Chapter Thirty One.
Denham’s bad luck.
The men of the corps were in high glee during the following days, the Boers making two or three attempts to cut off our grazing horses and oxen, but smarting terribly for being so venturesome. In each case they were sent to the right-about, while our cattle were driven back into safety without the loss of a man.
The enemy still surrounded us, occupying precisely the same lines; and, thoroughly dissatisfied with a style of fighting which meant taking them into the open to attack our stronghold, they laagered and strengthened their position, waiting for us to attack them. This could only be done at the risk of terrible loss and disaster, for the Boers were so numerous that any attempt to cut through them might only result in our small force being surrounded and overwhelmed by sheer weight of numbers. Therefore our Colonel decided not to make an attack.
“The Colonel says they’re ten to one, Val; and as we’ve plenty of water and provisions, he will leave all ‘acting on the aggressive’ to the Doppies.”
This remark was made by my companion Denham when we had been in possession of the old fortress for nearly a fortnight.
At first, while still suffering a little from the injuries I had received, the confinement was depressing; but as I gradually recovered from my wrenches and bruises, and as there was so much to do, and we were so often called upon to be ready for the enemy, the days and nights passed not unpleasantly. Discipline was strictly enforced, and everything was carried out in the most orderly way. Horses and cattle were watered and sent out to graze in charge of escorts, and a troop was drawn up beyond the walls, ready to dash out should the Boers attempt to cut them off; guard was regularly mounted; and the men were set to build stone walls and roofs in parts of the old place, to give protection from the cold nights and the rain that might fall at any time.
As for the men, they were as jolly as the proverbial sandboys; and at night the walls echoed with song and chorus. Then games were contrived, some played by the light of the fires and others outside the walls. Bats, balls, and stumps were made for cricket; of course very roughly fashioned, but they afforded as much amusement as if they had come straight from one of the best English makers.
There was, however, a monotony about our food-supply, and the officers more than once banteringly asked me when I was going to cut out another half-dozen wagons.
“Bring more variety next time,” they said merrily. “Pick out one loaded with tea, coffee, sugar, and butter.”
“Yes,” cried Denham, laughing; “and when you are about it, bring us some pots and kettles and potatoes. We can eat the big ones; and, as we seem to be settled here for the rest of our days, we’re going to start a garden and plant the little ’taters in that.”
“To be sure,” said another officer; “and I say, young fellow, mind and choose one of the next teams with some milch-cows in it. I feel as if I should like to milk.”
I laughed too, but I felt as if I should not much like to undertake such another expedition as the last, and that it would be pleasanter to remain content with the roast beef and very decent bread our men contrived to make in the old furnace after it had been a bit modified, or with the “cookies” that were readily made on an iron plate over a fire of glowing embers. Oh no! I don’t mean damper, that stodgy cake of flour and water fried in a pan; they were the very eatable cakes one of our corporals turned out by mixing plenty of good beef-dripping with the flour, and kneading all up together. They were excellent—or, as Denham said, would have been if we had possessed some salt.
One of our greatest difficulties was the want of fuel, for it was scarce around the old stronghold when we had cut down all the trees and bushes growing out of the ledges and cracks about the kopje; and the question had been mooted whether we should not be obliged to blast out some of the roots wedged in amongst the stones by ramming in cartridges. But while there was any possibility of making adventurous raids in all directions where patches of trees existed, and the men could gallop out, halt, and each man, armed with sword and a piece of rein, cut his faggot, bind it up, and gallop back, gunpowder was too valuable to be used for blasting roots. This was now, however, becoming a terribly difficult problem, for the enemy—eagerly seizing upon the chance to make reprisals when these were attended by no great risk to themselves—had more than once chased and nearly captured our foraging parties.
Consequently all thoughts of fires for warmth during the cold nights, when they would have been most welcome, were abandoned; while the men eagerly volunteered for cooks’ assistants; and the officers were not above gathering in the old furnace-place of a night, after the cooking was over, for the benefit of the warmth still emitted by the impromptu oven.
Meanwhile every economy possible was practised, and the fuel store jealously guarded. The said fuel store consisted of every bone of the slaughtered animals that could be saved, and even the hides; these, though malodorous, giving out a fine heat when helped by the green faggots, which were in turn started ablaze by chips of the gradually broken-up wagons.
Then, too, the veldt was laid under contribution, men going out mounted, and furnished with sacks, which they generally brought back full of the scattered bones of game which had at one time swarmed in the neighbourhood, but had been ruthlessly slaughtered by the Boers.
So the days glided on, with not the slightest prospect, apparently, of our escape.
“Every one’s getting precious impatient, Val,” said Denham one day when we were idling up on the walls with his field-glass, after lying listlessly chatting about the old place and wondering what sort of people they were who built it, and whether they did originally come gold-hunting from Tyre and Sidon. “Yes,” he added, “we are impatient in the extreme.”
“It doesn’t seem like it,” I replied; “the men are contented enough.”
“Pooh! They’re nobody. I mean the officers. The chief’s leg’s pretty nearly right again, and he was saying at mess only yesterday that it was a most unnatural state of affairs for British officers to be forced by a set of low-bred Dutch Boers, no better than farm-labourers, to eat their beef without either mustard, horse-radish, or salt.”
“Horrible state of destitution,” I said quietly.
“None of your sneers, Farmer Val,” he cried. “He’s right, and I’m getting sick of it myself. He says it is such an ignoble position for a mounted corps to suffer themselves to be shut up here, and not to make another dash for freedom.”
