Shadows in the Grass

by Beverley Harper

  ‘Many things, I am sure, but I pray that this day will not be one of them.’

  Cetshwayo proved to be quite a philosopher. He loved to gossip, insisting on all the latest news from Durban, tales of hunters and traders. With the business side of their meeting out of the way, the king kept both men talking for several hours before, with obvious reluctance, he had to dress more formally and attend to pressing tribal matters.

  ‘Don’t expect anything in writing,’ John warned as they departed the isigodlo. ‘The king’s word is his bond until he decides otherwise.’

  ‘Thank you for your help. I’d have been less successful on my own.’

  ‘I disagree. The king was impressed by you.’

  ‘Does he usually greet visitors dressed like that?’

  Dunn laughed. ‘Cetshwayo takes many by surprise, including his own people. How he presents himself seems to reflect the mood he’s in, but in the company of friends, he tends to favour traditional dress. You have to agree, it’s more comfortable.’

  ‘I wouldn’t know,’ Dallas admitted. ‘He wears it well. He’s a fine-looking man.’

  ‘Walks ten miles a day to keep fit.’ Dunn changed the subject. ‘Your woman, Lorna. She’ll be pleased with the outcome.’

  ‘Indeed. She’s as anxious as I to move out of Durban.’

  ‘Gossip is an ugly pastime. Unfortunately, rumours spread quickly. I hear tell you’ve already got a wife.’

  ‘A young lady has my name,’ Dallas responded tightly.

  ‘And I know her father, slightly.’

  ‘Then you will understand that I had no choice.’

  ‘A man who dallies should expect to pay the price.’

  ‘Ah! That is merely one side of the story.’

  ‘Fair enough. You protect her good name. I’ll say no more. As far as I’m concerned, Lorna is your wife. I just wanted you to know that.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Dallas laughed in good humour. ‘And you?’

  Dunn also laughed. ‘Catherine is my great wife. The rest?’ He shrugged and laughed again. ‘They just happened. Actually, it was Cetshwayo who encouraged me to take more wives. Two are his sisters and you don’t refuse an offer like that from the king.’

  ‘I hope he never makes a similar offer to me. Lorna would not stand for such a thing.’

  ‘He won’t. Cetshwayo knows that it would offend.’

  Dallas stopped reminiscing. He should be at the house helping Lorna. Yet sitting on the hilltop his thoughts returned to the past, to the day they realised that Torben was a fixture in their lives.

  At first, Dallas and Lorna found themselves working hard to simply like the child. Jette had obviously indulged his every whim. Sharing with Cam was a concept Torben found totally alien. The boy demanded and took, never asking or showing gratitude. He would scream with frustration if Lorna’s attention wandered from him.

  Despite his best efforts, Torben did actually find a way into the hearts of his new parents. When happy, the youngster was delightful. By the time word reached Dallas and Lorna of Jette’s and Jeremy Hardcastle’s fate, Torben was as much a part of the family as the other children were.

  The rumour was that Jette and Jeremy had been killed in a place called Kumasi, the Ashanti capital, inland in a British colony known as the Gold Coast. They were reputed to have been caught up in a tribal war between the Fanti people of the coast and the Ashanti. There was some doubt as to the accuracy of this story since the Fanti were not a warlike tribe. Clashes between them and the Ashanti were invariably close to the coast, where they did little more than defend themselves against their marauding northern neighbours.

  As with many other incidents reported by visiting sailors, Dallas was uncertain whether this one was true. Attempts to find out met a brick wall. The Natal administration had little interest in what took place thousands of miles further north. All Dallas ever learned was that there had been an incident in which the name Jeremy Hardcastle featured and the man was believed to be dead. He could find out nothing more.

  He was not surprised to learn that they had headed for the Gold Coast. Although Britain had been the dominant force there since the sixteenth century, the Danes were actively interested until 1850. The place would have suited both Hardcastle and Jette. If they were dead, a more likely cause would have to be that the sultan had finally caught up with Jette. Either that, or they’d been innocent victims when, in 1874, the British burned Kumasi to the ground. Given the reluctance of official sources in Natal to provide any details, Dallas was inclined to believe the latter.

