"Too late, boys, I guess the Southern Column got there first." And the
utterer of this remark lowered his field glasses and turned to the
remainder of the little band of scouts with an air of profound
conviction.
Away in the distance dense columns of smoke were rising heavenward. For
some time this group of men had been eagerly intent upon watching the
phenomenon through their glasses, and there was reason for their
eagerness, for they were looking upon the goal of the expedition, and
what should practically represent the close of the campaign--Bulawayo to
wit, but--Bulawayo in flames. Who had fired it?
Considerable disappointment was felt and expressed. Their prompt march,
their hard and victorious fighting had not brought them first to the
goal. The Southern Column had distanced them and was there already.
Such was the conclusion arrived at on all sides.
One man, however, had let go no opinion. Lying full length, his field
glass adjusted upon a convenient rock, he had been steadily scanning the
burning kraal in the distance during all the foregoing discussion,
ignoring the latter as though he were alone on the ground. Now he
spoke.
"There's no Southern Column thereat all. No sign or trace of a camp."
This dictum was received with dissent, even with a little derision.
"Who's set it on fire then, Blachland?" said one of the exponents of the
latter phase, with a wink at the others. "You're not going to tell us
that Lo Bengula's set his own shop alight?"
"That's about what's occurred," was the tranquil reply. "At least I
think so."
"It's more'n likely Blachland's right, boys," said one of the scouts,
speaking with a pronounced American accent. "He's been there anyway."
With renewed eagerness every glass was once more brought to bear. There
appeared to be four great columns of smoke, and these, as they watched,
were merging into one, of vast volume, and now bright jets of flame were
discernible, as the fire licked its way along the thatch of the grass
huts. Then something strange befel. They who watched saw a fresh
outburst of smoke rise suddenly like an enormous dome from the centre of
that already ascending, seeming to bear aloft on its summit the
fragments of roofs, fences, _debris_ of every description, and then they
were conscious of a mighty roar and a vibrating shock, as the whole mass
subsided, releasing the flames, which shot up anew.
"That's an explosion!" cried some one excitedly. "Old Lo Ben's not only
burnt his nest, but blown it up into the bargain."
For some time further they lay there watching the distant work of
destruction. Then it was decided that their number should be divided,
and while some returned to the column to report the result of their
observations, the remainder should push on, and get as near Bulawayo as
they possibly could--an undertaking of no slight risk, and calling for
the exercise of unflagging caution, for there was no telling what bands
of the enemy might be hovering about in quite sufficient strength to
prove dangerous to a mere handful, though the opinion was that the bulk
of the nation's forces, with the King, had fled northward.
"Well, Percy? Tired of this kind of fun yet?" said Blachland as he and
his young kinsman rode side by side, the two or three more also bent on
this service advancing a little further on their right flank.
"Rather not. I wish it wasn't going to be over quite so quickly."
The other laughed. "I'm not so sure that it is," he said.
"Eh? But we've got Bulawayo."
"But we haven't got Lo Ben yet. My impression is that the tougher part
of this campaign is going to begin now. I may be wrong of course, but
that's my impression."
"Oh, then that settles it," answered Percival, not ironically, but in
whole-hearted good faith, for his belief in, and admiration for his
relative had reached the wildest pitch of enthusiasm. There was no
greater authority in the world, in his estimation, on everything to do
with the country they were in. He would have accepted Hilary's opinion
and acted upon it, even though it went clean contrary to those in
command all put together, upon any subject to do with the work in hand,
and that with the blindest confidence. And then, had he not himself
witnessed Hilary's gallant and daring deed, during the battle fought a
couple of days ago?
His presence there with the scouts instead of as an ordinary trooper in
the column, he owed to his relative, the latter having specially asked
that he should be allowed to accompany him in such capacity. Blachland
at that juncture, with his up-to-date knowledge of the country and the
natives, was far too useful a man not to stretch a point for, and
Percival West, although new to that part, was accustomed to sport and
outdoor life at home, and brimful of pluck and energy, and now, in the
short time he had been out, had thoroughly adapted himself to the life,
and the vicissitudes of the campaign.
To the cause of their being up here together Hilary never alluded, but
he noted with quiet satisfaction that the cure in the case of his young
cousin seemed complete. Once the latter volunteered a statement to that
effect.
"Ah, yes," he had replied. "Nothing like a life of this sort for
knocking any nonsense of that kind out of a fellow--" mentally adding,
somewhat grimly, "When he's young."
For Hilary Blachland himself did not find the busy and dangerous, and at
times exciting, work of the campaign by any means such an unfailing
panacea as he preached it to his younger relative. With it all there
was plenty of time for thought, for retrospect. What an empty and
useless thing he had made of life, and now the best part of it was all
behind him--now that it had been brought home to him that there was a
best part, now that it was too late. He was familiar with the axiom
that those who sell themselves to the devil seldom obtain their price,
and had often scoffed at it: for one thing because he did not believe in
the devil at all. Yet now, looking back, he had come to recognise that,
in substance at least, the axiom was a true one.
