This Was the Old Chief's Country

by Doris Lessing

  As for Paul, he said to James: ‘Let’s start prospecting.’ James said: ‘There’s no hurry.’ ‘Yes, there is, there is,’ insisted the boy, and with a shrug James went to find his hammer.

  Together they spent some days working over the nearer parts of the bush. At this stage they did not go near the Barnes’s farm, but kept on the neighbouring farm. This neighbour was friendly because he hoped that a really big reef could be found and then he could sell his land for what he chose to ask for it. Sometimes he sent a native to tell them that there was a likely reef in such and such a place, and the man and the boy went over to test it. Nothing came of these suggestions. Mostly Paul slept in James’s house. Once or twice, for the sake of peace, he went home, looking defiant. But Maggie greeted him pleasantly. She had gone beyond caring. She was listless and ironic. All she feared was that Alec would find out that Paul was prospecting. Once she said, trying to joke: ‘What’d you do if Paul found gold?’ Alec responded, magnificently: ‘Any fool can find gold. It takes intelligence to use the divining rod properly.’ Maggie smiled and shrugged. Then she found another worry: that if Paul knew that his father did not think enough of him to care, he might give up the search; and she felt it better for him to be absorbed in prospecting than in running away down South, or simply drinking his time away. She thought sadly that Paul had made for himself an image of a cruel and heartless father, whereas he was more like a shadow. To fight Alec was shadow-boxing, and she remembered what she had felt over the wedding rings. He had lost her ring, she felt as if the bottom had dropped out of their marriage, and all he said was: ‘Send to town for another one, what’s in a ring, after all?’ And what was in a ring? He was right. With Alec, any emotion always ended in a shrug of the shoulders.

  And then, for a time, there was excitement. Alec found a reef that carried gold; not much but almost as much as the mine on the ridge. And of course he wanted to work it. Maggie would not agree. She said it was too risky; and anyway, where would they find the capital? Alec said, calmly, that money could be borrowed. Maggie said it would be hanging a millstone around their necks … and so on. At last experts came from town and gave a verdict: it was under the workable minimum. The experts went back again, but oddly enough, Alec seemed encouraged rather than depressed. ‘There you are,’ he said, ‘I always said there was gold, didn’t I?’ Maggie soothed him, and he went off to try another reef.

  Paul, who had not been home for a couple of weeks, got wind of this discovery and came striding over with a fevered look to demand: ‘Is it true that father’s found gold?’

  ‘No,’ said Maggie. And then, with sad irony: ‘Wouldn’t you be pleased for his sake if he did?’ At that look he coloured, but he could not bring himself to say he would be pleased. Suddenly Maggie asked: ‘Are you drinking, Paul?’ He did not look well, but that was due to the intensity of his search for gold, not due to drink. James would not let him drink: ‘You can do what you like when you’re twenty-one,’ he said, just like a father. ‘But you’re not drinking when you’re with me till then.’

  Paul did not want to tell his mother that he allowed James to order him about, and he said: ‘You’ve got such a prejudice against drink.’

  ‘Plenty of people’d be pleased if they’d been brought up with that prejudice,’ she said, dryly. ‘Look how many ruin themselves in this country with drink.’

  He said, obstinately: ‘James is all right, isn’t he? There’s nothing wrong with him – and he drinks off and on.’

  ‘Can’t you be “all right” without drinking off and on?’ enquired Maggie, with that listless irony that upset Paul because it was not like her. He kissed her and said: ‘Don’t worry about me, I’m doing fine.’ And back he went to James.

  For now he and James spent every spare moment prospecting. It was quite different from Alec’s attitude. James seemed to assume that since this was gold country, gold could be found; it was merely a question of persistence. Quite calmly, he closed down his mine, and dismissed his labour force, and set himself to find another. It had a convincing ring to Paul; it was not nearly as thrilling as with Alec, who was always on the verge of a discovery that must shake the world, no less; but it was more sensible. Perhaps, too, Paul was convinced because it was necessary; and what is necessary has its own logic.

