The Angels Weep (37 page)

Jordan was staring at Mr Rhodes with such an expression of
naked adoration that Ralph was certain that every other man at
the table must see it too, and he was sickened with shame. He
need not have concerned himself, they were all caught up in the
glory and grandeur of one man’s dream, carried forward by
the charisma and compelling leadership of the shaggy colossus at
the head of the table.

Yet it was still Zouga the pragmatic soldier who probed for
flaws and faults.

‘Doctor Jim, will you be raising all six hundred men
here in Rhodesia?’ he asked.

‘For reasons of secrecy and expediency, we cannot raise
them in Cape Colony, or anywhere else, for that matter,’
Jameson nodded. ‘With the rinderpest scourge having swept
away their fortunes, there will be that number and more of young
Rhodesians eager to enlist if only for the pay and the rations,
and all of them will be good fighting men who rode against the
Matabele.’

‘Do you think it wise to leave this country stripped
bare of its able-bodied men?’

Mr Rhodes frowned quickly as he intervened. ‘It would be
only for a few short months, and we do not have an enemy to fear,
do we?’

‘Don’t we?’ Zouga asked. ‘There are
tens of thousands of Matabele—’

‘Oh come now, Major,’ Jameson cut in. ‘The
Matabele are a defeated and disorganized rabble. General St John
will be acting Administrator of the territory in my absence,
perhaps he is the best person to set your fears at
rest.’

They all looked to the tall man at Jameson’s side, and
Mungo St John removed the long cheroot from his mouth and smiled,
crinkling the corner of his single eye.

‘I have two hundred armed native police whose loyalty is
unquestioned. I have informers placed in every large Matabele
village who will give me warning of any stirrings. No, Major, I
give you my assurance that the only enemy we need take into
account is the obstinate old Boer in Pretoria.’

‘I accept that from a soldier of General St John’s
calibre,’ said Zouga simply, and turned back to Mr Rhodes.
‘Can we discuss the details of raising this force: how much
money do we have at our disposal?’

Ralph watched their faces as they planned and argued, and with
surprise saw that his own father’s was as greedy and eager
as any of them. Whatever words came from their mouths, Ralph
thought, whatever they seem to be talking about, what they are
actually talking about is money.

Suddenly Ralph remembered that dawn over the barren Karroo,
when he had knelt alone in the desert and sworn an oath, calling
on God to witness it, and he now had to use all his will-power to
prevent himself from looking up at Mr Rhodes. He knew that this
time he could not conceal it from him, so he kept his eyes on the
crystal glass of cognac in front of him, while he strove for
self-control and forced himself to think dispassionately.

If it were possible to destroy this giant of a man, was it not
also possible to destroy his Company, to wrest from it the powers
of government and the land rights and the mineral rights that it
held over all Rhodesia?

Ralph felt the thrill of it humming through his blood as he
realized that this might be not only the chance for fierce
vengeance, but also for vast fortune, within his grasp. If the
plot failed, then the shares of the gold-mining companies
involved, Corner House mining group, Rand Mines, Consolidated
Goldfields, would all crash with it. A simple bear coup on the
Johannesburg stock exchange could net millions of pounds.

Ralph Ballantyne felt a sense of awe at the magnitude of the
prospect that faced him, a prospect of power and wealth such as
he had never dreamed of until this moment. He almost missed the
question, and looked up when Mr Rhodes repeated it.

‘I said, how soon can you leave for Kimberley to take
charge of the shipments, Ralph?’

‘Tomorrow,’ Ralph replied evenly.

‘I knew we could rely upon you,’ Mr Rhodes
nodded.

R
alph had
lingered deliberately to be the last to leave King’s
Lynn.

Now he and his father stood on the veranda and watched the
dust column raised by Mr Rhodes’ mule coach dwindling away
down the hill. Ralph leaned against one of the whitewashed
pillars that supported the roof, with his sunbrowned muscular
arms folded across his chest and his eyes crinkled against the
spiralling smoke of the cheroot between his teeth.

‘You aren’t naïve enough to accept young
Percy’s estimate of the Boers, are you, Papa?’