  When Cam and Torben were six, they were told the circumstances of their birth. ‘I know they’re still young,’ Lorna said to Dallas, ‘but it’s best that we tell them before they work it out for themselves. With only two months’ difference in their ages, I can’t possibly pass myself off as Torben’s mother.’

  Dallas agreed and was more than willing to leave the job to Lorna. In the years they’d been together, individual strengths and weaknesses seemed to be equally divided between them and diplomacy tilted very definitely in her favour.

  Cam took the news calmly. He’d always known Dallas to be his real father. The fact that his parents were not married was of little interest. They were together and both loved him. That was all that mattered. His mother’s long-dead husband drew some curiosity. ‘What’s a marquis?’

  ‘A member of the British peerage.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘In Scotland, it means he is a lord.’

  ‘Like God?’

  ‘Nothing like God. A marquis is usually very wealthy and owns lots of land.’

  ‘How did he die?’

  ‘He was quite an old man. His heart got tired and, one day, it just stopped.’

  ‘What happened to all the land?’

  ‘When you are older it could be yours.’

  ‘Mine! Why?’

  ‘People think the marquis was your father.’

  Cam screwed up his nose. ‘I’m glad he wasn’t.’

  ‘No more so than I,’ Lorna said with heavy irony.

  ‘So the land is mine?’

  ‘Only if you wish to claim it.’

  ‘How would I do that?’

  ‘By acknowledging the Marquis of Dumfries as your real father.’

  ‘But he wasn’t.’

  ‘That’s right. People only think he was.’

  ‘Then I don’t want it.’

  Lorna had smiled at that. ‘You don’t have to make up your mind right now. When you reach twenty-one, then you’ll have to decide.’

  ‘I’ve already decided.’

  ‘Fine. It’s really up to you.’

  Cam looked reflective. ‘Who is looking after this land?’

  ‘My father.’

  ‘Then let him keep doing it. I might change my mind.’

  That was the end of it as far as Cam was concerned. As Lorna told Dallas later, his candid acceptance of the situation had been quite amusing.

  Torben was a slightly different kettle of fish and Dallas lent Lorna support by sitting in on the conversation.

  ‘You’re not my real mother?’

  ‘No, darling. We think she was killed in an accident.’

  ‘Was I very young?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who is my father?’

  ‘Dallas.’

  Lorna could see the six-year-old mind trying to work it out. She tried to explain. ‘I was married to someone else. Dallas met your mother and you were born. Your real mother loved you very much, as I do now.’

  ‘Why didn’t Father stay with my mother?’

  ‘She didn’t wish it.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It was her choice. Your father had no idea he had two sons until you were about seven months old.’

  ‘Is that why he hates me?’ Torben’s eyes slid to Dallas to see his reaction and was rewarded with a bland expression.

  ‘He doesn’t hate you, darling. Your father loves you very much.’

>   ‘And Cam is Father’s real son, too?’

  ‘Yes, he is.’

  ‘So why were you married to someone else?’

  Lorna sighed inwardly. This was going badly. ‘In Scotland, women don’t always choose their husbands. Their parents do it for them. Sometimes that means that when a girl marries, she is in love with someone else. It was like that with your father and me.’

  ‘What happened to the man you married?’

  ‘He died.’

  Torben chewed that one over for a while. Then, ‘If you are not my real mother, I don’t have to do what you tell me.’

  ‘Yes you do,’ Lorna said gently. ‘Because learning is a part of growing up. If I don’t correct your mistakes, how will you learn?’ She could see one of the boy’s moods becoming evident. They always began with a suffusion of scarlet spreading from his neck. ‘Torben,’ she went on quietly. ‘You belong to this family every bit as much as everyone else. I may not be your real mother but I love you very much and want only the best for you. Do you understand that?’

  ‘I don’t like you.’

  ‘You don’t mean that.’

  Lorna’s ability to stay calm in the face of Torben’s regular bouts of rudeness or disobedience never ceased to amaze Dallas. Usually, he stayed out of these confrontations, knowing that she was emotionally better equipped than he to deal with them. This occasion was too much.

