The Diamond Hunter

by Fiona McIntosh

  Joseph sat down and pulled his tribal rug around himself.

  ‘Daddy also says you like to keep watch on our claim.’

  ‘We don’t want anyone else to steal our conker if it tiptoes up from the earth overnight.’

  ‘No.’ She laughed and was surprised to hear footsteps and then a cough. It was her father.

  ‘Oh, this dust. It will kill me,’ he said, hacking loudly into their comfortable quiet.

  Clementine didn’t know a world without the cloud of dust that hung over the Big Hole and she preferred the nights because she didn’t have to look at it; it seemed to settle and allow her to instead see the night sky, depthless and limitless in its vast blackness.

  ‘You left me,’ James bleated, slumping beside her.

  She giggled. ‘You were snoring, Daddy. Ooh, look!’ Clementine nudged Joseph and pointed.

  ‘What should I see?’

  ‘A falling star. Daddy, you said we must always make a wish when we see one.’ She didn’t see the Zulu wince as she grabbed her friend’s large hand with its grazed, still-bleeding knuckles, and she took her father’s hand too, placing both in her lap.

  ‘What shall we wish for, darlin’?’

  ‘That tomorrow we find the big diamond.’

  She screwed up her eyelids with exaggerated tightness, squeezing their hands as hard as she could. ‘Wish it with me.’

  She was pleased they obliged, opening their eyes finally.

  ‘Clem, look how bright Venus is.’

  She pointed for the benefit of Joseph. ‘That’s called a bright planet.’

  ‘Let’s continue your astronomy education, Clem,’ her father said. ‘Do you know the brightest star in the sky?’

  ‘Northern or southern hemisphere?’ she asked, wrapping her tongue around that last difficult word.

  Her father chuckled. ‘Don’t be cocky.’

  ‘The North Star?’ she tried, looking unsure.

  ‘Good effort, Clem, but no. The brightest star is called Sirius. We can see him from anywhere in the world because he sparkles so clearly. There he is. He has the nickname “the Dog Star”.’

  ‘Why, Daddy?’

  ‘His constellation – do you remember us talking about a constellation?’ She nodded. ‘In Latin the constellation that Sirius belongs to is called Canis Major, or the Greater Dog. If we link the main stars, you can quite easily pick out the shape of a dog. And from here in Africa we can see him arcing across the sky directly overhead, but if we were in England, then he’d be in a more southern direction.’ James traced with an outstretched finger. ‘From south-east to south-west from your mother’s home of Woodingdene Estate.’ He nodded as if in private thought. ‘He’s easy to find, but in case you need help, look for Orion’s Belt – you remember that, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes. Mrs Carruthers said I was talking a lot of rubbish when I explained it to the class.’

  ‘Mrs Carruthers needs her big backside slapped for talking to you like that.’

  Clem dissolved into giggles.

  He continued. ‘Find those three stars of Orion’s Belt and draw an imaginary line through them and keep going and they will lead you to Sirius . . . always chasing Orion.’

  She listened to her father sigh.

  ‘I know this is hard to believe but Sirius burns brighter than our sun, Clem, and although I haven’t seen it, I have spoken to astronomers who tell me that its radial arms —’ he pointed again — ‘you see those pointed rays that spike from the main glow?’ As he leaned close she smelled the whisky but it wasn’t the sour tang of a drunk tonight, as she’d dreaded. Instead his breath had a honey-sweet quality that spoke of the Scottish ancestry he’d whispered about at night when she had cried for her mother. Here, right now, was the father she loved: affectionate and full of interest. She was still holding the hand of the Zulu, too. He was the counterbalance: strong, wise, always sober, always looking out for her. Clementine missed her mother but she never wanted to be separated from the two men in her life – if these were her parents, they were more than enough. She returned her attention.

  ‘Well, apparently those radial arms, they twinkle in a rainbow of marvellous colours. He really is a special star, that one.’

  ‘Then we should call our conker Sirius when we find it,’ she said.

  ‘Actually, that’s a great name for a diamond, if we ever find one. Here’s to tomorrow’s digging, then.’

