Power of the Sword

Wilbur Smith - The Power of the Sword

Synopsis:

Half-brothers and blood enemies Manfred de la Rey and Shasa Courtney, the sons of Centaine de Thiry-Courtney, are irrevocably caught up in an age-old and savage war to seize the sword of power in their land. The Power of the Sword follows them through two decades of South African history in an epic story of life-long love and hate, of rivalry and revenge, of winners and losers in a deadly struggle where only the ruthless survive.

WILBUR SMITH

Power of the Sword

If I would have given way to an arbitrary way, for to have all Laws chang'd according to the Power of the Sword, I needed not to have come here. King Charles I of England.

Speech on the scaffold, 30 January 1649.

The Power of the Sword

The fog smothered the ocean, muting all colour and sound.

It undulated and seethed as the first eddy of the morning breeze washed in towards the land. The trawler lay in the fog three miles offshore on the edge of the current line, where the vast upwellings from the oceanic depths, rich in life-bringing plankton, met the gentle inshore waters in a line of darker green.

Lothar De La Rey stood in the wheelhouse and leaned on the spoked wooden wheel as he peered out into the fog. He loved these quiet charged minutes of waiting in the dawn.

He could feel the electric tingle starting in his blood, the lust of the huntsman that had sustained him countless times before, an addiction as powerful as opium or strong spirits.

Casting back in his mind he remembered that soft pink dawn creeping stealthily over the Magersfontein Hills as he lay against the parapets of the trenches and waited for the lines of Highland infantry to come in out of the darkness, to march with kilts swinging and bonnet ribbons flutting onto their waiting Mausers, and his skin prickled with gooseflesh at the memory.

There had been a hundred other dawns since then, waiting like this to go out against great game, shaggy maned Kalahari lion, scabby old buffalo with heads of armoured horn, sagacious grey elephant with wrinkled hides and precious teeth of long ivory, but now the game was smaller than any other and yet in its multitudes as vast as the ocean from which it came.

His train of thought was interrupted as the boy came down the open deck from the galley. He was barefoot and his legs were long and brown and strong. He was almost as tall as a grown man, so he was forced to stoop through the wheelhouse door balancing a steaming tin mug of coffee in each hand.

Sugar? Lothar asked.

Four spoons, Pa. The boy grinned back at him.

The fog had condensed in dew droplets on his long eyelashes, and he blinked them away like a sleepy cat. Though his curling blond head was bleached to streaks of platinum by the sun, his eyebrows and lashes were dense and black; they framed and emphasized his amber-coloured eyes.

Wild fish today. Lothar crossed the fingers of his right hand in his trouser pocket to ward off the ill luck of having said it aloud. 'We need it, he thought. To survive we need good wild fish. Five years previously he had succumbed once more to the call of the hunter's horn, to the lure of the chase and the wilds. He had sold out the prosperous road and railway construction company which he had painstakingly built UP, taken everything he could borrow and gambled it all.

He had known the limitless treasures that the cold green waters of the Benguela Current hid. He had glimpsed them first during those chaotic final days of the Great War when he was making his last stand against the hated English and their traitorous puppet Jan Smuts at the head of his army of the Union of South Africa.

From a secret supply base among the tall desert dunes that flanked the South Atlantic, Lothar had refuelled and armed the German U-boats that were scourging the British mercantile fleets, and while he waited out those dreary days at the edge of the ocean for the submarines to come, he had seen the very ocean moved by its own limitless bounty. it was there merely for the taking, and in the years that followed that ignoble peace at Versailles he made his plans while he laboured in the dust and the heat, blasting and cleaving the mountain passes or driving his roads straight across the shimmering plains. He had saved and planned and schemed for this taking.

The boats he had found in Portugal, sardine trawlers, neglected and rotten. There he had found Da Silva also, old and wise in the ways of the sea. Between them they had repaired and re-equipped the four ancient trawlers and then with skeleton crews had sailed them southwards down the length of the African continent.

The canning factory he had found in California, situated there to exploit the tuna shoals by a company which had overestimated their abundance and underestimated the costs of catching these elusive unpredictable chicken of the sea'.

Lothar had purchased the factory for a small fraction of its original cost and shipped it out to Africa in its entirety. He had re-erected it on the compacted desert sands alongside the ruined and abandoned whaling station which had given the desolate bay its name of Walvis Bay.

For the first three seasons he and old Da Silva had found wild fish, and they had reaped the endless shoals until Lothar had paid off the loans that had fettered him. He had immediately ordered new boats to replace the decrepit Portuguese trawlers which had reached the end of their useful lives, and in so doing had plunged himself more deeply into debt than he had been at the outset of the venture.

Then the fish had gone. For no reason that they could divine, the huge shoals of pilchards had disappeared, only tiny scattered pockets remaining. While they searched futilely, running out to sea a hundred miles and more, scouring the long desert coastline far beyond economic range from the canning factory, the months marched past remorselessly, each one bringing a note for accrued interest that Lothar could not meet, and the running costs of factory and boats piled up so that he had to plead and beg for further loans.

Two years with no fish. Then dramatically, just when Lothar knew himself beaten, there had been some subtle shift in the ocean current or a change in the prevailing wind and the fish had returned, good wild fish, rising thick as new grass in each dawn.

Let it last, Lothar prayed silently, as he stared out into the fog. Please God, let it last. Another three months, that was all he needed, just another three short months and he would pay it off and be free again.

She's lifting, the boy said, and Lothar blinked and shook his head slightly, returning from his memories.

The fog was opening like a theatre curtain, and the scene it revealed was melodramatic and stagey, seemingly too riotously coloured to be natural as the dawn fumed and glowed like a display of fireworks, orange and gold and green where it sparkled on the ocean, turning the twisting columns of fog the colour of blood and roses so that the very waters seemed to burn with unearthly fires. The silence enhanced the magical show, a silence heavy and lucid as crystal so that it seemed they had been struck deaf, as though all their other senses had been taken from them and concentrated in their vision as they stared in wonder.

Then the sun struck through, a brilliant beam of solid golden light through the roof of the fog-bank- It played across the surface, so that the current line was starkly lit. The inshore water was smudged with cloudy blue, as calm and smooth as oil. The line where it met the up welling of the true oceanic current was straight and sharp as the edge of a knife-blade, and beyond it the surface was dark and ruffled as green velvet stroked against the pile.

Daar spring hy! Da Silva yelled from the fore-deck, pointed out to the line of dark water There he jumps! As the low sun struck the water a single fish jumped. It was just a little longer than a man's hand, a tiny sliver of burnished silver.

Start up! Lothar's voice was husky with excitement, and the boy flung his mug onto the chart-table, the last few drops of coffee splashing, and dived down the ladder-way to the engine-room below.

Lothar flipped on the switches and set the throttle as below him the boy stooped to the crank-handle.

Swing it! Lothar shouted down and the boy braced himself and heaved against the compression of all four cylinders.

He was not quite thirteen years old but already he was almost as strong as a man, and there was bulging muscle in his back as he worked.

Now! Lothar closed the valves, and the engine, still warm from the run out from the harbour, fired and caught and roared. There was a belch of oily black smoke from the exhaust port in the side of the hull and then she settled to a regular beat.

The boy scrambled up the ladder and shot out onto the deck, racing up into the bows beside Da Silva.

Lothar swung the bows over and they ran down on the current line. The fog blew away, and they saw the other boats. They, too, had been lying quietly in the fog-bank, waiting for the first rays of the sun, but now they were running down eagerly on the current line, their wakes cutting long rippling Vs across the placid surface and the bow waves creaming and flashing in the new sunlight. Along each rail the crews craned out to peer ahead, and the jabber of their excited voices carried above the beat of the engines.

From the glassed wheelhouse Lothar had an all-round view over the working areas of the fifty-foot trawler and he made one final check of the preparations. The long net was laid out down the starboard rail, the corkline coiled into meticulous spirals. The dry weight of the net was seven and a half tons, wet it would weigh many times heavier. It was five hundred feet long and in the water hung down from the cork floats like a gauzy curtain seventy feet deep. It had cost Lothar over five thousand pounds, more money than an ordinary fisherman would earn in twenty years of unremitting toil, and each of his other three boats was so equipped. From the stern, secured by a heavy painter, each trawler towed its bucky an eighteen-foot-long clinker-built dinghy.

With one long hard glance, Lothar satisfied himself that all was ready for the throw, and then looked ahead just as another fish jumped.

This time it was so close that he could see the dark lateral lines along its gleaming flank, and the colour difference, ethereal green above the line and hard gleaming silver below. Then it plopped back, leaving a dark dimple on the surface.

As though it was a signal, instantly the ocean came alive.

The waters turned dark as though suddenly shaded by heavy cloud, but this cloud was from below, rising up from the depths, and the waters roiled as though a monster moved beneath them.

,Wild fish! screamed Da Silva, turning his weathered and creased brown face back over his shoulder towards Lothar, and at the same time spreading his arms to take in the sweep of ocean which moved with fish.

A mile wide and so deep that its far edge was hidden in the lingering fog-banks, a single dark shoal lay before them.

In all the years as a hunter, Lothar had never seen such an accumulation of life, such a multitude of a single species.

Beside this the locusts that could curtain and block off the African noon sun and the flocks of tiny quelea birds whose combined weight broke the boughs from the great trees on which they roosted, were insignificant. Even the crews of which the racing trawlers fell silent and stared in awe as the shoal broke the surface and the waters turned white and sparkled like a snow bank; countless millions of tiny scaly bodies Caught the sunlight as they were lifted clear of the water by the press of an infinity of their own kind beneath them.

Da Silva was the first to rouse himself. He turned and ran back down the deck, quick and agile as a youth, passing only at the door of the wheelhouse. Maria, Mother of God, grant we still have a net when this day ends. It was a poignant warning and then the old mail ran to the stern and scrambled over the gunwale into the trailing dinghy while at his example the rest of the crew roused themselves and hurried to their stations.

Manfred! Lothar called his son, and the boy who had stood mesmerized in the bows bobbed his head obediently and ran back to his father.

Take the wheel. It was an enormous responsibility for one so young, but Manfred had Proved himself so many times before that Lothar felt no misgiving as he ducked out of the wheelhouse. In the bows he signalled without looking over his shoulder and he felt the deck cant beneath his feet as Manfred spun the wheel, following his father's signal to begin a wide circle around the shoal.

So much fish, Lothar whispered. As his eyes estimated distance and wind and current, old Da Silva's warning was in the forefront of his calculations: the trawler and its net could handle 150 tons of these nimble silver pilchards, with skill and luck perhaps 200 tons.

Before him lay a shoal of millions of tons of fish. An injudicious throw could fill the net with ten or twenty thousand tons whose weight and momentum could rip the mesh to tatters, might even tear the entire net loose, snapping the main cork line or pulling the bollards from the deck and dragging it down into the depths. Worse still, if the fines and bollards held, the trawler might be pulled over by the weight and capsize. Lothar might lose not only a valuable net but the boat and the lives of his crew and his son as well.

Involuntarily he glanced over his shoulder and Manfred grinned at him through the window of the wheelhouse, his face alight with excitement. With his dark amber eyes glowing and white teeth flashing, he was an image of his mother and Lothar felt a bitter pang before he turned back to work.

Those few moments of inattention had nearly undone Lothar. The trawler was rushing down on the shoal within moments it would drive over the mass of fish and they would sound; the entire shoal, moving in that mysterious unison as though it were a single organism, would vanish back into the ocean depths. Sharply he signalled the turn away, and the boy responded instantly. The trawler spun on its heel and they bore down the edge of the shoal, keeping fifty feet off, waiting for the opportunity.

Another quick glance around showed Lothar that his other skippers were warily backing off also, daunted by the sheer mass of pilchards they were circling. Swart Hendrick glared across at him, a huge black bull of a man with his bald head shining like a cannonball in the early sunlight. Companion of war and a hundred desperate endeavours, like Lothar he had readily made the transition from land to sea and now was as skilled a fisherman as once he had been a hunter of ivory and of men. Lothar flashed him the underhand cut-out signal for caution and danger and Swart Hendrick laughed soundlessly and waved an acknowledgement.

Gracefully as dancers, the four boats weaved and pirouetted around the massive shoal as the last shreds of the fog dissolved and blew away on the light breeze. The sun cleared the horizon and the distant dunes of the desert glowed like bronze fresh from the forge, a dramatic backdrop to the developing hunt.

Still the massed fish held its compact formation, and Lothar was becoming desperate. They had been on the surface for over an hour now and that was longer than usual.

At any moment they might sound and vanish, and not one of his boats had thrown a net. They were thwarted by abundance, beggars in the presence of limitless treasure, and Lothar felt a recklessness rising in him. He had waited too long already.

Throw, and be damned! he thought, and signalled Manfred in closer, narrowing his eyes against the glare as they turned into the sun.

Before he could commit himself to folly, he heard Da Silva whistle, and when he looked back the Portuguese was standing on the thwart of the dinghy and gesticulating wildly. Behind them the shoal was beginning to bulge. The solid circular mass was altering shape. Out of it grew a tentacle, a pimple, no, it was more the shape of a head on a thin neck as part of the shoal detached itself from the main body. This was what they had been waiting for.

Manfred! Lothar yelled and wind-milled his right arm.

The boy spun the wheel, and she came around and they went tearing back, aiming the bows at the neck of the shoal like the blade of an executioner's axe.

,slow down! Lothar flapped his hand and the trawler checked. Gently she nosed up to the narrow neck of the shoal. The water was so clear that Lothar could see the individual fish, each encapsuled in its rainbow of prismed sunlight, and beneath the dark green bulk of the rest of the shoal as dense as an iceberg.

Delicately Lothar and Manfred eased the trawler's bows into the living mass, the propeller barely turning so as not to alarm it and force it to sound. The narrow neck split before the bows, and the small pocket of fish that was the bulge detached itself. Like a sheep-dog with its flock, Lothar worked them clear, backing and turning and easing ahead as Manfred followed his hand signals.

Still too much! Lothar muttered to himself. They had separated a minute portion of the shoal from the main body, but Lothar estimated it was still well over a thousand tons even more depending on the depth of fish beneath that he could only guess at.

It was a risk, a high risk. From the corner of his eye he could see Da Silva agitatedly signalling caution, and now he whistled, squeaking with agitation. The old man was afraid of this much fish and Lothar grinned; his Yellow eyes narrowed and glittered like polished topaz as he signalled Manfred up to throwing speed and deliberately turned his back on the old man.

At five knots he checked Manfred and brought him around in a tight turn, forcing the pocket of fish to bunch up in the centre of the circle, and then as they came around the second time and the trawler passed downwind of the shoal, Lothar spun to face the stern and cupped both hands to his mouth.

Los! he bellowed. Throw her loose! The black Herero crewman standing on the stern flipped the slippery knot that held the painter of the dinghy and threw it overboard. The little wooden dinghy, with Da Silva clinging to the gunwale and still howling protests, fell away behind them, bobbing in their wake, and it pulled the end of the heavy brown net over the side with it.

As the trawler steamed in its circle about the shoal, the coarse brown mesh rasped and hissed out over the wooden rail, the cork line uncoiled like a python and streamed overside, an umbilical cord between the trawler and the dinghy.

Coming around across the wind, the line of corks, evenly spaced as beads on a string, formed a circle around the dense dark shoal and now the dinghy with Da Silva slumped in resignation was dead ahead.

Manfred balanced the wheel against the drag of the great net, making minute adjustments as he laid the trawler alongside the rocking dinghy and shut the throttle as they touched lightly. Now the net was closed, hemming in the shoal, and Da Silva scrambled up the side of the trawler with the ends of the heavy three-inch manila lines over his shoulder.

YoU'll lose your net, he howled at Lothar. Only a crazy man would close the purse on this shoal, they'll run away with your net. St Anthony and the blessed St Mark are my witnesses! But under Lothar's terse direction the Herero crewmen were already into the routine of net recovery. Two of them lifted the main cork line off Da Silva s shoulders and made it fast, while another was helping Lothar lead the purse line to the main winch.

It's my net, and my fish, Lothar grunted at him as he started the winch with a clattering roar. Get the bucky hooked on! The net was hanging seventy feet deep into the clear green water, but the bottom was open. The first and urgent task was to close it before the shoal discovered this escape.

Crouched over the winch, the muscles in his bare arms knotting and bunching beneath the tanned brown skin, Lothar was swinging his shoulders rhythmically as he brought the purse line in hand over hand around the revolving drum of the winch. The purse line running through the steel rings around the bottom of the net was closing the mouth like the drawstring of a monstrous tobacco pouch.

in the wheelhouse Manfred was using delicate touches of forward and reverse to manoeuvre the stern of the trawler away from the net and prevent it fouling the propeller, while old Da Silva had worked the dinghy out to the far side of the cork line and hooked onto it to provide extra buoyancy for the critical moment when the oversized shoal realized that it was trapped and began to panic. Working swiftly, Lothar hauled in the heavy purse line until at last the bunch of steel rings came in glistening and streaming over the side.

The net was closed, the shoal was in the bag.

With sweat running down his cheeks and soaking his shirt, Lothar leaned against the gunwale so winded that he could not speak. His long silver-white hair, heavy with sweat, streamed down over his forehead and into his eyes as he gesticulated to Da Silva.

The cork line was laid out in a neat circle on the gentle undulating swells of the cold green Benguela Current, with the bucky hooked onto the side farthest from the trawler.

But as Lothar watched it, gasping and heaving for breath, the circle of bobbing corks changed shape, elongating swiftly as the shoal felt the net for the first time and in a concerted rush pushed against it. Then the thrust was reversed as the shoal turned and rushed back, dragging the net and the dinghy with it as though it were a scrap of floating seaweed.

The power of the shoal was as irresistible as Leviathan.

By God, we've got even more than I reckoned, Lothar panted. Then, rousing himself, he flicked the wet blond hair from his eyes and ran to the wheelhouse.

The shoal was surging back and forth in the net, tossing the dinghy about lightly on the churning waters, and Lothar felt the deck of the trawler list sharply under him as the mass of fish dragged abruptly on the heavy lines.

Da Silva was right. They are going crazy, he whispered, and reached for the handle of the foghorn. He blew three sharp ringing blasts, the request for assistance, and as he ran back onto the deck he saw the other three trawlers turn and race towards him. None of them had as yet plucked up the courage to throw their own nets at the huge shoal.

Hurry! Damn you, hurry! Lothar snarled ineffectually at them, and then at his crew, All hands to dry up! His crew hesitated, hanging back, reluctant to handle that net.

Move, you black bastards! Lothar bellowed at them, setting the example by leaping to the gunwale. They had to compress the shoal, pack the tiny fish so closely as to rob them of their strength.

The net was coarse and sharp as barbed wire, but they bent to it in a row, using the roll of the hull in the low swell

to work the net in by hand, recovering a few feet with each concerted heave.

Then the shoal surged again, and all the net they had won was ripped from their hands. One of the Herero crew was too slow to let it go and the fingers of his right hand were caught in the coarse mesh. The flesh was stripped off his fingers like a glove, leaving bare white bone and raw flesh.

He screamed and clutched the maimed hand to his chest, trying to staunch the spurt of bright blood. It sprayed into his own face and ran down the sweat polished black skin of his chest and belly and soaked into his breeches.

Manfred! Lothar yelled. See to him! and he switched all his attention back to the net. The shoal was sounding, dragging one end of the cork line below the surface, and a small part of the shoal escaped over the top, spreading like dark green smoke across the bright waters.

Good riddance, Lothar muttered, but the vast bulk of the shoal was still trapped and the cork line bobbed to the surface. Again the shoal surged downwards, and this time the heavy fifty-foot trawler listed over dangerously so that the crew clutched for handholds, their faces turning ashy grey beneath their dark skin.

