Veldt Hunter

Chapter 1

The bullet made a tiny hole in the bush duiker’s chest, distorting on impact, to tear through the beast’s vital organs. The death leap was majestic; a farewell flourish of life, before the animal collapsed to twitch, then lie still. The crack of the shot sent a pied crow flapping into the dry air, cawing in indignation. The silence that followed was broken by the swish of damp grass against Helena van Aardt’s boots.

She strode towards the body, stopping only to eject the empty brass cartridge from her Martini Henry. A trail of smoke marked the cartridge’s fall. Helena stooped to pick up the warm casing and dropped it into her jacket pocket in one deft movement. In a habit that had become second nature, she inserted a fresh round into the rifle and raised the under-lever to close the breech. It was loaded again; good practice when alone on the veldt in these troubled times.

Helena knelt by the animal and laid a hand on its warm neck, thanking it for giving its life. It was a ritual her father had taught and, in his memory, she had never forgotten it. She bound the animal’s slender legs, hefted the body across her shoulders and walked towards the stand of thorns where her mount was tethered. Her brown Basuto pony nickered and Helena smiled, white teeth gleaming against a tanned face the colour of the duiker’s flawless fur.

‘Good girl, Somer. That didn’t take long, did it?’ She heaved the duiker over the pony’s neck. The Basuto fidgeted at the smell of blood. ‘Still now, still.’ Helena slung the rifle over her shoulder, put a boot into the stirrup and swung herself into the saddle. It was a movement that she enjoyed in the freedom of breeches.

‘I’ve got us enough meat to last a week. Mama will be pleased, as long as she doesn’t know I’m out this early.’ She turned Somer towards the east and set off at a canter, taking in the vastness of the veldt in the early morning, the sky awash with pinks and reds.

She had stolen out to the stable when the sun was still below the horizon, despite her parent’s warnings about the dangers of being alone before the dawn. Helena would not normally go against their advice, but the hunting trip at this hour was a necessity if she was going to make a kill and be back before her mother woke. Then there was breakfast and the chores to attend to on the farm; work which filled the daylight hours now that her brother, Jan, was away at the war.

Somer picked up the track that led back home. Helena wondered if there would be news from Jan. It had been two weeks since the last letter, and she and her mother were starting to worry. Not that Helena’s mother voiced her anxiety. Sophia van Aardt was not the sort of woman to show weakness. She was a voortrekker’s daughter; a belief in God, the rifle and a love of the land, for which her parents had fought, flowed through her veins.

As the farm came into sight, Helena imagined the crease on her mother’s pale forehead and the tightened lips, as she gazed at the horizon from her bed, propped up by pillows so she could see better through her bedroom window. Sophia grew weaker by the day; the unspoken truth of every hacking cough that shook her thin frame could not hide what they both knew. It was one of the few things they had ever agreed upon. Her mother was dying.

The pair had grown apart following the death of Helena’s father. With no father figure to keep her in check, and a brother as a wilder influence, Helena had passed from girlhood in the home, to womanhood in the saddle, to Sophia’s despair. Sophia had wanted everything for her daughter that she had been denied: embroidered dresses, the piano, flowers on the dining table, soft clothes, suitors with clean fingernails. These were the things Sophia had yearned for as a young woman, things which her parents could not lavish on her, as they struggled to carve out a new life in the Orange Free State.

It was the rigours of that life which were now killing Sophia. Those… and a broken heart. Something had died inside her when the only man she had ever loved was brought home slung across his own saddle like a hunting trophy, the flies buzzing around the savage cuts that laced his torso. The Zulu cattle raiders confronted by her husband that day may as well have driven their razor-sharp assegais into Sophia’s heart as well. It was not the first time such a tragic tableau was played out for her family against the backdrop of that brutal land. It would not be the last.

The death of her father lit the fires of Helena’s independent streak. When she clung to her Mama’s hand, watching his coffin being lowered into the sun-baked African earth, Helena realised that death could come in many guises, and she would have no one to protect her but herself. Since then she had learned to use the Martini Henry her grandfather had brought back from the victory over the British at Majuba, and ride just as well as her brother. She hunted and shot with him through her teens and, by the age of twenty-three, with her hardy and sure-footed Basuto beneath her, she could outride and outshoot all but the most experienced horsemen in the district.

Helena had her mother’s dark eyes, set in an angular face, framed by a sleek mane of black hair. The neighbours from the isolated farmsteads in the area nicknamed her ‘die wildsbokke’, the Antelope, after her grace and agility. And her wild streak. The old mothers did not approve of the way she wore men’s trousers to ride out on the veldt and, even worse, sat astride her horse rather than use the side-saddle. They would shake their heads and mutter to each other about the place of a Boer woman in the homestead and, as the years passed, the subject of who would ‘tame die wildsbokke’ in marriage was a topic of gossip, whenever the older women gathered.

Suitors had tried, arriving at the Van Aardt homestead in their Sunday suits, carrying fresh flowers. At best, they were met by polite indifference, at worst they were rebuffed with a wry comment. Not that Helena was indifferent to men. There was her mother to care for, a farm to help run. Love would have to wait.

