'Fall in, the Mounted Infantry!' cried the voice of Hammersley, when with earliest dawn strong parties were detailed from the camps of the Second Division and Sir Evelyn Wood to scout the scene of the tragedy; and as his squadron rode forth in the grey light with rifle-butt resting on the thigh, just as the dawn began to redden the summit of the Itelezi Hill, Florian remembered that this mournful search was his first duty as an officer; but the calamity clouded the joy of his promotion, and would be always associated with it.
He felt himself again the equal of Dulcie Carlyon; but, still, to what end? He could not go home to her, nor could she come there to him, a combatant in Zululand; besides, he knew well enough that an officer's pay, unless when on service, is not sufficient for himself without the encumbrance of a wife; and with this enforced practical view of the situation he could only sigh as he rode on and thought of poor Dulcie.
As some of the Volunteer Horse went to the front, Florian became conscious that two, wearing huge, battered hats, who rode together, were regarding him furtively, and with a curiously hostile and scowling expression; and his heart gave a kind of leap when he recognised in these, two of the ruffians whose odious features were indelibly impressed upon his memory by the adventures of that horrible night in the so-called hotel at Elandsbergen—Josh Jarrett and Dick of the Droogveldt, with his short, thickset figure, small, dull eyes, and heavy, bull-dog visage.
That they would work him some mischief, if possible, in their new capacity he never doubted; and possibly enough it was their design to do so, secretly and securely, amid the often confused scouting and scampering to and fro of the Mounted Infantry among bush and cover of every kind. But, as they were then going to the front, he thought it unwise to move in the matter at the time; besides, they might be knocked on the head, and all on the ground were thinking only of the Prince Imperial.
A deep silence hovered over the ranks of the various searching parties that rode round by the base of the flat-topped Itelezi Hill. The swallow-tailed banneroles of the 17th Lancers, who looked handsome and gay in their white helmets and blue tunics faced and lapelled with white, fluttered out on the morning wind; but the iron hoofs of their horses fell without a sound on the soft and elastic turf of the green veldt. Occasionally a low murmur would be heard as the searchers drew nearer the fatal kraal, and the lance was slung and the carbine grasped instinctively when at times the black Kaffir vultures, hinting of a dreadful repast, rose from among the tall, feathery Tambookie grass, and, croaking angrily, winged their way aloft as if enraged and interrupted.
Driving out roughly by lance point and rifle bullet about a hundred Zulus from some holes and scrub, several of the Lancers under Lieutenant Frith, their adjutant, and the Mounted Infantry under Hammersley, next drew near the fatal donga, which some officers crossed on foot. Among those who were in advance of all the rest was Lieutenant Dundonald Cochrane, of the Cornish Light Infantry.
'Look!' cried Hammersley to Florian, as Cochrane was seen to pause and with reverence take off his helmet. Then a hum went along the ranks of the searchers, who all knew what he had found.
And there, on the sloping bank of the donga in the evening sunshine, with his head pillowed on some sweet wild-flowers, nude as he came into the world, save that a reliquary and locket with his father's miniature were round his neck—supposed to be potent fetishes—lay the poor young Prince, the guest of Britain, the hope of Imperial France, and the only son of his mother, dead, and gashed by sixteen assegai wounds, among them the usual cruel Zulu coup de grace—the gash in the stomach.
It was found that, though an accomplished swordsman, he had failed to use his sword—the sword of his father the Emperor—which had dropped from the scabbard in his attempts to mount; but that, seizing an assegai which had been hurled at him, he had defended himself till he sank under repeated wounds; and a tuft of human hair clenched in his left hand attested the valour and the desperation of his resistance.
His faithful little Scottish terrier was found dead by his side.