'Tween Snow and Fire: A Tale of the Last Kafir War

“That is an odd question, and a thoroughly characteristic one,” he replied slowly. “Unfortunately all the events of life, as well as the laws of Nature, go to bear out the opinions of the theologians. Everything must be paid for, and from this rule there is no escape. Everything, therefore, resolves itself into a mere question of price – e.g., Is the debt incurred worth the huge compound interest likely to be exacted upon it in the far or near future? Now apply this to the present case. Do you follow me?”

“Perfectly. If our love is wrong – wicked – we shall be called upon to suffer for it sooner or later?”

“That is precisely my meaning. I will go further. The term ‘poetic justice’ is, I firmly believe, more than a mere idiom. If we are doing wrong through love for each other we shall have to expiate it at some future time. We shall be made to suffer through each other. Now, Eanswyth, what do you say to that?”

“I say, amen. I say that the future can take care of itself, that I defy it – no – wait! – not that. But I say that if this delirious, entrancing happiness is wrong, I would rather brave torments a thousand-fold, than yield up one iota of it,” she answered, her eyes beaming into his, and with a sort of proud, defiant ring in her voice, as if throwing down the gage to all power, human or divine, to come between them.

“I say the same – my life!” was his reply.

Thus the bargain was sealed – ratified. Thus was the glove hurled down for Fate to take up, if it would. The time was coming when she – when both – would remember those defiant, those deliberate words.

Not to-day, however, should any forebodings of the Future be suffered to cloud the Present. They fled, all too quickly, those short, golden hours. They melted one by one, merged into the dim glories of the past. Would the time come when those blissful hours should be conjured forth by the strong yearnings of a breaking heart, conjured forth to be lived through again and again, in the day of black and hopeless despair, when to the radiant enchantment of the Present should have succeeded the woe of a never-ending and rayless night?

But the day was with them now – idyllic, blissful – never to be forgotten as long as they two should live. Alas, that it fled!

Tom Carhayes returned that evening in high good humour. He was accompanied by another man, a neighbouring settler of the name of Hoste, a pleasant, cheery fellow, who was a frequent visitor at Anta’s Kloof.

“Well, Mrs Carhayes,” cried the latter, flinging his right leg over his horse’s neck and sliding to the ground side-saddle fashion, “your husband has been pretty well selling up the establishment to-day. What do you think of that? Hallo, Milne. How ’do?”

“I’ve made a good shot this time,” assented Carhayes, “I’ve sold off nearly three thousand of the sheep to Reid, the contractor, at a pound a head all round. What do you think of that, Eustace? And a hundred and thirty cattle, too, heifers and slaughter stock.”

“H’m! Well, you know best,” said Eustace. “But why this wholesale clearance, Tom?”

“Why? Why, man, haven’t you heard? No, of course he hasn’t. War! That’s why. War, by the living Jingo! It’s begun. Our fellows are over the Kei already, peppering the niggers like two o’clock.”

“Or being peppered by them – which so far seems to be the more likely side of the question,” struck in Hoste. “A report came into Komgha to-day that there had been a fight, and the Police had been licked. Anyhow, a lot more have been moved across the river.”

“Wait till we get among them,” chuckled Carhayes. “Eh, Hoste? We’ll pay off some old scores on Jack Kafir’s hide. By the Lord, won’t we?”

“Ja. That’s so. By-the-by, Mrs Carhayes, I mustn’t forget my errand. The wife has picked up a cottage in Komgha, and particularly wants you to join her. She was lucky in getting it, for by now every hole or shanty in the village is full up. There are more waggons than houses as it is, and a lot of fellows are in tents. They are going to make a big laager of the place.”

Eanswyth looked startled. “Are things as bad as all that?” she said.

“They just are,” answered Hoste. “You can’t go on staying here. It isn’t safe – is it, Carhayes? Everyone round here is trekking, or have already trekked. I met George Payne in Komgha to-day. Even he had cleared out from Fountains Gap, and there’s no fellow laughs at the scare like he does.”

“Hoste is right, Eanswyth,” said Carhayes. “So you’d better roll up your traps and go back with him to-morrow. I can’t go with you, because Reid is coming over to take delivery of the stock. Eustace might drive you over, if he don’t mind.”

