The Last Horseman (30 page)

Killing was the only reason to go to war and war was the only reason to live.

*

Several miles behind the train bodies lay scattered among the stones of the plain. Some were twisted in grotesque positions, a leg tucked under the body, an arm flung above the head as if shot down in a macabre dance of death. The heat had already dried their blood into the hard-baked ground as flies settled into their wounds and feasted on any moisture left in their blind eyes.

Radcliffe gazed across the scene. It was as if the hand of God had swept across the field of pain and flattened these men with one crippling blow. The great Irish horse that had borne him here so quickly stood quivering from exhaustion, chest heaving, nearly dead from fatigue. Radcliffe had spared neither his horse nor himself. He trembled as he walked, uncertainly picking his way through the carnage from body to body, searching for Edward.

As each corpse revealed itself to be that of a stranger, Radcliffe quickened his pace, daring to hope that his son was not among the fallen. He was blind to any movement and deaf to any sound as he prayed to an uncaring God to grant him mercy and the life of his boy. The slow metallic double-click of a bolt-action rifle touched a deeper instinct than that of prayer, and he spun on his heel, reaching for the pistol at his side. A big man stood casually aiming his rifle from the hip. His belly pressed against the rough woollen waistcoat and homespun jacket that hugged his muscled frame. Without taking his eyes off Radcliffe he spat a globule of chewing tobacco into the dirt.

‘We’ve been watching you,’ an American voice said.

Radcliffe felt a surge of relief as he heard an accent that took him back to a place far from the massacre. ‘I’m Joseph Radcliffe, and I’m looking for my son.’

Jackson Lee lowered his rifle. ‘We know who you are.’ He turned and began walking towards the rocks at the foot of the kopje. Radcliffe followed him between a cleft in the rocks where he saw spent cartridge cases. Someone had fired from here into the killing ground. Boer or British? he wondered. Another twenty yards of edging around boulders brought the two men to an open, flat piece of ground that made a good encampment. Barely a dozen gaunt-faced men glared at him. He’d seen that look on men’s faces before, when horror had pierced their souls and fear strangled their hearts. Horses were tethered and four wagons stood empty at the head of a track that Radcliffe realized was the way in and out from this rocky enclave.

‘We can’t bury our dead,’ said one man from the corner of the camp as he laid a final stone on to a mound. His Irish accent was tinged with a matter-of-fact regret.

Radcliffe scanned the men. The Foreign Brigade. Irish and American, he knew that much at least. There’d be others. And Boers no doubt. This must have been a small commando. What? Two hundred men? Less? Before they got wiped out, that is.

The man at the grave hammered a crude cross made from ammunition box wood into the ground. ‘Not out there. Kith and kin we can dig in here. The others stay for the scavengers.’

Radcliffe looked at the men who remained silent. They were a beaten bunch of fighters.

‘How many did you lose?’ he asked the man at the graveside.

Liam Maguire threw down the rock he had used to hammer in the cross. ‘Sixty out there. Another forty-odd a mile from here. Dutchies mostly back there. Our own, some French, German and Boers out there by the rail line.’

‘Seems your man here knows who I am,’ said Radcliffe, looking towards Jackson Lee.

Liam ignored Radcliffe’s comment. ‘Jesus, they shot the hell out of us. Popped up they did. A terrible thing. Then they chased us like rabbits. We held our own for a bit. They weren’t gonna risk losing men for a handful of us, were they?’ he said, picking up his rifle and using it as a walking aid. Radcliffe noticed the bloody bandage strapped around his middle.

‘Aye, I know who you are,’ said the wounded Maguire, tugging a piece of folded paper from inside his jacket. He stepped closer and extended it to Radcliffe with a hand ingrained with dried blood and dirt.

Radcliffe half opened the old newspaper cutting by its crease. Most of the text was smudged from dirt and other dark stains but there was a clear enough photograph of him. The article’s broken typeface peeked half-seen from the grubby folds:
AMERI LAWY DEFENDS FENIA
.

‘Says there who y’are. And what ya did. I could recite the whole bloody thing if you asked me. Some nights out here ya get desperate enough to read a torn bit of paper from the
Dublin Evening Mail
. We passed it around. Me and the lads.’

‘Where did you get this?’ said Radcliffe.

