When the Lion Feeds (17 page)

about four miles behind, on the edge of the forest where it thinned out, a black pencil line drawn on the brown parchment of grassland. But the line was moving.

How many of them? asked Sean. Fifty, hazarded Mbejane. Too many. I wish I had brought my rifle, muttered Sean. If you had they would be much closer now, and one gun against fifty! Mbejane left it unfinished.

all right, let's get going again, said Sean. We must rest a little longer. This is the last time we can stop before nightfall. Their breathing had slowed. Sean took stock of himself: he was aching a little in the legs, but it would he hours yet before he was really tired. He hawked a glob of the thick gummy saliva out of his throat and spat it into the grass. He wanted a drink but knew that would be fatal folly. Oh! exclaimed Mbejane. They have seen us. How do you know?

asked Sean. Look, they are sending out their chasers From the head of the line a trio of specks had detached themselves and were drawing ahead.

What do you mean? Sean scratched the side of his nose uneasily. For the first time he was feeling the fear of the hunted, vulnerable, unarmed, with the pack closing in. They are sending their best runners ahead to force us beyond our strength. They know that if they push us hard enough, even though they break their own wind while they do it, we will fall easily to the others that follow Good God! Sean was now truly alarmed. What are we going to do about it? For every trick, there is a trick, said Mbejane. But now we have rested enough, let us go. Sean took off down the hill like a startled duiker, but Mbejane pulled him up sharply. That is what they want. Run as before. And once again they fell into the steady lope, swinging long-legged and relaxed. They're closer, said Sean when they reached the top of the next hill. Three specks were now well ahead of the others. Yes. Mbejane's voice was expressionless. They went over the crest and down the other side, the slap-slap-slap of their feet together and their breathing an unaltering rhythm: suck blow, suck blow.

There was a tiny stream in the bottom of the valley, clean water rippling over white sand. Sean jumped it with only a single longing glance and they started up the far slope. They were just short of the crest when behind them they heard a thin distant shout. He and Mbejane looked round. on the top of the hill they had just left, only a half a mile away, were the three Zulu runners, and as Sean watched they plunged down the slope towards him with their tall feather head-dresses bobbing and their leopardtail kilts swirling about their legs. They had thrown aside their shields, but each man carried an assegai. Look at their legs, exulted Mbejane. Sean saw that they ran with the slack, blundering steps of exhaustion. They are finished, they have run too hard MbeJane laughed. Now we must show them how afraid we are: we must run like the wind, run as though a hundred Tokoloshe* breathe on our necks. It was only twenty paces to the crest of the slope and they pelted panic-stricken up and over the top. But the instant they were out of sight Mbejane caught Sean's arm and held him. Get down, he whispered. They sank into the grass and then crawled back on their stomachs until they lay just below the crest.

Mbejane held his assegai pointed forward, his legs were gathered up under him and his lips were drawn back in a half grin.

Sean searched in the grass and found a rock the size of an orange. It fitted neatly into his right hand.

A chimera of Zulu mythology.

They heard the Zulus coming, their horny bare feet pounding up the hill and then their breathing, hoarse hissing gasps, closer and closer until suddenly they came up over the crest. Their momentum carried them down to where Sean and Mbejane stood up out of the grass to meet them. Their fatigue-grey faces crumbled into expressions of complete disbelief; they had expected to find their quarry half a mile ahead of them. Mbejane killed one with his assegai, the man did not even lift his arms to parry the thrust; the point came out between his shoulders.

Sean hurled the rock into the face of another. It made a sound like a ripe pumpkin dropped on a stone floor; he fell backwards with his assegai spinning from his hand.

The third man turned to run and Mbejane landed heavily on his back, bore him down and then sat astride his chest, pushed his chin back and cut his throat.

Sean looked down at the man he had hit; he had lost his head-dress an his face had changed shape. His jaw hung lopsided, he was still moving feebly.

I have killed three men today, thought Sean, and it was so easy.

