Chapter Sixteen.
First Blood
Peters was fossicking away at his shaft sinking, rather as if nothing had happened, yet all the while he was thinking out the situation from every side.
For a good deal had happened, and that since the averted tragedy of the race meeting. True to his word Lamont had made another visit to Zwabeka’s kraal, and had persisted in making it alone. This Peters would not hear of, and after considerable altercation they had gone together. But for all they elicited – anything definite, that is – they might just as well have stayed at home; yet there was a something in the demeanour of the savages that seemed to make up for this. They were altogether too cordial, too effusive – in short, over-acted their part. From this, also true to his word, Lamont had duly sent in to Orwell the deductions he had drawn.
It had been a risky venture, knowing what they did. They had avoided spending a night there, and all the while, not seeming to be, were keenly on the alert, outwardly chaffing at ease with their doubtful entertainers. Qubani was away; where, nobody knew. Au! an isanusi was not an ordinary mortal, they said. His goings and comings were perforce mysterious at times. However, they had returned in safety and had experienced no overt manifestation of hostility.
On these things was Peters pondering as he kept his boys tolerably hard at their job. The new development of affairs was particularly vexatious to him, in that he had of late detected signs that this time he was not toiling in vain. Any day, any moment, might disclose a rich field, and then what fun it would be to go to Lamont and say – “What have I always told you? We’ve ‘struck ile’ at last, and now you can get away home – and clear off all the encumbrances on your family place, and then – where the devil do I come in?” Yes, he had often rehearsed the revelation, and doing so had come to the conclusion that even luck had its seamy side.
What on earth would he do when Lamont had gone for good? Lamont would probably marry and take up his position, and then he, Peters, with all the wealth he was going to take out of this hole in front of him – why, he was far happier as things were.
You see, he was rather an out-of-the-way character was Peters.
Now a murmur among his boys attracted his attention, and Lamont himself appeared on the scene.
“Here, what the devil d’you think, Peters?” he said glumly, as he slid from the saddle. “Here’s this fellow Ancram turned up again.”
“Ancram? Good Lord! Has he come to stay?”
“Rather. He borrowed a horse from Fullerton, and he’s got luggage enough on his saddle to weigh down two railway porters. Said he had such a good time before that he must come and see us again. I couldn’t turn him away, and so there he is, damn him.”
Peters roared.
“Don’t you get your shirt out over it, old chap,” he said. “We’ll work him out with a real scare this time – and that mighty sharp.”
Here again how little did the speaker know how much earnest there was underlying this promise. The shimmer of heat rose from the pleasant roll of undulating country. The tranquil life of the veldt lay outspread around, peaceful, sunny, smiling; but – beneath?
“That’s all jolly fine,” rejoined Lamont disgustedly. “But he’s grown too knowing since he’s been at Gandela. I believe he smokes that we were ‘kidding’ him before.”
“Well, we’ll do it more to the purpose this time, and no mistake. Oh, don’t you bother about it, Lamont. We’ll get the biggest grin out of him we ever got yet. He shall earn his keep that way, by the Lord Harry!”
“It’ll have to be a big one then; I detest the chap. Well, I must be getting on. Two more rinderpest cases. What do you think of that?”
“Nothing. Wait till I get a little deeper here; and if all the cattle in Matabeleland were to snuff out, it wouldn’t matter.”
“Well, that’s what they’re going to do. This is a God-forsaken country, after all. So long.”
About an hour after Lamont had gone, two young Matabele came into the camp, and saluted pleasantly.
“Why, who are these, Inyovu?” asked Peters, seeing that in outward appearance they were the very image of his boy.
“They are my brothers, Nkose.”
“Your brothers? And what do they want?”
“They would like to work at the mine, Nkose.”
“But I don’t want them. I have boys enough.”
“But such are only Makalaka, Nkose. These are much better. Au!”
With the last exclamation the speaker turned sharply. As he did so, Peters instinctively turned his head to look in the same direction, and – received a whack on the back of it that made him stagger. A shout was raised —
“Throw him in! Throw him in!” The mouth of the shaft gaped behind him. The three young savages closed with him, and Inyovu called to the other two to pinion him while he got in another blow with the pick-handle. They were young, and athletic. Peters was not young, but was athletic too, and the struggle became a furious one. He could not draw his revolver, because, foreseeing the attempt, one of them had kept a hand upon it. Inyovu the while was dancing round the combatants, holding a pick-handle all ready to strike when he saw a chance of not felling one of his brothers instead. Then Peters saw his chance, and – kicked. Right in the pit of the stomach it caught the man who was giving him most trouble. With a gasp of anguish this fellow staggered back, then doubling up, toppled down the shaft behind him. Quick as lightning, and taking advantage of the momentary panic, Peters shot forth his left fist, and caught Inyovu under the jaw. It was a regular knock-out blow, and Inyovu dropped. The other, however, still hung on, and, looking up, the reason for this became clear.
