The Sound of Thunder(13)

Below them on the great plain of the Tugela, General Buller was massing his army for the breakthrough to relieve Ladysmith.

‘But let him try – Oom Paul is waiting for him.’

‘Who is Oom Paul – Surely not Kruger?’ Sean was puzzled. Oom Paul was the affectionate nickname of the President of the South African Republic.

‘Nee, man! This is another Oom Paul. This one is Vecht-General Jan Paulus Leroux of the Wynberg commando.’ And Sean caught his breath.

‘Is he a big man with red hair and a temper to go with it?’

Laughter, and then. ‘Ja! that’s the one. Do you know him?’

‘Yes. I know him.’

So my brother-in-law is now a general, Sean grinned to himself, and then asked:

‘Is this the general we are going to visit?’

‘If we can find him.’

Young Dirk will meet his uncle at last – and Sean found himself anticipating the reunion   with a tingle of pleasure.





– 8 –

The canvas of the tent did little to moderate the volume of the voice within. It carried clearly to where Sean waited with his escort.

‘Must I drink coffee and shake hands with every rooinek we catch? Have I not already enough work for ten men, but you must bring me more? Send him to one of the Field-Comets! Send him to Pretoria and let them lock him up! Do whatever you like with him if he is a spy – but, in the name of a merciful providence, don’t bring him to me.’

Sean smiled happily. Jan Paulus certainly hadn’t lost his voice. There was an interval of comparative quiet while Beaver’s voice mumbled within the tent. Then again the muted bellow.

‘No! I will not! Take him away.’

Sean filled his lungs, cupped his hands about his mouth and shouted at the tent.

‘Hey, you bloody Dutchman! Are you afraid to meet me again? You think I’ll knock your teeth out like I did last time.’

A few moments of appalling stillness, then the clattering of an overturned stool and the flap of the tent was thrown open. Into the sunlight, blinking in the glare, but scowling, the red hair that fringed his bald pate burning like a bushfire, and his shoulders hunched aggressively, came Jan Paulus. His face turned from side to side as he searched for the source of the insult.

‘Here,’ called Sean, and Jan Paulus stopped dead. Uncertainly he peered at Sean.

‘You!’ He took a pace forward and then, ‘It is you, isn’t it. Sean!’ And he began to laugh. His right hand that had been clenched into a huge fist unfolded and was thrust forward.

‘Sean! Hell, man! Sean!’

They gripped hands and grinned at each other.

‘Come into the tent. Come on in, may’

Once they were inside, Jan Paulus’s first question was:

‘Where’s Katrina? Where is my little sister?’ and immediately the smile was gone from Sean’s face. He sat down heavily on the reimpje stool and took off his hat before he answered.

‘She’s dead, Paulus. She’s been dead these last four years.’

Slowly the expression on Jan Paulus’s face changed until it was bleak and hard.

‘How?’ he asked.

And what can I answer him, thought Sean. Can I tell him she killed herself for some reason that no one will ever know.

‘Fever,’ he said. ‘Blackwater fever.’

‘You did not send word to us.’

‘I did not know where to find you. Your parents—’

‘They too are dead,’ Jan Paulus interrupted brusquely and turned away from Sean to stare at the white canvas wall of the tent. There was silence between them then as they remembered the dead in sorrow, made more poignant by its utter helplessness. At last Sean stood up and went to the entrance of the tent.

‘Dirk. Come here.’

Mbejane pushed him forward and he crossed to Sean and took his hand. Sean led him into the tent.

‘Katrina’s son,’ he said and Jan Paulus looked down at him.

‘Come here, boy.’ Hesitantly Dirk went to him. Suddenly Jan Paulus dropped into a squat so that his eyes were on a level with those of the child. He took Dirk’s face between the palms of his hands and studied it carefully.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘This is the type of son she would breed. The eyes—’ His voice stumbled and stopped. A second longer he looked into Dirk’s eyes. Then he spoke again.

‘Be proud,’ he said and stood up. Sean motioned at the flap of the tent, and thankfully Dirk scampered out to where Mbejane waited.

‘And now?’ Jan Paulus asked.

‘I want passage through the lines.’

‘You are going over to the English?’

‘I am English,’ said Sean. Frowning a little, Jan Paulus considered this before he asked: