Men of Men b-2

by Wilbur Smith

  "There is a man who wishes to speak with you." Jan Cheroot's words had started it, and something in his tone made Zouga look up sharply. They had been together many years and there was little they did not know of each other's moods and meanings.

  "That is simple enough," Zouga had told him. "Send him to the camp."

  "He wishes to speak secretly, at a place where no other eyes will be watching."

  "That sounds like the way of a rogue," Zouga frowned.

  "What is the man's name?"

  "I do not know his name," Jan Cheroot admitted, and then when he saw Zouga's expression, he explained. "He sent a child with a message."

  "Then send the child back to him, whoever he is. Tell him he will find me here every evening, and anything he has to discuss I will be pleased to listen to in the privacy of my tent."

  "As you wish," Jan Cheroot grunted, and the wrinkles on his face deepened so that he looked like a pickled walnut. "Then we will continue to eat maize porridge And they did not discuss it again, not for many weeks, but the worm was planted and it gnawed away at Zouga until he was the one who asked.

  "Jan Cheroot, what of your nameless friend. What was his reply?"

  "He sent word that it was not possible to help a man who refused to help himself," Jan Cheroot told him airily.

  "And it is clear to all the world that we have no need of help. Look at your fine clothes, it is the fashion now to have the buttocks hanging out of the pants., Zouga smiled at the hyperbole, for his breeches were neatly patched. Jordan had seen to that.

  "And look at me," Jan Cheroot went on. "What reason do I have for complaint? I was paid a year ago,"

  "wasn't,"

  "Six months ago," Zouga corrected him.

  "I cannot remember," Jan Cheroot sulked. "The same way I have forgotten what beef tastes like."

  "When the stagings are completed -" Zouga began, and Jan Cheroot snorted.

  "They are more likely to fall on our heads. At least then we won't have to worry about being hungry."

  Serious defects had shown up in the design of the stagings. They had been unable to support the weight of cable. The cables between them weighed over three hundred tons and they had to be stretched to sufficient tension to carry the gravel buckies without sagging excessively.

  The very first day of operation the stagings at the north end of the section gave under the strain. Two winches tore loose and the wires fell twanging and snaking into the diggings. There had been a gravel bucky on the rope, carrying five black workmen down to the floor of the workings to begin re-opening the long deserted claims. They screamed the whole way down as the bucky spun and twisted, throwing them clear, and the tangle of snapping silver cables caught them up like the tentacles of some voracious sea-monster.

  it took the rest of the day to bring out the fearfully mutilated bodies, and the Diggers" Committee closed the number 6 Section again while modifications were made to reinforce the stagings.

  The number 6 Section was still closed.

  Zouga had one bottle of Cape brandy leftwhich he had been saving but now he fetched it from his locker, pulled the cork with his teeth and poured into their two mugs.

  He and Jan Cheroot drank in moody silence for a while, and then Zouga sighed.

  "Tell your friend I will meet him," he said.

  Pale dust chalked the sky above the plain, so that the distances drifted away, dreamlike and insubstantial, to an indefinite horizon.

  There was no living thing, no bird nor vulture in the milky blue sky, no ripple of flocks nor smoky drift of springbuck herds through the low scrub.

  In this loneliness the little cluster of buildings stood forlorn, long deserted, roofs sagging and the adobe plaster falling from the walls in chunks exposing the unsawn timber frames beneath.

  Zouga touched the reins and brought the gelding down to a walk, while he slouched in the saddle, riding with long stirrups and the disinterested mien of a man on a long and boring journey, but his eyes under the brim of the wide hat were quick and restless.

  He was uncomfortably aware of the empty rifle scabbard under his right knee.

  "Unarmed." The invitation had been unequivocal. "You will be watched."

  The man had chosen an ideal rendezvous. There was no approach to this deserted farmhouse except across miles of bare veld, no cover higher than a man's knee and it was good shooting light, with the sun in the west.

  Zouga shifted his weight restlessly in the saddle, and the big ungainly Colt revolver under his coat dug into his side, a pain he did not resent, although the comfort it gave him was illusory. A man with a rifle could pick his shot and take his time as Zouga rode in.

