Company Of Spears

‘No.’

‘The words are exactly the same.’

‘Ay, sir, but ah wouldn’t ask thee ‘ow’d tha like thi steak doin when ah knew th’d ‘ad plenty already!’

Hervey shook his head with mock gravity. ‘How could I have made such a mistake?’

‘Because tha’s tired, an’ that mead.’

Hervey looked long at him. ‘Johnson, is there any of the India ale left?’

‘Couple o’ bottles.’

‘Then fetch two, and I’ll tell you about Gaika’s hut, and what I think we’ll do next.’

Not long before dusk Fairbrother returned unexpectedly – and urgently. Hervey was first alerted by a trail of dust which he observed through his telescope a full ten minutes before making out the rider. The lathered flanks of Fairbrother’s Caper testified to their hard gallop: he had left his escorts far behind. He looked more purposeful than troubled, however, as he dismounted in the Sixth’s lines. But all knew that a man did not ride as hard as he had for no good reason.

One of the dragoons took the reins. The horse was blown but by no means finished, Hervey noted: Fairbrother had judged it well. There were some who believed it necessary to ride a horse into the ground when carrying an urgent dispatch, but Hervey had always been of the opinion that the precise moment of collapse was never predictable, and therefore that it was too hazardous a principle to follow. ‘What’s the alarm?’

Fairbrother took off his shako and wiped his brow with his forearm. ‘Dundas,’ he began, shaking his head, and taking a long drink from a flask of Cape wine which Johnson had produced from nowhere. ‘Done the deucedest thing. I ought to report to Somerset straight away.’

‘He’s still at Gaika’s hut. I’ll send word.’ He turned to find Serjeant Wainwright already standing at attention. ‘We need to alert Colonel Somerset. Will you present my compliments, tell him that Captain Fairbrother is returned, and ask if he will come here or if he wishes us to attend on him.’

‘Sir!’ Wainwright saluted and spun round, setting off towards the kraal in a brisk march that would have matched a Xhosa’s lope.

‘Now,’ said Hervey when there was no one within earshot, and sitting down in one of the camp chairs that Johnson had brought. ‘What’s the business with Dundas?’

Fairbrother settled heavily, and blew out his breath. ‘He got up to the hills in the Tambooka country the day before yesterday, about thirty miles north and east of here. He had a report of a force of Zulu advancing towards the Bashee. The Tambooka were to make a stand east of the river.’ He took another draw on the flask. ‘So he crossed the river a few hours before dusk and met Voosani, the Tambooka chief, who told him the Zulu had already taken several thousand head of cattle. Dundas said he would assist him recovering them. Why he believed that recovering the cattle was a more effective means of conveying the message to Shaka I have no notion.’ He took yet another long draw.

‘And?’

Fairbrother shook his head. ‘It might have passed with no great harm, for it seems Dundas’s original intention was to block the ford through which the Zulu intended driving off the cattle. But as they approached, apparently with just a few drovers, he decided he’d attack. The drovers were seen off easily, but then he ran into the Zulu rear guard, and it was a desperate business for a while, until powder began to tell. He reckons to have killed fifty of them, but then came word that several thousand were moving on the ford, and so Dundas got the Tambooka to recover what cattle they could, but even these had to be abandoned as the Zulu began pressing them. So Dundas decided to escort Voosani to his kraal to try to rally more warriors, which is where I found him, and he at once sent me back to alert Somerset.’

Hervey began unfolding his map. ‘How long do you think it will take us to get up to the Bashee? What is the country?’

‘The infantry won’t manage in less than a day. But why exhaust ourselves? Why not wait for the Zulu to come to us? They’ll burn the kraals and take the cattle and the corn, but it might have to be the price if we’re to be certain of stopping them. The Tambooka will flee this way. We could rally them and have another five thousand or so.’

‘Do the Zulu have muskets?’

‘The scouts didn’t speak of them.’

Hervey was trying to calculate time, distance and relative strengths. ‘Do you not think we might overawe them with a show of force – the troop and Rifles, I mean – while the infantry and the rest march up?’

‘Divide one’s force?’

Hervey raised his eyebrows. ‘In ordinary, of course, it’s folly; but in an exigency … I wish I had some better idea of how the Zulu fight.’

He and Fairbrother had talked a good deal of Shaka’s system, such as they knew it. However, the accounts came either from (as Somerset called them) rascals, freebooting Englishmen, or else from the defeated tribes, and were hardly reliable therefore, given as they usually were in wide-eyed terror or with nefarious intent. It was evident that the Zulu did not simply overwhelm their opponents by sheer numbers – a great host of savages bearing down on their peace-able neighbours like the wolf on the fold. There were, it seemed, well-formed regiments – impi – who moved quickly and under strict discipline. Their weapon was the short spear, the iklwa, which was not thrown but thrust, like the jabbing sword of the Roman legions. And there was no doubt that a Zulu warrior was possessed of singular courage. But as to what this amounted to in the field neither Hervey nor Fairbrother could tell. Of one thing, however, Hervey was sure: dash, the bold offensive action which in India could turn the tables so spectacularly when the situation looked desperate, might not serve here. For if, as the stories went, the warriors were more afraid of Shaka’s vengeance than of death at the hands of the enemy, they would not be so easily scattered as the bandits who passed for soldiers in India.

‘We have lost the element of surprise, of course,’ said Hervey, rising as he saw Somerset approaching. ‘They know there are white faces with the Xhosa now, and guns. The only thing left to dismay them is numbers or some clever manoeuvre.’

Fairbrother said nothing. What he knew of his friend’s capacity for audaciousness was considerable. From all he had read, and even more from those he had spoken to, he judged this measured response to be uncharacteristic – as well as intriguing.

Somerset was a shade unsteady and his speech not entirely even. Hervey felt only sympathy, and nodded to Johnson, who knew what was required.

Fairbrother made his report.

Somerset, sitting low in a camp chair, sipping repeatedly at his strong black coffee, began to look uncertain. His fighting, such as it was, had been on interior lines, east of the Fish River, with a number of strongpoints around which to rally. Here in open country, a thorn-fenced kraal the only feature, and his force not yet even united, he saw the possibilities of defeat only too clearly. His distaste for Fairbrother was now all but gone. ‘I am grateful for your timely intelligence, Captain Fairbrother. Admirable. And Dundas?’

‘As I said, Colonel, I believe he may be able yet to bring over Voosani and his men.’

Somerset nodded slowly. ‘That is what Gaika said – that Voosani will fight if we support them.’ He looked at Hervey. ‘Colonel, what is your opinion?’

Hervey was surprised to be asked; Somerset had scarcely spoken half a dozen civil words to him since Cape Town. He sensed he was not being asked the best course of fighting the Zulu, however; rather whether they should fight at all. ‘Well, Colonel, General Bourke’s orders are clear enough, and we know what is the lieutenant-governor’s intention behind them. We have not been able to deliver an ultimatum to Shaka, but if we don’t make a stand against these Zulu here then an ultimatum would have no effect. I see no occasion to withdraw.’

Somerset looked disconcerted. ‘You do not consider it my overwhelming duty to preserve my force? We should be hard pressed to find another.’

Hervey saw no profit in debating the principle. ‘I don’t think we need consider it in those terms, Colonel. May I propose that I take the mounted detachments forward to make contact with the Zulu? It might still be possible to parley with them, especially since they have not yet seen troops under discipline. But if not, at least I should be able to ascertain something of their numbers and condition, and perhaps intention. Meanwhile, if Voosani’s men can be rallied, and Gaika can muster all the Xhosa …’ He tried to make his suggestion as unemphatic as possible: he