Across the circle of cork line the dinghy was dragged over sharply, and it did not have the buoyancy to resist. Green water poured in over the gunwale, swamping it.

Jump! Lothar yelled at the old man. Get clear of the net! They both understood the danger.

The previous season one of their crew had fallen into the net. The fish had immediately pushed against him in unison, driving him below the surface, fighting against the resistance of his body in their efforts to escape.

When, hours later, they had at last recovered the corpse from the bottom of the net, they had found that the fish had been forced by their own efforts and the enormous pressures in the depths of the trapped shoal into all the man's body openings. They had thrust down his open mouth into his belly; they had been driven like silver daggers into the eye-sockets, displacing the eyeballs and entering the brain. They had even burst through the threadbare stuff of his breeches and penetrated his anus so that his belly and bowels were stuffed with dead fish and he was bloated like a grotesque balloon. It was a sight none of them would ever forget.

Get clear of the net! Lothar screamed again and Da Silva threw himself over the far side of the sinking dinghy just as it was dragged beneath the surface. He splashed frantically as his heavy seaboots began to drag him under.

However, Swart Hendrick was there to rescue him. He laid his trawler neatly alongside the bulging cork line, and two of his crew hauled Da Silva up the side while the others crowded the rail and under Swart Hendrick's direction hooked onto the far side of the net.

If only the net holds, Lothar grunted, for the two other trawlers had come up now and fastened onto the cork line.

The four big boats formed a circle around the captive shoal and, working in a frenzy, the crewmen stooped over the net and started to dry up.

Foot by foot they hauled up the net, twelve men on each trawler, even Manfred taking his place at his father's shoulder. They grunted and heaved and sweated, fresh blood on their torn hands when the shoal surged and burning agony in their backs and bellies, but slowly, an inch at a time, they subdued the huge shoal, until at last it was dried up', and the upper fish were flapping helplessly high and dry on the compacted mass of their fellows I who were drowning and dying in the crush.

Dip them out Lothar shouted, and on each of the trawlers the three dip-men pulled the long-handled dip-nets from the racks over the top of the wheelhouses and dragged them down the deck.

The dip-nets were the same shape as a butterfly-net, or those little hand nets with which children catch shrimps and crabs in rock pools at the seaside. The handles of these nets, however, were thirty feet long and the net purse could scoop up a ton of living fish at a time. At three points around the steel ring that formed the mouth of the net were attached manila lines; these were spliced to the heavier winch line by which the dip-net was lifted and lowered. The foot of the net could be opened or closed by a purse line through a set of smaller rings, exactly the same arrangement as the closure of the great main net.

While the dip-net was manhandled into position, Lothar and Manfred were knocking the covers off the hatch of the hold. Then they hurried to their positions, Lothar on the winch and Manfred holding the end of the purse line of the dip-net. with a squeal and clatter Lothar winched the dip-net high onto the derrick above their heads while the three men on the long handle swung the net outboard over the trapped and struggling shoal. Manfred jerked hard on the purse line, closing the bottom of the dip-net.

Lothar slammed the winch gear into reverse and with another squeal of the pulley block the heavy head of the net dropped into the silver mass of fish. The three dip-men leaned all their weight on the handle, forcing the net deeply into the living porridge of pilchards.

Coming up! Lothar yelled and changed the winch into forward gear. The net was dragged upwards through the shoal and burst out filled with a ton of quivering, flapping pilchards. With Manfred grimly hanging onto the purse line, the full net was swung inboard over the gaping hatch of the hold.

Let go! Lothar shouted at his son, and Manfred released the purse line. The bottom of the net opened and a ton of pilchards showered down into the open hold. The tiny scales had been rubbed from the bodies of the fish by this rough treatment and now they swirled down over the men on the deck like snowflakes, sparkling in the sunlight with pretty shades of pink and rose and gold.

As the net emptied, Manfred jerked the purse line closed and the dip-men swung the handle outboard, the winch squealed into reverse and the net dropped into the shoal for the whole sequence to be repeated. on each of the other three trawlers the dip-men and winch driver also were hard at work, and every few seconds another ton load of fish, seawater and clouds of translucent scales streaming from it, was swung over the waiting hatches and poured into them.

It was heartbreaking, back-straining work, monotonous and repetitive, and each time the net swung overhead the crew were drenched with icy seawater and covered with scales. As the dip-men faltered with exhaustion, the skippers changed them without breaking the rhythm of swing and lift and drop, spelling the men working on the main net with those on the handle of the dip-net, although Lothar remained at the winch, tall and alert and indefatigable, his white-blond hair, thick with glittering fish scales, shining in the sunlight like a beacon fire.

Silver three-pennies. He grinned to himself, as the fish showered into the holds on all four of his trawlers. Shiny three-penny bits, not fish. We will take in a deck-load of tickeys today. Tickey was the slang for a three-penny coin.

Deck-load! he bellowed across the diminishing circle of the main net to where Swart Hendrick worked at his own winch, stripped to the waist and glistening like polished ebony.

Deck-load! he bellowed back at Lothar, revelling in the physical effort which allowed him to flaunt his superior strength in the faces of his crew. Already the holds of the trawlers were brimming full, each of them had over a hundred and fifty tons aboard, and now they were going to deck-load.

Again it was a risk. Once loaded, the boats could not be lightened again until they reached harbour and were pumped out into the factory. Deck-loading would burden each hull with another hundred tons of dead weight, far over the safe limit. If the weather turned, if the wind switched into the north-west, then the giant sea that would build up rapidly would hammer the overloaded trawlers into the cold green depths.

The weather will hold, Lothar assured himself as he toiled at the winch. He was on the crest of a wave; nothing could stop him now. He had taken one fearsome risk and it had paid him with nearly a thousand tons of fish, four deck-loads of fish, worth fifty pounds a ton in profits. Fifty thousand pounds in a single throw. The greatest stroke of fortune of his life. He could have lost his net or his boat or his life, instead he had paid off his debts with one throw of the net.

By God,he whispered, as he slaved at the winch, nothing can go wrong now, nothing can touch me now. I'm free and clear. So with the holds full they began to deck-load the trawlers, filling them to the tops of the gunwales with a silver swamp of fish into which the crew sank waist-deep as they dried the net and swung the long handle of the dip.

Over the four trawlers hovered a dense white cloud of seabirds, adding their voracious squawking and screeching to the cacophony of the winches, diving into the purse of the net to gorge themselves until they could eat no more, could not even fly but drifted away on the current, bloated and uncomfortable, feathers started and throats straining to keep down the contents of their swollen crops. At the bows and stern of each trawler stood a man with a sharpened boat-hook, with which he stabbed and hacked at the big sharks that thrashed at the surface in their efforts to reach the mass of trapped fish. Their razor-sharp triangular fangs could cut through even the tough mesh of the net.

While the birds and sharks gorged, the hulls of the trawlers sank lower and still lower into the water, until at last a little after the sun had nooned even Lothar had to call enough. There was no room for another load; each time they swung one aboard it merely slithered over the side to feed the circling sharks.

Lothar switched off the winch. There was probably another hundred tons of fish still floating in the main net, most of them drowned and crushed. Empty the net, he ordered. Let them go! Get the net on board. The four trawlers, each of them so low in the water that seawater washed in through the scuppers at each roll, and their speed reduced to an ungainly waddling motion like a string of heavily pregnant ducks, turned towards the land in line astern with Lothar leading them.

Behind them they left an area of almost half a square mile of the ocean carpeted with dead fish, floating silver belly up, as thick as autumn leaves on the forest floor. On top of them drifted thousands of satiated seagulls and beneath them the big sharks swirled and feasted still.

The exhausted crews dragged themselves through the quick-sands of still quivering kicking fish that glutted the deck to the forecastle companionway. Below deck they threw themselves still soaked with fish-slime and seawater onto their cramped bunks.

In the wheelhouse Lothar drank two mugs of hot coffee then checked the chronometer above his head.

Four hours run back to the factory, he said. Just time for our lessons. Oh, Pa! the boy pleaded. Not today, today is special. Do we have to learn today? There was no school at Walvis Bay. The nearest was the German School at Swakopmund, thirty kilometres away.

Lothar had been both father and mother to the boy from the very day of his birth. He had taken him wet and bloody from the child-bed. His mother had never even laid eyes upon him.

That had been part of their unnatural bargain. He had reared the boy alone, unaided except for the milk that the brown Nama wet-nurses had provided. They had grown so close that Lothar could not bear to be parted from him for a single day. He had even taken over his education rather than send him away.

No day is that special, he told Manfred. Every day we learn. Muscles don't make a man strong. He tapped his head. This is what makes a man strong. Get the books! Manfred rolled his eyes at Da Silva for sympathy but he knew better than to argue further.

Take the wheel. Lothar handed over to the old boatman and went to sit beside his son at the small chart-table. Not arithmetic. He shook his head. It's English today., I hate English! Manfred declared vehemently. I hate English and I hate the English. Lothar nodded. Yes! he agreed. The English are our enemies. They have always been and always will be our enemies.

That is why we have to arm ourselves with their weapons.

That is why we learn the language, so when the time comes we will be able to use it in the battle against them. He spoke in English for the first time that day. Manfred started to reply in Afrikaans, the South African Dutch patois that had only obtained recognition as a separate language and been adopted as an official language of the Union of South Africa in 1918, over a year before Manfred was born.

Lothar held up his hand to stop him.

English, he admonished. Speak English only. For an hour they worked together, reading aloud from the King James version of the Bible and from a two-month-old COPY of the Cape Times, and then Lothar set him a page of dictation. The labour in this unfamiliar language made Manfred fidget and frown and nibble his pencil, until at last he could contain himself no longer.

Tell me about Grandpa, and the oath! he wheedled his father.

Lothar grinned. You're a cunning little monkey, aren't you. Anything to get out of work. Please, Pa, I've told you a hundred times. Tell me again. It's a special day. Lothar glanced out of the wheelhouse window at the precious silver cargo. The boy was right, it was a very special day. Today he was free and clear of debt, after five long hard years.

All right. He nodded. I'll tell you again, but in English. And Manfred shut his exercise book with an enthusiastic snap and leaned across the table, his amber eyes glowing with anticipation.

The story of the great rebellion had been repeated so often that Manfred had it by heart and he corrected any discrepancy or departure from the original, or called his father back if he left out any of the details.

Well then, Lothar started, when the treacherous English King George V declared war on Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany in 1914, your grandpa and I knew our duty. We kissed your grandmother goodbye What colour was my grandmother's hair? Manfred demanded.

Your grandmother was a beautiful German noblewoman, and her hair was the colour of ripe wheat in the sunlight. just like mine, Manfred prompted him.

Just like yours, Lothar smiled. And Grandpa and I rode out on our war-horses to join old General Maritz and his six hundred heroes on the banks of the orange river where he was about to go out against old Slim Jannie Smuts., Slim was the Afrikaans word for tricky or treacherous, and Manfred nodded avidly.

Go on, Pa, go on! When Lothar reached the description of the first battle in which Jannie Smuts troops had smashed the rebellion with machine-guns and artillery, the boy's eyes clouded with sorrow.

But you fought like demons, didn't you, Pa? We fought like madmen, but there were too many of them and they were armed with great cannons and machine-guns.

Then your grandpa was hit in the stomach and I put him up on my horse and carried him off the battlefield. Fat tears glistened in the boy's eyes now as Lothar ended.

When at last he was dying your grandfather took the old black Bible from the saddle bag on which his head was pillowed, and he made me swear an oath upon the book. I know the oath, Manfred cut in. 'Let me tell it? What was the oath? Lothar nodded agreement.

Grandpa said: "Promise me, my son, with your hand upon the book, promise me that the war with the English will never end." Yes, Lothar nodded again. That was the oath, the solemn oath I made to my father as he lay dying. He reached out and took the boy's hand and squeezed it hard.

Old Da Silva broke the mood; he coughed and hawked and spat through the wheelhouse window. You should be ashamed, filling the child's head with hatred and death, he said, and Lothar stood up abruptly.

Guard your mouth, old man, he warned. This is no business of yours. Thank the Holy Virgin, Da Silva grumbled, for that is devil's business indeed. Lothar scowled and turned away from him. Manfred, that's enough for today. Put the books away. He swung out of the wheelhouse and scrambled up onto the roof. As he settled comfortably against the coaming, he took a long black cheroot from his top pocket and bit off the tip. He spat the stub overside and patted his pockets for the matches. The boy stuck his head over the edge of the coaming, hesitated shyly and when his father did not send him away, sometimes he was moody and withdrawn and wanted to be alone, Manfred crept up and sat beside him.

Lothar cupped his hands around the flare of the match and sucked the cheroot smoke down deeply into his lungs and then he held up the match and let the wind extinguish it. He flicked it overboard, and let his arm fall casually over his son's shoulders.

The boy shivered with delight, physical display of affection from his father was so rare, and he pressed closer to him and sat still as he could, barely breathing so as not to disturb or spoil the moment.

The little fleet ran in towards the land, and turned the sharp northern horn of the bay. The seabirds were returning with them, squadrons of yellow-throated gannets in long regular lines skimming low over the cloudy green waters, and the lowering sun gilded them and burned upon the tall bronze dunes that rose like a mountain range behind the tiny insignificant cluster of buildings that stood at the edge of the bay.

I hope Willem has had enough sense to fire up the boilers, Lothar murmured. We have enough work here to keep the factory busy all night and all tomorrow. We'll never be able to can all this fish, the boy whispered.

No, we will have to turn most of it to fish oil and fish meal, Lothar broke off and stared across the bay. Manfred felt his body stiffen and then, to the boy's dismay, he lifted his arm off his son's shoulders and shaded his eyes.

The bloody fool, he growled. With his hunter's vision he had picked out the distant stack of the factory boilerhouse.

It was smokeless. What the hell is he playing at? Lothar leapt to his feet and balanced easily against the trawler's motion. He has let the boilers go cold. It will take five or six hours to refire them and our fish will begin to spoil.

Damn him, damn him to hell! Raging still, Lothar dropped down to the wheelhouse. As he yanked the foghorn to alert the factory, he snapped, With the money from the fish I'm going to buy one of Marconi's newfangled short-wave radio machines so we can talk to the factory while we are at sea; then this sort of thing won't happen. He broke off again and stared. What the hell is going on! He snatched the binoculars from the bin next to the control panel and focused them.

They were close enough now to see the small crowd at the main doors of the factory. The cutters and packers in their rubber aprons and boots.

They should have been at their places in the factory.

There is Willem. The factory manager was standing on the end of the long wooden unloading jetty that thrust out into the still waters of the bay on its heavy teak pilings.

What the hell is he playing at, the boilers cold and everybody hanging about outside? There were two strangers with Willem, standing one on each side of him. They were dressed in dark civilian suits and they had that self-important, puffed-up look of petty officialdom that Lothar knew and dreaded.

Tax collectors or other civil servants, Lothar whispered, and his anger cooled and was replaced with unease. No minion of the government had ever brought him good news.

Trouble, he guessed. Just now when I have a thousand tons of fish to cook and can, Then he noticed the motor cars. They had been screened by the factory building until Da Silva made the turn into the main channel that would bring the trawler up to the off-loading jetty. There were two cars. One was a battered old T model Ford, but the other, even though covered with a pale coating of fine desert dust, was a much grander machine, and Lothar felt his heart trip and his breathing alter.

There could not be two similar vehicles in the whole of Africa. it was an elephantine Daimler, painted daffodil yellow. The last time he had seen it, it had been parked outside the offices of the Courtney Mining and Finance Company in the Main Street of Windhoek.

Lothar had been on his way to discuss an extension of his loans from the company. He had stood on the opposite side of the wide dusty unpaved street and watched as she came down the broad marble steps, flanked by two of her obsequious employees in dark suits and high celluloid collars; one of them had opened the door of the magnificent yellow machine for her and bowed her into the driver's seat while the other had run to take the crank handle. Scorning a chauffeur, she had driven off herself, not even glancing in Lothar's direction, and left him pale and trembling with the conflicting emotions that the mere sight of her had evoked. That had been almost a year before.

Now he roused himself as Da Silva laid the heavily burdened trawler alongside the jetty. They were so low in the water that Manfred had to toss the bow mooring-line up to one of the men on the jetty above him.

Lothar, these men, they want to speak to you. Willem called down. He was sweating nervously as he jerked a thumb at the man who flanked him.

Are you Mr Lothar De La Rey? the smaller of the two strangers demanded, pushing his dusty fedora hat onto the back of his head and mopping the pale line of skin that was exposed beneath the brim.

That's right. Lothar glared up at him with his clenched fists upon his hips. And who the hell are your Are you the owner of the South west African Canning and Fishing Company? Ja! Lothar answered him in Afrikaans. I am the owner and what of it? I am the sheriff of the court in Windhoek, and I have here a writ of attachment over all the assets of the company. The sheriff brandished the document he held.

They've closed the factory, Willem called down to Lothar miserably, his moustaches quivering. They made me draw the fires on my boilers. You can't do that! Lothar snarled, and his eyes slitted yellow and fierce as those of an angry leopard. I've got a thousand tons of fish to process. Are these the four trawlers registered in the company's name? the sheriff went on, unperturbed by the outburst, but he unbuttoned his dark jacket and pulled it back as he placed both hands on his hips. A heavy Webley service revolver hung on a leather holster from his belt. He turned his head to watch the other trawlers mooring at their berths on each side of the jetty, then without waiting for Lothar to answer he went on placidly, My assistant will place the court seals on them and their cargoes. I must warn you that it will be a criminal offence to remove either the boats or their cargoes. You can't do this to me! Lothar swarmed up the ladder onto the jetty. His tone was no longer belligerent. I have to get my fish processed. Don't you understand? They'll be stinking to the heavens by tomorrow morning They are not your fish. The sheriff shook his head. They belong to the Courtney Mining and Finance Company., He gestured to his assistant impatiently. Get on with it, man. And he began to turn away.

She's here, Lothar called after him, and the sheriff turned back to face him again.

She's here, Lothar repeated. That's her car. She has come herself, hasn't she? The sheriff dropped his eyes and shrugged, but Willem gobbled a reply.

Yes, she's here, she's waiting in my office. Lothar turned away from the group and strode down the jetty, his heavy oilskin breeches rustling and his fists still bunched as though he were going into a fight.

The agitated crowd of factory hands was waiting for him at the head of the jetty.

What is happening, Baas? they pleaded. They won't let us work.

What must we do, Ou Baas? Wait! Lothar ordered them brusquely. I will fix this. Will we get our pay, Baas? We've got children, 'You'll be paid, Lothar snapped, I promise you that. It was a promise he could not keep, not until he had sold his fish, and he pushed his way through them and strode around the corner of the factory towards the manager's office.

The Daimler was parked outside the door, and a boy leaned against the front mudguard of the big yellow machine. It was obvious that he was disgruntled and bored. He was perhaps a year older than Manfred but an inch or so shorter and his body was slimmer and neater. He wore a white shirt that had wilted a little in the heat, and his fashionable Oxford bags of grey flannel were dusty and too modish for a boy of his age, but there was an unstudied grace about him, and he was beautiful as a girl, with flawless skin and dark indigo eyes.

Lothar came up short at the sight of him, and before he could stop himself, he said, Shasa! The boy straightened up quickly and flicked the lock of dark hair off his forehead.

How do you know my name? he asked, and despite his tone the dark blue eyes sparkled with interest as he studied Lothar with a level, almost adult self-assurance.

There were a hundred answers Lothar could have given, and they crowded to his lips: Once, many years ago, I saved you and your mother from death in the desert.. . I helped wean you, and carried you on the pommel of my saddle when you were a baby ... I loved you, almost as much as once I loved your mother ... You are Manfred's brother you are half brother to my own son. I'd recognize you anywhere, even after a t s time. But instead he said, Shasa is the Bushman word for "Good Water", the most precious substance in the Bushman world. That's right. Shasa Courtney nodded. The man interested him. There was a restrained violence and cruelty in him, an impression of untapped strength, and his eyes were strangely light coloured, almost yellow like those of a cat. You're right. It's a Bushman name, but my Christian name is Michel. That's French. My mother is French. Where is she? Lothar demanded, and Shasa glanced at the office door.