“Well, I shall be glad if we make another attempt to get through their lines,” I said thoughtfully.
“That’s what the Major said, when, hang me! if the chief didn’t turn suddenly round like a weathercock, and say that what we were doing was quite right, because we held this great force of Boers occupied so that the General might carry out his plans without being harassed by so large a body of men.”
“That’s right enough,” I said.
“Don’t you get blowing hot and cold,” cried Denham, with impatience. “Then some one else sided with the Colonel. It was the doctor, I think. He said the General must know when, where, and how we were situated, and that sooner or later he would attack the Boers, rout them, and set us at liberty.”
“That sounds wise,” I hazarded.
“No, it doesn’t,” said my companion; “because we shouldn’t want setting at liberty then. Do you suppose that if we heard the General’s guns, and found that he was attacking the enemy, we should sit still here and look on?”
“Well, it wouldn’t be right,” I replied.
“Right? Of course not. As soon as the attack was made we should file out and begin to hover on the enemy’s flank or rear, or somewhere else, waiting our time, and then go at them like a wedge and scatter them. Oh, how I do long to begin!”
“It seems to me,” I said thoughtfully, “that the General ought to have sent some one to find us and bring us a despatch ordering the Colonel what to do.”
“I dare say he has—half-a-dozen by now—and the Boers have captured them; but it doesn’t matter.”
“Doesn’t matter?” I said wonderingly.
“No; because, depend upon it, he’d have ordered us to sit fast till he came.”
“Well, but oughtn’t the Colonel to have sent out a despatch or two telling the General how we are fixed?”
“Yes—no—I don’t know,” said Denham sourly. “I’m only a subaltern—a bit of machinery that is wound up sometimes by my superior officers, and then I turn round till I’m stopped. Subalterns are not expected to have any brains, or to think for themselves.”
“Now you are exaggerating,” I said.
“Not a bit of it, my little man. But I know what I should have done if I had been chief.”
“What’s that?”
“Sent out a smart fellow who could track and ride.”
“With a despatch for the General?”
“No; a message that couldn’t fall into the enemy’s hands. I’d have gone like a shot.”
“You couldn’t send yourself,” I said dryly.
“Eh? What do you mean?”
“You were telling me what you would have done if you had been chief.”
“Bah! Yah! Don’t you pretend to be so sharp. That’s what the old man ought to do, though—send out a messenger, and if he didn’t find the General he’d find out how things are going. I believe the Boers are licking our regular troops.”
“Oh, nonsense!” I said, looking startled. “Impossible.”
“Nothing’s impossible in war, my boy. I’m getting uncomfortable. You’d go with a message if you were ordered?”
“Of course,” I said.
“Of course you would. That’s what the chief ought to do, and I’ve a good mind to tell him so. But I say,” he added, in alarm, “don’t you go and tell any one what I’ve been talking about.”
I looked him in the face and laughed.
“Of course you will not,” said Denham confidently. “Hullo! Going?”
“Yes; I want to go and see how the great Irish captain is,” I replied.
“What do you want to go and see him for?” said my companion angrily.
“I hardly know,” I replied. “I like to see that he’s getting better.”
“Well, you are a rum chap,” cried Denham. “I should have thought you would like to go and sit upon the bragging brute. Why, last time, when I went with you, he talked to both of us as if we were two privates in his Boer corps.”
“Yes, he’s a self-satisfied, inflated sort of fellow; but he’s wounded and a prisoner.”
“What of that? It’s only what he ought to be. I want to know what’s to be done with him.”
“The Colonel won’t send him to the Boer lines when he’s well enough to move, I hope.”
“Not he. I expect he’ll be kept till he can be handed over to the General. Here, I’ll come with you.”
I was quite willing, and we descended to the hospital, as the shut-off part of one of the passages was called; and there sat the only patient and prisoner, with an armed sentry close at hand to prevent any attempt at escape.
The Captain turned his head sharply on hearing our footsteps, and gave us both a haughty stare, which amused Denham, making him look to me and smile.
“Oh, you’ve come at last,” said the patient. “I’ve been wanting you.”
“What is it?” I said. “Water?”
“Bah!” he replied, his upper lip curling. “I want you to bring your chief officer here.”
“I dare say you do, my fine fellow,” cried Denham. “Pretty good for a prisoner! You don’t suppose he’ll come—do you? Here, what do you want? Tell me, and I’ll carry your message to the chief.”
Moriarty gave the young officer a contemptuous glance, and then turned to me.
“Go and tell the Colonel, or whatever he is, that I am greatly surprised at his inattention to my former message.”
“Did you send a message?” I asked, surprised by his words.
“Of course I did, two days ago, by the surgeon. It’s not gentlemanly of your Colonel. Go and tell him that I feel well enough to move now, and that I desire him to send me with a proper escort, and under a white flag, to make an exchange of prisoners.”
“Well, I’ll take your message,” I said; “but—”
“Yes, go at once,” said Moriarty, “and bring me back an answer, for I’m sick of this place.”
He turned away, and, without so much as a glance at Denham, lay back, staring up at the sky.
“Well,” said Denham when we were out of hearing, “of all the arrogance and cheek I ever witnessed, that fellow possesses the most. Here, what are you going to do?”
“Take the message to the Colonel,” I replied.
“Going to do what?” cried Denham. “Nothing of the kind.”
“But I promised him.”
