The covenant - James A. Michener [356]
'As bad as on the Vaal River?'
'Worse. Mzilikazi was wily and brilliant. Dingane is terrible and undisciplined. If I'm ever absent, keep the wagons in laager.' 'We haven't been in laager for months.'
'I've seen Dingane,' Tjaart said. 'I've seen his kraal. This man is a king, and kings invade.'
Three times in the next days he contemplated following his wife's advice and leaving this encampment, and he even went so far as to consult with his son-in-law: 'Theunis, how would you respond to Jakoba's belief that we should leave here, climb the mountain and go north, as we proposed?'
'I would go tomorrow.'
'Why?'
'Balthazar Bronk, he's a tyrant. He's not a man to lead other men.'
Tjaart laughed. 'You're angry with him for demoting you.'
'That's one reason,' Theunis confessed. 'But we're in a new land, new problems. Desperately this people needs a predikant. Our church has refused to countenance us, so we should establish our own rules.'
'I tried. You saw me try, and we were defeated.'
'I would like to go north with you, Tjaart, and find our own land. Believe me, this Natal is contaminated.'
It was contaminated in ways that the sick-comforter either did not know or refused to recognize, for Minna, always fearful that the trek might split and take Ryk Naude from her permanently, was stealing out to see him at every opportunity, and he seemed as eager as she for these assignations. This left Aletta free, and for reasons that no one could have explained, and certainly not the participants, she threw herself in Tjaart's way, knowing that he was hungry for her. It was a strange and ugly situation, the more so in that the aggrieved parties, Jakoba and Theunis, were among the strongest of the Voortrekkers, and the best. They never spoke to each other of their private griefs, but in their family prayers little Theunis, twisted to one side, sometimes became eloquent when he invoked God on behalf of the Voortrekkers, seeking for them a strength unusual, a devotion unworldly. Often at the end of his protracted prayers tears would spring from both his eyes, not only from the blemished one.
The Van Doorns were not able to leave Blaauwkrantz, because Piet Retief came riding into camp with an urgent request: 'I need a hundred men to accompany me to Dingane's Kraal. And they must be good horsemen.'
'Why?' a murmur of voices asked.
'Tjaart knows why,' and he asked Van Doorn to describe the exhibitions Dingane had provided for his visitors during the last meeting: the military drills, the dancing of the oxen. 'I want our horsemen to show that king something he's never even imagined. Boer strength. Our horsemen in their speediest drill.'
He was not able to enlist the full hundred, but he did get seventy-one skilled horsemen, including himself and his son. Of course, some thirty-one Coloureds rode along, for the Voortrekkers engaged in not a single operation, warlike or peaceful, without their usual complement of assistants. Besides, some of the Coloured were exciting horsemen, and Retief was counting on them to adorn the display he had in mind.
Added to the roster were Tjaart and Paulus de Groot, two weeks short of six years old and already a practiced horseman; as Tjaart said farewell to Jakoba and the Nels, he promised them that he would protect the boy and be home soon with an agreement giving the Voortrekkers rights in Natal. Plans for seeking a safer home in the north were abandoned.
It was a beautiful summer's journey down to the Tugela and across it into the heart of Zululand, but it was dangerously seductive, for the Voortrekkers had convinced themselves that no harm could befall them. Even Tjaart, who had been warned by the missionary and cautioned by his wife, forgot his apprehensions.
'What could happen to us?' he asked his friends. 'Dingane wanted us to recover his stolen cattle, and there they are, trailing along behind us. He'll welcome us and sign the papers we want.'
They arrived at the great kraal on Saturday morning, 3 February 1838, and the festivities began at once. Paulus encountered