Echoes from the Past (The Brigandshaw Chronicles Book 1)

by Peter Rimmer

  "You are changing the subject."

  "There is nothing to change. I have told you more than once I will not kill my fellow man."

  "If he's pointing a gun?"

  "Plato had something to say about that only he was talking of knives not guns. He said no one is ever sure if the other man will kill so self-defence doesn't exonerate murder. Murder is murder whatever its form. The Bible says 'though shalt not kill' but the Christians somehow have excluded a just war if there ever is such a thing. Some people say if your cause is right you can kill as many people as you like; the good man can kill his bad man. No one ever tells the truth why they do things. Somehow they make the most horrible acts honourable. That old man on his stoep in Pretoria who went off to Switzerland with the Boer treasure once Pretoria fell was a man overwrought with pride. So he took his people to war and once the killing began everyone had a pride but it was now mixed with hatred. The British knowing they could not control the wealth of the gold mines without controlling the country found their high horse with the Uitlanders, foreigners to Kruger, people exploiting his country to whom he would not give the vote. He never said, 'I am a man of great pride and wish to remain President at any cost to my people'. We were unable to tell the world that if Kruger and his people did not give us their gold we would kill them. The lives of all men are thick with hypocrisy. If you want to keep a friend, brother James, never tell him the truth, only tell him what he wants to hear. Now try and convince me to take up my guns and kill my fellow man."

  "If you agree that war is bad then it is good to stop it quickly. And, just to remind you, if during the rebellion here in '96 your fellow Englishmen had not taken up their guns you and your family would have been killed. When the danger is far away sweet words of righteousness are easier to say. Man, even in his most primitive stage has always been in a state of war and peace, having either just fought a war or knows one is coming; without power there can never be a peace which is why I became a soldier. Right and wrong are always interfered with by reality. The reality at the moment is a war between England and the Boers. The right and wrong of its cause is pleasant talk away from danger. Forget about the morality, old chap, you can’t just run away from your responsibilities and leave them to the other members of your society. It is why we have societies, nations, tribes to protect each other from our natural enemies. And, we all have enemies however good we are. Any man who possesses something his neighbour covets has an enemy. And man by his nature is covetous."

  "But the Boer is not my enemy."

  "But he is the enemy of your country. England may say in the future when you Rhodesians need help that your enemy is not their enemy. But the Australians, Canadians, New Zealanders fighting with us against the Boers understand that any threat to the Empire is a threat to themselves and if we ever stop thinking that way the parts of the Empire will be picked off one by one and destroyed as we know them. You just can't have only the benefits of a society any more than you can agree with everything within that society. You can't just choose which part of the mutual protection you wish to perform, old chap. Life doesn't work that way."

  "Why do you want me so badly, James?"

  "Because you know the bush better than most Englishmen and if we are going to capture the Boer generals who say they will fight to the bitter end we have to go into the bush and hunt them."

  "I don't even wish to hunt animals anymore."

  "As an Englishman, you have no choice."

  "And which particular Boer general do you wish me to hunt?"

  "The Giant," said James softly watching his brother's eyes for recognition.

  "I suppose you want to tell me all the bad things he has done."

  "That will be a start."

  "And who is he? What's his real name?"

  James got up from his deckchair and walked with his glass of whisky towards the river before he was able to make up his mind.

  "We don't know old chap," he lied. "We don't know," said James looking his brother straight in the eye, "But he's the best of their guerrilla fighters. That prank with General Gore-Bilham has given the Boers a new lease of life."

  "Tell me the way he operates. How, for instance did he catch the general with his pants down?"

  "It's no laughing matter, Seb."

  "Probably not. Anyway, at least we know this Giant has a sense of humour. But why didn't the general die of thirst?"

  "The man gave them three water bottles each."

  "Then he's also a man of honour and he also respects the bush. Sounds like our man knew his captives would get back to camp. He was sending you a message of defiance…Why don't you try and negotiate an end to this war?"

