Free 1999 - Ladysmith by Giles Foden Page A

had persuaded them that in fact he was there because he had been pulling the guns, and they had turned to go off—leaving him lying there on the slope of Bulwan, half naked (he had lost his kaross and his cooking pot), nursing his injured leg. Only the intervention of this doctor, who had ordered that he be brought into camp, had saved him. In the days that followed, Sterkx had come into the hut from time to time to rebind his ankle and to give him some food. Muhle had gathered from the doctor that the splints would have to stay on for at least a month.
    This morning was the same. Sterkx—a small, stooping man with gold-rimmed glasses and thinning hair—came in and bent over him in the semi-darkness, readjusting the pieces of wood and wrapping the bindings ever more tightly.
    Muhle gasped at the pain. “Why are you helping me?”
    Sterkx pulled at the fabric again. “The week before we found you, the British burned my farm—the wagons, the house, the furniture, everything gone…They even burned my piano and music…”
    The doctor stood up, and looked out through the oval gap that served as the hut door. His voice was strained with feeling. “But that was nothing, for they also took my wife into Ladysmith as a prisoner. I fear for her safety there, and thought of her when I saw you lying there on Bulwan.”
    Muhle didn’t understand. “But I am a black man. You don’t usually give us charity.”
    Sterkx turned towards the pallet, and looked down at him. “You are God’s creature. Since my Frannie was taken from me, I have been full of anger and bitterness. And then a calm came, and I prayed to the Lord, and I realized that I must offer kindness to others, in the hope that the same will be offered to Frannie in the town there.”
    “My family…” said Muhle, and then paused.
    “What?”
    “My family are missing also.”
    “Then you know what I am feeling, in spite of being a kaffir. Here, have some biltong.”
    Sterkx reached into his pocket and, pulling out a long strip of the dried meat, handed it to him. “This war is a terrible thing. Even though we are on the side of right, even though the Germans and the French and the Americans are on our side also against the English oppressor, I regret it, for whatever happens it will come to no good…”
    Muhle sat up and chewed on the tough meat. He felt its goodness seep into him as the Dutchman talked on, and he reflected that never before had one of this race talked to him man to man—that is, as if he too were a man—and then, as Sterkx continued, he slowly understood that this Dutchman was really talking to himself, wrestling with his own pain even as Muhle’s ankle throbbed on the bed beneath him. And yet he was also kind, saying that he would have one of the Xhosas bring him a pot of water…
    “And once the bone has set, I suppose we can get some crutches fixed up for you too.”
    “Thank you, nkosi,” said Muhle.
    The Dutchman turned to go.
    “Wait,” Muhle said. “When I am able to walk, they will let me look for my family, yes?”
    Sterkx stopped by the doorway. “I am sorry. I do not think we can let you go now—in case you fell into the hands of the British, you see.”
    “But you understand—about my wife and my son. I must find them!”
    “I am sorry,” said Sterkx. “They would not let me.” And then he left.
    Muhle stared at the oval of light in the doorway. The ragged edges of it, where the straw stuck out, represented to him the pain and anger he felt—pain in his ankle, anger at being forced to stay here, a prisoner of his body and the hateful Boers. For even the good doctor had become hateful now, as did everything he saw through that hole, from the horsemen, as they came and went, to the guns looming behind them.
    In the days that followed, the commando in which he was held fought a number of battles with the British. The rattle of Maxims, the crackle of Mausers and other small arms could be heard in the hills around the