“I know you did; but you must have a fit of delirium coming on. It’s being too much up in the sun.”
“Nonsense,” I said. “I’ve no time for joking.”
“Joking, my dear boy? Nothing of the kind. I’m going to take you to the doctor; he’ll nip your complaint in the bud.”
“Absurd,” I cried. “Come with me to the Colonel.”
“What! To deliver the message?”
“Of course.”
“No, Val, my boy. I like you too well to let you go to the old man. Do you know what he’d do?”
“Send me back to our friend there with a message as sharp as a sword. Of course I know he will not send him across to the Boers.”
“My dear Val,” said Denham solemnly, “let me inform your ignorance exactly what would happen. I know the chief from old experience. He’ll sit back and listen to you with one of those pleasant smiles he puts on when he’s working himself up into a rage. He’ll completely disarm you—as he did me once—and all the time, as he hears you patiently to the end, he’ll think nothing about my lord Paddy there, but associate you, my poor boy, with what he will consider about the most outrageous piece of impudence he ever had addressed to him. Then suddenly he’ll spring up and say— No, I will not spoil the purity of the atmosphere this beautiful evening by repeating a favourite expletive of his—he’ll say something you will not at all like, and then almost kick you out of his quarters.”
“I don’t believe it,” I said.
“That’s giving me the lie, Val, my boy. He’ll be in such a rage that he’ll forget himself; for, though he’s a splendid soldier, and as brave a man as ever crossed a charger, he is one of the—”
“What, Mr Denham?” said the gentleman of whom he spoke, suddenly standing before us. “Pray speak out; I like to hear what my officers think of me.”
Chapter Thirty Two.
Denham Shivers.
I wanted to dash off—not from fear, but to indulge in a hearty roar of laughter—for Denham’s countenance at that moment wore the drollest expression I have ever seen upon the face of man.
“I—I—I beg your pardon, Colonel,” he stammered at last.
“For backbiting me, sir,” said the Colonel shortly. “I could not help hearing your last sentence, for you raised your voice and forced it upon me. Now, if you please, I am one of the—what?”
“I was—I was only telling Moray here, sir, that you were—er—er—very passionate, and that if—”
“Passionate, am I?”
“Yes, sir,” stammered Denham. “No, no; I beg your pardon, sir. I didn’t mean to say that.”
“I presume you are saying what you consider to be the truth, Mr Denham,” said the Colonel coldly. “Now, pray go on: and that if—”
“If he came to you with—with a message, sir, that he has just received, you would kick him out of your presence.”
“Humph!” said the Colonel sternly. “Just this minute, sir, you said of me what you believed to be the truth; but now you have been saying what you must know to be false.—Pray, what was the message Moray?” he added, turning to me.
There was only one thing to do, and I did it, giving Moriarty’s message to the end.
“The insolent, conceited idiot!” said the Colonel scornfully. “You need not go back to him with my answer; but if you come across him again and he asks what I said, you can tell him this: that at the first opportunity I shall hand him over to my superior officers, as one of Her Majesty’s subjects found with arms in his hand fighting against the British force after taking service with her enemies, and doing his best to impress Englishmen to serve in the same ranks.—Mr Denham, I should like a few words with you in the morning.”
He turned upon his heel and strode heavily away, with his spurs clinking loudly and the guard at the end of his scabbard giving a sharp chink every now and then, as, field-glass in hand, he climbed to the top of the wall to take a look round at the positions of the enemy before the evening closed in.
“Well,” said Denham at last, looking the while as if all the military starch had been taken out of him, “you’ve done it now.”
I could keep back my laughter no longer.
“Somebody has,” I cried merrily.
“Yes,” he said dolefully; “somebody has. Oh, I say, Val, you oughtn’t to have told tales like that.”
“What?” I cried. “How could I help it?”
“Well, I suppose you couldn’t,” said my companion. “But there never was such an unlucky beggar as I am. What did he want to come upon us just at that moment for? Oh dear! oh dear! and I got to face him to-morrow morning! I say, can’t we do something to put it off—something to make him forget it?”
“Impossible,” I said.
“Oh, I don’t know; try and think of a good dodge—a sortie, or doing something to make the Boers come on to-night. If we had a jolly good light he’d forget all about it, and I shouldn’t hear any more about the miserable business. Here, what can we do to make the Boers come on? I might get killed in the set-to, and then I should escape this awful wigging.”
“Who ought to go and see the doctor now?” I said. “Who’s going mad?”
“I am, I believe, old fellow; and enough to make me. It’s enough to make a fellow desert. Here, I know; I’ll do something. It’s all the fault of that miserable renegade. I’ll go in and half-kill him—an insolent, insulting brute!”
Just then Denham, who was as fearless as any man in the ranks when out with the corps, started violently in his alarm; for a hail came from high up on the wall in the Colonel’s familiar voice; and upon looking up, there he was, glass in hand, looking down at us.
“Denham,” cried the Colonel, “run to the Major. Tell him to come here to me at once, and bring his glass.”
“Yes, sir,” cried my companion.—“Come with me, Val. My word! He gave me such a turn, as the old women say; I thought he’d heard me again. Hurrah, old fellow! there’s something up, and no mistake. I shan’t get that tongue-flogging after all.”
Chapter Thirty Three.
Denham Proves to be Right.