  The sheep kraal was part of the homestead, unplastered stone walls, and there was a well in front of the house, again with a stone coping. Beside the well lay the remains of a wagon, three wheels and the disselboom missing, the paint dried and cracked away, the weed growing up through the wagon bed.

  Zouga touched the gelding's neck and he stopped beside the wagon. He dismounted swiftly, dropping off on the side farthest from the building, using the horse as cover, and while he made a show of adjusting the girth, he studied the empty building again.

  The windows were dark empty holes, like missing teeth, and there could be an unseen marksman standing well back in the gloomy interior. The front door was blanched by the sun; Zouga could see the light through the cracks. It banged aimlessly and unrhythmically in the wind, and the wind hooted and moaned in the eaves and through the empty windows.

  Behind the gelding's body Zouga loosened the revolver in his belt, making certain that it was ready to hand. He tied the gelding's reins to the wagon body with a slippery knot that would come undone at a tug, and then he consciously steeled himself, drew breath and squared his shoulders and stepped out from behind the horse.

  He began to walk towards the front door, but his right hand was on his hip, under the tail of his jacket, almost touching the checkered grip of the revolver.

  He reached the doorway, keeping clear of the entrance, and then flattened his back against the wall.

  With faint surprise he realized that his breathing was rough, as though he had been running. Then another surprise, he was enjoying his own fear, the feeling of heightened sensitivity of his skin, the enhanced clarity of vision, the singing of the adrenalin in his blood, the nervous tension of his sinew and muscle, the awareness of being alive in the threat of death. He had been too long without this stimulant.

  He placed one hand on the sill of the window and vaulted through it lightly, dropping to the earthen floor as he landed and rolling swiftly to his feet again in the corner, facing the room. It was small and empty, bunches of dusty cobwebs hung from the rafters, and the floor was scattered with the white-flecked droppings of gecko, lizards.

  Zouga moved down the wall, keeping his back covered, and stepped through into the second room. The kagel fireplace was blackened with soot, and the smell of dead ash caught in his throat. He looked through the open doorway into the sunlit sheep kraal beyond. There was a riderless horse tethered in the angle of the wall. A grey, dappled quarters, uncropped dark mane and full tail almost sweeping the ground.

  The rifle scabbard on the saddle was empty, and Zouga's nerves fizzed.

  The unknown rider must have the gun with him.

  Zouga loosed the long barrel of the Colt revolver in his belt, peering out into the sunlight.

  "Keep your hand away from that gun." The voice came from behind him, from the empty front room through which Zouga had just passed. "Don't draw it, and don't turn around."

  The voice was quiet, controlled and very close. Zouga obeyed it, standing awkwardly with his right hand under his coat, and he felt the touch of steel between his shoulder blades. It had been well done; the man had been lying outside, had let him walk through the house and then had come in behind him.

  "Now very slowly bring out the gun and put it on the floor between your feet. Very slowly, please, Major Ballantyne. I don't wa
nt to have to kill you, but if I hear the hammer cocked I will, believe me, I will."

  Slowly Zouga freed the heavy pistol and stooped to place it on the littered kitchen floor. He glanced back between his own legs and saw the man's feet. He was wearing velskoen of tanned kudu hide and leather leggings, big feet, big man, strong legs.

  Zouga straightened up, holding his hands well away from his body.

  "You should not have brought a gun, Major. That is very distrustful of you, and dangerous for both of us." He could hear the relief in the man's tone, and the voice was familiar, he searched his memory. That strange accent, where had he heard it? The footsteps retreated across the kitchen.

  "Slowly now, Major, very slowly, you may turn around."

  The man stood in the gloom of the soot-darkened walls, but the shaft of sunlight from the high window fell on his hands and the weapon they held.

  It was a shotgun. Both big fancy hammers were at full cock,-and the man's fingers were hooked around the triggers.

  "You!" said Zouga.