She doesn't want to be disturbed, he warned, but Lothar De La Rey stepped past him, so closely that Shasa could smell the fish smell on his oilskins and see the small white fish scales stuck to his tanned skin.

You'd best knock, Shasa dropped his voice, but Lothar ignored him and flung the door of the office open so that it crashed back on its hinges. He stood in the open door and Shasa could see past him. His mother rose from the straight-backed chair by the window and faced the door.

She was slim as a girl, and the yellow crape-de-chine of her dress was draped over her small fashionably flattened breasts and was gathered in a narrow girdle low around her hips. Her narrow-brimmed cloche hat was pulled down, covering the dense dark bush of her hair, and her eyes were huge and almost black.

She looked very young, not much older than her son, until she raised her chin and showed the hard, determined line of her jaw and the corners of her eyes lifted also and those honey-coloured lights burned in their dark depths. Then she was formidable as any man Lothar had ever met.

They stared at each other, assessing the changes that the years had wrought since their last meeting.

How old is she? Lothar wondered, and then immediately remembered. She was born an hour after midnight on the first day of the century. She is as old as the twentieth century

that's why she was named Centaine. So she's thirty-one

years old, and she still looks nineteen, as young as the day

I found her, bleeding and dying in the desert with the

wounds of lion claws deep in her sweet young flesh.

He has aged, Centaine thought. Those silver streaks in

the blond, those lines around the mouth and eyes. He'll be over forty now, and he has suffered -- but not enough. I am glad I didn't kill him, I'm glad my bullet missed his heart. It would have been too quick. Now he is in my power and he'll begin to learn the true-

Suddenly, against her will and inclination, she remembered

the feel of his golden body over hers, naked and

smooth and hard, and her loins clenched and then dissolved

so she could feel their hot soft flooding, as hot as the blood

that mounted to her cheeks and as hot as her anger against

herself and her inability to master that animal corner of her

motions. In all other things she had trained herself like an

athlete, but always that unruly streak of sensuality was just

beyond her control.

She looked beyond the man in the doorway, and she saw ... ...

Shasa standing out in the sunlight, her beautiful child,

watching her curiously, and she was ashamed and angry to

have been caught in that naked and unguarded moment

when she was certain that her basest feelings had been on

open display.

Close the door, she ordered, and her voice was husky

and level. Come in and close the door. She turned away and

stared out of the window, bringing herself under complete

control once More before turning back to face the man she

had set herself to destroy.

The door closed and Shasa suffered an acute pang of disappointment . He sensed that something vitally important was taking place. That blond stranger with the cat-yellow eyes who knew his name and its derivation stirred something in him, something dangerous and exciting. Then his mother's reaction, that sudden high colour coming up her throat into her checks and something in her eyes that he had never seen before, not guilt, surely? Then uncertainty, which was totally uncharacteristic. She had never been uncertain of anything in the world that Shasa knew of. He wanted desperately to know what was taking place behind that closed door. The walls of the building were of corrugated galvanized iron sheeting.

If you want to know something, go and find out. it was one of his mother's adages, and his only compunction was that she might catch him at it as he crossed to the side wall of the office, stepping lightly so that the gravel would not crunch under his feet, and laid his ear against the sun-heated corrugated metal.

Though he strained, he could only hear the murmur of voices. Even when the blond stranger spoke sharply, he could not catch the words, while his mother's voice was low and husky and inaudible.

The window, he thought, and moved quickly to the corner. As he stepped around it, intent on eavesdropping at the open window, he was suddenly the subject of attention of fifty pairs of eyes. The factory manager and his idle workers were still clustered at the main doors, and they fell silent and turned their full attention upon him as he appeared round the corner.

Shasa tossed his head and veered away from the window.

They were all still watching him and he thrust his hands into the pockets of his Oxford bags and, with an elaborate show of nonchalance, sauntered down towards the long wooden jetty as though this had been his intention all along.

Whatever was going on in the office now was beyond him, unless he could wheedle it out of his mother later, and he didn't think there was much hope of that. Then suddenly he noticed the four squat wooden trawlers moored alongside the jetty, each lying low in the water under the glittering silver cargo they carried, and his disappointment was a little mollified. Here was something to break the monotony of his hot dreary desert afternoon and his step quickened as he went onto the timbers of the jetty. Boats always fascinated him.

This was new and exciting. He had never seen so many fish, there must be tons of them. He came level with the first boat. It was grubby and ugly, with streaks of human excrement down the sides where the crew had squatted on the gunwale, and it stank of bilges and fuel oil and unwashed humanity living in confined quarters. It had not even been graced with a name: there were only the registration and licence numbers painted on the wave-battered bows.

A boat should have a name, Shasa thought. It's insulting and unlucky not to give it a name. His own twenty-five-foot yacht that his mother had given him for his thirteenth birthday was named The Midas Touch, a name that his mother had suggested.

Shasa wrinkled his nose at the smell of the trawler, disgusted and saddened by her disgracefully neglected condition.

If this is what Mater drove all the way from Windhoek for, He did not finish the thought for a boy stepped around the far side of the tall angular wheelhouse.

He wore patched shorts of canvas duck, his legs were brown and muscled and he balanced easily on the hatch coarning on bare feet.

As they became aware of each other both boys bridled and stiffened, like dogs meeting unexpectedly; silently they scrutinized each other.

A dandy, a fancy boy, Manfred thought. He had seen one or two like him on their infrequent visits to the resort town of Swakopmund up the coast. Rich men's children dressed in ridiculous stiff clothing, walking dutifully behind their parents with that infuriating supercilious expression upon their faces. Look at his hair, all shiny with brilliantine, and he stinks like a bunch of flowers. One of the poor white Afrikaners, Shasa recognized his type. A bywoner, a squatter's kid. I His mother had forbidden him to play with them, but he had found that some of them were jolly good fun. Their attraction was of course enhanced by his mother's prohibition. One of the sons of the machine-shop foreman at the mine imitated bird calls in such an amazingly lifelike manner that he could actually call the birds down from the trees, and he had shown Shasa how to adjust the carburettor and ignition on the old Ford which his mother allowed him to use, even though he was too young to have a driver's licence. While the same boy's elder sister, a year older than Shasa, had shown him something even more remarkable when they had shared a few forbidden moments together behind the pumphouse at the mine. She had even allowed him to touch it and it had been warm and soft and furry as a new-born kitten cuddling up there under her short cotton skirt, a most remarkable experience which he intended to repeat at the very next opportunity.

This boy looked interesting also, and perhaps he could show Shasa over the trawler's engine-room. Shasa glanced back at the factory. His mother was not watching and he was prepared to be magnanimous.

Hello. He made a lordly gesture and smiled carefully. His grandfather, Sir Garrick Courtney, the most important male person in his existence, was always admonishing him. By birth you have a specially exalted position in society. This gives you not only benefit and privilege, but a duty also. A true gentleman treats those beneath his station, black or white, old or young, man or woman, with consideration and courtesy. My name is Courtney, Shasa told him. 'Shasa Courtney.

My uncle is Sir Garrick Courtney and my mother is Mrs Centaine de Thiry Courtney. He waited for the deference that those names usually commanded, and when it was not evident, he went on rather lamely. 'What's your name? My name is Manfred, the other boy replied in Afrikaans and arched those dense black eyebrows over the amber eyes.

They were so much darker than his streaked blond hair that they looked as though they had been painted on. Manfred De La Rey, and my grandfather and my great-uncle and my father were De La Rey also and they shot the shit out of the English every time they met them. Shasa blushed at this unexpected attack and was on the point of turning away when he saw that there was an old man leaning in the window of the wheelhouse, watching them, and two coloured crewmen had come up from the trawler's forecastle. He could not retreat.

We English won the war and in 1914 we beat the hell out of the rebels, he snapped.

Well! Manfred repeated, and turned to his audience. This little gentleman with perfume on his hair won the war. The crewmen chuckled encouragement. Smell him, his name should be Lily, Lily the perfumed soldier. Manfred turned back to him, and for the first time Shasa realized that he was taller by a good inch and his arms were alarmingly thick and brown. So you are English, are you, Lily? Then you must live in London, is that right, sweet Lily? Shasa had not expected a poor white boy to be so articulate, nor his wit to be so acerbic. Usually he was in control of any discussion.

Of course I'm English, he affirmed furiously, and was seeking a final retort to end the exchange and allow him to retire in good order from a situation over which he was swiftly losing control.

Then you must live in London, Manfred persisted.

I live in Cape Town. Hah! Manfred turned to his growing audience. Swart Hendrick had come across the jetty from his own trawler, and all the crew were up from the forecastle. That's why they are called Soutpiel, Manfred announced.

There was an outburst of delighted guffaws at the coarse expression. Manfred would never have used it if his father had been present. The translation was Salt Prick and Shasa flushed and instinctively bunched his fists at the insult.

A Soutpiel has one foot in London and the other in Cape Town, Manfred explained with relish, and his willy-wagger dangling in the middle of the salty old Atlantic Ocean. You'll take that back! Anger had robbed Shasa of a more telling rejoinder. He had never been spoken to in this fashion by one of his inferiors.

Take it back, you mean like you pull back your salty foreskin? When you play with it? Is that what you mean? Manfred asked. The applause had made him reckless, and he had moved closer, directly under the boy on the jetty.

Shasa launched himself without warning and Manfred had not anticipated that so soon. He had expected to trade a few more insults before they were both sufficiently worked up to attack each other.

Shasa dropped six feet and hit him with the full weight of his body and his outrage. The wind was driven out of Manfred's lungs in a whoosh as, locked together, they went flying backwards into the morass of dead fish.

They rolled over and with a shock Shasa felt the other boy's strength. His arms were hard as timber balks and his fingers felt like iron butcher's hooks as he clawed for Shasa's face. only surprise and Manfred's winded lungs saved him from immediate humiliation, and almost too late he remembered the admonitions of Jock Murphy, his boxing instructor.

Don't let a bigger man force you to fight close. Fight him off. Keep him at arm's length. Manfred was clawing at his face, trying to get an arm around him in -a half Nelson, and they were floundering into the cold slippery mass of fish. Shasa brought up his right knee and, as Manfred reared up over him, he drove it into his chest. Manfred gasped and reeled back, but then as Shasa tried to roll away, he lunged forward again for the head lock. Shasa ducked his head and with his right hand forced Manfred's elbow up to break the grip, then as Jock had taught him, he twisted out against the opening he had created. He was helped by the fish slime that coated his neck and Manfred's arm like oil, and the instant he was free he threw a punch with his left hand.

Jock had drilled him endlessly on the short straight left.

The most important punch you'll ever use. it wasn't one of Shasa's best, but it caught the other boy in the eye with sufficient force to snap his head back and distract him just long enough to let Shasa get onto his feet and back away.

By now the jetty above them was crowded with coloured trawler-men in rubber boots and blue rollneck jerseys. They were roaring with delight and excitement, egging on the two boys as though they were game cocks.

Blinking the tears out of his swelling eye, Manfred went after Shasa, but the fish clinging to his legs hampered him, and that left shot out again. There was no warning; it came straight and hard and unexpectedly, stinging his injured eye so that he shouted with anger and groped wildly for the lighter boy.

Shasa ducked under his arm and fired the left again, just the way Jock had taught him.

Never telegraph it by moving the shoulders or the head, he could almost hear Jock's voice, just shoot it, with the arm alone. He caught Manfred in the mouth, and immediately there was blood as Manfred's lip was crushed onto his own teeth.

The sight of his adversary's blood elated Shasa and the concerted bellow of the crowd evoked a primeval response deep within him. He used the left again, cracking it into the pink swollen eye.

When you mark him, then keep hitting the same spot. Jock's voice in his head, and Manfred shouted again, but this time he could hear the pain as well as the rage in the sound.

It's working, Shasa exulted. But at that moment he ran backwards into the wheelhouse and Manfred, realizing his opponent was cornered, rushed at him through the slimy fish, spreading both arms wide, grinning triumphantly, his mouth full of blood from his cut lip and his teeth dyed bright pink.

In panic Shasa dropped his shoulders, braced himself for an instant against the wheelhouse timbers and then shot forward, butting the top of his head into Manfred's stomach.

Once again Manfred wheezed as the air was forced up his throat, and for a few confused seconds they writhed together in the mess of pilchards, with Manfred gurgling for breath A. and unable to get a hold on his opponent's slippery limbs.

Then Shasa wriggled away and half crawled, half swam to the foot of the wooden ladder of the jetty and dragged himself onto it.

The crowd was laughing and booing derisively as he fled, and Manfred clawed angrily after him, spitting blood and fish slime out of his injured mouth, his chest heaving violently to refill his lungs.

Shasa was halfway up the ladder when Manfred reached up and grabbed his ankle, pulling both his feet off the rungs.

Shasa was stretched out by the heavier boy's weight like a victim on the rack, clinging with desperate strength to the top of the ladder, and the faces of the coloured fishermen e were only inches from his as they leaned over the jetty and howled for his blood, favouring their own.

With his free leg Shasa kicked backwards, and his heel caught Manfred in his swollen eye. He yelled and let go, and Shasa scrambled up onto the jetty and looked around him wildly. His fighting ardour had cooled and he was trembling.

His escape down the jetty was open and he longed to take it. But the men around him were laughing and jeering and pride shackled him. He glanced around and, with a surge of dismay that was so strong that it almost physically nauseated him, he saw that Manfred had reached the top of the ladder.

Shasa was not quite sure how he had got himself into this fight, or what was the point at issue, and miserably he wished he could extricate himself. That was impossible, his entire breeding and training precluded it. He tried to stop himself trembling as he turned back to face Manfred again.

The bigger boy was trembling also, but not with fear. His face was swollen and dark red with killing rage, and he was making an unconscious hissing sound through his bloody lips. His damaged eye was turning purplish mauve and puffing into a narrow slit.

Kill him, kleinbasie! screamed the coloured trawler-men.

murder him, little boss. And their taunts rallied Shasa. He took a deep steadying breath and lifted his fists in the classic boxer's stance, left foot leading and his hands held high in front of his face.

Keep moving, he heard Jock's advice again, and he went up on his toes and danced.

Look at him! the crowd hooted. He thinks he is Jack Dempsey! He wants to dance with you, Manie. Show him the Walvis Bay Waltz However, Manfred was daunted by the desperate determination in those dark blue eyes and by the clenched white knuckles of Shasa's left hand.

He began to circle him, hissing threats.

I'm going to rip your arm off and stick it down your throat.

I'm going to make your teeth march out of your backside like soldiers. Shasa blinked but kept his guard up, turning slowly to face Manfred as he circled. Though both of them were soaked and glistening with fish slime and their hair was thick with the gelatinous stuff and speckled with loose scales, there was nothing ludicrous nor childlike about them. It was a good fight and promised to become even better, and the audience gradually fell silent. Their eyes glittered like those of a wolf pack and they craned forward expectantly to watch the ill-matched pair.

Manfred feinted left and then charged and rushed from the side. He was very fast, despite his size and the heaviness of his legs and shoulders. He carried his shining blond head low and the black curved eyebrows emphasized the ferocity of his scowl.

In front of him Shasa seemed almost girlishly fragile. His arms were slim and pale, and his legs under the sodden grey flannel seemed too long and thin, but he moved well on them. He dodged Manfred's charge and as he pulled away, his left arm shot out again, and Manfred's teeth clicked audibly at the punch and his head was flicked back as he was brought up on his heels.

The crowd growled, Vat horn, Manie, get him! and Manfred rushed in again, throwing a powerful round-house punch at Shasa's pale petal-smooth face.

Shasa ducked under it and, in the instant that Manfred was screwed off balance by his own momentum, stabbed his left fist unexpectedly and painfully into the purple, puffed-up eye. Manfred clasped his hand over the eye and snarled at him. Fight properly, you cheating Soutie!

Ja! a voice called from the crowd. Stop running away.

Stand and fight like a man. At the same time Manfred changed his tactics. instead of feinting and weaving, he came straight at Shasa. and kept on coming, swinging with both hands in a terrifying mechanical sequence of blows. Shasa fell back frantically, ducking and swaying and dodging, at first stabbing out with his left hand as Manfred followed him relentlessly, cutting the swollen skin that had begun to bag under his eye, hitting him in the mouth again and then again until his lips were distorted and lumpy. But it was as though Manfred was imuned to the sting of these blows now and he did not alter the rhythm of punches nor slacken his attack.

His brown fists, hardened by work at the winch and net, flipped Shasa's hair as he ducked or hissed past his face as he ran backwards. Then one caught him a glancing blow on the temple and Shasa stopped aiming his own counter-punches and struggled merely to stay clear of those swinging fists, for his legs started to turn numb and heavy under him.

Manfred was tireless, pressing him relentlessly, and despair combined with exhaustion to slow Shasa's legs. A fist crashed into his ribs, and he grunted and staggered and saw the other fist coming at his face. He could not avoid it, his feet seemed planted in buckets of treacle and he grabbed at Manfred's arm and hung on grimly. That was exactly what Manfred had been trying to force him to do, and he whipped his other arm around Shasa's neck.

Now, I've got you, he mumbled through swollen bloody lips, as he forced Shasa to double over, his head pinned under Manfred's left arm. Manfred lifted his right hand high and swung it in a brutal uppercuts Shasa sensed rather than saw the fist coming, and twisted so violently that he felt as though his neck had snapped. But he managed to take the blow on the top of his forehead rather than in his unprotected face. The shock of it was driven like an iron spike from the top of his skull down his spine. He knew he could not take another blow like that.

Through his starring vision he realized that he had tottered to the edge of the jetty, and he used the last vestiges of his strength to drive them both towards the very edge. Manfred had not been expecting him to push in that direction and was braced the wrong way. He could not resist as they went flying over and fell back onto the trawler's fish-laden deck six feet below.

Shasa was pinned beneath Manfred's body, still caught in the headlock, and instantly he sank into the quicksand of silver pilchards.

Manfred tried to swing another punch at his face, but it slogged into the soft layer of fish that was spreading over Shasa's head. He abandoned the effort and merely leaned his full weight on Shasa's neck, forcing his head deeper and still deeper below the surface.

Shasa started to drown. He tried to scream but a dead pilchard slid into his open mouth and its head jammed in his throat. He kicked and lashed out with both hands and writhed with all his remaining strength, but remorselessly his head was thrust downward. The fish lodged in his throat choked him. The darkness filled his head with a sound like the wind, blotting out the murderous chorus from the jetty above, and his struggles became less urgent until he was flopping and flapping his limbs loosely.

I'm going to die, he thought with a kind of detached wonder. 'I'm drowning, and the thought faded with his consciousness.

You have come here to destroy me, Lothar De La Rey accused her with his back against the closed door. You have come all this way to watch it happen, and to gloat on it!

You flatter yourself, Centaine answered him disdainfully.

I have not that much interest in you personally. I have come to protect my considerable investment. I have come for fifty thousand pounds plus accrued interest. If that was true you wouldn't stop me running my catch through the plant. I've got a thousand tons out there - by sunset tomorrow evening I could turn it into fifty thousand pounds. Impatiently Centaine lifted her hand to stop him. The skin of the hand was tanned a creamy coffee colour in contrast to the silver white diamond as long as the top joint of the tapered forefinger that she pointed at him.

