Aletta: A Tale of the Boer Invasion

“Nouwja. I would cure that ‘madness’ with a sjambok if I were the Commandant,” growled another, sitting up and listening. “He gives all the trouble he can.”

The hour was that of sunrise, and although midsummer, the air at that altitude was raw and chilly when Colvin turned out, shivering, to look after his horse, which had been picketed among the steeds of the burghers. As he did so the sun, mounting above the surrounding heights into the fresh clear air, seemed to shed around a new hope, to light up a new exhilaration in his mind. His own atmosphere would clear, even as the dewy mists of night had done before the great flaming luminary. He would now seek out the Commandant, explain matters, and resume his way. And having so decided, he was straightway confronted by a couple of burghers summoning him to the presence of that official without delay.

Commandant Schoeman was an elderly man with a hard, wooden-faced expression. He wore a straight lank beard, a chimney-pot hat, once white, and weather-beaten moleskin clothes, which looked as if they had not been off him for a month, which indeed was very near the truth. He was a Boer of the most unprogressive type, and as entirely dissimilar to one of the stamp of Stephanus De la Rey as could possibly be imagined. He was lacking in the good qualities of Andries Botma, who, however fiery and perfervid as a patriotic orator, was a kindly and courteous gentleman beneath. This man was brusque and uncouth, and cordially hated everything English, both in season and out of season.

He was seated in his tent as Colvin came up. The flaps were folded back so that those surrounding him who could not find room inside could still assist at what was going on in the way of official business. These consisted almost entirely of Boers holding subordinate commands under him. They wore their bandoliers, and their rifles lay on the ground beside them.

“Daag, Mynheer Commandant,” said Colvin, mindful of the way in which a greater than this had received a less formal mode of address.

“Daag,” replied Schoeman curtly, tendering a cold lifeless paw, and just touching the other’s outstretched hand.

The same ceremony was gone through with the others. Two old acquaintances Colvin recognised – Swaart Jan Grobbelaar and old Sarel Van der Vyver. These responded to his greeting characteristically – the first showing his tusks with a sort of oily, half-satirical grin, the other infusing a heartiness into his reply, and then drawing back as though half-frightened. There was a third present, however, whom he recognised – recognised, moreover, with some astonishment – Morkel, the Civil Commissioner’s clerk.

“Hallo, Morkel!” he exclaimed in English. “I never expected to see you. Why, what on earth are you doing here?”

“I am acting as secretary for the Commandant,” answered Morkel, making believe to be wondrously busy with some papers on the rough wooden table in front of him. His momentary embarrassment was not lost upon Colvin, nor a look he fancied he detected, warning him not to ask questions.

“I do not know why we need talk English here,” said the Commandant curtly. “Sit.”

Colvin obeyed, and subsided on to the floor of the tent by Swaart Jan, who made room for him, at the same time offering his tobacco bag, for they were all smoking. The great man and his “secretary” were the only ones who occupied seats, and these consisted of inverted packing-cases. The rest squatted primitively on mother earth.

Then turning to Colvin, the Commandant began to put him through a pretty close cross-examination, causing Morkel to take down the answers, partly with a view to impressing the others with his magisterial dignity, partly from a genuine motive, for he was an illiterate man, and had all the suspiciousness which characterises such. He questioned Colvin with regard to all as to which he had been an eye-witness when with Cronje’s force, and with regard to a great deal as to which he had not, the others listening with vivid interest.

And here Colvin began to feel himself in somewhat of a quandary, remembering the parting injunctions and warnings of Andries Botma. The latter had especially cautioned him against revealing matters even to the burghers on this side of the Orange River, and now the warning rose clear in his mind. Who could say that there might not be spies among those here present, or, at any rate, but lukewarm adherents of the Republican cause? And the result of such misgiving was that his answers were somewhat constrained, and to the distrustful ears of the Boer Commandant more than suspicious.

“Be careful, Englishman,” said the latter bluntly. “You are telling us the truth, are you? You had better tell the truth – oh, much better.”

The rudeness of the other’s words and manner angered Colvin, but he yielded to the expediency of restraining too great a manifestation of resentment.

“Look, Mynheer Commandant,” he said. “I have been courteously received by His Honour the President, I can call Andries Botma my friend and Piet Plessis’” – and he named half a dozen other prominent Transvaal officers – “but it has remained to me to return here to be called a liar by a man of whom I never heard before.”

