1999 - Ladysmith Read online

  “It’s as if we are all protecting some dreadful secret,” he said to Steevens on his nightly visit to the sick man.

  Enteric was taking its toll. Steevens had been sweating heavily all day, soaking the sheets, and the room smelt of diarrhoea. But he maintained his customary cheerfulness and wit.

  “I know what you mean,” he replied from his pillow. “We should all be shaking hands and sharing cups of tea with the Boers, telling them our innermost thoughts. Perhaps even building a new world order with them, circling outwards from the Cape, as Rhodes thinks we should. What a load of rot. Imagine it, the connection of good Afrikaner stock with British brains. He reckons he would conquer the world by that kind of admixture. To my mind, it seems a very dangerous kind of thinking. Talking of which—I’ve got some bits and pieces for the Lyre, if you might take them down to the office.”

  Steevens gathered a sheaf of papers from the bedside table and handed them to Nevinson.

  “And if, by any miracle of fate, you lay your hands on another paper from outside, I’d give my right arm for it.”

  “I’ll ask about, and see if any of the runners has brought one in,” said Nevinson. “Probably be weeks old again, though.”

  “Better than nothing.”

  “Anything else you want?”

  “Dancing girls,” said Steevens loudly. “My own troupe. And a box of Turkish delight!”

  His drolleries, reflected Nevinson as he went next door to his own room, were becoming more extravagant by the day. Perhaps it was the fever. He prepared himself for bed and then settled down to peruse Steevens’s contributions to the Lyre.

  THE SITUATION

  The situation is unchanged.

  NEWS

  There is no news.

  THE CONVENT

  The Convent is evacuated. Nun there.

  THE DIARY OF A CITIZEN

  Nov. 14: General Buller has twice been seen in Ladysmith, disguised as a kaffir. His force is entrenched behind Bulwan. Hurrah!

  Nov. 20: HMS Powerful ran aground in attempting to steam up the Klip. Feared total loss.

  Nov. 21: Hear on good authority that gunner of Long Tom is Captain Dreyfus.

  Nov. 22: Dreyfus rumour confirmed.

  NEW SONGS

  ‘Oft in the Stilly Night’

  Boer Artillery Chorus

  ‘Over the Hills and Far Away’

  Relief Column Chorus

  They’re after me, they’re after me,

  To capture me is everyone’s desire;

  They’re after me, they’re after me,

  I’m the individual they require.

  By Colonel Rhodes, on account of the Boer shells which follow him however often he changes his residence.

  SKILL COMPETITION

  A bottle of anchovies will be awarded to sender of first opened solution of this competition: “Name date of relief of Ladysmith.” Generals and inhabitants of Ladysmith who say ‘Ja’ instead of ‘Yes’ will be disqualified as possessing exceptional sources of information. Send answers, with small bottle of beer enclosed, to Puzzle Editor, Ladysmith Lyre.

  WHERE TO SPEND A HAPPY DAY

  To the Ladies of Pretoria: Messrs. Kook and Son beg to announce a personally conducted tour, Saturday to Monday, to witness the Siege of Ladysmith. Full view of the enemy guaranteed. Tea and shrimps (direct from Durban) on the train. Four-in-hand ox wagon direct from Modder Spruit to Bulwan. Fare 15s. return. One guinea if Long Tom is in action.

  FRAGMENT OF A POEM

  (found in a hole in the ground)

  A pipe of Boer tobacco ‘neath the blue,

  A tin of meat, a bottle, and a few

  Choice magazines like Harmsworth’s or The Strand -

  I sometimes think war has its blessings too.

  Twenty-Seven

  On the day of the cricket match, a strange silence hung above the beleaguered town. Talk of a truce had been heard around Ladysmith and (so the spies said) behind the Boer lines as well. At any rate—thanks in no small part to the counter-battery fire of the naval guns, like that of Foster and his team, carted in from HMS Powerful— the Boer firing had slackened. A collective sense of relief had spread through the garrison and townsfolk. The quartermaster felt it, to the extent of issuing several barrels of stockfish for general use; the press corps felt it; two sisters sitting in deckchairs under some blue-gums by the edge of the pitch felt it.

