King or Kaiser

Sullatober Dalton

Description

This is a story of rebellion. In 1914, as the Kaiser's ships threaten the trade routes to Britain, the Westminster government asks South Africa to destroy the Windhoek wireless station that keeps the Kaiser's navy advised of ship movements around the Cape. First, however, the South Africans must deal with a rebellion by those who choose the Kaiser rather than the King. As the Royal Navy battles with the Kaiser's sailors, Koos Jacobs, a young coloured man, rebels against his brother, Abel, being beaten by a farmer and they go on the run. When the Army mistakes Koos for white, he rebels against officers being chosen by the colour of their skin and doesn't correct them. As an officer, further rebellion finds him in Intelligence under Captain Phoxx. This apppointmkent takes him into battle with instructions to be captured and escape. 'Should be easy,' Phoxx tells him. His escape, with Abel's help, leads him to espionage and desperate deeds. There is a price to be paid for rebellion, however. Will the army discover his coloured background and quietly murder him? Will it be the happiness of the white girl who fell in love with him when he saved her from possible mugging?

Informations

• Publié par: Andrews UK
• Date de parution: 14 octobre 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785380037
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Title Page
KING OR KAISER

Sullatober Dalton



Publisher Information
Published in 2014 by
Andrews UK Limited
www.andrewsuk.com
The right of Sullatober Dalton to be identified as the Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1998
Copyright © 2014 Sullatober Dalton
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser. Any person who does so may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.



Dedication
This book is dedicated to the people of Pniel, the village Apartheid forgot.



King Or Kaiser
In 1914, two worlds, six thousand miles apart, one, the winter world of dust and stumpy bushes of the South African Karoo, the other, in the midst of the bustle of London, where summer sunshine warmed England’s green and pleasant land, were brought together by wireless and the efforts of a captain of army intelligence called Phoxx.