“All Englishmen are liars,” interpolated a grim old burgher on the opposite side of the tent, spitting on the ground. Schoeman, however, received the reply with a wooden-faced silence. But Colvin did not miss a look of dismay and warning darted at him by Morkel, and at the same time, with anything but satisfaction, he realised that he had probably made a deadly enemy of the Commandant.

“Well then,” he continued, “the whole square truth of the matter is that Andries Botma particularly urged upon me not to talk of what I had seen with Cronje’s force, not even on this side of the river. Does that satisfy all here?” And he looked around the circle.

“Ja, ja,” assented most of them, Swaart Jan adding:

“It is true, Commandant Colvin is a true man. I know him. He is a friend of ‘The Patriot’. Besides, he is one of us now. He is going to marry Stephanus De la Rey’s daughter.”

“Quite right, Oom Jan,” said Colvin, with alacrity. Then, judging that this was exactly the moment for preferring his request, he represented to the Commandant that it was while on his way to Ratels Hoek that he had been detained and brought here. Might he not now proceed thither?

This request was backed up by most of the assembled Boers. Schoeman, beginning to think it would save trouble, was inclined to yield, when a contretemps occurred, one of those freaks of fate which have an impish and arbitrary way of skipping forward just at the right moment to divert and ruin the course of human affairs when such course is beginning to run smoothly. A considerable hubbub had arisen outside; curses and threats in Dutch and English, with the sound of scuffling, and, over and above all, a voice lifted in song, bellowing stentoriously, if somewhat jerkily:

“Ta-ra-ra-ra Boomdeay!
Oom Paul op een vark gerij,
Af hij val en rier gekrij,
Toen klim op en weg gerij.”

The concluding words were hurled, so to say, right into the tent, for a group of burghers had appeared, and in their midst was the singer. The latter was receiving somewhat rough usage – though, truth to tell, he was bringing it upon himself. His arms were tightly pinioned to his sides with a long coil of reim, and he was being hustled forward with varying degrees of roughness. But the more they hustled and cursed him the more defiantly he shouted his idiotic and, under the circumstances, insulting doggerel. Colvin, with dismay and consternation, had recognised the stuff and had recognised the singer, and, even before the latter had been dragged into sight, knew that it could be no other than Frank Wenlock. So this was the obstreperous prisoner? Well, Frank Wenlock could be pretty obstreperous, as he knew by experience.

“Still, man, still!” growled one of his escort, shaking him violently. Here again was an old acquaintance, in the shape of Hermanus Delport. But the big Dutchman’s face was considerably damaged, one eye being totally closed. Frank had been using his fists to some purpose. Now he let off a volley of perfectly unprintable expletives.

“You’d dare lay a finger on me but for this reim, wouldn’t you?” he yelled. “I’d plug up your other eye for two pins, and every man’s blanked eyes in this camp.” And more to the same effect.

“Still, man, do you hear?” repeated Hermanus, administering another shake. “The Commandant is speaking to you. Do you hear?”

“Is he? Well, then, I don’t care a little damn for Mr bally Commandant or the whole lot of infernal rebels and traitors in that tent. Aha, Swaart Jan! you may well look sick, you old liar; there’s a nice rope waiting for you. Old Sarel, too? What a hanging of rebels and traitors there’ll be by-and-by! And Morkel? Ja, you will dangle, too.” Then becoming alive to the presence of Colvin, he burst into a very roar of derisive hatred. “Good-day, Mister Kershaw – or should I say Commandant Kershaw? – the biggest blanked traitor of the lot. You’ll be blown from a gun, I should think.”

These ravings, uttered half in English, half in Dutch, were not without effect upon most of those within the tent. They had about concluded that the violence and insolence of this prisoner had reached limits.

“Let him taste the sjambok” growled the old burgher who had expressed the opinion antagonistic to British veracity. But Commandant Schoeman gave no sign of perturbation. Save for a stern and ominous look in his cold, snaky eye, he might not have heard.

“Frank – Frank! Do be quiet, man,” said Colvin earnestly. “Don’t make a silly ass of yourself. You are doing yourself no good.”

“Not, eh? I’d do you some good though if I could get at you; I’d give you the jolliest hammering you ever had. Look at Mani Delport’s mug there. That’s nothing to what yours would be, you infernal traitor.”

