A Cleft Of Stars

by Geoffrey Jenkins

  Von Praeger indicated me. 'I got him, Koen! It's Bowker. Watch your step though; you should see what he's done to Rankin.'

  The newcomer unsnipped the machine-pistol and covered me.

  Allemagtig, Doc! Both of 'em, eh?'

  The crude vowels and gutter accent came from the Lichtenburg diamond fields. The association made me crawl inside. '

  Come on in and see.'

  I reached out unobtrusively for the lamp. Thrown, it would become a flaming Molotov cocktail.

  'Keep away!' snarled Praeger. 'Back! Watch him, Koen!

  All the time. And don't let him get close to you. He's got all the tricks and some besides!'

  The two of them, weapons at the ready, led us through to Rankin's bedside where Praeger showed him the wound. Koen's response was to hold the M-25 on me and give me a long, silent, threatening stare. It was my main impression of him and I saw little else of him that night for shortly afterwards he and Praeger busied themselves clearing out all the equipment from the cave while the hyena kept us securely pinned in the outer enclosure. At the beginning of this operation Praeger spent some time treating Rankin and from time to time checked on him.

  Finally I was ordered into the inner cave and Nadine confined to the mill section. Koen took up sentry on a stool out front. For the first couple of hours he used the torch to make frequent checks on us. It grew weaker. however, and after midnight there was no further check. From time to time I caught the murmur of the two men's voices, but as it grew late they became silent. Koen remained very much on the alert, however, blocking our escape route, as I discovered by creeping to the boundary of the kitchen cave.

  The words night-attack continued to gnaw away at my brain and, try as I would, I could not dispel them. Sleep was out of the question; I felt no tiredness but only an increasing sense of bafflement and frustration. I mentally reviewed every geographical feature of the area, reconnoitring them in thought, weighing the merits of possible hidden strongpoints at The Hill, of the semi-desert places round about, and of course the Limpopo and Shashi waterways. Every workable plan I framed was scuppered by some major flaw.

  I was pulling off my boots in order to give myself a quick bout of warming exercise – a chill had risen up out of the rock – when out of the blue came one of those strange flashes of thought which seem to be born fully grown when one has been devoting all one's time to another stream of preoccupation. The crucial remark had been crowded out of my mind by the non-stop action since my encounter with Rankin; now it blazed before me like a comet in the sky.

  Rankin had said as I hit him, they were cut diamonds. I could have laughed out loud: it is not a crime to possess a cut diamond. IDB means trading in uncut stones. That admission in itself, whether he lived or died now, was a starting-point towards clearing me. I realized at once, however, that it would involve big technical questions. The detective who had arrested me had said that Rankin's diamonds were foreign to the Lichtenburg fields: he could only have cut them here at The Hill but at the same time it must have been a crude job. No one, not even my lawyer, had thought of requesting expert, microscopic, examination of the diamonds. Rankin all at once became vital to any escape plan, for I had to get him to blow up that tenuous admission into a full-scale confession, with all the accompanying involvements of his own underground 'salting' activities. Paralleling this dramatic revelation, the hang-ups and self agonizing which had dogged me since I became involved with Charlie Furstenberg fell away as unexpectedly and I freewheeled to a similar moment of truth regarding Nadine. I found myself confronted with a need greater than that of escaping : to restore the love which – for my part at least –

  had been progressively eroded for over a year. With an intuitive flash I knew in my heart that she was more important than anything else and that the time was overdue for clearing the junk out of my emotional attic and taking up our love again where it had begun: here, at The Hill.

  Not half a dozen machine-pistols in Koen's hands would have kept me from her in that moment of insight.

  Still without my boots, I squirmed silently towards where she lay faintly visible near the bench under a cheap grey cotton blanket that Praeger had given her.

  I crouched immobile for a long moment when I reached her, looking down on her loveliness. There was only a memory of light in the face; the rest of her, including the dark hair, was indistinguishable from the night.

  I kissed the parted lips.

  Her eyes opened, staring up at me in disbelief, and her lips took on the frame of my name without saying it.

  I looked into her eyes, not speaking either.

