Luck at the Diamond Fields

by Dalrymple J. Belgrave

Tom Bats was a not very excellent character who had once been in Jack Brereton’s regiment, and for a short time was his soldier-servant. He was not a bad-natured man, but unsteady, hot-tempered, and pugnacious. Jack Brereton had liked him very well, and he had from the first a wonderful affection and admiration for ‘the Captain.’ Strangely enough, both of them drifted to the Diamond Fields, where they met again, and very rejoiced was Tom Bats to see his old master. On the Diamond Fields Tom did not become a reformed character; he was straight, as the saying there was, and did not buy diamonds or do anything that was dishonest, but was much given to going on the spree and punching heads, and had on several occasions given the police a great deal of trouble.

Unfortunately, when on the spree he had fallen foul of a policeman against whom he had an old grudge, and had knocked the guardian of the peace about severely, thus making Kimberley too warm for him, and obliging him to start off at once for some place of refuge.

He had turned up at Buffelsfontein, where Jack Brereton gave him shelter and food for some days, and employed him looking after the horses, for Jack was not quite certain that though Buffelsfontein was a quiet place some forty miles from Kimberley, it would not be worth some one’s while to pay it a visit and try and get at Kildare.

“Look ’ere, captain,” said Tom after Jack had left the tables, “I think I had better come back with you to-morrow, it’s rather a lonely journey for you to take with such valuable property as the horses, and no one but the Kaffir boys with you. I will see you as far as the camp and then turn back again.”

“No, you shan’t do that; what’s the good? It’s lonely, but it’s as safe a road as any high-road in England; no one will harm the horse when I am by looking after him.”

Tom Bats felt that this was about true, so he settled to leave for Christiana the next morning, when Jack and the horses started for Kimberley.

The next morning Jack started for Kimberley riding his pony Nobbier, Kildare and The Muffin Man being ridden by two little bushmen who were in his service. It was a dreary journey from Buffels Drift to Kimberley, only one or two farm-houses were on the way, and a great part of the road was deep sand through which the horses laboured painfully. Jack had arranged for the horses to be put up at a farm-house on the way, so he took the journey easily enough; and as he rode along a little behind the others, he looked at Kildare and added up the money which he felt confident that he could win with the brave little horse. Kildare was a black horse—not very big. At first sight one would think that he was not quite big enough to hold his own, but any good judge would recognise that he was good enough if he were big enough; and when one saw him stride along one forgot about his being on a small scale.

The Diggers’ Stakes would come to about five hundred pounds; besides that Jack had about a thousand pounds in bets for that race, for he stood half of the bet Crotty had laid Gideon. It was hard luck not being able to get odds about the horse, but as several people in Kimberley knew how good the horse was, and that the theory of his being lame which, somehow or the other, had got about was false, it was necessary to get this money on the race at the best terms they could. Though Kildare had been actually backed for very little by either Brereton or Crotty, for the latter had only bet against The Pirate, he was the favourite, with slight odds laid on him, and it would not be easy to back him to win much at any reasonable price. Still, there would be his lottery, which would come to some five hundred pounds or so more, and perhaps it would be possible to get a little more money on, but it was a pity that he could not make more of a coup. There was another race on the card which he hoped to win with Kildare, and he might win one or two minor races with The Muffin Man. Altogether Jack hoped, with what he could win and with the price he could get for his horses, which he intended to sell, he would be worth about five thousand pounds after the races. As he watched Kildare stepping along he thought that he would like to take him home to England and win a big handicap with him, as he believed he could; but his good sense told him that it would be better to sell the horse on the Fields. With the money that he would have after the races he determined he would clear out of the country, and either go home, where he might get something, or to some other colony. It is ill counting your chickens before they are hatched. As Jack was thinking what he would do with the money he would win he had come to a place where the road ran between some mountains, and where by the side of the road there was a good deal of thick bush. Just there some Kaffirs who were coming from the direction of Kimberley were passing the horses; they looked as if they had been working in the mines and were going back to the kraals up country, and Jack paid very little attention to them. Suddenly he was startled by seeing them close round the two horses, Muffin Man and Kildare, and take hold of their bridles.

In a second he had whipped out a revolver and was riding up to them, when a man with crape on his face jumped from the bushes by the road and struck him a heavy blow on the head with a knobkerri, which stretched him on the ground senseless.

When he came to again he found two white men with crape round their faces engaged in tying him up with a rope, which they knotted in a way that would puzzle the Davenport brothers. When they had finished they carried him away from the road along a water-course which came down from the hills. He did his best to struggle, but it was no use for he was helpless. As he was carried along he saw that the two horses and his pony were in the possession of the enemy, and the two bushmen were also captive and were being carried off by some of the Kaffirs.