  The band of the Leicesters played the game in, mostly with tuba and trombone. A large crowd of Ladysmithites and assorted military were there to watch, though not all from the same vantage point. The soldiers, for propriety’s sake, had been ordered to keep on the opposite side of the pitch to the ladies. Near to Bella and Jane was a large white tent which had been brought in from the cavalry lines to serve as a refreshment stall: cordials were on offer, along with sandwiches filled with cucumber and stockfish paste. Two large bowls of pears stood on a trestle table outside, covered with muslin fly-guards.

  The pitch itself was a stretch of coarse grass on the outskirts of town. It wasn’t, as many of the cricketers remarked, a good wicket, being hard and bumpy. The outfield was so overgrown with elephant grass that it could indeed have concealed an elephant, never mind a withered lump of leather. All seemed set to enjoy themselves in fair measure—given good weather grace of the Umpire in the Sky and, more important still, a quiet, shell-free sky, grace of Long Tom. A stake of a case of champagne, one of few remaining in the town, had been raised for the game.

  The sisters watched their father walk out for the toss. Against his will, against his better judgement, against, for that matter, fact (unless Ireland were to be called a colony), he was captain of the Colonial Born…Lieutenant Norris, wearing a hideous parti-coloured silk cap, was captain of the Mother Country. “You call this a ball?” he said to the hotel-keeper, holding it between thumb and forefinger, with a queer look on his face.

  “You’re not at Lords now, sir,” Kiernan replied, piqued. “In the Colonies, Lieutenant, we have to make do.”

  The Mother Country won the toss, and elected to bat.

  “Why are we going in first?” asked a drummer boy of Hussars, who though he had played many good games for his school, had not been given a place in the team.

  “Because both science and cricketing lore tell us,” said Major Mott, “that a bad wicket is likely further to deteriorate over time.”

  The Major was talking through his sealion moustache, but he was right all the same. The match started at twelve and, with old Sol sending down—through a cloudless, noonday sky more devilish than heavenly—the kind of rays that would penetrate even Lieutenant Norris’s cap, the few remaining stalks of grass on the crease were soon shrivelling. There were actually not many proper cricket caps to be seen; indeed, all manner of uniform was on display—one full set only of virginal white flannel, plus large displays of khaki fatigues (on the one side) and of shirtsleeves and braces (the other). Mr Star was wearing a straw boater but pride of place went to Mr Grimble, who—being a man of some vanity—had arrayed himself in tails, top hat and stiff collar, a la Alfred Mynn, the famous cricketer.

  He must be boiling up, Bella thought. She took a handkerchief out of her sleeve and wiped her forehead. Round about her and her sister was gathered a fair proportion of Ladysmith’s population, including Mrs Frinton—who was presiding over a vat of home-made lemonade in the shade of the tent—and a noisy Bobby Greenacre. The latter was another enthusiastic young aspirant to cricket honours who had not been permitted to play.

  On the other side of the pitch, Major Mott was busy explaining to the drummer boy of Hussars that cricket was significant because it was a metaphor for life, its regular rhythms and sudden, surprising changes imitating the very phases of existence. This, he said, was why it was most important to watch the match closely.

  On the near side, Bella and Jane were not looking at the match, but through it—beyond the scattered figures, beyond Major Mott and the little drummer boy—to a patch of grass whe
re two Mother Country batsmen, Barnes and Foster, awaited their chance of glory. The two men were practising their catching, throwing the ball in high looping curves against the sunlight.

  “I do hope they come in soon,” said Jane. “Goodness, they’re throwing it up a long way. They must have strong wrists.”

  Then she laughed.

  “Janey,” said Bella reprovingly, then laughed herself.