You are living in a dream world, she told him. Your fish is worth nothing. Nobody wants it, not at any price, certainly not fifty thousand. It's worth all of that, fish meal and canned goods Again she gestured him to silence. The warehouses of the world are filled with unwanted goods. Don't you understand that? Don't you read a newspaper? Don't you listen to the wireless out here in the desert? It's worthless, not even worth the cost of processing it. That's not possible. He was angry and stubborn. Of course I've heard about the stock market, but people have still got to eat. I've thought many things about you, she had not raised her voice, she was speaking as though to a child, but I have never thought you stupid. Try to understand that something has happened out there in the world that has never happened before. The commerce of the world has died; the factories of the world are closing; the streets of all the major cities are filled with the legions of the unemployed. You are using this as an excuse for what you are doing.

You are conducting a vendetta against me. He came towards her. His lips were icy pale against the dark mahogany tan.

You are hounding me for some fancied offence committed long ago. You are punishing me. The offence was real! She stepped back from his advance, but she held his gaze and her voice though low-pitched was bleak and hard. It was monstrous and cruel and unforgivable, but there is no punishment I could deal out to you which would fit that crime. If there is a God, he will demand retribution. The child, he started.

The child you bore me in the wilderness, For the first time he penetrated the armour of her composure.

You'll not mention your bastard to me. She clasped one hand with the other to prevent them trembling. That was our-bargain. He's our son. You cannot avoid that fact. Are you content to destroy him also? He's your son, she denied. I have no part of him. He does not affect me or my decision. Your factory is insolvent, hopelessly, irredeemably insolvent. I cannot expect to recover my investment, I can only hope to retrieve a part. Through the open window there came the sound of men's voices, even at a distance they sounded excited and lustful, baying like hounds as they take the scent. Neither of them glanced in that direction; all their attention was concentrated on each other.

Give me a chance, Centaine. He heard the pleading timbre in his own voice and it disgusted him. He had never begged before, not with anybody, not once in his life, but now he could not bear the prospect of having to begin all over again. It would not be the first time. Twice before he had been rendered destitute, stripped of everything but pride and courage and determination by war and the fortunes of war. Always it had been the same enemy, the British and their aspirations of empire. Each time he had started again from the beginning and laboriously rebuilt his fortune.

This time the prospect appalled him. To be struck down by the mother of his child, the woman he had loved, and, God forgive him, the woman he loved still against all probabilities. He felt the exhaustion of his spirit and his body.

He was forty-six years old; he no longer had a young man's store of energy on which to draw, and he thought he glimpsed a softening in her eyes as though she was moved by his plea, wavering at the point of relenting.

Give me a week, just one week, Centaine, that's all I ask, he abased himself, and immediately realized that he had misread her.

She did not alter her expression, but in her eyes he could see that what he had mistaken for compassion was instead the shine of deep satisfaction. He was where she had wanted him all these years.

I have told you never to use my Christian name, she said. I told you that when I first learned that you had murdered two people whom I loved as dearly as I have ever loved anyone. I tell you that again. A week. just one week. I have already given you two years. Now she turned her head towards the window, no longer able to ignore the sound of harsh voices, like the blood roar of a bullfight heard at a distance.

Another week will only get you deeper into my debt and force heavier loss on me. She shook her head, but he was staring out the window and now her voice sharpened. What is happening down there on the jetty? She leaned her hands on the sill and peered down the beach.

He stepped up beside her. There was a dense knot of humanity halfway down the jetty, and from the factory all the idle packers were running down to join it.

Shasa! Centaine cried with an intuitive surge of maternal concern. Where's Shasa? Lothar vaulted lightly over the sill and raced for the jetty, overhauling the stragglers and then shouldering his way through the circle of yelling, howling trawler-men just as the two boys teetered on the edge of the jetty.

Manfred! he roared. Stop that! Let him go! His son had the lighter boy in a vicious headlock, and he was swinging overhand punches at his trapped head. Lothar heard one crack against the bone of Shasa's skull.

You fool! Lothar started towards them. They had not heard his voice above the din of the crowd, and Lothar felt a slide of dread, a real concern for the child and a realization of what Centaine's reaction would be if he were injured.

Leave him! Before he could reach the wildly struggling pair, they reeled backwards and tumbled over the edge of the jetty. Oh my God! He heard them hit the deck of the trawler below, and by the time he reached the side and looked down they were half buried in the deck-load of glittering pilchards.

Lothar tried to reach the ladder head, impeded by the press of coloured trawler-men who crowded forward to the edge so as not to miss a moment of the contest. He struck out with both fists, clearing his way, shoving his men aside, and then clambered down to the deck of the trawler.

Manfred was lying on top of the other boy, forcing his head and shoulders beneath the mass of pilchards. His own face was contorted with rage, and lumped and discoloured with bruises. He was mouthing incoherent threats through blood-smeared and puffed lips, and Shasa was no longer struggling. His head and shoulders had disappeared but his trunk and his legs twitched and shuddered in the spontaneous nerveless movements of a man shot through the head.

Lothar seized his son by the shoulders and tried to drag him off. It was like trying to separate a pair of mastiffs and he had to use all his strength. He lifted Manfred bodily and threw him against the wheelhouse with a force that knocked the belligerence out of him and then grabbed Shasa's legs and pulled him out of the engulfing quicksilver of dead pilchards. He came slithering free, wet and slippery.

His eyes were open and rolled back into his skull exposing the whites.

You've killed him, Lothar snarled at his son, and the furious tide of blood receded from Manfred's face leaving him white and shivering., with shock.

I didn't mean it, Pa! didn't, I There was a dead fish jammed into Shasa's slack mouth, choking him, and fish slime bubbled out of his nostrils.

You fool, you little fool! Lothar thrust his finger into the corners of the child's slack mouth and prised the pilchard out.

I'm sorry, Pa. I didn't mean it, Manfred whispered.

if you've killed him, you've committed a terrible offence in the sight of God. Lothar lifted Shasa's limp body in his arms. You'll have killed your own, He did not say the fateful word, but bit down hard on it and turned to the ladder.

I haven't killed him? Manfred pleaded for assurance. He's not dead. it will be all right, won't it, Pa? No. Lothar shook his head grimly. It won't be all right, not ever. Carrying the unconscious boy, he climbed up onto the jetty.

The crowd opened silently for Lothar. Like Manfred, they were appalled and guilty, unable to meet his eyes as he shouldered past them.

Swart Hendrick, Lothar called over their heads to the tall black man. You should have known better. You should have stopped them. Lothar strode away up the jetty, and none of them followed him.

Halfway up the beach path to the factory Centaine Courtney waited for him. Lothar stopped in front of her with the boy hanging limply in his arms.

He's dead, Centaine whispered hopelessly.

No, Lothar denied with passion. It was too horrible to think about, and as though in response Shasa moaned and vomited from the corner of his mouth.

Quickly. Centaine stepped forward. Turn him over your shoulder before he chokes on his own vomit. with Shasa hanging limply over his shoulder like a haversack, Lothar ran the last few yards to the office and Centaine swept the desktop clear.

Lay him here, she ordered, but Shasa was struggling weakly and trying to sit up. Centaine supported his shoulders and wiped his mouth and nostrils with the fine cloth of her sleeve.

It was your bastard. She glared across the desk at Lothar.

He did this to my son, didn't he? And she saw the confirmation in his face before he looked away.

Shasa coughed and brought up another trickle of fish slime and yellow vomitus, and immediately he was stronger. His eyes focused and his breathing eased.

Get out of here. Centaine leaned protectively over Shasa's body.

I'll see you both in hell, you and your bastard. Now get out of my sight. The track from Walvis Bay ran through the convoluted valleys of the great orange dunes, thirty kilometres to the railhead at Swakopmund. The dunes towered three and four hundred feet on either side. Mountains of sand with knife-edge crests and smooth slip faces, they trapped the desert heat in the canyons between them.

The track was merely a set of deep ruts in the sand, marked on each side by the sparkling glass of broken beer bottles. No traveller took this thirsty road without adequate supplies for the journey. At intervals the tracks had been obliterated by the efforts of other drivers, unskilled in the art of desert travel, to extract their vehicles from the clinging sands, leaving gaping traps for those who followed.

Centaine drove hard and fast, never allowing her engine revolutions to drop, keeping her momentum even through the churned-up areas and holes where the other vehicles had bogged down, directing the big yellow car with deft little touches of the wheel so that the tyres ran straight and the sand did not pile and block them.

She held the wheel in a racing driver's grip, leaning back against the leather seat with straight arms ready for the kick of the wheel, watching the tracks far ahead and anticipating each contingency long before she reached it, sometimes snapping down through the gears and swinging out of the ruts to cut her own way around a bad stretch. She scorned even the elementary precaution of travelling with a pair of black servants in the back seat to push the Daimler out of a sand trap.

Shasa had never known his mother to bog down, not even on the worst sections of the track out to the mine.

He sat up beside her on the front seat. He wore a suit of old but freshly laundered canvas overalls from the stores of the canning factory. His soiled clothing stinking of fish and speckled with vomit was in the boot of the Daimler.

His mother hadn't spoken since they had driven away

from the factory. Shasa glanced surreptitiously at her, dreading her pent-up wrath, not wanting to draw attention to himself, yet despite himself unable to keep his eyes from her face.

She had removed the cloche hat and her thick dark cap of hair, cut fashionably into a short Eton crop, rippled in the wind and shone like washed anthracite.

,Who started it? she asked, without taking her eyes from the road.

Shasa thought about it. I'm not sure. I hit him first, but he paused. His throat was still painful.

Yes? she demanded.

It was as though it was arranged. We looked at each other and we knew we were going to fight. She said nothing and he finished lamely. 'He called me a name. What name? I can't tell you. It's rude. "I asked what name? Her voice was level and low, but he recognized that husky warning quality.

He called me a Soutpiel, he replied hastily. He dropped his voice and looked away in shame at the dreadful insult, so he did not see Centaine struggle to stifle the smile and turn her head slightly to hide the sparkle of amusement in her eyes.

I told you it was rude, he apologized.

So you hit him, and he's younger than you. He had not known that he was the elder, but he was not surprised that she knew it. She knew everything.

He may be younger, but he's a big Afrikaner ox, at least two inches taller than I am, he defended himself quickly.

She wanted to ask Shasa what her other son looked like.

Was he blond and handsome as his father had been? What colour were his eyes? Instead she said, And so he thrashed you. I nearly won. Shasa protested stoutly. I closed his eyes and I bloodied him nicely. I nearly won. Nearly isn't good enough, she said. In our family we don't nearly win, we simply win!

He fidgeted uncomfortably and coughed to relieve the pain in his injured throat.

You can't win, not when someone is bigger and stronger than you, he whispered miserably.

Then you don't fight him with your fists, she told him.

You don't rush in and let him stick a dead fish down your throat. He blushed painfully at the humiliation. You wait your chance, and you fight him with your own weapons and on your own terms. You only fight when you are sure you can win. He considered that carefully, examining it from every angle. That's what you did to his father, didn't you? he asked softly, and she was startled by his perception so that she stared at him and the Daimler bumped out of the ruts.

Quickly she caught and controlled the machine, and then she nodded. Yes. That's what I did. You see, we are Courtneys. We don't have to fight with our fists. We fight with power and money and influence. Nobody can beat us on our own ground. He was silent again, digesting it carefully, and at last he smiled. He was so beautiful when he smiled, even more beautiful than his father had been, that she felt her heart squeezed by her love.

I'll remember that, he said. Next time I meet him, I'll remember what you said. Neither of them doubted for a moment that the two boys would meet again, and that when they did, they would continue the conflict that had begun that day.

The breeze was onshore and the stink of rotting fish was so strong that it coated the back of Lothar De La Rey's throat and sickened him to the gut.

The four trawlers still lay at their berths but their cargoes were no longer glittering silver. The fish had packed down and the top layer of pilchards had dried out in the sun and turned a dark, dirty grey, crawling with metallic green flies as big as wasps. The fish in the holds had squashed under their own weight, and the bilge pumps were pouring out steady streams of stinking brown blood and fish oil that discoloured the waters of the bay in a spreading cloud.

All day Lothar had sat at the window of the factory office while his coloured trawler-men and packers lined up to be paid. Lothar had sold his old Packard truck and the few sticks of furniture from the corrugated shack in which he and Manfred lived. These were the only assets that did not belong to the company and had not been attached. The second-hand dealer had come across from Swakopmund within hours, smelling disaster the way the vultures do, and he had paid Lothar a fraction of their real value.

There is a depression going on, Mr De La Rey, everybody is selling, nobody is buying. I'll lose money, believe me. With the cash that Lothar had buried under the sandy floor of the shack there was enough to pay his people two shillings on each pound that he owed them for back wages.

He did not have to pay them, of course, it was the company's responsibility, but that did not occur to him, they were his people.

I'm sorry, he repeated to each one of them as they came to the pay window. That's all there is. And he avoided their eyes.

When it was all gone, and the last of his coloured people had wandered away in disconsolate little groups, Lothar locked the office door and handed the key to the deputy sheriff .

Then he and the boy had gone down to the jetty for the last time and sat together with their legs dangling over the end. The stink of dead fish was as heavy as their mood.

I don't understand, Pa. Manfred spoke through his distorted mouth with the crusty red scab on the upper lip. We caught good fish.

We should be rich. What happened, Pa? We were cheated, Lothar said quietly. Until that moment there had been anger, no bitterness, just a feeling of numbness. Twice before he had been struck by a bullet. The .303

Lee Enfield bullet on the road to Ornaruru when they were opposing Smuts invasion of German South West Africa, and then much later the Luger bullet fired by the boy's mother.

He touched his chest at the memory, and felt the rubbery puckered pit of the scar through the thin cotton of his khaki shirt.

It was the same thing, first the shock and the numbness and then only much later the pain and the anger. Now the anger came at him in black waves, and he did not try to resist. Rather he revelled in it; it helped to assuage the memory of abasing himself, pleading for time from the woman with the taunting smile in her dark eyes.

Can't we stop them, Pa? the boy asked, and neither of them had to define that them'. They knew their enemy.

They had grown to know them in three wars; in 1881 the first Boer War, then again in the Great Boer War of 1899

when Victoria called her khaki multitudes from across the oceans to crush them, and then in 1914 when the British puppet Jannie Smuts had carried out the orders of his imperial masters.

Lothar shook his head, unable to answer, choked by the strength of his anger.

There must be a way, the boy insisted. We are strong. He recalled the feeling of Shasa's body slowly weakening in his grip and he flexed his hands involuntarily. It's ours, Pa.

This is our land. God gave it to us, it says so in the Bible. Like so many before him, the Afrikaner had interpreted that book in his own way. He saw his people as the children of Israel, and Southern Africa as the promised land flowing with milk and honey.

Lothar was silent and Manfred took his sleeve. God did give it to us, didn't he, Pa? Yes. Lothar nodded heavily.

Then they've stolen it from us: the land, the diamonds, and the gold and everything, and now they have taken our boats and our fish. There must be a way to stop them, to win back what belongs to us. 'It's not as easy as that. Lothar hesitated how to explain it to the child. Did he truly understand it himself, how it had happened? They were squatters in the land that their fathers had wrested from the savages and the wilderness at the point of their long muzzle-loading guns.

When you grow up you'll understand, Manie, he said.

When I grow up I'll find a way to beat them. Manfred said it so forcefully that the scab on his lip cracked open and a droplet like a tiny ruby glowed upon it. I'll find a way to get it back from them. You'll see if I don't, Pa. Well, my son, perhaps you will. Lothar placed his arm around the boy's shoulders.

Remember Grandpa's oath, Pa? I'll always remember. The war against the English will never end. They sat together until the sun touched the waters of the bay and turned them to molten copper, and then in the darkness they went up the jetty, out of the stench of decaying fish and along the edge of the dunes.

As they approached the shack there was smoke rising from the chimney and when they entered the lean-to kitchen, there was a fire on the open hearth. Swart Hendrick looked up from it.

The Jew has taken the table and the chairs, he said. But I hid the pots and the mugs. They sat on the floor and ate straight from the pot, a porridge of maize meal flavoured with salty wind-dried fish.

Nobody spoke until they had finished.

You didn't have to stay. Lothar broke the silence and Hendrick shrugged.

,I bought coffee and tobacco at the store. The money you paid me was just enough. There is no more, Lothar said. It is all gone. 'It's all been gone before. Hendrick lit his pipe with a twig from the fire. We have been broke many times before. This time it is different, Lothar said. This time there is no ivory to hunt or, He broke off as his anger choked him again, and Hendrick poured more coffee into the tin mugs.

It is strange, Hendrick said. When we found her, she was dressed in skins. Now she comes in her big yellow car, he shook his head and chuckled, and we are the ones in rags. It was you and I that saved her, Lothar agreed. More than that, we found her diamonds for her, and dug them from the ground. Now she is rich, Hendrick said, and she comes to take what we have also. She shouldn't have done that. He shook his great black head. No, she shouldn't have done that. Lothar straightened up slowly. Hendrick saw his expression and leaned forward eagerly, and the boy stirred and smiled for the first time.

Yes. Hendrick began to grin. What is it? Ivory is finished it's all been hunted out long ago. No, not ivory. This time it will be diamonds, Lothar replied.

Diamonds? Hendrick rocked back on his heels. What diamonds? 'What diamonds? Lothar smiled at him, and his yellow eyes glowed. 'Why, the diamonds we found for her, of course!

Her diamonds? Hendrick stared at him. The diamonds from the h'ani Mine? How much money have you got? Lothar demanded and Hendrick's eyes shifted. I know you well, Lothar went on impatiently and seized his shoulder. You've always got a little bit salted away. How much? Not much. Hendrick tried to rise but Lothar held him down.

You have earned well this last season. I know exactly how much I have paid you., Fifty pounds,grunted Hendrick.

No. Lothar shook his head. You've got more than that. 'Perhaps a little more. Hendrick resigned himself.

You have got a hundred pounds, Lothar said definitely.

That's how much we will need. Give it to me. You know you will get it back many times over. You always have, and you always will., The track was steep and rocky and the party straggled up it in the early sunlight. They had left the yellow Daimler at the bottom of the mountain on the banks of the Liesbeek stream and begun the climb in the ghostly grey light of predawn.

In the lead were two old men in disreputable clothing, scuffed velskoen on their feet and sweatstained shapeless straw hats on their heads. They were both so lean as to appear half starved, skinny but sprightly, their skin darkened and creased by long exposure to the elements, so that a casual observer might have thought them a couple of old hoboes, and there were enough of that type on the roads and byways in these days of the great Depression.

The casual observer would have been in error. The taller of the two old men limped slightly on an artificial leg and was a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire, a holder of the highest award for valour that the Empire could offer, the Victoria Cross, and he was also one of the most eminent military historians of the age, a man so rich and careless of worldly wealth that he seldom bothered to count his fortune.

Old Garry, his companion addressed him, rather than as Sir Garrick Courtney. That is the biggest problem we have to deal with, old Garry. He was explaining in his high, almost girlish voice, rolling his R's in that extraordinary fashion that was known as the 'Malmesbury bray'. Our people are deserting the land and flocking to the cities. The farms are dying, and there is no work for them in the cities. His voice was un-winded although they had climbed 2,000 feet up the sheer turreted side of Table Mountain without a pause, maintaining the pace that had outdistanced all the younger members of the party.

It's a recipe for disaster, Sir Garrick agreed. They are poor on the farms, but when they leave them they starve in the cities. Starving men are dangerous men, Ou Baas. History teaches us that. The man he called old master was smaller in stature, though he carried himself straighter. He had merry blue eyes under the drooping brim of his Panama hat and a grey goatee beard that waggled as he spoke. Unlike Garry, he was not rich; he owned only a small farm on the high frost-browned veld of the Transvaal, and he was as careless of his debts as Garry was of his fortune, but the world was his paddock and had heaped honours upon him. He had been awarded honorary doctorates by fifteen of the world's leading universities, Oxford and Cambridge and Columbia amongst them.

He was the freeman of ten cities, London and Edinburgh and the rest. He had been a general in the Boer forces and now he was general in the army of the British Empire, a Privy Councillor, a Companion of Honour, a King's Counsel, a bencher of the Middle Temple and a Fellow of the Royal Society. His chest was not wide enough for all the stars and ribbons he was entitled to wear. He was without question the cleverest, wisest, most charismatic and influential man that South Africa had ever produced. It was almost as though his spirit was too big to be contained by terrestrial borders, as though he were a true citizen of the wide world. This was the one chink in his armour, and his enemies had sent their poison-tipped arrows through it. His heart is across the sea, not with you, and it had brought down his government of the South African Party of which he had been prime minister, minister of defence and of native affairs. Now he was leader of the opposition. However, he was a man who thought of himself as a botanist by preference and a soldier and politician by necessity.

We should wait for the others to catch up. General Jan Smuts paused on a lichen-covered rocky platform and leaned on his staff. The two of them peered back down the slope.

A hundred paces below them a woman plodded grimly up the path; the outline of her thighs through her heavy calico skirts were thick and powerful as the haunches of a brood mare, and her bare arms were as muscled as those of a wrestler.

My little dove, Sir Garry murmured fondly as he watched his bride. After fourteen long years of courtship she had only acceded to his suit six months before.

Do hurry, Anna, the boy behind her on the narrow path entreated. 'It will be noon before we reach the top and I'm dying for breakfast. Shasa was as tall as she was, though half her bulk.

Go ahead if you are in such a big hurry, she growled at him. The thick solar topee was pulled low over her red, round face. Her features were as folded as those of a friendly bulldog. Though why anybody should want to reach the top of this cursed mountain- I'll give you a shove, Shasa offered, and placed both hands on Lady Courtney's massive round buttocks. Heave ho! And up she rises! 'Stop that, you wicked boy, Anna gasped as she scrambled to adjust to her sudden rapid ascent, or I'll break this stick over your backside. Oh! Stop now. That's enough. Until she had become Lady Courtney, she had been plain Anna, Shasa's nurse and his mother's beloved maid. Her meteoric rise up the social ladder had in no way altered their relationship.

They arrived gasping and protesting and laughing on the ledge. 'Here she is, Grandpater! Special delivery! Shasa grinned at Garry Courtney, who separated them firmly and fondly. The beautiful boy and the homely red-faced woman were the most precious of all his treasures, his wife and his only grandson.

Anna, my sweeting, you mustn't tax the boy's strength so, he warned her with a straight face, and she struck him on the arm half playfully and half in exasperation.

I should be seeing to the lunch rather than gallivanting around on this mountain. Her accent was still thick Flemish, and she relapsed thankfully into Afrikaans as she turned to General Smuts. How much further is it, Ou Baas? Not far, Lady Courtney, not far at all. Ah! Here are the others. I was beginning to worry about them. Centaine and her companions emerged from the edge of the forest further down the slope. She wore a loose white skirt that left her legs bare from the knees and a white straw hat decorated with artificial cherries. When they caught up with the leaders, Centaine smiled at General Smuts. 'I'm winded, Ou Baas. May I lean on you for the last lap? And though she was barely glowing with exertion he gallantly offered her his arm and they were first to reach the crest.

These annual picnics on Table Mountain were the traditional family way of celebrating Sir Garrick Courtney's birthday, and his old friend General Smuts made a point of never missing the occasion.

On the crest they all spread out to sit in the grass and catch their breath. Centaine and the old general were a little apart from the others. Below them lay the whole sweep of the Constantia Valley, patchworked with vineyards in full green summer livery. Scattered amongst them the Dutch gables of the great chateaux glowed like pearls in the low rays of the sun and the smoky mountains of the Muizenberg and Kabonkelberg formed a solid amphitheatre of grey rock, hemming in the valley to the south while in the north the far mountains of the Hottentots Holland were a rampart that cut off the Cape of Good Hope from the continental shield of the African Continent. Directly ahead, wedged between the mountains, the waters of False Bay were ruffling and flecking at the rising importunity of the southeaster. It was so beautiful that they were silenced for many minutes.

General Smuts spoke first. So, Centaine, my dear, what did you want to talk about? You are a mind-reader, Ou Baas. She laughed ruefully.

How do you know these things? These days, when a pretty girl takes me aside, I can be sure it's business and not pleasure. He twinkled at her.

You are one of the most attractive men I've ever met Ah ha! Such a compliment! It must be serious. Her change of expression confirmed it. It's Shasa, she said simply.

No problem there, or I miss my guess., She took a single-paged document from her skirt pocket and handed it to him. It was a school report. The embossed crest was a bishop's mitre, the emblem of the country's most exclusive public school.

The general glanced at it. She knew how swiftly he could read even a complicated legal document, so when he handed it back to her almost immediately she was not put out. He would have it all, even down to the headmaster's summation on the last line: Michel Shasa is a credit to himself and to Bishops. General Smuts smiled at her. You must be very proud of him. He is my entire life. I know, he said, 'and that is not always wise. A child soon becomes a man, and when he leaves he will take your life with him. However, in what way can I help you, my dear? He is bright and personable and he has a way with people, even those much older than himself, she replied. I would like to have a seat for him in Parliament, to begin with. The general removed the Panama hat from his head and smoothed back his sparkling silver hair with the palm of his hand. I do think he should finish his schooling before he enters Parliament, don't you, my dear! he chuckled.

That's it. That is exactly what I want to know from you, Ou Baas. Should Shasa go home to Oxford or Cambridge, or will that count against him later when he goes to the electorate? Should he rather attend one of the local universities and if so, should it be Stellenbosch or the University of Cape Town? I will think about it, Centaine, and I will give you my advice when it is time to make the final decision. But in the meantime may I be bold enough to warn you of something else, a state of mind which could prejudice your plans for the young man. Please, Ou Baas, she begged. A word of yours is worth! she did not have to find a comparison, for the general went on softly.

That word "home", it is a fatal one. Shasa must decide where his true home is, and if it is across the sea, then he must not count on my assistance. How foolish of me. He saw that she was truly angry with herself. Her cheeks darkened and her lips hardened. Soutpiel.

She remembered that jeer. One foot in London, the other in Cape Town. It was no longer amusing.

It won't happen again, she said, and she laid her hand on his arm to impress him with her sincerity. So you will help him? Can we have breakfast now, Mater? Shasa called across.

All right, put the basket on the bank of the stream over there. She turned back to the old man. Can I count on you? I am in opposition, Centaine You won't be for long. The country must come to its senses at the next election. You must realize I cannot promise you anything now. He was choosing his words carefully. He is still a child. However, I will be watching him. If he fulfils this early promise, if he meets my standards, then he will have all my support.

God knows how we need good men. She sighed with pleasure and relief, and he went on more easily. Sean Courtney was an able minister in my government. Centaine started at the name. It brought back so many memories, so much intense pleasure, and deep sorrow, so many dark and secret things. But the old man appeared not to have noticed her consternation as he went on. He was also a dear and trusted friend. I would like to have another Courtney in my government, someone to trust, a good friend, perhaps one day another Courtney in my cabinet. He stood and helped her to her feet. I'm as hungry as Shasa, and the smell of food is too good to resist. Yet when the food was offered, the general ate most frugally, while the rest of them, led by Shasa, attacked the food with ravenous appetites sharpened by the climb. Sir Garry carved from the cold cuts of lamb and pork and the turkey, and Anna dished out slices of the pies, Melton Mowbray, ham and egg, minced fruit and cubes of pigs trotter embedded in delicious clear gelatine.

One thing is certain, Cyril Slaine, one of Centaine's general

managers, declared with relief. The basket will be a sight lighter on the way down. And now, the general roused them from where they sprawled, satiated, on the bank of the tiny burbling stream, land now for the main business of the day. Come on everybody. Centaine was the first on her feet in a swirl of skirts, gay as a girl. Cyril, leave the basket here. We'll pick it up on the way back. They skirted the very edge of the grey cliff, with the world spread below them, until the general suddenly darted off to the left and scrambled over rock and through flowering heather and protea bush, disturbing the sugar birds that were sipping from the blooms. They rose in the air, flirting their long tail feathers and flashing their bright yellow belly patches with indignation at the intrusion.

Only Shasa could keep up with the general, and when the rest of the party caught the pair of them again, they were standing on the lip of a narrow rocky glen with bright green swamp grass carpeting the bottom.

Here we are, and the first one to find a disa wins a sixpence, General Smuts offered.

Shasa dashed away down the steep side of the glen, and before they were halfway down he was yelling excitedly.

I've found one! The sixpence is mine! They straggled down from the rough rim and at the edge of the swampy ground formed a hushed and attentive circle around the graceful lily-stemmed orchid.

The general went down on one knee before it like a worshipper. 'It is indeed a blue disa, one of the rarest flowers on our earth. The blossoms that adorned the stern were a marvelous cerulean blue, shaped like dragon's heads, their gaping throats lined with imperial purple and butter yellow.

They only grow here on Table Mountain, nowhere else in the world. He looked up at Shasa. Would you like to do the honours for your grandfather this year, young man? Shasa stepped forward importantly to pick the wild orchid and hand it to Sir Garry. This little ceremony of the blue disa was part of the traditional birthday ceremony and they all laughed and applauded the presentation.

Watching her son proudly, Centaine's mind went back to the day of his birth, to the day the old Bushman had named him Shasa, Good Water', and had danced for him in the sacred valley deep in the Kalahari. She remembered the birth song that the old man had composed and sung, the Bushman language clicking and rustling in her head again, so well remembered, so well loved: His arrows will fly to the stars And when men speak his name

It will be heard as far

the old Bushman had sung,

And he will find good water, Wherever he travels, he will find good water.

She saw again in her mind, the old long-dead Bushman's face, impossibly wrinkled and yet glowing that marvelous apricot colour, like amber or mellowed meerschaum, and she whispered deep in her throat, using the Bushman tongue.

Let it be so, old grandfather. Let it be so.

On the return journey the Daimler was only just large enough to accommodate all of them, with Anna sitting on Sir Garry's lap and submerging him beneath her abundance.

As Centaine drove down the twisting road through the forest of tall blue gum trees, Shasa leaned over the seat from behind her and encouraged her to greater speed. Come on, Mater, you've still got the hand brake on! Sitting beside Centaine, the general clutched his hat and stared fixedly at the speedometer. That can't be right. It feels more like one hundred miles an hour. Centaine swung the Daimler between the elaborately gabled white main gates of the estate. The pediment above, depicting a party of dancing nymphs bearing bunches of

famous sculptor Anton Anreith. The name of the estate was blazoned in raised letters above the sculpture:

WELTEVREDEN 1790

Well Satisfied was the translation from the Dutch, and Centaine had purchased it from the illustrious Cloete family exactly one year after she had pegged the claims to the H'ani Mine. Since then she had lavished money and care and love upon it.

She slowed the Daimler almost to walking pace. I don't want dust blowing over the grapes, she explained to General Smuts, and her face reflected such deep content as she looked out on the neatly pruned rows of trellised vines that he thought how the estate had been aptly named.

The coloured labourers straightened up from the vines and waved as they passed. Shasa leaned from the window and shouted the names of his favourites and they grinned with huge gratification at being singled out.

The road, lined with mature oaks, led up through two hundred acres of vines to the chAteau. The lawns around the great house were bright green Kikuyu grass. General Smuts had brought shoots of the grass back from his East African campaign in 1917 and it had flourished all over the country.

In the centre of the lawn stood the tall tower of the slave bell, still used to toll the beginning and end of the day's labours. Beyond it rose the glacial white walls and massive Anreith gables of Weltevreden under its thatched roof.

Already the house servants were hurrying out to fuss around them as they spilled out of the big yellow machine.

Lunch will be at one-thirty, Centaine told them briskly.

Ou Baas, I know Sir Garry wants to read his latest chapter to you. Cyril and I have a full morning's work ahead, she broke off, 'Shasa, where do you think you are off to? The boy had sidled to the end of the stoep and was within an ace of escaping. Now he turned back with a sigh. Jock and I were going to work out the new pony. The new polo pony had been Cyril's Christmas present to Shasa.

Madame Claire will be waiting for you, Centaine pointed out. We agreed that your mathematics needed attention, didn't we? Oh Mater, it's holiday time Every day you spend idly, there is someone out there working. And when he meets you he is going to whip you hollow. Yes, Mater. Shasa had heard that prediction many times before, and he looked to his grandfather for support.

Oh, I'm sure your mother will allow you a few hours to yourself after your maths tuition, he came in dutifully. As you pointed out, it is officially holiday time. He looked hopefully at Centaine.

Might I also enter a plea on my young client's behalf? General Smuts backed him, and Centaine capitulated with a laugh.

You have such distinguished champions, but you will work with Madame Claire until elevenses. Shasa thrust his hands into his pockets and with slumped shoulders went to find his tutor. Anna disappeared into the house to chivy the servants and Garry led General Smuts away to discuss his new manuscript.

All right. Centaine jerked her head at Cyril. Let's get to work. He followed her through the double teak front doors down the long voorkamer, her heels clicking on the black and white marble floors, to her study at the far end.

Her male secretaries were waiting for her. Centaine could not abide the continual presence of other females. Her secretaries were both handsome young men. The study was filled with flowers. Every day the vases were refilled from the gardens of Weltevreden. Today it was blue hydrangeas and yellow roses.

She seated herself at the long Louis XIV table she used as a desk.

The legs were in richly ornate ormolu and the top was expansive enough to hold the memorabilia she had assembled.

There were a dozen photographs of Shasa's father in separate silver frames covering his life from schoolboy to dashing young airman in the RFC. The last photograph depicted him with the other pilots of his squadron standing in front of their single-seater scout planes. Hands thrust into his pockets, cap on the back of his head, Michael Courtney grinned at her, seemingly as certain of his immortality as he had been on the day that he died in the pyre of his burning aircraft. As she settled into her leather wingbacked chair, she touched the photograph, rearranging it slightly.

The maid could never get it exactly right.

I've read through the contract, she told Cyril as he took the chair facing her. There are just two clauses I am not happy with. The first is clause twenty-six. He turned to it obediently, and with her secretaries standing attentively on each side of her chair she began the day's work.

Always it was the mine which occupied Centaine first.

The Hlani Mine was the source, the spring from which it all flowed, and as she worked she felt her soul yearning towards the vastness of the Kalahari, towards those mystic blue hills and the secret valley which had concealed the treasures of the H'ani for countless aeons before she had stumbled upon them, dressed in skins and a last tattered remnant of cloth, great with the child in her womb and living like an animal of the desert herself.

The desert had captured part of her soul, and she felt anticipation rising in her. Tomorrow, she thought, tomorrow Shasa and I will be going back. The lush vineyards of the Constantia Valley and the chateau of Weltevreden filled with beautiful things were part of her also, but when they cloyed she had to go back to the desert and have her soul burned clean and bright once more by the white Kalahari sun. As she signed the last of the documents and handed them to her senior secretary for witnessing and sealing, she stood and crossed to the open french doors.

Down in the paddock beyond the old slave quarters Shasa, released from his mathematics, was schooling his pony under Jock Murphy's critical eye.

It was a big horse; the limitation on size had recently been dropped by the International Polo Association, but he moved well. Shasa turned him neatly at the end of the paddock and brought him back at a full gallop. Jock tossed a ball to his near-side and Shasa leaned out to take it on his backhand.

He had a firm seat and a strong arm for one so young. He swung in a good full arc and the crisp click of the bamboo-root ball carried to where Centaine stood and she saw the white flash of its trajectory in the sunlight.

Shasa reined the pony down and swung him back. As he passed again Jock Murphy tossed another ball to his offside forehand. Shasa topped the shot and it bounced away sloppily.

Shame on you, Master Shasa, Jock called. You are chopping again. Let the head of your stick take your shot through. Jock Murphy was one of Centaine's finds. He was a stocky, muscular man with a short neck and perfectly bald head.

He had done everything: Royal Marines, professional boxer, opium runner, master at arms to an Indian maharajah, racehorse trainer, bouncer in a Mayfair gambling club and now he was Shasa's physical instructor. He was a champion shot with rifle, shotgun and pistol, a ten-goal polo player, deadly on the snooker table. He had killed a man in the ring, ridden in the Grand National, and he treated Shasa like his own son.

Once in every three months or so he went on the whisky and turned into a devil incarnate. Then Centaine would send someone down to the police station to pay the damages and bail Jock out. He would stand in front of her desk, his Derby hat held in front of his chest, shaky and hung over, his bald head shiny with shame, and apologize humbly.

It won't happen again, missus. I don't know what came over me. Give me another chance, missus, I won't let you down. It was useful to know a man's weakness: a leash to hold him and a lever to move him.

There was no work for them in Windhoek. When they arrived, having walked and begged lifts on trucks and wagons all the way from the coast, they moved into the hobo encampment near the railway tracks on the outskirts of the town.

By tacit agreement the hundred or so down-and-outers and drifters and out-of-workers were allowed to camp here with their families, but the local police kept a wary eye on them.

The huts were of tarpaper and old corrugated iron sheets and rough thatch and in front of each squatted dejected clusters of men and women. Only the children, dusty and skinny and sun-browned, were noisy and almost defiantly rambunctious. The encampment smelled of wood smoke and the shallow pit latrines.

Somebody had erected a crudely lettered sign facing the railway tracks: Vaal Hartz? Hell No! Anyone who applied for unemployment benefits was immediately sent by the government labour department to work on the huge Vaal Hartz river irrigation project for two shillings a day.

Rumours of the conditions in the labour camps there had filtered back, and in the Transvaal there had been riots when the police had attempted forcibly to transport men to the scheme.

All the better spots in the encampment were already occupied, so they camped under a small camel-thorn bush and hung scraps of tarpaper in the branches for shade. Swart Hendrick was squatting beside the fire, slowly trickling handfuls of white maize meal into a soot-blackened billy of boiling water. He looked up as Lothar came back from another unsuccessful job hunt in the town. When Lothar shook his head, Hendrick returned to his cookery.

Where is Manfred? Hendrick pointed with his chin at another shack near by.

A dozen or so ragged men were sitting in a fascinated knot listening to a tall bearded man in their midst. He had the intense expression and fanatically dark eyes of a zealot.

Mal Willem, Hendrick muttered. Crazy William, and Lothar grunted as he searched for Manfred and then recognized his son's shining blond head amongst the others.

Satisfied that the boy was safe, Lothar took his pipe from his top pocket, blew through it and then filled it with Magaliesberg shag. The pipe stank, and the black tobacco was rank and harsh, but cheap. He longed for a cheroot as he lit the pipe with a twig from the fire. It tasted disgusting, but he felt the soothing effect almost immediately and he tossed the tobacco pouch to Hendrick and leaned back against the trunk of the thorn tree.

What did you find out? Hendrick had spent most of the night and morning in the coloured. shanty town across the other side of Windhoek. if you want to know a man's intimate secrets, ask the servants who wait at his table and make his bed.

I found out that you can't get a drink on credit, and the Windhoek maids don't do it for love alone. He grinned.

Lothar spat tobacco juice and glanced across at his son. It worried him a little that the boy avoided the camp urchins of his own age and sat with the men. Yet the men seemed to accept him.

What else? he asked Hendrick.

The man is called Fourie. He has been working at the mine for ten years. He comes in with four or five trucks every week and goes back loaded with stores. For a minute Hendrick concentrated on mixing the maize porridge, applying exactly the right heat from the fire.

Go on. Then, on the first Monday of every month, he comes in one small truck, the four other drivers with him riding in the back, all of them armed with shotguns and pistols. They go directly to the Standard Bank in Main Street. The manager and his staff come to the side door. Fourie and one of his drivers carry a small iron box from the truck into the bank.

Afterwards Fourie and his men go down to the corner bar and drink until closing time. In the morning they go back to the mine. Once a month, Lothar whispered. They bring in a whole month's production at one time. Then he looked up at Hendrick. You said the corner bar? And when the big black man nodded, I'll need at least ten shillings. 'What for? Hendrick was immediately suspicious.

One of us has to buy the barman a drink and they don't serve blacks at the corner bar. Lothar smiled maliciously, then raised his voice. Manfred! The boy had been so mesmerized by the speaker that he had not noticed his father's return. He scrambled to his feet guiltily.

Hendrick dumped a lump of fluffy white maize porridge into the lid of the billy and poured maas, thick soured milk, over it before he handed it to Manfred where he squatted cross-legged beside his father.

Did you know that it's all a plot by the Jewish owners of the gold mines in Johannesburg, Papa? Manfred asked, his eyes shining like a religious convert's.

What is? Lothar grunted.

The Depression. Manfred used the word importantly, for he had just learned it. It's been arranged by the Jews and the English so that they will have all the men they want to work for them for nothing on their mines and in their factories. Is that so? Lothar smiled as he spooned up the maas and maize meal. And did the Jews and the English arrange the drought as well? His hatred of the English did not extend beyond the borders of reason, though it could not have been more intense had the English indeed engineered the drought that had turned so many of his people's farms into sandy wastelands, the topsoil blown away on the wind, and the livestock into desiccated mummies embalmed in their own plank-hard skins.

It's so, Papa! Manfred cried. Oom Willem explained it to us. He pulled a rolled sheet of newsprint from his back pocket and spread it across his knee. Just look at this! The newspaper was Die Vaderland, an Afrikaans-language publication, The Fatherland', and the cartoon that Manfred was pointing out with a forefinger that trembled with indignation was in its typical style: Look what the Jews are doing to us! The main character in the cartoon was Hoggenheimer', one of Die Vaderland's creations, depicted as a gross creature in frock coat and spats, a huge diamond sparkling in his cravat, diamond rings on the fingers of both his hands, a top hat over his dark Semitic curls, a thick drooping lower lip and a great hooked beak of a nose the tip of which almost touched his chin. His pockets were stuffed with five-pound notes and he brandished a long whip as he drove a loaded wagon towards distant steel headgear towers labelled gold mines'. In the traces of the wagon were human beings instead of trek-oxen. Lines of men and women, skeletal and starving, with huge tortured eyes as they toiled onwards under Hoggenheirner's whip. The women wore the traditional voortrekker bonnets, and the men slouch hats, and so that there could be no mistake, the artist had labelled them Die Afrikaner Volk, the Afrikaans people', and the caption to the cartoon was The New Great Trek'.

Lothar chuckled and handed the news-sheet back to his son. He knew very few Jews, and none who looked like Hoggenheimer. Most of them were as hardworking and ordinary as anyone else, and now were as poor and starving.

If life were as simple as that... He shook his head.

It is, Papa! All we have to do is get rid of the Jews, Oom Willem explained it. Lothar was about to reply when he realized that the smell of their food had attracted three of the camp's children, who were standing at a polite distance watching each spoonful he raised to his mouth. The cartoon was no longer important.

There was one older girl, about twelve years of age. She was blonde, her long braids bleached as silver and fine as the Kalahari grass in winter. She was so thin that her face seemed all bone and eyes, prominent cheekbones and a high straight forehead. Her eyes were the light blue of the desert sky. Her dress was of old flour sacks sewn together, and her feet were bare.

Clinging to her skirts were two smaller children. A boy with a shaven head and large ears. His skinny brown legs stuck out of his patched khaki shorts. The small girl had a runny nose, and she sucked her thumb as she clung to her elder sister's skirts with the other hand.

Lothar looked away but suddenly the food lost its flavour and he chewed with difficulty. He saw that Hendrick was not looking at the children either. Manfred had not noticed them and was still poring over the news-sheet.

If we feed them, we'll have every kid in the camp on our backs, Lothar murmured, and he made a resolution never to eat in public again.

We've got just enough left for tonight, Hendrick agreed.

We cannot share it. Lothar raised the spoon to his mouth, and then lowered it. He stared at the food on his tin plate for a moment and then beckoned the eldest girl.

She came forward shyly.

Take it, Lothar ordered gruffly.

Thank you, Uncle, she whispered. Dankie, Oom. She whipped the plate under her skirt, hiding it from other eyes, and then dragged the two little ones away. They disappeared amongst the huts.

The girl returned an hour later. The plate and spoon had been polished until they shone. Does Oom have a shirt or anything that I can wash for him, she asked.

Lothar opened his pack and handed over his and Manfred's soiled clothing. She brought the laundry back at sunset, smelling faintly of carbolic soap and neatly folded.

Sorry, Oom, I didn't have a smoothing iron. What is your name? Manfred asked her suddenly. She glanced around at him, blushed scarlet and looked at the ground.

Sarah, she whispered.

Lothar buttoned the clean shirt. Give me the ten shillings, he ordered.

We'd have our throats cut if anybody knew that I have that much money, Hendrick grumbled.

You are wasting my time. Time is the only thing we have plenty of. Including the barman, there were only three men in the corner bar when Lothar pushed through the swing doors.

Quiet tonight, Lothar remarked as he ordered a beer, and the barman grunted. He was a nondescript little man with wispy grey hair and steel-framed spectacles.

Take . a drink for yourself, Lothar offered, and the man's expression changed.

I'll take a gin, thank you. He poured from a special bottle that he produced from under the counter. They both knew that the colourless liquid was water and the silver shilling would go directly into the barman's pocket.

Your health. He leaned over the counter, prepared to be affable for a shilling and the possibility of another.

They chatted idly, agreeing that times were hard and would get harder, that they needed rain and that the Government was to blame for it all.

How long have you been in town? I haven't seen you around. One day, one day too long, Lothar smiled.

I didn't catch your name. And when Lothar told him, he showed genuine interest for the first time.

Hey, he called down the bar to his other customers. Do you know who this is? It's Lothar De La Rey! Don't you remember the reward posters during the war? He is the one that broke the hearts of the rooinekke. Red neck was the derogatory term for the newly arrived Englishman whose neck was inflamed by the sun. Man, he blew up the train at Gemsbokfontein. So great was their approbation that one of them even bought him another beer, but prudently limited his largesse to Lothar alone.

I'm looking for a job, Lothar told them when they had

all become firm friends, and they all laughed.

I heard there was work out at the H'ani Mine, Lothar persisted.

I'd know if there was, the barman assured him. The drivers from the mine come in here every week. Would you give them a good word about me? Lothar asked.

I'll do better. You come in Monday and I'll set you up with Gerhard Fourie, the chief driver. He is a good pal of mine. He'll know what's happening out there. By the time Lothar left, he was established as a good fellow and a member of the inner clique of the corner bar, and when he returned four nights later he was hailed by the barman.

Fourie is here, he told Lothar. Down at the end of the bar. I'll introduce you after I've served these others. The bar-room was half full this evening, and Lothar was able to study the driver. He was a powerful-looking man of middle age, with a big slack gut from sitting hours each day behind the driving-wheel. He was balding but had grown the hair above his right ear and then plastered it across his pate with brilliantine. His manner was bluff and loud; he and his mates had the well-satisfied air of men who had just performed a difficult task. He didn't look like a man that you could threaten or frighten, but Lothar had not yet finally decided on what approach to make.

The barman beckoned to him. Like you to meet a good friend., They shook hands. The driver turned it into a contest but Lothar had half-expected that and shortened his grip, taking his fingers rather than his palm so that Fourie could not exert full force. They held each other's eyes until the driver winced and tried to pull his hand away. Lothar let him go.

Buy you a drink. Lothar felt easier now, the man was not as tough as he put out, and when the barman told them who Lothar was and related an exaggerated version of some of his exploits during the war, Fourie's manner became almost fawning and obsequious.

Look here, man. He drew Lothar aside and lowered his voice. 'Erik tells me you're looking for a job out at the H'ani Mine. Well, you can forget it, and that's straight. They haven't taken on any new men in a year or longer. Yes. Lothar nodded glumly. Since I asked Erik about the job, I've learned the truth about the H'ani Mine. It will be terrible for you all when it happens. The driver looked uneasy. What are you talking about, man? What truth is this? Why, I thought you'd know. Lothar seemed amazed by his ignorance. They are going to close the mine in August.

Shut it down. Pay everybody off. Good Christ, no! There was fear in Fourie's eyes. That's not true, it can't be true. The man was a coward, gullible, easily impressed and even more easily influenced. Lothar was grimly satisfied.

I'm sorry, but it's best to know the truth, isn't it? Who told you this? Fourie was terrified. He drove past the hobo camp down by the railway every week. He had seen the legion of the unemployed.

I am walking out with one of the women who works for Abraham Abrahams. He was the attorney who conducted all the business of the H'ani Mine in Windhoek. She saw the letters from Mrs Courtney in Cape Town. There is no doubt. The mine is shutting down. They can't sell the diamonds. Nobody is buying diamonds, not even in London and New York. Oh my God! My God! whispered Fourie. What are we going to do? My wife isn't well and we've got the six children. Sweet Jesus, my kids will starve. It's all right for somebody like you. I'll bet you've got a couple of hundred quid saved up. You'll be all right., But Fourie shook his head.

Well, if you haven't got anything saved, you'd best put a few pounds

aside before they lay you off in August. How does a man do that?

How do I save, with a wife and six kids? Fourie demanded hopelessly.

I tell you what. Lothar took his arm in a friendly concerned grip. Let's get out of here. I'll buy a bottle of brandy.

Let's go some place where we can talk. The sun was up by the time Lothar got back to the camp the following morning. They had emptied the brandy bottle while they talked the night away. The driver was intrigued tempted by Lothar's proposition but unsure and afraid.

and Lothar had to explain and convince him of every single point, particularly of his own safety. Nobody will ever be able to point a finger at you. I give you my sacred word on it. You will be protected even if something goes wrong, and nothing will go wrong. Lothar had used all his powers of persuasion, and he was tired now as he trudged through the encampment and squatted down beside Hendrick.

Coffee? he asked and belched the taste of old brandy into his mouth.

Finished. Hendrick shook his head.

Where is Manfred? Hendrick pointed with his chin. Manfred was sitting under a thorn bush at the far end of the camp. The girl Sarah was beside him, their blond heads almost touching as they pored over . a sheet of newsprint. Manfred was writing on the margin of the page with a charcoal stick from the camp fire.

Manie is teaching her to read and write, Hendrick explained.

Lothar grunted and rubbed his bloodshot eyes. His head ached from the brandy.

Well, he said. We've got our man. Ali! Hendrick grinned. 'Then we will need the horses., The private railway coach had once belonged to Cecil Rhodes and the De Beers Diamond Company. Centaine Courtney had purchased it for a fraction of the price that a new carriage would have cost her, a fact that gave her satisfaction. She was still a Frenchwoman and knew the value of a sou and a franc. She had brought out a young designer from Paris to redecorate the carriage in the Art Deco style, which was all the rage, and he had been worth every penny of his fee.

She looked around the saloon, at the uncluttered lines of the furnishings, at the whimsical nude nymphs which supported the bronze light-fittings and the Aubrey Beardsley designs inlaid with exquisite workmanship into the lightwood panelling and she remembered that the designer had struck her at first as being a homosexual, with his long flowing locks, his darkly decadent eyes and the features of a beautiful, bored and cynical faun. Her first estimate had been far wide of the truth, as she had discovered to her delight on the circular bed which he had installed in the coach's main bedroom suite. She smiled at the memory and then checked the smile as she saw that Shasa was watching her.

You know, Mater, I sometimes think I can see what you are thinking, just by looking into your eyes. He said these disconcerting things sometimes, and she was sure that he had grown another inch in the last week.

I certainly hope that you cannot. She shivered. It's cold in here. The designer had incorporated, at enormous expense, a refrigeration machine which cooled the air in the saloon. Do turn that thing off, She stood up from her desk and went out through the frosted glass doors onto the balcony of the coach and the hot desert air rushed at her and flattened her skirts across her narrow boyish hips. She lifted her face to the sun and let the wind ruffle her short curly hair.

What time is it? she asked with her eyes closed and face uplifted, and Shasa who had followed her out leaned against the balcony rail and consulted his wristwatch.

We should be crossing the Orange river in the next ten minutes, if the engine driver has kept us on schedule. I never feel as though we are home until I cross the Orange. Centaine went to lean beside him and slipped her arm through his.

The Orange river drained the western watershed of the southern African continent, rising high in the snowy mountains of Basutoland and running down fourteen hundred miles through grassy veld and wild gorges, at some seasons a clear slow trickle and at other times a thunderous brown flood bringing down the rich chocolate silts so that some called it the Nile of the south. it was the boundary between the Cape of Good Hope and the former German colony of South West Africa.

The locomotive whistled and the coupling jolted as the brakes squealed.

We are slowing for the bridge. Shasa leaned out over the balcony, and Centaine bit back the caution that came automatically to her lips.

Beg your pardon, you can't baby him forever, Missus, Jock Murphy had advised her. He's a man now, and a man's got to take his own chances., The tracks curved down towards the river, and they could see the Daimler riding on the flat bed behind the locomotive.

It was a new vehicle; Centaine changed them every year.

However, it also was yellow, as they all were, but with a black bonnet and black piping around the doors. The train journey to Windhoek saved them the onerous drive across the desert, but there was no line out to the mine.

There it is! Shasa called. There is the bridge The steelwork seemed feathery and insubstantial as it crossed the half mile of riverbed, leapfrogging across its concrete buttresses. The regular beat of the bogey wheels over the cross ties altered as they ran out onto the span, and the steel girders beneath them rang like an orchestra.

The river of diamonds, Centaine murmured as she leaned shoulder to shoulder with Shasa and peered down into the coffee-brown waters that swirled around the piers of the bridge beneath them.

Where do the diamonds come from? Shasa asked. He knew the answer, of course, but he liked to hear her tell it to him.

The river gathers them up, from every little pocket and crevice and pipe along its course. It picks up those that were flung into the air during the volcanic eruptions at the beginning of the continent's existence. For hundreds of millions of years it has been concentrating the diamonds and carrying them down towards the coast. She glanced sideways at him. And why aren't they worn away, like all the other pebbles? Because they are the hardest substance in nature. Nothing wears or scratches a diamond, he answered promptly.

Nothing is harder or more beautiful, she agreed, and held up her right hand before his face so that the huge marquis cut diamond on her forefinger dazzled him. You will grow to love them. Everybody who works with them comes to love them. The river, he reminded her. He loved her voice. The husky trace of her accent intrigued him. Tell me about the river, he demanded, and listened avidly as she went on.

Where the river runs into the sea, it has thrown its diamonds up on the beaches. Those beaches are so rich in diamonds that they are the forbidden area, the Spieregebied. Could you fill your pockets with diamonds, just pick them up like fallen fruit in the orchard? 'It's not as easy as that, she laughed. You could search for twenty years and not find a single stone, but if you knew where to look and had even the most primitive equipment and a great deal of luck- Why can't we go in there, Mater? Because, mon cheri, it is all taken. It belongs to a man named Oppenheimer, Sir Ernest Oppenheimer, and his company called De Beers. One company owns it all. That's not fair! he protested, and Centaine was delighted to notice the acquisitive sparkle in his eyes for the first time. Without a healthy measure of avarice, he would not be capable of carrying through the plans she was so carefully laying for him. She had to teach him to be greedy, for wealth and for power.

He owns the Orange river concessions, she nodded, and he owns the Kimberley and Wesselton and Bultfontein and all the other great producing mines, but more, much

more than that, he controls the sale of every single stone,

even those produced by us, the few little independents. He controls us, he controls the H'ani? Shasa demanded indignantly, his smooth cheeks flushing.

Centaine nodded. We have to offer every diamond we mine to his Central Saling Organization, and he will set a price upon it. And we have to accept his price? No, we don't! But we would be very unwise not to do so. What could he do to us if we refused? Shasa, I have told you often before. Don't fight with somebody stronger than yourself. There aren't many people stronger than us, not in Africa anyway, but Sir Ernest Oppenheimer is one of them. What could he do? Shasa persisted.

He could eat us up, my darling, and nothing would give him greater pleasure. Each year we become richer and more attractive to him. He is the one man in the world that we have to be afraid of, especially if we were rash enough to come near this river of his. She swept a gesture across the wide river.

Although it had been named Orange by its Dutch discoverers for the Stadtholders of the House of Orange, the name could have as readily applied to its startling orangecoloured sandbanks. The bright plumage of the waterfowl clustered upon them were like precious stones set in red gold.

He owns the river? Shasa was surprised and perplexed.

Not legally, but you approach it at your own peril for he protects it and the diamonds it contains with his jealous wrath. So there are diamonds here? Eagerly Shasa scanned the banks as though he expected to see them sparkling seductively in the sunlight.

Dr Twenty-man-Jones and I both believe it, and we have isolated some very interesting areas. Two hundred miles upstream is a waterfall that the Bushmen called the Place of the Great Noise, Aughrabies. There the Orange thunders

through a narrow rocky chute and falls into the deep, inaccessible gorge below. The gorge should be a treasurehouse of captured diamonds.

Then there are other ancient alluvial beds where the river has changed its course. They left the river and its narrow strip of greenery and the loco accelerated again as they ran on northwards into the desert. Centaine watched Shasa's face carefully as she went on explaining and lecturing. She would never go on until she reached the point of boredom, at the first sign of inattention, she would stop. She did not have to press. There was all the time necessary for his education, but the one single most important consideration was never to tire him, never to outrun his immature strength or his undeveloped powers of concentration. She must retain his enthusiasm intact and never jade him. This time his interest persisted beyond its usual span, and she recognized it was time for another advance.

It will have warmed up in the saloon. Let's go in. She led him to her desk. There are some things I want to show you. She opened the confidential summary of the annual financial reports of the Courtney Mining and Finance Company.

This would be the difficult part, even for her the paperwork was deadly dull, and she saw him immediately daunted by the columns of figures. Mathematics was his only weak subject.

You enjoy chess, don't you? Yes, he agreed cautiously.

This is a game also, she assured him. But a thousand times more fascinating and rewarding, once you understand the rules. He cheered up visibly, games and rewards Shasa understood.

Teach me the rules, he invited.

Not all at one time. Bit by bit, until you know enough to start playing. It was evening before she saw the fatigue in the lines at the corners of his mouth and the white rims to his nostrils, but he was still frowning with concentration.

That's enough for today. She closed the thick folder.

What are the golden rules? You must always sell something for more than it cost you. She nodded encouragement.

And you must buy when everybody else is selling, and you must sell when everybody else is buying. Good. She stood up. Now a breath of fresh air before we change for dinner. On the balcony of the coach she placed her arm around his shoulders, and she had to reach up to do so. When we get to the mine, I want you to work with Dr Twenty-man Jones in the mornings. You may have the afternoons free, but you'll work in the mornings. I want you to get to know the mine and all its workings. Of course, I will pay you., That isn't necessary, Mater. Another golden rule, my darling, never refuse a fair offer. Through the night and all the following day they ran on northwards across great spaces bleached by the sun, with blue mountains traced in darker blue against the desert horizons.

We should get into Windhoek a little after sunset, Centaine explained. But I have arranged for the coach to be shunted on to a quiet spur and we will spend the night aboard and leave for the mine in the morning. Dr Twenty-man-Jones and Abraham Abrahams will be dining with us, so we will dress. In his shirtsleeves Shasa was standing in front of the long mirror in his compartment, struggling with his black bow tie, he had not yet entirely mastered the art of shaping the butterfly, when he felt the coach slowing and heard the loco blow a long eerie blast.

He felt a prickle of excitement and turned to the open window. They were crossing the shoulder of hills above the town of Windhoek, and the street lights came on even as he watched. The town was the size of one of Cape Town's suburbs and only the few central streets were lit.

The train slowed to a walking pace as they reached the outskirts of the town, and Shasa smelled wood-smoke. Then he noticed that there was some sort of encampment amongst the thorn trees beside the tracks. He leaned out of the window to see more clearly and stared at the clusters of dy shanties, wreathed in the blue smoke of campfires and shaded by the deepening dusk. There was a crudely lettered sign facing the tracks and Shasa read it with difficulty: Vaal Hartz? Hell No! It made no sense and he frowned as he noticed two figures standing near the sign, watching the passing train.

The shorter of the two was a girl, barefoot and with a thin shapeless dress over her frail body. She did not interest him and he transferred his attention to the taller, more robust figure beside her.

Immediately he straightened in shock and rising indignation. Even in the poor light, he recognized that silver-blond shock of hair and the black eyebrows. They stared at each other expressionlessly, the boy in the white dress shirt and black tie in the lighted window and the boy in dusty khaki. Then the train slid past and hid them from each other.

Darling Shasa turned from the window to face his mother. She was wearing sapphires tonight and a blue dress as filmy and light as wood-smoke. You aren't ready yet. We'll be in the station in a minute - and what a mess you have made of your tie. Come here and let me do it for you. As she stood in front of him and shaped the bow with dextrous fingers, Shasa struggled to contain and suppress the anger and sense of inadequacy that a mere glimpse of the other boy had aroused in him.

The driver of the locomotive shunted them off the main track on to a private spur beyond the sheds of the railway workshop and uncoupled them beside the concrete ramp where Abraham Abrahams Ford was already parked, and Abe scampered up on to the balcony the moment the coach came to a stop.

Centaine, you are more beautiful than ever. He kissed her hand and then each of her cheeks. He was a little man, just Centaine's height, with a lively expression and quick, alert eyes. His ears were pricked up as though he were listening to a sound that nobody else could hear.

His studs were diamond and onyx, which was flashy, and his dinner jacket was a little too extravagantly cut, but he was one of Centaine's favourite people. He had stood by her when her total wealth had amounted to something less than ten pounds. He had filed the claims for the H'ani Mine and since then conducted most of her legal business and many of her private affairs as well. He was an old and dear friend but, more important, he did not make mistakes in his work.

He wouldn't have been here if he did.

Dear Abe. She took both his hands and squeezed them.

How is Rachel? Outstanding, he assured her. It was his favourite adiective. She sends her apologies, but the new baby Of course. Centaine nodded, understanding. Abraham knew her preferences for masculine company and seldom brought his wife with him, even when invited to do so.

Centaine turned from her lawyer to the other tall stoop shouldered figure that was hovering at the gate of the balcony.

Dr Twenty-man-jones. She held out her hands.

Mrs Courtney, he murmured like an undertaker.

Centaine put on her most radiant smile. It was her own little game, to see if she could inveigle him into the smallest display of pleasure. She lost again. His apparent gloom deepened until he looked like a bloodhound in mourning.

Their relationship went back almost as far as Centaine's with Abraham. He had been a consulting mining engineer with the De Beers Diamond Company, but he had evaluated and opened the H'ani workings for her back in 1919. It had taken almost five years of her most winning persuasion before he had agreed to come to work for the H'ani Mine as Resident Engineer. He was probably the best diamond man in South Africa, which meant the best in the world.

Centaine led the two of them into the saloon and waved the white-jacketed barman aside.

Abraham, a glass of champagne? She poured the wine with her own hands. And Dr Twentyrnan-Jones, a little Madeira? You never forget, Mrs Courtney, he admitted miserably as she carried the glass to him. Between them it was always full titles and surnames, although their friendship had stood all the tests.

I give you good health, gentlemen. Centaine saluted them, and when they had drunk she glanced across at the far door.

On cue Shasa came through and Centaine watched critically as he shook hands with each of the men. He conducted himself with just the correct amount of deference for their age, showed no discomfort when Abraham over-effusively embraced him and then returned Twentyrnan-Jones's greeting with equal solemnity. She gave a small nod of approval and took her seat behind her desk. it was her sign that the niceties had been observed and they could get on to business.

The two men quickly perched on the elegant but uncomfortable Art Deco chairs and leaned towards her attentively.

It has come at last, Centaine told them. They have cut our quota. They rocked back in their seats and exchanged a brief glance before turning back to Centaine.

We have been expecting it for almost a year, Abraham pointed out.

Which does not make the actuality any more pleasant, Centaine told him tartly.

How much? Twenty-man-Jones asked.

Forty percent, Centaine answered, and he looked as though he might burst into tears while he considered it.

Each of the independent diamond producers was allocated a quota by the Central Selling Organization. The arrangement was informal and probably illegal, but nonetheless rigorously enforced, and none of the independents had ever been foolhardy enough to test the legality of the system or the share of the market they were given.

Forty percent! Abraham burst out. That's iniquitous! An accurate observation, dear Abe, but not particularly useful at this stage. Centaine looked to Twenty-man-Jones.

No change in the categories? he asked. The quotas were broken down by carat weight into the different types of stones, from dark industrial boart to the finest gem quality, and by size from the tiny crystals of ten points and smaller to the big valuable stones.

Same percentages, Centaine agreed, and he slumped in his chair, pulled a notebook from his inside pocket and began a series of quick calculations. Centaine glanced behind her to where Shasa leaned against the panelled bulkhead.

Do you understand what we are talking about? The quota? Yes, I think so, Mater. If you don't understand, then ask, she ordered brusquely and turned back to Twenty-man-Jones.

Could you appeal for a ten percent increase at the top end? he asked, but she shook her head.

I have already done so and they turned me down. De Beers in their infinite compassion point out that the biggest drop in demand has been at the top end, at the gem and jewellery level. He returned to his notebook, and they listened to his pencil scratching on the paper until he looked up.

Can we break even? Centaine asked quietly, and Twenty-man-Jones looked as though he might shoot himself rather than reply.

It will be close,he whispered, and we'll have to fire and cut and hone, but we should be able to pay costs, and perhaps even turn a small profit still, depending upon the floor price that De Beers sets. But the cream will be skimmed off the top, I'm afraid, Mrs Courtney. Centaine felt weak and trembly with relief. She took her hands off the desk and placed them in her lap so the others might not notice. She did not speak for a few moments, and then she cleared her throat to make certain her voice did not quaver.

The effective date for the quota cut is the first of March, she said. That means we can deliver one more full package.

You know what to do, Dr Twenty-man-jones. We will fill the package with sweeteners, Mrs Courtney. What is a sweetener, Dr Twenty-man-jones? Shasa spoke for the first time, and the engineer turned to him seriously.

When we turn up a number of truly excellent diamonds in one period of production, we reserve some of the best of them, set them aside to include in a future package which might be of inferior quality. We have a reserve of these high quality stones which we will now deliver to the CSO while we still have the opportunity. I understand, Shasa nodded. Thank you, Dr Twenty-man-Jones. Pleased to be of service, Master Shasa. Centaine stood up. We can go in to dinner now, and the white-jacketed servant opened the sliding doors through into the dining room where the long table gleamed with silver and crystal and the yellow roses stood tall in their antique celadon vases.

A mile down the railway track from where Centaine's coach stood, two men sat huddled over a smoky campfire watching the maize porridge bubbling in the billy-can and discussing the horses. The entire plan hinged on the horses. They needed at least fifteen, and they had to be strong, desert hardened animals.

The man I am thinking of is a good friend, Lothar said.

Even the best friend in the world won't lend you fifteen good horses. We can't do it with less than fifteen, and you won't buy them for a hundred pounds. Lothar sucked on the stinking clay pipe and it gurgled obscenely. He spat the yellow juice into the fire. I'd pay a hundred pounds for a decent cheroot, he murmured.

Not my hundred, you won't, Hendrick contradicted him.

Leave the horses for now, Lothar suggested. Let's go over the men we need for the relays. The men are easier than the horses. Hendrick grinned.

These days you can buy a good man for the price of a meal, and have his wife for the pudding. I have already sent messages to them to meet us at Wild Horse Pan. They both glanced up as Manfred came out of the darkness, and when Lothar saw his son's expression he stuffed the notebook into his pocket and stood up quickly.

Papa, you must come quickly, Manfred pleaded.

What is it, Manie? Sarah's mother and the little ones. They are all sick. I told them you would come, Papa. Lothar had the reputation of being able to heal humans and animals of all their ills, from gunshot wounds and measles to staggers and distemper.

Sarah's family was living under a tattered sheet of tarpaulin near the centre of the encampment. The woman lay beneath a greasy blanket with the two small children beside her. Though she was probably not older than thirty years, care and punishing labour and poor food had greyed and shrunken her into an old woman. She had lost most of her upper teeth so that her face seemed to have collapsed.

Sarah knelt beside her with a damp rag with which she was trying to wipe her flushed face. The woman rolled her head from side to side and mumbled in delirium.

Lothar knelt on the woman's other side, facing the girl.

Where is your pa, Sarah? He should be here., He went away to find work on the mines, she whispered.

When? Long ago. And then she went on loyally, But he is going to send for us, and we are going to live in a nice house How long has your ma been sick? Since last night. Sarah tried again to place the rag on the woman's forehead but she struck it away weakly.

And the babies? Lothar studied their swollen faces.

Since the morning. Lothar drew back the blanket and the stench of liquid faeces was thick and choking.

I tried to clean them, Sarah whispered defensively, but they just dirty themselves again. I don't know what to do., Lothar lifted the little girl's soiled dress. Her small pot belly was swollen with malnutrition and her skin was chalky white. An angry crimson rash was blazoned across it.

involuntarily Lothar jerked his hands away. Manfred, he demanded sharply. Have you touched them, any of them? Yes, Pa. I tried to help Sarah clean them. Go to Hendrick, Lothar ordered. Tell him we are leaving immediately. We have to get out of here. What is it, Pa? Manfred lingered.

Do as I tell you, Lothar told him angrily, and when Manfred backed away into the darkness, he returned to the girl.

Have you been boiling your drinking water? he asked, and she shook her head.

It was always the same, Lothar thought. Simple country people who had lived far from other human habitation all their lives, drinking at sweet clean springs and defecating carelessly in the open veld. They did not understand the hazards when forced to live in close proximity to others.

What is it, Oom? Sarah asked softly. What is wrong with them? Enteric fever. Lothar saw that it meant nothing to her.

Typhoid fever, he tried again.

Is it bad? she asked helplessly, and he could not meet her eyes. He looked again at the two small children. The fever had burned them out, and the diarrhoea had dehydrated them. Already it was too late. With the mother there was perhaps still a chance, but she had been weakened also.

Yes, Lothar said. It is bad. The typhoid would be spreading through the encampment like fire in the winter-dry veld.

There was already a good chance that Manfred might have been infected, and at the thought he stood up quickly and stepped away from the foul-smelling mattress.

What must I do? Sarah pleaded.

Give them plenty to drink, but make sure the water is boiled. Lothar backed away. He had seen typhoid in the concentration camps of the English during the war. The death-toll had been more horrible than that of the battlefield.

He had to get Manfred away from here.

Do you have medicine for it, Oom? Sarah followed him.

I don't want my ma to die, I don't want my baby sister if you can give me some medicine, She was struggling with her tears, bewildered and afraid, turning to him in pathetic trust.

Lothar's only duty was to his own, yet he was torn by the child's little display of courage. He wanted to tell her, There is no medicine for them. There is nothing that can be done for them. They are in God's hands now. Sarah came after him and took Lothar's hand, tugging desperately at it as she tried to lead him back to the shelter where the woman and the two small children lay dying.

Help me, Oom. Help me to make them better. Lothar's skin crawled at the girl's touch. He could imagine the loathsome infection being transferred from her warm soft skin. He had to get away.

Stay here, he told her, trying to disguise his revulsion.

Give them water to drink. I will go to fetch medicine. When will you come back? She looked up trustingly into his face, and it took all his strength to tell the lie.

I will come back as soon as I can,he promised, and gently broke her grip.

Give them water, he repeated, and turned away, Thank you, she called after him softly. God bless you, you are a kind man, Oom. Lothar could not reply. He could not even look back.

Instead he hurried through the darkened camp. This time, because he was listening for them, he picked up the other little sounds from the huts he passed: the fretful feverish cry of a child, the gasp and moan of a woman in the terrible abdominal cramps of enteric fever, the concerned murmurs of those who tended them.

From one of the tarpaper huts a gaunt dark creature emerged and clutched at his arm. He was not sure whether it was man or woman until she spoke in a cracked almost demented falsetto.

Are you a doctor? I have to find a doctor. Lothar shrugged off the clawed hand and broke into a run.

Swart Hendrick was waiting for him. He had the pack on his shoulder already and was kicking sand over the embers of the campfire. Manfred squatted on one side, beneath the thorn tree.

Enteric. Lothar said the dread word. It's through the camp already. Hendrick froze. Lothar had seen him stand down the charge of a wounded bull elephant, but he was afraid now.

Lothar could see it in the way he held his great black head and smell it on him, a strange odour like that of one of the copper-hooded desert cobras when aroused.

Come on, Manfred. We are getting out. Where are we going, Pa? Manfred remained squatting.

Away from here, away from the town and this plague. What about Sarah? Manfred ducked his head on to his shoulders, a stubborn gesture which Lothar recognized.

She is nothing to us. There is nothing we can do. She's going to die, like her ma, and the little kids. Manfred looked up at his father. She's going to die, isn't she? Get up on your feet, Lothar snarled at him. His guilt made him fierce. We are going. He made an authoritative gesture and Hendrick reached down and hauled Manfred to his feet.

Come, Manie, listen to your Pa. He followed Lothar, dragging the boy by his arm.

They crossed the railway embankment and Manfred stopped pulling back. Hendrick released him, and he followed obediently. Within the hour they reached the main road, a dusty silver river in the moonlight running down the pass through the hills, and Lothar halted.

Are we going for the horses now? Hendrick asked.

Yes. Lothar nodded. That's the next step. But his head turned back in the direction they had come and they were all silent, looking back with him.

I couldn't take the chance, Lothar explained. I couldn't let Manfred stay near them. Neither of them answered. We have to get on with our preparations, the horses, we have to get the horses, His voice trailed off.

Suddenly Lothar snatched the pack from Hendrick's shoulder and threw it to the ground. He ripped it open angrily and snatched out the small canvas roll in which he kept his surgical instruments and store of medicines.

Take Manie, he ordered Hendrick. Wait for me in the gorge of the Gamas river, at the same place we camped on the march from Usakos. You remember it? Hendrick nodded. How long will it be before you come? As long as it takes them to die, said Lothar. He stood up and looked at Manfred.

Do what Hendrick tells you, he ordered.

Can't I come with you, Pa? Lothar did not bother to reply. He turned and strode back amongst the moonlit thorn trees and they watched him until he disappeared. Then Hendrick dropped to his knees and began re-rolling the pack.

Sarah squatted beside the fire, her skirts pulled up around her skinny brown thighs, slitting her eyes against the smoke as she waited for the soot-blackened billy to boil.

She looked up and saw Lothar standing at the edge of the firelight. She stared at him, and then slowly her pale delicate features seemed to crumple and the tears streamed down her cheeks, glistening in the light of the flames.

I thought you weren't coming back, she whispered. I thought you had gone. Lothar shook his head abruptly, still so angry with his own weakness that he could not trust himself to speak.

Instead he squatted across the fire from her and spread the canvas roll. Its contents were pitifully inadequate. He could draw a rotten tooth, lance a boil or a snake-bite, or set a broken limb, but to treat runaway enteric there was almost nothing. He measured a spoonful of a black patent medicine, Chamberlain's Famous Diarrhoea Remedy, into the tin mug and filled it with hot water from the billy.

Help me, he ordered Sarah and between them they lifted the youngest child into a sitting position. She was without weight and he could feel every bone in her tiny body, like that of a fledgling taken from the nest. It was hopeless.

She'll be dead by morning he thought, and held the mug to her lips. She did not last that long; she slipped away a few hours before dawn. The moment of death was ill-defined, and Lothar was not certain it was over until he felt for the child's pulse at the carotid and felt the chill of eternity in her wasted flesh.

The little boy lasted until noon and died with as little fuss as his sister. Lothar wrapped them in the same grey, soiled blanket and carried them in his arms to the communal grave that had been already dug at the edge of the camp.

They made a small lonely little package on the sandy floor of the square excavation, at the end of the row of larger bodies.

Sarah's mother fought for her life.

God knows why she should want to go on living, Lothar thought, there isn't much in it for her. But she moaned and rolled her head and cried out in the delirium of fever. Lothar began to hate her for the stubborn struggle to survive that kept him beside her foul mattress, forced to share in her degradation, to touch her hot fever-wracked skin and dribble liquid into her toothless mouth.

At dusk he thought she had won. Her skin cooled and she was quieter. She reached out feebly for Sarah's hand and tried to speak, staring up at her face as though she recognized her, the words catching and cawing in the back of her throat and thick yellow mucus bubbling in the corners of her lips.

The effort was too much. She closed her eyes and seemed to sleep.

Sarah wiped her lips and held on to the thin bony hand with the blue veins swelling under the thin skin.

An hour later the woman sat up suddenly, and said clearly: Sarah, where are you, child? then fell back and fought for a long strangling breath. The breath ended in the middle and her bony chest subsided gradually, and the flesh seemed to droop from her face like warm candlewax.

This time Sarah walked beside him as Lothar carried the woman to the grave site. He laid her at the end of the row of corpses. Then they walked back to the hut.

Sarah stood and watched Lothar roll the canvas pack, and her small white face was desolate. He went half a dozen paces and then turned back. She was quivering like a rejected puppy, but she had not moved.

All right, he sighed with resignation. Come on, then. And she scampered to his side.

I won't be any trouble, she gabbled, almost hysterical with relief. I'll help you. I can cook and sew and wash. I won't be any trouble. What are you going to do with her? Hendrick asked. She can't stay with us. We could never do what we have to do with a child of her age. I could not leave her there, Lothar defended himself, in that death camp. It would have been better for us. Hendrick shrugged. But what do we do now? They had left the camp in the bottom of the gorge and climbed to the top of the rocky wall. The children were far below on the sandbank at the edge of the only stagnant green pool in the gorge that still held water.

They squatted side by side, Manfred with his right hand extended as he held the handline. They saw him lean back and strike, then heave the line in hand over hand. Sarah jumped up and her excited shrieks carried up to where they sat. They watched Manfred swing the kicking slippery black catfish out of the green water. It squirmed on the sand, glistening with wetness.

I will decide what to do with her, Lothar assured him, but Hendrick interrupted.

It better be soon. Every day we waste the water-holes in the north are drying out, and we still don't even have the horses. Lothar stuffed his clay pipe with fresh shag and thought about it. Hendrick was right; the girl complicated everything. He had to get rid of her somehow. Suddenly he looked up from the pipe and smiled.

My cousin, he said, and Hendrick was puzzled.

I did not know you had a cousin. Most of them perished in the camps, but Trudi survived. Where is she, this beloved cousin of yours? She lives on our road to the north. We'll waste no time in dumping the brat with her. I don't want to go, Sarah whispered miserably. I don't know your aunt. I want to stay here with you. 'Hush, Manfred cautioned her. You'll wake Pa and Henny. He pressed closer to her and touched her lips to quieten her. The fire had died down and the moon had set.

Only the desert stars lit them, big as candles against the black velvet curtain of the sky.

Sarah's voice was so small now that he could barely make out the words, though her lips were inches from his ear.

You are the only friend I have ever had, she said, and who will teach me to read and write? Manfred felt an enormous weight of responsibility conferred upon him by her words. His feelings for her to this A moment had been ambivalent. Like her he had never had friends of his own age, never attended a school, never lived in a town.