‘From yer boy. It was your name that saved him from us shooting him as a spy. Looked to be a year or two younger than my slip of a brother, who’s buried back there,’ said Liam, nodding towards the grave, seeing the light of hope in Radcliffe’s eyes. ‘You’d best prepare yourself for a shock, Mr Radcliffe. About your lad. I’m sorry. He tried to save my Corin. But he couldn’t. God bless him for trying, mind.’

*

The skirl of bagpipes rent the air as a battalion from the Highland Division marched out of the Swartberg HQ encampment. The Scottish troops’ swirling kilts were held in check by the khaki aprons they wore to subdue the bright colours of their tartans. As the pipes played ‘Road to the Isles’, troops cheered and waved the Jocks marching off to the front. In a less celebratory manner Radcliffe walked into the camp leading his exhausted and dust-laden horse. There was a five-foot-high wall that ran for several hundred yards – a defensive barrier between them and the open veld that soldiers patrolled. He was obliged to show his papers at the sentry post and was then allowed through as the rhythmic scuff of soldiers’ boots marched past him. The camp was a cluster of tin buildings with criss-crossing boardwalks laid for the mud churned up by the violent rainstorms. There were stone-built stables that held grain and feed for the hundreds of horses that this war demanded and further up the track longhorn cattle were corralled – fresh meat for the troops. Radcliffe led his horse past field kitchens laboured in by Africans and army cooks while off-duty soldiers lazed in front of their tents: some smoked; others sat heads bowed writing letters or reading. From somewhere in the distance a concertina squeezed out the rousing notes of ‘Soldiers of the Queen’. Radcliffe realized that these men were fresh troops, and were obviously being gathered for the next big push. Bell tents, rifles stacked in front of each entrance, spread out towards the rail track that cut through the camp.

Radcliffe headed for the stables, avoiding marching squads of men as work details unloaded supplies from the railhead yard. An African wearing a floppy broad-brimmed hat loped towards him carrying a pail of water that slopped as he ran. Mhlangana faltered when he saw the exhausted dust-caked man and horse, but quickly offered Radcliffe a ladle of water.

‘
Inkosi
,’ Mhlangana said. ‘
Sawubona
, I see you. Drink. Let me help you.’

Radcliffe gazed at the concerned African, for a moment not recognizing him from their previous encounter. Exhaustion had slowed his thoughts, but he quickly gulped the water as his horse dipped its head into the pail and slurped noisily. ‘Thank you,’ he said.

‘
Inkosi
, you have seen more killing?’ asked Mhlangana, sensing that it was more than tiredness etched on Radcliffe’s face.

‘Enough for a lifetime,’ Radcliffe answered. ‘And I wish never to see it again.’ He smiled grimly.

Mhlangana nodded. ‘There is an African proverb,
inkosi
: “Human blood is heavy, and the man who has shed it cannot run from it.”’ He looked with compassion at Pierce’s friend.

The words rang true. Radcliffe had spilled enough blood in his time to know of such haunting.

‘Take my horse. Find him a dark corner where it’s cool and give him more water. Can you get him some feed?’ Radcliffe asked.

‘Yes,
inkosi
,’ said Mhlangana.

‘Is my friend here?’

‘Mr Pierce? No. I have not seen him.’

Radcliffe nodded, and touched the horse’s face with affection. ‘Look after him well, Mhlangana. Where is the field hospital?’

Mhlangana took the horse’s rein. ‘Through the tents across there, into the old farm buildings and the sheds. That is where they have the wounded. I will take your horse to the stable and care for him. I will wait there and watch in case Mr Pierce comes here. Will he come,
inkosi
?’

‘I don’t know. I hope so.’

*

Radcliffe made his way wearily through the tented area towards the cluster of buildings. What had once been an old railway shed was now a vast hospital ward where orderlies and a handful of nurses attended to the wounded men who lay in four rows of palliasses, one each side and two head-to-head in the centre of the shed. Radcliffe watched as the handful of orderlies attended to the injured; then he stopped one who hurried past with a bundle of bloodied bandages.

‘Where’s the doctor in charge?’

The orderly hardly gave Radcliffe a second look. Despite his appearance his voice carried the authority of an officer. ‘Through that door at the end. There’s another small ward. He’s in there.’

Radcliffe walked along the ranks of the sick. The fighting had been on various fronts, but this looked as though the British had taken a recent beating. Many of the men would never see war again, and some would not see the next day. He pushed through the door that led to a smaller room with no more than twenty-odd stretchers balanced on boxes, makeshift beds bolstered with a blanket beneath each man in a bid to offer some small comfort. An armed guard stood on the other side of the door. He was an older man, probably a non-combatant, but he turned quickly to face the intruder.