Chapter 1
In one of those worlds ...
The dogs were after them. The two Cape Coloured men could hear their baying as the taller of the two dragged his bloodied brother into the donga.
***
Minutes before, Koos Jacobs had been hurrying his steps across the veldt, the sun already half down and winter chill settling on the scrubland that dominated this Northern Cape area of South Africa. Tomorrow was Sunday and their sister, now twelve, eight years younger than Koos, was being confirmed in the morning. If Abel and he were to get to Kimberley and their parent’s home before it was too late, they’d have to step out.
People talked of the Karoo veldt being flat but it was really a series of undulations, rolling one after the other like mile long swells in an endless sea. The small shrubs that survived in the dry climate stood apart like strangers at a party. Close, the red earth showed through the spaces between the shrubs. As it stretched away, the horizon took on the soft grey green of the bushes. Here and there, steep sided hills, koppies, the rocks on their side’s burnt brown and black by the endless sun, interrupted the horizon.
In the troughs between the swells, the rainstorms that dropped from the afternoon clouds in crashes of thunder and crackling streaks of lightening turned the hollows into streams, in places eroding ragged gullies, deep enough to hide a man, where recent unseasonable rains had left trickles and puddles of water.
As much to keep warm in the biting wind as to hurry, Koos broke into a loping run. He hoped his brother Abel would be waiting but you could never tell with Abel’s farmer employer, Rash. Rash had no sympathy with coloured people. His bible taught him they were a bastard race, useful only for carrying water and chopping wood. Since there was no possibility of them aspiring to God’s Heaven, Rash could see no point in their going to worship and might stop Abel from going to their sister’s confirmation.
Despite the puddles in the dongas, the recent rain had been little more than showers and the constant wind had dried the surface of the veldt and Koos’s bare feet turned up little spurts of dust as he ran, long usage having hardened the soles against the odd stone and thorn. He ran lightly for his five foot ten, tall for a coloured man, carrying his height and muscular body well and without the rounding of the shoulders normal for people of his lowly status in their attempts to avoid offending any white man. People like Rash did take offence; others of that ilk had beaten Koos on the pretext that he was getting too white and needed a lesson. Even with his worn work clothes, Koos looked like a tanned, sallow skinned white and that increased the irritation of some of Rash’s type. Koos avoided them when they were in laughing drunken groups.
Abel, a year younger, at nineteen, was shorter, darker and slim, not noticeably scrawny. The kind of person who melted into a crowd. People tended to assume Abel was passive and, in the main, that was true. It was Abel’s intelligence that kept him out of trouble. Few would have accepted work with Rash but Abel had not only accepted the job but had stayed out of trouble - so far.
Closer to the farm buildings, Koos could see how the rain had splashed red earth as high as a man’s waist on the scaling white plaster of the walls of the buildings. There was a main house, a miserable building with a rusty, moth eaten, corrugated iron roof; an outhouse for storing farm implements and tools; and a long low building set back from both of these where the farm labourers lived, four to a small room, in cots.
It was only different from many other farms, including the one where Koos worked, in that, in the sunny chill of late afternoon, it had a more dismal, almost abandoned air.
The place was so deserted, Koos was surprised to hear several dogs barking excitedly beyond the house. If they’d been barking at him, an intruder, he’d have understood, but their attention seemed to be solely on something he couldn’t see on the other side of the house.
Curious, but in too much haste to investigate, he strode past the main house towards the low buildings where he hoped Abel would be waiting. As he passed the house, he saw the dogs were chained to the draw bar of a wagon. They were barking at a scene that brought blood pumping angrily to his face.
Two white men, a younger one with a sjambok, a whip made from a long strip of rhinoceros hide, the other, older, carrying a shotgun over his arm, were standing close together looking at something, no, someone, tied to the wheel of the wagon. The shirt that covered the tied up torso was torn and marked with red.
‘Hit him some more, Frikkie,’ the older man shouted, laughing. ‘These damned Hotten’ots need a real good lesson to get anything into their thick curly heads.’
Koos was turning away when the person tied to the wheel lifted his head and Koos recognised the movement as his brother, Abel’s.
The young white man grinned and raised the whip. It flicked across Abel’s back leaving another red stripe.
Koos started to run.
The young white man drew the whip back again but Koos caught it and jerked it from his hand.
‘Hey!’ the older man shouted, raising the shotgun. Koos used the handle of the whip to hit him a glancing blow on the side of the head and the man dropped.
The young white turned to grab Koos. Koos hit him with the stiff handle low in the crotch. He screamed in agony. Koos hit him with his left hand, sending him sprawling.
In anger, Koos lashed the squealing young white as he squirmed on the ground. As the youngster tried to rise, Koos side-swiped the whip and the blood splashed where the lash cut into the terrified face.
The young white started to crawl away and Koos was about to follow when he heard Abel moan and turned to help his brother, smelling of blood and sweat and earth.
The dogs went crazy, barking and snarling in fury, foaming saliva dribbling from their gaping red mouths, their chains snapping tight with a bang in their desperation to get at Koos.
Koos grabbed the shotgun where it had fallen. The younger white struggled to his knees. Koos waved the shotgun towards the house and the younger man stumbled off.
Koos pulled a knife from his belt and sawed at Abel’s bonds. The older man stirred but Koos kept sawing.
Above the clamour of the dogs, Koos heard the screen door of the house rattle as the younger man reached the house.
Abel’s right hand came loose and Abel turned towards Koos, smiling recognition.
When the other hand came free, Abel fell to the ground. The dogs barked furiously at him.
‘Get up, Abel! Get up! We need to get out of here,’ Koos shouted.
The older white man, whom Koos now recognised as Rash, got to his feet, stared at Koos, looked as if he might tackle Koos, Koos stared back, waggled the shotgun and the man ran to the house.
The dogs leapt at Koos, snarling and barking, but the chains snatched their throats in mid leap and flung them back, chocking, to turn snarling with hate.
‘He’s gone to get another gun, or the key to let the dogs loose,’ Koos roared above the barking of the dogs and the rattling of the dogs’ chains as he dragged Abel to his feet.
‘Don’t steal the gun, Koos,’ Abel muttered.
‘They’ll send the dogs after us, Abel,’ Koos told him as he gathered two cartridges Rash had dropped. ‘Now RUN,’ he yelled.
Abel staggered a few paces, Koos grabbed his hand and pulled and Abel picked up his stride.
‘Go to the donga, where they can’t see us,’ Abel yelled. ‘There’s water running in it and the dogs won’t be sure which way we’ve gone.’
In the dimming light of the quick twilight, Abel stumbled and fell. Koos grabbed him with his free arm, pulling him to his feet.
The noise of the dogs rose again, presumably as Rash turned them loose.
Koos looked back but Abel shouted, ‘Come on Koos, we’re nearly there.’
The dogs barking changed, going quieter.
‘They’ve got the dogs loose, Koos!’
‘Into the donga,’ Koos shouted as Abel hesitated on the edge.
The slid down the steep bank and splashed into a puddle.
‘Downstream,’ Koos shouted.
The stream wasn’t much more than a series of shallow pools and they ran sliding and splashing, losing and regaining their balance, the bloody tatters of Abel’s shirt trailing behind.
‘Ke