patterns on the brown grass plain.
'Nou skeet hulle, ' muttered a burgher beside him.
'Ja, ' agreed Leroux. 'Now they will shoot,' and the smoke gushed from
the muzzle of one of the guns out on the plain. The shell burst
thunderously on the lower slopes and for an instant the lyddite smoke
danced like a yellow ghost swirling and turning upon itself, before the
wind drifted it up to them. They coughed in the bitter, tasting
fumes.
The next shell burst on the crest, throwing smoke and earth and rock
high into the air, and immediately the rest of the batteries opened
together.
They lay behind their hastily constructed earthworks while the
shellfire battered the ridge. The shrapnel buzzed and hummed and
struck sparks from the rocks, the solid jarring concussions made the
earth jump beneath their bellies and dulled their ears so they could
hardly hear the screaming of the wounded, and slowly a great cloud of
dust and fumes climbed into the sky above them. A cloud so tall that
Sean Courtney could see it from where he waited fifteen miles north of
the Vaal.
'It looks as though Acheson has caught them,' murmured Saul.
'Yes, he's caught them,' Sean agreed, and then softly,
'The poor bastards. ' 'The least they could have done was to let us be
in at the kill,' growled Sergeant, Major Eccles. The distant rumble of
the guns had awakened his blood lust and his great moustache wriggled
with frustration. 'Don't seem right to me, seeing as how we been
following the old Boer for going on a year and a half, the least they
could have done was to let us be there at the end. ' 'We are the cover
guns, Eccles. General Acheson is trying to drive them south on to his
cavalry, but if any of the birds break back through his line of beaters
then they're ours,' Sean explained.
'Well, it just don't seem right to me,' Eccles repeated, then suddenly
remembering his manners, he added,
'Begging your pardon, sir.
Exultantly General Acheson traversed his binoculars across the group of
hills. Vaguely through the dust and smoke he could pick out their
crests.
'A fair cop, sir! ' Peterson grinned.
'A fair cop indeed,' Acheson agreed. They had to shout above the
thunder of the guns and beneath them their horses fidgeted and
trembled. A dispatch, rider galloped up, saluted and handed Peterson a
message.
'What is it?' Acheson asked without lowering his glasses.
'Both Nichols and Simpson are in position for the assault.
They seem anxious to engage, sir. ' Then Peterson looked up at the
holocaust of dust and flame upon the hills. 'They'll be lucky if they
find anyone left to fight up there.'
'They will,' Acheson assured him. He was not misled by the deceptive
fury of the barrage. They had survived worse at Spion Kop.
'Are you going to let them go, sir? ' Peterson insisted gently.