Eustace did not mind – of that we may be sure. But although no glance passed between Eanswyth and himself, both were thinking the same thing. To the mind of each came back the words of that morning: “A sort of instinct tells me it is the last day we shall have to ourselves for some time to come!” And it would be.

They sat down to supper. Tom Carhayes was in tremendous spirits that evening. He breathed threatenings and slaughter against the whole of the Xosa race, chuckling gleefully over the old scores he was going to pay off upon it in the persons of its fighting men. In fact, he was as delighted over the certainty of an outbreak as if he held half a dozen fat contracts for the supply of the troops and levies.

“I’ll keep a tally-stick, by Jove; and every nigger I pot I’ll cut a nick,” he said. “There’ll be a good few notches at the end of the war! It was a first-class stroke of luck doing that deal with Reid, wasn’t it, Eustace? We shall have our hands entirely free for whatever fun turns up.”

Eustace agreed. He had reasons of his own for wanting to keep his hands free during the next few months – possibly, however, they were of a different nature to those entertained by his cousin.

“We can move the rest of the stock to Swaanepoel’s Hoek,” went on Carhayes. “Bentley will be only too glad to look after it for a consideration. Then for some real sport! Eustace, pass the grog to Hoste.”

“That your Somerset East farm?” said the latter, filling his glass.

“Yes. Not a bad place, either; only too stony.”

“You’re a jolly lucky fellow to have a Somerset East farm to send your stock to,” rejoined Hoste. “I wish I had, I know. The few sheep I have left are hardly worth looking after. There are safe to be a lot of Dutchmen in laager with brandt-zick flocks, and ours will be covered with it by the time it’s all over. Same thing with cattle. Red water and lung sickness will clear them all out too.”

“Well, we’ll lift a lot from old Kreli to make up for it,” said Carhayes. “By the way, Eustace. Talking of Kreli – he’s been summoned to meet the Governor and won’t go.”

“H’m. Small wonder if he won’t. What was the upshot of his father, Hintza, being summoned to meet the Governor?”

“Oh, you’re always harping on that old string,” said Carhayes impatiently. “Hang it all – as if a lot of red-blanket niggers are to be treated like civilised beings! It’s ridiculous, man. They’ve got to do as they are told, or they must be made to.”

“That’s all very pretty, Tom. But the ‘making’ hasn’t begun yet. By the time it’s ended, we shall have a longish bill to pay – and a good many vacant chairs at various household tables. Fair play is fair play – even between our exalted selves and ‘a lot of red-blanket niggers.’”

“Milne is right, Carhayes,” struck in Hoste. “Milne is right so far. Kafirs have got long memories, and I, for one, don’t blame old Kreli for snapping his fingers at the Governor. But I don’t agree with him that we haven’t treated him fairly on the whole. Hang it, what have they got to complain of?”

“I don’t say they have anything in that line,” said Eustace. “My remark about treating them fairly was only in answer to what Tom suggested. Still, I think it a mistake to have located the Fingoes and Gcalékas next door to each other, with a mere artificial boundary between. It was safe to produce a shindy sooner or later.”

Thus the ball of conversation rolled on. Carhayes, excited over the prospect of hostilities, took a glass or two of grog more than was good for him, and waxed extremely argumentative as they adjourned to the stoep for an al fresco smoke. So he and his guest began, continued, and ended the campaign according to a great diversity of plans, each highly satisfactory to its originators and proportionately disastrous to the dark-skinned enemy.

In this conversation Eanswyth did not join. The sweet and soothing influences of the day just passed filled her mind – and all this noisy talk jarred upon her. To her also the prospect of the coming campaign was a welcome one. After the events of the last twenty-four hours to go on living as heretofore would be a terrible strain. Her newly awakened love for the one man was so overwhelming as to engender in her a proportionate feeling of aversion towards the other. It was a fearful position. The temporary separation involved by the campaign would be more than welcome. But separation from the one meant separation from the other. That was not welcome.

And that other – what if he were to fall? He was so fearless – so foolhardy and confident. What if he undertook some insane mission and was treacherously murdered? – O Heaven – what would life be without him now? And a rush of tears brimmed to her eyes at the mere thought.

Eustace, who had remained behind for a moment, to light his pipe, looked up and caught her glance.