  And I wondered, in that mute and magic moment, if the tide of her spirit would do the same at other deep occasions between us. Her features remained composed, as if still sleepbound, but the 'pupils of her eyes grew wide and then contracted. Then she raised her lips to mine and the pupils widened again. A lifetime ran by.

  At length, at a silent signal from me, she slipped from under the blanket and made her way with me to the inner cave. There was the danger that Koen would check and find her gone: to fox him, I used a variation of the schoolboy dormitory trick – wrapping the blanket round her water jug in imitation of her head on the pillow.

  We crept to the farthest wall of my cave so that Koen would not hear our suppressed whispers. There remained Dika, however. The brute's ears were twice as keen as a human's. We lay in each other's arms saying the things lovers say, cajoling and teasing a little, our words gaining an extra dimension from our danger.

  'It can't be true, can it, Guy?'

  'It is, my darling.'

  Her laugh was low and soft, full of a new joy.

  'Not this, not us – the Cullinan, I mean. Rather, that fantastic yarn of von Praeger's about another half to the Cullinan. Is it remotely possible it could be hidden away here at The Hill?'

  'Rankin is a crook,' I replied. this place is both his base and his funkhole. It's easy now to understand why he didn't want the scientific party ferreting around. But to Praeger it's the clincher on the most way-out bit of nonsense it's ever been my misfortune to hear. "Hyena's blanket", my foot!'

  She snuggled close and kissed me deeply, fervently. 'It's our Hill, ;not theirs. You're mine, not theirs,' she said, between kisses. The tip of her tongue was a soft electric caress against my palate. I crushed her to me; for a brief desperate moment all we knew was the thing our bodies cried out for, then she took my face in her hands and made us separate again, running her fingers over my features in the darkness as if to use them as eyes to remember.

  'The Hill to me is a place of love, my darling. Remember that when we've sorted out this other side. And my love is for your taking then.'

  She put her palms against my lips and her fingers to frame my face. I do not know how long she held me like that: her trembling told me how the current sparked between us, until finally it ebbed a little.

  'Escape,' she said huskily. 'We must talk about escape, my love; not about us.'

  'Escape!' I echoed. 'I've lain awake all night thinking only of that!'

  'Somehow there must be a way.'

  'We'll have to take Rankin with us .. ' I explained to her quickly his remark about cut diamonds. 'We need him. What he has already admitted is enough to have the case against me re-opened. But I must have a full confession. I want the world to know it was a plant, a frame-up. I'll make Rankin swear an affidavit in front of the first policeman or magistrate I can get him to – alive.'

  'How do you intend to do "that, Guy?'

  'I've got half a dozen half-baked plans. None of them works. But I know this, I'm not including any heroics in them – no getting even with Praeger or Koen. Just plain flight.'

  'If only we had a vehicle!'

  'I can't think even in terms of annexing Praeger's because he hasn't one, as far as we know. Yet this business of putting down a plane near The Hill has me licked. I simply don't know how he managed it.'

  'A plane's no use: neither of us can fly. If
only Peter . . she broke off, choking slightly. 'Guy, I think he must be dead.' '

  Why?'

  'I caught something von Praeger and Koen said when they were talking between themselves outside. Koen said something like, "well, that's one less to worry about': I refused to let my anger rise but I answered grimly.

  'I believe Praeger could have saved him if he'd wanted to. He's concentrating everything on Rankin.'

  'In a way, the more he helps Rankin the more he helps us.'

  'True, though it doesn't excuse Praeger's gas oven mentality. We've got to play this thing coolly and not let our anger run away with us or we're sunk. It boils down to our having two alternatives for escape – first, to try and make a break on foot; or second, to use my boat. For both of them there's one hell of a prerequisite and that is to give Praeger and Koen the slip. Let's by-pass that one for the moment and assume we get clear of them. What do we do? Without transport we'd be lucky if we got ten miles before the sun killed us. If we try and work downriver on foot our problems are almost worse. The water is poison to drink and the sun reflects at double strength off the white sand. It would burn us up quicker than if we used a bush route. There's no real choice between upstream and downstream; either the Limpopo or the Shashi. We haven't any food here either, remember. It would be straight suicide. Think of Rankin. He can't walk even one mile in his present state.'

