Page 4 of The Angels Weep


  ‘Matabeleland is booming, Mr Rhodes,’ Zouga reported. ‘You will find Bulawayo is almost a city already, with its own school and hospital. There are already more than six hundred white women and children in Matabeleland, a sure sign that your settlers are here to stay at last. All the land grants have been taken up, and many of the farms are already being worked. The bloodstock from the Cape is taking to the local conditions and breeding well with the captured Matabele cattle.’

  ‘What about the minerals, Ballantyne?’

  ‘Over ten thousand claims have been registered, and I have seen some very rich crushings.’ Zouga hesitated, glanced at Ralph, and when he nodded, turned back to Rhodes. ‘Within the last few days, my son and I have rediscovered and pegged the ancient workings I first stumbled on in the sixties.’

  ‘The Harkness Mine,’ Rhodes nodded heavily, and even Ralph was impressed by the range and grasp of his mind. ‘I remember your original description in The Hunter’s Odyssey. Did you sample the reef?’

  In reply, Zouga placed a dozen lumps of quartz upon the table in front of him, and the raw gold glistened so that the men around the table craned forward in rapt fascination. Mr Rhodes turned one of the samples in his big mottled hands before passing it to the American engineer.

  ‘What do you make of these, Harry?’

  ‘It will go fifty ounces a ton,’ Harry whistled softly. ‘Perhaps too rich, like Nome and Klondike.’ The American looked up at Ralph. ‘How thick is the reef? How broad is the strike?’

  Ralph shook his head. ‘I don’t know, the workings are too narrow to get into the face.’

  ‘This is quartz, of course, not the banket reef like we have on the Witwatersrand,’ Harry Mellow murmured.

  The banket reef was named after the sweetmeat of toffee and nuts and almonds and cloves which the conglomerated reef so much resembled. It was made up of the thick sedimentary beds of ancient buried lakes, not as rich in gold as this chip of quartz, but many feet thick and extending as wide as the broad lakes had once stretched, a mother lode which could be mined for a hundred years without exhausting its reserves.

  ‘It’s too rich,’ Harry Mellow repeated, fondling the sample of quartz. ‘I can’t believe that it will be more than a stringer a few inches thick.’

  ‘But if it isn’t?’ Rhodes demanded harshly.

  The American smiled quietly. ‘Then you will not only control nearly all the diamonds in the world, Mr Rhodes, but most of the gold as well.’

  His words were a sharp reminder to Ralph that the British South Africa Company owned fifty per cent royalty in every ounce of gold mined in Matabeleland, and Ralph felt his resentment return in full force. Rhodes and his ubiquitous BSA Company were like a vast octopus that smothered the efforts and the fortunes of all lesser men.

  ‘Will you allow Harry to ride with me for a few days, Mr Rhodes, so that he can examine the strike?’ Ralph’s irritation sharpened the tone of his request, so that Rhodes’ big shaggy head lifted quickly and his pale blue eyes seemed to search out his soul for a moment before he nodded, and then with a mercurial change of direction abandoned the subject of gold and shot his next question at Zouga.

  ‘The Matabele indunas – how are they behaving themselves?’

  This time Zouga hesitated. ‘They have grievances, Mr Rhodes.’

  ‘Yes?’ The swollen features coagulated into a scowl.

  ‘The cattle, naturally enough, are the main source of trouble,’ Zouga said quietly, and Rhodes cut him off brusquely.

  ‘We captured less than 125,000 head of cattle, and we returned 40,000 of those to the tribe.’

  Zouga did not remind him that the return was made only after the strongest representation by Robyn St John, Zouga’s own sister. Robyn was the missionary doctor at Khami Mission Station and she had once been Lobengula’s closest friend and adviser.

  ‘Forty thousand head of cattle, Ballantyne! A most generous gesture by the Company!’ Rhodes repeated portentously, and again he did not add that he had made this return in order to avert the famine which Robyn St John had warned him would decimate the defeated Matabele nation, and which would have surely brought the intervention of the Imperial government in Whitehall, and possibly the revocation of the Royal Charter under which Rhodes’ Company ruled both Mashonaland and Matabeleland. Not such an outstanding act of charity, after all, Ralph thought wryly.

