by John Wilcox
Simon, aware that the eyes of the tribunal officers were fixed upon him, stared at Morgan while his mind worked fast. It could be said that the QMS had told the fundamental truth. But oh, what a pejorative slant he had put on it. If only Jenkins had survived - but he had not, and Simon knew that he would have to fight this battle alone. He must redress the balance somehow. Clutching his blank sheet of paper, he rose to question the witness.
‘Q, do you remember how we first met?’
The question was met with an unmistakable ‘Pshew!’ from Covington.
‘Pay no attention,’ ordered Simon. ‘Please answer the question.’
‘Yessir. You and that private soldier came to me just before the battle with a requisition for me to issue you with jackets an’ rifles an’ lungers.’
‘When you issued us with jackets, did you notice any wound on my body?’
‘Don’t think so.’
‘Not on my shoulder? A spear wound?’
‘Can’t rightly remember, sir.’
Bastard, thought Simon. He tried once more. ‘When I came into the wagon, wasn’t it perfectly clear that I had run out of ammunition and had come to take cartridges back to the line?’
‘Dunno, sir.’
‘When Private Jenkins suggested that I should fix my bayonet because the Zulus had broken through the line, it wasn’t an order, was it? He was advising me to do so for my own safety, wasn’t he?’
‘Dunno, sir. Wasn’t time to consider all that, what with the trouble gettin’ the boxes open an’ all.’
Simon sighed. ‘When we left the wagon, you say you saw no more of me or of Private Jenkins?’
‘That’s right, sir. I just saw you runnin’ up the ’ill, like.’
‘You did not see a spear take Jenkins in the back so that he fell? And you did not see me stand over him and try and protect him with my bayonet as the Zulus swarmed about us?’
A heavy, histrionic sigh came from the bench behind Bradshaw.
‘No, sir.’
Simon let the witness go and Covington strode forward to give evidence again. This time, Bradshaw merely asked the big man a preliminary question and then let him address the tribunal without interruption.
‘Colonel Covington,’ said the prosecutor, ‘you have brought these two grave charges against this young officer. You know that a guilty verdict on either of them can mean death for him’ - Simon flinched at this, for it was the first time that punishment had been mentioned - ‘so you must have a very good reason for doing so?’
‘Indeed I have.’ Covington thrust out his moustaches and addressed the officers sitting before him. ‘The first charge needs little explanation. Without warning, this young man hit me and in so doing escaped arrest. He does not deny it and will not - he cannot - offer extenuating circumstances for his act. It is an open and shut case.
‘However, on the second charge, you, sir, and your colleagues may wonder why I, who was not present at the battle, should bring it. The facts of the matter are these. When Fonthill was arrested at Rorke’s Drift on the first charge I was naturally interested to know what he had been up to at Isandlwana.’ A shrug of the shoulders and the tone of Covington’s voice invited the tribunal to agree that this was a perfectly normal thing for him to speculate upon - and, indeed, the expression on the officers’ faces showed that they agreed.
‘So,’ he went on, ‘I made enquiries and heard the QM’s story. Now, I was not at all surprised by this because, as I have touched upon earlier, I have long believed Fonthill to be a malingerer and, indeed, a coward. You see, he came under my command some three years or more ago when he was transferred to the 2nd Battalion from the 1st under rather unusual circumstances. It seems that when the 1st was ordered abroad to take part in the Kaffir War in the Cape, Fonthill collapsed immediately and missed the draft. He lay in some sort of coma for a couple of days or so and then, conveniently, recovered just after his comrades in the battalion had shipped out.’
Covington raised his eyebrows in mock surprise. ‘You may wonder, gentlemen, what was the complaint that laid low this young officer just when the call came to go to war. I certainly did. But, as you will hear’ (Simon pricked up his ears at this) ‘the doctors were not able to find anything wrong with him at all. I have to tell you that the general verdict among his contemporaries was that he had deliberately feigned illness to avoid being posted into danger.
