A Lively Bit of the Front Part 8

"I wonder whether that fellow in the train was all above board?"

said Malcolm. "Now I come to think over the matter it looks rather fishy. And we told him a jolly lot, too. He might be a Boche."

"If he is a Boche, and I run across him, I'll bash him," said Selwyn vehemently.

"Set to, you Diggers!" ordered Fortescue. "Selwyn, you take an oar and relieve Carr. Now, then, you pull while I back."

Under the reverse action of the oars the boat turned towards the sh.o.r.e, then both men pulled their hardest.

"We don't seem to be moving," remarked Malcolm after five minutes had elapsed. "I've been watching those two lights, and they have been in line ever since we turned."

"Perhaps we're aground," suggested Fortescue, and thrusting his oar vertically into the water he sounded. The thirteen-foot oar failed to touch bottom.

"Plenty of water," he reported. "Carr, you must be making a mistake.

Now, Selwyn, put your back into it. I've never had such a heavy old tub to pull in all my previous experience."

"We're not gaining an inch," reported Malcolm.

"Current out of the river, most likely," was Selwyn's theory.

For once Fortescue lost his temper.

"Currents, you young jackal!" he exclaimed. "Do you think this is a Bath-bun shop? We are a crowd of jacka.s.ses. We never unmoored the boat properly."

The craft was fitted with a short bowsprit, from the end of which a wire shroud or "bobstay" led to a shackle-plate in the stem. When the mooring-buoy had been thrown overboard, the rope had caught between the bobstay and the stem, with the result that for the last hour the three raw amateurs in salt-water seamans.h.i.+p had been simply keeping their craft straining at the end of the buoy-rope.

The tension was broken in a double sense. The mooring-rope was this time properly cast adrift, while the mercurial spirits of the three absentees rose to the occasion.

"We've been a crowd of mugs," declared Selwyn, laughing. "Swotting for an hour or more and fancying we were on the move. Now what's to be done?"

"I suggest that we sleep on board until daybreak," said Fortescue.

"No good purpose is served by jogging into Cape Town at this hour of the night. I suppose neither of you thought to bring along any tommy?"

The others had to admit that they were unprovided with food.

"Then tighten your belts, boys," continued Fortescue. "We've been feeding like turkey-c.o.c.ks; a few hours' fast won't do much harm."

With the first streaks of dawn they ran the boat ash.o.r.e, secured her with a rope, and set off towards the town. When the transport office opened the three absentees reported themselves, and, after having had a stiff "dressing down" were placed under open arrest.

"One advantage of being a non-com.," remarked Fortescue. "We are lucky not to be in the 'clink'."

"That Tommy officer seems a good sort," declared Malcolm. "As you say, he might have made things hot for us. So we have to cool our heels here until we can proceed with the next draft."

Two days later the three chums received instructions to report on board the _Pomfret Castle_, which was due to sail with a mixed contingent on the following afternoon. The vessel was a Union Castle liner commandeered by the Government. Capable of doing twenty-two knots, compared with the _Pintail's_ seventeen, it was more than likely, U-boats and mines excepted, that the _Pomfret Castle_ would arrive at Plymouth days ahead of the convoy with the New Zealand reinforcements.

Taking no chances this time, Malcolm and his companions went on board a couple of hours before the authorized time. Baggage was still being stowed, while the decks teemed with troops of various nationalities. The bulk consisted of South Africans, mostly veterans of middle age, with a sprinkling of youths; detachments transferred from Mesopotamia to France; and Imperial troops from German South-East Africa. A draft of Maoris, and about twenty Australians who had overstayed their leave at Cape Town, completed the muster.

Instructed by the embarkation officer, the New Zealanders went below to their mess.

"Hallo, here are three Diggers!" exclaimed a strapping Queenslander.

"Make them at home, you chaps. Now our mess is quite filled up. By Gum, I don't quite cotton on to those Dutchmen. I'm a believer in Australia for the Australians, and You fellows stand in with that crush."

The speaker introduced himself as Jack Kennedy, quartermaster-sergeant by rank, and sheep-farmer in civilian life.

His left hand was in a sling, a strip of surgical plaster embellished his cheek. During his stay at Cape Town he had been forced into a squabble with a crowd of disloyal Cape Dutch. Words led to blows, with the result that three of his opponents were picked up insensible, while Kennedy was taken to the military hospital with a broken wrist and a nasty contusion of the forehead, caused by the nail-shod boot of an eighteen-stone antagonist.

