On the Heels of De Wet

T >> The Intelligence Officer >> On the Heels of De Wet

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* * * * *

"Now we shall have to take our coats off."

The brigadier was right. It was no mean affair to arrive at sundown at
a miserable siding in the Karoo, called by courtesy a station, to find
its two parallels of rails blocked with the trucks containing the
nucleus of a cavalry brigade, and to get that nucleus on the road by
daybreak. The supply column was all out, the battery half out--these
were old soldiers; but the two squadrons of 20th Dragoon Guards had
not yet awakened to the situation. The brigadier looked up and down
the platform, gazed a moment at the long tiers of laden trucks, and
then made the above remark.

And we had to take our coats off. The 20th were new but they were
willing; and it is difficult to say which hampers you most, an
over-willing novice or an unwilling expert. You who sit at home and
rail at the conduct of the campaign, rail at the wretched officer,
regimental or staff, little know what is expected of him. You have
your type in your mind's eye--an eyeglass, spotless habiliments, and a
waving sword; you pay him and expect him to succeed. Your one argument
is unanswerable. You place the greatest man that you can select to
guide and cherish him, therefore if he does not succeed it must be
through his own shortcomings. In your impatience you opine that he has
not succeeded. Therefore he must be ignorant, indifferent, and
incompetent. Little do you realise the injustice of your opinion. You
sweat, during a war, an intelligent class--the same class, be it said,
from which the best that your universities can produce is drawn,--you
sweat it as no other educated class would allow itself to be sweated
in the whole civilised world, and yet, though men drop in harness for
you by dozens every month, you turn upon them and revile them. Can you
not appreciate the fact that it is not always the medium, through
which the Great Head you have selected works, that is in error,--that
the pilot's hand may be at fault, and not the steering-gear? Take us
that night at Richmond Road. New troops, new staff, little or no
information, and an order to be in position at a point 50 miles
distant in 36 hours. If bricks have to be made, has not the workman a
right to expect to be supplied with the ingredients? Is the blame
altogether his if, when exposed to the heat of a tropical sun, his
hurriedly constructed clay crumbles to pieces for want of the straw
with which his taskmaster failed to supply him? We think not. But that
night at Richmond Road we had no time to ruminate upon our
difficulties. We had to surmount them, and with our brigadier we took
our coats off and buckled to the job.

Telegrams:--

1. _To Intelligence, New Cavalry Brigade, Richmond Road, from
Intelligence, De Aar._

"You must organise your intelligence locally, impossible to
supply so many columns with men from here. Will see what can be
done later. Authorise such expenditure as you think fit."

2. _To Int. N.C.B. from Int. De Aar._

"De Wet Expert[2] reports De Wet moving towards Vosberg. Plumer
still in touch. Hertzog, Brand, Pretorius, all between Prieska
and Vosberg with large quantities remounts for De Wet. Theron
has been detached by De Wet, moving south rapidly to join Brand,
intention attacking Britstown. Local farmers Hanover and
Victoria West districts collecting to assist invaders. Inform
New Cavalry Brigade. This wire is repeated to Intelligences
Victoria West, Carnarvon, Fraserberg, 'Chowder'[3] Cape Town,
Orange River, Beaufort, and Chief Pretoria."

3. _From Brigade-Major New Cavalry Brigade, Hanover Road, to O.C.
N.C.B. Richmond Road._

"Hope to move out from here to-morrow. No trains available. As
ordered by you, proceed by road to Britstown. Saddles for Mount
Nelson's not yet arrived."

4. _From Ass. Director Transport De Aar to O.C. N.C.B. Richmond
Road._

"Impossible to equip you with more mule transport than has been
forwarded to you; will make up your deficiencies with ox
transport, which will be waiting for you at Britstown when you
arrive."

5. _From O.C. De Aar to O.C. N.C.B. Richmond Road_ (60871).

"Proceed with extreme caution, as local rebel commando under Van
der Merwe said to be collected at Nieuwjaarsfontein between you
and Britstown. As extra precaution you may take the company of
Wessex Mounted Infantry, stationed at Richmond Road, with you as
far as Britstown."

6. (Six hours later) "_Vide_ my 60871. Wessex M.I.
countermanded."

These only represent a portion of the communications which were
waiting for us in the telegraph-office at Richmond Road. But
they are a fair enough sample to illustrate the difficulties
with which the brigadier had to contend. The communication about
the rebel gathering at Nieuwjaarsfontein moved him to moralise.
"Alas for my advance squadron! If I believed that it were true,
I would move out at once with what we have got and nab those
rebels. But as it is I will leave it to the advance squadron,
and we will supply the burial-party in the morning! Look here,
Mr Intelligence, you have got to form an Intelligence Department
to-night. You had better set about it at once."