  A couple of Imperial Light Horse were keeping score on roughly chalked blackboards, while Henry Nevinson, the journalist, was acting as chief umpire. This was assented to by the opposing teams mainly because of his supposedly neutral status, but also on the strength of his knowing W. G. Grace, who had sometimes signed his names to the charity-seeking letters sent out from Toynbee Hall when Nevinson worked there. What a fine specimen of man he was, the Champion. The journalist remembered writing in his diary of the great cricketing doctor, “and all his powers spent on knocking balls about! What might he not have done a thousand years ago!”

  Initial progress at Ladysmith seemed (as Nevinson further observed) a thousandfold slower than if W. G. had been on the pitch. Messrs Greenacre and Grimble opened the Colonial Born bowling. At first both bowled too short and were ruthlessly cut and pulled. Once they steadied down, they took a wicket apiece, and thereafter Mother Country wickets began to fall. Mr Star, the baker, surprised everyone with a great catch, picking a skimming ball out of the air as if he had known, a few seconds before, where it was going to be. At fifty-six for four, Tom Barnes came in and, easy and alert at the wicket, began to forge a useful partnership with Herbert Foster. The latter was frail and sensitive, a little awkward in his movements, but he gave the Colonials beans: his highlight was a six into the blue-gums, off a ball by Mr Kiernan. The same bowler, however, finally caused his downfall, with a smart caught and bowled. Barnes went out through a copybook l.b.w. and the tail was then mopped up, leaving a final target of one hundred and fifty-three runs.

  “I told you I was feeling lucky,” said Foster during the break.

  The drummer boy of Hussars had been sent over to collect trays of food and drink from Mrs Frinton, and now the two men were lying on the grass, a little away from the rest of the team. Tom finished his mouthful of fish-paste sandwich.

  “It’s not luck,” he said. “It’s all worked out, up there.”

  He lay back on the grass and looked up into the sky: the hard, hot blue of the first innings had softened, and now a few large white galleons were beginning to sail over from the crest of the Drakensberg.

  “You reckon?” queried Foster, as if it were a matter of little import.

  “All shall be revealed before stumps are pulled,” said Tom, with mock solemnity. He turned his head to where Jane and Bella were sitting, on the opposite side of the pitch. He thought he could hear them laughing, or maybe it was just in his head, this engaging giggle of young girls. “Not fair, this no-association rule, considering.”

  “Considering what?”

  “Considering that even the pluckiest fellow needs the comfort of womankind. We’re under fire, after all.”

  Foster sat up and rubbed his elbow. “Hardly,” he said. “I mean, we’re not now, are we?”

  “Looks like we are.” Tom nodded in the direction of Lieutenant Norris, who was irritatedly beckoning them over for a bracing talk.

  Once the break was over, the correspondent-umpire took up his position and watched with a cold eye. Mr Grimble opened the account for the Colonial Born, strutting out in his long coat like a peacock. The impression was marred only by his carrying of the bat over his shoulder. Off the very first ball (unidentified bowler) he gave a chance to Major Mott at square leg, but it was not held. The Mother Country supporters groaned with disappointment.

  Foster was keeping wicket, cheroot between his lips, and Tom Barnes next to bowl. He proceeded to deliver three overs of hostile inswingers, one delivery cracking Mr Grimble on the ankle.

  “That was a bit quick,” said Nevinson to Barnes, censoriously.

  “It’s my style.”

  Kneeling, his coat-tails spread on the crease like a bridal gown, Mr Grimble inspected his bruised ankle. There was then some talk of a runner being called for, but the farmer decided in the end to persevere, to a chorus of bravos. To give him his due, he proved a stayer, persisting while other Colonial Born batsmen came and went.

  Star the baker, walking out, announced: “I mean to lay on the wood.”

  He returned without scoring, saying the wicket was untrue.

  By the time it was Leo Kiernan’s turn to pad up, the Colonial Born were falling like dead men, six dismissed in the first eight overs.

