Chapter Twenty Two.
A Grim Running Fight
Once clear of Gandela, Lamont had subsided into moody silence. Only the eager glow in his eyes, as he sent his horse along at a brisk pace at the head of his troop, told how his thoughts were working. At present they held but two considerations – a vivid picture of the horror he had witnessed and the torturing fear lest he should be too late to prevent a repetition of it. No, that contingency would not bear contemplation, and all unconsciously he urged his horse on to greater speed, till at last something of a murmur arose from one or two of his followers.
“We shall bust our horses if we stretch them out like this at the start.”
He looked round.
“Oh no, we shan’t. And every moment may make all the difference.”
What was it that rendered his every thought a keen torture? Had it been a case of rescuing from horrible danger any other two women in the township, would he have been so eager? Yes, he would. He could safely say that. But he would not have suffered from this overweighting, distracting apprehension begotten of the knowledge that one of these two was Clare Vidal.
But if his chief for the time being was silent, the same could not be said of Peters. For Peters was giving a graphic account of all that had befallen, and especially was he graphic on the barbarous massacre of the Tewson family. His object was to inflame the minds of these men, to work them up to a very fever-heat of desire for revenge; thus would each man feel endowed with the strength and bravery of six, and they would need it too, for after all their force was a puny one – yes, a very puny one, considering the overwhelming odds they would almost certainly have to encounter.
They made Langrishe’s Store in fine time, but – where was Langrishe? No answer was returned to their loud, impatient hail. He could not be away, for the door was half open. Some opined that he was probably drunk, but to two there, at any rate, that silence bore an ominous similarity to that which had signalled their approach to another homestead only yesterday morning. The solution was somewhat startling. From the partly open door half a dozen armed savages shot forth, and darted for the nearest bush with inconceivable swiftness.
But not one of them was destined to reach it. A perfect howl of rage went up from the spectators, and waiting for no word of command a dozen horsemen were on the heels of the fugitives, who were shot down to a man. It was all over in a moment.
“Loosen girths everyone and water the horses while we investigate,” ordered Lamont. “No time to off-saddle.”
It was even as they had dreaded. Lying behind the counter of his store was the body of poor Langrishe, the skull battered in, the clothing riddled with assegai cuts, but the body was still quite warm. Bales and cases, and goods of every description, were piled and heaped about in the last degree of confusion. The murderers had obviously been too busy looting to hear the approach of the party and so secure their own safety in time. The wrath of the latter found vent in bitter curses, and blood-curdling promises of vengeance upon the whole Matabele race.
But the ride had been a forced and a hot one, eke a dusty one and a dry. One of the men came forward.
“Captain,” he said, with a glance at the bar shelves, “some of us are thinking that while the horses are resting a tot all round wouldn’t hurt us any. Might buck us up a bit, and it’s mortal dry.”
“Yes; that’s right,” said Lamont. “But – only one, mind. We mustn’t overdo it, for we shall have all our work cut out for us.”
The said tot having been served out to all hands, and the party having requisitioned some of poor Langrishe’s biscuit in case of accidents – for they had set forth none too well provisioned – the body of the unfortunate storekeeper was left locked up within his own house. Girths were tightened, and the road was resumed.
The fresh spoor of the mule-waggon and the police horses was plain enough in the dry, powdery road, but the rapidity of their pace underwent no diminution. But, like those they followed, they were disgusted to find Skrine’s Store shut up and deserted. Equally, with those they followed, they did not discover the remains of the luckless Skrine and his unknown companions, lying murdered in the bush.
Again girths were loosened for a bare five minutes, and again they cantered forward. And now hopes began to rise. They had covered about half the stage to the Kezane Store. It was late in the afternoon, and Fullerton’s party would be sure to sleep there. They might have to stand a siege there, but that was safety itself compared with being attacked in the open. Then, just as this hope had become almost a certainty, there occurred that which brought a quick exclamation to every mouth. Right ahead on the smooth still air, distant and muffled came the dull rattle of a volley.
“Great Jupiter! they’re attacked,” cried Lamont, putting his horse to a gallop. “Come on, Peters. Come on everybody. For God’s sake, put your best foot forward!”