In a few minutes the Major had joined the Colonel, and soon every officer and man in the old fortification was waiting breathlessly for information as to what intelligence regarding the movements of the enemy the two stern-looking men up on the wall were gathering into their brains through their glasses—intelligence far beyond the ken of the sentries, whose duty it was to keep strict watch upon the great circle which was formed by the Boer lines.
There was no hurry or bustle; but our trumpeter had buckled his sword-belt and taken down his instrument from where it hung, and then stationed himself upon one of the blocks of stone in the great courtyard, watching his chiefs, and holding his instrument ready, while his eyes seemed about to start out of his head in his excitement. Everywhere it was the same. Men glided about here and there, after a glance at the ranges of rifles against the wall, with their well-filled bandoliers, and only paused at last where each could dart to his horse, ready to saddle and bridle the tethered beast. The officers were also silently preparing—buckling on their swords, taking revolvers from their belt-holsters, and filling the chambers from their cartridge-pouches, quite mechanically, without taking their eyes off the watchers on the wall. But in spite of all these preparations no sounds were heard save those made by the horses—an impatient stamp or pawing at the stones, followed by a snort or a whinnying neigh.
I did as the rest had done. Meeting Denham after his return from the sheltered spot occupied by the officers, we stood together, looking up at the wall.
“What a long time they are taking!” whispered Denham impatiently. “The Doppies can’t be coming on, or they’d have been seen before now.”
Almost as he spoke the two officers strode to one end of the rampart and began to inspect the veldt again. The next minute they were making for the opposite side of the great building, to examine the country in that direction; and here they stood for a long time.
“Oh dear!” groaned Denham at last. “What’s-its-name deferred makes the heart sink into your boots. It’s a false alarm.”
“Not it,” I said, “for there has been no alarm.”
“Well, you know what I mean. It’s all over. I did hope the chief would be so busy that he’d forget all about what I said. There never was such a miserably unlucky beggar born as I am. Now we shall—”
Just then the Major left the Colonel’s side, came to the edge of the wall, and looked down into the court, gave a nod of satisfaction, and made a sign to the trumpeter, whose bugle went with a flip to his lips, and there was a sound as if the pent-up breath of some four hundred men had been suddenly allowed to escape. Then the walls were echoing to the call “Boot and Saddle,” and every man sprang to his hung-up saddle and then to his horse, the willing beasts seeming all of a tremor with an excitement as great as that of their riders. Long practice had made us quick; and in an incredibly short time I was standing like the rest with my rifle slung across my back, holding Sandho’s bridle ready to lead him out through the gateway, military fashion, though he would have walked at my side like a dog.
“We’re only going for a bit of a reconnaissance,” said Sergeant Briggs gruffly as, after a sharp, non-com glance at his men, he settled down close to my side.
“How do you know?” I asked, speaking as if to a friend, and not to a superior officer on parade.
“No orders for water-bottles and rations, my lad. I was in hopes that we were going to make a dash through them and get out of this prison of a place.”
“What! and leave all that splendid beef, Briggs?” said Denham, who came up in time to hear the Sergeant’s words.
“Yes; and the gold-mine too, sir. We could come back and take possession of that.”
“But the bullocks?”
“They’d find their way out and get their living on the veldt. Needn’t trouble about them, sir. Look out.”
We were looking out, for our two chief officers had now descended from the walls and crossed to where their servants were holding their chargers.
Directly after a note was sounded, followed by a sharp order or two, and horse and man, troop after troop, filed out into position and stood ready to mount.
The order was not long in coming, and we sprang into our saddles, all in profound ignorance of what was before us, save that we were soon to return. About fifty men had been left as garrison.
Then an order was given, and we divided into two bodies. One detachment, under the Major, moved off, to pass round by the kopje; the other, in which I served, taking the opposite direction, but turning after passing round the stronghold, and meeting the other detachment about half a mile to the east. There we sat, obtaining in the clear evening light a full view of the enemy’s proceedings.
We had no sooner halted than the officers’ glasses were focussed, and all waited anxiously for an explanation of the movements which the non-commissioned officers and privates could see somewhat indistinctly with the naked eye.
Denham was close to me; and, like the good fellow he was, he took care to let me know what he made out, speaking so that his words were plainly heard by Sergeant Briggs and the others near.
“It seems to be a general advance of the enemy,” he said, with his eyes close to his glass. “They’re coming steadily on at a walk. Yes; wagons and all.”
“That doesn’t mean an attack, sir,” said the Sergeant.
“I don’t know what it means,” said Denham. “Yes, I think I do. They’ve got some notion into their heads that we mean to break through the ring, and they are going to close up, to make it more solid.”
“They think we’re getting tired of it, sir, and that when we see them loaded with plenty of good things we shall surrender.”
“Perhaps it’s out of kindness, Briggs,” said Denham, laughing. “They want to tempt us into making another raid because the distance will be shorter for us to go.”
“Then I’m afraid they’ll be disappointed, sir, for the Colonel isn’t likely to risk losing any of his men while we’ve got all those bullocks to eat.”
“I don’t know what to make of it,” said Denham; then, thoughtfully: “It looks to me like some bit of cunning—a sort of ruse to get within rifle-shot. Look how steadily they’re coming on.”
That was plain enough to us all, line after line of horsemen advancing as regularly as if they had been well-drilled cavalry; and for my part, inexperienced as I was in such matters, I could not help thinking that the wagons were being pushed forward on purpose to afford cover for their best marksmen, and that in a short time the bullets would begin to be pinging and buzzing about our ears.