‘Fonthill was transferred to my command and, to be frank, I told him of my feelings about him and gave him the chance of resigning then and there or staying with the 2nd Battalion, where I would test him to the extreme. Now,’ Covington gave his idiosyncratic flick of the moustaches, for he was undoubtedly enjoying the telling of the story, ‘in fairness the man did not crack, but he was damned clever. Somehow-I know not how - he convinced the Horse Guards that he had a good knowledge of Zulu and other Bantu languages and that he could ride well - which he could not - and scraped a strange posting in Zululand to be away from me and arduous line duty. I do not know what he was up to in Zululand but I am perfectly certain that this story of his about bearding Cetswayo in his den, being imprisoned by him and then escaping from Ulundi in time to join poor Pulleine’s column just before the battle is poppycock. It is typical Fonthill make-believe, and as I understand it, he has no evidence of any sort to substantiate it.’
Covington now addressed Glyn directly. ‘You will see, then, sir, that knowing what I know about Fonthill, and having been a victim of his sudden attack on me, I had no alternative but to bring both these charges.’
As Covington concluded, a silence fell on the court. Bradshaw indicated that he was finished with the witness and once again Simon thought quickly. He stood. ‘Gentlemen,’ he addressed the tribunal, ‘I have many questions to put to Colonel Covington, but in view of what he has said about events three or more years ago and,’ he took a deep breath here and looked at Glyn, ‘since this court has extended a minor concession to Colonel Covington in allowing him to stay to hear the QM’s evidence, I wonder if a similar modest indulgence could be extended to me in hearing the third witness for the prosecution before I question both him and Colonel Covington.’ He hurried on, his voice on edge: ‘As, from what I have heard, a death sentence could be imposed upon me in the event of guilty verdicts, I do believe this request to be not unreasonable.’
Covington was about to speak, but Glyn held up a restraining hand and shot a quick glance at the lawyer, who, almost imperceptibly, gave a nod.
‘Very well,’ said Glyn. ‘Captain Bradshaw, call your last witness.’
Through the door guarded by the sergeant major came the unprepossessing figure of Surgeon Major Reynolds. His appearance caused a slight frisson in the little courtroom, not least because a long cut above his eyebrow (a Zulu throwing spear, a slip with the scalpel?) gave his already gloomy visage an even more threatening aspect. The doctor looked tired, irritable and ill at ease. With several men still on the danger list and demanding his care, attending a court martial obviously did not figure high on his list of priorities. To Simon he represented the joker in the pack-a witness who could either condemn or clear him. Which Simon would he portray to the tribunal: the suspected malingerer of three years ago, or the man who took his share in the defence of Rorke’s Drift?
Bradshaw was soon on the attack.
‘When Lieutenant Fonthill collapsed all those months ago in Brecon, how long was he unconscious?’
‘About two and a half days.’
‘Just long enough for his battalion to leave, travel to Southampton and board the steamer for the Cape, then?’
‘I can’t remember the exact timing, but something like that, I suppose, yes.’ The Surgeon Major spoke without expression, neither his heavily bearded face nor his voice betraying emotion. But to Simon he evinced a weariness quite unlike his memory of the brusque little doctor with his staccato questions and sharp eyes. Working through the night sewing up assegai slashes and extracting bullets from torn flesh by the light of
the burning hospital must have taken its toll, even on a constitution as iron-bound as Reynolds’s.
‘Could you find anything wrong with your patient?’ Bradshaw, on sure ground, was pressing for the kill.
‘No. Throughout the time he was in my care, I could find nothing organically wrong with him. There was no evidence of a wound, as with a bump on the head, nor trace of malaria, typhoid, typhus, diabetes or poisoning. Yet he seemed to be in a light coma, stirring and even taking spoonfuls of liquid nourishment occasionally, but not really conscious.’
Bradshaw leaned forward. The room was quite silent. ‘Could he have been malingering?’
‘Yes, it is quite possible.’
For a moment the prosecutor looked uncertain, as though a co-actor on stage had departed from the rehearsed script. ‘With respect, Major, all things are possible. Did you believe him to be malingering?’
Reynolds nodded his head slowly. ‘Yes, I did.’
‘Ah. And did you give that opinion to Lieutenant Colonel Covington?’
‘In the end, yes.’ Reynolds lifted weary eyes to Simon and then to Glyn. ‘The Colonel was pressing me on the point, y’see.’
