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This was a bitter disappointment to me, but I consoled myself with the thought that the General was much older than myself, and had been fighting since he was a baby. I therefore presumed he knew better. Possibly if we younger commanders had had more authority in the earlier stages of the war, and had had less to deal with arrogant and stupid old men, we should have reached Durban and Cape Town.
It takes from four to five days, according to the speed of the vessel and the state of the weather, to run up from the Cape to Durban. Sometimes, if the landing is bad at East London, where they have not yet made that wonderful harbour they talk so much of, and sink such a mint of money in, a ship is delayed for twenty-four hours before the cargo boats can get out to take off the goods.
There is no need to tell lies about hunting, for so many curious things happen within the knowledge of a man whose business it is to hunt; but this is by the way. At last, one beautiful evening in January, which is our hottest month, we steamed past the coast of Natal, expecting to make Durban Point by sunset.
Lieutenant Bathurst, who now assumed the position of our custodian, was a good prototype of friend Ellet at Durban, and he was at pains to treat us as felons rather than as prisoners-of-war. In order to reach Broadbottom Camp we had to ascend a remarkably rocky cliff named "Jacob's Ladder," the face of which was cut into a multitudinous series of steps.
Carew, do you ever yearn for the fleshpots?" Without bringing his jaws to a halt, Carew shook his head. "Do you?" he asked, after a prolonged interval. "Yes, if they could be brought here; not otherwise. I like the game; but I also like a little more oats mixed with my fodder. How long is it since we had a square meal?" "How long since we halted in that pineapple grove, coming up from Durban?"
All the lads who had come down with Chris had some time before obtained their parents' consent to join a volunteer corps, or form one among themselves, and as it was evident that the crisis was at hand no objections were raised to their doing so at once. Mrs. King would go down to Durban with her friends, so that there was no need for her son to accompany her.
Or the Boers of the Orange Free State and Transvaal may get tired of paying customs dues at Durban, and march 5000 men down to take possession of the port!
John Laputa, about whom I knew one strange thing. So did Tam by the way, but he had not identified his former pursuer, and I had told him nothing. I was leaving two men behind me, Colles at Durban and Aitken at Lourenco Marques, who would help me if trouble came. Things were shaping well for some kind of adventure. The talk with Aitken had given Tam an inkling of my thoughts.
He asserted: "I had the humiliation, as the representative of the American Government, of sitting in my office in Pretoria and looking upon envelopes bearing the official seal of the American Government, opened and officially sealed with stickers, notifying me that the contents had been read by the censor at Durban."
At dawn on the third day after my arrival I was awakened by a soldier and informed that I was to be taken to the station. The train was in readiness when I arrived, and the officer in charge invited me to take a seat in his compartment. I was then told that we were to proceed to Durban, but no information was given me as to my ultimate destination.
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