No need was there for this exhortation. Tingling with excitement every man was sending his steed along for all he knew how – those who were the most indifferently mounted slashing and spurring and cursing. And if any additional stimulant were needed the sound of further firing in front went far to supply it.
“It won’t be far beyond here,” yelled Peters, as they tore through the entrance to the bushy valley, where the fight at close quarters had first commenced. And, even as he spoke, more shots rang out, this time very near indeed, and with them mingled the roars and hisses of the attacking Matabele. Only a bend in the road hid from them the scene of action.
“Come on, boys!” shouted Lamont, half turning in his saddle. “You’ll know what to do when you see what’s going on.”
A minute later, and they did see, and what they saw was this. The waggon was at a standstill. The two leading mules were down – one motionless, the other struggling and kicking frantically. Of the police escort half had been killed, and the remnant, now dismounted, were standing, back to the waggon on either side, with revolver pointed, facing a swarm of dark leaping figures, closing in more and more, uttering their vibrating war-hiss, yet still not quite liking to face those deadly revolvers.
“Charge!” shouted Lamont. “Divide. Half of us each side.”
With a wild, roaring cheer the men spurred forward. The assailants did not wait. Uttering loud cries of warning and dismay they fled helter-skelter for more secure cover, and not all reached it, for the irresistible impetus of their charge had carried the rescuers right in among the discomfited Matabele, whom they shot down right and left, well-nigh at point-blank.
“Quick, some of you cut loose those mules,” ordered Lamont. “Steele, you’re a good man at that sort of thing. Three, all told, will be enough.”
In a trice the two wounded leaders were cut loose, the one still kicking being given its quietus. Wyndham, the while, kept to his business as driver with an unswerving attention that no temptation to bear a hand in the fight caused him to lose sight of for a moment, and in an incredibly short space of time the reduced team was on the move again.
Lamont’s glance took in Clare Vidal’s pale, set face with a glow of indescribable relief. She was uninjured, and he noted further that she gripped the revolver he had given her as though she had been using it. She, for her part, was fully appraising this man, whom last she had seen cool, indifferent, rather cynical. Now – grimy, unshaven, fierce-eyed – he was all fire and energy, and she noted further that he seemed in every way as one born to command. The alacrity with which the others sprang to execute his orders did not escape her either – even Jim Steele, whose ambition the other day had been to punch his head.
“Get your mules along as quick as you can, Wyndham,” he said. “We must be a good hour from the Kezane, and when these devils discover we are not the advance guard of a bigger force they’ll make it lively for us again.”
One more quick look, and that was all, then his attention was turned solely and entirely to the matter in hand. Clare Vidal read that look, and was perchance satisfied; anyhow she regarded him – grimy, unshaven, fierce-eyed – with an admiration she had never felt for any living man. The ‘coward’! she said to herself – the man whom her brother-in-law and others had described as a funkstick.
“See here, Lamont,” now sung out Fullerton. “I’m going to get on one of those police horses and help in this racket. I’m dead sick of sitting here.”
For two of the horses of the fallen troopers had been brought on and were being led by the survivors.
“All right. There’ll be no harm in that. Miss Vidal, you’d better get into the back of the waggon and let down the sail. We haven’t done with the enemy yet – and you won’t be such a conspicuous mark when he comes on again.”
For a moment Clare was about to object. But she said —
“Do you really wish me to?”
“Certainly I do.”
Then she complied without another word.
“Cheer up, Lucy, we are safe now,” she said to her sister. “Mr Lamont has come up just in the nick of time.”
“The nick of time indeed,” was the shuddering answer. “If he hadn’t we should have been dead by now.” And she shivered again.
“A miss is as good as a mile, Mrs Fullerton,” said Wyndham cheerily. “That was a near thing, but our time hasn’t come yet. Gee-yup!”
He had managed to knock a sort of jaded amble out of the dispirited mules. The relieving force, divided into two, was advancing through the bush and long grass on either side of the waggon – in open skirmishing order: Peters, by tacit consent, being in virtual command of one. Every man was keenly on the alert, and the faintest movement in the grass or bush would bring rifle or pistol to the ready.