I can’t say what the Colonel thought; but almost directly the trumpet rang out, and we were cantered back, to file steadily into the great courtyard again, with the men grumbling and muttering among themselves at having been made what they called fools of.
“I tell you what it is, Val,” said Denham as soon as he had another chance to speak; “I believe I’ve got it.”
“What—the Boers’ plan?”
“Yes; don’t you see? They’ll come right in so as to be within easy shot of our grazing grounds.”
“Oh!” I exclaimed, “I never thought of that. Of course; and if the horses and cattle are driven out, they’ll be able to shoot them down till we haven’t a beast left.”
“Nor a bit of beef. It’s to force us to surrender—a regular siege.”
It was rapidly getting dark then; and we soon learned that our ideas of the Boers’ ruse were the same as those entertained by our chiefs.
Upon the strength of the closer approach the sentries were doubled, and by means of the wagons the entrance to our stronghold was barricaded in a more effectual way; but we were not to be allowed to rest with a feeling of security that night. In about a couple of hours after our return a shot was fired by one of the sentries, then another, and another; and the men stood to their arms, on foot, ready for an attack by the enemy. In a few minutes, however, the news ran round that the sentries had fired at a dark figure creeping along under the wall inside the courtyard after repeated challenges; and, later, the news spread that the sentry on guard over the prisoner was lying insensible and bleeding from a great cut on the back of his head, and that Captain Moriarty was nowhere to be found.
Chapter Thirty Four.
An Ambuscade In Stone.
“The chief’s in an awful rage, Val,” said Denham, when he came to me after a thorough search had seemed to prove that the prisoner had eluded the vigilance of the sentries. “He swears that some one must have been acting in collusion with the pompous blackguard, and that he means to have the whole of our Irish boys before him and cross-examine the lot.”
“I hope he will not,” I said.
“So do I; for I don’t believe one of them would have lent him a hand, and it would offend them all.”
“Yes,” I said; “they’re all as hot-headed and peppery as can be.”
“Spoiling for a fight,” put in Denham.
“Yes; and so full of that queer feeling which makes them think a set is made against them because they are Irish.”
“Exactly,” cried my companion; “and it’s such a mistake on their part, because we always like them for their high spirits and love of a bit of fun.”
“They’re the wittiest and cleverest fellows in the corps.”
“And if I wanted a dozen chaps to back me up in some dangerous business, I’d sooner depend on them for standing to me to the last than any one I know.”
“Oh! it would be a pity,” I said warmly. “I hope the Colonel will think better of it.”
Denham winked at me as we sat in shelter by the light of a newly-invented lamp, made of a bully-beef tin cut down shallow and with a couple of dints in the side; it was full of melted fat, across which a strip out of the leg of an old cotton stocking had been laid so that the two ends projected an inch beyond the two spout-like dints.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“The chief,” said Denham, “good old boy, kicks up a shindy, and swears he’ll do this or that, and then he thinks better of it. I’ve got off my wigging.”
“How do you know?” I said.
“Met the old boy after I had been having a regular hunt everywhere with half-a-dozen men, and he nodded to me in quite a friendly way. ‘Thank you, Denham,’ he said. ‘Tell your men that they were very smart.’”
“I’m glad of that,” I said.
“Same here, dear boy. It’s his way, bless him! He likes a red rag to go at, the old John Bull that he is; but if another begins to flutter somewhere else, he forgets number one and goes in for number two.”
“Yes, I’ve noticed that,” I said. “But it’s a great pity that fellow got away. I believe he has been shamming a bit lately.”
“No doubt about it. The nuisance of it is, that the brute will go and put the Boers up to everything as to our strength, supplies, ammunition, and goodness knows what else. But, look here, I’m going on now to see how Sam Wren is.”
“Sam Wren?” I cried wonderingly. “What’s the matter with him?”
“Matter? Why, he was the sentry Moriarty knocked down.”
“Oh, poor fellow! I am sorry,” I said, for the private in question was one of the smartest and best-tempered men in our troop.
“So’s everybody,” replied Denham. “I say: it was contusion in his case, not collusion.”
“Where is he?” I said.
“In hospital. Duncombe’s a bit uneasy about him. I’m going on again to see him. Will you come?”
“Of course,” I said eagerly.
“Come along, then. We’ll take the lamp, or some sentry may be popping at us.”
“The wind will puff it out in that narrow passage.”
“Not as I shall carry it,” replied my companion; and he led off, with his broad-brimmed felt held over the flickering wick, in and out among the fallen stones between the walls, nearly to the other side of the court. Here another covered-in patch had been turned into a fairly snug hospital by hanging up two wagon-tilts twenty feet apart, after clearing away the loose stones; and a certain number of fairly comfortable beds had been made of the captured corn-sacks.
On reaching the first great curtain Denham called upon me to hold it aside, as his hands were full; and as I did so I caught sight, on the right-hand side, of our doctor down on one knee and bending over his patient, whose face could be seen by the light of a lantern placed upon a stone, while his voice sounded plainly, as if he were replying to something the surgeon had said.
“Only me, Duncombe,” said Denham. “Just come to see how Wren is.”
“Better, thank goodness,” said the doctor. “He seemed to come-to about five minutes ago.”
“I am glad, Wren,” said Denham, setting down the lamp beside the lantern.
“Thank ye, sir,” said the poor fellow, smiling. “Moray’s come with me to look you up.” The wounded man looked pleased to see me, and then his face puckered up as he turned his eyes again to the doctor and said:
“I don’t mind the crack on the head, sir, a bit. Soldiers deal in hard knocks, and they must expect to get some back in return. I know I’ve given plenty. It’s being such a soft worries me.”
