by Wilbur Smith
"You are welcome, Louisa." Tom bowed.
Sarah smiled. She hadn't seen him do that for a while- her husband was not the courtly kind. So much for your prison drab, Tom Courtney, she thought complacently, I give you instead a golden Dutch daffodil.
She glanced at her only son, and saw his expression. No doubt about where Jim stands either. It seems that Louisa has been unanimously elected to the Courtney clan.
Later that night Sarah and Tom settled under the blankets in their nightclothes: even down here on the plains the nights were chilly. For twenty years they had slept like spoons, one body fitted into the curve of the other, changing places when one rolled over without waking or losing contact. That night they lay in poignant silence, neither wanting to be the first to speak.
Tom gave in first.
"She is rather pretty," he ventured.
"You might say so," Sarah agreed. "You might even go so far as to say she's no prison drab."
"I never said that." Tom sat up indignantly, but she pulled him down again, and cuddled comfortably into the warm bulge of his belly. "Well, if I did say it, I take it back now."
She knew how much it cost him to admit that he was wrong, and her heart went out to him. "I have spoken to her," she said. "She's a good girl."
"Well, if you say so, that's all right, then." He closed the subject. They began drifting towards sleep.
"I love you, Tom Courtney," she murmured drowsily.
"I love you, Sarah Courtney," he replied. "Young Jim will be a lucky lad if she ever makes him half as happy as you make me." Usually he scorned what he called mawkishness. This was a rare pronouncement.
"Why, Tom Courtney! Sometimes you can still surprise me," she whispered.
They were all up before dawn. Louisa emerged from her wagon, which was parked close alongside Tom and Sarah's. Sarah had placed her there deliberately, and sequestered Jim in the furthest. If there had been any nocturnal shenanigans she would have heard every last whisper.
Poor child, Sarah thought with an inward smile. She had to listen to my Tom's snores all night long. In the event her precautions had proved unnecessary: Tom and the jackals had provided all the vocal entertainment and there had been not so much as a whisper from Louisa's wagon. When Louisa saw Sarah already at the cooking fire she ran to help her with the breakfast, and soon the two were chatting like friends. While Louisa laid rows of sausages to splutter and hiss on the grill, Sarah poured batter on to the flat iron griddle and watched it brown into pancakes.
Tom and Jim were already inspecting the wagons Tom had brought up from the Cape. These were large, powerful vehicles, built in the colony to a design that was constantly being modified to suit the rough African conditions. They ran on four wheels, the front pair of which were used to steer. The pivoted front axle was connected to the disselboom, the long, sturdy main drag pole. The team of twelve oxen were in spanned in pairs by a simple system of yokes, yoke-pins and rawhide ropes. The main harness, or trek-tow;, was connected to the front end of the disselboom. The rear wheels were much larger in diameter than the front pair.
The body of the vehicle was a capacious eighteen feet in length, with a breadth of four feet. At the bow the wooden sides were two feet high, rising to over three at the stern. Along both sides of the body, iron staples were riveted to hold the arched greenwood boughs over which was spread the tent. The interior was about five feet high, so a tall man had to stoop beneath it. The awning was double-layered. A strong
life.
canvas outer sail rendered it waterproof, or at least deterred the ingress of large quantities of rainwater. A mat of coarse coir fibre, woven from the husk of the coconut, insulated the interior from the worst heat of the sun. The long sail curtains at front and back were called the fore clap and afterclap. The driver's seat was a large chest that stretched the full breadth of the wagon, and there was a similar chest at the rear, the fore chest and the after chest Along the outsides of the body and under the floorboards were rows of iron hooks from which were suspended pots and pans, tools, canvas bags, powder kegs and other heavy paraphernalia.
Within the wagon another row of hooks held the square-cut canvas side pockets into which were stuffed spare clothing, combs, brushes, soap and towels, tobacco and pipes, pistols, knives, and anything that might be needed urgently. There were also adjustable pegs to support the car dell the comfortable and spacious bed upon which the traveller slept. By means of the pegs, this could be raised or lowered to make room for the bags, boxes, chests and kegs stored beneath it. Like the camp chairs, the bed was also strung with rawhide riempies, crisscrossed like the catgut strings of the racquets used in the royal game of tennis.
Tom had brought four of these enormous vehicles and the oxen to pull them. Each vehicle required a skilled driver, and a voorloper, a lad to lead the front oxen by a halter of kudu skin looped about the base of their horns.
All four wagons were heavily laden, and after breakfast Sarah and Louisa were summoned to help take an inventory of the contents. For this purpose the wagons had to be unloaded, and all the goods checked. Tom, as an old ship's captain, had made out an itemized bill-of-lading, and Jim had to know exactly where each item was stowed. It would be wasted and frustrating labour if somewhere out in the wilderness they had to unload and search all four wagons to find a lynch-pin, horseshoes or a hank of sail twine.
Even Jim was amazed at what his father had provided for them. "It's all your inheritance, my boy, and there's no more coming to you. Use it wisely."