Heading for the spot at a run came quite a number of natives, and shields and assegais glancing through the sparse bush told upon what sort of errand were these. It was manifest that the rising had begun.
Do what he would Peters could not throw off his wiry antagonist, who hung on to him like a terrier, utterly impervious to kicks or blows, the object being to prevent him from effecting his escape until the others should come up, and then – good-night! The Makalaka boys had already taken to their heels and were fleeing wildly.
Then fortune favoured him. His adversary slipped on a loose stone, and in trying to save himself loosed the hand which had been gripping the revolver holster. It was a slip there was no retrieving, and in a twinkling a bullet crashed through his ribs, sending him spinning round and round, to flatten out, face downward, to the earth.
A wild shout went up from the advancing savages. At them Peters sent one look and pointed his pistol. No, they were not near enough for a shot to prove effective, but quite near enough for him to start running – and that at nearly his best pace – homeward, for he had no horse.
As he turned to run, the pursuing Matabele set up a series of the most appalling yells; which, however, so far from appalling the object of their pursuit, caused him to laugh grimly to himself as he thought how these idiots were wasting wind in making a wholly unnecessary noise.
Peters was as hard as nails, and absolutely sound in wind and limb – yet he started handicapped by reason of the strain upon both effected by his recent struggle. And he had about two miles to cover before reaching the homestead. Even then, was safety there? Lamont might not have returned, in all probability would not have – and then these might waylay and murder him at their leisure; whereas the two of them might have made a good show of defence. Of Ancram’s presence he took no account whatever.
All this passed through his brain as he ran – yet ran with judgment. He had not put forth his best pace as yet. A glance over his shoulder from time to time told him that his enemies, though they kept the distance equal, were not gaining on him, and that being so, he would reserve a spurt for emergencies. Thus the chase sped on, and the pursuing savages strung out upon the track of the one white man like a pack of hounds in full cry.
Ancram the while was sitting in the shade of the rough verandah, reading a novel, and, alternately, thinking. He had returned there with a purpose, and that was to force Lamont to do something for him; wherefore the ill-concealed ungraciousness of his welcome had no effect upon him whatever. He could make it unpleasant for Lamont – very unpleasant; he had already noticed a growing coolness towards the latter since he had insinuated here and there the tale – his version – of the affair at Courtland Mere. And Clare Vidal? Watching her furtively but keenly he had recognised that she entertained a high opinion of Lamont, but not of himself. Well, that might be altered, with a little judicious innuendo, as to the first, at any rate, if not as to the last. She certainly was a splendid looking girl, and ought to have her eyes opened. Lovely eyes they were, too, by Jove!
Looking up now, he saw Lamont strolling across from the stable.
“I say, old chap, do you go to bed with that magazine rifle?” he said banteringly, in allusion to the weapon the other always carried during the last few days.
“You may yet come to see the sound judgment even of that,” he answered grimly.
And such are the coincidences, the ironies of life, that even as he spoke a couple of shots snapped forth from among the thorns along the top of the river bank, together with an astonishing whoop.
“Hi-ha! Lamont! Look out! Look out! The devils are coming!”
“That’s Peters,” he said.
“Why, what the deuce – ” began Ancram, looking blank, as a horrible suspicion of the truth began to dawn upon him.
Both men stood staring in the direction of the sounds. Then one of them instinctively and characteristically slipped under cover of the house. But that one was not Lamont. Now Peters appeared, sprinting in fine form across the open. Behind him, a flourish of shields above the thorn-bushes, and some threescore savages sprang forth at a run, determined to fall on the place before its surprised inmate or inmates should have time to realise what had happened. But they reckoned without one of the said inmates.
The magazine rifle spoke, and a bedizened warrior flung his shield in the air and plunged forward upon his face. Another followed suit – then another. A magazine rifle, accurately handled, is a terror, and so the assailants realised as a third went to ground, and then a fourth, and all in a moment’s space. With a loud cry of startled warning they halted, then dropped down into the cover of the bushes and stones, yet not before the marksman, detecting a momentary bunching of the crowd, had let go another shot, this time with more deadly effect still.
