Harley Greenoak's Charge

The moon, though far from at full, threw upon the house a great deal too much light, and, on the other hand, not enough to dispel the shade of the quince hedge. To this extent the enemy had the advantage, and the flash and roar, and the vicious spit of missile on wall or roof – or a humming whistle above either, as it hurtled away harmlessly into space – was continuous. Kafirs, as a rule, are execrable shots, though here and there a rare exception is to be found. Such a rare exception now Dick Selmes began to fear was present among this crowd, for every now and then a single bullet would hum through the upper half of the door, always striking in the same place, and always when he, judging position from some recent discharge, had returned the fire, using the rifle this time.

But now that he had to play a waiting game, his blood cooled. The nights were short at this time of year. With the first light of morning their weakness would become apparent. The Kafirs would find some means of rushing them. It was clear that Thompson’s prediction had been verified. This was no sporadic outbreak of irresponsible savagery. The whole Gaika location was up in arms, and the glow succeeding glow which he and Hazel had seen earlier in the evening, was that of flaming homesteads, deserted or the reverse, which the barbarians had fired to signal their rising. As for relief from without, why, it was probable that Komgha itself was threatened, or if not, to send forth a small force among thousands of savages pillaging and burning would be madness, whereas to send out a large one would be to expose the settlement itself to attack and massacre. Things looked dark enough, anyway, and now the first heat and excitement of actual and active fight over, a reaction of foreboding set in upon him. A soft rustle of garments beside him in the darkness made him start.

“Mr Selmes. I have a plan. It might be worth trying.”

“Good God, Mrs Waybridge, go out of here! There’s one beast who can shoot, and you’re bang in the line of fire. Ah!”

With the very words a missile came humming between the two, splashing itself into the wall. Dick pulled her suddenly and forcibly out of the line of the open half-door.

“This is it,” she said, as coolly as though nothing had happened. “The rockets. Why not do something with the rockets?”

“The rockets! Ah!”

The words escaped him with a gasp, and the explanation of the idea was this. By way of adding to their Christmas festivities, now barely a week back, the Waybridges had imported a big box of fireworks. But they had not been used, thanks to an opportune suggestion from Harley Greenoak to the effect that, in the current state of alarm, the firing off of rockets might be misunderstood and cause a scare, under the impression that they were being sent up as signals of distress. Now they would come in for just that very purpose.

“The idea is splendid, Mrs Waybridge,” said Dick. “Will you get them out. I can’t leave my post.”

“I have got them out. One minute.”

She went into the other room, and immediately returned with quite a bundle of rockets, all attached ready to the sticks.

“Is Hazel all right?” he whispered eagerly.

“Yes. Elsie is watching over her. I know I would about as soon try and steal its cub from a lioness under the same circumstances,” she added, with a laugh.

“And you? You are splendidly cool and plucky. What about the children? Aren’t they scared?”

“They are, of course, poor chicks. But they’ve learnt to do as they are told. They are inside – and quite quiet.”

The plan was soon formed. Dick was to go outside and stick up the rockets just in front of the stoep. None of the enemy seemed to be on that side, the ground was too open and devoid of cover in the clear moonlight. The while Mrs Waybridge, gun in hand, would watch his present post.

“It’s done,” whispered Dick, returning in a minute. “There are half a dozen of them there. But before I touch them off I’ve got a jolly little surprise for our friends yonder. Now look, and you’ll see some fun.”

Slightly opening one of the windows, with the aid of a chair he adjusted a rocket horizontally on the sill, in such wise as to rake the quince hedge, as near as he could judge, at the point whence the man who was a marksman had been making things lively for them. Then, striking a match, and carefully shading it, he touched the fuse.

It sputtered a moment. Then there was a deafening and appalling hiss, and a great fiery snake of sparks sped straight for the point designed, bursting with a crackling boom in among the quince hedge. The effect was ample. A hubbub of cries and shouts arose among the lurking savages, and immediately Dick had placed another rocket into position and touched it off with similar effect. Utterly panic-stricken now, the Kafirs thought of nothing but wild flight, and the crashing of their demoralised retreat through the garden was the most welcome sound the beleaguered listeners had at one time ever expected to hear again. Quick as thought Dick slipped out to the front, and applied a light to the upright rockets, one after another. Band after band of snake-red flame leapt up into the heavens, bursting with shell-like boom into beautiful blue and red and golden stars.

