GENERAL CATHCART RETURNED from his Basotholand expedition claiming a victory which those who were present knew had never occurred and early in 1853 Jinqi and the chieftain of the Gaika made peace with the British authorities. The terms upon which the peace is made, wrote the Captain, neither the Gaika nor the colonists can exactly make out.
In March General Cathcart issued a general order:
HEADQUARTERS, GATESTOWN
The Commander-in-chief, in disbanding this corps – The Kromme Rangers – wishes to convey to its gallant commander, officers and men, the high estimation in which he holds their services &c.
(Signed.)
J. A. Cloete
Quartermaster General.
The Captain copied the general order down in his book and on the day following the irregulars assembled for the last time on the parade ground in Gatestown. Most of the men took offers of transport to The Bay and thence by ship to the Cape but some remained behind to claim their farms. The last time the kid saw Evans and the joiner they were following Higgs and Basson into the black hole of a bar in a side street of Gatestown.
The Captain sailed for London with a skull for Doctor Anderson and another for himself and he was refused a commission by the Horse Guards who told him that if he wanted such a thing he would have to pay. Six months after his return, however, the Captain found himself talking with a young man who was both the Duke of Brabant and King of the Belgians. The Captain was explaining to the Duke something of the nature of the Dutch colonists on the southern tip of Africa in whom the Duke had a great interest. A solemn gentleman approached and asked the Captain to follow him.
The Captain shook hands with the Duke and excused himself and the solemn one led him to a small side door. The solemn one stopped and hesitated and then he opened the door like an unctuous country beadle entering a rich man’s chapel. He stood back and ushered the Captain forward. The Captain stepped into an oak-panelled room where he saw a dark robust woman and a number of sedate and immaculately dressed men. The Captain wondered for a moment if a mistake had been made. He was about to bow himself out when the woman looked at him and offered him a brisk grim smile and looked away again.
One of the men stepped forward and placed a cushion at the Captain’s feet. A voice whispered behind.
Kneel.
The Captain obeyed and bowed his head and he saw a pair of brown leather shoes of sturdy manufacture peek from beneath the woman’s skirts as she approached. The Captain waited and a long silence ensued. A whispering commenced above him and then it stopped. The Captain looked up. The woman grimaced and struggled to hold a great gleaming blade in the air with both hands. She looked over the Captain’s head at the men behind.
What is his name, she said.
His name, Your Majesty?
Yes. His Christian name. What is the man’s name?
No word came from the men and the woman grunted and shifted her hands on the weapon which wobbled perilously above the Captain’s head like a guillotine over a Jacobin.
No one knows his name?
She looked down at the Captain.
Stephen, said the Captain.
The woman let the sword fall in her hands and it came down past the Captain’s dodging shoulder and clanged upon the wooden floor and one of the men stepped forward quickly to take it.
Arise, said the woman, Sir Stephen. And she held out her hand.
The Captain bit his lip. His eyes were wet. He took her hand in his and he pressed his ardent lips to the cool alabaster flesh.