Traffics and Discoveries Part 2

"'Oh, d.a.m.n it all!' he says, as serious as the Supreme Court. 'It's too bad,' he says. 'Johanna must have misunderstood me, or else I've got the wrong Dutch word for these blarsted days of the week. I told Johanna I'd be out on Friday. The woman's a fool. Oah, da-am it all!' he says. 'I wouldn't have sold old Van Zyl a pup like that,' he says. 'I'll hunt him up and apologise.'

"He must have fixed it all right, for when we sailed over to the General's dinner my Captain had Van Zyl about half-full of sherry and bitters, as happy as a clam. The boys all called him Adrian, and treated him like their prodigal father. He'd been hit on the collarbone by a wad of shrapnel, and his arm was tied up.

"But the General was the peach. I presume you're acquainted with the average run of British generals, but this was my first. I sat on his left hand, and he talked like--like the _Ladies' Home Journal_. J'ever read that paper? It's refined, Sir--and innocuous, and full of nickel-plated sentiments guaranteed to improve the mind. He was it. He began by a Lydia Pinkham heart-to-heart talk about my health, and hoped the boys had done me well, and that I was enjoying my stay in their midst. Then he thanked me for the interesting and valuable lessons that I'd given his crowd-- specially in the matter of placing artillery and rearguard attacks. He'd wipe his long thin moustache between drinks--lime-juice and water he used --and blat off into a long 'a-aah,' and ladle out more taffy for me or old man Van Zyl on his right. I told him how I'd had my first Pisgah-sight of the principles of the Zigler when I was a fourth-cla.s.s postmaster on a star-route in Arkansas. I told him how I'd worked it up by instalments when I was machinist in Waterbury, where the dollar-watches come from. He had one on his wrist then. I told him how I'd met Zalinski (he'd never heard of Zalinski!) when I was an extra clerk in the Naval Construction Bureau at Was.h.i.+ngton. I told him how my uncle, who was a truck-farmer in Noo Jersey (he loaned money on mortgage too, for ten acres ain't enough now in Noo Jersey), how he'd willed me a quarter of a million dollars, because I was the only one of our kin that called him down when he used to come home with a hard-cider jag on him and heave ox-bows at his nieces. I told him how I'd turned in every red cent on the Zigler, and I told him the whole circus of my coming out with her, and so on, and so following; and every forty seconds he'd wipe his moustache and blat, 'How interesting. Really, now? How interesting.'

"It was like being in an old English book, Sir. Like _Bracebridge Hall_.

But an American wrote _that!_ I kept peeking around for the Boar's Head and the Rosemary and Magna Charta and the Cricket on the Hearth, and the rest of the outfit. Then Van Zyl whirled in. He was no ways jagged, but thawed--thawed, Sir, and among friends. They began discussing previous sc.r.a.ps all along the old man's beat--about sixty of 'em--as well as side- shows with other generals and columns. Van Zyl told 'im of a big beat he'd worked on a column a week or so before I'd joined him. He demonstrated his strategy with forks on the table.

"'There!' said the General, when he'd finished. 'That proves my contention to the hilt. Maybe I'm a bit of a pro-Boer, but I stick to it,' he says, 'that under proper officers, with due regard to his race prejudices, the Boer'ud make the finest mounted infantry in the Empire. Adrian,' he says, 'you're simply squandered on a cattle-run. You ought to be at the Staff College with De Wet.'

"'You catch De Wet and I come to your Staff College--eh,' says Adrian, laughing. 'But you are so slow, Generaal. Why are you so slow? For a month,' he says, 'you do so well and strong that we say we shall hands-up and come back to our farms. Then you send to England and make us a present of two--three--six hundred young men, with rifles and wagons and rum and tobacco, and such a great lot of cartridges, that our young men put up their tails and start all over again. If you hold an ox by the horn and hit him by the bottom he runs round and round. He never goes anywhere. So, too, this war goes round and round. You know that, Generaal!'

"'Quite right, Adrian,' says the General; 'but you must believe your Bible.'

