When the Lion Feeds (24 page)

Every morning he set his Zulus a task for the day, always just a little more than the day before. They sang as they worked and it was very seldom that the task was not complete by nightfall. The days blurred into each other and turned to weeks which quadrupled like breeding amoebae and became months. Sean began to imagine Duff giving the capetown girls a whirl with his eight hundred pounds. One evening he rode south for miles along the Cape road, stopping to question every traveller he met and when he finally gave up and returned to the goldfields he went straight to one of the canteens to look for a fight.

He found a big, yellow-haired German miner to oblige him. They went outside and for an hour they battered each other beneath a crisp transvaal night sky surrounded by a ring of delighted spectators. Then he and the German went back into the canteen, shook each others bleeding hands, drank a vow of friendship together and Sean returned to the Candy deep with his devil exorcized for the time being The next afternoon Sean was working near the north boundary of the claims, at this point they had burrowed down about fifteen feet to keep contact with the reef.

Sean had just finished marking the shot holes for the next blast and the zulus were standing around him taking snuff and spitting on their hands before attacking the rock once more. Mush, you shag-eared villains.

What's going on here, a trade union meeting? The familiar voice came from above their heads, Duff was looking down at them. Sean scrambled straight up the side of the trench and seized him in a bear hug. Duff was thinner, his jowls covered with a pale stubble and his curly hair white with dust.

When the fury of greeting had subsided a little Sean demanded, Well, where's the present you went to fetch me? Duff laughed, Not far behind, all twenty-five wagons full of it. You got it then? Sean roared.

You're damn right I did! Come with me and I'll show you. # Duff's convoy was strung out four miles across the veld, Most Of the wagons double-teamed against the enormous weight of the machinery. Duff pointed to a rust-streaked cylinder that completely filled one of the leading wagons. That is my particular cross, seven tons of the most spiteful, stubborn and evil boiler in the world. if it's broken the wagon axle once it's broken it a dozen times since we left Colesberg, not to mention the two occasions on which it capsized itself, once right in the middle of a river.

They rode along the line of wagons. Good God! I didn't realize there'd be so much. Sean shook his head dubiously. Are you sure you know how it all fits together? Leave it to your Uncle Duff. Of course, it's going to need a bit of work done on it, after all it's been lying out in the open for a couple of years. Some of it was rusted up solid, but the judicious use of grease, new paint and the Charleywood brain will see the Candy Deep plant breaking rock and spitting out gold within a month.

Duff broke off and waved to a horseman coming towards them. This is the transport contractor. Frikkie Malan, Mr Courtney, my partner. The contractor pulled up next to, them and acknowledged the introduction. He wiped the dust off his face with the sleeve of his shirt. Gott, man, Mr charleywood, I don't mind telling you that this is the hardest money i've ever worked for.

Nothing personal, but I'll be vragtig glad to see the last of this load.

Duff was wrong, it took much longer than a month. The rust had eaten deep into parts of the machinery and each bolt they twisted open was red with the scaly cancer.

They worked the usual twelve-hour day chipping and scraping filing and greasing, knuckles knocked raw against steel and palms wet and red where the blisters had burst.

Then one day suddenly and miraculously they were finished. Along the ridge of the Candy Deep, neat and sweet smelling in its new paint, thick with yellow grease and waiting only to be fitted together, lay the dismembered mill.

How long has it taken us so far? Duff asked. It seems like a hundred years. Is that all? Duff feigned surprise. Then I declare a holiday, two day's of meditation. You meditate, brother, I'm going to do some carousing. , That's an excellent alternative, let's go! They started at Candy's place but she threw them out after the third fight so they moved on. There were a dozen places to drink at and they tried them all. Others were celebrating, because the day before old Kruger, the president of the Republic, had given official recognition to the goldfields. This had the sole effect of diverting the payments for mining licences from the pockets of the farmers who owned the land into the Government coffers. No one worried about that, except possibly the farmers. Rather it was an excuse for a party. The canteens were packed with swearing, sweating men. Duff and Sean drank with them.