  When they had covered the neighbour’s farm they hesitated before crossing the boundary on to Alec’s. But one evening they straddled over the barbed fence, while Paul lagged behind, feeling unaccountably guilty. James wanted to go to the quartz reef. He glanced enquiringly back at the boy, who slowly followed him, persuading himself there was no need to feel guilty. Prospecting was legal, and he had a right to it. They slowly made their way to the reef. The trenches had been roughly filled in, and the places where the stone had been hammered and blasted were already weathering over. They worked on the reef for several days, and sometimes James said, humorously: ‘When your father does a thing he does it thoroughly …’ For there was hardly a piece of that mile-long reef which had not been examined. Soon they left it, and worked their way along the ridge. The ground was broken by jutting reefs, outcrops, boulders, but here, it seemed, Alec had not been.

  ‘Well, sonnie,’ said James, ‘this looks likely, hey?’

  There was no reason why it should be any more likely than any other place, but Paul was trusting to the old miner’s instinct. He liked to watch him move slowly over the ground, pondering over a slant of rock, a sudden scattering of sparkling white pebbles. It seemed like a kind of magic, as ways of thinking do that have not yet been given names and classified. Yet it was based on years of experience of rock and minerals and soil; although James did not consciously know why he paused beside this outcrop and not the next; and to Paul it appeared an arbitrary process.

  One morning they met Alec. At first Paul hung back; then he defiantly strode forward. Alec’s face was hostile and he demanded: ‘What are you two doing here?’

  ‘It’s legal to prospect, Mr Barnes,’ said James.

  Alec frowned and said: ‘You didn’t have the common decency to ask.’ He was looking at Paul and not at James. Then, when Paul could not find words, he seemed to lose interest and began moving away. They were astounded to hear him remark: ‘You’re quite right to try here, though. It always did seem a likely spot. Might have another shot here myself one day.’ Then he walked slowly off.

  Paul felt bad; he had been imagining his father as an antagonist. So strong was his reaction that he almost lost interest in the thing; he might even have gone back to the farm if James had not been there to keep him to it. For James was not the sort of man to give up a job once he had started.

  Now he glanced at Paul and said: ‘Don’t you worry, son. Your Dad’s a decent chap, when all’s said. He was right, we should have asked, just out of politeness.’

  ‘It’s all very well,’ said Paul, hugging his old resentment. ‘He sounds all right now, but you should have heard the things he said.’

  ‘Well, well, we all lose our tempers,’ said James, tolerantly.

  Several days later James remarked: ‘This bit of rock looks quite good, let’s pan it.’ They panned it, and it showed good gold. ‘Doesn’t prove anything,’ said James. ‘We’d better dig a trench or two.’ A trench or two were dug, and James said, casually: ‘Looks as if this might be it.’ It did not immediately come home to Paul that this was James’s way of announcing success. It was too unheroic. He even found himself thinking: If this is all it is, what’s the point of it? To find gold – what a phrase it is! Impossible to hear it without a quickening of the pulse. And so through the rest: I might find gold, you could find gold; they, most certainly, always seem to find gold. But not only was it possible to drop the words, as if they were the most ordinary in the world, it did not occur to James that Paul might be disappointed. ‘Yes, this is it,’ he confirmed himself, some days later, and added immediately: ‘Let’s get some food, no point in being uncomfortable for nothing.’

  So flat was the scene,
just a few untidy diggings in the low greenish scrub, with the low, smoky September sky pressing down, that Paul was making the thing verbally dramatic in his mind, thus: ‘We have found gold. James and I have found gold. And won’t my father be cross!’ But it was no use at all; and he obediently followed James back to the little shack for cold meat and potatoes. It all went on for weeks, while James surveyed the whole area, digging cross trenches, sinking a small shaft. Then he sent some rocks in to the Assay people and their assessment was confirmed. Surely this should be a moment of rejoicing, but all James said was: ‘We won’t get rich on this lot, but it could be worse.’ It seemed as if he might even shrug the whole thing off and start again somewhere else.

