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Then, when the Force had sufficiently rested, there was saddling up and inspanning, and soon after midday the column pulled out.
Chapter Twenty Seven.
Of the Bush Road
An advance guard of twenty men was thrown forward; Ben Halse’s trap and that containing the other storekeeper’s family being in the middle of the main body, which was ready to close up around both at a moment’s warning. Scouts were thrown out, but there were places in which the thick bush rendered the services of such entirely useless.
The prospectors especially were inclined to treat the whole thing as a picnic; indeed, there was hardly a man there present who was not spoiling for a fight – and would have been intensely disappointed if no such were put up. The women and children were certainly a drawback; stray bullets have an uncomfortable knack of splattering in anywhere. That the escort might be overwhelmed by weight of numbers and utterly wiped out never occurred to them. Nearly a hundred police in full fighting kit, and the dozen or so of extra rifles, ought to be able to hold their own against all Zululand. Isandhlwana? Oh yes; but that was out of date; out-of-date weapons and out-of-date men. With quick-firing rifles, and an abundance of ammunition, they could hold out for ever against a mob of ricksha pullers and kitchen boys, for such were the sorry substitutes for the old-time splendid legionaries of the last king. The civilian element, in view of its victory that morning, was inclined to treat the whole situation as a joke.
Denham, however, formed an exception to this spirit, so, too, did Ben Halse, for the same reason. Inspector Bray, an experienced officer, who was in command of the Force, felt not a little anxious; he would not have felt anything of the kind but for his charges; and there was a very critical bit of the road just beyond the Gilwana drift – several miles of thickly bushed country. If they were attacked at all it would be there, he prophesied to Denham, who was riding beside him.
It was a lovely afternoon, the air brisk, fresh and crisp, the sky cloudless. The scattered thorn-bushes were alive with bird voices, but that dark hang of forest on the rugged hills, now on the right hand, now on the left, there it was that the element of menace lay.
“It’s the devil,” he said, “to have women to look after. I beg your pardon, Denham, but I’m talking generally. You see, any tumble-down shanty of a brick building will stop a bullet, but nothing will here. You can make ’em lie down in the bottom of a trap, for instance, but that’s not bullet-proof. And I think I see Miss Halse, for instance, consenting to do anything of the kind.”
“I’d be sorry for the chump, black or white, she had got the sights of a rifle on,” he answered, with a thrill of pride. “She’s just a dead shot.”
“So I’ve heard,” said Bray, with a twinkle in his eyes. “You must have had a good time together all this while. Good sport – and all that?”
“No, you don’t draw me, Bray. I’m a collector, and I never heard that birds and snakes were ‘royal’ game.”
“Rather hard to keep one’s piece from going off – by accident, of course – when a waterbuck or something strays across the road, eh?”
But this chaff was interrupted by a trooper, who had ridden back from the advance guard, and the intelligence he brought caused his superior to swear. The river was down, and the passage of the Gilwana drift would be impossible for at least a couple of hours.
“That’s that infernal thunder burst up in the hills early this morning,” declared Bray. Then he gave orders to off-saddle where they were, for, of course, he had originally intended to do so on the further side. However, it was open here, at any rate, and they might still be able to push through the thickest and most dangerous part before dark.
“This is a real old picnic now, Miss Halse,” pronounced Sub-Inspector Dering, as he helped to unpack from the spider the requisite things which had been brought along for lunch. “Lord, what a nuisance those kids are!” he added in an undertone. “Always howling.”
For Minton’s small family was uttering shrilling expostulation at the delayed meal. The while vedettes were posted, and the police, split up into groups, were discussing their rations. The officers and the civilian element were making a picnic together, and as such it seemed, but the stacked rifles and full bandoliers told a different tale.
“What d’you think, Halse?” said Inspector Bray, as the two talked apart while the others were laughing and joking and making merry as they laid out the things. “Shall we slip through, or shall we get a chance at Sapazani?”
