Six weeks before, full of hope and confidence in their leader, despite the gloomy prophecies of those who had attempted the task before, this column had started on its quest, and so far not one man of the hostile commando had they seen; apparently at its ease, it kept just one march ahead, which distance, strive as he might, Colonel Bradford found himself powerless to lessen.
Gradually, in the column, hope had died out, and with its death came the longing for the comforts of civilisation: hot baths, whiskey and cigarettes for the officers, beer and tobacco for the men—luxuries that for the past three weeks they had been without. The former grew slack and dispirited; the latter sullen, in the last few days, indeed, almost openly mutinous, a state of things of which their leader was only too well aware, and which in his heart, secretly as hopeless as theirs, he knew himself powerless to combat. He was thinking of these things, and even meditating the abandonment of his quest, as he sat on the hillside overlooking the bivouac, and gloomily noted the air of unwillingness pervading the men below.
Surely it was justifiable to give up now, he thought; he had done all that a man could, but the task set was beyond him or anyone else; better to accept the inevitable and go back. He was but wearing out men and horses in a vain quest, and to force the march on was to risk the catastrophe of mutiny and consequent ruin of his career. His authority, he knew well, only hung by a hair, and the mere writing out of orders for the next day had become a torment, so fearful was he of a flat refusal to obey; only, last night their issue had been received with "booing"—a sound that had filled him with nervous dread. Despite his present despondency, Colonel Bradford's reputation was that of a good and able commander; and since landing in the country five months before his career had been one of unbroken success. Cool in action, ready of resource, and deeply read in military lore, he had, as a brigade commander in the main body, won high opinions from superiors and subordinates alike, and it had been in the full hope of a successful issue that to him had been entrusted the capture of the notorious and hitherto undefeated Van der Tann.
Unsuspected by all, however, in Bradford's character there was a weak spot, which events so far had failed to discover, and that was the inability to hold on his way, unmoved by the opinions of those around him. Give him a willing army to lead and all was well, but, let the men become discouraged and show hostility to authority, he also, only too soon, came to share the one feeling and fear the other. The double task of overcoming them as well as the enemy was beyond him—as it is to all save the Marlboroughs and Wellingtons of history—and in the present crisis, instead of rooting up the sprouting weeds of insubordination, his sole desire, and that the most fatal of all, was to conciliate the malcontents, with the inevitable result that the murmuring grew daily louder.
There was one, and, probably the only one in the column, who was not only unaffected by the general depression, but rather stimulated by it, and that was Captain Hector Graeme. So far, in his novel rôle of A.D.C., he had failed to justify his selection for the post by General Quentin; indeed, Bradford had many times thought hard things of the Adjutant-General to the Indian Forces, for providing him with a staff officer so negligent and ignorant of his work.
On more than one occasion he had had just reason for complaint, Hector's arrangements as to messing and the transport of his chief's baggage having only too often proved defective, while his cavalier treatment of senior officers had brought more than one rebuke on his careless head. His sartorial eccentricities, too, were a source of constant irritation to Colonel Bradford, for now that he was no longer a regimental officer he had given free rein to his taste for original garments; and, bizarre as were many of the uniforms worn at that time in South Africa, Hector, in unconventionality and strangeness of attire, eclipsed them all.
Several times Bradford, stung by the remarks of distinguished visitors to his Mess, had debated the advisability of sending Graeme about his business, or at any rate palming him off on some unwary new-comer, but somehow he had never done so; and in the last fortnight had come to be glad of his forbearance. For during that time a surprising change had come over his A.D.C. In proportion as the spirits of the rest went down, his went up, and no matter how long or profitless the day Hector never seemed tired or depressed, but, on the contrary, cheerful and full of fight. And gradually Bradford, harassed by doubts and the unresponsiveness of his followers, began to turn to his erstwhile obnoxious A.D.C., whose confidence in ultimate success seemed to increase daily, and who alone amongst his fellows appeared to be thoroughly enjoying the present expedition.
He looked at him now as he lay on his back close by, calm and content, the end of a "Pinhead" cigarette—given him a the rate of one daily by his servant from the latter's scanty store—between his teeth, and, as he looked, he sighed. He wished that he too could feel like that. Hector heard the sigh, and, instantly opening his eyes, sat up and gazed meditatively at the mob of men and horses below.
"Hard as nails, those horses," he observed cheerfully, "do their thirty miles a day easy now; never so fit in their lives before."
"I don't know what you call fit, Graeme," was the moody answer, "they're all skin and bone. Worn out, that's what they are; look at the way they're standing."