Free 1999 - Ladysmith by Giles Foden Page B

camp, underlaid by the deeper echo of field artillery. Going out, the Boer horsemen were an impressive sight: the men cool in the saddle, bandoliers of ammunition across their chests (the beards of the older ones flowing down over the belts of shining cartridges), Mausers in rifle buckets on their saddles or slung over their backs, boots of soft hide pushed into their stirrups, and assorted kit—bedding rolls, tin pots for cooking—strapped to their saddles. Their clothes were mostly grey or brown, home-made, except for those of the officers, who favoured more formal black suits: coats with claw-hammer tails, and half top hats.
    Coming back in after an engagement, officers and men alike looked sorry creatures: slumping in the saddle, soaked with rain and blood and mud, the wounded piled up in ox carts behind. In other carts came the dead, their staring eyeballs fixing on Muhle through the ragged gap. He saw in those eyes images of Nandi and Wellington, and knew more deeply than ever that as soon as he was able, he would flee this place and find them.
    In the meantime, the oval of light played on: from where he lay, Muhle could see the big gun he had helped pull up the hill. Its spoked wheels were huge, glittering with steel plate and rivets; in between, the dark grey of the barrel stretched up high against the sky. In front of the gun, Boer and African diggers had built up a great mountain of earth, to protect it from British fire. Soon, Sterkx had said, they would start the bombardment of Ladysmith.
    “And then,” the doctor had said, “God preserve my Fran-nie and any other innocent shut up in that town.”
    Around the emplacement scurried the gunners of the Staats Artillerie , their blue uniforms and gold epaulettes sharply different from the country clothes of the ordinary horsemen. Now and then, Muhle would also see striding around the tall, broad-shouldered figure of General Joubert, his iron-grey hair and white beard making him a natural man of authority. His headquarters was a large marquee in the middle of the camp, over which fluttered the vierkleur of the Transvaal. As the Zulu gazed silently upon the flag, wagons crossed to and fro, obscuring his field of vision. From these, as the oxen snorted and moved about in the shafts, men unloaded sacks of sugar and coffee and corn, all brought in from the surrounding farms. The sight of the food made Muhle feel hunger again: the biltong Sterkx had given him had taken the edge off it, but he craved some maize porridge, something to fill him up. Thought of maize made him wish he was at home, back at his kraal, watching the fields of bright green ears swaying in the wind, or watching Nandi drying the kernels on a mat, or Wellington shooting at a chicken with his sling, to frighten it away from the glossy white pile on Nandi’s mat.
    But these were all lies. These were images of his own childhood. Since Wellington had been a young boy, Muhle had worked down the mines in Johannesburg, sweating and cursing with the others in the galleries, swinging pick against rock, sparks flying up, or pulling gouts of red clay out of the wall with the big hoes. Then every night back to the dreadful shanty with its stinking water and thousands of inhabitants from all over southern Africa. Every day, in the mines, he had longed to be back in Natal; every evening, in the shanty, Nandi had said to him how she hated their life and he had promised to bring her back as soon as they had saved enough money. Now, by force of circumstance, they were in Natal, but apart, and far from home.
    Later on in the week, once Sterkx had brought him his crutches—home-made, they were little more than two branches of thorn tree—Muhle was able to get up and move around the camp. It was important, he knew, that he get himself fit enough to slip past the sentries one night. He was often challenged about why he was wandering round the camp, but usually his explanation—that he was an injured labourer—was