Zouga chuckled. ‘Slow, suspicious, malevolent and all
that nonsense.’ He shook his head. ‘They ride hard
and shoot straight, they have fought every black tribe south of
the Limpopo—’

‘Not to mention our own soldiers,’ Ralph reminded
him. ‘Majuba Hill, 1881, General Colley and ninety of his
men are buried on the peak, the Boers didn’t lose a single
man.’

‘They are good soldiers,’ Zouga admitted,
‘but we will have surprise on our side.’

‘However, you do agree that it will be an act of
international banditry, Papa?’ Ralph removed the cheroot
from his mouth and tapped off the ash. ‘We won’t have
one shred of moral justification for it.’

Ralph watched the scar on Zouga’s cheek turn white as
bone-china. It was an infallible barometer of his mood.

‘I do not understand,’ Zouga said, but they both
knew he understood perfectly.

‘It’s robbery,’ Ralph persisted. ‘Not
just a little footpaddery, but robbery on the grand scale. We are
plotting to steal a country.’

‘Did we then steal this land from the Matabele?’
Zouga demanded.

‘That was different,’ Ralph smiled. ‘They
were pagan savages, but here we are planning to overthrow a
government of fellow Christians.’

‘When we consider the greater good of the Empire,’
Zouga’s scar had turned from icy white to crimson.

‘Empire, Papa?’ Ralph was still smiling. ‘If
there are two people who should be entirely honest with each
other, they are you and me. Look at me, and tell me straight that
there will be no profit in it for us – other than the
satisfaction of having done our duty to the Empire.’

But Zouga did not look at him. ‘I am a
soldier—’

‘Yes,’ Ralph cut him short. ‘But you are
also a rancher who has just come through the rinderpest. You
managed to sell five thousand head of cattle, but we both know
that was not enough. How much do you owe, Papa?’

After a moment’s hesitation, Zouga told him grudgingly.
‘Thirty thousand pounds.’

‘Do you have any expectation of paying off those
debts?’

‘No.’

‘Not unless we take the Transvaal?’

Zouga did not reply, but the scar faded and he sighed.

‘All right,’ Ralph told him. ‘I just wanted
to be certain that I was not alone in my motives.’

‘You will go through with it?’ Zouga asked.

‘Don’t worry, Papa. We’ll come out of it, I
promise you that.’ Ralph pushed himself away from the
pillar, and called to the grooms to bring his horse.

From the saddle he looked down at his father and for the first
time noticed how the weariness of age had faded the green of his
eyes.

‘My boy, just because some of us will be rewarded for
our endeavours, it does not mean that the enterprise is not a
noble one. We are the servants of the Empire, and faithful
servants are entitled to a fair wage.’

Ralph reached down and clasped his shoulder, then he picked up
the reins and rode down the hill through the acacia forests.

T
he railhead
was feeling its way up the escarpment, like a cautious adder,
often following the ancient elephant roads, for these huge beasts
had pioneered the easiest gradients and the gentlest passes. It
had left the swollen baobabs and yellow fever trees of the
Limpopo basin far below and the forests were lovelier, the air
sweeter, and the streams clearer and colder.

Ralph’s base camp had moved up with the railhead into
one of the secluded valleys, just out of earshot of the hammers
of the gangs driving the steel spikes into the teak railway
sleepers. The spot had many of the charms of the remote
wilderness. In the evenings a herd of sable antelope came down to
feed in the grass glade below the camp, and the barking of
baboons from the hills roused them each dawn. Yet the telegraph
hut at the railhead was ten minutes’ stroll away, around
the foot of the wooded hill, and the locomotive bringing up the
rails and sleepers from Kimberley delivered as well the latest
copy of
The Diamond Fields Advertiser
, and any other small
luxuries that the camp required.

In an emergency Cathy would have the railway overseer and any
men of his gang to call upon, while the camp itself was protected
by twenty loyal Matabele servants and Isazi, the little Zulu
driver, who pointed out modestly that he alone was worth twenty
more of the bravest Matabele. In the unlikely event of Cathy
becoming lonely or bored, the Harkness Mine was only thirty miles
away, and Harry and Vicky promised to ride across every
weekend.

‘Can’t we come with you, Daddy?’ Jonathan
pleaded. ‘I could help you, really I could.’

Ralph lifted him into his lap. ‘One of us has to stay
and look after Mama,’ he explained. ‘You are the only
one I can trust.’