“Lamont,” said Fullerton gravely, as they thus moved forward, “I don’t want to go through such another experience. That’s the very closest thing I’ve ever been in or ever expect to be. It’d have been bad enough, but the consciousness that the wife and Clare were in for it too – eugh! it was awful! And you got us out.”
Lamont frowned.
“You’ll excuse my saying so, Fullerton, but how you could be such a bedevilled idiot as to start across country at this time of day, with two helpless women and a handful of police, bangs me I own.”
“Helpless women!” echoed Fullerton. “Not much of the ‘helpless’ woman about Clare, I can tell you. Why, she accounted for more niggers than I did, with that pistol you gave her. But why didn’t you warn us if you were in the know?”
“I did, and nobody more than half believed me – some not even that.”
“I know now what you did on the day of the race meeting, Lamont,” said Fullerton gravely. “I consider we all owe our lives to you, and I, for one, want to apologise sincerely for having misunderstood you – ”
But his words were cut short. Lamont had risen in his stirrups and, swift as thought, discharged his revolver. Fullerton had a quick glancing vision of the head and shoulders of a savage twenty yards distant above the tall grass, and of the flinging aloft of black hands, and the upturned roll of white eyeballs, as, struck full and fair in the chest, the warrior fell backward with a crash. At the same time the hum of missiles overhead, and the report of firearms – but – not those of the force.
“This is a fresh crowd,” he cried. “Those who tackled us first hadn’t a gun among them.”
Then, from among the grass and bushes, dark forms arose, and the spurt of smoke and the ‘whigge’ of great clumsy missiles accompanied the appearance of each. But there were cool heads and fine shots among those white men, and the dusky barbarian found in a surprisingly short space of time that even momentary exposure meant almost certain death. Moreover, from the hurry and flurry of it, all untrained to quick shooting as he was, he could take no aim, and sent his bullet humming away harmlessly to high heaven. Fortunately, too, the outfit had got beyond the valley, and here in the open ground there was no elevated point of vantage whence it could be raked.
Yet the situation was becoming serious. Heartened by their reinforcement, and the moral effect of knowing that they, too, were returning the fire of the Amakiwa, though as yet harmlessly, the original attacking force was pressing forward under cover of the firing and confusion, swarming up stealthily in the bush and long grass, preparing for a final and decisive rush. But somehow that rush never quite came off. The fire of those cool, experienced whites was too determined, too hot, too deadly. Moving with judgment and rapidity, the mounted men would dart right up to any massing of the dark crowd, and pouring their fire literally into their faces would break up any attempt at an organised charge. But they did not come off unscathed. Three were wounded at close quarters, two had their horses stabbed right under them, but with unfailing cool-headedness and magnificent valour these were kept from falling into the hands of the savages.
For half an hour this continued, and indeed it seemed as though some supernatural power was aiding that mere handful of men against swarming odds, as with brain dizzy and the whole world seeming to grow glistening leaping bodies and gleaming blades and great waving shields, the air to buzz with the vibrating war-hiss – that handful fought its way step by step.
The red sun had just touched the far skyline when the assailants slackened, then drew off, and there – not half a mile distant – rose the substantial stockade of the Kezane Store. A ringing cheer went up, and even the played-out mules snuffed the air and pricked up their ears, and pulled forward with a will.
The long, hard, running fight – valiantly fought – was over, and there in front lay rest and safety – for a time.
Chapter Twenty Three.
The Kezane Store
The Kezane Store – shop, inn, farm, posting-stables rolled into one – was almost a small fort, in that its buildings were enclosed within a stout stockade of mopani poles. This is exactly as its owner intended it should be; and now the said owner – an elderly German who had served in the Franco-Prussian war – came forth, together with three other white men, to welcome the party.
“Ach! dot was very exciting,” he said. “We was hearing the fight – for the last hour – coming nearer and nearer. We was not able to help outside, only four of us, but we was ready to shoot from here if the Matabele had come near enough.”