‘Thank you, Surgeon Major. That will be all.’
Reynolds looked about him in surprise. ‘Is that it?’
Glyn intervened quickly. ‘If the accused officer wishes to question you, Major, he may do so. But I feel that we have all heard enough for one day and I intend now to adjourn the court martial until eight a.m. tomorrow. I regret, then, that I must keep you from your patients a little longer and ask you to reappear at that time in the morning.’
Reynolds nodded gloomily, the sergeant major roared his stentorian ‘AttenSHUN!’ and within three minutes Simon was back in his makeshift cell, pondering the twists and turns of the day. In fact, his analysis did nothing to lighten the gloom of the shack. It was clear that the case was going against him and that he would need to break Covington somehow under questioning - an improbable concept - or to extract some sort of indulgence from Reynolds about his breakdown at Brecon. Either that or he must produce strong testimonies from his three witnesses - two of whom could only submit written references. He had no means of knowing how pertinently Baxter and Lamb had responded to the court’s request, or whether they knew the extent of his plight. Alice had offered to help, but where was she? Simon sighed, thought again of Jenkins and, fleetingly, of his parents, and slipped eventually into a light sleep.
If Colonel Glyn had seemed unhelpful on the first day, he was positively surly at the beginning of the second, as though he saw no reason for continuing to waste precious army time on a legal ritual that ought to be terminated immediately with a guilty verdict on both counts.
‘Now,’ he addressed Simon over the top of his spectacles, ‘you have the right to question the two witnesses brought by the prosecution on the second charge, namely Colonel Covington and Surgeon Major Reynolds. We do not have all the time in the world, since the witnesses and the members of the tribunal here are all serving officers engaged in a savage war. Do you still wish to do so?’
Simon stood. ‘I do, sir,’ he said, without a thought in his head of the best course to take with his questioning.
Glyn sighed. ‘Very well. But Surgeon Major Reynolds has patients depending upon his attention and I insist that you question him first.’
‘Of course, sir.’ Simon eyed Reynolds as the surgeon re-entered the room, his face set in iron. The man had glimpsed Simon fighting at the drift so perhaps some concession might be wrung from him there . . . and yet a return to Brecon could be productive, if he took great care with the questions. He had nothing to lose, anyhow.
‘Doctor,’ he began.
‘I’m a Surgeon Major, not a doctor,’ rasped Reynolds.
‘I beg your pardon, sir. May I take you back to Brecon and the evidence you gave earlier? Were you certain that I was malingering, that I was fooling everyone? After all, you told me when I came out of my coma that you had been sticking needles in me.’
The hard blue eyes regarded Simon expressionlessly. ‘Oh yes, I was convinced all right,’ he said. ‘I thought I should give you the benefit of the doubt so I called a specialist in diabetes down from London, since this seemed the likeliest cause of your coma. But he could find no trace. So I put it down to blue funk and good play-acting. I didn’t think much of that, of course, so I allowed you to return to general duties in the 2nd Battalion.’
Reynolds now turned to the tribunal and began addressing them as though Simon was not present. ‘But I am glad that I have been asked this question because I was not allowed to develop my response on the same point yesterday.’ He shot a quick, hard glance at Bradshaw. ‘The case bothered me, you see. I knew that the boy was of good stock - his father was a distinguished officer - and he seemed to behave himself well during the remainder of his time at Brecon. I had been told that he had been a sensitive child, and certainly he did not seem to display the normal characteristics of a coward - no bluster, nor the other extreme, undue diffidence. Anyway, he went out to the Cape. But I could not get the case out of my mind.’
For the first time his face softened a little as he looked along the seated line of officers. ‘I’m only an army doctor, not a mind doctor, y’know. So I consulted an old colleague in Geneva who had been working in the field of unconsciousness for some time. He outlined a possible source of the coma and directed me to see if the patient had suffered a blow to the head in the recent past before this so-called coma had materialised. The boy had not recalled any such blow, but I made some enquiries and found a groom in the battalion who told me that, a few weeks before his collapse, Fonthill had taken a fall from his horse while riding in the hills. He had hit his head and lost consciousness. It was only for a minute or so, I understand, and he had not reported sick. Nevertheless, it is quite likely that he had sustained concussion.
