Men of Men (80 page)

Of all the fighting impis of Matabele, only one remained intact, the Inyati regiment of Induna Gandang, the king’s half-brother. Gandang alone had been able to resist the madness of
hurling his men over open ground at the waiting Maxim guns, and now he waited for his king’s orders in the hills just north of the royal kraal with his impi gathered about him.

In all of GuBulawayo, there was one small group remaining. Twenty-six of these were white men and women. They were the traders and concession-hunters who had been at the kraal when Jameson had
marched from Iron Mine Hill. With them, were the Codrington family, Clinton and Robyn and the twins. Lobengula had ordered them all to remain under his protection, while the impis were out in
battle array, and now he had called them to the goat kraal for his last audience.

Drawn up before the two new brick-built houses which had replaced the great thatched hut, were Lobengula’s four Cape wagons with the teams already in the traces.

About the wagons were a small party of the royal retainers: two of the king’s senior wives, four elderly indunas, and a dozen or so slaves and servants.

The king himself sat on the box of the leading wagon. In that wagon were all Lobengula’s treasures, a hundred big tusks of ivory, the little sealed pots of uncut diamonds, and the canvas
bags stencilled with the name ‘The Standard Bank Ltd’ containing the sovereigns paid to him during the four years since he had granted the concession to the British South Africa
Company, four thousand sovereigns, less than a sovereign for every one of his dead warriors.

Around the wagon were gathered the white men, and Lobengula looked down upon them. The king had become an old man in the few short weeks since he had thrown the war spear on the Hills of the
Indunas. There were deep lines of sorrow and despair carved around his mouth and eyes. His eyes were rheumy and shortsighted, his hair bleached silver-grey, his body bloated and misshapen, and his
breathing was racked and irregular like that of a dying animal.

‘Tell your queen, white men, that Lobengula kept his word. Not one of you has been harmed,’ he wheezed. ‘Daketela and his soldiers will be here tomorrow. If you go out upon the
eastern road, you will even meet them before nightfall.’ Lobengula paused to catch his breath, and then went on. ‘Go now. There is nothing more I have to say to you.’

They were silent, subdued, and strangely chastened, as they trooped out of the goat kraal. Only Robyn and her family remained.

The twins stood on each side of Robyn. At twenty-one years of age, they were as tall as she. It seemed that the three of them were sisters – for they all had the clear eyes and glossy hair
of healthy young women.

Clinton Codrington, standing behind them, stooped and bald, dressed in sober broadcloth that was mossy green with age and shiny at the cuffs and elbows, seemed father to Robyn as well as to the
twins.

The king looked down upon them with a terrible regret.

‘It is the last time that you will make my eyes glad, Nomusa,’ he said.

‘Oh King, my heart is on fire for you. I think of what has happened and how I advised you.’

Lobengula held up his hand to silence her. ‘Do not torture yourself, Nomusa. You have been a true friend of many years, and what you did was done in friendship. Nothing you or I could have
done would have changed the manner of it. It was the prophecy; it was as certain as the fall of the leaves from the msasa trees when the frosts are on the hills.’

Robyn ran forward to the wagon, and Lobengula stooped to take her hand.

‘Pray to your three gods that are one god for me, Nomusa.’

‘He will hear you, Lobengula, you are a good man.’

‘No man is all goodness or all evil,’ the king sighed. ‘Now, Nomusa, soon Daketela and his soldiers will be here. Tell him that Lobengula says thus. “I am beaten, white
men, my impis are eaten up. Let me go now, do not hunt me further, for I am an old sick man. I wish only to find a place where I may mourn my people – and at last die in
peace.”’

‘I will tell them, Lobengula.’

‘And will they listen, Nomusa?’

She could not face him, and she dropped her eyes. ‘You know they will not listen.’

‘My poor people,’ whispered Lobengula. ‘Will you look after my poor people when I am gone, Nomusa?’