The excitement of the men was now fairly let loose, and everybody seemed to be talking at once; fighting the battle over again in bulk, or recounting individual experiences. The surviving half of the handful of police were more subdued – the recollection of five dead comrades left behind on the road having something to do with it.
“Good old Grunberger,” sang out Jim Steele. “You ought to have been with us, a jolly old soldier like you. You’d have been a tiger.”
“Ach! I do not know,” replied the old German quite flattered. “Now, chentlemen, you will all come and haf some drinks wit me. Wit me, you understand.”
“Good for you, Grunberger,” said Peters. “But we can’t leave everything entirely without a guard. Why, they might come on again at any moment. Who’ll volunteer for first guard?”
There was perforce no actual discipline among this scratch corps, and the speaker, or even Lamont himself, had no power to enforce obedience to any single order they might issue. But these men had gone through a splendid experience together. Quite half of them had never before seen a life taken, or a shot fired in anger, in their lives; yet when put to it they had made a gallant running fight, against tremendous odds, with judgment and pluck such as no similar number of trained soldiers could have excelled them in. They had succeeded in their object, and had succeeded brilliantly, and the glow of satisfaction which this inspired was heightened by the absolute certainty that had they overtaken the mule-waggon ten minutes later their arrival would have been too late. All this had implanted in them an instinctive soldierly spirit, and not a man there would have dreamed of questioning an order issued by Lamont, or even Peters. Yet the latter now invited some of them to ‘volunteer.’ The whole corps responded.
“Half a dozen ’ll do,” was the answer, and those who seemed the most willing were duly told off. The while the ladies were being looked after by the storekeeper’s wife.
Lamont was helping to look after the wounded. Fortunately, among the three men who found themselves at Kezane when they arrived was a young doctor from Buluwayo; and his services being readily and skilfully given, there was no cause whatever for anxiety on the part of these less lucky ones.
“Where’s the captain?” sang out Jim Steele, as the residue of the corps were doing full and jovial justice to the hospitable German’s invitation. “We must have the captain. We want to drink his jolly good health. Here it is. Here’s to Captain Lamont, and ripping good luck to him.”
The toast was drunk with a roar of cheering.
“He’s helping look after the wounded,” said Peters. “There’s a doctor here luckily, and he’s having them seen to all right.”
A sort of compunctious silence fell upon the others at this announcement. Here they were, refreshing and making merry and enjoying themselves, while the man who had led them, and taken a tiger’s share in the fight, had gone straight away to care for their wounded comrades.
“Chaps,” said Jim Steele shortly, “we are sweeps. D’you hear? Sweeps.”
“It’s all right, Jim,” said Peters. “Lamont told me to look after you all, even apart from Grunberger’s jolly hospitable invitation. Don’t you bother about him.”
“Bother about him?” echoed Jim Steele. “But that’s just what we’re going to do. We must have him here and drink his jolly good health. This time it’ll be my round, boys, and we’re going to do it with musical honours. So, Peters, cut away and rout him out, like the good chap you are.”
Peters, nothing loth, went out. He found Lamont just coming out of the house, having seen the wounded men made as snug and comfortable as they could be under the circumstances. Indeed, he had been giving the doctor actual aid with his own hands, in one case where an amputation had been necessary.
“Certainly I’ll come, Peters,” he said. “I want to thank these fellows for coming with me when I asked them. Heavens! to think what would have happened if they’d hung back, for you and I would have been nowhere against such odds. But – it won’t bear thinking about.”
A huge cheer greeted his entrance. All hands were awaiting him, glasses ready. A gigantic tumbler of whisky-and-soda was thrust into his hand by Jim Steele.
“Toss that down first, captain,” said that worthy. “You’ve had nothing yet.”
Lamont, entering into the fun of the thing, complied. Then Jim Steele went on —
“Boys, I’m going to give you the health of our captain, the biggest tiger in a fight any fellow could wish to find himself alongside of – ”
The vociferous chorus of ‘Hear – hear!’ having subsided, he went on —
“But before doing that, I want to apologise to him – yes, to apologise, and I don’t know how to do it quite low enough. The day of the race meeting I insulted you, captain. I called you a coward. A coward I think of that, boys, after what we’ve seen to-day. Well, now I want to say you may kick me – now, in front of everyone here, and I won’t move. So, go ahead.”