"No kits?" continued Kennedy. "Your chaps went on and left you behind? We were much in the same sort of hole, only Buck-up Miller here knows the ropes. We'll soon see that you are comfortable. How about a pannikin of tea?"

Under the attentions of their new chums Malcolm and his companions soon adapted themselves to present conditions, and before the _Pomfret Castle_ cleared Table Bay the Anzacs felt as if they had known each other for years.

Although the troops on board were going to fight a common foe--a foe that victorious would speedily prove more than a menace to Australia, to United South Africa, and to civilization in general--there was a certain amount of misunderstanding between the Afrikanders and their brothers-in-arms. In spite of the utmost endurance on the part of the Imperial officers, petty squabbles were frequent. The Boers, for instance, were p.r.o.ne to treat the Maoris in a similar manner to the Kaffir "boys". They could not understand how a white man could treat a Maori as an equal, being ignorant of the high moral and physical standard of the latter, that has justly earned the appreciation and admiration of the New Zealand colonists.

For their part the Maoris accepted the Afrikanders' remarks with courteous equanimity, but there were others on board who championed them--with no uncertain voice.

Big Kennedy 'was as good as his word, and before nightfall each of the New Zealanders had a full kit, although they wisely refrained from asking questions as to the origin of the source of supplies.

Already they were well advanced in the ways of the old campaigner.

If they kept rigidly to the codes of civil life they would soon have found themselves very much out in the cold as far as personal comforts were concerned, although on board, in camp, and on active service, it was noticeable that personal property was rightly considered as inviolate.

One of the morning parades had Just ended, and Malcolm was hurrying down the accommodation-ladder to the mess deck when he was brought up sharply by a huge fist tapping him on the centre of his chest.

Coming out of the brilliant suns.h.i.+ne to the comparative gloom 'tween decks, young Carr could not at first discern the features of the man who barred his progress.

It was a Maori. The man was grinning broadly, yet he did not say a single word.

"Te Paheka!" exclaimed Malcolm in astonishment. "You here?"

A few months previously, when Malcolm saw Te Paheka vanis.h.i.+ng round a corner as he drove juggernaut at a furious rate, the lad had come to the conclusion that he had seen the last of his Maori friend for many a long day. And now, by one of the vagaries of fate, Te Paheka was on board the _Pomfret Castle_, rigged out in khaki, and bound for the goal of freedom--the Western Front.

"Yes, I came along," explained Te Paheka. "Since you added a few years to your age I thought I would make a corresponding reduction in mine. Things were a bit dull. You heard about the car? Selwyn told you, then? I've cleared out. Sold every acre of land that I could legally dispose of. The rest the paternal Government prevents me getting rid of; but it's let, so I think I'm good for about four hundred a year. By the time I return--if I ever do see Wairakato again--I'll have enough to buy the out-and-out top-hole racing car in New Zealand."

Just then four men hurried along the alley-way. By the letters S.A.H.A. on their shoulder-straps, Malcolm knew that they belonged to the South African Heavy Artillery. As the foremost pa.s.sed by he deliberately lurched against Te Paheka.

"Out of my way, Zwartnek!" he shouted, adding something in _Taal_ which, fortunately for him, neither Malcolm nor the Maori understood.

As the last of the four men pa.s.sed, Malcolm, seething with indignation, caught a glimpse of his features.

"Dash it all!" he soliloquized. "Where have I seen that fellow before?"

Te Paheka took no notice of the insult.

"I would have told that fellow to _imps.h.i.+e_ pretty sharp if I'd been you, Te Paheka," observed the lad.

The Maori shrugged his broad shoulders.

"Manners, Malcolm, or the lack of them," he remarked. "This evening I hope to teach him a lesson. There's a boxing-match fixed up, and I hear that this fellow is the champion of his battery. I'll do my best to take him down a peg."

The two men separated, Te Paheka going to his mess, while Malcolm made his way to his quarters, where he informed Selwyn of his chance meeting with the Maori.

"And," he added, "although I'm not absolutely sure about it, I have an idea that the blighter who let us down on the train from Muizenberg is on board."

"A transport officer?" enquired Fortescue.