Bloemfontein had fallen since our arrival, but there was plenty of
fight in the Free Staters still, and I will not deny that it was these
gentry who were showing us the sport for which our corps came in.
Constant skirmishing was our portion, with now and then an action that
you would know at least by name, did I feel free to mention them. But I
do not, and indeed it is better so. I have not to describe the war even
as I saw it, I am thankful to say, but only the martial story of us two
and those others of whom you wot. Corporal Connal was the dangerous
blackguard you have seen. Captain Bellingham is best known for his
position in the batting averages a year or two ago, and for his
subsequent failure to obtain a place in any of the five Test Matches.
But I only think of him as the officer who recognized Raffles.
We had taken a village, making quite a little name for it and for
ourselves, and in the village our division was reinforced by a fresh
brigade of the Imperial troops. It was a day of rest, our first for
weeks, but Raffles and I spent no small part of it in seeking high and
low for a worthy means of quenching the kind of thirst which used to
beset Yeomen and others who had left good cellars for the veldt. The
old knack came back to us both, though I believe that I alone was
conscious of it at the time; and we were leaving the house, splendidly
supplied, when we almost ran into the arms of an infantry officer, with
a scowl upon his red-hot face, and an eye-glass flaming at us in the
sun.
“Peter Bellingham!” gasped Raffles under his breath, and then we
saluted and tried to pass on, with the bottles ringing like
church-bells under our khaki. But Captain Bellingham was a hard man.
“What have you men been doin’?” drawled he.
“Nothing, sir,” we protested, like innocence with an injury.
“Lootin’ ’s forbidden,” said he. “You had better let me see those
bottles.”
“We are done,” whispered Raffles, and straightway we made a sideboard
of the stoop across which he had crept at so inopportune a moment. I
had not the heart to raise my eyes again, yet it was many moments
before the officer broke silence.
“Uam Var!” he murmured reverentially at last. “And Long John of Ben
Nevis! The first drop that’s been discovered in the whole psalm-singing
show! What lot do you two belong to?”