The huge yellow-wood chest that Sarah had packed for Louisa was placed in the bows of the wagon that would be Louisa's home over the months, perhaps years to come. It contained combs and brushes, needles and thread, a complete wardrobe of clothing and rolls of cloth to make more, gloves and bonnets to protect delicate skin from the sun, scissors and nail files, scented English soaps and medicines. Then there was a thick book of recipes and prescriptions written in Sarah's own hand, invaluable empirical knowledge gathered at first hand: instructions for cooking everything from an elephant's trunk to wild mushrooms, for
making soap and tanning leather; lists of medicinal wild herbs and edible plants and tubers; cures for sunstroke, stomach upsets and a baby's teething problems. Then there was a small library of other books, including a medical lexicon published in London and an almanac beginning at the year 1731, the Holy Bible, ink, pens and writing paper, a box of watercolours and brushes, reams of fine-quality drawing paper, knitting needles and wool, a roll of soft tanned leather from which to make the uppers for footwear- the soles would be cut from buffalo rawhide. Then there was bed-linen, blankets, pillows stuffed with wild goose down, shawls and knitted stockings, a beautiful kaross of jackal fur, a long coat of sheepskin, and a waterproof cape of tarpaulin with an attached hood. That was but the half of it.
Tom's chest was smaller and contained all his old and well-worn clothing, his razor and strop, his hunting and skinning knives, fishing line and hooks, the under box that held his flint and steel, a magnifying glass, a spare telescope, and other items that he would never have considered. They bespoke his mother's concern for his well-being: a long tarpaulin waterproof coat and a wide-brimmed hat of the same material, scarves and gloves, neckerchiefs and woollen socks, a dozen bottles of extract-of-lettuce cough mixture and another dozen of Dr. Chamberlain's sovereign diarrhoea remedy.
When they came to the list of general stores and provisions, this seemed endless. At the head of it were eight quarter-chests of coffee beans, totalling six hundred pounds in weight, and three hundred pounds of sugar. Jim was overjoyed to see them. Then there were two hundred pounds of salt for preserving venison, ten pounds of pepper, a large box of strong curry powder, sacks of rice, flour and maize meal, bags of spices and bottles of flavouring essences for stews and cakes, bottles of jam and kegs of pickles from the kitchens of High Weald. Cheeses and hams hung from the hooks inside the wagons. There were pumpkins and sun-dried maize on the cob, and packets and boxes of veg
etable seeds to be planted wherever they camped long enough to raise a crop.
For cooking and eating there were three-legged pots, baking, stewing and frying pans, saucepans, gridirons and kettles, water buckets, plates and mugs, forks, spoons and soup ladles. Each wagon was equipped with two fifty-gallon Fagies, or water casks. Then there were canteens and water bottles of military design to carry on horseback. There was fifty pounds of yellow soap, and when this was expended Jim could make more with hippopotamus fat and wood ash.
For the maintenance of the wagons there were two drums of tar to be mixed with animal fat to grease the wheel hubs, heavy coils of rawhide
trek ropes, ri ems and straps, yokes and yoke-pins, lynch-pins for the wheel hubs, rolls of canvas and coir matting to repair the tents. One of the after chests contained a selection of tools such as augers, brace and bits, wood planes and spoke shaves, chisels, a heavy vice, blacksmith's tongs and hammers, and a huge selection of other carpenter's and blacksmith's equipment stores, including two hundred horseshoes, bags of nails and drawing knives to trim hoofs.
"Now, these are important, Jim." Tom showed him the iron pestle and mortar for crushing rock samples, and a nest of gold pans, each a broad flat dish with a groove around the circumference. The groove would capture the heavy flakes of gold when the ore or river-sands were washed.
"Old Humbert showed you how to use them." Humbert had been Tom's gold-finder until his liver had succumbed to a steady diet of Hollands gin and cheap Cape brandy. "There is also a tub of slow-match -two hundred yards of fuse for blasting open the reef when you find gold."
As trade goods and gifts to African chieftains and potentates, Tom had selected stores that he knew were highly valued by all the wild tribes they might meet in the far interior: two hundred cheap knives, axe heads, bags of Venetian trade beads in fifty different patterns and colours, hand mirrors, under boxes, coils of thin copper and brass wire to be converted into bracelets, anklets and other ornaments by the indi genes who received them.
There were two fine English hunting-saddles and tack, common saddles for the servants, two pack-saddles for bringing in venison from the veld, a large bell tent for a kitchen and dining room, folding chairs and tables to furnish it.
For hunting and defence against attack by the more warlike tribes Tom had provided twenty naval cutlasses and thirty smooth-bore Brown Bess muskets, which most of the servants could load and fire with some proficiency, two heavy German elephant guns that threw four to the pound and could drive to the heart of an elephant or a rhinoceros, and a pair of iniquitously expensive London-made two-grooved double barrelled rifles so accurate that Jim knew from experience that with the conical bullet he could bring down an oryx or kudu at four hundred paces. There was one other rifle, a lovely little lady's gun made in France. Its provenance was noble for the lock was gold inlaid with the coat of arms of the dukes of d'Ademas. Tom had given it to Sarah when Jim was born. It was light and accurate and there was a pink velvet cheek pad on the walnut stock. Although nowadays she seldom hunted, Jim had once seen his mother drop a running spring buck at two hundred
paces with this weapon. Now she was giving it to Louisa. "It may be
useful."