“Well, don’t let it worry you. Help me by taking it all coolly, and I’ll soon get you well again.”
“That you will, sir. I know that,” said the man gently. “But I feel as if I should like to tell the Colonel that I was trying to do my duty.”
“He doesn’t want telling that, Sam,” said Denham. “Of course you were.”
“But I oughtn’t to have been such a fool, sir—such a soft Tommy of a fellow. I knew he was a humbug; but he looked so bad, and pulled such a long face, that I didn’t like to be hard. ‘Here, sentry,’ he says, as he sat up with his back to the wall, just after you’d gone, ‘this right leg’s gone all dead again. It’s strained and wrenched through the horse lying upon it all those hours. Just come and double up one of those sacks and lay it underneath for a cushion. The pain keeps me from going to sleep.’”
“Oh, that’s how it happened—was it?” said the doctor, while we two listened eagerly.
“I’m coming to it directly, sir,” said the man querulously. “Well, sir, seeing as I felt that, as I was sentry over the hospital, I was in charge of a wounded man as well, I just rested my rifle against the wall, picked up one of the sacks, and doubled it in four. Then, just as innocent as a babby, I kneels down, lifts up his leg softly, bending over him like, and was just shoving the bit of a cushion-like thing under his knee, when it seemed as if one of the big stones up there had fallen flat on the back of my head, and I heard some one say, ‘Take that, you ugly Sassenach beast! and see how you like lying in hospital.’ Then it was all black, sir, till I opened my eyes and saw you holding that stuff to my lips.”
“Yes, my man,” said the doctor; “now don’t talk any more, but lie still.”
“Tell me about that crack on the head again, sir, please. It wasn’t one of the stones fell down, then?”
“No; the prisoner must have got hold of this piece somehow, then kept it ready by the side of his bed, and struck you down.”
“And a nasty, dirty, cowardly blow, too,” said the poor fellow feebly. “Beg pardon, sir; you’ll pull me round as quickly as you can—won’t you?”
“Of course,” said the doctor, smiling.
“Thank ye, sir. I want to have an interview with that gentleman again.”
“I suppose so,” said Denham; “and so do about four hundred of the corps. He’d have been stood up with his back to one of the walls and shot by this time, but the brute has got away.”
“We shall run against him again, though, sir,” said the wounded man confidently, “and we shan’t mistake him for any one else.—Beg pardon, though, sir; you’re quite sure my skull isn’t broken?”
“Quite,” said the doctor. “Now be quiet.”
“Certainly, sir; but is it cracked?”
“No, nor yet cracked,” said the doctor, smiling. “You’re suffering from concussion of the brain.”
“And I’ll concuss his brain, sir, if I can only get a chance; but I will do it fair and— Yes, sir, I’ve done, and I’m going to sleep.”
He smiled at us both, and then closed his eyes; while, after a few words with the doctor, Denham picked up the lamp, and we went gently to the other rough curtain.
“It’s just as near to go back this way,” said Denham as I lowered the canvas again, and we passed on, to be confronted directly after by a sentry, who challenged with his levelled bayonet pointed at our breasts; but after giving the word we passed on.
“Seems queer for poor Sam Wren,” said my companion, “changing places like that. Sentry one moment; patient the next. Bah! it is a nuisance that the prisoner should have been able to get away.”
“And go back to the Boers, full of all he has seen here,” I said.
“Well, it will make us all the more careful,” said Denham, still shading the lamp with his hat as we went on, till we had passed where we could hear the movement of the horses tethered to the long lines, with none too much room to stir, poor beasts! Commenting on the condition of our mounts, I remarked that, as the Boers had come in so close, the horses would have but little opportunity for stretching their legs.
“Oh, don’t you be afraid about that; the chief isn’t the man to let the Doppies come close like this without having something to say on his side. You may depend upon it that the moment he feels that the horses are going the wrong way, there’ll be such a dash made as will astonish our friends outside.”
“Well, I shall not be sorry,” I said, “for I don’t like being shut up as we are. Look up. I say, what a lovely starlight night!”
“No, thank you,” replied Denham. “I like fine nights, but I like to take care of my shins; and if I get star-gazing the lamp will be blown out, and we shall be going down one of those holes into the old gold-mine. There is one just in front—isn’t there?”
“Two,” I said; “but there are great stones laid across now.”
“Across the middle; but there’s plenty of room to go down on one side. Look! Here we are.”
He stopped and held the lamp down, its feeble rays showing that he was upon a broad stone laid across one of the old mine-shafts, one of those close by the ancient furnace we had discovered on our first visit. On this he now halted for a moment, partly from curiosity, partly to draw my attention to the danger.
“I should like to tie some of the horses’ reins together and have a decent lantern, so as to be let down to explore these places.”
“You couldn’t,” I said. “Don’t you remember when we threw a stone down this one it fell some distance and then went splash into the water?”
“It was the one farther on, not this one,” said Denham, bending lower.
“Well, you may depend upon it that there’d be no going far before coming to water.”
“Val!” cried my companion suddenly.
“What’s the matter?”
“That’s what some of our chaps have been doing.”
“What! going down to the water?”
“No; exploring to find gold. Look here; they’ve been doing exactly what I said. Here’s a rein tied round this stone with the end going right down, and—”
Crash!
“Ah! Val!”