“Can’t say. You see, I’ve been cut off from communication ever since I left home. But I should say the chances are about even. One thing you may rely upon, we have been watched every inch of the way.”
“Sure?”
“Dead cert. However, let’s fall-to, at any rate. We’ll be ready for them if they do come, and we can’t do more.”
The picnic proceeded merrily enough. Sub-Inspector Dering attached himself very attentively to Verna. He was aware of her engagement, but he was an Irishman, and therefore bound to attach himself to the best-looking woman present. Harry Stride was rather silent, hardly talking with the other prospectors, among whom he had chosen to keep himself. But when the after-lunch pipes came out, Bray, with an escort of a dozen men, started off to examine the drift for himself, and with him went Denham.
It was barely two miles off. The river, not a wide one, swirled between high, clayey banks fringed with dense bush. If attacked at the point of crossing the matter might be serious.
He was relieved. The high-water mark of the flood had left a broad, wet stripe between it and the surface. The stream was subsiding rapidly.
“In half-an-hour we shall be able to take it,” he said. “Hallo! Don’t see anything, Denham?”
“Yes,” said the latter, with his glasses to his eyes. “It looks like cattle. Yes, it is; black and white ones. But they are not being driven; they seem to be grazing.”
Away on the hill, some seven hundred yards beyond the river, where the bush thinned out into rocks and open ground, white specks were visible to the naked eye.
“It’s a signal, I believe,” said Bray. “Well, we’ll take the drift now, at any rate. If we are to have a fight here, I prefer it by daylight.” And he ordered a trooper to gallop back to the camp with instructions to saddle up and inspan immediately.
In a surprisingly short space of time the troop was ready to march. But a delay occurred through Minton’s rotten harness, which kept giving way in all sorts of unexpected directions. Inspector Bray cursed hideously to himself; but for the presence of the women he might have earned heartfelt admiration from his troop at large by reason of his proficient originality in that direction. Willing hands, and handy ones, there were and plenty, but by the time the damage was repaired quite a considerable portion of precious time had been wasted.
Again at the drift more delay. The storekeeper’s wretched horses stuck. All the flogging in the world was of no use; and there was the trap in the middle of the stream, the water flowing through the bottom boards soaking everything, and the woman and children howling dismally. Had an attack been delivered then the result might have been disastrous. But Ben Halse outspanned his pair and hitched them on, and by this aid, and much shouting and flogging, the whole outfit emerged, panting and dripping on the opposite bank. By then a great deal more valuable time had been lost. And it was nearly sundown, and about seven miles of the most dangerous and bushy part of the road had to be negotiated.
The early afternoon was drawing in, and there is little or no twilight in those latitudes. They had covered about three miles from the drift, when suddenly and without any warning a mass of Zulus rose up from the bush on One side of the road, and roaring “Usutu!” charged down upon the front of the column. They were naked, save for their mútyas and ornaments of flowing cowhair, and carried shields and bright, business-like assegais.
“Sapazani’s people,” exclaimed Ben Halse. “Look out for the chief, boys. You can’t mistake him once you sight him – half a head taller than the longest here.”
There was not even time to dismount, but the revolvers of the police at such close quarters, aimed low, poured such a terrific fire into the advancing mass that those behind could not come on for the line of writhing, struggling bodies that lay in front.
“Give it them again, boys,” yelled Sub-Inspector Dering, lifting the top off the skull of a gigantic savage who was clutching at his bridle rein with one hand, a broad assegai held ready to strike in the other. The great body toppled over with a thud, and at the same time another crashing volley sent many more to earth, the residue dropping into cover again. With splendid discipline the troop resumed its march.
Fresh cartridges were slapped into the pistols; it seemed likely to prove a revolver duel, in that the bush was too thick to admit of using rifles. The trained horses, being all together, had shown themselves wonderfully free from restiveness. As for the men, an extraordinary thrill of excitement had run through all ranks. This was battle indeed, and, so far, they had held their own.