  “I’ll stop this rot,” he said to Bella as he strode out to join Mr Grimble, hefting the bat in his hand. “Good god, this must weigh four pounds. And it looks like the kaffir’s dog has been at it.”

  By now, Tom having ceased bowling, Bella was beginning to lose interest. But she supposed she ought to see how Father got on.

  “He is taking it all very seriously,” she said to Jane, beside her.

  “Of course he is. I hope Herbert doesn’t stump him out, or else he will never like him.”

  “He probably won’t ever anyway.”

  “He’ll come round—more than he will with Tom anyway, since he was so rude.”

  They fell silent, concentrating on the figures as they moved about on the carpet of yellowing veld. Although Father didn’t look like the hero to redeem the score, he acquitted himself well. The first ball came and he blocked it stoutly. Then the second—and then an ostrich, which had been brought into town for meat, ran out over the pitch. Play was suspended for ten minutes or so while they tried to catch it. Everybody rushed about in circles, and Father collided with Mr Grimble, whose top hat fell off.

  As she watched the ostrich run about, jerking its neck hither and thither, Bella was reminded of a story she had once heard: how, when hunting the outlandish birds, the Bushmen who lived around here long ago would dress up in feathers and go into the middle of a flock to shoot them with poisoned arrows, maintaining the illusion of being ostriches even as they killed them. Not far outside the town was a Bushman cave with paintings in it that she and Jane had once explored, but the paintings did not show that scene. Perhaps it was just a tall tale.

  Finally, play resumed. Bella reached down for the glass next to the deckchair and took a sip of lemonade. The taste reminded her of childhood, stirring faint memories of her mother which, together with the comforting murmur of the game, made her feel dreamy.

  She tried to concentrate on the game. It was quite soothing to watch. Most of the time, it seemed to her, people didn’t seem to be doing anything, just loafing about, lost in their own reflections, alone with their thoughts. Some, like Foster, were smoking and some even had their hands in their pockets.

  The bowlers changed. Mr Grimble hit the ball in the air past square leg, narrowly missing being caught by Major Mott. The ball rolled under the rope close to her. She wondered whether to get up and throw it in, but then the Major trundled past her, his moustache jiggling up and down. It really was very large, in the handlebar style, and as the Major threw in, Bella wondered whether children liked to ask him if they could pull it, to see if it was real. She could hardly resist the inclination herself.

  Moustaches apart, the drowsy sounds of the game were the things most present in Bella’s head—the applause, the clicks and thumps, the shouted appeals, “Well played!” and “Yes! No! Get back!”—which, in their mixed-up totality, made the whole thing all the more soporific. Other sounds too, that weren’t properly part of it, contributed to the somnolent effect: the cooing of collared doves in the blue-gums; the clank of Mrs Frinton’s ladle in the lemonade vat; the snuffling of a cavalryman’s charger that had been tied to a guy-rope of the tent and—these last were not peaceful, that had to be conceded—the croak of a pair of ravens nesting in a nearby outcrop of rock, their intimation of death punctuating an all-too-lively repetitive tapping of ba
ll on bat.

  That came from Bobby Greenacre, showing off how long he could keep the ball bouncing on the bat. He was behind Bella, and every time the ball fell to the ground he exclaimed in disappointment.

  “Shouldn’t you be over with the men?” she said, over her shoulder.

  “Oh! You’ve ruined my concentration,” he replied, coming round in front of her.

  “Sorry, Bobby,” said Bella, wearily.

  He retrieved the ball from where it had rolled under a tent flap and began bouncing it on the bat again.

  “But I suppose you’re right, Miss Kiernan,” he said at length. With that he set off along the edge of the pitch, still bouncing the ball as he walked, dancing from side to side to keep it going.

  “He’s so annoying,” said Jane, getting up to fetch a pear from the table near by.

  “Want one?”

  “Please.”

  Bella watched the Greenacre boy make his way to the military supporters and begin his own private game with the drummer boy, who bowled to him along the perimeter. Jane came back, handed a pear to Bella, and sat down on the chair’s striped canvas.