Yes, the better part of his life was now behind him, with its ideals,
its possibilities, its finer impulses. Carrying his bitter introspect
within the physical domain, had he not become rough and weather-beaten
and lined and seamed and puckered? It did not strike him as odd that he
should be indulging in such analysis at all--yet had he let anybody
else, say any of his present comrades, into the fact that he was doing
so, they would have deemed him mad, for if there was a man with that
expedition who was envied by most of his said comrades as the embodiment
of cool, sound daring, combined with astute judgment, of rare physical
vigour and striking exterior, assuredly that man was Hilary Blachland.
Yet as it was, he regarded himself with entire dissatisfaction and
disgust, and the medium through which he so regarded himself was named
Lyn Bayfield.
Her memory was ever before him; more, her presence. Asleep or awake, in
the thick of the hardest toil and privation of the campaign, even in the
midst of the discharge of his most important and responsible duties yet
never to their detriment, the sweet, pure, lovely fairness of her face
was there. He had come to worship it with a kind of superstitious
adoration as though in truth the presence of it constituted a kind of
guardian angel.
Was he, after all, in love with Lyn? He supposed that not a man or
woman alive, knowing the symptoms, but would pronounce such to be the
case, even as one woman had done. But he knew better, knew himself
better. The association of anything so gross, so earthly, here, he
recoiled from as from an outrage. It was the unalloyed adoration of a
strange, a holy and a purifying influence.
In love with her? He, Hilary Blachland, at his time of life, and with
his experience of life, in love! Why, the idea was preposterous,
grotesque. He recalled the time he had spent beneath the same roof with
her, and the daily association. It would be treasured, revered to the
utmost limit of his life, as a sacred and an elevating period, but--as
an influence, not a passion.
He had exchanged correspondence with Bayfield more than once since
leaving, and had received two or three letters from Lyn--expressing--
well, simply Lyn. He had answered them, and treasured them secretly as
the most priceless of his possessions. From Bayfield he had learned
that the disturbing element had refrained from further molestation, and
had moreover, taken her own departure from the neighbourhood almost
immediately, a piece of intelligence which afforded him indeed the
liveliest gratification.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
As they drew near to their objective, other kraals near and around
Bulawayo itself, were seen to be on fire. But no sign of their recent
occupants. For all trace remaining of the latter, the whole Matabele
nation might have vanished into thin air.
"That's extraordinary," remarked Blachland, taking a long steady look
through his glasses. "That's Sybrandt's house down there and they
haven't burnt it," pointing out a collection of buildings about a mile
from the site of the great kraal.
"So it is. Wonder if it means a trap though," said another of the
scouts. "By Jingo! There's some one signalling up there. I'll bet my
bottom dollar it's a white man by the look of him. And--there are two
of 'em."
Such was in fact the case--and the biggest surprise of all came off when
a couple of white traders, well known to most of them, came forward to
welcome them to the conquered and now razed capital. There these two
had dwelt throughout the campaign, often in peril, but protected by the
word of the King. Lo Bengula had burnt his capital and fled, taking
with him the bulk of the nation. He, the dreaded and haughty potentate
of the North, whose rule had been synonymous with a terror and a
scourge, had gone down before a mere handful of whites, he, the dusky
barbarian, the cruel despot, according to popular report revelling in
bloodshed and suffering, had taken his revenge. He had protected these
two white men alone in his power--had left them, safe and sound in
person, unharmed even in their possessions, to welcome the invading
conquerors, their countrymen, to the blazing ruins of his once proud
home. Such the revenge of this savage.
The Southern Column did not arrive till some days after the first
occupation of Bulawayo, and some little time elapsed, resting and
waiting for necessary supplies, before the new expedition should start
northward, to effect if possible, the capture of the fugitive King.
Several up-country going men were here foregathered.
"I say, Blachland," said old Pemberton, with a jerk of the thumb to the
southward, "We didn't reckon to meet again like this last time when we
broke camp yonder on the Matya'mhlope, and old Lo Ben fired you out of
the country? Eh?"
"Not much, did we? You going on this new trot, Sybrandt?"
"I believe so. What do you think about this part of the world, West?"
"Here, let's have another tot all round," interrupted Pemberton who, by
the way, had had just as many as were good for him. "You ain't going to
nobble Lo Ben, Sybrandt, so don't you think it."
"Who says so, Pemberton?"
"I say so. Didn't I say Blachland 'ud never get to Umzilikazi's grave?
Didn't I? Well, he never did."
Possibly because the old trader was too far on in his cups the quizzical
glance which passed between Blachland and Sybrandt--who was in the
know--at this allusion, went unnoticed. Pemberton continued, albeit
rather thickly:
"Didn't I say he'd never get there? Didn't I? Well, I say the same
now. You'll never get there. You'll never nobble Lo Ben. See if I
ain't right."