  'It all seems to point to transport of some sort'

  'I hid the boat pretty carefully under a palm clump and we'd be unlucky if Praeger sighted it. It depends, of course, where he landed but the sand and mud seem to rule out that particular area.'

  'He appeared very taken aback, didn't he, when I blurted out that bit about our having no Land Rover? Perhaps he'll simply assume that the plane which crashed was how we eat here and never even think of a boat. It seems unlikely when you consider the state of the river.'

  'If that's so, it gives us the edge on him at the outset. The first four miles downriver from here isn't too bad but farther on the rough stuff really begins. I wish to Heaven I had one of those shallow-draft water-jet affairs which are specially designed for these conditions! We could then work our way without portaging through all the shallow channels and stagnant pools. Make no mistake, Nadine, if we do manage to escape it's going to be a hell ride. Our biggest advantage will be if we can win the head start of those first four miles of clear water. That'll give us room to play with.'

  'They'd pick us up from their plane within an hour,' she objected. 'You can't hide in this bare countryside.'

  'What good's a plane? They can't land it in the bush. They could try shooting us up but they wouldn't manage more than a few pot-shots. Firing from a fast-moving plane is a dead loss anyway: the odds against one are enormous. We'd hear the machine coming into the bargain and have plenty of time to take cover . .

  'Guy, Guy, it's all ifs and buts, all hit-and-miss, this sort of plan! If this, then that!'

  'I know, I know! I've been worrying at it all night. If we plump for the boat to escape by, we still haven't touched on the initial hurdle – just how are we to overpower Praeger and Koen before we even begin?'

  'They've got a sub-machine-gun now as well as everything else.' There was a tremor in her voice.

  'Machine-pistol,' I corrected her gently, kissing her hair. She pressed her cheek hard against mine and spoke close into my ear. 'Promise me, my darling, promise me above anything else that you .

  'I won't,' I smiled in the darkness. 'Not now.'

  'Not ever,' she whispered passionately. 'Not ever. I couldn't bear being left alone like the queen. I ... I ..

  I calmed her and she lay warm against me.

  'Koen's gun in my hands would be the answer,' I resumed thoughtfully. 'He's very cagey, though. It's a dicey chance that he'd drop his guard long enough for me to jump him.'

  'Rankin isn't going to rush at our invitation to come along either.'

  'He's a very slippery customer and a dangerous one, even hurt as he is. The last thing he wants is to be brought to book. He'll vanish like a puff of smoke if he's given the slightest chance.'

  'It's not only him I'm thinking about. What if we do escape? What happens to von Praeger and Koen? Do you think they'll simply wait around for you to return with the police?'

  'We could burn their plane.'

  'Guy, do you really believe the police will swallow your story about a secret diamond works hidden in a cave? You'll be suspect in their eyes right from the start, having just come out of jail. How will you explain away a couple of bodies? If you view it impersonally it sounds like an elaborate attempt at a cover-up for yourself. That's the way they'll look at it, I'm certain.'

  I felt an apprehensive knot in my stomach. I said with more assurance than I felt, 'Praeger and Koen can't destroy all traces of this machinery ..

  'What if the whole plan misfires?' she persisted. What happens to you? And to me? Von Praeger and Koen aren't the sort to stand by with their arms crossed. They're capable of anything! And you've still to tell me how you intend overpowering two heavily-armed, desperate men. How are you, with the added handicaps of an injured man and a woman round your neck? It won't work, Guy! Its success hangs on a series of chances which we may never get!'

  I knew in my heart that she was right; I answered defensively, 'What do you propose in its place then? Simply string along with them in the hope that the mad Gestapo doctor comes to his senses and realizes we don't know anything about his super-gem? We'd both be dead from torture before that happened! Under no circumstances can he afford to let us go. We know too much about him.'

  I felt her body stir against me. 'I've got it!' she continued to keep her voice low but there was a ripple of excitement in it.'The Hill!'