“It might not be so easy, Frank. But do be reasonable. How can you expect decent treatment if you will persist in behaving like a lunatic?”

“Would you be reasonable if you had seen your home sacked and gutted by a lot of rebels and traitors, and your mother turned out homeless, Mister Dutchman Kruger Kershaw?” snarled Frank. “No fear though. Your place wasn’t interfered with. You’re one of them, you know.”

Colvin was not disposed to deny this in the faces of those present, intending to use that very argument in favour of being allowed to proceed on his way. But he was deeply concerned on behalf of Frank. The fool was simply committing suicide. Yet – how prevent him? He had seen Frank very uproarious more than once, in his cups, but here that motive power was lacking. The silly chap seemed to have gone half off his head with racial antagonism. But his own endeavours to persuade the Boer authorities to that effect drew forth a renewed outburst from the man he was striving to befriend. The Dutch Commandant lost patience.

“Be still, Englishman,” he said, very sharply and sternly. “I am going to speak, and if you open your mouth again until I have finished, you will have that thrust into it which will quiet you. Well, then, you were treated no worse than others in your position until you brought rough treatment upon yourself. You have been as violent; as a drunken Bastard Hottentot, without his excuse. You have assaulted and struck our burghers, and you have only opened your mouth to shout out insults to His Honour the President and horrid blasphemies to Almighty God. There can be no place for such a man as you among our God-fearing burghers, and we are not going to release you while so many of our brave comrades are rotting on your English prison ships. It may be that you have not many hours left in this world, and I advise you to think over and ask pardon of Heaven for all your blasphemous words.” Then to the guards, “Take him back whence he came while we deliberate.”

“That for your cant, you cursed, whining old snuffle-nose,” yelled Frank, spitting in the direction of the Commandant. “You can shoot me if you like, but you’ll all hang – every man jack of you – infernal rebels and traitors. Hurrah! God save the Queen!” And thus vociferating, he was hustled away.

“Do not hold him responsible for what he says or does, Mynheer Commandant,” said Colvin earnestly. “I think his misfortunes have turned his brain. He was always excitable. We cannot hold a man responsible when he is off his head, can we?”

To this plea Commandant Schoeman made no reply. He turned a cold, fishy eye upon the pleader, then remarked to the others:

“Toen, Heeren. We had better discuss, under the guidance of Heaven, what our best course will be with regard to this violent and blasphemous prisoner. For yourself, Mynheer” – to Colvin – “you would doubtless prefer the rest and quiet of your tent – or to see if some of your friends are in our camp.”

Colvin promptly acted upon this more than hint. But with all his anxiety to reach Ratels Hoek, a kind of instinct on Frank Wenlock’s account reconciled him to a further sojourn in Schoeman’s camp. He suspected that Frank stood in grave peril of his life; and if so he must exert all and whatever influence he himself possessed on behalf of his friend and former comrade.

His instinct proved an accurate one, and his worst fears were justified. Not until near evening, however, did he learn that Frank Wenlock had been sentenced to be shot, and would meet his death at daybreak.

Chapter Ten.

The Net draws in

It was Morkel who brought the news. Their deliberations on Frank’s fate had lasted for some hours, being interspersed with a sort of impromptu prayer-meeting or two – and in the result he had been brought before the Commandant again, and being asked if he had any thing to say in excuse for having repeatedly insulted the President, blasphemed Almighty God, and taken up arms against the Republic, part of whose territory this had now been proclaimed by annexation, replied simply by a savage renewal of all the abuse he had already been foolish enough to heap upon those in whose power he was. So he was condemned to be shot at daybreak on the following morning.

Not all had been in favour of that extreme measure, said Morkel. Swaart Jan Grobbelaar for one, and old Sarel Van der Vyver for another, had spoken on the side of mercy; possibly with an uneasy eye to eventualities. But Commandant Schoeman, who was a Free State Boer, and whose own position as a mere belligerent was secure in any event, had overruled them, and by that time to-morrow poor Frank Wenlock would no longer exist. “What can be done, Morkel?” said Colvin, very much moved. “Do you think they really intend to do it?”

“Dead certain,” was the gloomy reply. “You know the poor devil simply brought it upon himself. You saw how he behaved this morning, Kershaw. Why he was simply committing suicide.”

“Would it be any use if I were to try and talk over Schoeman? Might persuade him to let the chap off with a bit of a fright. I am in with some of the big bugs up at Pretoria, you know.”