Without emotion he watched Mbejane come across to his victim. Mbejane stooped over him and the man made a small gasping sound then lay still.

Mbejane straightened up and looked at Sean. Now they cannot catch us before dark. And only a night ape can see in the dark!

said Sean.

Remembering the joke, Mbejane smiled; the smile made his face younger.

He picked up a bunch of dry grass and wiped his hands on it.

The night came only just in time to save them. Sean had run all day and at last his body was stiffening in protest; his breathing wheezed painfully and he had no moisture left to sweat with. A little longer, just a little longer.

Mbejane whispered encouragement beside him.

The pack was spread out, the stronger runners pressing a scant mile behind them and the others dwindling back into the distance. The sun is going; soon you can rest. Mbejane reached out and touched his shoulder, strangely, Sean drew strength from that brief physical contact. His legs steadied slightly and he stumbled less frequently as they went down the next slope. Swollen and red, the sun lowered itself below the land and the valleys were full of shadow. Soon now, very soon Mbejane's voice was almost crooning. He looked back. the figures of the nearest zulu were indistinct. Sean's ankle twisted under him and he fell heavily; he felt the earth graze the skin from his cheek and he lay on his chest with his head down. Get up, Mbejane's voice was desperate.

Sean vomited painfully, a cupful of bitter bile. Get up, Mbejane's hands were on him, dragging him to his knees. Stand up or die here, threatened Mbejane. He took a handful of Sean's hair and twisted it mercilessly. Tears of pain ran down Sean's eyes and he swore and lashed out at Mbejane.

Get up, goaded Mbejane and Sean heaved to his feet. Run, said Mbejane, half-pushing him and he's legs began to move mechanically under him.

MbeJane looked back once more. The nearest Zulu was very close but almost merged into the fading twilight. They ran on, Mbejane steadying sean when he staggered, Sean grunting in his throat with each step, his mouth hanging open, sucking air across a swollen tongue.

Then quickly, in the sudden African transition from day to night, all colour was gone from the land and the darkness shut down in a close circle about them.

Mbejane's eyes flicked restlessly back and forth, picking up shapes in the gloom, judging the intensity of the light.

Sean reeled unseeing beside him. We will try now, decided Mbejane aloud. He checked Sean's run and turned him right at an acute angle on their original track, now they were heading back towards the hunters at a tangent that would take them close past them but out of sight in the darkness.

They slowed to a walk, Mbejane holding Sean' s arm across his shoulders to steady him, carrying his assegai ready in his other hand. Sean walked dully, his head hanging.

They heard the leading pursuers passing fifty paces away in the darkness and a voice called in Zulu, Can you see them? Albo! l Negative answered another. Spread out, they, may try to turn in the dark.

Yeh-ho! l Affirmative.

Then the voices were passed and silence and night closed about them once more. Mbejane made Sean keep walking. A little bit of moon came up and gave them light and they kept going with Mbejane gradually working back onto a course towards the southeast. They came to a stream at last with trees along its bank. Sean drank with difficulty, for his throat was swollen and sore. Afterwards they curled together for warmth on the carpet of leaves beneath the trees and they slept.

They found Chelmsford's last camp on the following afternoon: the neat lines of black camp fires and the flattened areas where the tents had stood, the stakes which had held the horse pickets and the piles of empty bully-beef tins and five-pound biscuit tins.

They left two days ago, said Mbejane.

Sean nodded, not doubting the correctness of this. Which way did they go? Back towards the main camp at Isandhlwana.

Sean looked puzzled. I wonder why they did that. MbeJane shrugged.

They went in haste, the horsemen galloped ahead of the infantry. We'll follow them, said Sean.

The spoor was a wide road for a thousand men had passed along it and the wagons and gun carriages had left deep ruts.

They slept hungry and cold beside the spoor and the next morning there was frost in the low places when they started out.

A little before noon they saw the granite dome of Isandhlwana standing out against the sky and unconsciously they quickened their pace.