* * * * *

The Intelligence officer walked out into the clearing in front of the
station and surveyed the scene. It was now too dark to see his face;
but there was that something in his attitude that betrayed the feeling
of utter hopelessness which possessed him. It is in just such an
attitude that the schoolmaster detects Smith Major's failure to
prepare his Horace translation before that youth has hazarded a single
word. The Intelligence officer had been ordered to raise an
Intelligence Department for the brigade. Trained in the stern school
of army discipline, he had no choice but to obey. And with this end in
view he left the precincts of the station. Then the absolute
impossibility of the situation dawned upon him. Not a soul was in
sight, and even if there had been, though the powers of the press-gang
officer were vested in him, he did not know a word of the Dutch or
Kaffir tongues. He stood upon the fringe of the gaunt Karoo. On either
hand stretched a waste of lone prairie--a solitude of gathering night.
Out of its deepest shades rose masses of jet-black hill: the ragged
outline of their crests bathed purple and grey in the last effort of
the expiring twilight. Already the great dome of heaven had given
birth to a few weary stars, and but for the shrinking wake of day
still lingering in the west the great desolate pall of night had
fallen upon the veldt--the vast, mysterious, indescribable veldt!

But as treasure-trove is found when the tide is at its lowest ebb, so
often when the wall of impossibility seems an insuperable mass of
concrete, it is found to be the merest paper. As the Intelligence
officer, awed by the great solitude of the sleeping veldt, stood
musing on its fringe, a voice hailed out of the darkness--

"What ho! Whose column is that?"

A moment more and a mounted man cantered up, and a young Africander
threw himself out of the saddle.

"Whose column?" asked the new-comer.

"The New Cavalry Brigade!"

"Not Henniker's?"

"No; who are you?"

"I'm one of Rimington's Tigers.[4] I'm attached to Henniker's column,
and I've been sent down here to round up a man who lives about these
parts!"

"Have you got him?"

"No. Who may you be? Have you got a match?"

The Intelligence officer felt in his pocket, and an inspiration came
to him as he fumbled for the matches.

"How did you see me? I never saw you, and you were against the
sky-line."

"A cigar is a big beacon, old chap!" Then the Tiger struck a light,
and for the first time realised that he was talking to an officer.
"Oh, I beg your pardon, I thought that you were a civilian."

In the short life of the match each had taken stock of the other,--the
one, a pleasant-faced Imperial officer, the other a hard-bitten
Colonial. The Intelligence officer was the first to speak.

"Do you speak Dutch and Kaffir?"

"I do."

"Are you in a giant hurry to get back to Henniker's?"

"I'm not wearing myself out with anxiety."

"Well, look here, we shall probably meet Henniker in the course of the
next few days. Come along with us till we strike your column. I am
Intelligence officer of this brigade, and I want to get together some
sort of an Intelligence gang to-night. We start at 4.30 to-morrow
morning."

"In what capacity do you want me?"

"As my chief guide. Do you know this country?"

"I have often been through it; but I'll soon find some one who does.
Have you got any boys?"[5]

"Not a soul. I've only just this moment arrived!"

"Well, we must have boys. Where are we to go?"

"To Britstown."

"Then we want a white guide and at least four boys. Yes, I'll come,
sir. What's the force?"

"It's an embryo brigade; but when we get it together it will be quite
a handsome force--three regiments and six guns!"

"Any Colonials?"

"Yes, the Mount Nelson Light Horse."

"Never heard of them, but you now want to raise these boys. What kind
of a man are you? Do you go straight in up to the elbows, or do you
play about in kid gloves?"

"How do you mean?"

"Well, will you come down to a farm over there, and back me up in
everything that I do? We can get all we want there!"

"I'll back you up in everything that is in accordance with the
exigencies of the service."

"Which means----?"

"That I don't wear kid gloves----?"

"Come along, then; we'll soon round up a gang!"

* * * * *

A quarter of a mile brought the two men to the enclosure of a little
Karoo homestead, nestling in a hollow in the veldt. The Tiger was
leading his pony, and after he had tied it to the rail outside, they
walked boldly up to the verandah. They were greeted by an excited dog,
and a minute later the door was opened by a tall cadaverous-looking
youth.

"What do you want?"