There was the sound of a couple of strokes, one falling upon the lamp, which seemed to leap down into the shaft at our feet, the other stroke falling on Denham’s head; and as I sprang to his assistance I was conscious of receiving a tremendous thrust which sent me headlong downward, as if I were making a dive from the stone I tried to cross. The next minute my head came in contact with stones, strange scintillations of light flashed before my eyes, there was a roar as of thunder in my ears, and then all was blank.
Chapter Thirty Five.
In Doleful Dumps.
Mine was a strange awakening to what appeared like a confused dream. There was a terrible pain in my head, and a sensation as of something warm and wet trickling down the side of my face, accompanied by a peculiar smarting which made me involuntarily raise my hand and quickly draw it away again, for I had only increased the pain. Then I lay quite still, trying to puzzle out what was the matter.
At first I could only realise the fact that the darkness was intense. After a time the idea occurred that I must have been out with my troop attacking the Boers, and that a bullet had struck me diagonally on the forehead and glanced off after making the cut, which kept bleeding; but I was so stunned that a kind of veil seemed to be raised between the present and the past.
“I shall think all about it soon,” I mused. “It’s of no use to worry after a fall.”
Then I wondered about Sandho, and how the poor beast had fared, a pang of mental agony shooting through me as I listened.
I could not hear a sound.
“He’s killed,” was my next thought; “for if he had been alive he would have stopped directly I fell from his back, and waited for me to remount.”
I began to feel about with my hands; but instead of touching soft earth or bush I felt rough stones, wet and slimy as if coated with fine moss, and it had lately been raining. A faint musical drip, as of falling water, strengthened this notion; but I did not try to follow it out, for my head throbbed severely. So I lay still trying to rest, and gazing upward expecting to see the stars. All above, however, was black with a solid intensity that was awe-inspiring. I could see nothing; but I could feel, and became aware of another fact: I was lying among rocks in a most uncomfortable and painful position, with my head and shoulders in a niche between two pieces of stone, and my feet high above me.
“At the foot of some kopje,” I remember fancying. Then my mind grew clearer—so much clearer that I felt for my handkerchief, got it out of my breast, doubled it, and bound it round my forehead to stop the bleeding. This took me some time; but the movement, painful though it was, seemed to give me more power of thinking, and I began to do more. After an effort, I managed to get my back and shoulders out of the crevice in the rocks where they were wedged. Then my legs slipped down of their own weight, and I felt myself gliding down a sharp incline. I spread out my hands to stop myself, and succeeded, bringing up against some loose stones.
“Sandho’s somewhere at the bottom of this slope,” I thought, and I called him by name; but I was horrified to hear my words go reverberating from me with strange, whispering echoes which died slowly away.
“How strange!” I muttered, as the intense darkness made my feeling of confusion return. “Where am I? What place is this?”
I knew I was saying these words aloud; and what followed came like an answer to my question, for from somewhere close at hand there was a deep moaning sigh. I started violently and tried to creep away; but my head began to swim with terrible giddiness on attempting to move. As this subsided a little I thrust out my hand cautiously and began to feel about, touching at the end of a few seconds something which brought back my memory with a rush. My fingers had come in contact with the tin contrivance we had used for a lamp; and, naturally enough, the touch recalled to me who had borne it, and the accident that had befallen us. Accident? No; it must have been an attack.
However, my head was clearing rapidly, and the sense of horror and pain was passing off like mist; and now I began again to feel cautiously about, but without avail, till I turned upon my hands and knees and crawled a yard or two, slipped, and clung to the rugged surface to check my descent. Then my feet went down to the full extent before they were stopped by something soft, and a thrill of satisfaction ran through me, for a well-known voice said peevishly:
“Don’t—don’t!—What is it?”
“Val,” I cried, and my voice was caught up, and died away in whispers.
Then there was a pause, and I lay listening till, from below, came the words:
“Did any one speak?”
“Yes, yes, I did,” I cried. “Where are you?”
“I—I don’t know. Think I must have had a fall.”
I was about to lower myself to the speaker, when a sudden thought made me turn a little over on my left side. The next moment I was clinging hard with both hands, for a stone I had touched gave way, and there was a rushing sound, silence, and then a horrible echoing splash which set my heart beating fast. In imagination I saw the loosened stone slide down to an edge below me, and bound off, to fall into the water, which I could hear lapping, sucking, and gliding about the sides of the chasm, strangely suggestive of live creatures which had been disturbed and had made a rush at the falling stone in the belief it was something they might tear and devour.
Recovering from my momentary panic, I set one hand free to search for and get out my little tin match-box. It was no easy task, under the circumstances, to get it open and strike one of the tiny tapers.
“Val, is that you?” came from just below.
“Yes; wait a moment. Hold tight,” I said in a choking voice, as I rubbed the match on the bottom of the box, making a phosphorescent line of light, then another, and another, before impatiently throwing the match from me and seeing its dim light die away in the darkness.
I knew the reason why I had not got the match to light. As I opened the box again to get another, I did not insert finger and thumb till they got a good rub on my jacket to free them from the dampness caused by holding on to the wet stones. Now, as I struck, there was a sharp crackling noise, and the light flashed out, caught on, and the match burned bravely, giving me light enough to look for the tin lamp I had touched before. There it was, some little distance above me, on a terribly steep, wet slope.