Helena’s reverie was broken by movement on the horizon. She touched the stock of the Martini Henry and reined in Somer. A figure was leading a pony, using a track that would lead close to the Van Aardt farm. It could be a passing farmer, but hopefully a neighbour’s husband returning from kommando. She urged Somer into a gallop, choosing a route that would cross the traveller’s path. As the distance closed, she could see that the horse looked ill-fed and its owner limped. He was likely a Boer returning from kommando. He could have news of her brother. Maybe a letter.

Helena stopped Somer in a flurry of dust where the tracks met and waited. She recognised the limp; her heart sank. It was the result of a broken femur; shattered by a pony’s kick many years ago. It was Piet Krog. Helena had known him since childhood and had disliked him since then. The Krogs scratched a living on the lower slopes of the Drakensberg. Piet was one of at least seven children, and the least likeable of them. She had not seen any of the Krogs for more than two years and had presumed they had given up their struggle and gone to live in one of the mining towns. As he came closer, Krog recognised Helena.

‘Well, if it isn’t Miss van Aardt.’

He swept off his battered hat with a flourish and gave a mock bow. His hair was plastered to his scalp; there were shadows under his eyes, and his face needed a wash.

‘Hello, Piet. How are you?’

Helena inclined her head and forced a smile. She had always found it hard to look Piet Krog in the eye and, as a waft of his unwashed body reached her, she flared her nostrils. It was a reminder of why she had spent her school years avoiding him. Krog’s dark eyes glittered in their sunken sockets.

‘I’m well. I’ve been away at the war, fighting the English.’ He stood a little straighter and grimaced at her with crooked teeth.

‘Good for you. Which kommando are you with? Did you see my brother?’ She immediately regretted being too anxious.

‘I am with the Staatsartillerie. I help fire the big guns. It is a very important job.’

‘Oh, well done.’

‘They gave me leave. I’m on my way home now, to see my mother.’

Helena was not sure if Krog was being evasive or just plain stupid over the matter of her brother. She put it down to the former.

‘Have you seen Jan?’

A shadow crossed Krog’s face at the thought of Jan van Aardt. It was a memory of the mockery he had suffered as a child at the hands of Jan and his friends at the church school. The cruelty of his classmates had not extended to Krog purely because of his unwashed and ragged appearance. He was regarded as a sneak and a bully of younger children and was punished accordingly by his peers. Chief among those who meted out playground justice was Jan van Aardt.

‘Yes, I saw Jan. It was at Ladysmith.’

‘How was he when you saw him? Is he well?’

Krog sensed her anxiety. ‘I was manning one of the big guns that we fired into Ladysmith. We’ve surrounded the English there. They are sending an army to relieve the town, but they have to cross the Tugela first. General Botha will fight them there. We will defeat them.’ He adopted what he thought was a serious expression, to go with the military news he was imparting.

Helena fought back the urge to scream at him. She took a deep breath. ‘How is Jan? What did he say?’

Krog looked thoughtful for a moment. ‘Oh, this and that. You know...’ There was a glint in his eyes.

Helena felt her rage rising, but she knew that losing her temper was not the way to handle Krog. She decided to call his bluff and started to tug on Somer’s rein. ‘Oh well, I must go. I have to get this duiker into the larder.’

‘I have something.’ Krog reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. A smug grin spread across his face. ‘I told Jan I was heading home and he asked me to give you this.’

‘How lovely. Thank you.’ Helena nudged Somer round and moved the pony closer to him. She put her hand out for the letter. Krog’s smile faded. His gaze shifted from her face and fixed on her thigh where it hugged the saddle. He licked his lips. A fly buzzed over the bullet wound on the duiker. Helena swiped at it and shifted uneasily. Somer flicked her tail.

‘Give me the letter, please.’ She reached out her hand further, wary of leaning too far out of the saddle.

Krog’s gaze lingered on the swell of Helena’s chest, then returned to her face. He was breathing heavily. ‘You’ve grown since I last saw you.’

‘Piet. The letter... please.’ Her arm was still outstretched.

‘You are prettier than I remember.’

‘That’s enough. The letter. Now.’

Krog’s pony twitched its tail and nickered to Somer. The Basuto pony snorted in reply and stepped away. Helena dropped her arm and forced a smile. She knew she had to go along with his game, if she was going to get the letter without making a scene.

‘How is your mother? Is she still sick? I was thinking of paying her a visit.’

‘She is as well as can be expected.’

Helena stepped Somer closer again. Krog held out the letter. She met his gaze, watching for more trickery, then raised her hand and took it.

‘Thank you.’

‘You are most welcome. Please, pass on my regards to your mother.’

Helena held Krog’s gaze as she coaxed Somer into a turn. ‘I’ll tell her you were asking after her. Goodbye. Tot siens.’

She dug in her heels and the pony burst into a gallop. Krog shouted something at her retreating back, but his words were lost in the rumble of Somer’s hooves. He watched her go and spat into the dust. He had fantasised long and hard about Helena van Aardt during his teenage years and meeting her again had reignited his desire. He had never been with a white woman, his forays into the mysteries of the female body being restricted to frantic couplings with Maria, his family’s ageing black servant.

He was only two hours from home now. His loins stirred at the thought of taking Maria into the barn that night. He had half a bottle of Cape Brandy in his saddlebag, and he knew she would accept a few mouthfuls of it by way of payment for lifting her dusty skirts for him. Krog tugged on the bridle of his flagging mount. His lust gave him new energy. He limped homewards.