‘Now, gentlemen,’ Reynolds continued as though he was addressing a theatre full of students, ‘my man in Geneva told me that it was not unlikely that Fonthill, a sensitive young man with a strong imagination, had experienced what was to him a severe shock when the news of the battalion’s posting had been suddenly broken to him. This could well have produced what I understand is becoming known as hysterical fugue, whereby the patient suddenly reverts to a concussed state, a coma, for a while. He would have retained no lasting ill effects from it, but it remains a puzzling condition about which little is known.’
The blue eyes turned on Simon. ‘So my advice to this young man is to control his imagination if he wishes to stay in the army.’ He swung back to the tribunal. ‘I don’t know about the situation in which Fonthill now finds himself, but to sum up, I do not now believe he was malingering back in Brecon, and having seen him in action at Rorke’s Drift, I do not believe that he is a coward. Now, gentlemen, may I return to my patients?’
Once again there was complete silence in the little room. Most of the tribunal members, including the lawyer, had been busily making notes as the surgeon spoke, and Simon’s eyes were wide as he stared at the little man before him - the rock-hard veteran who was now saying that he was no coward.
Glyn coughed and cocked a quizzical eye at Simon.
‘Eh . . . what?’ Simon stuttered. ‘Oh yes, indeed, sir. Do. And thank you very much, Doc - Surgeon Major.’
With a curt nod to the tribunal, Reynolds stumped out of the room, leaving it in silence and Simon lost in thought.
‘Well come on then, Fonthill,’ said Glyn. ‘Do you wish to question Colonel Covington on his evidence or not? We can’t wait all day.’
Simon thought quickly. What could he gain? Reynolds’s evidence had surely destroyed Covington’s claim about malingering and it would be better to give the man no chance of casting doubt upon what the surgeon had said.
‘Thank you, but no, sir,’ he replied. ‘I believe that the Surgeon Major’s evidence has poured light on the charges made against me by Colonel Covington and I have no need to recall the Colonel.
’
‘Very well, then. We must now turn to the witnesses for the defence, and I shall begin by reading the affidavits we have received from Major Baxter and Colonel Lamb. Then we shall call Mr Chard.’
The affidavits were short, to the point and similar in tone. That from Baxter expressed surprise at Simon’s predicament and told the story of the shipwreck and of Simon’s part in it in a matter-of-fact way, but commending the young man’s initiative in lowering the boats and getting the troops away from the foundering ship. ‘I find it most surprising that a young officer who I mentioned in my dispatches for cool leadership should have these charges levelled against him.’
Simon bit his knuckles and silently recorded a vote of thanks to the artillery major who was afraid of the sea but not afraid to admit it.
Lamb’s submission was less eulogistic - not that Baxter’s language had been anything but formal. It recounted the task that had been given to Simon and to Jenkins, and the receipt of Simon’s coded message, and informed the court that the contents had been of assistance to the General Staff, although they had been received only after the decision to invade had been taken. Lamb then related how he had instructed both men to return to their base in Natal and that some concern had been felt at their continued absence. Fonthill, wrote Lamb, had appeared to be a good officer who had shown initiative in a difficult task, although the Colonel could not verify any account of his activities in Zululand.
It was clear to Simon, looking along the row of faces on the tribunal, that these officers were less than impressed by the two affidavits as strong bulwarks in his defence. And in all honesty, he had to agree with them. Lamb’s statement, in particular, was objective but almost disinterested. He would have to do better with Chard.
The big lieutenant was announced by the sergeant major with a noise level several decibels higher than for any who had been introduced before. The bearded commander of Rorke’s Drift had clearly become the Empire’s hero, as was evident from the heartfelt tone in which Glyn congratulated him on his achievement and, it seemed to Simon, almost apologised for bothering him with attendance at something as unsavoury as a court martial when there were so many other calls on his time. God, thought Simon, this is becoming even more of a stacked deck as the trial goes on. Well, thank God for Reynolds and to hell with them all! He stood and began his questioning to a subdued and clearly rather puzzled Chard.
