simon gathered up the reins of the horses. ‘Worse than that. We’re back in the army.’
‘What? What?’ Jenkins’s consternation was real, and in his haste to catch Simon, his foot slipped from the stirrup as he tried to mount. ‘Not me, boyo,’ he called plaintively after Simon. ‘Oh no. Not me.’ The sentry watched in disbelief as the strange couple rode away, the shorter one behind calling after the slim young man, who rode on, down to the Tugela ferry crossing, a half-smile on his face.
As they crossed, Simon began telling Jenkins of what had ensued with the Colonel. The Welshman listened quietly, occasionally pulling at his moustache. Across on the Zululand side of the river, John Dunn, formerly one of King Cetswayo’s indunas and now chief of intelligence for the southern column of Lord Chelmsford’s army, had erected his own tents away from the mud of the main campsite. Simon was glad to find that Dunn was away so that he was able to complete the briefing of Jenkins without interruption. Jenkins gave no response but walked slowly to a large bowl, where he had left the washing. He lifted a shirt from the tub.
‘Ah, bach, what on earth did you do to this shirt? I can’t get rid of this stain no how, see.’
Simon inspected the wet lump thrust under his nose. ‘Hmmn. Red wine, I think. Sorry, 352.’
‘Well, I can’t do much with it.’ Jenkins slapped the shirt between hands as wide as paddles. Then his face lit up. ‘Tell you what,’ he beamed. ‘Tell the girls it’s blood. Marks of a wound received in a terrible fight against the savage Zulu.’
Simon smiled. Jenkins was get
ting round to it, he knew. The Welshman looked down at the shirt and spoke without glancing up. ‘So we’re goin’ to swap the savage Zulu for the savage Afghan, is it?’
‘Sort of. Though I hope we won’t be exactly fighting him. More a question of getting to know him and of reporting on his movements, that sort of thing.’ Simon waited. Jenkins’s reaction was vital. Despite the Colonel’s threat, Simon would refuse to go to India if Jenkins did not accompany him. Life in the field without the Welshman would be unthinkable.
A sniff came from beneath the big moustache. ‘I don’t think I’d be much good at spyin’, wearin’ turbans and all that.’
‘Well, I’m not sure that I’ll be much good at that either. But the Colonel seems to think that we would make a better job of it than the people doing it now.’
The sniff came again. ‘So I’ll have to start calling you sir again, salutin’ and so on?’
‘No, not really. Not to me, anyhow, and I don’t think we will be seeing much of the regular army.’
Jenkins smoothed out the shirt. ‘Well, if you go, I’ll go. You’ll need me to look after you.’
‘Rubbish. I don’t need a bloody nursemaid.’
‘You do when you’re tryin’ to sit on a horse.’
‘Oh, come on. I’m much better than I used to be.’
Jenkins suddenly smiled, his teeth all the whiter beneath the black moustache. ‘Sergeant, eh? Well, well, well. What will they think about that back home, eh, bach?’
‘They’ll be as astounded as me. Come on. You’ve got to pack. We leave for Durban in the morning.’
Simon crept into his tiny bell tent, sat on his trestle bed and opened the letter from General Roberts to Lamb. It had been written from Gandamak, the border town in eastern Afghanistan where the treaty had been signed, and dated 26 May, six weeks before. It was in two parts. The first was couched in formal language, penned in a clerkly hand, and had obviously been dictated. It updated Lamb on the situation and told Simon nothing that the Colonel had not already related. The second, much shorter, slanted across the pages in a scrawl that exuded urgency. It had been written by Roberts himself, a few hours after the treaty had been signed, and concentrated on his intelligence needs. It was clear that the General had little confidence in the agreement made with the Afghans.
The Afghans are an essentially arrogant and conceited people. No great battle has yet been fought and the Afghans have nowhere suffered serious loss. It is not to be wondered at if the fighting men in distant villages and in and around Kabul, Ghazni, Herat, Balkh and other places still consider themselves undefeated and capable of defying us.
Both Stewart and Browne are withdrawing their columns. I am to stay and a mission is to go to Kabul, with just a small contingent of Guides to join them. I have fears for their safety but my intelligence is most ineffective.
Look here, Baa-Baa, I need you quickly to organise this. Neither the nature of the country nor the attitude of its people permit me to make effective reconnaissance. Afghan sources are not to be trusted and the political officers, whose job this is, have proved to be useless in conditions of war.
I have heard about Isandlwana and I am sorry about it. But you should have no trouble in quelling the Zulus now with the resources I understand you are receiving. So please get out here as soon as you can. I have cleared this with Delhi and London and I know that Chelmsford will let you go. You will need help. Bring with you whoever you trust. This affair will undoubtedly get worse. Our treaty has only brought us a little respite. The Russians are still behind it all . . .
Simon put down the closely written pages, lay back on the bed and closed his eyes in concentration. He knew little of Roberts except that he had fought that fine action on the ridges of Peiwa Kotal, and that Lamb clearly idolised him. The Pathans of the Afghan hills had fought the British for years. They were renowned as fine, if ill-disciplined warriors, but fierce and cruel. To be captured by them could mean being killed by slow torture. Simon frowned as he forced himself to contemplate this. The women of the tribes were supposed to do the business, he recalled. They used knives and hot coals . . .
He lay quietly for a moment. No. He remained physically unaffected by the prospect. No perspiration. No slump of the heart and dryness of the mouth. Had he cured himself at last of his fear - fear of the actuality and, even worse, of the unknown? Well, there was only one way to find out: go there and see.
