dust and the smoke drifted away from the crests and after its gloom the
sunshine burned down brightly on the hills and the golden brown plain,
it sparkled with dazzling brilliance on the sweeping waters of the
Vaal, and it lit each tiny khaki figure with stark intensity, so their
shadows lay dark on the earth beneath them. They reached the line of
markers.
Leroux picked up his rifle. There was one man he had been watching, a
man who wLeroux had seen who walked a little ahead of his line. Twice
watching, him pause as if to shout an order to those who followed
him.
'You first, my friend,' and he took the officer in his sights, holding
him carefully in the notch with the bead obscuring his trunk.
Gently he took up the slack in the trigger and the recoil slammed back
into his shoulder. With the vicious characteristic crack of the Mauser
stinging his eardrums, Leroux watched the man go down into the grass
'Ja! ' he said and reloaded.
Not in simultaneous volley, not with the continuous wild crackle which
they had used at Colenso, but in a careful, steady stutter which showed
that each shot was aimed, the Boer rifles started the hunt.
'They have learned, ' Leroux muttered as he worked the bolt of his
rifle, and the empty case pinged away among the rocks.
'They have learned well,' and he killed another man. At two places on
the ridge the Maxim guns began their frenzied hammering bursts.
Before it reached the second row of markers, the first line of infantry
no longer existed, it was scattered back in the grass, completely
annihilated by the terrible accuracy of the Boer fire.
The second line walked over them and came on steadily.
'Look at them come,' shouted a burgher farther down the line.
Though they had seen it a dozen times before, all of these ragged
farmers were awed by the passive, impersonal advance of British
infantry.
'These men fight not to live but to die!' muttered the man who lay
beside Leroux.
'Then let us help them to die, ' Leroux shouted. And below him on the
plain the slow inexorable ranks moved forward towards the third row of
markers.
'Shoot, Kerels. Shoot straight,' Leroux roared, for now he could see
the bayonets. He pressed a clip full of ammunition down into the
magazine, and with the back of his hand brushed the clinging drops of
sweat from his eyebrows, pushed the rifle forward and knocked down four
men with his next six shots.
And then he saw the change. At one place the line bulged as men began
to hurry forward, while on the flanks it wavered and disintegrated as
others hung back or crouched down behind pitifially inadequate cover.
'They are breaking! ' Leroux howled excitedly. 'They won't reach the
slopes. ' The forward movement faltered, no longer able to stand the
mauling they were receiving, men turned back or went to ground while
their officers hurried along the ranks goading them on. In so doing
they proclaimed to the Boer riflemen that they were officers and at