‘No entry here, sir, if you please.’

Radcliffe looked past him to where a tall grey-haired man, pince-nez spectacles pinching the bridge of his hooked nose, studied the chart of a wounded man. A Boer. This was the prison ward.

‘I’m here to see the doctor,’ Radcliffe said, scanning the beds. ‘I think my son’s here.’

‘Not here, sir. No, I think you’re mistaken. This is for Dutchies, this room is. Prisoners of war.’

The doctor had raised his head at the intrusion and handed the chart back to the orderly. ‘Who are you?’ he asked.

Radcliffe removed his hat. ‘My name is Joseph Radcliffe. I believe my son was brought here, perhaps by Captain Belmont’s troops after a recent action. My boy is sixteen years old, dark hair, and he’s tall for his age. Which might make people think he is older. His name is Edward.’

The older man extended his hand. ‘I’m Amery. I know your name. Not too popular among some back home, Mr Radcliffe.’

‘No.’

‘It’s not my business to ask of the circumstances but I have your boy under my care. Do you know of his injuries?’

‘He’s alive then?’ said Radcliffe, hope pushing weariness aside.

The doctor scowled. ‘You had better know, Mr Radcliffe, that he suffered a grievous wound. It’s my opinion that infection and shock might still take him. He is unconscious. We are doing the best we can.’

‘What kind of wound?’ Radcliffe asked, swallowing hard, being no stranger to mutilation.

‘Sabre. It took his arm between wrist and elbow.’

Radcliffe saw the blade in his mind’s eye. He knew the viciousness of a sabre. How many times had he swung down his own into an enemy and seen the vicious cut inflicted? He nodded, understanding.

Amery took him by the arm and guided him. ‘He’s in the corner.’

Radcliffe stood at the foot of the makeshift bed and gazed down at the gaunt, unconscious Edward. He turned to Amery. ‘May I stay?’

‘Of course,’ he said gently, and gestured to an orderly to bring a stool. ‘For a short while only, I’m afraid.’

Radcliffe nodded. ‘Thank you.’

As Amery turned away Radcliffe could restrain himself no longer. He bent forward and eased his son into his arms and held him, as he would a small child. Amery looked back and saw Radcliffe’s shoulders tremble as he let every regret spill out.

*

Mhlangana brushed the dirt-laden horse with hard, long strokes that made the big Irish horse shiver. A nosebag full of oats contented the great beast. Across the horse’s withers he saw a buggy carrying a white woman and a soldier come to a halt outside the building the British General Reece-Sullivan used as his headquarters. At the rear of the carriage, half-obscured by a trailing horse, Benjamin Pierce eased himself down on to the ground. Evelyn Charteris had told the sentry at the camp’s gate that the African was a scout. Marlowe said nothing. He didn’t care about an African friend of the conchie-loving woman, and had no desire to become more embroiled than he already was. So he kept his mouth shut. Let the darkie be whatever he wanted to be. The sooner he made his report, the sooner he could rejoin Captain Belmont.

Mhlangana could not help smiling when he saw Pierce, who said something to the woman and then strode into the street carrying his rifle and saddle, looking directly to where Radcliffe’s horse was tethered. Mhlangana waited in the stable’s shadows, uncertain whether to show that he knew this big man who carried his own weapon. Pierce grinned when he reached him, dropped the saddle and embraced the man who had helped them at Tugela. Mhlangana winced.

‘My brother, I see you,’ said Mhlangana.

The two men shook hands. ‘I see you, Mhlangana.’ Pierce saw the slight stoop of a man who’s been beaten and is trying to ease the burden of the shirt on his back. ‘You hurt?’

‘It is nothing,’ said Mhlangana.

Pierce turned him half around. He could see the top of the welts behind Mhlangana’s collar. ‘The British whip you?’ he asked.

Mhlangana nodded. ‘For helping you with the gun. I told you, we are not permitted to fight.’

‘Then why help?’

‘The English will beat us, but the Boer, he would shoot us. Blacks mean nothing to them. They are our real foe: we are blood enemies. The English are harsh but the Boers do not even see us. Who would you choose to help?’

‘Damned if I know,’ said Pierce. ‘Is Joseph Radcliffe here?’