“I suppose I had better arrange to drive you over to Komgha to-morrow?” he said, aloud and in an ordinary voice. Outside the other two were talking and arguing at a great rate.

“Yes, I would not forego that for anything,” she whispered. “But – leave me now, or I shall break down. Quick! I wish it.”

One glance, straight into her eyes, and he obeyed. But that glance had said enough – had said more than many words could have done.

“By the way, Tom,” said Eustace, joining the pair of wranglers outside. “What about Nteya? You were going to have him run in, you know.”

“So! Well, you see, it’s this way: I got on that deal with Reid, first thing, and that drove the other out of my head. I had a job to find Reid, in the first place, but when you hear of a man willing to give a lumping big price for what you want to sell, that man’s worth some hunting for, I can tell you. So I let Nteya slide – until we reach the Gaika location. Then I’ll take it out of him, and a good many more of them too.”

Next morning, shortly after sunrise, the contractor arrived to take delivery of the stock. So he and Carhayes were extremely busy, the latter too much so to be able to afford more than an off-hand and hurried farewell to his wife.

But the same held not good of his cousin and partner. Indeed one would think that Eustace had no concern whatever in the sale for all the interest he took in it. Far more concerned was he to ensure that Eanswyth had every conceivable thing that might conduce to her comfort and convenience during her journeying to and sojourn in the settlement, than to satisfy himself that Contractor Reid, a canny Scot and a knowing file at a deal, should be allowed no loop-hole for climbing down from or getting behind his bargain.

“I say, Milne,” cried Hoste, while the horses were being inspanned. “It’s rather slow work riding by one’s self. Let’s span in my horse as a leader, and drive unicorn. There’s room for my saddle if we tie it on behind – and I can get in the cart with you. More sociable like. See?”

But Eustace didn’t see, or rather didn’t want to see. This was clearly a case of “two’s company, three’s a crowd.”

Equally clearly was it a case wherein the third might be excused for omitting to apply the maxim.

“There’s a goodish weight in the trap already,” he replied dubiously. But Eanswyth struck in:

“We can make room for you, Mr Hoste. Certainly. And if we have the additional pull of your horse it will neutralise the additional weight.”

Eustace said nothing. If Eanswyth’s mood had undergone something of a change since last night, that was only natural, he allowed. The arrangement was not to his liking. But then, of most arrangements in this tiresome world the same held good. With which reflection, being a philosopher, he consoled himself.

There was not much sign of the disturbed state of the country during the first part of the drive. But later, as they drew nearer the settlement, an abandoned homestead – standing silent and deserted, its kraals empty and the place devoid of life, or a trek of sheep and cattle raising a cloud of dust in the distance, together with a waggon or two loaded with the families and household goods of those, like themselves, hastening from their more or less isolated positions to seek safety in numbers, spoke eloquently and with meaning. Now and again a small group of Kafirs would pass them on the road, and although unarmed, save for their ordinary kerries, there seemed a world of grim meaning in each dark face, a menace in the bold stare which did duty for the ordinarily civil, good-humoured greeting, as if the savages knew that their time was coming now.

It was a splendid day, sunny and radiant. But there was an oppressiveness in the atmosphere which portended a change, and ever and anon came a low boom of thunder. An inky cloud was rising behind the Kabousie Heights, spreading wider and wider over the plains of Kafirland. A lurid haze subdued the sunshine, as the rumble of the approaching storm drew nearer and nearer, and the blue electric flashes played around the misty hilltops where the ill-omened war-fires had gleamed two nights before. Even so, in like fashion, the brooding cloud of war swept down upon the land, darker and darker.

Chapter Fourteen.

A Curtain Secret

The settlement of Komgha – called after an infinitesimal stream of that name – was, like most frontier townships, an utterly insignificant place. It consisted of a few straggling blocks of houses plumped down apparently without rhyme or reason in the middle of the veldt, which here was open and undulating. It boasted a few stores and canteens, a couple of institutions termed by courtesy “hotels,” an exceedingly ugly church, and a well-kept cricket ground. To the eastward rose the Kei Hills, the only picturesque element about the place, prominent among these the flat, table-topped summit of Moordenaar’s Kop, (Dutch, “Murderer’s Peak”) a tragical spot so named on account of the surprise and massacre of a party of officers who had incautiously ventured up there in small force during one of the previous wars. The village was virtually the headquarters of the Frontier Armed and Mounted Police, the substantial square barracks, which harboured the artillery troop of that useful force, crowning the hill nearly a mile away, and there was generally another troop or two quartered around the place. The main road from King Williamstown to the Transkeian territories ran through the village.