The Tiger answered in Dutch. The farmer had evidently seen him before,
as he bridled angrily.

"Oh, it's you, is it?" came the answer. "You have come back again.
Well, I am sorry we have no forage for you!"

"It is not forage I want. Where is your father? Here is an officer who
must see the 'boss.'"

"I tell you the 'boss' is not here. But will not the officer come in.
Good evening, mister, come in here. I will bring a light!"

The two men were shown into a sitting-room, and the youth disappeared.
A moment later a slender girl of about seventeen whisked into the room
with a lamp, put it on the table, and disappeared. But the light had
shone upon her just long enough to show that she was very comely. The
true Dutch type. Flaxen hair, straight forehead and nose, beautiful
complexion, and faded blue eyes. The farm evidently belonged to people
of some substance. The room, after the manner of the Dutch, was well
furnished. Ponderously decorated with the same lack of proportion
which is to be found in an English middle-class lodging-house.
Harmonium and piano in opposite corners,--crude chromos and distorted
prints upon the walls; artificial flowers, anaemic in colouring and
glass-protected, on the shelves; unwieldy albums on the table; coarse
crotchet drapings on the chairs; the Royal Family in startling
pigments as an over-mantel. For the moment one might have fancied that
it was Mrs Scroggins's best parlour in Woburn Square.

After considerable whispering in the passage, the mother of the
family, supported by two grown daughters and three children with
wide-opened eyes, marched into the room.

"Good evening," and there was a limp handshake all round.

The attitude and expression of the good dame was combative. She was
stout, slovenly, and forty. And the first impression was that she had
once been what her pretty daughter was now at seventeen. There is
nothing of the beauty of dignified age in the Dutch woman past her
prime.

"Where is your man?"[6] asked the Tiger.

"He has gone to Richmond to sell the _scaapen_."[7]

"And your sons?"

"I have no sons."

The Tiger threw open the photograph album on the table, and put his
finger on a recent photo of two hairless youths in bandoliers. The
likeness to the good lady in front of us was unmistakable.

"Who are these?"

"My sister's children," came the glib answer.

"Good," said the Tiger, as he slipped the photograph out. "I shall
keep this. Who is the young man who opened the door."

"Bywoner."[8]

"Good; then he can come along with us. How many boys have you on this
farm?"

"They have all gone with my man."

"All right, I am going round to see--bring a candle. All right, don't
make a fuss, my good lady. Don't take that lamp; the officer will stay
here while I go out."

The stout _frau_ produced a piece of paper, and laid it on the table
with all the confidence of a poker-player displaying a Royal Flush.
The Tiger picked it up and read:--

"This is to certify that Hans Pretorius can be implicitly
trusted to give all assistance to the military authorities. He
has furnished the required assurances.

"(Signed) L----,
_Resident Magistrate_."

The Tiger held the slip of paper and photograph side by side for a
moment, and then slowly lit the former in the flame of the lamp. The
women and children stood solemnly and watched the blaze. Only the
pretty girl showed any emotion. The faded blue of her eyes seemed to
darken. She said something. It sounded like "hands opper."[9] How the
Dutch hate the English Africander!

The Tiger only laughed as he said, "You wait here, sir, while I go
round the premises. Come along, Mrs Pretorius."

The Intelligence officer had not been alone five minutes before the
door opened and the pretty daughter appeared with a glass of milk on a
tray. The look of indignation had disappeared--a smile lurked on the
pretty features. Now the Intelligence officer was tired and thirsty--a
glass of milk was most refreshing. Moreover, he was an Englishman--a
pretty face was not without its charms for him.

_The Daughter._ "Please, sir, the Kharki[10] is taking Stephanus with
him. You will not let him do that. There will be no one left to look
after the farm and to protect us from the boys."

_Intelligence Officer._ "Who is Stephanus?"

_D._ "He does not stay here; he is" (_then the blue eyes filled with
tears_)--"he is--my sweetheart!"

_I. O._ (_softening_) "But we will not hurt him; you will have him
back in a few days."

_D._ "Who can say? You are going to make him fight, and then I shall
never see him again. Oh, please, sir, don't take him" (_and a hand--a
fair dimpled hand--rested on the Intelligence officer's sleeve_).

_I. O._ (_moving uncomfortably_) "I am afraid that I must; but no harm
shall come to him, that I promise!"

_D._ "But he doesn't know the way, and you will shoot him if he shows
you a wrong road."

_I. O._ "He will know all that we want him to know."

_D._ "Where will you want him to take you? I know he doesn't know the
way."