For a few minutes they kept on in silence, with pulses tingling, but cool-nerved, alert, ready for any fresh move. Then a volley broke forth, flashing redly from the dim duskiness of the slope. Bullets hummed over the heads of the troop, two of them splintering the side of Ben Halse’s spider. Verna, who had got out her magazine rifle, and was straining her eyes in search of a mark, heard them and moved not a muscle. Her father, who was driving, but whose revolver was ready to his hand, also took no notice. But just before the volley ceased down went a trooper almost under the wheels of the trap.
“In here with him,” cried Verna, springing to the ground, and herself helping to lift the stricken man in. He was badly hurt, too, and insensible, but there was little enough time then for attending the wounded, for immediately a fresh volley was poured in. This time two troopers fell, one shot stone dead. The concealed savages raised a deafening roar of exultation.
But now some of them began to show themselves. There was a break in the dense bush, and in their eagerness they began to cross this too soon. The order for half the escort to dismount was followed by a volley from the rifles. It was now too dark to see the result clearly but from the vengeful yells that went up it was obvious that more than one bullet had gone home. Again the volleys roared redly through the night.
A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, which for present purposes may be taken to mean that two of the prospectors’ horses had gone dead lame. After the repulse of the first attack the escort had been going at a trot, and the prospectors, who had been bringing up the rear, had dropped dangerously behind, and among all the noise and firing their shouts to that effect had gone unheard. One, galloping furiously up, now brought the intelligence.
“Dickinson, ten men and come along,” yelled Dering, who was looking after the rear of the column. “Those devils’ll have ’em if we ain’t sharp.”
It happened that Denham had been chatting with the sergeant, incidentally little dreaming of the nature of the other’s furtive interest in him. Now that there was a call to the rescue he dashed off with the party. These they came up with not far down the road. Robson had been hit by a bullet and badly wounded, and a comrade was supporting him on his horse. Stride’s horse was one of the lame ones, and Stride himself was doing all he knew by kicks and blows and cursed to urge that noble but unreliable animal onward. Just then the enemy seemed to become aware that something was wrong.
“Look out, sir,” warned Dickinson to his officer. “On the right!”
They could hear the bushes parting, the thud of running feet. Then Stride’s horse fell.
“Here, jump up, man!” cried Denham. “Up behind me. My horse is as strong as the devil.”
“Usutu!” broke from the onrushing crowd. “Usutu, ’Sutu!”
The savage forms were almost in among them now – assegais ready.
“Quick, quick, damn it!” shouted Denham. Stride hesitated no longer, and the horse with its double burden started off after the rest.
The roar of the war-shout was right in their ears now. They had just regained their comrades when something seemed to strike Denham with a debilitating numbness, followed by a spasm of the most intense agony. His hold relaxed. He was conscious of a roaring inside his head, and out of it. The whole world seemed to be whirling round with him.
Rescuers and rescued reached the column just in time, just as another fierce attack was delivered. But again that well-directed volley was available, and the assailants dropped back. Moreover, the bush ended here, and in the face of that determined repulse the savages had no stomach for trying their luck in the open. The troop moved on unmolested.
Then was heard a voice, a clear, woman’s voice, audible in the still night to every man in the whole escort.
“Where is Mr Denham?”
A thrill of instinctive consternation ran through all who heard. Denham’s name was called up and down the line of march, but with no result. In the confusion attendant on the last close attack on the rescue party nobody had seen anybody. It had been very much a case of every man for himself. Some one, however, had seen Denham mount Stride behind him on his horse. And then Stride himself came forward.
“You left him,” said Verna, her pale face and gleaming eyes looking dreadful in the brilliant starlight. “He saved you, and you left him. You coward!”
“So help me, God, I didn’t!” objected Stride vehemently. “I don’t really know what happened. I’ll go back this moment and look for him. Any one go with me?” looking around somewhat vacantly. “Then I’ll go alone.” Then he swayed and tottered, pulled himself together, then subsided on the ground, in total unconsciousness.