At the period of our story, however, there was no lack of life or stir about the normally sleepy little place, for it was in process of transformation into a huge laager or armed camp. Waggons were coming in from several directions – laden mostly with the families and household goods of fleeing settlers, and the sharp crack of whips and the harsh yells of their drivers rose high above the general turmoil. Men were bustling to and fro, bent upon nothing in particular and looking as though each and all carried the fate of a nation in his pockets, or standing, in knots at street corners, discussing the situation, each perchance with a little less knowledge than his neighbour. All sorts of wild rumours were in the air, the least of which was that every white in the Transkei had been massacred, and that Kreli was marching upon Komgha at the head of the whole Gcaléka army.

Mrs Hoste, with her two young daughters, were at the door as the party drove up. They received Eanswyth very cordially.

“At last – at last! Why, we have been looking out for you for the last hour. I declare, I began to think you had stayed too long at Anta’s Kloof, and the Kafirs had taken you prisoner or something. How do you do, Mr Milne? But – come in. We are going to have a dreadful storm in a minute. Mercy on us! What a flash!”

The blue, steely gleam was followed by a roll of thunder, long, loud, reverberating. There was a patter upon the zinc roof. A few raindrops, nearly as large as saucers, splashed around, and then, almost before the two men could get into their waterproof coats, the rain descended with a roar and a rush, in such a deluge that they could hardly see to outspan the trap.

“Allamaghtaag! but that’s a fine rain,” cried Hoste, with a farmer’s appreciation, as he swung himself free of his dripping mackintosh in the little veranda.

“Especially for those who are under canvas,” said Eustace with a significant glance at a group of tents pitched upon the plain just outside the village. For the surrounding veldt had been turned into something like a sea, and a miniature torrent roared down every depression in the ground.

“Well, Mr Milne,” cried Mrs Hoste, from the head of the table, as the two men entered. “Its past three o’clock and dinner has been ready since half-past one. We quite expected you then.”

“Which, being interpreted, means that I must prepare for the worst,” was the rejoinder. “Never mind. I dare say we shan’t starve. Well, and what’s the latest absurdity in the way of news?”

“Just what I was going to ask you. You’re hand-in-glove with all the Kafir chiefs. You ought to be able to give us all the news.”

Eustace smiled to himself. He could tell them a few things that would astonish them considerably, if he chose. But he did not choose.

“We’ll loaf round the village presently,” said Hoste. “Likely enough we’ll hear something then.”

“Likely enough it’ll be about as reliable as usual,” said Eustace. “What was the last report? Kreli and the Gcaléka army encamped at the Kei Drift – be here in two hours?”

“It’s all very well to laugh,” said Mrs Hoste. “But what if we were attacked some fine night?”

“There isn’t the ghost of a chance of it. Especially with all these wondrous fortifications about.”

“I wish I thought you were serious. It would be a relief to me if I could think so.”

“Pray do think so, Mrs Hoste. There is no sort of chance of this place being attacked; so make your mind easy.”

“What do you think of our crib, Milne?” struck in Hoste.

“It seems snug enough. Not palatial, but good enough for all purposes. You were lucky to light upon it.”

“Rather. There isn’t so much as the corner of a rat hole to be had in the whole place now. But, it’s knocked off raining,” as a bright gleam of sunlight shot into the room. “Only a thunder-shower. We seem to have done dinner. Let’s go out and pick up the latest lie. By the way, you don’t want to go home again to-night, Milne? We can give you a shake-down on the sofa.”

“The fact is I don’t. To-morrow will do just as well, and then I suppose I’ll have to trek with the stock down to Swaanepoel’s Hoek, while Tom, thirsting for death or glory, fills up that tally slick he was telling us about last night.”

“But don’t you intend to volunteer for the front, like the rest?” asked Mrs Hoste in astonishment.

“No. Not at present, anyway. I’ve no quarrel with Jack Kafir; rather the reverse. I own I should like to see the campaign, but I couldn’t do that without drawing trigger, and that’s just what I’d rather avoid, except in a case of absolute necessity.”