_I. O._ "Why, he has only to go to Britstown!"

_D._ (_the tears drying_) "And you promise me that you will not harm
him?"

_I. O._ "Of course I won't."

_D._ "Oh, thank you." She was gone, and the Intelligence officer was
left to his own thoughts. It had slipped out unawares. He had been
caught: he realised that much as soon as the word had left his lips.
He had yet much to learn.

There was a noise in the verandah. The Tiger had arrived with
Stephanus, four ponies, and three native boys.

"This will do for a start, sir; we will amplify on the march!"

But as the Intelligence officer handed over his department to the
quarter-guard of the 20th Dragoon Guards for safe keeping until the
morrow, Miss Pretorius was saddling a pony in the kraal. She had to
find her father before daybreak. Her father with his two sons was at
Nieuwjaarsfontein!

* * * * *

Richmond Road is not a township. It is only a railway-station, but it
boasts of one _winkel_[11] adjoining the railway buildings. Here the
O.C. of the New Cavalry Brigade had taken up his quarters for the
night, and here the Jew proprietor had arranged food and lodging for
the staff. Part barn, part shop, and part dwelling, this dilapidated
hostelry is typical of its kind. You meet with them all over the South
African veldt. You bless them when they shelter you from the wind and
rain; curse them when, housed in a six-storeyed mansion, which boasts
the same legend over the door--hotel--you remember to what you were at
one time reduced by the chances of a soldier's life.

The brigadier was just sitting down to the only meal that the
slatternly wife of the Jew could produce--a steaming mess of lean
boiled mutton--when the Intelligence officer returned from his
adventure.

"Come and sit down, Mr Intelligence; have you raised a band of robbers
yet?"

"Yes, sir; I've collected a trooper of Rimington's Guides and some
boys."

"You seem a brighter fellow than I took you for. Well, here you are;
here is another telegram for you. We ought to come right on the top of
the swine to-morrow."

_To Intelligence N.C.B. from Int. De Aar._

"Gathering of rebels at Nieuwjaarsfontein confirmed from two
sources. Repeated, &c."

The Intelligence officer kept his own counsel. He felt certain that
there would be no gathering at Nieuwjaarsfontein when the force
arrived. But he had bought his experience, and determined to profit by
the same in the future.

"I think that we have a chance of a show this jaunt," said the
brigadier, after somebody had produced a bottle of port. "This is
about the best plan that K.[12] has thrown off his chest. But I am
afraid that Plumer will spoil it. He is a holy terror when he gets on
a trail. That is his great fault: you will never catch these fellows
by holding on to a trail after you have been on it three days. I don't
care how red-hot it may be. You run yourself stone-cold, only to find
that your quarry has outlasted you. Now, after De Wet crossed the
railway at Hautkraal, Plumer's obvious move was to Strydenburg. They
could have pushed stuff out there to him from Hopetown. K. wants De
Wet to go south-west into the loop of the J which our five columns
make. Now, if Plumer, Crabbe, & Co. stick to him, he'll break back to
the Orange River as sure as fate. But if Plumer lets him alone, and we
are not messed about by too many general-men, we'll have him. Once De
Wet gets south as far as Britstown he's a dead bird. But we shall be
messed about by too many generals. See, how many have we?--Five.
That's enough in the way of cooks to spoil any pottage. But personally
I don't think De Wet will be the good little fly and walk into our
pretty parlour. They don't ask me for opinions; but if I was running
this show, I would have halted Plumer on the railway, left the J as it
is, and collected an infernal 'push' of men north of the Orange River.
I should have held a line from Mark's Drift to Springfontein. When I
had got that, I would have turned our sleuth-hound Plumer loose again.
Then all we fine fellows could have played with De Wet until he was
sick of the Colony. We could then escort him to the Orange River, and
the 'pushes' on the far side would have picked up the pieces. But here
we are; may Providence guide him to us! I'm for bed. Good night!"

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Commandant Judge Hertzog.

[2] A special Intelligence officer was told off to watch De Wet's
movements.

[3] "Chowder" was telegraphic address of general commanding line of
communications in Cape Colony.

[4] Rimington's Guides wear a piece of leopard-skin in their hats, and
are known as Rimington's Tigers.

[5] Native boys.

[6] Husband.

[7] Sheep.

[8] Farm working hand.

[9] Traitor. Lit., Hands upper--_i.e._, surrendered man.

[10] The Boers speak of all British soldiers as Kharkis.

[11] Store.

[12] Lord Kitchener is commonly spoken of as "K." in South Africa.