“He’s hit, himself,” said one of the police who were bending over the wounded man. “Rather. He’s got it bang through the chest.”
Verna looked at the fallen man, and her bitter resentment left her, but not her grief.
“I am going back to look for him,” she said. “Who’ll volunteer?”
“You shan’t go,” said her father decisively; “but I will. How many men can you spare me, Bray?”
Inspector Bray was not pleased. Here he had brought off this expedition with success, even with brilliancy, and now the kudos he would gain would be utterly marred. For to allow any of his men to go on this insane quest would mean to send them to their death. There was not a chance of the missing man being found, except cut into small pieces. Still, if it had been any other than Ben Halse – and, besides, that white face, those eyes, gleaming in the starlight!
“You can have ten,” he said gruffly, “if you can get as many to volunteer.”
Ten? The whole troop wanted to volunteer on the spot. But the ten were chosen.
“I’ll be somethinged if I follow up this investigation any further,” said Sergeant Dickinson, who was one of those chosen, to himself, as they set out. “He may have killed a hundred blanked ‘Sheenies’ for all I care. I’m not going to hunt down a chap like that. I’d rather chuck the Force.”
It may be said that the search party utterly failed in its object. It was met by overwhelming numbers, and there was nothing for it but a precipitate retreat upon the column again.
Then and for all the days to come Verna Halse realised that for her the light of the world had gone out.
Chapter Twenty Eight.
The Naked Impi
The police camp was still and silent in the early dawn, if dawn it could be called, for a damp, dark mist wrapped the earth in thick folds. It had been found necessary to go into camp, if only to rest the horses for the next day’s march, which would bring the escort to Esifeni. It was deemed fairly safe too, in view of the defeat inflicted upon the enemy the evening before. Besides, they had got into open country now, and the close quarter surprise in the bush was no longer possible.
Was it not? Here was a worse enemy than thick bush. In the couple of hours before dawn the mist had stolen down upon them, shrouding the whole camp with a feeling of dazed helplessness. The vedettes thrown out on four sides, three men strong apiece, might as well not have been there now. Mist is a dreadfully formidable auxiliary to a wary, determined foe, stealing in cautiously behind it.
Of course all had lain down, ready for the smallest call to arms. Most were asleep; young men, fearless, healthily tired, are not likely to be kept awake by such a trifle – all in the day’s work – as a possible attack. Not all so slept, however. Verna, pale, haggard, hollow-eyed with grief, was carefully sponging out her rifle; eager now in her fierce longing for some kind of vengeance, even though vicarious vengeance, for another opportunity of using it to some purpose. No compunction of any sort was in her mind now. The more of his slayers she could send to join him in the other world, the greater would be her joy – the only joy left to her. She had declined Sub-Inspector Dering’s offer to clean the weapon for her on the ground that any sort of occupation was better than none, and sleep was impossible.
By this time the whole Force was aware of the relationship existing between her and the missing man, and all forbore or feared to intrude upon her grief. Stony-eyed, silent, under this second blow, she stared forth upon the enshrouding mist, as though to pierce its dark folds and see – what? Her father was frankly snoring. It was characteristic of that hardened up-country adventurer that nothing short of absolute necessity should be allowed to interfere with the recuperating powers of nature. The two officers in command, likewise the same number of sergeants, were wide awake, and conversing in low tones.
It grew lighter and lighter, the mist notwithstanding. The sun must be up. They thought of giving orders to saddle up. By the time the process was accomplished, and Minton’s miserable harness got into working order by the agency of countless bits of string and reimpje, it would be clear enough to march. But there was a guardian angel over that camp after all.
Suddenly a shot rang out, then another. In an instant the whole camp was astir. But no flurry, no fuss. As we have said, the whole escort had slept under arms, and each trooper awoke in his place and ready. Two more shots followed from the same quarter, but this time much nearer, then a small volley from another vedette posted on the next face of the camp.