It might have been imagination, but Eustace fancied he could detect a look of intense relief pass over Eanswyth’s features as he announced his desire to avoid the scene of hostilities. Yet with so many eyes upon him – upon them both – he would not look directly at her. Such is the effect of an arrière-pensée. Two days ago he would not have been careful to study appearances. But a good deal can happen in two days, notably the establishment of a thorough understanding between two persons.

“We’ll go round to Pagel’s first,” said Hoste, as the two men strolled forth. “If rumour has taken shape at all, likely as not it’s there we shall pick it up.”

They soon reached the hotel. The bar and smoking-room were crammed with men – and smoke; men mostly of the farming class; men with large, sinewy hands, and habited partially or entirely in corduroy. There was a very Babel of tongues, for pretty nearly every man was talking at once, mostly on the all-absorbing topic. Some were indulging in chaff and loud laughter, and a few, we regret to say, were exceedingly unsteady on their pins.

Rumour, our two friends found, had taken shape, and the great item of news which everybody was discussing had received the imprimatur of official announcement. There had been a fight between the Gcalékas and the Fingoes, and a body of Mounted Police, interfering on behalf of the latter, had been defeated and forced to retire with the loss of a sub-inspector and half a dozen men. This had happened in the Idutywa Reserve two days previously.

Grave news, was the unanimous verdict. Grave news that the enemy should have triumphed in the very first engagement. Another such success, and every native from Natal to the Great Fish River would be up in arms. The news would flash from tribe to tribe, from kraal to kraal, quicker than a telegraphic message.

“That you, Payne?” cried Hoste.

The man addressed, who formed one of an arguing knot, turned.

“Thought it was,” went on the first speaker, shaking hands. “Here’s Milne, on the scare like the rest of us. Carhayes is still on his farm, standing out longer than even you, eh Payne? We brought in his wife to-day, Milne and I.”

“Then he’s all right. If it wasn’t for our women-kind we could all stick to our farms right through,” answered Payne. “Just think what sort of effect it has on Jack Kafir to see every fellow cutting away from him like mad.”

“Why don’t you practise what you preach then, old chap?” put in another man, while three or four more laughed significantly, for Payne’s opinions were decidedly in disfavour among that gathering. “Why do you trek away and leave your own place?”

“Oh, blazes take you all! Ain’t I jolly well hung round with women-kind?” was the reply, in a rueful, comic tone which raised a roar of laughter. “How can I?”

“What has become of that Britisher who was staying with you?” asked Hoste.

A very quaint expression came into the other’s face. “He’s thinking more of love than of war,” he answered, lowering his voice for Hoste’s benefit. “Expect he’ll take one of the said women-kind off my hands mighty sharp. Won’t be his fault if he doesn’t.”

“Britishers ain’t no damn good!” said a burly fellow in corduroy, with a lurch up against Eustace.

Some of the men looked awkward; others interested. The remark was enough to provoke half a dozen fights, especially in that room, frequented as it often was by Police troopers, many of whom were young Englishmen of recent importation and thus likely to resent such a slur upon the home-grown article. But it took a good deal more than this to embark Eustace in active hostilities. The expression of his immobile features was as if the remark had passed unheard. Besides, he saw at a glance that the fellow was drunk.

“I say, you fellows – Hoste, Milne. Lets go and have a wet!” said Payne, making a move towards the bar, partly with a view to avoiding any further chance of a row. “Put a name to your pet poison and we’ll drink confusion to old Kreli. Hang it. This atmosphere is enough to float a line-of-battle ship. Let’s get out of it – when we’ve had our moistener, not before.”

“It’s rather rough on me, this shindy,” he continued as they found themselves outside again. “What’s the good of a fellow laying himself out to improve his place? Here I’ve got a lot of splendid lands under cultivation. Fountains Gap is a perfect jewel in that line, and now I must sacrifice the whole lot. Well, we’re all in the same boat, that’s one thing,” he added philosophically. “So long, you fellows. I must go home. Hallo! Wonder if those chaps have brought any news.”

Three Police troopers rode quickly by, heading for the quarters of their commanding officer. They had evidently ridden express direct from the Transkei, and had not spared their horses either, for both the latter and themselves looked jaded and travel-worn, besides being splashed from head to foot with mud.