III.

BEE-LINE TO BRITSTOWN.

"Not bad for a green crush."

The brigadier sat down on the edge of a great slab of rock to watch
the baggage over the nek. It was a typical South African nek. An
execrable path winding over the saddle of a low range of tumbled
ironstone. Just one of those ranges which force themselves with sheer
effrontery out from the level of the plain. Loose sugar-loaf
excrescences which stud the sea of prairie with a thousand flat-topped
islets, and weave the monotony of landscape peculiar to this great
continent. The rough post-cart track led down into a vast
amphitheatre, so vast that Western Europe can furnish no parallel to
it. Yet its counterparts are met and traversed every day by the
countless British columns now slowly darning the gaping rent in
Africa's robe of peace. Who, if they had not known, would have said
that the beautiful panorama, which the morning sun now unveiled before
us, was a theatre of war? Away at our feet stretched mile upon mile of
rolling Karoo and blue-grey prairie. True it was punctuated and ribbed
with stunted kopjes. But still the everlasting plain predominated,
until it was lost in an autumn haze which no sun could master.
Immense,--a land without a horizon, a land every characteristic of
which inspires a sense of independence and freedom. A sensation--an
intoxication, to be felt, not to be described. Why should men fight in
a land such as this? Surely there is room for all! The very animals of
the field, ignorant of the selfishness bred of a limited pasturage and
restricted space, are docile and free of vice. But with man it is
different.

The dweller on the open plain learns freedom. The lesson of cramped
cities is avarice--that the fittest may survive. Who shall blend the
two? There, as we stood with our loins girt for war, did that great
peaceful prairie unfold before us. As the morning sun grew stronger,
the everlasting grey of the Karoo became jewelled with brighter tints.
The middle distance of the plain was spangled with a streak of winding
silver. A river tracing its erratic course between the kopje islets.
At intervals along its banks the eye rested upon the patches of darker
green. The home plantation of some farm, glimpses of whose whitewashed
walls even now caught a glint from the strengthening sun-rays. Here
was a stretch of yellow furrow--the finger of civilisation on a virgin
waste. Here spots of shimmering white, where the surface of a dam
reflected the flooding light of day. Here and there a flock of sheep
relieved the monotony of the everlasting grey. While across our front
a bunch of brood-mares were galloping in the ecstasy of day and
freedom, and a bevy of quaintly pirouetting ostriches gave life to the
wonderful picture. And presently a little fan of brown dots opened out
on the grey below--opened out and diverged in pairs. Dots so small and
insignificant that they looked like ants upon a carriage-drive. Out
and out they spread, till they seemed lost and merged with the
brood-mares and ostriches, now ceasing their wild movements and
grouping in mild amazement at the strange invasion. And still the dots
diverge. It is the advance-guard of our column--heralds of selfish man
bringing horrid war into this peaceful vale. As the dots mingle with
the ant-heaps on the plain, or are lost in the folds of the grey
prairie, a pillar of dust rises from the centre of the fan. A larger
mass of brown--the battery and its escort--a great kharki caterpillar
creeping across the grey,--it is time to be moving, the last
mule-waggon has topped the nek, and the last of the rear-guard are
leading their horses up the post-cart road.

"Not bad for a green crush!" said the brigadier as he prepared to
follow down the hillside. "Hullo! what is that?"

A spark had shown out of the misty distance. A little glitter. It
came, trembled a second, and disappeared. Again it came, a
many-pointed star, winking and shivering.

"Some one is calling up. Here, signaller!--where is the brigade
signaller?"

A great dragoon tumbles out of his saddle and begins to arrange his
tripod. In a few seconds his mirror has caught the sun in answer to
the twinkling star in front.

"Who is it?"

A silence broken only by rhythmic clicks, as the signaller catches the
distant conversation, and his monotonous reading of the code. A stolid
assistant takes it down. "'T' group, 'W' group, 'I' group, 'Enna,' 'E'
group--Major Twine, sir."

"Oh, the advance squadron. Well, that's satisfactory; we shall not
have to bury them after all. What have they got to say?" and the
brigadier sat down on his rock again as the signaller spelt out the
message.

"Am moving now on Nieuwjaarsfontein. Parties of mounted Boers on both
flanks. Have not been molested." Here the signaller broke down.

"Something has gone wrong, sir. They have gone out!"

For a moment the light again twinkled in frenzied haste. "Breaking
station--shooting!" then all was dark.

"I think, sir," ventured the signaller, "that they have broken up the
station because some one was shooting at them."

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