  ‘After giving back those cattle to the indunas, we were left with less than eighty-five thousand head, the Company barely recouped the cost of the war.’

  ‘Still the indunas claim they were given back only inferior beasts, the old and barren cows and scrub bulls.’

  ‘Damn it, Ballantyne, the volunteers earned the right to first pick from the herds. Quite naturally, they chose the prime stock.’ He shot out his right fist with the forefinger aimed like a pistol at Zouga’s heart. ‘They do say that our own herds, chosen from the captured cattle, are the finest in Matabeleland.’

  ‘The indunas don’t understand that,’ Zouga answered.

  ‘Well then, the least they should understand is that they are a conquered nation. Their welfare depends on the goodwill of the victors. They extended no such consideration to the tribes that they conquered when they lorded it across the continent. Mzilikazi slew a million defenceless souls when he devastated the land south of the Limpopo, and Lobengula, his son, called the lesser tribes his dogs, to kill or cast into slavery as the whim took him. They must not whine now at the bitter taste of defeat.’

  Even gentle Jordan, at the end of the table, nodded at this. ‘To protect the Mashona tribes from Lobengula’s depredations was one of the reasons why we marched on GuBulawayo,’ he murmured.

  ‘I said that they had grievances,’ Zouga pointed out. ‘I did not say that they were justified.’

  ‘Then what else do they have to complain of?’ Rhodes demanded.

  ‘The Company police. The young Matabele bucks whom General St John has recruited and armed are strutting through the kraals, usurping the power of the indunas, taking their pick of the young girls—’

  Again Rhodes interrupted. ‘Better that than a resurrection of the fighting impis under the indunas. Can you imagine twenty thousand warriors in impi under Babiaan and Gandang and Bazo? No, St John was right to break the power of the indunas. As Native Commissioner, it is his duty to guard against resurgence of the Matabele fighting tradition.’

  ‘Especially in view of the events that are in train south of where we now sit.’ Dr Leander Starr Jameson spoke for the first time since he had greeted Ralph, and Rhodes turned to him swiftly.

  ‘I wonder if this is the time to speak of that, Doctor Jim.’

  ‘Why not? Every man here is trustworthy and discreet. We are all committed to the same bright vision of Empire, and the Lord knows, we are in no danger of being overheard. Not in this wilderness. What better time than now to explain why the Company police must be made even stronger, must be better armed and trained to the highest degree of readiness?’ Jameson demanded.

  Instinctively Rhodes glanced at Ralph Ballantyne, and Ralph raised one eyebrow, a cynical and mildly challenging gesture that seemed to decide Rhodes.

  ‘No, Doctor Jim,’ he spoke decisively. ‘There will be another time for that.’ And when Jameson shrugged and capitulated, Rhodes turned to Jordan. ‘The sun is setting,’ he said, and Jordan rose obediently to charge the glasses. The sundowner whisky was already a traditional ending to the day in this land north of the Limpopo.

  The brilliant white gems of the Southern Cross hung over Ralph’s camp, dimming the lesser stars, and sprinkling the bald domes of the granite kopjes with a pearly light as Ralph picked his way towards his tent. He had inherited his father’s head for liquor, so that his step was even and steady. It was ideas, not whisky, which had inebriated him.

  He stooped through the fly of the darkened tent and sat down on the edge of the cot. He touched Cathy’s cheek.

  ‘I am awake,’ she said softly. ‘What time is it?’
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  ‘After midnight.’

  ‘What kept you so long?’ she whispered, for Jonathan slept just beyond the canvas screen.

  ‘The dreams and boasts of men drunk with power and success.’ He grinned in the dark and dragged off his boots. ‘And by God, I did my fair share of dreaming and boasting.’ He stood to strip off his breeches. ‘What do you think of Harry Mellow?’ he asked, with an abrupt change of pace.

  ‘The American? He is very—’ Cathy hesitated. ‘I mean, he seems to be manly and rather nice.’

  ‘Attractive?’ Ralph demanded. ‘Irresistible to a young woman?’

  ‘You know I don’t think like that,’ Cathy protested primly.