  ‘Coming to bed, Clem?’

  ‘I’ll bring her, Mr James,’ Joseph assured him.

  James yawned and kissed his daughter’s greasy hair, then he hauled himself to his feet, nodded goodnight and shuffled away.

  Joseph gestured towards the sky. ‘The star your father speaks of. We call this inDosa. The star that pulls the night across the sky and draws the dawn,’ he said and she saw the gleam of his teeth.

  She repeated it and his smile widened. ‘You make a good Zulu.’

  Joseph squeezed Clem’s hand. ‘We have to try harder, Miss Clementine.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  The Zulu lifted one of his large shoulders. ‘For your father. His shadow is darkening.’

  ‘He wasn’t drunk.’

  ‘That is why I feel . . .’ He reached for the right word. ‘Uncomfortable,’ he settled upon, although he frowned uncertainly. ‘Mr James was sad tonight. I don’t trust this. This is when sickness comes.’

  ‘So what do we do?’

  ‘You must stay close. Keep him smiling.’

  ‘I’ll try.’

  The Zulu stood without breaking their link, bending so he did not lose hold of her hand. ‘Your daddy didn’t tell you that inDosa has a star that follows him. Ask him about it. You are that little star that must follow, but one day you will become Sirius and you will shine brightly.’

  ‘But who will follow me?’

  ‘I shall. Always.’

  ‘But what if you die first?’

  He chuckled low and deep, his teeth gleaming in the minimal light. ‘Then my spirit shall follow you.’

  ‘Tell me about what to do when you die so that I can take care of you properly.’

  Again, he laughed, this time openly. ‘I am nowhere near my time, Miss Clementine.’

  ‘I don’t want anyone to burn you, Joseph.’

  ‘We bury our dead, Miss Clementine, often wrapped in the skin of the animal we kill, as blood must be shed.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s a sacrifice to the gods so that no misfortune comes to the family or to the dead person as they make their way to join their ancestors. It’s about giving the dead what we call light feet for their spirit’s journey ahead, so they don’t get lost or trapped between here and the afterlife.’

  ‘I wonder if your one shoe will make your journey too heavy. Should I take it off your foot?’

  He laughed delightedly. ‘If you wish.’

  ‘Then you can move easily on your bare foot like a good Zulu and follow me on tiptoe forever, never making a sound.’

  He nodded.

  ‘But, Joseph . . .’

  ‘Yes, Miss Clementine?’

  ‘Please don’t die.’

  ‘I promise.’

  She clung to him suddenly and he lifted her into the cradle of his arms as he stood to his full height and pointed. ‘And I will always be watching you and proud of you, wherever you are.’

  2

  WOODINGDENE ESTATE, NORTHUMBERLAND, ENGLAND

  March 1872

  Reggie Grant stared at the pages, trying to convince himself that what he had now read three times couldn’t be true. The battered envelope had been placed among the other letters to the right of his water glass; its jewel-coloured stamps had dragged his attention away from the morning headlines simply by the fact they were from Africa. His spirits lifted. At last! It had been far too long since he’d heard from her.

  He barely looked at the front of the letter. Its underside was smudged with reddish grime, and it had clearly travelled an arduous journ
ey via Her Majesty’s Post to reach him. He did not even bother searching for the letter opener, as the envelope’s flap unglued itself at the barest pressure of his fingernail at its edge.

  Yet before he could read the two pages, he was distracted by the arrival of the newly appointed Robert Milton. Now essentially in charge of running the household staff, he was also available to help Reggie with anything else, from his wardrobe to driving him down to London if need be. A jack-of-all-trades, Reggie thought to himself, with only a hint of disgust that he’d arrived on the scene too late to enjoy the full life of the landed gentry with a queue of servants for various duties.