The Crown and Anchor boards were doing a steady business in every bar and the men who crowded around them were the new population of the goldfields. Diggers bare to the waist and caked with dirt, salesmen with loud clothes and louder voices selling everything from dynamite to dysentery cure, an evangelist peddling salvation, gamblers mining pockets, gentlemen trying to keep the tobacco juice off their boots, boys new-flown from home and wishing themselves back, Boers bearded and drabsuited, drinking little but watching with inscrutable eyes the invaders of their land. Then there were the others, the clerks and farmers, the rogues and contractors listening greedily to the talk of gold.

The coloured girl, Martha, came to find Sean and Duff on the afternoon of the second day. They were in a mudbrick and thatch hut called The tavern of the Bright Angels. Duff was doing a solo exhibition of the dashing White Sergeant partnered by a chair; Sean and the fifty or so other customers were beating the rhythm on the bar counter with glasses and empty bottles.

Martha skittered across to Sean, slapping at the hands that tried to dive up her skirts and squealing sharply every time her bottom was pinched. She arrived at Sean's side flushed and breathless. Madame says you must come quickly, there's big trouble, she gasped and started to run the gauntlet back to the door. Someone flipped up her dress behind and a concerted masculine roar approved the fact that she wore nothing under the petticoats.

Duff was so engrossed in his dancing that Sean had to carry him bodily out of the bar and dip Ins head in the horse through outside before he could gain his attention. What the hell did you do that for? spluttered duff and swung a round-arm punch at Sean's head. Sean ducked under it and caught him about the body to save him falling on his back. Candy wants us, she says there's big trouble. Duff thought about that for a few seconds, frowning with concentration, then he threw back his head and sang to the tune of London's Burning, Candy wants us, Candy wants us we don't want Candy, we want brandy.

He broke out of Sean's grip and headed back for the bar.

Sean caught him again and pointed him in the direction of the Hotel.

Candy was in her bedroom. She looked at the two of them as they swayed arm-in-arm in the doorway. Did you enjoy your debauch? she asked sweetly.

Duff mumbled and tried to straighten his coat. Sean tried to steady him as his feet danced an involuntary sideways jig. What happened to your eye? she asked Sean and he fingered it tenderly; it was puffed and blue. Candy didn't wait an answer but went on, still sweetly:Well, if you two beauties want to own a mine by tomorrow you'd better sober up.

They stared at her and Sean spoke deliberately but nevertheless indistinctly. Why, what's the matter? They're going to jump the claims, that's the matter.

This new proclamation of a State goldfield has given the drifters the excuse they've been waiting for. About a hundred of them have formed a syndicate. They claim that the old titles aren't legal any more; they are going to pull out the pegs and put in their own. Duff walked without a stagger across to the washbasin beside Candy's bed; he splashed his face, towelled it vigorously then stooped and kissed her.

Thanks, my sweet. Duff, please be careful, Candy called after them.

Let's see if we can't hire a few mercenaries, Sean suggested. Good idea, we'll try and find a few sober characters there should be some in candy's dining-room. They made a short detour on their way back, to the mine and stopped at Francois's tent; it was dark by then and Francois came out in a freshly ironed nightshirt. He raised an eyebrow when he saw the five heavily armed men with Sean and Duff.

You going hunting? he asked.

Duff told him quickly and Francois was hopping with agitation before he had finished. Steal my claims, the thunders, the stinking thunders!

He rushed into his tent and came out again with a doublebarrelled shotgun. We'll see, man, we'll see how they look full of buckshotFrancois, listen to me, Sean shouted him down. We don't know which claims they'll go to first. Get your men ready and if you hear shooting our way come and give us a hand, we'll do the same for you. Ja, ja, we'll come all right, the dirty thunders. His nightshirt flapping around his legs Francois trotted off to call his men. Mbejane and the other Zulus were cooking dinner, squatting round the three-legged pot.