  "We are trying."

  "And if I can capture this Giant you think he will negotiate?"

  "That is our hope."

  "I don’t mind capturing the man though I am not sure if I know how. I just don't wish to kill anyone. Would it help if I went into the bush to find the man and talk to him, persuade the man to negotiate?"

  "You'll hunt him then?"

  "But not as a soldier."

  "You'll need soldiers for protection. This war, Seb, has to come to an end. There's another problem. Their women and children in these camps."

  "Tell me about them. There's nothing about that in the papers."

  With secret relief, James sat down in his deckchair. He had found the way to make his brother go to war. In vivid detail he described the hell in what some were beginning to call the concentration camps.

  "You see," he concluded, "now you know why we all have to do everything in our power to stop this war."

  Chapter 3: May 1901

  Sarie Mostert's only excitement was to wake each morning in the hut and find everyone alive. The quickly-built hut had replaced the tent but the ground area was the same and the four families lived diagonally across from each other with the cooking fire in the centre and a hole in the roof to let out the smoke. Typhoid had swept through the close confines of the camp killing six hundred and twelve people but in hut twenty-two, with Sarie in strict control of their habits no one had fallen sick. By one of the many tricks Sarie had learnt in the slums of Pretoria as the dog lady, she had channelled the rainwater from the roof into closed containers that were jealously guarded inside the hut. The food was washed with the rainwater, food was cooked in rainwater and no one was allowed to drink anything else. The strange mix of containers had been filched from the British who threw them away; some had contained cooking oil, some paraffin for the lamps and every meal or drink had a taste of something bad. When the rain fell, Sarie had the members of the hut, from children to the old woman Piers and Karel called Ma, out collecting water. Even when it was cold at night the regime of changing the containers went on until everyone was full. Some humid evenings, that changed to cold when the sun went down, precipitated dew and not a drop of moisture was allowed down the improvised gutter pipes without ending up in the jumbled collection of containers. Water dished out by the British was used to wash their bodies and their clothes but was not allowed into their mouths.

  Most of the day and night when she was not being told what to do by Sarie, Helena Oosthuizen sat on the floor in her corner of the hut. She looked and behaved like an old woman of seventy and kept to herself, her mind blank. Having convinced herself that everyone was dead there had been no point in thought. With her eyes closed she made her mind a blank only responding to orders from the girl who had once been her servant. Guarded by Sarie she had been left on her own as the weeks and months trailed by with everyone except Helena wishing the war to be over.

  Taking each day as it came, Sarie's triumph was waking with them all alive in the morning. To remain sane she neither thought forward nor back. To think of open space, her dogs or Billy would make her cry and there was no place for the luxury of crying until they all went somewhere else they would hopefully call home.

  Taking her daughters by the hand she went off once again to complain to the British about the food a
nd to beg for extra blankets. At night in the middle of May it was bitterly cold on the highveld. She could have been talking to a brick wall, she told herself as not one of the soldiers understood a word of Afrikaans. They just smiled at her and did nothing making Sarie want to scream with frustration. Even the few words of English she had learned from Billy were useless.

  The swing had been built by Harry on his extended holiday from school. Hanging from the tallest tree on the bank of the Mazoe River it could take the rider out over the water and far back towards the homestead. The clean, tall branch that gave the swing its reach was as thick and strong as an elephant's trunk but only Harry in his frustration had taken the swing to its zenith.

  Emily held the ropes at elbow height and trolled gently, her feet together in front of her. May was the best month in Rhodesia when the heat had gone and the trees were still green. It was early in the morning and the sun was yellow on the trees, the air soft and windless. There was not a sound from the houses behind and being a Sunday none of the servants came up from their compound. In front of Emily the river flowed on its long journey to the Zambezi; it was quiet and gentle, a friendly river.