Isandhlwana, the Hill of the Little Hand. Sean was limping for his boot had rubbed the skin from one heel. His hair was thick and matted with sweat and his face was plastered with dust. Even army bully beef is going to taste good, said Sean in English, and Mbejane did not answer for he did not understand, but he was looking ahead with a vaguely worried frown on his face.

INkosi, we have seen no one for two days, march. it comes to me that we should have met patrols from the camp before now. We might have missed them, said Sean without much interest, but Mbejane shook his head. In silence they went on. The hill was closer now so they could make out the detail of ledge and fissure that covered the dome in a lacework pattern. No smoke from the camp, said Mbejane. He lifted his eyes and started visibly.

What is it? Sean felt the first tingle of alarm. N'yoni, said MbeJane softly and Sean saw them. A dark pall, turning like a wheel slowly, high above the hill of Isandhlwana, still so far off that they could not distinguish the individual birds: only a shadow, a thin dark shadow in the sky. Watching it Sean was suddenly cold in the hot noonday sun. He started to run.

There was movement below them on the plain. The torn canvas of an overturned wagon flapped like a wounded bird, the scurry and scuffle of the jackals and higher up the slope of the kopje the hunch-shouldered trot of a hyena. Oh, my God! whispered Sean. Mbejane leaned on his spear; his face was calm and withdrawn but his eyes moved slowly over the field. Are they dead? Are they all dead? The question required no answer. He could see the dead men in the grass, thick about the wagons and then scattered more thinly back up the slope. They looked very small and inconsequential. Mbejane stood quietly waiting. A big black kolbes vulture planed across their front, the feathers in its wing-tips flated like the fingers of a spread hand. Its legs dropped, touched and it hopped heavily to rest among the dead, a swift transformation from beautiful flight to obscene crouching repose. It bobbed its head, ruffled its feathers and waddled to dip its beak over a corpse that wore the green Hunting Tartan of the Gordons. Where is Chelmsford? Was he caught here also?

Mbejane shook his head. He came too late. Mbejane pointed with his spear at the wide spoor that skirted the battlefield and crossed the shoulder of Isandhlwana towards the Tugela. He has gone back to the river. He has not stopped even to bury his dead. Sean and Mbejane walked down towards the field. On the outskirts they picked their way through the debris of Zulu weapons and shields; there was rust forming on the blades of the assegais. The grass was flattened and stained where the dead had lain, but the Zulu dead were gone sure sign of victory.

They came to the English lines. Sean gagged when he saw what had been done to them. They lay piled upon each other, faces already black, and each one of them had been disemboweled. The flies crawled in their empty stomach cavities. Why do they do that? he asked. Why do they have to hack them up like thatF He walked on heavily past the wagons.

Cases of food and drink had been smashed open and scattered in the grass, clothing and paper and cartridge cases lay strewn around the dead, but the rifles were gone. The smell of putrefaction was so thick that it coated his throat and tongue like castor oil.

I must find Pa, Sean spoke quietly in almost a conversational tone.

Mbejane walked a dozen paces behind him.

They came to the lines where the Volunteers had camped.

The tents had been slashed to tatters and trampled into the dust. The horses had been stabbed while still tethered to their picket lines, they were massively bloated. Sean recognized Gypsy, his father's mare. He crossed to her. Hello, girl, he said. The birds had taken her eyes out; she lay on her side, her stomach so swollen that it was as high as sean's waist. He walked around her. The first of the Lady-burg men lay just beyond. He recognized all fifteen of them although the birds had been at them also.

They lay in a rough circle, facing outwards. Then he found a sparse trail of corpses leading up towards the shoulder of the mountain. He followed the attempt that the Volunteers had made to fight their way back towards the Tugela and it was like following a paper chase. Along the trail, thick on each side of it, were the marks where the Zulus had fallen. At least twenty of them for every one of us, whispered Sean, with a tiny Ricker of pride. He climbed on up and at the top of the shoulder, close under the sheer rock cliff of Isandhlwana, he found his father.