  ‘The hell you don’t,’ Ralph chuckled, and as he kissed her, he covered one of her round breasts with his cupped hand. Through the thin cotton nightdress it felt taut as a ripening melon. She struggled genteelly to free her lips from his and to prise his fingers loose, but he held her fast and after a few seconds she struggled no more, and instead she slipped her arms around the back of his neck.

  ‘You smell of sweat and cigars and whisky.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘Don’t be, it’s lovely,’ she purred.

  ‘Let me take off my shirt.’

  ‘No, I’ll do it for you.’

  Much later Ralph lay upon his back with Cathy snuggled down against his bare chest.

  ‘How would you like to have your sisters come down from Khami?’ he asked suddenly. ‘They enjoy camp life, but even more, they like to escape from your mother.’

  ‘It was I who wanted to invite the twins,’ she reminded him sleepily. ‘You were the one who said they were too – unsettling.’

  ‘Actually, I said they were too rowdy and boisterous,’ he corrected her, and she raised her head and looked at him in the faint moonlight that filtered through the canvas.

  ‘A change of heart—’ She thought about it for a moment, aware that her husband always had good reason for even his most unreasonable suggestions.

  ‘The American,’ she exclaimed, with such force that behind the canvas screen Jonathan stirred and whimpered. Instantly, Cathy dropped her voice to a fierce whisper. ‘Not even you would use my own sisters – you wouldn’t, would you?’

  He pulled her head down onto his chest again. ‘They are big girls now. How old are they?’

  ‘Eighteen.’ She wrinkled her nose as his damp, curly chest hairs tickled it. ‘But, Ralph—’

  ‘Old maids, already.’

  ‘My own sisters – you wouldn’t use them?’

  ‘They never get to meet decent young men at Khami. Your mother frightens them all off.’

  ‘You are awful, Ralph Ballantyne.’

  ‘Would you like a demonstration of just how awful I can be?’

  She considered that for a moment, and then, ‘Yes, please,’ she giggled softly.

  ‘One day I will be riding with you,’ Jonathan said. ‘Won’t I, Papa?’

  ‘One day, soon,’ Ralph agreed, and ruffled the child’s dark curling head. ‘Now I want you to take care of your mother while I am away, Jon-Jon.’

  Jonathan nodded, his face pale and set, the tears grimly restrained.

  ‘Promise?’ Ralph squeezed the small warm body that he held on his lap, and then he stooped from the saddle and stood the child beside Cathy, and Jonathan took her hand protectively, though he did not reach to her hip.

  ‘I promise, Papa,’ he said, and gulped, staring up at his father on the tall horse.

  Ralph touched Cathy’s cheek lightly with his fingertips.

  ‘I love you,’ she said softly.

  ‘My beautiful Katie.’ And it was true. The first yellow rays of sunlight in her hair turned it into a bright halo and she was serene as a madonna in the deep fastness of their love.

  Ralph spurred away, and Harry Mellow swung his horse in beside him. It was a fine red thoroughbred from Mr Rhodes’ private stable, and he rode like a plainsman. At the edge of the forest both men turned to look back. The woman and child still stood at the gate of the stockade.

  ‘You are a lucky man,’ Harry said softly.

  ‘Without a good woman, there is no today, and without a son there is no tomorrow,’ Ralph agreed.

  The vultures were still hunched in the tree-tops, although the bones of the lions had been picked clean and scattered across the stony ground of the ridge. They had to digest the contents of their bloated bellies before they could soar away, and their dark misshapen bodies against the clear winter sky guided Ralph and Harry the last few miles to the ridge of the Harkness claims.

  ‘It looks promising,’ Harry gave his guarded judgement that first night as they squatted beside the camp fire. ‘The country rock is in contact with the reef. You could have a reef that continues to real depth, and we have traced the strike for over two miles. Tomorrow I will mark out the spots where you must sink your prospect holes.’

  ‘There are mineralized ore bodies right across this country,’ Ralph told him. ‘The continuation of the great gold crescent of the Witwatersrand and Pilgrims Rest and Tati goldfields curves right across here—’ Ralph broke off. ‘But you have the special gift, I have heard them say you can smell gold at fifty miles.’