“What’s the bag, Lamont?” cried Peters, with a laugh, though still panting with his run.
“Five, for cert. I think two or three more are damaged as well. Fired into the brown that last time.”
“Well done – well done. Now I’m going to take a hand;” and diving into the house he quickly opened the armoury chest, of which he had a duplicate key, and produced a weapon exactly similar to Lamont’s.
“Hallo, Ancram, you back again?” he cried in hurried greeting to that worthy. “Now you’re going to see that fight you were spoiling for,” going to the window which commanded the point of attack. “Oh, blazes! The devils ain’t going to give us a show after all.”
For the enemy seemed to have vanished into empty air. Yet both knew that they were lying there meditating on the situation. Lamont’s prompt and accurate shooting had been of incalculable moral effect; and that one man, standing out in the open, should be able to do such execution, all with the same gun and not even pausing to reload, was not less so. Would that gun go on shooting for ever? was what they were asking themselves.
“Dig us out a drink, Lamont, while I keep an eye on our black brother,” said Peters. “My tongue’s hanging out after that run, I can tell you.”
“That holds good of all hands, I guess,” was the answer; and Ancram, after a considerable stiff dose, began to grow valiant and hold the fighting qualities of the concealed foe exceeding cheap.
“Don’t crow yet, Ancram,” said Peters grimly. “These are only the advance guard of a much bigger lot. You’ll get all you want of them before to-night.”
“No! Why d’you think that?” and even the abundant infusion of Dutch courage was not quite abundant enough to stifle the anxiety underlying the query.
“Because – Ah! There you are! I thought so.”
A whiz of something, together with a double report. A bullet thudded hard upon the outside wall, knocking up a cloud of chips and dust. Then a regular fusillade rattled from the nearest thorn-bushes, and the vicious hum of missiles in uncomfortable proximity. At the same time tossing shields and glinting assegais stirred along the mimosa fringe, as a swarm of savages broke into view, hurrying to the support of those who had first attacked.
Chapter Seventeen.
A Trap
Ancram felt his face going cold and white. He was not by temperament especially brave, and had never seen a shot fired, or a blow struck in anger, with lethal weapon that is, in his life, and now the whiz and impact of these humming missiles, any one of which might knock him into the next world in less than a second, struck terror into his soul. So too did the sight of those long bright blades in the grip of these threatening savages, brawny of frame and ferocious of aspect, in their wild and fantastic war-gear of cow-tails and monkey skins and variegated hide. Not to put too fine a point upon it, he was badly scared, and, what was worse, looked all that.
“Here – hi! Hold up!” cried Lamont, as ducking spasmodically to avoid a bullet that had whizzed nearly a yard over his head Ancram cannoned violently against him. “Confound it, you’ve upset all my ‘peg,’ which is a waste of good liquor. Never mind, there’s plenty more, fortunately. You’d better have another yourself, Ancram.”
“Er – ah – I think I had.”
But the hand that held his glass trembled so violently that he spilled nearly half of what he had just mixed for himself. At the same time Peters burst into a roar of laughter, but not at this.
“There’s a nigger,” he explained, “who keeps bobbing his head round a stone, but he’s in too much of a funk to keep it there; and the expression on his face as he bobs it back again is enough to kill a cat.”
Ancram stared, and gave a sickly grin. He couldn’t have raised a spontaneous laugh then – no not to save his life. Yet these other two were keenly enjoying the joke.
“They won’t show in a hurry,” said Lamont. “These magazine guns of ours have put the fear of the Lord into them.”
“Will they go away then, and leave us?” said Ancram eagerly.
“Not much. They’ll lie low till it’s dark. Then they’ll have things all their own way.”
Ancram went pale again.
“But – but – D’you mean to say,” he stammered, “that we shall be – at their mercy?”
“Just that,” answered Lamont, who was busy lighting his pipe. “I say, Ancram, it’s different here now to that day at Courtland Mere. Slightly warmer, eh?”
He took a fiendish pleasure in the situation, as the incidents of that memorable day came before him once more. Then, and since, this man had held him up as a coward, this man standing here now with the blanched face and staring eyes. Yet if ever any man was in a blue funk, that man was Ancram – here at this moment.
“Oh, come now, Lamont,” objected the latter, with a forced laugh. “You’re humbugging, you know. You wouldn’t be so jolly cool and contented if it was really as you say.”