‘I swear it to you, oh King,’ Robyn said fiercely. ‘I will stay at Khami Mission until the day that I die, and I will devote my life to your people.’

Then Lobengula smiled, and once again there was a flash of the old mischievous twinkle in his eye.

‘I give you the royal permission which I denied you all these years, Nomusa. From this day forward any of my people – man or woman or child of Matabele who wish it of you – you
may pour water on their heads and make the cross of your three gods over them.’

Robyn could not reply.

‘Stay in peace, Nomusa,’ said Lobengula, and his wagon rumbled slowly out through the gates of the stockade.

C
linton Codrington reined in the mule on the crest of the rise above the royal kraal, and he groped for Robyn’s hand. They sat silently on
the seat of the little Scotch cart, watching the last pale shreds of dust thrown up by the king’s wagons disappearing away in the north across the grassy plain.

‘They will never leave him in peace,’ Robyn said softly.

‘Lobengula is the prize,’ Clinton agreed. ‘Without him, Jameson and Rhodes will have no victory.’

‘What will they do with him?’ she asked sadly. ‘If they catch him.’

‘Exile, certainly,’ Clinton said. ‘St Helena Island, probably. It’s where they sent Cetewayo.’

‘Poor tragic man,’ Robyn whispered. ‘Caught between two ages, half savage and half civilized man, half cruel despot and half a shy and sensitive dreamer. Poor
Lobengula.’

‘Do look, Papa!’ Vicky called suddenly, pointing down the rude track towards the east. There was a thick column of dust rising above the tops of the thorn trees, and even as they
watched, a distant troop of mounted men rode out onto the grassy plain with badges and weapons twinkling in the sunlight.

‘Soldiers,’ whispered Lizzie.

‘Soldiers,’ repeated Vicky gleefully. ‘Hundreds of them.’ And the twins exchanged a bright ecstatic glance of complete understanding and accord.

Clinton picked up the reins – but Robyn tightened her grip on his hand to restrain him.

‘Wait,’ she said. ‘I want to watch it happen. Somehow it will be the end of an age, the end of a cruel but innocent age.’

Lobengula had left one of his trusted indunas in the royal kraal, with instructions to lay fire to the train as soon as the last wagons were clear. In the mud-brick building behind the
king’s new residence were the remains of the hundred thousand rounds of Martini-Henry ammunition for which he had sold his land and his people. There were also twenty barrels of black
powder.

‘There!’ said Robyn, as the pillar of black smoke and flame shot hundreds of feet straight up into the still air.

Only many seconds later did the shock wave and the great clap of sound pass over where they watched from the ridge, and the smoke, still spinning upon itself, blossomed into an anvil head high
above the shattered kraal.

Lobengula’s house that had given him such pleasure and pride was only a shell, the roof blown away and the walls fallen in.

The beehive huts of the women’s quarters were ablaze, and even as they watched, the flames jumped the stockade and caught in the roofs beyond. Within minutes the whole of GuBulawayo was in
leaping, swirling flames.

‘Now we can go on,’ Robyn said quietly, and Clinton shook up the mule.

T
here were thirty horsemen in the advance scouting party – and as they galloped up, the tall straight figure leading them was
unmistakable.

‘Thank God that you are safe!’ Zouga called to them. He was handsome and heroic in the frogged uniform with his brass badges of rank ablaze in the sunlight, and the slouch hat cocked
forward over his handsome, gravely concerned features.

‘We were never in any danger,’ Robyn told him. ‘And well you knew that.’

‘Where is Lobengula?’ Zouga sought to divert her scorn, but she shook her head.

‘I am guilty of one act of treachery against Lobengula—’

‘You are an Englishwoman,’ Zouga reminded her. ‘You should know where your loyalties lie.’

‘Yes, I am an Englishwoman,’ she agreed icily, ‘but I am ashamed of that today. I will not tell you where the king is.’

‘As you wish.’ Zouga looked at Clinton. ‘You know that it is for the good of everyone in this land. Until we have Lobengula, there will be no peace.’