  ‘You apologise, young man. Immediately,’ he snapped.

  A clash of wills locked eyes across the room, the tension palpable. In the ensuing silence, Torben wavered first. ‘Sorry.’ But he hadn’t finished. ‘What am I supposed to call you?’

  ‘What you’ve always called me. Mama.’

  A small shake moved the mutinous head. ‘No. You are not my mother.’

  ‘Very well.’ Lorna was brisk. ‘If you prefer, call me Aunt Lorna.’

  And Aunt Lorna she stayed. From that moment on, Torben took every opportunity to remind Lorna that she had no claim to him, nor control over him. It frustrated and angered Dallas to see the hurt such a young boy could inflict on the woman he loved. Lorna, if anything, became even quicker to defend Torben. It sometimes seemed as if she were trying too hard to be fair.

  While Cam was delighted to live on the farm and mix with Zulu children, Torben went further into a shell. Cam thrived. Ranging all over the land dressed in nothing more than a pair of old shorts, he spent almost as much time in the Zulu kraals as he did at home. Torben, on the other hand, became engrossed in reading and rarely ventured outside. If he did, chances were he’d disrupt the others deliberately. This morning’s incident had been a typical case in point.

  The move to Zululand had gone smoothly. After Eleanor was born – and she became Ellie within the first five minutes of her life and remained so – Lorna was filled with a restless impatience to start their new life in Zululand. Wagons and tents were their first home. Then they lived Zulu style, in beehive-shaped thatch huts, for another six months until their new house was habitable. Built mainly of stone, with wooden windows, floors and beams, a slate roof, and with a deep verandah running around three sides, it was a far cry from the stately homes Lorna and Dallas had grown up in. But, unlike their childhood surroundings, the house resonated with laughter and informality.

  Mister David recruited men to work with the cattle. Both Tobacco and July were among the first to arrive. Life stretched ahead in pleasant anticipation of health, happiness and, God willing, peace and wealth. Katherine was born two years after Ellie. No-one called her anything but Kate. When Duncan came along Lorna insisted that he never be called Dunk.

  As good as his word, life for Zulus on the farm Dallas and Lorna called Ludukaneni – the place where you get lost – remained traditional save for two exceptions. People were paid to work and children, if their parents chose, received education. Cattle belonging to the Africans were allowed to graze at will, fields still cultivated in the traditional manner. Hunting, provided it was for food and clothing and not profit, was permitted. The umuzi had resident inyanga and sangoma as well as various other muthi specialists. The head man, or chief, was too old to work and decided to make Mister David induna provided his authority be accepted once he returned to the umuzi.

  A schoolroom was erected – upright poles, half walls of woven grass, a hard-packed dirt floor and a thatched roof. Desks and chairs arrived but few chose to use them, preferring to sit on the floor. The teacher, a middle-aged man who had come to Zululand as a missionary and found his efforts better valued imparting practical knowledge than matters ecclesiastical, arrived one day out of the blue. He had heard that Ludukaneni was looking for a teacher. He spoke fluent Zulu and German but his English was guttural and broken. Attempts to find a suitable teacher had, so far, failed. Since Dallas had promised Cetshwayo that the children would be taught English, he took the man on but insisted that lessons be conducted in that language. As a result, most of the school’s pupils ended up with a heavily Germanic accent.

  Cam and Torben joined the class when they turned five. Torben had a quick mind and enjoyed learning. Cam, on the other hand, was easily distracted and preferred to play with his Zulu friends. However, the stimulation of lessons did ease the constant battle of wills between the two boys.

  Dallas and Lorna loved Zululand. Neither of them wished to leave. Their bond with Ludukaneni was eclipsed only by an ever-deepening love for each other and their growing family. Still unmarried, for despite many appeals, Sarah and her father steadfastly refused to consider her divorce from Dallas, the lack of formal recognition rarely bothered them. They had held a private ceremony shortly after moving to the farm, exchanging vows and rings. Each was as committed to the other as any married couple could be. Perhaps more so.