His thoughts turned to the nature of the work. Roberts wanted intelligence: information about tribal movements and notice of confederation against him; news of massing in the hills, the size of the gatherings and likely direction of strike; that sort of thing. But if the experts on the spot - what were they called, political officers? - couldn’t provide this, with all their knowledge of the country and the people, how on earth could he? Simon sat up quickly. To hell with it! If Lamb felt he could do it, then he could. If he could fight the Zulu, he could fight the Afghan. And of course - he smiled - Jenkins could fight anyone.
That evening, Simon put on as clean a shirt as Jenkins could find for him, struggled into his only other pair of breeches - he had long ago given away his army uniform - and re-crossed the Tugela. He turned right along the riverbank, skirting the periphery of the camp, until he found a small stream. He followed it away from the camp until it reached a quiet clearing where half a dozen tents were pitched, each at a distance from the other. A notice nailed to a tree announced that this was the ‘Newspaper Compound’. He saw a familiar black figure laying a fire before one of the tents.
‘George. Where is Miss Griffith?’
‘In the tent, baas. Shall I call her?’
‘Yes please.’
Simon dismounted, tied the reins loosely to a bush and waited. Eventually, a slim young woman in her mid twenties emerged from one of the tents and hurried over to him, tying back long fair hair into a bun at the nape of her neck. She was dressed purposefully in a simple cotton blouse, riding breeches and long boots, and her bronzed face broke into a smile of greeting.
Without hesitation she kissed him on the cheek, put her arm through his and walked with him back towards her tent.
‘I haven’t seen you since Ulundi,’ she said. ‘What did you think of the battle? It was my first, and I have to say, I took no joy in it. Tell me, what did you think?’
As she referred to the battle, she frowned and her grey eyes looked with concern into Simon’s. She was not conventionally pretty, the set of her jaw and the line of her mouth giving her perhaps too masculine an air, but her figure was tall and slim, her skin clear, her cheekbones high and her hair the colour of soft honey. Alice Griffith was attractive enough to have turned many a head since she first arrived in South Africa nine months ago. Now, her earnest enquiry and the concern of her gaze made it difficult for Simon to resist a smile. He must not smile, though. She hated condescension.
‘I suppose, Alice,’ he said, ‘no battles are very edifying. We had to shoot down the Zulus before they could get to the square and then . . . then ...’ he hesitated for a moment, because the memory was unpleasant, ‘then we had to send out the cavalry to hunt them down to make sure the defeat was complete.’
‘I know. I saw it. I rode out after the Lancers and saw them do it. Do you know, Simon,’ she swung him round so that she could look into his eyes, ‘most of those natives had thrown away their weapons and were trying to run away. Some just lay down and put their shields over their heads. It was pathetic. But the cavalry still killed them with their lances, as though they were spearing pigs.’ The grey eyes filled with tears. ‘It was just sport to them. Brutal. Brutal.’
Simon blinked at her vehemence and marvelled anew at the change in the girl he had first met three years ago. Then, to confound their parents’ scheming, she had made him confess that there was no love between them and agree that they would become good friends. But that was long ago, and it was a woman of the world who confronted him now. Then, as he held her gaze, the fire slowly died from her eyes and sh
e smiled.
‘Sorry. I know it’s not your fault.’ She shouted to her servant. ‘George. Tea. Quickly now.’ She ducked into the tent and emerged with two small camp chairs, and they sat together in front of the fire which George had succeeded in lighting. ‘Now,’ said Alice comfortably, ‘what are you up to?’
‘Well, I do have something to tell you.’ He related his meeting with Lamb. To his surprise, she was not at all disconcerted by the revelation that the Colonel knew of her forgery. She simply shrugged her shoulders and buried her nose in the tea mug.
‘Well, he was too smart not to find out sometime. But it was good of him to keep it quiet - even if he has used it to blackmail you.’ She laughed. ‘Shrewd old devil.’ She gave Simon a cool glance. ‘But he obviously thinks a great deal of you to use his dirty trick to get you to go to Afghanistan.’ She nodded thoughtfully. ‘Simon, I must say that you have grown, well, much older, my dear, in the last eighteen months.’
Simon laughed ruefully. ‘You mean that I have grown up. Well, I suppose I have, and perhaps not before time.’
The sun had long since gone and the flames from the camp fire threw shadows across Alice’s face. They gave golden highlights to her hair and silhouetted the gentle thrust of the breasts beneath her shirt. Simon felt again the stirrings of desire he had first experienced long ago.
‘Alice,’ he began tentatively.
‘No, Simon.’ Her eyes were now laughing at him again. ‘I shan’t miss you, for the simple reason that I am leaving here.’
‘What! You are going to India too?’
‘No, I wish I was. I can’t say that I like wars, but they do give one the best possible material for writing - and I agree with Roberts that I think the Afghan business will flare up again. No, I’m going home.’ She looked around her. ‘I’m not sorry to leave here and I don’t think that my reports have particularly endeared me to the army.’ She laughed again. ‘So no one here will grieve at my departure. But the Morning Post has been very kind to me. The editor has instructed me to take the first ship to England now that the campaign is over. I understand that dear old Gladstone is preparing a great attack on the Government for its handling of foreign policy and these colonial wars, and my editor wants me to come home to cover it.’ Alice’s voice took on an air of excitement. ‘I do so admire Mr Gladstone, and reporting on his campaign will be capital experience for me and should further my career.’ For a moment, the woman of the world had become a girl again.