  "Yes, Major, me!" The pockmarked Griqua Bastaard smiled at him, white teeth in the darkly handsome face and the gypsy ringlets dangling to his collar. "Hendrick Naaiman, at your service, once again."

  "If you are buying cattle, it's a hell of a way to do business."

  The Griqua was the one who had bought Zouga's bullock team the money he had used to buy the Devil's Own.

  "No, Major, this time I am selling." And then sharply, "No, Major, do not move, and keep your hands there, where I can see them. I have loaded with Big Loopers lion-shot, Major. At this range it will cut you in half."

  Zouga lifted his hands away from his sides.

  "What are you selling?"

  "Wealth, Major, a new way of life for you, and for me."

  Zouga smiled bleakly, sarcastically.

  "I am truly grateful for your kindness, Naaiman."

  "Please call me Hendrick, Major, if we are to be partners."

  "We are?" Zouga inclined his head gravely. "I am honoured."

  "You see, you have something I need and I have something you need., "Go on."

  "You have two excellent claims, they are truly excellent claims in all except they yield very few diamonds."

  Zouga felt the scar on his cheek heating up, but he kept his expression neutral.

  "And as you know, Major, my ancestry, the touch of the tarbrush, I think is the polite term, or more succinctly my kaffir blood, precludes me from owning claims."

  They were silent then, regarding each other warily across the darkened kitchen. Zouga had abandoned any idea of going for the shotgun. He was starting to become intrigued by the articulate and persuasive voice of the tall Griqua.

  "For that reason I cannot sell you my claims, not even at gunpoint," Zouga said quietly.

  "No, no, you do not understand. You have the claims but no diamonds, while I have no claims but Hendrick drew a drawstring tobacco bag from his inner pocket and dangled it by its string from his forefinger.

  "-But I have diamonds." He finished the sentence and tossed the bag across the room.

  Instinctively Zouga reached out one hand and caught it. The bag crunched in his hands like a bag of humbugs, bringing back childhood memories. He held it, staring still at Hendrick Naaiman.

  "Open it, please, Major."

  Slowly Zouga obeyed, pulling open the mouth of the cloth bag, and then peered into it.

  The light was bad, but in the bag something gleamed like the coils of a sleeping serpent.

  Zouga felt the diamond thrill close its fist upon his chest. It never failed, he thought, always that choking feeling when the stones shine.

  He tipped the bag and spilled a small rush of uncut diamonds into his hand. He counted them quickly; there were eight of them altogether.

  One was a canary bright stone, twenty carats if it was a point. Two thousand pounds" worth, Zouga estimated.

  "These are just samples of my wares, Major, a week's takings."

  There was another perfect eight-sided crystal, slick and soapy silver-grey, bigger than the yellow diamond, at least three thousand pounds" worth.

  Another of the stones was a symmetrical triangular shape, like those throat lozenges that tasted of liquorice, more childhood memories. A clear silver stone, limpid and lovely. Zouga picked it up between thumb and forefinger and held it to the light of the high window.

  "These are I.D.B?" he asked.

  "Dirty words, Major; they offend my delicate breeding.

  Do not concern yourself further with where they come from, or how I get them. just be certain that there will be more, many more, every week there will be a parcel of first water stones."

  "Every week?" Zouga asked, and heard the greed in his own voice.

  "Every week," Hendrick agreed, watching Zouga's expression, and he knew the fly had touched the sticky strands of his web. He let the barrel of the shotgun sag towards the mud floor and he smiled that flashing flamboyant smile. "Every week you will have a parcel like this to seed into your own cradle, to throw out on your own sorting-table."

  There was another stone in his palm. At first Zouga had thought it to be black boart, the almost worthless industrial diamond; but his heart bounced suddenly as the poor light caught it and he saw the deep emerald colour flash from its heart. His fingers trembled slightly as he lifted it.

  "Yes, Major." Hendrick Naaiman nodded approval. "You have a good eye; that's a green dragon."