  As so often happened when she was alone her mind went back to England and she smiled ruefully to herself that all that had brought her here and begun on the soft moss beneath an English oak with the tall bracken guarding their sanctuary, the hum of summer insects sweet melody in their ears. And then came Arthur, dead Arthur and she did not feel a thing for his passing. Swinging harder she castigated herself: it was never good to think evil of the dead however far away. Hers was not the first arranged marriage in the family and without even one of them she would not be swinging from the trees in the middle of nowhere in the middle of Africa, a family of English surrounded by people she had never known to exist before her flight with Seb from England. The log floating by in midstream looked at her with large round eyes, turning the harmless wood into a live reptile and when the swing came back she let go and dropped to her knees on the bank. The shiver of fear made her almost rattle.

  Seb had watched her ever since she had left their house and had come out to sit on the bench under the msasa tree while he plucked up his courage to tell her what he had to do. When she fell off onto her knees he ran down the lawn to find her shivering from fright. Emily looked at him from the ground.

  "There is a crocodile in the river. I thought it was a log and then looked at me. Oh Seb, the eyes were the most malevolent eyes I have ever seen. It was as though he hated me. Can’t we go back to England now that Arthur's dead?"

  "What would I do? What would we live off?"

  "We still own our shares in African Shipping. With the war they must be worth a lot more than when Tinus sold his shares. Please, Seb. It was like someone walking over my grave. A premonition of evil. Please, Seb, I want to go home."

  "No, it isn't. This is our home and you know that just as much as me. We came here because we had to come here. We ran away with Harry. Now we can be married and even if some of the country people cut us dead it's better than living here."

  "Em. You forget the children. Harry's a bastard. So are Madge, George and little James. It isn't a problem here. They will marry other Rhodesians as the country thrives and grows. Your father can't go back. He gave up his money to annul your marriage. Outside of this farm he doesn't have a penny. You mustn't let a crocodile floating out in the river frighten you."

  "But it did, Seb. It frightened me almost to death."

  "Come on up to the house and I'll make some tea."

  Wearily Emily got to her feet.

  "Are any of the children awake?" she asked.

  "Not yet. And I'll take your father some tea in bed."

  Arm in arm they walked back to the house through the gate in the stockade.

  "Don't you think it's beautiful, Em?"

  "Yes it is."

  "Look, I'll tell you what we'll do. The moment this war is over, we'll have ourselves married in church. Even Nat will consider you a widow. A sinner yes but the Church always talks of repentances and forgiveness."

  "What has the war got to do with it?"

  "I'm going away, Em. There's something very important I have to do."

  "Oh my God. Why now? Why you? It's James! Now do you believe in premonitions? You're going to die and leave me and the children in this wilderness. Please, Seb. Let's take our chances and go back to England."

  As Sebastian Brigandshaw was riding south leading a second pack horse; some three hundred miles away to the south-west Tatenda was slowly riding north through the bush, two mules unwillingly following on a long leash. Zwide had died three days before and on his death bed had confided to Tatenda the whereabouts of Lobengula's gold.

  "You must take care of the people's gold and only use it for the Chimerenga that will free the black people from being the white man's servant," the old induna, general to Lobengula, the last King of the Matabele, had told Tatenda in the small, dark room at the back of Jack Slater's butcher shop, the iron bed on which Zwide was dying two bricks off the ground so the tokalosh, the small people, could not look into his eyes. In the bush timber roof rafters, three bats were hanging upside down in the semi-dark, with the only light of the sun filtering through cracks in the badly built shed. "Make the gold safe and if in your lifetime the rising does not come entrust the gold to a man like yourself. Only the gold can buy us enough guns to kill the white men when they have finished killing each other down south."

  Slowly and with pain as the great cancer destroyed his body he made Tatenda repeat the praise song he had composed for Lobengula's funeral.

  "The Shona and the Matabele are now brothers with the same desire to kill the white people. We are men of men who will not live forever like dogs in the white man's kennel."

