Роберт Фиш - Rough Diamond

There was silence from the two. Then Luckner cleared his throat.

“Granted the men and horses could use rest at this point,” he said quietly, “but the longer we remain here, the longer the Boers have to bring up fresh horses and fresh men. They know full well the losses they’ve inflicted on us; all they have to do is count the bodies on the ridge and in the swamp. I know the men need rest, but I don’t believe they need all that much rest. It’s barely eight in the morning, Captain; by noon the men should have had ample rest. The fact is, we’ve been badly beaten, but there’s no need for Jo’burg or the Reform Committee to ever know about it, or at least not until after the revolution, and then it really won’t matter. I estimate we still have at least three hundred men, and that’s plenty to put over the revolution, or at least to stiffen the backs of the committee. But only if we get there quickly. Why not let the men rest until noon, and then let’s get on our way? I’ll find the road around Krugersdorp somehow.”

Jameson frowned, thinking. White kept silent. Luckner clinched his argument.

“If we don’t know the road, or if it’s unfamiliar to us, then trying to push through to Jo’burg in darkness, is insane. Besides, the Boer will be expecting us to march at night; we’ve been doing it all along. He’ll probably be sleeping this afternoon.”

“That’s true,” Jameson conceded, and forced himself to make a decision. He looked at White. “Tell the men they have until noon to rest. Then we ride for Jo’burg.” His head swiveled to Luckner. “And you find the road.”

“Right,” both men said, and came to their feet. Jameson stayed where he was, staring at the ground, waiting for Lieutenant Willoughby and his casualty report, although the captain knew it was going to be bad…

The two boys were apparently tending geese, sitting on the ground beside the shallow pan with bits of sedge grass between their teeth, talking idly, watching the goslings waddle down the shallow bank and follow their parents into the water, paddling along behind them bravely, ducking their heads for food as their parents did, trying to raise their necks impressively as their parents did, but failing conspicuously. Luckner drew up his mount, looking down at the boys with no expression on his scarred face, while his horse drank thirstily from the edge of the pan, the geese and goslings hurrying away from the puffling sound. Luckner had come back along their trail the night before for several miles before he had spotted the boys; there had been no other possible road that might lead them out of their position and around Krugersdorp. Luckner studied the frightened faces. Too young to bear arms, he thought, but they’ll grow up to be as vicious as any other Boer, I’ll warrant! Still, they were probably also too young to lie, although he was sure from their nervous expressions that he could frighten them out of any tendency to lie in any event. The two had stopped talking and had scrambled to their feet at his approach, staring at him, influenced, he could see, by his hard, scarred face, and by his trooper’s uniform.

“Boys,” he said, “do either one of you know the way around Krugersdorp to hit the road to Jo’burg to the south?”

The boys remained silent, looking first at each other and then back at the man seated on the horse.

“Now, boys,” Luckner said, smiling a humorless, a dangerous smile, “I asked you a question. It isn’t polite not to answer. Didn’t your pa ever tell you that? Or your ma?”

One of the boys finally found his voice. He pointed off to the left. “There’s a kopje about three miles from here,” he said, trying to keep his voice from trembling. “Actually, two kopjes, maybe fifty yards apart, maybe a hundred yards high. You can’t miss them. They look like a woman’s tits.” The two boys giggled a bit nervously at this apt description, and then straightened their faces to see the waiting man remain with graven face. The one boy swallowed and went on. “They got trees on them, mostly sneeze-wood. You go between them and about a mile on you’ll see another pan like this one, only a little bigger. Skirt it to the left and you’ll run into the road from Krugersdorp to Johannesburg.”

Luckner scowled at the boys, his face as hard as he could make it look.

“You boys wouldn’t lie to me, would you? Because if that was the case, I’d be coming back this way, and I wouldn’t be pleased. And when I’m not pleased, I hurt people.” His voice was threatening. His one hand reached back to touch the whip he had coiled at the pommel of his saddle, and then slid to rest on the hilt of his saber a moment. “I hurt them bad.”

“Oh, no, sir!” the boy said hurriedly. He pointed again, as if to confirm his first information. “My pa took me to Johannesburg once. That’s the way we went. It’s got ox-wagon tracks you can’t miss. It’s the way lots of people from north of Krugersdorp go, to miss the town.”

“Well,” Luckner said, “in that case, thank you.” He sounded anything but thankful. He remained seated on his horse, towering over the boys, thinking. He considered the possibility that the boys might report his questioning to some adults and that, in turn, the Boer commandos might hear of it, but if they did it would be too late for them to do anything about it. And if he killed the boys and Jameson ever heard of it — and word was bound to get around, even to Johannesburg — the captain, in his lily-livered way, would probably raise all sorts of hell over the matter, knowing who had gone back to ask around and locate the road. And if Captain Jameson didn’t, then that bastard White would. The boys were staring at him a bit fearfully, as if they might have read his mind. Luckner leaned over, giving the boys a closer look at his scarred face. “And you two keep quiet about my asking you any questions, hear? Or I’ll come back and cut off your little puds, and then you’ll never enjoy a woman, tits or no tits!”

He turned and wheeled his horse, returning in the direction of their temporary campsite, intent upon getting Jameson to reduce the rest period even further, and get them on the road as soon as possible. The one boy looked at the other, his eyes twinkling.

“Nasty man, isn’t he?”

“They’re all nasty men,” the second said contemptuously. “Not very smart, but nasty. Still,” he added, thinking about it, “we’d better get away from here before they come through.”

“Why? We don’t have to get away before they come,” the first boy pointed out. “Our staying will prove we didn’t lie to the man. It’s the way their heads work.” He grinned. “Besides, I’d like to see what they look like after the swamp and the ridge.”

“A lot better than they’ll look after the twin kopjes,” the other boy predicted, and also grinned. “You’re right. Let’s get a look at them,” and he settled down again, reaching for a new bit of sedge grass. The geese marched steadily across the pond, obediently followed by the goslings.

Jameson compromised on leaving the rest area at eleven in the morning, to the satisfaction of Luckner and the profound disgust of Lieutenant White. Forty-two men had died on the ridge and in the swamp; sixty-seven had been wounded, and of these, thirty-five were too badly injured to ride their mounts at the fast pace necessary to reach Johannesburg as quickly as possible. That left the captain with three hundred and four able-bodied troopers, plus thirty-two who could ride but would be of limited use in case of any running battle with the Boer commandos as they galloped along the road to Johannesburg. Still, Jameson thought, it might have been worse. At least they did have a way around Krugersdorp, thanks to Luckner. Otherwise they would have had to pause in their ride to Jo’burg to raid one or more farms for food for the men and feed for the animals, and that delay might well have proven fatal to the revolution. Now it was just a matter of time, a matter of hours.