His only teacher had been his father. He had lived all his life with grown men; his father and Hendrick and the rough hard men of the road camps and trawler fleet.

There had been no woman to caress or gentle him.

She had been his first female companion, though her weakness and silliness irritated him. He had to wait for her to catch up when they climbed the hills and she wept when he beat a squirming catfish to death or wrung the neck of a fat feathered brown francolin taken in one of his noose snares. However, she could make him laugh and he enjoyed her voice when she sang, thin but sweet and melodious. Then again although her adulation was sometimes cloying and excessive, he experienced an unaccountable sense of well being when she was with him. She was quick to learn and in the few days they had been together she already had the alphabet by heart and the multiplication tables from two to ten.

It would have been much better if she had been a boy, but then there was something else. The smell of her skin and the softness of her intrigued him. Her hair was so fine and silky. Sometimes he would touch it as though by accident and she would freeze and keep very still under his fingers, so that he was embarrassed and dropped his hand self-consciously.

Occasionally she would brush against him like an affectionate cat and the strange pleasure this gave him was out of all proportion to the brief contact; and when they slept under the same blanket, he would awake in the night and listen to her breathing and her hair tickled his face.

The road to Okahandja was long and hard and dusty. They had been on it for five days now. They travelled only in the early morning and late evening. In the noonday the men would rest up in the shade, and the two children could sneak away to talk and set snares or go over Sarah's lessons. They did not play games of make-believe as other children of their age might have done. Their lives were too close to harsh reality. And now a new threat had been thrust upon them: the threat of separation which grew more menacing with each mile of road that fell behind them. Manfred could not find the words of comfort for her. His own sense of coming loss was aggravated by her declaration of friendship. She snuggled against him under the single blanket and the heat that emanated from her thin frail body was startling. Awkwardly he slipped an arm around her thin shoulders and her hair was soft against his cheek.

I'll come back for you. He had not meant to say that. He had not even thought it before that moment.

Promise me. She twisted so that her lips were by his ear.

Promise me you will come back to fetch me., I promise I will come back to you, he repeated solemnly, appalled at what he was doing. He had no control over his future, could never be certain of honouring a promise like that.

When? She fastened on it eagerly. We have something to do. Manfred did not know the details of what his father and Henny were planning. He only understood that it was arduous and somehow dangerous.

Something important. No, I can't tell you about it. But, when it is over, we will come back for you. It seemed to satisfy her. She sighed, and he felt the tension go out of her limbs. Her whole body softened with sleepiness, and her voice drifted into a low murmur.

You are my friend, aren't you, Manie? Yes. I'm your friend. My best friend? Yes, your best friend. She sighed again and fell asleep. He stroked her hair, so soft and fluffy under his hand, and he was assailed by the melancholy of impending loss. He felt that he would weep, but that was a girlish thing and he would not let it happen.

The following evening they trudged ankle-deep in the floury white dust up another fold in the vast undulating plain, and when the children caught up with Lothar at the crest, he pointed wordlessly ahead.

The cluster of iron roofs of the little frontier town of Okahandja shone in the lowering sunlight like mirrors, and in their midst was the single spire of a church. Also clad in corrugated iron, it barely topped the trees which grew around it.

A We'll be there after dark. Lothar eased his pack to his other shoulder and looked down at the girl. Her fine hair was plastered with dust and sweat to her forehead and cheeks, and her untidy sun-streaked blond pigtails stuck out behind her ears like horns. The sun had burned her so dark that were it not for the fair hair she might have been a Nama child. She was dressed as simply and her bare feet were white with floury dust.

Lothar had considered and then rejected the idea of buying her a new dress and shoes at one of the little general-dealer's stores along the road. The expense might have been worthwhile, for if the child were rejected by his cousin, He did not follow the thought further. He would clean her up a little at the borehole that supplied the town's water.

The lady you will be staying with is Mevrou Trudi Bierman. She is a very kind religious lady., Lothar had little in common with his cousin. They had not met in thirteen years. She is married to the dominie of the Dutch Reformed Church here at Okahandja. He is also a fine God-fearing man. They have children your age. You will be very happy with them. Will he teach me to read like Manie does? Of course he will. Lothar was prepared to give any assurance to rid himself of the child. He teaches his own children and you will be like one of them. Why can't Manie stay with me? Manie has to come with me. Please, can't I come with you too? No, you cannot. You'll stay here, and I don't want to go over that again. At the reservoir of the borehole pump Sarah bathed the dust from her legs and arms and dampened her hair before re-plaiting her pigtails.

I'm ready, she told Lothar at last, and her lips trembled while he looked her over critically. She was a grubby little urchin, a burden upon them, but somehow a fondness for her had crept in upon him.

He could not help but admire her spirit and her courage. Suddenly he found himself wondering if there was no other way than abandoning the child and it took an effort to thrust the idea aside and steel himself to what must be done.

Come on then. He took her hand and turned to Manfred.

You wait here with Henny. Please let me come with you, Pa, Manfred begged. Just as far as the gate. just to say goodbye to Sarah-, Lothar wavered and then agreed gruffly. All right, but keep your mouth shut and remember your manners. He led them down the narrow sanitary lane at the rear of the row of cottages until they came to the back gate of a larger house beside the church and obviously attached to it.

There was no mistaking that it was the pastory. There was a light burning in the back room, the fierce white light of a Petromax lamp, and the bugs and moths were drumming against the wire screening that covered the back door.

The sound of voices raised in a dolorous religious chant carried to them as they opened the gate and went up the kitchen path. When they reached the screen door they could see in the lighted kitchen beyond a family seated at a long deal table, singing together.

Lothar knocked on the door and the hymn trailed away.

From the head of the table a man rose and came towards the door. He was dressed in a black suit that bagged at the knees and elbows but was stretched tightly across his broad shoulders. His hair was thick and long, hanging in a greying mane to his shoulders and sprinkling the dark cloth with a flurry of dandruff.

Who is it? he demanded, in a voice trained to boom out from the pulpit. He flung open the screen door and peered out into the dark. He had a broad intelligent forehead with the arrowhead of a sharp widow's peak emphasizing its depth, and his eyes were deep-set and fierce as those of a prophet from the Old Testament.

You! He recognized Lothar, but made no attempt to greet him further. instead he looked back over his shoulder.

'Mevrou, it is your godless cousin come in from the Wilderness like Cain! The fair-headed woman rose from the foot of the table, hushing the children and signalling them to remain in their seats. She was almost as tall as her husband, in her forties and well fleshed, with a rosy complexion and braids piled on top of her head in the Germanic fashion. She folded her thick creamy-skinned arms across her bulky shapeless bosom.

What do you want with us, Lothar De La Rey? she demanded. This is the God-fearing home of Christian folk; We want nothing of your wanton ways and wild behaviour. She broke off as she noticed the children and stared at them with interest.

Hello, Trudi. Lothar drew Sarah forward into the light.

It has been many years. You look well and happy., I am happy in God's love, his cousin agreed. But you know I have seldom been well. She assumed an expression of suffering and Lothar went on quickly.

I am giving you another chance of Christian service. He pushed Sarah forward. This poor little orphan, she is alone.

She needs a home. You could take her in, Trudi, and God will love you for it. Is it another of your, His cousin glanced back into the kitchen at the interested faces of her own two daughters, and then lowered her voice and hissed at him, Another of your bastards? Her family died in the typhoid epidemic. It was a mistake. He saw her recoil from the girl. That was weeks ago. She is free of the disease. Trudi relaxed a little and Lothar went on quickly. I cannot care for her. We are travelling, and she needs a woman. We have too many mouths already, she began, but her husband interrupted her.

Come here, child, he boomed and Lothar shoved Sarah towards him. 'What is your name? Sarah Bester, Oom. So you are of the Volk? the tall dominie demanded. One of the true Afrikaner blood? Sarah nodded uncertainly.

And your dead mother and father were wed in the Reformed Church? She nodded again. And you believe in the Lord God of Israel? Yes, Oom. My mother taught me, Sarah whispered.

Then we cannot turn the child away, he told his wife.

Bring her in, woman. God will provide. God always provides for his chosen people. Trudi Bierman sighed theatrically and reached for Sarah's arm. So thin, and filthy as a Nama piccaninny. And you, Lothar De La Rey, the dominie pointed a finger at him. Has not the merciful Lord yet shown you the error of your ways, and placed your feet on the path of righteousness? Not yet, dear cousin. Lothar backed away from the door, his relief undisguised.

The dominie's attention flicked to the boy standing in the shadows behind Lothar. Who is this? ,My son, Manfred. Lothar placed a protective arm over the boy's shoulder, and the dominie came closer and stooped to study his face closely. His great dark beard bristled and his eyes were wild and fanatical, but Manfred stared directly into them, and saw them change. They warmed and lightened with the sparkle of good humour and compassion.

Do I frighten you, Jong? His voice mellowed, and Manfred shook his head.

No, Oomie, or not too much anyway. The dominie chuckled. Who teaches you your Bible, Jong? He used the expression meaning young or young man.

My father, Oom. Then God have mercy on your soul. He stood up and thrust his beard out at Lothar.

I would you had left the boy, rather than the girl, he told

him, and Lothar tightened his grip on Manfred's shoulder. He is a likely looking lad, and we need good men in the service of God and the Volk. He is well taken care of. Lothar could not conceal his agitation, but the dominie dropped his compelling gaze back to Manfred.

I think, Jong, that you and I are destined by Almighty God to meet again. When your father drowns or is eaten by a lion or hanged by the English, or in some other fashion punished by the Lord God of Israel, then come back here.

Do you hear me, Jong? I need you, the Volk need you, and God needs you! My name is Tromp Bierman, the Trumpet of the Lord. Come back to this house! Manfred nodded. I will come back to see Sarah. I promised her. As he said it the girl's courage broke and she sobbed and tried to pull free from Trudi's grip.

Stop that, child. Trudi Bierman shook her irritably. Stop blubbering. Sarah gulped and swallowed the next sob.

Lothar turned Manfred away from the door. The child is hard-working and willing, cousin. You will not regret this charity, he called over his shoulder.

That we shall see, his cousin muttered dubiously, and Lothar started back down the path.

Remember the Lord's word, Lothar De La Rey, the Thimpet of the Lord bugled after them. I am the Way and the Light. Whosoever believeth in me- Manfred twisted in his father's grip and looked back.

The tall gaunt figure of the dominie almost filled the kitchen doorway, but at the level of his waist Sarah's small face peered around him, in the light of the Petromax it was white as bone china and glistened with her tears.

Four men were waiting for them at the rendezvous. During the desperate years when they had fought together in guerilla commando, it had been necessary for every man to know the reassembly points. When cut up and separated in the running battles against the Union troops, they had scattered away into the veld and days later come together at one of the safe places.

There was always water at these assembly points, a seep in the rocky crevice of a hillside, a Bushman well or a dry riverbed where they could dig for the precious stuff. The assembly points were always sited with an all-round view so that a following enemy could never take them by surprise.

In addition, there was always grazing nearby for the horses and shelter for the men, and they had laid down caches of supplies at these places.

The rendezvous that Lothar had chosen for this meeting had an additional advantage. It was in the hills only a few miles north of the homestead of a prosperous German cattle-rancher, a good friend of Lothar's family, a sympathizer who could be relied upon to tolerate their presence on his lands.

Lothar entered the hills along the dried watercourse that twisted through them like a maimed puffadder. He walked in the open so that the waiting men could see him from afar, and they were still two miles from the rendezvous when a tiny figure appeared on the rocky crest ahead of them, wind-milling his arms in welcome. He was quickly joined by the other three and then they came running down the rough hillside to meet Lothar's party in the river-bed.

Leading them was Vark Jan', or Pig John', the old Khoisan warrior with his yellow wrinkled features that bespoke his mixed lineage of Nama and Berg-dama and, so he boasted, of even the true Bushman. Allegedly, his grandmother had been a Bushman slave captured by the Boers in one of the last great slave raids of the previous century. But then he was a famous har and opinion was divided as to the truth of this claim. He was followed closely by Klein Boy, Swart Hendrick's bastard son by a Herero mother.

He came directly to his father and greeted him with the traditional deferential clapping of hands. He was as tall and as powerfully built as Hendrick himself, but with the finer features and slanted eyes of his mother, and his skin was not as dark. Like wild honey it changed colour as the sunlight played upon it. These two had worked on the trawlers at Walvis Bay, and Hendrick had sent them ahead to find the other men they needed and bring them to the rendezvous.

Lothar turned to these men now. It was twelve years since last he had seen them. He remembered them as wild fighting men, his hunting dogs, he had called them with affection and total lack of trust. For like wild dogs they would have turned and savaged him at the first sign of weakness.

Now he greeted them by their old noms de guerre. Legs', the Ovambo with legs like a stork and Buffalo', who carried his head hunched on his thick neck like that animal. They clasped hands, then wrists and then hands again in the ritual greeting of the band reserved for special occasions, as after long separation or a successful foray, and Lothar studied them and saw how twelve years and easy living had altered them. They were fat and soft and middle-aged but, he consoled himself, the tasks he had for them were not demanding.

So! He grinned at them. We have pulled you off the fat bellies of your wives, and away from your beer-pots. And they roared with laughter.

We came the same minute that Klein Boy and Pig John spoke your name to us, they assured him.

Of course, you came only because of the love and loyalty you bear me, Lothar's sarcasm was biting, the way the vulture and the jackal come for love of the dead, not of the feast. They roared again. How they had missed the whip of his tongue.

Pig John did mention gold, the Buffalo admitted, between sobs of laughter. And Klein Boy whispered that there might be fighting again. It is sad, but a man of my age can pleasure his wives only once or twice a day, but he can fight and enjoy old companions and plunder day and night without end, and the loyalty we bear you is wide as the Kalahari, Stork Legs said, and they hooted with laughter and beat each other upon the back.

Still rumbling with occasional laughter, the group left the riverbed and climbed up to the old rendezvous point. It was a low overhanging shelf of rock, the roof blackened with the soot of countless campfires and the rear wall decorated with the ochre-coloured designs and drawings of the little yellow Bushmen who, before them, had used this shelter down the ages. From the entrance of the shelter there was a sweeping view out across the shimmering plains. It would be almost impossible to approach the hilltop undetected.

The four first-corners had already opened the cache. It had been hidden in a cleft of rock further down the side of the hill, and the entrance closed with boulders and plastered over with clay from the riverbank. The contents had survived the years better than Lothar had expected. Of course, the canned food and the ammunition cases had all been sealed, while the Mauser rifles were packed in thick yellow grease and wrapped in grease-paper. They were in perfect condition. Even most of the spare saddlery and clothing had been preserved by the desert's dry air.

They feasted on fried bully beef and toasted ship's biscuit, food they had once hated for its monotony but now was delicious and evocative of countless other meals, back in those desperate days rendered attractive by the passage of the years.

After they had eaten they picked over the saddlery and boots and clothing, rejecting those items damaged by insects and rodents or dried out like parchment, cannibalizing and re-stitching and polishing with dubbin until they had equipment and arms for all of them.

While they worked Lothar considered that there were dozens of these caches, scattered through the wilderness, while in the north at the secret coastal base from which he had refuelled and re-equipped the German U-boats there must still be thousands of pounds worth of stores. Until now it had never occurred to him to raid them for his own account,, somehow they had always been in patriotic trust.

He felt the prickle of temptation: Perhaps if I chartered a boat at Walvis and sailed up the coast, But then with a sudden chill he remembered that he would never see Walvis Bay or this land again. There would be no return after they had done what they were setting out to do.

He jumped to his feet and strode to the entrance of the rock shelter. As he stared out across the dun and heat-shot plain with its dotted camel-thorn trees, he felt a premonition of terrible suffering and unhappiness.

Could I ever be happy elsewhere? he wondered. Away from this harsh and beautiful land? His resolve wavered. He turned and saw Manfred watching him with a troubled frown. Can I make this decision for my son? He stared back at the boy. Can I condemn him to the life of an exile? He thrust the doubts aside with an effort, shaking them

off with a shudder like a horse driving the stinging flies from its hide, and called Manfred to him. He led him away from the shelter, and when they were out of earshot of the others told him what lay ahead of them, speaking to him as an equal.

All we have worked for has been stolen from us, Manie, not in the sight of the law but in the sight of God and natural justice. The Bible gives us redress against those who have deceived or cheated us, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. We will take back what has been stolen from us.

But, Manie, the English law will look upon us as criminals.

We will have to fly, to run and hide, and they will hunt us like wild animals. We will survive only by our courage and our wits. Manfred stiffed eagerly, watching his father's face with bright eager eyes. it all sounded romantic and exciting and he was proud of his father's trust in discussing such adult matters with him.

We will go north. There is good farming land in Tanganyika and Nyasaland and Kenya. Many of our own Volk have already gone there. Of course, we will have to change our name, and we can never return here, but we will make a fine new life in a new land. Never come back? Manfred's expression changed. But what about Sarah? Lothar ignored the question. Perhaps we will buy a beautiful coffee shamba in Nyasaland or on the lower slopes of Kilimanjaro. There are still great herds of wild game upon the plains of Serengeti, and we will hunt and farm., Manfred listened dutifully but his expression had dulled.

How could he say it? How could he tell his father: Pa! I don't want to go to a strange land. I want to stay here. ?

He lay awake long after the others were snoring and the camp-fire had burned down to a red smear of embers, and he thought about Sarah, remembering the pale pixie face smeared with tears and the hot thin little body under the blanket beside him: She is the only friend I've ever had. He was jerked back to reality by a strange and disturbing sound. It came from the plain below them but it seemed that distance could not take the fierce edge from the din.

His father coughed softly and sat up, letting his blanket fall to his waist. The awful sound came again, rising to an impossible crescendo and then dying away in a series of deep grunts, the death rattle of a strangling monster.

What is it, Pa? The hair at the back of Manfred's neck had risen and prickled as though to the touch of a nettle.

They say even the bravest of men is afraid the first time he hears that sound, his father told him softly. That is the hunting roar of a hungry Kalahari lion, my son. In the dawn when they climbed down the hillside and reached the plain, Lothar, who was leading, stopped abruptly and beckoned Manfred to his side.

You have heard his voice, now here is the track of his feet. He stooped and touched one of the pad marks, the size of a dinner plate, that was pressed deeply into the soft yellow earth.

An old maanhaar, a solitary, old, maned male. Lothar traced the outline of the spoor. Manfred would see him do that often in the months ahead, always touching the sign as though to draw out its secrets through his fingertips. See how his pads are worn smooth, and how he walks with his weight back towards his ankles. He favours his right fore, a cripple. He will find a meal hard to take, perhaps that is why he keeps close to the ranch. Cattle are easier to kill than wild game. Lothar reached out and plucked something from the lowest branch of thorns. Here, Manie, he placed a small tuft of coarse red-gold hair in Manfred's palm. There is a tress of his mane he left for you. Then he stood up and stepped over the spoor. He led them on down into the broad saucer of land, watered by a string of natural artesian springs, where the grass grew thick and green and high as their knees, and they passed the first herds of cattle, humpbacked and with dewlaps that almost brushed the earth, their coats shiny in the early sunlight.

The homestead of the ranch stood on the higher ground beyond the wells, in a plantation of exotic date palms imported from Egypt. It was an old colonial German fort, a legacy from the Herero war of 1904 when the whole territory had erupted in rebellion against the excesses of German colonization. Even the Bondel swarts and Namas had joined the Herero tribe and it had taken 20,000 white troops and an expenditure of Y,60 million to quell the rebellion. Added to the cost, in the final accounting, were the 2,500 German officers and men killed and the 70,000 men, women and children of the Herero people shot, burned and starved to death. This casualty list constituted almost precisely seventy percent of the entire tribe.