  When it was over Tatenda, no longer interested, had left the old man where he was for someone else to find and bury.

  The mules being pulled behind the horse carried empty leather saddlebags that Tatenda had bought with one of the gold coins Zwide had given him. At twenty-five his aquiline features, a throwback to some itinerant Arab trader, were harder, the pointed ears sharper, the black eyes cold and full of hate. The passion of his conviction took him ever north towards the second cave where Zwide had taken the gold and ivory.

  Back in Bulawayo the Jewish pedlar looked at the old Portuguese gold coin in the palm of his hand. "Lobengula gold," he said out loud. "Where else would a black get a coin like this, that man had no idea of its value. Maybe there are more," he talked loudly to himself as the fever of gold flooded his mind. "Now who can I trust to follow that black man?" Having trekked through the bush for ten years, Isaac Stein was sure he could find and follow the distinctive trail of a horse and two mules." You are an old fool, Isaac," he said. "You can trust no man with gold." Quickly, he put the two horses into the shafts and without telling anyone left Bulawayo in the same direction he had watched the black man leave with the mules and Isaac Stein's leather saddlebags. For the first time in a very long time he was excited.

  Ten miles to the north, Tatenda was making a vow to his dead parents and siblings, massacred by the impi of Matabele.

  "First we will kill the white men and then we will turn our guns against the Zulus who call themselves Matabele. The people of Monomotapa, the Shona, will rise again as the great power of central Africa. This my dead parents I swear to you and all my ancestors."

  On the fifth day of his journey Isaac caught sight of the mules for the first time having followed the trail through the Mopani Forest, the footprint of the two mules quite distinctive from the horse. Every night his quarry had stopped and made a fire, making his pursuit as simple as following a road. The bush, empty of people had only twice made him deviate to find a way around for his small covered wagon where the horse and mules had been able to go straight ahead. At the end of the third day he had thought of giving up but each subsequent day he had said he would try another. Even as he looked at the mules and the lone rider ten y
ards further into the trees Isaac was no wiser as to their destination. From where he stopped on the wooded hill he could look down and see the horse and the pack animals as they moved through the trees, the startled call of a bird having brought him up and presented him the breaking cover. The black man was maybe a mile ahead of him and through the binoculars he could make out what he thought was a rifle in a holster next to the rider's right knee. To the left about three miles rose a jagged outcrop of vast round rocks the size of small mountains. Isaac got down from the bench, letting the reins loose on the back of the horses. The two animals dropped their heads and began pulling at the brown, dry grass while Isaac watched his prey from the shade of a tree. In two hours the sun would go down and the man in front would make a fire while Isaac took refuge from the wild animals in his covered wagon. Looking at the barrier of the great rocks, Isaac estimated the line of mules and horse to be heading for the centre and not a detour that would take them round through the forest. To be sure the man in front was unaware of his presence, Isaac refrained from making a fire. When the light had gone from the sky completely he climbed into his wagon and for more than an hour he prayed to his God for guidance. Then he slept the night through at peace in both his mind and body.

  Tatenda had been unaware of the eyes watching him through the glasses but had been certain he had found the right range of low mountains. Instead of memorising each word of the king's praise song, he had memorised each of Zwide's directions. He had travelled north-west by the sun during the day while checking his position each night by the cross in the sky made of four stars with two bright stars below the cross. When he had reached the Shangani River, where Zwide had won his greatest battle, he had not crossed but kept along its banks looking for the great rocks that pushed up from the Mopani Forest. When the sun had been sinking behind the great, round mountains he had waited to be shown the one shaped like a buffalo. Exactly as Zwide had said, as the ball of fire through the last flames of day brushed the sky behind the rocks blood red, Tatenda had seen the one he was looking for. That night, he had talked to God through his ancestors and when he finally slept by the fire he slept comfortably, not even remembering in the morning the times he had been awake to stack more wood on the fire.