  A freak stone, a green diamond, a "fancy" in the parlance of the kopje-wallopers. There were fancy diamonds the colour of rubies, or sapphires or topaz, and fancies commanded whatever the trade would bear. It was not impossible that this green dragon would fetch ten thousand pounds, and end up in the crown jewels of an emperor.

  "You said partners?" Zouga asked softly.

  "Yes, partners," Hendrick nodded. "I will find the stones. Let me give you an example. I paid three hundred to one of my men for that green dragon. You put it across your table and register it from the Devil's Own, " Zouga was staring at him fixedly, hungrily, his hands still trembling, and Hendrick stepped towards him confidently.

  You should get four thousand pounds for a stone like that, a profit of three thousand seven hundred; and we share that fiftyfifty, because I am not a greedy man.

  Equal partners, Major, eighteen fifty for you and eighteen fifty for me."

  Zouga poured the glittering stones into his left hand.

  His eyes had not left Hendrick Naaiman's lips.

  "What do you say, Major? Equal partners." Hendrick transferred the shotgun to his left hand and reached out with his right.

  "Equal partners," he repeated. "Let's shake hands on it."

  Slowly Zouga stretched out his own right hand, fingers open, palm upwards. And then, as their fingers touched, he hurled the handful of diamonds into Hendrick Naaiman's face. All Zouga's strength was behind the throw, all his anger at being so sorely tempted, all his outrage at this devilish assault upon his own self-esteem.

  The diamonds tore into Hendrick Naaiman's flesh, one sharp-sided crystal ripped open his smooth olive-skinned forehead above the right eye, another sliced his lip.

  Involuntarily Hendrick threw up his hands, lifting the shotgun muzzle high before his face as he staggered back from this unexpected assault, but at the same instant his right hand closed over the pistol grip and his forefinger hooked for the triggers. The gun was still at full cock, each barrel loaded with lion-shot. Hendrick started to drop the muzzles, pointing for Zouga's belly.

  Zouga grabbed the barrel six inches below the gaping muzzles and forced the gun upwards, grasping with his left hand for Hendrick's right wrist. The big Griqua jerked backwards with both arms, and Zouga made no effort to resist him; instead he lunged forward, thrusting the gun into Hendrick's own face. The blue steel barrels cracked against his cheekbone, and Hendrick gasped at the blow and reeled backwards. Zouga drove at him again, forcing him into the soot-blackened wall so that he grunted with pain, pinned there
for a moment with the shotgun pointing at the roof. In these seconds Zouga reached with his left hand, hooked his thumb through the trigger guard and jerked back against the triggers.

  Both barrels fired simultaneously.

  The burst of gunfire in the tiny confined kitchen was deafening. The bright orange muzzle flashes lit the gloom like a lightning strike, and the charges of shot crashed through the rotten roof, blowing gaping holes through which the sun shot long bright shafts of light.

  The massive recoil of the double-shotted gun drove the butt back into Hendrick's own belly, and he doubled over with a gasp of shock and agony.

  The gun was empty, harmless. Zouga let it go and dived full length across the dusty floor. At full stretch his fingers touched the cool checkered grip of the ugly black Colt revolver. As he fumbled for it desperately, he heard the light crunch of footsteps across the earthen floor behind him, and rolled right, flicking over on his back without raising his head.

  Hendrick was over him, the empty shotgun raised above his head with both hands like an executioner's axe, and he had already launched the stroke. The gun swung down in a wide arc, the blue steel glittering sullenly in the gloom and the hiss of it like the sound of a goose's wing. Zouga rolled again flipping his body aside.

  But the butt of the shotgun caught him.

  It was only a touch, high in the shoulder, but it jerked his head so that his teeth clashed in his skull, and his right arm was instantly nerveless, numb from his shoulder to fingertips. The Colt revolver went flying from his grip, spinning away across the kitchen floor until it hit the far wall.

  Instantly Hendrick turned to chase the pistol, and Zouga kicked out at the back of his knee, landing solidly with the heel of his boot.

  Hendrick's leg folded under the blow, and he would have gone down but the wall was there to hold him. He fell against it, pinned for a moment by his crippled leg, and Zouga rolled to his feet.