"'Hooh!' says Adrian, and reaches for the whisky. 'I've never known a Dutchman a professing Atheist, but some few have been rather active Agnostics since the British sat down in Pretoria. Old man Van Zyl--he told me--had soured on religion after Bloemfontein surrendered. He was a Free Stater for one thing.'

"'He that believeth,' says the General, 'shall not make haste. That's in Isaiah. We believe we're going to win, and so we don't make haste. As far as I'm concerned I'd like this war to last another five years. We'd have an army then. It's just this way, Mr. Zigler,' he says, 'our people are brimfull of patriotism, but they've been born and brought up between houses, and England ain't big enough to train 'em--not if you expect to preserve.'

"'Preserve what?' I says. 'England?'

"'No. The game,' he says; 'and that reminds me, gentlemen, we haven't drunk the King and Foxhunting.'

"So they drank the King and Fox-hunting. I drank the King because there's something about Edward that tickles me (he's so blame British); but I rather stood out on the Fox-hunting. I've ridden wolves in the cattle- country, and needed a drink pretty bad afterwards, but it never struck me as I ought to drink about it--he-red-it-arily.

"'No, as I was saying, Mr. Zigler,' he goes on, 'we have to train our men in the field to shoot and ride. I allow six months for it; but many column-commanders--not that I ought to say a word against 'em, for they're the best fellows that ever stepped, and most of 'em are my dearest friends--seem to think that if they have men and horses and guns they can take tea with the Boers. It's generally the other way about, ain't it, Mr.

Zigler?'

"'To some extent, Sir,' I said.

"'I'm _so_ glad you agree with me,' he says. 'My command here I regard as a training depot, and you, if I may say so, have been one of my most efficient instructors. I mature my men slowly but thoroughly. First I put 'em in a town which is liable to be attacked by night, where they can attend riding-school in the day. Then I use 'em with a convoy, and last I put 'em into a column. It takes time,' he says, 'but I flatter myself that any men who have worked under me are at least grounded in the rudiments of their profession. Adrian,' he says, 'was there anything wrong with the men who upset Van Bester's applecart last month when he was trying to cross the line to join Piper with those horses he'd stole from Gabbitas?'

"'No, Generaal,' says Van Zyl. 'Your men got the horses back and eleven dead; and Van Besters, he ran to Delarey in his s.h.i.+rt. They was very good, those men. They shoot hard.'

"_'So_ pleased to hear you say so. I laid 'em down at the beginning of this century--a 1900 vintage. _You_ remember 'em, Mankeltow?' he says.

'The Central Middles.e.x Buncho Busters--clerks and floorwalkers mostly,'

and he wiped his moustache. 'It was just the same with the Liverpool Buckjumpers, but they were stevedores. Let's see--they were a last-century draft, weren't they? They did well after nine months. _You_ know 'em, Van Zyl? You didn't get much change out of 'em at Pootfontein?'

"'No,' says Van Zyl. 'At Pootfontein I lost my son Andries.'

"'I beg your pardon, Commandant,' says the General; and the rest of the crowd sort of cooed over Adrian.

"'Excoose,' says Adrian. 'It was all right. They were good men those, but it is just what I say. Some are so dam good we want to hands-up, and some are so dam bad, we say, "Take the Vierkleur into Cape Town." It is not upright of you, Generaal. It is not upright of you at all. I do not think you ever wish this war to finish.'

"'It's a first-cla.s.s dress-parade for Armageddon,' says the General. 'With luck, we ought to run half a million men through the mill. Why, we might even be able to give our Native Army a look in. Oh, not here, of course, Adrian, but down in the Colony--say a camp-of-exercise at Worcester. You mustn't be prejudiced, Adrian. I've commanded a district in India, and I give you my word the native troops are splendid men.'

"'Oh, I should not mind them at Worcester,' says Adrian. 'I would sell you forage for them at Worcester--yes, and Paarl and Stellenbosch; but Almighty!' he says, 'must I stay with Cronje till you have taught half a million of these stupid boys to ride? I shall be an old man.'