Sean rode up to them. Get your spears, he told them. They ran for their huts and almost immediately came crowding back.

Nkosi, where's the fight! they pleaded, food forgotten. Come on, I'll show you. They placed the hired gunmen amongst the mill machinery from where they could cover the track which led up to the mine. The Zulus they hid in one of the prospect trenches. If it developed into a hand-to-hand fight the syndicate was in for a surprise. Duff and Sean walked a little way down the slope to make sure their defenders were all concealed.

How much dynamite have we got? Sean asked thoughtfully. Duff stared at him a second, then he grinned. Sufficient, I'd say. You're full of bright ideas this evening He led the way back to the shed which they used as a storeroom.

In the middle of the track a few hundred yards down the slope they buried a full case of explosive and placed an old tin can on top of it to mark the spot. They went back to the shed and spent an hour making grenades out of bundles of dynamite sticks, each with a detonator and a very short fuse. Then they settled down huddled into their sheepskin coats, rifles in their laps and waited.

They could see the lights of the encampments straggled down the valley and hear an occasional faint burst of singing from the canteens, but the moonlit road up to the mine remained deserted. Sean and Duff sat side by side with their backs against the newly painted boiler. How did candy find out about this, I wonder? Sean asked.

She knows everything. That hotel of hers is the centre of this goldfield and she keeps her ears open. They relapsed into silence again while Sean formed his next question. She's quite a girl, our Candy.

Yes, agreed Duff. Are you going to marry her, Duff? VGood God! Duff straightened up as though someone had stuck a knife into him. You going mad, laddie, or else that was a joke in the worst possible taste. She dotes on you and from what I've seen you're fairly well disposed towards her. Sean was relieved at Duffs quick rejection of -the idea. He was jealous, but not of the waYes, we've got a common interest, that I won't deny but marriage!

Duff shivered slightly, not altogether from the cold. Only a fool makes the same mistake twice. Sean turned to him with surprise. You've been married before? he asked. With a vengeance. She was half Spanish and the rest Norwegian, a smoking bubbly mixture of cold fire and hot ice.

Duff's voice went dreamy. The memory has cooled sufficiently for me to think of it with a tinge of regret. What happened? I left her yWe only did two things well together and one of them was fight. If I close my eyes I can still see the way she used to pout with those lovely lips and bring them close to my ear before she hissed out a particularly foul word, then, hey ho! back to bed for the reconciliation. Perhaps you made the wrong choice. You look around, you'll see millions of happily, married people Name me one, challenged Duff and the silence lengthened as Sean thought.

Then Duff went on, There's only one good reason for marriage, and that's children. And companionship, that's another good reason. Companionship from a woman? Duff cut in incredulously. Like perfume from garlic.

They're incapable of it.

I suppose it's the training they get from their mothers, who are after all women themselves, but how can you be friends with someone who suspicions every little move you make, who takes your every action and weighs it on the balance of he loves me, he loves me not? Duff shook his head unhappily. How long can a friendship last when it needs an hourly declaration of love to nourish it? The catechism of matrimony, "Do you love me, darling?

"Yes, darling of course I do, my sweet. " It's got to sound convincing every time otherwise tears.

Sean chuckled. All right, it's funny, it's hilarious until you have to live with it, Duff mourned. Have you ever tried to talk to a woman about anything other than love? The same things that interest you leave them cold. It comes as a shock the first time you try talking sense to them and suddenly you realize that their attention is not with you -

they get a slightly fixed look in their eyes and you know they are thinking about that new dress or whether to invite Men Van der Hum to the party, so you stop talking and that's another mistake. That's a sign; marriage is full of signs that only a wife can read. I hold no brief for matrimony, Duff, but aren't you being a little unfair, judging everything by your own unfortunate experience? Select any woman slap a ring on her third finger and she becomes a wife. First she takes you into her warm, soft body, which is pleasant, and then she tries to take you into her warm, soft mind, which is not so pleasant.