‘We can take her with us,’ Jonathan suggested
eagerly, and Ralph had a vision of his wife and child in the
midst of an armed revolution, with barricades in the streets and
Boer commandos ravaging the countryside.

‘That would be very nice, Jon-Jon,’ Ralph agreed,
‘but what about the new baby? What happens if the stork
arrives here while we are all away and there is nobody to sign
for your little sister?’

Jonathan scowled. He was already developing a healthy dislike
for this not yet arrived but eternally present female personage.
She seemed to stand squarely in the way of every pleasant
prospect or exciting plan, both parents managed to introduce his
darling sister into almost every conversation, and his mother
spent much of the time formerly devoted to Master
Jonathan’s interests in knitting and sewing or just sitting
smiling to herself. She no longer went out riding with him each
morning and evening, nor indulged in those rowdy romps which he
enjoyed so heartily. Jonathan had in fact already consulted Isazi
on the possibility of getting a message to the stork and telling
him not to bother, that they had changed their minds. However,
Isazi had not been very encouraging, although he had promised to
have a word with the local witchdoctor on Jonathan’s
behalf.

Now confronted once more with that ubiquitous female, Jonathan
capitulated with poor grace.

‘Well, can I come with you when my baby sister is here
to look after Mama?’

‘I tell you what, old fellow, I’ll do better than
that. How would you like to go on a big boat across the
sea?’ This was the kind of talk Jonathan preferred, and his
face lit up.

‘Can I sail it?’ he demanded.

‘I’m sure the captain will let you help
him,’ Ralph chuckled. ‘And when we get to London, we
will stay in a big hotel and we will buy all sorts of presents
for your mama.’

Cathy dropped her knitting into her lap, and stared at him in
the lamplight.

‘What about me?’ Jonathan demanded. ‘Can we
buy all sorts of presents for me too?’

‘And for your baby sister,’ Ralph agreed.
‘Then when we come back we will go to Johannesburg and we
will buy a big house, with shining chandeliers and marble
floors.’

‘And stables for my pony.’ Jonathan clapped his
hands.

‘And a kennel for Chaka.’ Ralph ruffled his curls.
‘And you will go to a fine brick school with lots of other
little boys.’ Jonathan’s grin wavered slightly, that
was perhaps carrying things a little too far, but Ralph stood him
on his feet again, slapped his backside lightly and told him,
‘Now go and kiss your mother goodnight, and ask her to tuck
you up in your cot.’

Cathy hurried back from the nursery tent, moving with the
appealing awkwardness of her pregnancy into the firelight, and
she came to where Ralph sat in the canvas folding chair with his
boots stretched to the blaze, and the whisky glass in his hand.
She stopped behind his chair, put both arms around his neck and,
with her lips pressed to his cheek, whispered: ‘Is it true,
or are you just teasing me?’

‘You have been a good brave girl for long enough.
I’m going to buy you a home that you didn’t dare even
dream about.’

‘With chandeliers?’

‘And a carriage to take you to the opera.’

‘I don’t know if I like opera – I’ve
never been to one.’

‘We’ll find out in London, won’t
we?’

‘Oh Ralph, I’m so happy I think I could cry. But
why now? What has happened to make it all change?’

‘Something is going to happen before Christmas that is
going to change our lives. We are going to be rich.’

‘I thought we were already rich?’

‘I mean really rich, the way Robinson and Rhodes are
rich.’

‘Can you tell me what it is?’

‘No,’ he said simply. ‘But you only have a
few short weeks to wait, just until Christmas.’

‘Oh, darling,’ she sighed. ‘Will you be away
that long, I miss you so.’

‘Then let’s waste no more precious time
talking.’ He stood up, picked her up in his arms and
carried her carefully to the bell tent under the spreading wild
fig tree.

In the morning Cathy stood with Jonathan beside her, holding
his hand to restrain him, and they looked up at Ralph on the
foot-plate of the big green locomotive.

‘We always seem to be saying goodbye.’ She had to
raise her voice above the hiss of steam from the driving wheels
and the roar of the flames in the firebox.

‘It’s the last time,’ Ralph promised
her.

How handsome and gay he was, it made her heart swell until it
threatened to choke her.