“As to being cool, you’ve got to be in these fixes. As for contented – I tell you I’m most infernally discontented. D’you think it’s any fun to have my place burnt down, and all sorts of things in it for which I still have a use? Well, it isn’t.”
“But ourselves – our lives?” urged Ancram wonderingly.
“We’re not going to lose those if we can help it. We’re going to skip.”
“But how? When?”
“Soon as it gets dark enough. Buck up, man. You’re in luck’s way. Why, you’ve got here just in the nick of time to see some of the fun you were hankering after that first night you arrived.”
“In luck’s way! Fun!” At that moment Ancram would have given a great deal more than he had ever possessed to find himself back safe and sound within even the doubtful security afforded by Gandela.
“You remember,” went on Lamont cruelly, “that night you arrived? It would be a jolly good job if we did have a war. It would be no end fun, and you’d enjoy it. Well, there’s a whole heap of enjoyment sticking out for you on those terms – if we get through to-night, that is.”
“What are our chances, then?”
“About one in three. Stand back. You’re getting into line with that window again.”
Ancram stepped aside with wondrous alacrity.
“Er – I say, can’t you lend me a gun of some sort?” he said.
“A gun? Done any rifle shooting?”
“Not much – in fact very little.”
“Then a bird gun is the thing for you. With buckshot cartridges it’s a terror – especially at close quarters. By Jove, Ancram! that last shoot we had at Courtland, you little thought that next time you and I were fellow guns it wouldn’t be as against the harmless homely rocketer, but the whole real live Matabele?”
“No, rather not,” answered Ancram, a little more confidently, for the cool, devil-may-care fearlessness of the other two was beginning to infect him. “And – er, Lamont, I think I’ll have another peg, if I may.”
The hot afternoon drowsed on, and the assailants, or besiegers rather, after the first few volleys made no further sign. It was clear that Lamont had accurately sized up their programme. Once, Peters had thought to descry the head of a savage peering round a bush, and had promptly sent a bullet where he judged the body should be, but there was nothing to tell with what success or not. Clearly they were playing a waiting game, for they made no attempt to occupy the cattle kraal, and rake the house from there. Those awful magazine rifles had established within them a wholesome fear.
But they had no idea of abandoning their plan, for all that. That house would be worth plundering. Its owner was known as one of the well-to-do settlers, and there would be stores of all kinds, and ammunition and firearms – good ones too. For the rest, they had already lost several warriors and thirsted for revenge.
During the hours of daylight the occupants were not idle. The position being menaced from one side only, they need only give cursory vigilance to the other, where the ground was too open for any wily savage to venture to risk his skin. So, while one watched, the other was busy putting up in portable packets a sufficiency of provisions to last for some days at a pinch, likewise as much ammunition as could be carried.
“Now we’ll have a feed,” said Lamont. “That’ll last us the night through, and spare our supplies for the road. They’re bound to burn this shack down in any case. Aren’t they, Peters?”
“Cert.”
“All right then. Now for the trap.”
And Ancram looked on with mystified eyes, while Lamont was arranging what seemed like a dummy parcel on a beam over the centre of the room, and connecting it by a string to a cross string, fastened about half a yard above the ground. This anybody exploring the room was bound to trip over, and then – down came the dummy parcel, hard and violently upon the table. Having tested it several times, he untied it from the string and chucked it into a corner.
“That’ll be all right. There’ll be some vacant places in kingdom come filled up before sunrise,” he said. And to Ancram’s inquiries as to what sort of booby trap they were concocting, the answers of both men were dark.
The sun dipped to the far horizon, throwing out his long sweeping rays of gold across the silent land. But there was no sign of the returning herd of cattle, of which Ujojo was in charge. It was significant, too, that no sign of a native servant was visible among the huts since the time that Peters had been chased in. Ujojo had, of course, run off the cattle as his share of the spoil. The few calves in the kraal were bellowing impatiently for their defaulting mothers, and some fowls were clucking and scratching about. In a few minutes it would be quite dark.
“Ready, Ancram?” said Peters.
“Ye-es. But – who’s going to fetch the horses?”
“Nobody,” said Lamont briskly. “We travel per Shanks his mare.”
“But – what’ll Fullerton say? I borrowed a horse from him.”
“Then he’ll lose it. Why, if anyone tried to get out the horses he’d make such a devil of a row over it that our scheme would be blown upon right there. And they wouldn’t funk rushing us in the dark, when we couldn’t see to shoot straight. Now then – got your gun and cartridges? That’s right. Out of that window, and stick hard to Peters. For your life walk quietly and don’t let a sound be heard. I’m going to set the trap.”