  Still, it was a far cry from the damp London flat whose weariness had been hidden beneath overwrought colour and the Second Empire-longing of his French mother; they’d been able to overlook its drab address thanks to his father’s promise of good things to come. Nevertheless, Spitalfields was where he had been raised by a mother who shared her favours for the right price. Even in his youth, when she still cut a superb hourglass figure in her bustle and silks, he had known that her breathy French accent and generous manner made her one of the most irresistible prostitutes in London. After the slums of Paris, where they’d started out, the Spitalfields flat – courtesy of Henry Grant, who wanted his ‘mistress’, as he termed her, on call whenever he wished – was a mansion.

  And so Woodingdene Estate, a genuine sprawling country manor that seemed to promise money on tap, might as well have been Buckingham Palace to Reggie.

  ‘What can I get for you, sir?’ Milton cut across his thoughts; he’d settled into his new role with ease and gave Reggie confidence that he could head up this family and make his own mark on the world, despite the large footsteps he followed.

  ‘Is Mrs Grant taking breakfast?’

  ‘I gather she’s had a tray sent up,’ Milton said.

  ‘Is she unwell?’

  ‘That’s not my understanding.’

  Adroitly said, Reggie thought. Milton would do well, but he would have a long path ahead of him yet to convince Lilian Grant that the family’s former butler could not remain. Reggie had graciously fashioned it as retirement. Although he was generous, Bellamy and others had resented the arrival of the ‘bastard son’ into their lives. The situation had become untenable as far as Reggie was concerned and he had taken a broom to the staff who lived in the past, in which his father’s word had been household law. He grieved for his father and regularly wished it had been the viper-tongued Lilian who had died, but they were now unhappily cloistered together at Woodingdene. He knew it was up to him to make the concessions that made life together bearable, despite how much she loathed him.

  ‘That I have a different mother is not my fault,’ Reggie had argued with her not so long ago. ‘But I am still Henry Grant’s son. You need me now.’

  ‘We got along just fine without you.’

  ‘Did you? Is that why my father went in search of comfort elsewhere, then?’

  He had watched the verbal blow land and he’d observed the pain of it glancing across her features: the tightening of her lips and the brief closing of the eyelids until it passed.

  ‘With whom he whored is not my concern.’

  ‘Yes, but I’m the result and he gave me his name. And on his deathbed he gave me instructions. About you, about Louisa and Clementine. Lilian, this is an old argument. You’ve been at my throat for the entire time that my sister —’

  ‘Half-sister,’ she remarked with an acid tone.

  He deliberately smiled to show she couldn’t hurt him.

  ‘Lilian,’ he began again, ‘I know you love Louisa. I know you dote on Clementine. I hope you understand that despite our differences I feel the same way about them. They are all we both have. So, love them. Don’t fill your heart with any more loathing for me. I gave my father a promise about the three women of this family, and I intend to keep it.’

  ‘Until you find a woman of your own – you’re nearly thirty. Then the pecking order will change sharply.’

  Oh, a new tack. This fresh argument was revealing. ‘You have absolutely nothing to fear there. Nothing whatsoever,’ he impressed upon her, hoping she would catch his hidden meaning but not the true one.

  He recalled how Lilian Grant had fixed him with her stare, cold as a glacier. He’d refused to look away from it and let its iciness scorch him as she turned over his carefully disguised remark. He’d absorbed the burn and gathered that she’d finally understood. ‘I see,’ she’d remarked with a single raised eyebrow.

  Relief had drained through him. Let her think he was one who preferred the affections of men, he told himself. As galling as that might be, it was preferable to the horror that might unfold if she, or indeed anyone else, knew the truth of his condition.

  His mind moved away from the syphilis and back to Lilian Grant. There was no doubting her beauty in her youth; men must have fallen over themselves to win her favour. While faded now that she was well into her sixties, she ate modestly to remain trim, walked daily, forced her posture to be military-straight at all times and kept her mind sharp by devouring the newspaper. He found himself helplessly impressed when he compared her to his slovenly mother, who by this time of day was still recovering from the previous night’s debauchery.

  ‘Then I hope you can be discreet,’ she’d warned, breaking into his thoughts.

  They’d never spoken of that topic again but his had been the right words at just the right time to appease her fears. While their relationship hadn’t become closer, they’d reached an understanding – albeit an uneasy one – that Reggie was here to stay at Woodingdene and that her best interests would be protected.

