The Petticoat Commando Part 33

The conflict must have been a desperate one!

He who played so brave a part in it, Krause, the only armed man on his side, shot down his opponents one by one, until they closed on him, and then, overpowered by the fearful odds and battered beyond recognition by heavy blows from the b.u.t.t-ends of their guns, he was at last pinioned to the ground by his infuriated captors.

Three men were taken, Krause, Venter (a mere boy, the son of a widow in Pretoria), and one other--who must be nameless here.

Of the rest some fled into the open veld, while others, hopelessly ignorant of their surroundings or of the route to take, wisely returned to town under cover of the darkness of the night.

With one exception. Fritz W., the wounded German, lost his way and was unable to go back to town before the curfew-bell, the hour at which every resident was supposed to be indoors.

Finding himself near a small camp of soldiers in the vicinity of the Pretoria West Station, he cautiously crept into one of the tents, where he found a solitary soldier, sound asleep. Without a moment's hesitation, he stretched himself down on the ground beside him, thinking over the tragic events of that awful Sunday evening and dozing off at intervals, from sheer exhaustion of mind and body.

During the night another soldier, evidently returning from duty as guard or outpost, entered the tent and lay beside him on the other side.

So he spent the night between two British soldiers, and with the first approach of dawn he cautiously and stealthily extricated himself from his perilous position and made his way to town.

Three or four days after the perfidious betrayal of the Secret Service men the Committee was staggered with the tidings of the execution of their comrades, Krause and Venter, in the prison-yard of the old Pretoria jail.

The third, the nameless one, had, it was said, saved himself by turning King's evidence.

Of their last days on earth nothing will ever be known, but those of us blessed or cursed with the divine and cruel gift of imagination see in our mind's eye two men in prison-cells in solitary confinement, one a broken-hearted husband, the other the beloved son of a widowed mother.

Wounded and suffering they lie on their last bed of pain. Friendless and alone they await the untimely end of their brief but glorious career. Longing, with all the weakness of the human heart, for one last look of love, one rea.s.suring clasp from a tender woman's hand, they prepare themselves to meet the death they have faced so often and so manfully in their heroic struggle for liberty and independence.

Fear? Despair?

No--a thousand times, No!

Could there have been fear or despair in the hearts of those two men, with the knowledge beating in their brains that they held their lives in their own hands, that one word from them of information against their fellow-workers could avert their doom, and that they, and they alone, could save themselves at the sacrifice of honour and fidelity?

How in the end they met their fate we do not know--we can but dimly guess.

The painful task of acquainting Mrs. Krause with the fate of her husband fell to the lot of Mr. Botha and Mr. Hocke.

As she would probably be dest.i.tute, the two men decided to collect a sum of money before approaching her with their evil tidings, and this they had to do by stealth, in order not to bring suspicion on themselves.

They were successful in obtaining over 34 for the bereaved wife in a very short time, from friends and sympathisers as poor as they themselves, and later, from the same source, in the same unostentatious way, a far larger amount was collected in order to send the widow to her relatives in Germany.

These details, mundane though they may appear after the stirring acts of heroism described above, are significant of greater things--self-sacrificing generosity, unswerving loyalty, and a compa.s.sionate desire to atone, in some practical and helpful way, for their share in the disaster brought on innocent and helpless womanhood.

CHAPTER XXV

THE SHOEMAKER AT WORK

That the inborn sense of humour of the Dutch South African race should have been stunted in its growth, if not completely crushed, by the horrors of the war, would be small cause for surprise to most people who have given the matter a thought. But to those of us acquainted with the facts, an entirely different and wholly comprehensible aspect of the case has been made manifest.

The blessed gift of humour is only sharpened by the hard realities of life, can never be appreciated to the full in the calm and shallow waters of prosperity.

Of this we had innumerable proofs during those tempestuous days, and certain it is that the memory of a harmless joke, enjoyed under circ.u.mstances of unusual stress and trouble, grows sweeter and is strengthened as the years go by.

For dry humour and keen enjoyment of the ludicrous, our friend Mr. W.

Botha could not easily be surpa.s.sed; and I advise you, good reader, if you have the chance, to induce him to tell you the following story in his own words, and to watch the flicker of amus.e.m.e.nt in his eye.

Four of Captain Naude's spies are in town again, resting, shopping, and exchanging items of war experiences with their friends and relatives.

Countless parcels have arrived from various stores of note in town, and four big bags, full to bursting, are arrayed against the wall for transportation "to the front" at 7 o'clock that night.

But what is this? Another bag? Impossible! There are but four men going out and each one has his load, quite as much as he can carry already.

What does it contain? A beautiful brand-new saddle, the property of an English officer, which Willie Els, son of the Committee member, has determined shall on no account be left behind.

Expostulations from the older men are all in vain.

The saddle, with the four other bags, is put into Delport's cab, which is waiting at the door, and, after many fond farewells, the young men drive off in the direction of the Pretoria Lunatic Asylum.

At this time there is no better spot for exit from the capital, but in order to reach it one point of extreme danger has to be pa.s.sed--the point at which a British officer, with five-and-twenty mounted men, is stationed, in command of a searchlight apparatus for scouring the surrounding country.

The dangerous spot has been frequently pa.s.sed in safety by these very spies.

To-night they pa.s.s again in un.o.bserved security, but alas! when they have crossed the railway line, immediately opposite the asylum, where they are in the habit of alighting with their parcels, they find to their distress that, try as they will, they cannot carry more than the four bags allotted to them in the first instance.

The bag containing the precious saddle must go back to town.

Oh, the pity of it!

The critical spot must be pa.s.sed again, and, as ill-luck would have it, the British officer hails the pa.s.sing cab and is about to get in, when his eye falls on the bag.

"What is this?" he asks the driver.

No concealment possible now!

"A saddle, sir."

"A saddle! Whose, and where are you taking it?"

"From Mr. Botha to Mr. Els in town. On my way I was stopped and asked to take some pa.s.sengers to the asylum, which I have just done. I was going to Mr. Botha when you stopped me."

The officer looks doubtful, feels the bag all over and, taking a notebook from his pocket, enters all the details of this most suspicious-looking affair, the number of the cab, the name and address of the driver, the names and full addresses of the two men who have been mentioned.

Then he gets in and peremptorily orders the cabman to drive to such-and-such an hotel in the centre of the town.