Clinton bowed his bald head. ‘The king has gone to the north with his wagons and wives and the Inyati regiment.’

‘Thank you,’ Zouga nodded. ‘I will send an escort with you to the main column. They are not far behind us. Sergeant!’

A young trooper with triple chevrons on his sleeve spurred forward. He was a fine-looking lad, with high English colour in his cheeks and broad shoulders.

‘Sergeant Acutt. Take the six men from the rear three files and see this party to safety.’

Zouga saluted his sister and brother-in-law curtly and then ordered, ‘Troop, at the gallop. Forward!’

The first two dozen troopers went clattering away towards GuBulawayo, while the sergeant and his six men wheeled in alongside the cart.

Vicky turned her head and looked directly into the young sergeant’s eyes. She took a long slow breath that pushed her bosom out under the faded cotton of her blouse. The sergeant stared,
and the flush of dark blood rose from the high stock of his tunic and suffused his cheeks.

Vicky wetted her pouting lips with the tip of a pink tongue, and slanted her eyes at him – and Sergeant Acutt seemed about to fall out of the saddle, for Vicky’s gaze had struck him
from a range of less than six feet.

‘Victoria!’ Robyn snapped sharply, without looking back over her shoulder.

‘Yes, Mama.’ Hurriedly, Vicky slumped her shoulders forward to alter the cheeky thrust of her bosom to a more demure angle, and composed her expression into dutiful gravity.

‘R
everend Codrington, I am sending out a considerable force to escort Lobengula in.’ Jameson stood at the fly of his tent, looking out
beyond the laager to the blackened ruins of the royal kraal. ‘I have already sent this message after the king.’ Jameson came back to his desk and read from his pad:

‘Has the king sent you a reply?’ Clinton asked. He had declined a seat and stood stiffly in front of the camp table that served Jameson as a desk.

‘Here.’ The doctor handed Clinton a grubby, folded scrap of paper. Clinton scanned it swiftly:

‘This is written by a half-caste rogue, named Jacobs, who has joined up with Lobengula,’ Clinton muttered, as he glanced through the rest of the wandering, misspelt and barely
literate note. ‘I know his handwriting.’

‘Do you think the king means it?’ Mungo St John asked. ‘Do you think he means to come in?’

Clinton did not turn his head towards where Mungo lolled in a canvas camp chair across the tent.

‘Dr Jameson, I do not condone your actions or those of your infamous Chartered Company, but I came here at your bidding in order to do what little I can to redress the terrible wrongs that
have been perpetrated on the Matabele people. However, I draw the line at having to speak or in any way communicate with this henchman of yours.’

Jameson frowned irritably. ‘Reverend, I would like you to bear in mind that I have appointed General St John as Administrator and Chief Magistrate of Matabeleland—’

Clinton cut in brusquely. ‘You are, of course, aware that your Chief Magistrate was once a notorious slave trader, buying and selling the black people over whom you now give him supreme
powers?’

‘Yes, thank you, Reverend, I am aware that General St John was once a legitimate trader, and I am also fully aware that while a serving officer of Her Majesty’s navy, you led an
attack on his ship – an action which led to your being court martialled, imprisoned and cashiered from the service. Now let us continue, Reverend. If you do not wish to talk directly to
General St John, you may address me instead.’

In the camp chair Mungo St John crossed his beautifully polished riding boots and smiled lazily, but his eye was bright and sharp as a bared blade. ‘Doctor Jameson, would you ask the good
priest if he is of the opinion that Lobengula will give himself up?’

‘Would you?’ Clinton asked, still without a glance in St John’s direction.

‘No,’ Mungo replied, and nodded his head significantly at Jameson.

‘Reverend, General St John is taking out a flying column to bring Lobengula in. I want you to go with him, please,’ Jameson said.

‘Why me, Doctor?’

‘You speak the language fluently.’

‘So do many others – Zouga Ballantyne is one of them. He is also a soldier.’