  The butler cleared his throat.

  ‘So, can I blame you, Milton, for her lack of interest?’ he said lightly, returning his attention to the letter. He wasn’t sure yet whether the new butler had a sense of humour.

  ‘I think you can, sir. Mrs Grant is finding it hard to adjust to my presence, I suspect.’

  It seemed his most senior staff member was trained in the understatement. ‘Thank you, Milton. Just some porridge and cream this morning.’

  ‘Very good, sir. Would you like me to pour?’ the man asked, nodding towards the silver pot not far from where the morning post sat. He reminded Reggie of a donkey: grey-toned and a sad-dish expression within a long face – he’d find what amused him yet.

  ‘No, I can do it.’

  Milton departed to leave Reggie alone in the enormous space they called the breakfast room. Reggie poured his tea and, ignoring the tongs for the gleaming, wafer-thin lemon slices that Lilian would have preferred, selected instead the small milk jug and splashed some of its contents into the strong brew. He took a first hot sip of the rich Assam and turned his sights to the folded letter, anticipating a long, humorous missive from his sister.

  Half-sister, he clarified in Lilian Grant’s voice. He sighed. If he was honest, they had been nastier to each other when his father was alive, perhaps both jostling for his attention and hating the other receiving it. Since his death more than a year ago a new and awkward existence, which felt like a truce, had helped them to survive, if just for Louisa’s sake. Louisa was the named heir to Woodingdene, not him. Lilian could not run the estate, nor did she wish to, and she had admitted to him that she knew he would do so in their shared best interests. It was the one and only concession he had received from her.

  When he opened the letter, sipping his tea again with pleasure, he was surprised to see that it was not from Louisa. He frowned, looked again at the envelope’s front and felt a dip of disappointment that it lacked all the loops and beautiful curves of his sister’s hand. Instead it was near enough to printing, in the brief and staccato style of her engineer husband.

  He put down his cup, the saucer protesting with a tinkling complaint at his pressure of disgust. He sighed audibly, wondering now about his porridge taking so long and the day’s tasks ahead. He really wasn’t interested in anything James Knight had to say; if Kni
ght was writing, then he had likely run out of money. Glancing absently over the pages, he saw that the handwriting began neatly enough but rapidly degenerated over the course of the two brief sheets; he could almost imagine that the man writing it had suffered a seizure of sorts.

  It couldn’t be true. But it also couldn’t be a jest. James was explaining that Louisa had died. Surely he’d misread that? Dead? No! Suddenly, swallowing was no longer silent and effortless but became a dry trial, and he became aware of his breath, could hear it like a loud rasp in the cavernous room – he had to inflate his lungs deliberately, unsure he could rely on his unconscious mind to keep breathing. A firm thump behind his ear was his pulse pounding as shock sprinted through his body. He felt instantly light-headed. Reggie glanced at the date at the top of the letter and let out a soft groan. His sister had not just recently died but was long dead, it seemed, buried in the miserable depths of the African desert where her body would desiccate and disappear.

  He read it twice more. It was obvious the man was broken but he couldn’t give a flying fig about Knight and his emotions.

  Louisa’s husband was the sole reason she was dead.

  Milton arrived with a fixed smile. ‘Your porridge and cream, sir . . .’

  Milton stopped his approach at the sound of crockery upending as Reggie stood suddenly. In flinging his napkin and banging the table, he had spilled his tea.

  ‘Mr Grant? Are you —’

  ‘Milton, please summon Mrs Grant. Convey it is urgent. I will be in my father’s study.’

  They sat opposite each other across the twin pedestal desk. Their enemy status had been reforged into something new through a far keener grief than had marked Henry’s passing. Reggie stared at the bright walnut grain, honeyed in parts and embellished on every surface with neo-Gothic decoration. He laid his hands against the warm, tooled-leather writing surface of the desk and drew a low breath. As with all of his father’s furnishings it was highly decorated and Reggie found it strangely comforting, as though he was finally experiencing an embrace from a father who had felt duty rather than affection towards the bastard son.