  Nothing stays the same, however. Dark clouds of confrontation gathered south of the Thukela. Britain’s war mentality was clear to all. Unrelenting, driven by hunger for land and power, urged on by ambitious officers eager to see their names adorn the pages of history, the halcyon days were rapidly coming to an end. Dallas and Lorna watched and waited. News reached them regularly. Within days of Sir Bartle Frere’s ultimatum being read out, Dallas and Lorna also knew of its crushing terms and conditions. Realising that the Zulu king would never accept them, war seemed the most likely outcome.

  Still they waited in hope. Cetshwayo did not wish to fight the British; it was this fact that kept them optimistic. And now the dreaded letter.

  Nudging Tosca forward, Dallas rode back to the house with a heavy heart. What was inevitable in this land he loved would be nothing short of murder. Cetshwayo could mobilise thirty-three regiments, each with an average strength of fifteen hundred warriors. Despite this, the Zulus would be hopelessly outgunned. True, they had firearms. Apart from a very few who became crack shots, most never mastered the idea that it was better to take aim before firing rather than randomly discharging bullets until ammunition ran out or a case jammed in the breech.

  In any event, the impi still had a preference for close-quarter combat, relying on their skill with shield and assegai. They were super fit, able to travel up to fifty miles in a day. Special ceremonies conducted by the king’s doctors gave each man protection and made them invincible in battle, or so they believed.

  Dallas thought otherwise. General Lord Chelmsford, the military commander of British forces in South Africa, might only have had access to seven battalions, just under eighteen thousand officers and men, but the Royal Artillery were armed with heavy cannons, rocket tubes and the newly introduced Gatling gun. Each infantryman carried a. 450 calibre Martini Henry breech-loading single-shot rifle and bayonet. There was little doubt that Chelmsford’s troops could destroy the Zulu capital and capture or kill Cetshwayo. It would be a bloodbath.

  In the kitchen he found Lorna already well into the packing. She looked up and sighed. ‘We can’t take it all. It breaks my heart to leave so much of ourselves behind.’

  He crossed the room and held her. ‘We’re not the only ones, m
y darling.’

  She burrowed against him. ‘I know.’ Tears weren’t far off. ‘It’s stupid to be so attached to possessions. It’s just that everything I look at has a memory. Everything I touch is a piece of our past and, Dallas, it’s so hard to decide.’

  He felt hot tears against his chest. ‘Come,’ he eased her back, cupped her face in his hands and gently thumbed them away. ‘We will choose together.’

  Dallas, Lorna and the children left their farm on the morning of 21 January 1879. What they took with them was carried in three wagons. The three dogs trotted beside them and one haughty cat perched atop the piled-high belongings, or sprawled indolently on the seat next to whichever driver she had chosen to ride with that day. Dallas drove one wagon, Lorna another, Cam and Torben, young as they were, the third. No-one looked back. As they passed the kraals there was evidence that women and children remained. They did not stop to say goodbye. Nor did the inhabitants acknowledge their passing. Everyone, Zulu and white alike, was in shock. The war touched them all but in each and every heart remained one question. Why was it necessary?

  Lord Chelmsford had invaded Zululand ten days earlier. Dallas and his family were stopped several times by British scouts who asked if they’d seen any signs of impi on the move. Although they had encountered similar Zulu scouting parties, Dallas could not bring himself to say so while still north of the Thukela. Treason? Perhaps. He didn’t care. The Zulus had shown him and his family nothing but courtesy and kindness and he would not betray them on their own soil.

  As they moved further south, rumours of a British defeat at Isandlwana and subsequent victory at Rorke’s Drift reached them. The tales varied wildly and claims ranged from a thousand to ten thousand deaths. Inclined to discount most of the stories as exaggerated gossip, the fact that they existed at all brought home the reality of war.

  Their return to the house in Durban was sober and without joy. Percy, too old to respond to Cetshwayo’s call to arms, had stayed on with his wives. Queenie, overjoyed to see the children, immediately took charge of them. Percy was full of news about Isandlwana but the rumour had travelled a long and pride-filled road before reaching his ears. Dallas listened respectfully. Inwardly he discounted much of it as hearsay.