  Once again the experts came out, standing over the diggings making their cautious pronouncements; city men, dressed in the crisp khaki they donned for excursions into the veld. ‘Yes, it was workable. Yes, it might even turn out quite prosperous, with luck.’ Paul felt cheated of glory, and there was no one who would understand this feeling. Not even Maggie; he tried to catch her eye and smile ruefully, but her eye would not be caught. For she was there on her son’s invitation. She walked over to see Paul’s triumph without telling Alec. And all the time she watched the experts, watched Paul and James, she was thinking of Alec, who would have to be told. After all these years of work with his divining rods and his theories; after all that patient study of the marsh light, gold, it seemed too cruel that his son should casually walk over the ridge he had himself prospected so thoroughly and find a reef within a matter of weeks. It was so cruel that she could not bring herself to tell him. Why did it have to be there, on that same ridge? Why not anywhere else in the thousands of acres of veld? And she felt even more sad for Alec because she knew quite well that the reef’s being there, in that ridge, was part of Paul’s triumph. She was afraid that Alec would see that gleam of victory in his son’s eyes.

  In the meantime the important piece of ground lay waiting, guarded by the prescribed pegging notices that were like signboards on which were tacked the printed linen notices listing fines and penalties against any person – even Alec himself – who came near to the still invisible gold without permission. Then out came the businessmen and the lawyers, and there was a long period of signing documents and drinking toasts to everyone concerned.

  Paul came over to supper one evening, and Maggie sat in suspense, waiting for him to tell his father, waiting for the cruel blow to fall. The boy was restless, and several times opened his mouth to speak, fell silent, and said nothing. When Alec had gone to his office to work out some calculations for a new reef, Maggie said: ‘Well, I suppose you’re pleased with yourself.’

  Paul grinned and said: ‘Shouldn’t I be?’

  ‘Your poor father – can’t you see how he’s going to feel about it?’

  All she could get out of him was: ‘All right, you tell him then. I won’t say anything.’

  ‘I’m glad you’ve got some feeling for him.’

  So Paul left and she was faced with the task of telling Alec. She marvelled that he did not know already. All he had to do was lift his eyes and look close at the ridge. There, among the bare thinned trees of the September veld, were the trenches, like new scars, and a small black activity of workers.

  Then one day Paul came again and said – and now he sounded apologetic: ‘You’ll have to tell him, you know. We’re moving the heavy machinery tomorrow. He’ll see for himself.’

  ‘I really will tell him,’ she promised.

  ‘I don’t want him to feel bad, really I don’t, mother.’ He sounded as insistent as a child who needs to be forgiven.

  ‘You didn’t think of it before,’ she said, dryly.

  He protested: ‘But surely – you’ve never said you were glad, not once. Don’t you understand? This might turn out to be a really big thing; the experts said it might. I might be a partner of a really big mine quite soon.’

  ‘And you’re not eighteen yet,’ she said, smiling to soften the words. She was thinking that it was a sad falling-off from what she had hoped. What was he? A small-worker. Half-educated, without ambition, dependent on the terrible thing, luck. He might be a small-worker all his life, with James for companion, drinking at week-ends, the African woman in the kitchen – oh, yes, she knew what went on, although he seemed to think she was a fool. And if they were lucky, he would become a rich man, one of the big financiers of the sub-continent. It was possible, anything was possible – she smiled tolerantly and said nothing.

  That night she lay awake, trying to arouse in herself the courage to tell Alec. She could not. At breakfast she watched his absorbed, remote face, and tried to find the words. They would not come. After the meal he went into his office, and she went quickly inside. Shading her eyes she looked across the mealie-fields to the ridge. Yes, there went the heavy wagons, laden with the black bulk of the headgear, great pipes, pulleys: Alec had only to look out of his window to see. She slowly went inside and said: ‘Alec, I want to tell you something.’ He did not lift his eyes. ‘What is it?’ he asked, impatiently.

  ‘Come with me for a minute.’ He looked at her, frowned, then shrugged and went after her. She pointed at the red dust track that showed in the scrub and said: ‘Look.’ Her voice sounded like a little girl’s.

  He glanced at the laden wagons, then slowly moved his eyes along the ridge to where the diggings showed.