“Oh, stow that, Jim Steele,” interrupted Lamont, “and don’t make a silly ass of yourself. You were a little bit screwed, you know, and didn’t know what the devil you were saying.” Here the listeners roared. “Don’t you imagine I’ve given that another thought, because I haven’t. And calling a man anything doesn’t make him so. We’ll rub out that little disagreement right here.”
He put out his hand, and the next moment almost wished he hadn’t, when Jim Steele was doing his best to wring it off. The cheering was wildly renewed.
“Boys,” went on the latter, raising his glass. “Here’s Captain Lamont, and his jolly good health. And if he’ll raise a corps to take the veldt and help straighten out this racket, I’m going to be the first man to join. I don’t suppose there’s a man jack in this room that won’t join. Is there?”
“No – no.”
The answer was an enthusiastic roar. And as they drank his health they struck up the usual chorus under the circumstances – ‘For he’s a jolly good fellow’ – until the room rang again. And if the watchful savage was crawling about the dark veldt outside, in a scouting capacity – and who shall say he was not – he must have decided that Makiwa was singing war-songs with extraordinary go and zest – not to say indulging in a Tyay’igama dance1 , by way of celebrating his victory.
Then Lamont made a little speech. He thanked them for responding so readily to his call for volunteers, but he knew that they would thank themselves for the rest of their lives that it had been given to them to be the means of averting the horrible tragedy they had been the means of averting. The whole country now was up in arms. These savages spared neither age nor sex, he had already seen enough – and Peters would bear him out there – to prove that. Probably they would hear of more and similar massacres elsewhere before long, but at any rate he, for one, was going to help the country in which he had lived since its opening up – to help it to the best of his ability; and whether they served with him or not he hoped and believed every man jack in that room was going to do the same.
As for himself, Jim Steele had been good enough to emphasise anything he might have done, but exactly the same and more might be said of every man who had fought that day in defence of their two fellow-countrywomen, and of none more than of Wyndham, who although he had had no opportunity of firing a shot at the would-be woman-slayers, had none the less by his coolness and skill contributed to the safety of the party as thoroughly as though he had shot a score of Matabele with his own hand.
Wyndham had just come in, and a shout of cheering greeted his appearance at these words. When this had abated Lamont went on.
They were not out of the wood yet, he said. They had either got to wait here until relieved or take the ladies back to Gandela themselves, and he himself favoured the first plan. Were they alone they would reckon it part of the day’s work to fight their way, if necessary, to whatever point at which their services were most required. But the events of the afternoon had shown they were an inadequate force for escort purposes, though providentially they had been brought through that time. Again, he repeated, he could not claim to have done more than any other man who was with him, where all did so well; and to the end of his days, be they many or few, one of the proudest recollections of his life would be that of the couple of dozen or so of men who fought side by side with him, against tremendous odds, to save their fellow-countrywomen from falling into the barbarous hands of murderous and treacherous savages.
Roars of cheers greeted the closing of this speech; and then they fell to the discussion of Jim Steele’s notion. For the idea had caught on. It was determined that those who had fought that day should form the nucleus of a corps to take the field under Lamont and Peters, and that the said corps should be known as Lamont’s Tigers.
“Dat is a goot name,” said Grunberger, nodding his head approvingly. “We will now drink de health of Lamont’s Tigers. Chentlemen, name your drinks.”
This announcement was received with great applause. Then, paper and pen having been requisitioned, every man there put down his name, pledging himself to serve in the corps and also to do all he could to induce desirable men to join it too.
Lamont had left them after his address, and was now examining the defences of the place. As he stood in the gathering darkness it was with a strange tingle of the pulses that he reflected upon the scene he had just left. This popularity to which he had thus suddenly sprung was not a little strange, in fact it was a little aweing. In what light would Clare Vidal view it? And then, at the thought of Clare, he felt more than devoutly grateful that he had been the means of saving her from a horrible death – and with it there intruded for the first time another thought. Had he thus saved her for himself?