Sarah dismissed Louisa's thanks, but impulsively Louisa threw both arms round her and whispered, "I shall treasure your gifts, and always remember your kindness to me."
To serve this battery of guns there was an assortment of lead ladles, bullet moulds, loading ramrods, shot-belts and powder flasks. To manufacture ammunition there were five hundredweight of lead in bars, fifty pounds of pewter to harden the balls to be used against heavy game, twenty thousand prepared lead musket balls, twenty kegs of first-class sporting gunpowder for the rifles and a hundred kegs of coarse black powder for the Brown Bess muskets, two thousand gunflints, greased patches to ensure a tight fit of the conical bullets in the rifle bore, fine cotton cloth to be cut into more patches, and a large keg of rendered hippopotamus fat to grease them.
So great was this store of goods that by nightfall on the second day they had not finished reloading the wagons. "That can wait until tomorrow," Tom said expansively, 'but now the ladies are free to make supper for us."
The last meal together was marred by melancholy silences when they were reminded of their imminent parting. These were followed by bursts of forced jollity. In the end Tom brought it to its conclusion with typical directness. "Early start tomorrow." He stood up and took Sarah's hand. As he led her to their quarters in the first wagon he whispered, "Can we leave them alone? Should we not chaperone them?"
Sarah laughed gaily at him. Tom Courtney, what a time for you to turn prissy on me! They have already spent weeks alone in the wilderness together, and it seems they are about to spend several years more. What good could you do now?"
Tom grinned ruefully, picked her up in his arms and boosted her into the wagon. Later as they settled in the car dell bed Sarah murmured, "Don't worry about Louisa. I have told you already that she is a good girl, and we have brought up Jim to behave like a gentleman. Nothing has happened between them yet, and nothing will until the time is ripe. Then herds of wild buffalo could not prevent it. If things have changed when next we all meet we can think of a wedding. As I recall, Tom Courtney, you showed less restraint when we first met, and there was some delay before we celebrated our own nuptials."
"In these matters, at least, you are wiser than me," Tom admitted and pulled her closer. "Mind you, Mistress Courtney, there are no herds of wild buffalo present to prevent anything happening here tonight, between you and me."
"Indeed, Mr. Courtney, how perceptive of you," she said, and giggled like a girl.
p a nrirl
They had taken breakfast and completed the rest of the loading before the sun had fully dispersed the last of the night's chill. With a single stroke of his trek whip Smallboy, the huge head driver, gave the signal to begin in spanning the oxen. This formidable instrument was a bamboo pole twenty-two feet in length, with a whip thong even longer. Without leaving his seat on the wagon or removing his clay pipe from his mouth, Smallboy could kill a fly on the rump of the lead ox in his team with the tapered fore lash of kudu hide and not disturb a hair on the beast's back.
Now as he cracked the long whip with a report like a double-shot ted pistol that could be heard a mile away across the plain, the lead boys ran to yoke the oxen in pairs and bring them in from the veld where they had been grazing. They drove them in with shouted insults and well-aimed pebbles.
"Come, Scotland, you snake with twenty-two fathers and only one mother."
"Hey! Squint Eye, look this way or you will fetch another stone."
"Wake up, Lizard, you lazy skelluml'
"Move along, Blackheart, don't try any of your tricks today."
Pair after pair the beasts were linked into the span. Then the leaders, the strongest and most tractable animals, were led to their places. Smallboy fired his great whip again and, without apparent strain, the oxen walked away and the heavily loaded wagon rolled smoothly after them. At intervals of a few hundred paces the other three wagons fell into caravan behind the leader. They maintained the wide spacing to avoid the dust raised by the hoofs of the leading oxen and the iron rimmed wheels of the vehicles they pulled. Behind the wagons followed a loose herd of horses, spare oxen, milk cows and sheep and goats for slaughter. Although they spread out to graze, they were kept in a loose formation and brought along at a leisurely pace by four herd-boys. None of these lads was older than thirteen or younger than ten. They were some of the orphans Sarah had gathered over the years, and who had pleaded to be allowed to join in the great adventure with Somoya, whom they revered. At their heels ran a motley pack of mongrel hounds, who would earn their keep by hunting and finding wounded game or stray animals.
Soon only one small dog-cart remained in the encampment below
the Baboon's Head kopje, but it was packed and the horses were grazing nearby, ready to take Tom and Sarah back to High Weald. The fa
mily the Baboon's Head kopje, but it was packed and the horses were grazing nearby, ready to take Tom and Sarah back to High Weald. The family were reluctant to part. They drew out the last hour together, drinking a final mug of coffee around the smouldering fire, remembering all the things they had forgotten to say over the last few days, and repeating all those that had been said many times already.