"Well, Sir, then and there they began arguing whether St. Helena would suit Adrian's health as well as some other places they knew about, and fixing up letters of introduction to Dukes and Lords of their acquaintance, so's Van Zyl should be well looked after. We own a fair- sized block of real estate--America does--but it made me sickish to hear this crowd fluttering round the Atlas (oh yes, they had an Atlas), and choosing stray continents for Adrian to drink his coffee in. The old man allowed he didn't want to roost with Cronje, because one of Cronje's kin had jumped one of his farms after Paardeberg. I forget the rights of the case, but it was interesting. They decided on a place called Umballa in India, because there was a first-cla.s.s doctor there.

"So Adrian was fixed to drink the King and Foxhunting, and study up the Native Army in India (I'd like to see 'em myself), till the British General had taught the male white citizens of Great Britain how to ride.

Don't misunderstand me, Sir. I loved that General. After ten minutes I loved him, and I wanted to laugh at him; but at the same time, sitting there and hearing him talk about the centuries, I tell you, Sir, it scared me. It scared me cold! He admitted everything--he acknowledged the corn before you spoke--he was more pleased to hear that his men had been used to wipe the geldt with than I was when I knocked out Tom Reed's two lead- horses--and he sat back and blew smoke through his nose and matured his men like cigars and--he talked of the everlastin' centuries!

"I went to bed nearer nervous prostration than I'd come in a long time.

Next morning me and Captain Mankeltow fixed up what his shrapnel had left of my Zigler for transport to the railroad. She went in on her own wheels, and I stencilled her 'Royal Artillery Mess, Woolwich,' on the muzzle, and he said he'd be grateful if I'd take charge of her to Cape Town, and hand her over to a man in the Ordnance there. 'How are you fixed financially?

You'll need some money on the way home,' he says at last.

"'For one thing, Cap,' I said, 'I'm not a poor man, and for another I'm not going home. I am the captive of your bow and spear. I decline to resign office.'

"'Skittles!' he says (that was a great word of his), 'you'll take parole, and go back to America and invent another Zigler, a trifle heavier in the working parts--I would. We've got more prisoners than we know what to do with as it is,' he says. 'You'll only be an additional expense to me as a taxpayer. Think of Schedule D,' he says, 'and take parole.'

"'I don't know anything about your tariffs,' I said, 'but when I get to Cape Town I write home for money, and I turn in every cent my board'll cost your country to any ten-century-old department that's been ordained to take it since William the Conqueror came along.'

"'But, confound you for a thick-headed mule,' he says, 'this war ain't any more than just started! Do you mean to tell me you're going to play prisoner till it's over?'

"'That's about the size of it,' I says, 'if an Englishman and an American could ever understand each other.'

"'But, in Heaven's Holy Name, why?' he says, sitting down of a heap on an anthill.

"'Well, Cap,' I says, 'I don't pretend to follow your ways of thought, and I can't see why you abuse your position to persecute a poor prisoner o'

war on _his!_'

"'My dear fellow,' he began, throwing up his hands and blus.h.i.+ng, 'I'll apologise.'

"'But if you insist,' I says, 'there are just one and a half things in this world I can't do. The odd half don't matter here; but taking parole, and going home, and being interviewed by the boys, and giving lectures on my single-handed campaign against the hereditary enemies of my beloved country happens to be the one. We'll let it go at that, Cap.'

"'But it'll bore you to death,' he says. The British are a heap more afraid of what they call being bored than of dying, I've noticed.

"'I'll survive,' I says, 'I ain't British. I can think,' I says.

"'By G.o.d,' he says, coming up to me, and extending the right hand of fellows.h.i.+p, 'you ought to be English, Zigler!'

"It's no good getting mad at a compliment like that. The English all do it. They're a crazy breed. When they don't know you they freeze up tighter'n the St. Lawrence. When they _do_, they go out like an ice-jam in April. Up till we prisoners left--four days--my Captain Mankeltow told me pretty much all about himself there was; his mother and sisters, and his bad brother that was a trooper in some Colonial corps, and how his father didn't get on with him, and--well, everything, as I've said. They're undomesticated, the British, compared with us. They talk about their own family affairs as if they belonged to someone else. 'Taint as if they hadn't any shame, but it sounds like it. I guess they talk out loud what we think, and we talk out loud what they think.

