It felt rather pleasant, sitting on a keg of small beer, but, he stood with a stifled groan, raised his pocket telescope once more, and gave the terrain a very close look-over.
Damme, are those springboks? he wondered, noting some white-and-tawny-coated things deep in a thorn tree thicket; Thought the clatter from the army would’ve scared them off!
They were nigh a cable’s distance off, he estimated, but there might be a chance to stalk them, pot one, field-dress it for supper …
“No,” he muttered. “It’d rot before we camp for the night, and the rest period’s too damned short, anyway.”
He sat back down, raised his magnum champagne bottle canteen, and took a deep drink.
“You, there! What detachment is this, and how do you come to be here?” someone was calling at them in one of those arrogant, and plummy, voices that simply got up Lewrie’s nose.
He stood and looked left, to see an elegantly uniformed young officer on a fine blooded horse pacing up to them. The officer wore a fore-and-aft bicorne trimmed with gold lace, and plumed with white egret feathers. It was tipped so low on his forehead that he had to look down his nose at them—or was that his usual demeanour when dealing with common soldiers and social inferiors?
“Good morning,” Lewrie called to him. “We are part of the Naval Brigade, sent ashore to land the siege artillery, and guard your baggage train. Captain Sir Alan Lewrie, Baronet, of the Reliant frigate.”
The bloody knighthood looks like it’ll prove useful, again, he thought.
“Good God above, sir!” the officer yelped in indignation, after taking a quick and dismissive look at Lewrie’s men. “You are drinking, sir? You allow your men spirits? Scandalous!”
“It’s water, sir,” Lewrie told him, feeling the urge to raise his bottle to his mouth for another guzzle. “My Marines are the only ones with proper canteens, so we had to improvise.”
At least he hoped that his men had only water! He had learned long ago how devious sailors could be when it came to getting and hiding stashes of rum or brandy, in the most unlikely places. His party might not be able to pass a close inspection, no matter how carefully their bottles had been checked before being filled. In point of fact, he had two pint flasks of spirits in his own bed-roll!
The officer, a Captain of Foot who had yet to introduce himself, un-buttoned his elegant tunic and clawed out a sheaf of papers from an inside breast pocket. “Look here, Captain … Lewis, was it? I find no mention of any naval parties serving ashore, and certainly no mention of your party in our order of march.”
“It’s Lewrie, not Lewis, and my orders come from Commodore Popham and General Sir David Baird,” Lewrie countered, producing his own papers. “And, strictly speakin’, we are not listed in the order of march, but are out on the flank of the baggage train, doin’ what we are ordered t’do … guarding it.”
“Humph! I see here that the so-called Naval Brigade’s first duty is to land the siege artillery, and guard the stores still piled above the beaches,” the Army officer said, looking up from the offered papers with a raised, dubious brow and handing them back. “I very much doubt that even the broadest interpretation of your orders may justify your presence anywhere near here, sir! Besides,” he huffed, and made a snide little grin, “the baggage train is already guarded by a battalion of Foot, as one may clearly see from here.”
“Your battalion’s spaced out in company lots, on both flanks, and at the rear, sir, right next to the waggons and pack animals, and eatin’ so much dust, they can’t see their hands in front of their faces. Have they any idea there’re impalas in the thorn trees? Or warthogs rootin’ round out in the open, not a quarter-mile off?” Lewrie pointed out, becoming irked at the man’s high-handedness. “Now, do those impalas spook, it’s good odds that it could be Dutch cavalry, sneakin’ up on the waggons. Do they break cover East or West, it’s something t’be concerned about. Do they run off South, then it’s our noises that does it. That’s why we’re out here, sir, where we can see any threat, and why I’ve pickets out beyond us.”
Which is what yer battalion should be doin’, Lewrie left to the soldier’s imagination—if he had one; And yes, I am teachin’ your granny how to suck eggs!
“I would strongly advise that you and your party return to the beach, Captain Lewrie,” the Army officer said, stiffening in umbrage to be told his trade. “Your men are not trained soldiers, and are an impediment to the Army’s movements. Too weak a force, more in need of protection than anything else!”
“I think I’ll obey my orders as written, sir,” Lewrie objected, “and we stand warned.”
“I will report this to General Baird,” the Army Captain threatened, glowering.
“When you do, sir, please extend my warmest regards to Sir David,” Lewrie replied with a perky version of his best “shit-eating” grin, and doffed his hat. “Good day to you. Hoy, Mister Simcock! Hoy, Mister Westcott! Call in the pickets, and form ranks!”
Lewrie hopped down from the bed of the waggon and went to join the Marines at the head of the column, leaving the Army officer to fume, jerk reins, and canter off in search of someone to complain to.
“You have been making friends with our compatriots in the Army, sir?” Lt. Simcock said from the corner of his mouth.
“Makin’ friends wherever I go, Mister Simcock,” Lewrie beamed back. “Will you just look at that, sir!”
That mounted officer had ridden to the infantry companies down the right flank of the baggage train, and was chivvying them to take positions further out.
“He may come back and tell us to bugger off for good and all,” Lewrie speculated to the Marine officer, “now that those soldiers are out far enough t’do a proper job.”
“Back to the beach, then, sir?” Simcock asked.
“No, sir,” Lewrie countered. “We’ll just amble on up with the regiments and see what we can see. Carry on, Mister Simcock.”
“Detachment, ’Shun! Shoulder, Hahms! For-ward, March!”
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Adrift and un-wanted, their little column shuffled its way out further to the right, beyond the head of the baggage train and up to the rear of an infantry battalion, taking their own half-hour break for water as the heads of the Army columns began their ascents up towards the Blaauwberg. Up close, the Blaauwberg looked to be merely a pimple compared to the rocky heights beyond, and its slope looked to be even easier, even for field artillery or supply waggons.
“Simply lovely,” Lt. Westcott commented. “The Cape Colony has the grand landscape of Scotland beat all hollow. As impressive as any painting I’ve ever seen of the Alps!”
“Aye, it is dramatic. Starkly so,” Lewrie agreed as he took a slug of stale ship’s water from his magnum bottle. “Once we’re at the top of this hill, I expect one could see for fifty miles on a clear day.”
“As soon as we clear the Dutch off it,” Westcott said with a chuckle. “If they’re there, that is. They might have decided to fort up nearer Cape Town and make their stand there.”
“They had batteries at the head of the bay when the other ships took them under fire, yesterday,” Lewrie cautioned. “No reason for them t’be run off by a few broadsides. Oh, look, Mister Westcott! Here comes the Thirty-fourth Dragoons!”