But chance intervened. Or perhaps governments intervened. The powers that Hardy referred to as organising the ‘scheduled slaughter’ in the War Office and who had sent Drummer Hodge out to the Transvaal, ‘ranged’ (lined up) these two potential friends ‘as infantry’ (soldiers who fight on foot) ‘face to face’. The repeated ‘face’ literally illustrates how their heads were lined up on opposing sides. So does ‘I shot at him as he at me’ – both men are acting in exactly the same way. But it just so happens that (I) ‘killed him’.