"I liked my Captain Mankeltow. I liked him as well as any man I'd ever struck. He was white. He gave me his silver drinking-flask, and I gave him the formula of my Laught.i.te. That's a hundred and fifty thousand dollars in his vest-pocket, on the lowest count, if he has the knowledge to use it. No, I didn't tell him the money-value. He was English. He'd send his valet to find out.

"Well, me and Adrian and a crowd of dam Dutchmen was sent down the road to Cape Town in first-cla.s.s carriages under escort. (What did I think of your enlisted men? They are largely different from ours, Sir: very largely.) As I was saying, we slid down south, with Adrian looking out of the car- window and crying. Dutchmen cry mighty easy for a breed that fights as they do; but I never understood how a Dutchman could curse till we crossed into the Orange Free State Colony, and he lifted up his hand and cursed Steyn for a solid ten minutes. Then we got into the Colony, and the rebs-- ministers mostly and schoolmasters--came round the cars with fruit and sympathy and texts. Van Zyl talked to 'em in Dutch, and one man, a big red-bearded minister, at Beaufort West, I remember, he jest wilted on the platform.

"'Keep your prayers for yourself,' says Van Zyl, throwing back a bunch of grapes. 'You'll need 'em, and you'll need the fruit too, when the war comes down here. _You_ done it,' he says. 'You and your picayune Church that's deader than Cronje's dead horses! What sort of a G.o.d have you been unloading on us, you black _aas vogels_? The British came, and we beat 'em,' he says, 'and you sat still and prayed. The British beat us, and you sat still,' he says. 'You told us to hang on, and we hung on, and our farms was burned, and you sat still--you and your G.o.d. See here,' he says, 'I shot my Bible full of bullets after Bloemfontein went, and you and G.o.d didn't say anything. Take it and pray over it before we Federals help the British to knock h.e.l.l out of you rebels.'

"Then I hauled him back into the car. I judged he'd had a fit. But life's curious--and sudden--and mixed. I hadn't any more use for a reb than Van Zyl, and I knew something of the lies they'd fed us up with from the Colony for a year and more. I told the minister to pull his freight out of that, and went on with my lunch, when another man come along and shook hands with Van Zyl. He'd known him at close range in the Kimberley seige and before. Van Zyl was well seen by his neighbours, I judge. As soon as this other man opened his mouth I said, 'You're Kentucky, ain't you?' 'I am,' he says; 'and what may you be?' I told him right off, for I was pleased to hear good United States in any man's mouth; but he whipped his hands behind him and said, 'I'm not knowing any man that fights for a Tammany Dutchman. But I presoom you've been well paid, you dam gun-runnin'

Yank.'

"Well, Sir, I wasn't looking for that, and it near knocked me over, while old man Van Zyl started in to explain.

"'Don't you waste your breath, Mister Van Zyl,' the man says. 'I know this breed. The South's full of 'em.' Then he whirls round on me and says, 'Look at here, you Yank. A little thing like a King's neither here nor there, but what _you've_ done,' he says, 'is to go back on the White Man in six places at once--two hemispheres and four continents--America, England, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa. Don't open your head,' he says. 'You know well if you'd been caught at this game in our country you'd have been jiggling in the bight of a lariat before you could reach for your naturalisation papers. Go on and prosper,' he says, 'and you'll fetch up by fighting for n.i.g.g.e.rs, as the North did.' And he threw me half-a-crown--English money.

"Sir, I do not regard the proposition in that light, but I guess I must have been somewhat shook by the explosion. They told me at Cape Town one rib was driven in on to my lungs. I am not adducing this as an excuse, but the cold G.o.d's truth of the matter is--the money on the floor did it.... I give up and cried. Put my head down and cried.

"I dream about this still sometimes. He didn't know the circ.u.mstances, but I dream about it. And it's h.e.l.l!