Company Of Spears

something that could not quite be touched, yet was not so far removed from the spirit of the day. This African night was somehow barren, a desolate time when the sun had forsaken the land – just as Fairbrother had told him the Xhosa said of the beginning of war, that ‘the land is dead’.

‘Did you ever think of being anything but a soldier, Hervey?’

It was a very sudden change in the degree of their intimacy. Hervey was quite taken aback. And yet, sitting here in the alien darkness, owing his life – almost certainly – to this man (and in all likelihood, too, dependent on his judgement to see them safely away), it could not be other than natural. And, indeed, welcome. ‘I don’t believe I did.’

‘Nor any second thoughts since, I imagine.’

Hervey thought for a moment, and decided on candour. ‘Once, yes: nine years ago after the death of my wife. I resigned and was an ordinary subject of His Majesty – for a year and more.’

‘My dear Hervey,’ began Fairbrother, the tautness in his voice at once apparent, ‘I owe you the greatest of apologies for what I asked about grieving for a woman.’

Hervey shook his head gently, as if Fairbrother might see. ‘And yet, time does bring its balm. I am able for the most part to think of her now with a happy composure. Even three years ago I could not have done so.’

‘And – I press you impertinently, no doubt – there has been no other claim on your affection?’

The intimacy had progressed to a degree Hervey had not imagined possible. He found it warming. ‘I am to be married.’

‘Indeed! Then I am most happy for you. May I ask who is the lady?’

‘Of course you may ask. She is my former commanding officer’s widow. He was killed in India.’

‘Fighting alongside you at Bhurtpore?’

‘Yes.’

Fairbrother nodded. ‘I had heard of the custom,’ he said, respectfully. ‘The widow of a fellow officer: it is most noble.’

Hervey balked at the assumption of nobility. ‘Truly, Fairbrother, you presume too much again! I do not marry out of duty.’ He found himself hesitating. ‘That is, I do not marry out of duty to my commanding officer’s widow.’

Fairbrother was pained. ‘I do not presume, my friend. I do not presume by speaking of noble motives that there is any absence of love. A man’s motives may be mixed, but it is not to say they are consequentially ignoble.’

‘I take no offence.’

Indeed he did not. He wished only for no questioning of his feelings towards Kezia Lankester. In truth, he was only yet discovering them for himself.

Hervey woke with a start. He seized his pistols and began making for Corporal Wainwright.

‘Hold fire! It is I, Fairbrother!’

Hervey, numb with the peculiar sensation that sudden wakefulness brought, could not make out where the shouts came from, or why. ‘Wainwright?’

‘Here, sir!’

He groped his way in the pitch darkness to where Corporal Wainwright crouched, carbine levelled. ‘What is it?’

‘It is I, Fairbrother; give me a voice!’

Hervey hesitated. It made no sense; and yet this was the man who had saved his life. ‘Here, Fairbrother, here!’

He repeated the call, twice, until after what seemed an age, Fairbrother reached him. Hervey could just make out a second figure. ‘What—’

‘Xhosa. There are two more, dead, yonder in the scrub.’ He pushed the man down, commanding him to sit: ‘Hlala phantsi!’

‘How in God’s name—’

‘Your Corporal Wainwright reported a noise,’ he said, breathless.

‘And you walked out and found them?’

‘I crawled out; circled across their line. They weren’t difficult to find. I could smell them. And they will stand erect.’ He held a long knife in his hand. He dropped to one knee and put it to the Xhosa’s neck. ‘Tell me, who are you? How many?’

‘Izinto azimntaka Ngqika zonke.’

Fairbrother jabbed in the point further, almost breaking the skin. ‘Do not sport with me!’

‘What does he say?’ whispered Hervey.

‘He says it is not everyone who is a son of Gaika. It’s a saying they have: he means not everyone is fortunate.’

Fairbrother began fingering the Xhosa’s necklace.

‘Lion claws. Well, well. Methinks he protests too much.’ He jabbed the Xhosa’s neck again. ‘Not everyone is a son of Gaika, but you are!’

The man made no sound. He dare not deny his affinity with so great a chief.

‘Bull’s-eye, Hervey! God only knows how many Xhosa there are in that scrub, but they’ll be powerfully determined to be in on us now. Our best chance is to set light to one of the fires so they’ll know he’ll be a dead Gaika’s son if they attack.’

It went against Hervey’s every instinct to light up the camp when they were not being attacked: the Xhosa could stand off and observe them all night, counting the odds, reckoning an assault would be an easy affair. Yet what option did they have, for the attack must now surely come? ‘Light the fire,’ he said.

‘Pandours’ve ‘oofed it, sir!’ came Johnson’s cheery report.

Corporal Wainwright fired his carbine and then reached for the pistols at his belt.

In the flash from the second shot Hervey saw a Xhosa fall. ‘Good shooting,’ he said quietly. ‘Now the fire.’

Wainwright struck a match, searched a few seconds for the powder trail and then lit it. The flame ran fast and strong, and the dry brushwood, sprinkled liberally with more powder, exploded in a fiery crackle.

Fairbrother immediately began dragging his captive towards the blaze, knife still at his throat. ‘Let them have a good look first,’ he growled.

Hervey had already decided they couldn’t sit it out, not with the two pandours gone. ‘Johnson, get the torches and bring five horses.’

‘Ay, sir.’

It took him a quarter of an hour – which seemed an age. Meanwhile the fire gave a strong and steady light, so there were no false alarms. Wainwright, his carbine reloaded, turned about continuously, slowly, to cover any approach. Hervey explained his intention meanwhile: they would walk towards Trompetter’s Drift until it was safe, and then they would outdistance the Xhosa in a mounted dash. They had six torches – if Johnson could find them: one and a spare he would take himself to lead; two torches Johnson would have for Fairbrother, and the other two Wainwright would carry at the rear. The Xhosa from whose shoulder they had removed the ball would be left by the fire: there his fellow tribesmen would see him, and Hervey’s obligation to a prisoner would be discharged.

‘ ’Ere, sir!’

Hervey could not see a thing except what the fire illuminated, his night eyes quite gone.

‘Can you come closer?’

‘I’ll try, but one of ’em’s being a dog!’

Hervey edged towards the voice, sabre drawn (a pistol would need reloading). He smelled the horse sweat before he could make out the shapes. ‘Well done, Johnson. Five in hand: the sarn’t-major shall hear of it!’

‘That’s all right then.’

Hervey could picture the expression on Johnson’s face. Things were becoming desperate, yet there was no cause for despair for as long as the Sixth remained the Sixth, however small a detachment or far-flung. ‘Where are the torches?’

‘Under t’stirrup leathers, sir – fust three on mi left.’

Hervey felt his way until he found the end horse’s saddle, uncrossed the stirrup leathers and took one of the