blast.
Above him a solid frieze of milling horses was outlined against the
darkening sky, the men upon them pouring their bullets into the crowded
river, bed. Wounded horses plunged down the bank, rolling and kicking
into the mud.
'Dismount! Dismount! Go in after them!' an old burgher with a neat
blond beard yelled.
Sean dragged the gun around to get him. The man saw him in the smoke
but his right leg was out of the stirrup, his rifle held in the left
hand, helpless in the act of dismounting. Sean saw his eyes were grey
and without fear as he looked down into the muzzle of the Maxim.
The burst hit him across the chest, his arm windmilled, his left foot
caught in the stirrup as he went backwards and his pony dragged him
away.
The attack broke. The Boer fire slackened, ponies wheeled away, and
raced back for the shelter of the hills. The old burgher Sean had
killed went with them, dragged upon his back with his head bouncing
loosely over the broken ground, leaving a long slide mark of flattened
grass.
Around him Sean's men cheered and laughed and chattered with
jubilation. But in the mud there were many who did not cheer and with
a guilty shock Sean realized he had been standing on the corpse of the
sailor who had died over the gun.
'Our round, that one!' Eccles beamed. Callous among the dead as only
an old soldier can be.
'Yes,' Sean agreed.
Out in the open a horse heaved itself up and stood shivering.
one leg hanging broken under it. A wounded burgher started to cough in
the grass, choking and gasping as he drowned in his own blood.
'Yes, our round, Eccles. Put up the flag. They must come, down and
collect the wounded.
They used lanterns in the darkness to find the wounded and kill the
horses.
'Nkosi, at a place where the river turns and the banks are low, they
have placed men,' Mbejane reported, back from his reconnaissance on
which Sean had sent him. 'We cannot escape that way.'
'I thought as much,' Sean nodded, and held out the open can of bully
beef to Mbejane. 'Eat,' he said.
'What's he say, sir?' Eccles asked.
'The river is held in force downstream.' Sean lit one of the cheroots
that he had recovered in the darkness from the saddlebag of his dead
horse.
'Ruddy cold sitting here in the mud,' Eccles hinted.
'Patience, Sergeant, Major,' Sean smiled. 'We'll give them until
midnight. By then most of them will be down the other side of the
ridge drinking coffee around the fires.
You are going to rush the ridge, sir?' Eccles obviously approved.
'Yes. Tell the men. Three hours' rest and then we'll take the
ridge.
'Very good, sir.