  Harry dismissed the suggestion with a deprecating wave of his coffee mug, but Ralph went on, ‘And I have the wagons and capital to grubstake a prospecting venture, and to develop the finds that are made. I like you, Harry, I think we would work well together, the Harkness Mine first, and after that, who knows, the whole bloody country, perhaps.’

  Harry started to speak, but Ralph put a hand on his forearm to stop him.

  ‘This continent is a treasure chest. The Kimberley diamond fields and the Witwatersrand banket, side by side, all the diamond and gold in the one bucket – who would ever have believed it?’

  ‘Ralph.’ Harry shook his head. ‘I have already thrown in my lot with Mr Rhodes.’

  Ralph sighed, and stared into the flames of the fire for a full minute. Then he relit the stump of his dead cheroot, and began to argue and cajole in his plausible and convincing way. An hour later as he rolled into his blanket, he repeated his offer.

  ‘Under Rhodes you will never be your own man. You will always be a servant.’

  ‘You work for Mr Rhodes, Ralph.’

  ‘I contract to him, Harry, but the profit or loss is mine. I still own my soul.’

  ‘And I don’t,’ Harry chuckled.

  ‘Come in with me, Harry. Find out what it feels like to bet your own cards, to calculate your own risks, to give the orders, instead of taking them. Life is all a game, Harry, and there is only one way to play it, flat out.’

  ‘I’m Rhodes’ man.’

  ‘When the time comes, then we will talk again,’ Ralph said and pulled the blanket over his head. Within minutes his breathing was slow and regular.

  In the morning Harry marked the sites for the prospect bores with cairns of stone, and Ralph realized how cunningly he was quartering the extended line of the reef to pick it up again at depth. By noon Harry had finished, and as they up-saddled, Ralph made a swift calculation and realized it would be another two days before Cathy’s twin sisters could arrive at the base camp from Khami Mission.

  ‘Seeing that we have come so far, we should make a sweep out towards the east before turning back. God knows what we could find – more gold, diamonds.’ And when Harry hesitated, ‘Mr Rhodes will have gone on to Bulawayo already. He’ll be holding court there for the next month at least, he won’t even miss you.’

  Harry thought for a moment, then grinned like a schoolboy about to bunk his classes to raid the orchard. ‘Let’s go!’ he said.

  They rode slowly, and at each river course they dismounted to pan the gravel from the bottom of the stagnant green pools. Wherever the bedrock outcropped above the overburden of earth, they broke off samples. They searched out the burrows of ant-bear and porcupine, and the nests of the swarming white termites to find what grains and chip-pings they
had brought up from depth.

  On the third day, Harry said, ‘We’ve picked up a dozen likely shows of colour. I particularly liked those crystals of beryllium, they are a good pointer to emerald deposits.’

  Harry’s enthusiasm had increased with each mile ridden, but now they had reached the end of the outward leg of their eastward sweep, and even Ralph realized that it was time to turn back. They had been out five days from the base camp, they had exhausted their coffee and sugar and meal, and Cathy would be anxious by now.

  They took one last look at the country that they must leave unexplored for the time being.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ Harry murmured. ‘I have never seen a more magnificent land. What is the name of that range of hills?’

  ‘That’s the southern end of the Matopos.’

  ‘I have heard Mr Rhodes speak of them. Aren’t they the sacred hills of the Matabele?’

  Ralph nodded. ‘If I believed in witchcraft—’ he broke off and chuckled with embarrassment. ‘There is something about those hills.’

  There was the first rosy flush of the sunset in the western sky, and it turned the smooth polished rock of those distant brooding hills to pink marble, while their crests were garlanded with fragile twists of cloud coloured by the softly slanting rays to ivory and ashes.

  ‘There is a secret cave hidden in there where a witch who presided over the tribes used to live. My father took in a commando and destroyed her at the beginning of the war against Lobengula.’

  ‘I have heard the story, it is one of the legends, already.’

  ‘Well, it’s true. They say—’ Ralph broke off and studied the tall and turreted range of rock with a thoughtful expression. ‘Those are not clouds, Harry,’ he said at last. ‘That’s smoke. Yet there are no kraals in the Matopos. It could be a bush-fire, but I don’t think so, it’s not on a broad front.’