Yes. The frozen horror with which he had received the announcement that morning, that she was advancing deeper and deeper into certain peril, and causing him to lose sight of his own fatigue and recent hardships, to start off then and there to her aid, had opened his eyes; but – was it for good or for ill?
“There you are at last, Mr Lamont,” said Clare, as he entered the living-room of the place. “We have been wondering what had become of you.”
She was alone. There was a something in her tone, even in her look, which he had not noticed before – a sort of gravity, as though the old fun and brightness had taken to itself wings.
“I’ve been going around seeing to things. Where’s Mrs Fullerton?”
“Gone to bed. She’s got a splitting headache, and seems to have got a kind of frightened shock. Dick is with her now, but I’m going directly.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. It has been a trying enough day for any woman, Heaven knows. But you, Miss Vidal. There isn’t a man in the whole outfit that isn’t talking of your splendid pluck.”
She smiled, rather wanly he thought, and shook her head.
“I wish they’d forget it then. I wish I could. Oh, Mr Lamont – I have killed – men.”
She uttered the words slowly, and in a tone of mingled horror and sadness. This, then, accounted for the changed expression of her face.
“Strictly and in absolute self-defence. Not only in self-defence but in defence of your helpless sister too. There is no room for one atom of self-reproach in that,” he went on, speaking rapidly, vehemently. “Not only that, but your courage and readiness were important factors in saving the situation until we arrived. Wyndham has been telling me all about it.”
She smiled, but it was a hollow sort of smile, and shook her head.
“It is good of you to try and comfort me. But do you mean it really?”
“Every word, really and entirely. ‘Men’ you said just now. Beasts in the shape of men you ought to have said, and would have if you had seen what Peters and I saw only yesterday morning, only I don’t want to shock you any further. Yes, on second thoughts I will though, if only to set those qualms of a too-sensitive conscience at rest. Well, we found the mutilated remains of poor Tewson, and his womenkind and children – little children, mind – whom these devils had murdered in their own home. I could tell you even more that would bring it home to you, but I won’t. Now, have you any further scruples of conscience?”
“No, I haven’t,” she answered, both face and tone hardening as she realised the atrocity in its full horror. “Thank you for telling me. It has made a difference already. And now, Mr Lamont, I must go to my sister. You have saved us from a horrible death, and I don’t know how to find words to thank you.”
“Oh, as to that, you can incidentally count in about three dozen other men. Not a man jack of them but did just as much as I did – some even more.”
She looked at him with such a sweet light glowing in her eyes, as well-nigh to unsteady him.
“I’ll believe that,” she said, “when you’ve answered one question.”
“And it – ?”
“Who got together these men the moment he knew we were in danger? Who, forgetting his own fatigue, started at a moment’s notice, and, inspiring the others with the same energy and bravery, rescued us from a ghastly death? Who was it?”
“It was only what any man would have done. Oh, Clare, you can never realise what that moment meant to me when I heard that that blighting idiot Fullerton had started this morning – literally to hurl you on to the assegais of these devils. You!”
In his vehemence he hardly noticed that he had used her Christian name. She did, however, and smiled, and the smile was very soft and sweet.
“Me!” she echoed. “Didn’t you think of poor Lucy too? Why only me?”
“Because I love you.”
It was out now. His secret had been surprised from him. What would she say? They stood facing each other, in that rough room with its cheap oleographs of the Queen, the Kaiser, and Cecil Rhodes staring down upon them from the walls in the dingy light of an unfragrant oil-lamp, any moment liable to interruption. The smile upon her face became a shade sweeter.
“Say that again,” she said.
“I love you.”
She was now in his embrace, but she sought not to release herself from it. Bending down his head she put her lips to his ear and whispered, “Consider the compliment returned.”
They said more than that, these two, who had thus so unpremeditatedly come together, but we do not feel under the necessity of divulging what they said. Perchance also they —did.
“I must really go now,” she said at last, as footsteps were heard approaching. “Good-night – my darling.”
And she disappeared with a happy laugh, leaving the other standing there in a condition little short of dazed, and sticking a pin into himself to make sure that he was actually awake and not merely dreaming.