  It came with a rush: 'There's the perfect place we've been looking for on the tabletop! It's near the queen's grave!

  There's a kind of deep underground chamber hewn from the rock and behind its innermost wall is another small room almost completely hidden.'

  'Steady!' In the darkness I smiled at her spate of words. '

  Step by step, please!'

  Her animation continued to bubble. 'It's perfect, perfect, Guy! The more I think about it the better I like it! One would never suspect there was anything there if you didn't know: the chamber has hardly been excavated or explored properly. I think it must have been what Dr Drummond was anxious about when he and Jock Stewart climbed to the summit after the damage to the Land-Rovers. He called it an armoury – they'd found some intriguing ivory arrow-heads and there's a beautiful inlaid mosaic floor'

  'Have you actually seen this hidden room?'

  'Yes. It's not big enough to be called a room really: more a minute hollow cut in the solid rock, about the size of a wardrobe and half blocked with rubble. It's a very tight squeeze. We could hide there and be absolutely safe from von Praeger, I'm sure.'

  'It sounds good.'

  'The spring's close so we wouldn't be short of water. I know my way up the secret stairway and the layout of the summit.'

  'Food I have it! We could pick up what's left at my camp.'

  She kissed me cheerfully. 'Everything for surviving a siege!'

  Although I too was sold on the idea I said cautiously, 'It doesn't solve our problem of how to break free of Praeger And Koen or how to take Rankin along.'

  'Perhaps we could use the place as a sort of staging post on the way to your boat if Rankin isn't fit enough to make it at one go,' she replied. 'Whatever we decide eventually, it gives us a firm objective to start with.'

  'Transport!' I exclaimed. 'That's what sinks us at every turn. I can't carry Rankin to The Hill'

  'Rankin doubles the odds against us.'

  'He's a built-in hazard and we've simply got to face that fact. He's got to come along; we must work on it.'

  A fragment of dawn seemed to be penetrating the darkness. I held her close, reluctant to let her go, but we both knew that she could not stay.

  'The Hill,' she whispered as she
left me to crawl back to her blankets. 'Everything always comes back to The Hill, doesn't it, Guy?

  I grinned back, not explaining. 'Thanks for the camisade.'

  CHAPTER TEN

  'Out, Bowker!' Koen jerked the machine-pistol towards the cave entrance. 'Quick as kiss-my-arse. Out!'

  Day seemed to have followed unbelievably fast after Nadine had left my side to return to her part of the cave; a few minutes before Koen had appeared to escort me I had heard him shepherding her out into the command-post's enclosure where I had first spotted Rankin.

  I decided to play things in a low key and did not react to Koen's tone. Daylight revealed him as an even tougher proposition than I'd thought. He had a weather-beaten face and powerful shoulders and chest. His arms were sunburnt the colour of seasoned stinkwood. He brought with him a stench of sweat, leather and gun-oil. His breath in the confined space was metallic with stale brandy and he was red-eyed from the night's vigil.

  'All right. As you say.'

  'I warn you, don't try to be smart with me, Bowker. It's the Doc's idea that you and the doll should have some coffee. If it was me, I'd let you sweat it out, march or no march.'

  'March?'

  'You'll see. Now – out!'

  We passed through Nadine's mill section and the first warmth in the open was welcome after the ground-chill of the cave. There was the faintest surprise touch of moisture in the early air which made the nostrils tingle. I greeted Nadine with studied casualness. However, a remarkable sight greeted us: Rankin sitting up on Talbot's bed, drinking coffee. There was no sign of Talbot. It amazed me to think that a man of his age could have put up such a fight but he was as hard as nails from a lifetime spent in the open amongst the tough breed of diamond diggers; and he looked at least twenty years younger than his age. Although he was balding, his sparse brown hair was only slightly flecked with grey and merged into his deep mahogany tan. His hatchet face was sullen now and his eyes below a high forehead had the kind of angry glassiness of a bird of prey – winged, wounded, watchful, dangerous. His chest was bandaged and I guessed that Praeger must have spent a good deal of the night working on him. I got nothing from him except a hard stare from his pale eyes.