At last Sarah could contain herself no longer. She stood over him and placed her fists on her hips. “That’s all very well and good, James Archibald Courtney, but what about the girl?” Jim choked on the tart, then looked shamefaced and at a loss for words.
“Out with it, boy!” Tom said, in support of his wife. “What about the girl—or woman or whatever she may be?”
“You will meet her. She’s coming now,” Jim said, in a subdued voice, and pointed to the horses and riders coming towards them across the plain in a cloud of their own dust. Tom and Sarah stood together and watched it drawing closer.
Tom spoke first. “An’t no girl there that I can see,” he said, with finality. “Zama and Bakkat, yes, but no girl.”
Jim jumped up from the trestle table and came to join them. “She must be…” His voice trailed off as he realized that his father was right. Louisa was not with them. He ran to meet Zama and Bakkat as they rode into camp. “Where is Welanga? What have you done with her?”
Zama and Bakkat looked at each other, both waiting for the other to answer. At times such as these Bakkat could be conveniently mute. Zama shrugged and took the responsibility of replying. “She will not come,” he said.
“Why not?” Jim shouted.
“She is afraid.”
“Afraid?” Jim was puzzled. “What has she got to be afraid of?”
Zama did not reply but glanced significantly at Tom and Sarah.
“What a time for her to start jibbing!” Jim strode towards where Drumfire was enjoying a nosebag of oats. “I will go and fetch her.”
“No, Jim!” Sarah called softly, but in a tone that stopped him in his tracks. He stared at his mother. “Saddle Sugarbush for me,” she told him. “I will go to her.”
From the saddle she looked down at Jim. “What’s her name?”
“Louisa,” he answered. “Louisa Leuven. She speaks good English.”
Sarah nodded. “I may be some time,” she said to her husband. “Now, don’t come looking for me, do you hear?” She had known Tom from girlhood, and loved him past the power of words to describe, but she knew that at times he had the tact of a wounded bull buffalo. She flicked the reins and Sugarbush cantered out of camp.
She saw the girl half a mile ahead, sitting under a camel-thorn tree on one of the fallen dead branches with Trueheart tethered beside her. Louisa scrambled to her feet when she saw Sarah riding towards her. On the vast plain she was a tiny forlorn figure. Sarah rode up to her and reined in Sugarbush. “You are Louisa? Louisa Leuven?”
“Yes, Mistress Courtney.” Louisa took off her hat and her hair tumbled down. Sarah blinked at its golden profusion. Louisa bobbed a small curtsy and waited respectfully for her to speak again.
“How do you know who I am?” Sarah asked.
“He looks just like you, mistress,” Louisa explained, “and he told me all about you and his father.” Her voice was low but sweet, and trembled on the verge of tears.
Sarah was taken aback. This was not at all what she had expected. But what had she expected of an escaped convict? Hard-boiled defiance? World-weariness? Corruption and depravity? She looked into those blue eyes and could find no vice in them.
“You’re very young, Louisa?”
“Yes, mistress.” Her voice broke. “I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to get Jim into trouble. I didn’t mean to take him away from you.” She was weeping slow, silent tears, which sparkled like jewels in the sunlight. “We haven’t done anything bad together, I promise you.”
Sarah stepped down from Sugarbush’s back and went to her. She placed one arm round her shoulders and Louisa clung to her. Sarah knew that what she was doing was dangerous, but her maternal instincts were strong, and the girl was so young. The aura of innocence that surrounded her was almost palpable. Sarah found herself drawn irresistibly to her.
“Come, child.” Gently Sarah led her into the shade, and they sat side by side on the dead branch.
They talked while the sun climbed to its zenith, then began its slow slide down the sky. At first Sarah’s questions were probing, and she fought her inclination to let down all her defences and allow this stranger into her inner keep, into the place of trust. From bitter experience she knew that the devil often conceals his true nature behind a beautiful exterior.
Louisa’s replies were open, unstinted, almost disconcertingly honest. She never avoided Sarah’s searching gaze. She seemed pathetically eager to please, and Sarah felt her reservations crumbling.
At last she took the girl’s hand. “Why do you tell me all this, Louisa?” she asked.
“Because Jim risked his life to save me, and you are Jim’s mother. I owe you that at least.” Sarah felt her own tears rising to the surface. She was silent while she brought herself under control.
At last Louisa broke the quiet. “I know what you are thinking, Mistress Courtney. You are wondering why I was on a convict ship. You wish to know what crime I am guilty of.” Sarah could not trust her voice to deny it. Of course, she wanted to know the answer. Her only son was in love with this girl, and she had to know.
“I will tell you,” Louisa said. “I have told no one except Jim, but now I will tell you.”
And she did. When she had finished Sarah was weeping with her. “It is late.” She glanced at the height of the sun, and stood up. “Come, Louisa, we will go home now.”
Tom Courtney was astonished to see that his wife had been weeping. Her eyes were swollen and red. He could not remember the last time that had happened, for Sarah was not much given to tears. She did not dismount, or make any move to introduce him to the pale girl who rode beside her into the camp.
“We need to be alone for a while, before Louisa is ready to meet you,” she told him firmly, and the girl kept her head down and her eyes averted as they rode past and went to the last wagon in the line. The two women disappeared behind the afterclap, the canvas screen at the back of the wagon, and Sarah called for the servants to bring the copper hipbath and buckets of hot water from the cooking fire. The mysterious chest that she had ordered to be loaded on to the wagon, which they had carried with them from High Weald, contained everything that a girl might need.
The two men were sitting beside the fire on the riempie camp chairs, the backs and seats laced with the crisscrossed rawhide strips that gave the chairs the name. They were drinking coffee, and Tom had laced their mugs with a liberal dram of Hollands gin. They were still discussing everything that had overtaken the family since their last meeting, and were making plans on how to proceed. They both skirted tactfully around the subject of Louisa and how she fitted into these plans. The nearest Tom had come to it was to say, “That is women’s business. We will have to let your mother decide.”
Night had fallen and out on the plain the jackals were wailing. “What is your mother doing?” Tom complained. “It’s long past my dinner time, and I’m hungry.” As if she had heard, Sarah came up from the last wagon carrying a lantern, and leading Louisa by the hand. As they stepped into the firelight, both men stared bemusedly at the girl. Jim was as amazed as his father.
Sarah had washed Louisa’s hair with lavender-scented soap from England, then rubbed it dry, brushed it, trimmed the ragged ends and caught it up with a satin ribbon. It hung down her back in a lustrous wave. Her blouse was buttoned demurely at the throat and the sleeves at the wrists. The full skirt just allowed her ankles to peep out from under the hem. White stockings hid the faint scars of the leg irons.
The firelight emphasized the smooth perfection of her skin, and the size of her eyes. Tom stared at her, and Sarah pre-empted any humorous remark he might come up with. “This is Jim’s friend, Louisa Leuven. She may be staying with us for a while.” It was an understatement. “Louisa, this is my husband Mr. Thomas Courtney.” Louisa made one of her graceful curtsies.
“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 pri
son 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 inspanned 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 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 foreclap 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 forechest and the afterchest. 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 cardell, 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, criss-crossed 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 tinder 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 vegetable 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, riems 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 afterchests 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, tinder boxes, coils of thin copper and brass wire to be converted into bracelets, anklets and other ornaments by the indigenes who received them.