But Peters protested this was his job – protesting, however, to deaf ears.
“Well then, for God’s sake, Lamont, be careful,” he whispered earnestly.
For all they had primed him liberally with ‘Dutch courage’ Ancram’s heart sank into his boots, as he found himself in the fresh, cool night air, and realised that anything over a hundred savages lurked within hardly more than three times that number of yards of him, thirsting for his blood. No need to enjoin caution upon him. He stepped as though walking on hot bricks. Suddenly he gave a violent start, and some special extension of the mercy of Providence alone restrained him from blazing off his gun. For he felt, rather than heard, stealthy footsteps behind him. Then the merest whisper breathed through the darkness.
“It’s all right. I’ve done it. Now let’s get on.”
And Ancram’s knees tottered under him in the revulsion of feeling. No murderous savage was this, stealing up to transfix him in the darkness. It was only that they had been joined by Lamont.
“Whau! it is near the time,” whispered Jabula, a fighting induna of the old Insukamini regiment. “It will never be darker than this, and these fools will be asleep by now. They believe we have gone away.”
“Not yet, not yet,” cautioned another man of equal rank. “When they have drunk a little more they will be less watchful I know these whites and their ways.”
After some more whispered discussions it was agreed that they should wait a little longer; and they lay there, in the darkness, impatiently fingering their blades, and thinking hungrily over all the good things they would find within that house when they had cut its occupants to pieces.
Savages rarely embark on night attacks, any more than they are keen to venture against unknown odds. These knew the odds they were facing: two cool and resolute men – of Ancram’s presence they were unaware – armed with rifles which seemed to require no reloading, and who rarely missed their aim. If such were to be overpowered, without terrific loss of life to themselves, it must be during the hours of darkness. That was the only chance, and even it was a desperate one. But for nearly two hundred of them to retire before two men, however resolute, however well-armed – no, that was not to be thought of.
The time had come, and now each supple, crawling shape moved noiselessly through the darkness. Those who had white among their war adornments had removed such, and were indistinguishable from the blackness that enveloped them. On the edge of the cover they halted, listening intently, but that dark silent house, now quite close, gave forth no sound, showed no glimmer of a light. They moved forward once more, those creeping snakes, a portion of them spreading out over the open ground, their tactics being to surround the place completely, lest its occupants should endeavour to escape in the darkness.
The circle closed in, and now they were right under the walls. Still no sound! What did it mean? Simply that the man who had counselled further delay had spoken the right word. The occupants were probably fast asleep.
Softly, noiselessly, Jabula put forth his hand and grasped the handle of the door; softly, noiselessly, he turned it. To his amazement the door readily opened. It was not even fast.
He whispered a moment to those behind him, and he and several others entered the room. Then, as prearranged, a blaze sprang up as one of them had struck a match and lighted an impromptu torch of grass and sticks intertwisted, and rubbed over with grease. More amazement! There, in an arm-chair, with back towards them, lounged the figure of a man. The broad-brimmed hat was pulled rather forward over the eyes, as though its wearer were fast asleep.
“U’ Lamonti!” murmured Jabula; adding, by way of injunction, “He is sleepy with drink. Do not kill him. We will take him alive.”
For a moment the induna and those inside the door stood contemplating the sleeping figure, the fitful glare of the impromptu torch lighting their savage faces and blood-covetous eyes. They felt no further misgiving. The other white man would be asleep too – also drunk. What surpassing fools these Amakiwa were.
“Wake, Lamonti,” said Jabula, advancing to the arm-chair and its occupant. “Lo, we have come to visit thee.”
And those were the last words he ever spoke, for he had tripped and stumbled over a line of taut string stretched across the room, and at the moment he did so there was a concussion that might well have shaken the world, together with a most awful and appalling roar; which, however, those within or around did not even hear, inasmuch as they, together with Lamont’s homestead, had been literally blown from the face of the earth.
When the sun rose the following morning, it rose upon a strange scene. The site of Lamont’s homestead was now represented by a huge pit surrounded by a jumble of stones and fragments of wood and of iron – human remains, also fragmentary, in ghastly profusion, mixed with half-charred shields and fused and twisted metal. And outside the radius of this indescribable ruin, an odd savage here and there was picking himself up, and blinking dazedly as he asked a comrade what had happened, and was surprised that though he could see the latter’s lips moving he could not hear one word of what was said. Indeed it would be long before those who had escaped with life would recover from the shock of that awful concussion, even if they ever did.