No time was to be lost; so, mastering my hesitation as I thought of what was before me if I slipped, I began to climb; but, before I had drawn myself up a yard, Denham’s voice rose to me, its tones full of agony and despair:
“Don’t leave me, Val, old fellow!”
“Not going to,” I shouted. “I’m getting the lamp.”
“Ah!” came from below.
Almost before the exclamation had died away I was within reach of the fallen lamp; but just then I dislodged another loose stone, which went rolling down and plunged into the water below.
The match had burned out.
“All right,” I shouted. “I’ll get another.”
The same business had to be gone through again. Untaught by experience, I moistened the top of the first match I took out, my fingers trembling the while with nervous dread that I would drop the box or spill the matches, when the result might be death to one, if not to both. I tried the damp match three times before throwing it away; then, taking out two together and striking them, my spirits rose as I got a light, which was passed into my left hand, and with the other I secured the lamp, which lay bottom up.
“The tallow and wick will have fallen out,” I thought. No; the hard fat was in its place. Again I took out a match, shivering as I saw how rapidly it burned away. The very next moment I had laid it against the bent-down wick, which had been flattened by the fall; and it sputtered and refused to burn. All I could do till my fingers began to burn was to melt out some of the tallow and partially dry the wick. Then all was darkness again.
“Cheer up!” I cried hoarsely; “third time never fails.” There was no response. I turned cold as I fumbled at the box once more; my fingers needed no moisture from the slippery stones now to make them wet, for the perspiration seemed to be oozing out of every pore.
I was again successful when I struck a match, and it burned up brightly. My heart now beat more hopefully, as one tiny strand of the cotton caught and ceased sputtering, giving forth a feeble blue flame, which I was able to coax by letting the fat it melted drain away till more and more of the wick caught and began to burn.
I dared not wait to light the second wick, but looked for a safe place to set the lamp; this I found directly, within reach of my hand. My hurried glance showed that we were in a rough tunnel or shoot, sloping down rapidly into darkness—a darkness too horrible to contemplate; and, to my despair, I could not see Denham. Then, as the sight of the light revived him, I could hear his shivering sigh.
“Where are you?” I said, trying to speak firmly.
“Just below you,” came faintly.
I felt my teeth were clenched together as I asked the next question, knowing only too well what must be the answer:
“Can you see to climb up to me?”
“No,” came back after a pause of a moment or two. “I’m hurt and sick. I feel as if I shall faint.”
“Can you hold on till I get down to you?”
“I—I think so, old fellow,” he said faintly. “I’m on a sort of shelf. But don’t try—you can’t do it—you’ll send the loose stones down upon me. That last one grazed my head.”
“But I must,” I said harshly, and I remember fancying that my voice sounded savage and brutal. “I can’t leave you like this.”
“Climb up out of this horrible hole yourself, old fellow, and leave me.”
“I won’t,” I shouted, so that my voice went echoing away; but as I looked up past the light it seemed to me that I could not, even if willing.
“You must,” said Denham more firmly. “Climb up and call for help.”
At that moment, sounding faint and distant, there was the report of a rifle; then another, and another, followed by four or five in a volley.
“The Boers are attacking,” I cried. My heart sank as something seemed to say to me, “Well, if they are, what does it matter to you?”
The firing went on, and just then the wick of the lamp, of which a good deal must have been loosened by the fall, began to blaze up famously. I looked around to ascertain if I could get down to help Denham; but it seemed impossible. I saw, however, that I might lower myself a couple of feet farther, and get my heels in a transverse crack in the rock, where I could check myself and perhaps afford some help to a climber.
“Look here, Denham,” I shouted out as if I had been running, “I can help you if you can climb up here. You must pluck up and try.”
He muttered, with a low groan:
“Don’t talk like that, old chap. I’ve got the pluck, but feel as if I haven’t got the power. If I stir I shall go down into that awful pool, and then— Oh dear, it’s very horrible to die like a rat in a flooded hole!”
“Hold your tongue, you idiot!” I shouted, in a rage. “Who’s going to die? Look here; I can’t get down to you, so I must climb out and fetch help. I’ll go if you’ll swear you’ll sit fast and be patient, even if the light goes out.”
There was no answer.
“Denham, old fellow, do you hear me?” I cried, with a thrill of horror running through me as I imagined he had fainted, and that the next moment I should hear a sullen splash.
“Yes, I hear you,” he said. “I’ll try. It’s all right. But why don’t you shout?”
“No one could hear me, even if that firing was not going on,” I said. Looking upwards, I felt that the only chance was to try; but I was almost certain that I should slip, fall, and most likely carry my poor friend with me. The flickering light made the rocks above appear as if in motion; and, as I stared up wildly, the various projections looked as if a touch would send them rushing down. Then I uttered a gasp and tried to shout, but my voice failed. Was I deceiving myself? Almost within reach was a rope hanging down, close to the wall of the shaft on my right. Then I could speak again.
“Hurrah!” I shouted. “Here’s help, Denham. Hold on; some one’s letting down a rope. Ahoy, there! swing it more into the middle.”
Echoes were the only answer. Almost in despair, I crept sideways, and made a frantic dash just as I felt I was slipping, and a stone gave way beneath my feet. There I hung, flat upon the rock, listening to a couple of heavy splashes, but with the rope tight in my grasp as if my fingers had suddenly become of steel. I could not speak again for a few minutes; but at last, as the echoes of the splashes died out, the words came:
“All right, Denham?” A horrible pause followed; then, with a gasp:
“Yes—all right—yes—I thought it was all over then.”