A swirl of air cleft the mist. From the sides on which the shots were fired the vedettes were now seen running in.
“Large impi close on us, sir,” reported the first to arrive, breathlessly. “Hardly six hundred yards now.”
Inspector Bray issued but one short order. He had been prepared for such a contingency, and everything had been prearranged on pitching camp. Now, in a second, each man had built up what cover he could with his saddle and blanket, and lay behind it, his rifle forward, alert and ready. He had not long to wait.
Another swirl of air rolled back the mist, leaving a quarter of a mile on that side exposed as by the raising of a curtain. It was as the sentinels had said. In crescent formation the dense black cloud swept on – in dead silence – a phalanx of shields, a perfect bristle of assegais. A black impi – a naked impi – no dirty tattered shirts or ragged store clothes among these. They were as the old-time warriors of the king – with flowing war adornments and crested headgear and great tufted shields. And they were no further off than four hundred yards.
A sharp word of command and the police rifles rang out. The oncoming ranks were shaken, but with the second volley the whole advancing mass had sunk like magic to the earth, and the discharge swept over them harmlessly. At the same time a terrific volley swept over the camp from the rear of the assailants. These, under cover of it, made a nearer rush, and the same tactics were repeated.
“By God!” shouted Bray, taking in this, and excited by a couple of bullets whizzing over, and very near to, his head. “There’s tactics in this. Covering their advance! Who the devil could have taught them that move, eh, Halse?”
The latter said nothing at first, but he thought he knew.
“It’s Sapazani’s prime impi,” he declared. “No clothes, and charging in. We’ve got our job cut out. Not ‘shirt-tail’ warriors these, but quite after the real old style.”
As the “covering tactic” was repeated the impi extended with lightning-like rapidity, following out the old Zulu practice of throwing out surrounding “horns.” They could not have been less than a thousand strong – rather over than under. And now for the first time arose from that number of throats the roar of the war-shout —
“Usutu!”
The police horses were now thrown into confusion – several of them had fallen in that overhead volley, standing high as they did, and were kicking and struggling in all directions; indeed, it was all that those told off to hold them could do to restrain them on the picket lines at all. As yet, however, not a man had been hit.
“The chief!” ejaculated Ben Halse eagerly, touching Bray on the arm. “Sapazani.”
In the forefront of the impi, waving his great shield, Sapazani was now conspicuous. His gigantic form, the towering black ostrich plumes stuck within his head-ring would have marked him anywhere. But he seemed to bear a charmed life. A bullet from Ben Halse clipped one of his plumes, but he shook his head and laughed.
“Greeting, U’ Ben! Thy hand and eye are failing,” he roared; bounding, leaping, like a wild beast, in the forefront of his followers, who were now beginning to fall around him in rows. All sides of the camp were busy now, and but for the quick and, literally, massacring fire poured into the rush, would have been overwhelmed.
“The chief! The chief!” shouted the excited men. “Now, then, all at him at once. We’ll down the devil.”
But they did not. Never still, Sapazani dodged the volley and laughed exultantly. But even as he did so he leaped in the air and fell flat. Those in her neighbourhood looked up at Verna Halse, who, pale as death, with a red spot on each cheek and dull eyes, after one quick glance began refilling her magazine.
“By God, Miss Halse, you’ve killed Sapazani!” ejaculated Sergeant Dickinson. “You’ve killed the chief.”
It was indeed so. While others had been concentrating their fire on that whirling, bounding figure without result, Verna, her heart on fire with burning longing for revenge, but her brain dangerously, deadly cool, had been watching her opportunity, watching when a fraction of a moment’s stillness on the part of her quarry should give her the opportunity she sought. It had comet and she had taken it.