  ‘What is it?’ he asked. She tried to speak and found that her lips were trembling. Inside she was crying: Poor thing; poor, poor thing! ‘What is it?’ he demanded again. Then, after a pause: ‘Have they found something?’

  ‘Yes,’ she brought out at last.

  ‘Any good?’

  ‘They say it might be very good.’ She dared to give him a sideways glance. His face was thoughtful, no more, and she was encouraged to say: ‘James and Paul are partners.’

  ‘And on that ridge,’ he exclaimed at last. There was no resentment in his voice. She glanced at him again, ‘It seems hard, doesn’t it?’ he said, slowly; and at once she clutched his arm and said: ‘Yes, my dear, it is, it is, I’m so very sorry …’ And here she began to cry. She wanted to take him in her arms and comfort him. But he was still gazing over at the ridge. ‘I never tried just that place,’ he said, thoughtfully. She stopped crying. ‘Funny, I was going to sink a trench just there, and then – I forget why I didn’t.’

  ‘Yes?’ she said, in a little voice. She was understanding that it was all right. Then he remarked: ‘I always said there was gold on that ridge, and there is. I always said it, didn’t I?’

  ‘Yes, my dear, you did – where are you going?’ she added, for he was walking away, the divining rod swinging from his hand.

  ‘I’ll just drop over and do a bit of work around their trenches,’ she heard as he went, ‘If they know how the reefs lie, then I can test …’

  He vanished into the bush, walking fast, the tails of his bushshirt flying.

  When Paul saw him coming he went forward to meet him, smiling a rather sickly smile, his heart beating with guilt, and all Alec said was: ‘Your mother told me you’d struck it lucky. Mind if I use my rod around here a bit?’ And then, as Paul remained motionless from surprise, he said, impatiently: ‘Come on, there’s a good kid, I’m in a hurry.’

  And as the labourers unloaded the heavy machinery and James and Paul directed the work, Alec walked in circles and in zigzags, the rods rising and falling in his hands like a variety of trapped insects, his face rapt with thought. He was oblivious to everything. They had to pull him aside to avoid being crushed by the machinery. When, at midday, they asked him to share their cold meat, and broke it to him that they had found a second reef, even richer than the first, with every prospect of ‘going as deep as China’, all he said was, and in a proud, pleased voice: ‘Well, that proves it. I told you, didn’t I? I always told you so.’

  The Antheap

  Beyond the plain rose the mountains, blue and hazy in a strong blue sky. Coming closer they were b
rown and grey and green, ranged heavily one beside the other, but the sky was still blue. Climbing up through the pass the plain flattened and diminished behind, and the peaks rose sharp and dark grey from lower heights of heaped granite boulders, and the sky overhead was deeply blue and clear and the heat came shimmering off in waves from every surface. ‘Through the range, down the pass, and into the plain the other side – let’s go quickly, there it will be cooler, the walking easier.’ So thinks the traveller. So the traveller has been thinking for many centuries, walking quickly to leave the stifling mountains, to gain the cool plain where the wind moves freely. But there is no plain. Instead, the pass opens into a hollow which is closely surrounded by kopjes: the mountains clench themselves into a fist here, and the palm is a mile-wide reach of thick bush, where the heat gathers and clings, radiating from boulders, rocking off the trees, pouring down from a sky which is not blue, but thick and low and yellow, because of the smoke that rises, and has been rising so long from this mountain-imprisoned hollow. For though it is hot and close and arid half the year, and then warm and steamy and wet in the rains, there is gold here, so there are always people, and everywhere in the bush are pits and slits where the prospectors have been, or shallow holes, or even deep shafts. They say that the Bushmen were here, seeking gold, hundreds of years ago. Perhaps, it is possible. They say that trains of Arabs came from the coast, with slaves and warriors, looking for gold to enrich the courts of the Queen of Sheba. No one has proved they did not.

  But it is at least certain that at the turn of the century there was a big mining company which sank half a dozen fabulously deep shafts, and found gold going ounces to the ton sometimes, but it is a capricious and chancy piece of ground, with reefs all broken and unpredictable, and so this company loaded its heavy equipment into lorries and off they went to look for gold somewhere else, and in a place where the reefs lay more evenly.