“There!” he said, coming back, and choking with laughter, in sheer reaction, “I believe Jack Kafir thinks the end of the world has come, or the Police artillery – doesn’t matter which. Your idea has been the saving of this camp, Mrs Waybridge, if he doesn’t get over his scare and come back.”

Chapter Thirty Five.

“Is it too late?”

Waybridge, having delivered his contract stock, had intended staying the night at Fort Isiwa, but some news which was brought in at that post decided him to start for home at no longer notice than it took him to saddle up, and to get there as fast as his steed could carry him.

It was rather late when he clattered into Komgha, but, late as it was, quite a number of men were astir. There was no help for it. He must perforce off-saddle if only for a quarter of an hour, after the pace at which he had pushed his horse, and that all uphill.

“Anything in this news?” he asked eagerly as he gained the stoep at Pagets and called for a very long brandy and soda.

“Or is it all a yarn?”

“Yarn? Not much. The Gaikas have broken out, and are burning all the farms within reach. Yours among ’em, I expect, Waybridge.”

“Mine among ’em! But, good Lord! man, my people are still there.”

The other whistled blankly.

“Didn’t they come in?” he said.

“No. We didn’t believe in the scare, you see. Devil take that confounded horse of mine! I shall have to give him a few minutes more, and then I’ll push him along if I kill him. Won’t any of you fellows come with me? Women in danger, you know.”

“Rather, I’ll go,” answered the man he had been talking to. Others joined, and soon a compact dozen started off to get their horses – if they could find them, and somebody else’s if they couldn’t – and whatever arms they happened to own.

“That you, Waybridge? Yes, it’s time you started. They are beginning to send up rockets at your place.” And Harley Greenoak, who had ridden up unperceived in the excitement, dismounted, and walked up the steps.

“I should think so,” said Waybridge, impatiently. “By the way, Greenoak, I wish you’d sent us some sort of warning. I’d have taken it from you.”

“Couldn’t, earlier than this moment.”

The rescue party now assembled. There were fifteen in all. But the presence of Harley Greenoak had the effect of sending up their confidence in themselves and each other. They felt as if their little force had suddenly been doubled.

“Have you been with Sandili, Greenoak?” said Waybridge, as they rode forth.

“No. With that fighting son of his, Matanzima. He’s practically baas, and he means mischief. He’d have let me be killed, but I happened to do him an important service some time back, and whatever may be said about there being no gratitude in a Kafir, there is. I’ve seen it in too many instances. Look. There are no less than six places ablaze.”

They were travelling at a smart canter. Glow after glow had arisen, at intervals over the dim moonlight waste. The barbarous orgy was in full swing. But no such glare hovered over the site of Waybridge’s homestead. Clearly, therefore, the Gaikas had not succeeded in capturing the place. The rocket flights had now ceased.

“That young Selmes is a plucky chap,” muttered Waybridge, more to himself than to the others. “It’s a Godsend he should be on the place.”

“He’s all that,” said Greenoak. “We shall find your crowd all safe, never fear.”

A little more than an hour’s sharp riding and they topped the last rise. There stood the homestead, white in the moonlight. An exclamation of relief escaped Waybridge. But on a nearer approach this feeling was dashed.

“There’s been a fight,” he said quickly. “Those are dead Kafirs, and, there are no lights showing.”

The dark, motionless forms lying in front of the house, and discernible in the moonlight, told their own tale. What other motionless forms would they find within? Instinctively they put their horses at a gallop now.

“Easy, easy!” warned Greenoak; “that line of quince hedge may cover any number. We don’t need to rush bang headlong into a trap.”

The warning told. Wildly excited as the men were now, such was the influence of its utterer that they slackened pace. Waybridge thought he had never known what tense, poignant anxiety was until that moment.

“I’ll go forward and make sure,” he said thickly. “If – if – anything has happened in there – it can’t matter what happens to me, and – ”

He rammed the spurs into his horse’s flanks. But before he had shot ahead fifty yards, a sight met his eyes – met the eyes of all of them – which caused such a wild burst of relief that it could only find vent in a ringing cheer.

Upon the stoep several figures were now standing, and prominent among them the tall form of Dick Selmes. Harley Greenoak, whose feeling of relief was certainly not inferior to that of the others, shook a disapproving head.

“We want to bring this off quietly,” he said. “We don’t want to let the whole Gaika nation know we’re here, and that’s about what all this hullabaloo is likely to effect.”