A rousing, ringing cheer went up from the men. Already on the other side the combat had become nearly hand to hand. Assegais now were hurled into the camp, and more than one trooper was stricken. Minton, the storekeeper, was raving and cursing with one sticking through his leg, to the accompaniment of the howling of his progeny; but on the side led by Sapazani the onslaught wavered. The dead and wounded lay tremendously thick, and still the police bandoliers were not half empty, and now amid freshly heartened cheers their contents still played upon the roaring masses. Then, as the word mysteriously and quickly went round that the chief was slain, the news instead of inspiring them with the fury of exasperation had the contrary effect, and lo! as quickly as they had come on they were now in full retreat. A rain of bullets followed them, but no pursuit was allowed.
Verna had grounded her rifle, and stood looking after the retreating enemy. Then she walked back to the trap and deposited the weapon, speaking to nobody and ignoring the enthusiastic congratulations showered upon her. The while the vanishing curtain of mist was hanging in diminishing filminess over the hills, and the sun rose bright and glorious into a vault of unclouded blue.
“If you’ll take my advice,” said Ben Halse to the Inspector, “you’ll have Sapazani verified dead without loss of time. They might rally and rescue him. But look out carefully for the wounded. They may send more than one man under before they go under themselves.”
His advice was needed. In more than one instance some desperate savage, mortally and otherwise disabled, gripped his assegai in a feigned death grip to strike a last blow at any who should be unwary enough to approach him. But Sapazani was found not to be dead, though his days were numbered not by hours, but by minutes.
He, as they surrounded him, opened his eyes, but made no act of aggression, although by an effort he might have reached his broad assegai. Verna’s bullet had drilled through his chest, narrowly missing the heart, and, being a Dum-dum, had torn away a gaping and ghastly hole beneath the shoulder where it had come out. As they propped him up against the body of one of his slain followers the rush of blood was enough to have ended the life of any one but a savage then and there.
“Whau!” he ejaculated feebly. “It is U’ Ben. And we were friends.”
“Were, yes,” answered the trader shortly. “No one knows better than Sapazani why we are so no longer.”
This, of course, was “dark” talking to Bray and the police. However, they supposed it referred to some trading transaction between these two. And at the same time a very uncomfortable misgiving came into Ben Halse’s mind. What if the dying chief, out of sheer malignity, were to “give away,” for the benefit of the police, some very awkward, not to say incriminating transactions in which he had been mixed up. But Sapazani’s next words were —
“Where is Izibu? for something tells me I died by her stroke. I would fain see her again to say farewell.”
Ben Halse’s face hardened, knowing what he did and what the others did not. He hesitated, but as he did so a clear, hard voice struck upon his ear – upon the ears of all of them.
“Here is Izibu.” And Verna, who had been approaching unseen, joined the group.
“It is well,” said the dying chief. “I am content. We have been friends.”
There was a world of pathetic dignity about the man as he sat there, his large, powerful frame thrilling in every nerve with bodily anguish, his fine face wet with the dews of death, as he turned his lustrous but fading eyes upon one or the other of the group.
“Friends!” echoed Verna in biting scorn. “Friends? Where, then, is he who was left behind yesterday, he who was our friend and therefore yours?”
Sapazani looked puzzled, then a light seemed to dawn upon him.
“Is it the man who collects snakes and – other things, Izibu?”
She nodded.
“Then of him I know nothing. Nor did I know even that he had been left behind, impela.”
“You swear it?”
“U’ Dingiswayo!” said the chief earnestly, invoking the name of the ancestral head of his tribe. And then for the first time a ray of hope came back into Verna’s life.
Then the dying man’s tone grew drowsy, and his head drooped forward. He was muttering words of counsel, of quick command, as though to his followers. Then he subsided to the ground. A sign or two and a groan. Sapazani was dead.
“Poor devil!” said Inspector Bray. “He’s a fine fellow when all’s said and done, and a plucky one.”
“Whatever else he may be, Sapazani’s a gentleman,” said Ben Halse, fully appreciative of the fact that the dead chief had observed the strictest secrecy with regard to such former transactions as have been alluded to.
But Verna said nothing. She fed and fostered that ray of hope.
